Game, Set, Math
Ben Coleman, Kevin Hartshorn · Mathematics Magazine · 2012
SummaryWe describe the card game SET, and discuss interesting mathematical properties of the game that illustrate ideas from group theory, linear algebra, discrete geometry, and computational complexity. We then suggest a criteria to identify when two card collections are similar to one another and appeal to Pólya's Theorem to determine the number of structurally distinct collections. For example, we find there are 41,407 collections of 12 cards, the layout most commonly seen in gameplay.