Chapter 1. Introduction
Chapter 2. The formal defintions
Chapter 3. Optimal responses to specific strategies
Chapter 4. The maximin strategy
Chapter 5. The minimax strategy
Chapter 6. Solutions of zero-sum games
Chapter 7. 2×n and mx×2 games
Chapter 8. Dominance
Chapter 9. Symmetric games
Chapter 10. Poker-like games
Chapter 11. Pure maximin and minimax strategies
Chapter 12. Pure nonzero-sum games
Chapter 13. Mixed strategies for nonzero-sum games
Chapter 14. Finding mixed Nash equilibria for 2×2 nonzero-sum games

The mathematical theory of games was first developed as a model for situations of conflict, whether actual or recreational. It gained widespread recognition when it was applied to the theoretical study of economics by von Neumann and Morgenstern in Theory of Games and Economic Behavior in the 1940s. The later bestowal in 1994 of the Nobel Prize in economics on Nash underscores the important role this theory has played in the intellectual life of the twentieth century.

This volume is based on courses given by the author at the University of Kansas. The exposition is “gentle” because it requires only some knowledge of coordinate geometry; linear programming is not used. It is “mathematical” because it is more concerned with the mathematical solution of games than with their applications. --- summary provided by publisher