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Subject: Re: Nullmove: when to avoid it?

Author: Leen Ammeraal

Date: 08:24:27 02/28/01

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On February 28, 2001 at 10:10:48, Robert Hyatt wrote:

>On February 28, 2001 at 05:56:36, Leen Ammeraal wrote:
>
>>I am not sure about when to avoid nullmoves.
>>I omit it:
>>a. when in check
>>b. when there are less than 5 pieces (including pawns) on the board
>>c. when the last move was a nullmove
>>d. at the root node
>>Should I also omit it in some other cases,
>>for example, when any hashmove (even with a low draft) was found,
>>or when beta = alpha + 1?
>>Thanks in advance for any help.
>>Leen
>
>
>B is dangerous.  You should probably begin to control / limit null-move if
>there is a rook or less on the board + any number of pawns.  In such positions
>zugzwang is likely and will cause null-move to fail improperly.
>
>your last question is easier.  Don't avoid null move just because a low-draft
>position was found.  Look at the stored bound and the draft.  Compare the draft
>to the draft you would be using if you played a null-move to see if this draft
>is deep enough there (IE with R=2, you would be probing with depth-3 at the
>next ply).  If you have enough draft for this test, then see if the score is
>< beta.  If so, this is probably the same score that null-move search would
>return since this is the score _before_ you make a move at this ply, and if
>you make a null-move the position won't change.  If the hash score is < beta,
>then a null-search won't fail high, and you can avoid doing it and save the
>nodes.
>
>Look at crafty source, hash.c file, "HashProbe()" procedure in that file to
>see exactly how I do this...

Thank you for your explanation about when
to avoid nullmoves. I found it
easier to read than you code in the hash.c file -:)
If I understand what you mean, I could use
something like the following code, right?

   bool avoidBecauseOfHash =
     hashDraft >= reducedRecDepth &&
     hashFlag != LOWER && hashScore < beta;

I inserted the hashFlag condition because I thought
that this should be EXACT or UPPER here: if
hashScore is a lower bound, the true score
may very well be above beta.

There is another point, unrelated to hashing,
which I forgot to mention in my original question.
Since we are hoping for fail high, it seems to
me obvious that nullmoves are also useless if
beta = inf, where inf is the maximum value,
used in the largest possible window. Perhaps this
is so obvious that nobody mentions it?
Leen



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