Noncooperative Game-Based Probability Assignment Formation Control for Networked Uncrewed Surface Vehicles Under Stochastic Packet Losses

Enhanced formation flexibility stringently commands on the connection stability of networked systems, while vehicle-equipped facilities limit interaction coherence. Either a prolonged communication range or a malicious attack leaves the networked system suffering from disconnections. Functioned as randomly occurring transmission packet dropouts, we consider the noncooperative game played by networked unmanned surface vehicles (NUSVs), where game theory enables NUSVs’ active mission assessment and thereby enhances flexibility. For loss rejection, a probability assignment event-triggered mechanism (PAETM) is explored under two cases, i.e., loss occurrence obeying a Bernoulli distribution and irregular occurrence. To begin with, PAETM is first proposed for the former. Assigned with specifically designed weights, historically triggered packets are employed to manage individual broadcast timing. By virtue of PAETM, neither explicit nor implicit loss acknowledgment is required, thus meritingacknowledgment-free. In this sequel, irregular loss occurrence, which is more generic, is considered by decomposing it into a piece-wise regular manner. Theoretical analysis and semi-physical simulations are performed to show the effectiveness and superiority of the proposed algorithm.