Author: Robert Hyatt
Date: 11:06:37 01/16/02
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On January 16, 2002 at 12:58:13, James Swafford wrote: >On January 16, 2002 at 11:43:59, Robert Hyatt wrote: > >>On January 16, 2002 at 07:41:28, Graham Laight wrote: >> >>>It has occurred to me that it is wrong to evaluate a position in terms of >>>relative pawns (the "de facto" standard - whereby an evaluation of 2 means that >>>you're approximately the equivalent of 2 pawns ahead). >>> >>>This means that many aspects of evaluation have to be squeezed into a dimension >>>which is not appropriate at all. >>> >>>A better way would be to evaluate "winning probability". If a position was a >>>draw, the value would be 0.50 (or 50%). If the player should win 3 out of 4 >>>times, the eval should be 75%. If the player must win from here, then the >>>evaluation should be 100%. >>> >>>It seems strange when you think about it that all programmers have chosen to >>>adopt the traditional "pawn equivalence" standard. >>> >>>-g >> >> >>It is harder to do otherwise. IE KPP vs K is winning, except for some rare >>cases, while KR vs KB is drawn. >> >>It would be very hard to translate some sort of material imbalance into a >>winning percentage. As a general rule, the more material you are ahead, the >>better your chances, with some exceptions that many engines know about... > >Right, but the gains are not linear, and raw scores from an evaluator >typically are. Winning probability is not a linear function of material >+ positional advantages. > >-- >James It could be linear. But perhaps the slope of the straight line is not 45 degrees...
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