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Main Authors: Grüne, Christoph, Janßen, Tom
Format: Preprint
Published: 2026
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Online Access:https://arxiv.org/abs/2605.10607
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author Grüne, Christoph
Janßen, Tom
author_facet Grüne, Christoph
Janßen, Tom
contents The problem Defensive $δ$-Covering, for some covering range $δ> 0$, is a continuous facility location problem on undirected graphs where all edges have unit length. It is a generalization of Defensive Dominating Set and $δ$-Covering. An attack and defense are sets of points, which are on vertices or on the interior of an edge. A defense counters an attack, if there is a matching of the points in the defense to the points in the attack, such that any matched points have distance at most $δ$, and every point in the attack is matched. The task is, given a graph $G$ and numbers $\ell, k \in \mathbb N$, to find a defense of size at most $\ell$ that counters every possible attack of size at most $k$. We study the complexity of this problem in various different settings. We show that if the attack is restricted to vertices, the problem is $Σ^P_2$-complete for large $δ$, but if the attack may consist of any points on the graph, it is NP-complete. Additionally, we analyze how the complexity changes if the attacks or defenses may be a multiset. If the defense is allowed to be a multiset, the complexity does not change in any case we consider, while if the attack is allowed to be a multiset, the problem often becomes easier. To show containment in the various complexity classes, we introduce a number of discretization arguments, which show that solutions with a regular structure must always exist.
format Preprint
id arxiv_https___arxiv_org_abs_2605_10607
institution arXiv
publishDate 2026
record_format arxiv
spellingShingle Continuous Defensive Domination Problems
Grüne, Christoph
Janßen, Tom
Computational Complexity
The problem Defensive $δ$-Covering, for some covering range $δ> 0$, is a continuous facility location problem on undirected graphs where all edges have unit length. It is a generalization of Defensive Dominating Set and $δ$-Covering. An attack and defense are sets of points, which are on vertices or on the interior of an edge. A defense counters an attack, if there is a matching of the points in the defense to the points in the attack, such that any matched points have distance at most $δ$, and every point in the attack is matched. The task is, given a graph $G$ and numbers $\ell, k \in \mathbb N$, to find a defense of size at most $\ell$ that counters every possible attack of size at most $k$. We study the complexity of this problem in various different settings. We show that if the attack is restricted to vertices, the problem is $Σ^P_2$-complete for large $δ$, but if the attack may consist of any points on the graph, it is NP-complete. Additionally, we analyze how the complexity changes if the attacks or defenses may be a multiset. If the defense is allowed to be a multiset, the complexity does not change in any case we consider, while if the attack is allowed to be a multiset, the problem often becomes easier. To show containment in the various complexity classes, we introduce a number of discretization arguments, which show that solutions with a regular structure must always exist.
title Continuous Defensive Domination Problems
topic Computational Complexity
url https://arxiv.org/abs/2605.10607