NP Reasoning in the Monotone $μ$-Calculus

Abstract: Satisfiability checking for monotone modal logic is known to be (only) NP-complete. We show that this remains true when the logic is extended with aconjunctive and alternation-free fixpoint operators as well as the universal modality; the resulting logic -- the aconjunctive alternation-free monotone $\mu$-calculus with the universal modality -- contains both concurrent propositional dynamic logic (CPDL) and the alternation-free fragment of game logic as fragments. We obtain our result from a characterization of satisfiability by means of B\"uchi games with polynomially many Eloise nodes.