I Would If I Could: Reasoning about Dynamics of Actions in Multi-Agent Systems

TL;DR

This paper introduces ATL-D and ATEL-D, logical frameworks for modeling dynamic action availability and knowledge updates in multi-agent systems, addressing a gap in existing strategic logics.

Contribution

It presents new logics that incorporate dynamic actions and knowledge updates, with analysis of their expressivity, relation to normative systems, and computational complexity.

Findings

ATL-D models granting and revoking actions dynamically.

ATEL-D captures how action updates affect agents' knowledge.

Complexity results for key computational problems are provided.

Abstract

Autonomous agents acting in realistic Multi-Agent Systems (MAS) should be able to adapt during their execution. Standard strategic logics, such as Alternating-time Temporal Logic (ATL), model agents' state- or history-dependent behaviour. However, the dynamic treatment of agents' available actions and their knowledge of required actions is still rarely addressed. In this paper, we introduce ATL with Dynamic Actions (ATL-D), which models the process of granting and revoking actions, and its extension ATEL-D, which captures how such updates affect agents' knowledge. Beyond the conceptual contribution, we provide several technical results: we analyse the expressivity of our logic in relation to ATL, study its relation to normative systems, and provide complexity results for relevant computational problems.