Given a Boolean game and a query propositional formula , decide whether some pure strategy Nash equilibrium satisfies . The problem is complete for the existential second level of the polynomial hierarchy.
For membership, existentially choose a Boolean valuation and universally check every player's every unilateral deviation. The goal must remain false under all such deviations for each player whose goal is currently false. Each individual check takes polynomial time.
For hardness, start with a two-block quantified Boolean formula . Give player 1 control of and the constant true goal. Give player 2 control of and goal , and use as the query. A queried Nash equilibrium exists exactly when some choice of leaves player 2 unable to falsify by changing . This is precisely the input quantified statement, and the construction is a polynomial-time reduction.
The definition in this part uses a single Boolean valuation, so the relevant Nash equilibria are pure strategy equilibria of a Boolean game. Use its standard convention that the players' control sets form a set partition of the variables.
Membership follows from an existential choice of a strategy profile and a universal check of all unilateral deviations. Assign payoff one to satisfying a player's goal and zero otherwise. A strategy profile is a Nash equilibrium precisely when, for every player and every alternative Boolean valuation of that player's variables,is true: either the goal is already satisfied or no deviation can satisfy it. Thus the requested property isThe strings encoding , and have polynomial length, and evaluating the bracketed propositional formulas takes polynomial time. Invalid encodings of a player index can simply be ignored by the test. This is the existential second level of the polynomial hierarchy, .
For hardness, reduce the canonical complete problem of deciding a two-block quantified Boolean formulaMake a two-player Boolean game: player 1 controls and has goal ; player 2 controls and has goal . Set the query formula to . The construction has size linear in the input formula.
If an assignment satisfies , combine it with any assignment . Player 1 already satisfies its goal, and player 2 cannot satisfy by any unilateral deviation. Thus is a Nash equilibrium satisfying the query.
Conversely, let be a Nash equilibrium satisfying . Player 2 currently has payoff zero. If some alternative made false, that deviation would satisfy player 2's goal and increase its payoff to one. The Nash equilibrium condition therefore implies . This proves the required equivalence and the polynomial-time reduction.
Together, membership and hardness prove -completeness of existential equilibrium checking in a Boolean game. The reduction works with only two players and one constant goal.