There is a tug-o-war competition consisting of rounds upon round that all end in a draw meaning both sides end in equal strength. There are several people of exactly equal strength and are represented by the same symbol. (i.e. all * pull the same, but a * and a @ must be different) Each team is representeed by a series of symbols followed by a dashed line being the rope. On the other side of the rope is the team that was equally matched in strength. Here are some of those rounds:
*%-----$
$$$-------@%*%@
@-------!*
Again remembering that ll of the above are ties, and assume that position on the rope doesn't matter, who will win the following match?
!@!!@!-------%$*$

I LOVE tug-o-wars! They're so raw, yaknow. Oh! Anyway, here goes.

If we change everything to equations (with the plus sign understood), we get:
$ = *%
$$$=@@%%*
so $$ = %@@
@ = !*

Now we need to get both sides in terms that can be compared.

!!!!@@----%*$$

The right side is the same strength as $$$
($$+(%*)), and we can then substitute the $$$ equivalent on the right:

!!!!@@----%%@@*
which then can be simplified
!!!!----%%*

Well, this doesn't seem to be going anywhere. EXCEPT, maybe we can get something more workable if we visit the original examples.

$$ = %@@, and $ = %*, so
%%** = %@@
%** = @@
%** = !*!*
and so % = !!

getting back to the 'pitted' battle (I'm thinking chocolate pudding in there, but that's a personal issue =0),

(!!)(!!)----%%*
substitute on the left
%%----%%*
And the weiner is: Team Righty!
Note: I actually came up with the % = !! by stopping at our stopping point above, taking another approach, and ending up with
!!!!!!----%%%*, but once I got there and saw the equivalency, I decided it was neater to prove it "mathematically."

Posted by Jim C on 2003-07-03 07:05:50