Definition of The Normal Form

Definition: The normal form is a way of writing out a game.

Formally:
let n be the number of players,

let A_i be the set of possible actions (or strategies) of player i,

and let u_i:A₁ x A₂ x ... x A_n -> R represents the payoff function (or utility function) for player i. That is once all players have chosen that set of actions, the payoff for player i is the value of that function.

Then the normal form of the game is characterized by G = (A₁, A₂, ... A_n, u₁, ... , u_n) (Econterms)

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