Player-Compatible Learning and Player-Compatible Equilibrium

Abstract: Player-Compatible Equilibrium (PCE) imposes cross-player restrictions on the magnitudes of the players' "trembles" onto different strategies. These restrictions capture the idea that trembles correspond to deliberate experiments by agents who are unsure of the prevailing distribution of play. PCE selects intuitive equilibria in a number of examples where trembling-hand perfect equilibrium (Selten, 1975) and proper equilibrium (Myerson, 1978) have no bite. We show that rational learning and weighted fictitious play imply our compatibility restrictions in a steady-state setting.