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Subject: Re: computer programs cannot see a very simple draw in a pawn ending

Author: Robert Hyatt

Date: 15:39:03 06/22/98

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On June 22, 1998 at 16:11:47, John Stanback wrote:

>This is a nice position for testing/debugging transposition
>tables and draw by 50 move rule.  I modified Zarkov to allow
>it to search beyond 100 plies, but it didn't find the draw.
>Then I added 1 line of code to store positions which were
>scored by the 50 move rule or draw by repetition in the
>transposition table before returning from search().  Now it
>gets a score of 0 after a 101 ply search, which takes about
>6.7 seconds.
>
>John
>

why wouldn't you always store such positions?  IE there are *no*
special cases I don't store, ever...



>
>On June 22, 1998 at 13:07:30, Bruce Moreland wrote:
>
>>
>>On June 22, 1998 at 12:15:25, Amir Ban wrote:
>>
>>>On June 22, 1998 at 10:02:42, blass uri wrote:
>>>
>>>>The position 3k4/2p1p1p1/p1P1P1Pp/P6P/4K3/8/8/8
>>>>white to move.
>>>>
>>>>every human can understand it is a draw but my programs cannot evaluate
>>>>the position as 0.00
>>>>Is there a program that understand it is a draw?
>>>>( it is enough to use an hash table of 36*9*2=648 positions)
>>>>
>>>>Uri
>>>
>>>This is a good example to see what your hash table can't do for you.
>>>
>>>The problem is that all the positions here evaluate the same. None of them are
>>>obviously drawn or obviously won, so the only way the search can find a draw
>>>score is to find a repetition or 50 moves in the PV. White cannot be forced to
>>>make a repetition, so the only hope is to search this to 100 ply, but this takes
>>>too much time.
>>
>>Mine completes a 101 ply search here in 1.9 seconds, returning a draw by the
>>50-move rule.
>>
>>It actually made it through 161 plies in 3.0 seconds, but then something broke.
>>
>>I had to relax my normal 40-ply maximum for this, so perhaps I need to increase
>>another compile-time constant.
>>
>>Here is the PV at ply 101.
>>
>>PV 00:00:01.875 101      0 [] Kd5 Ke8 Ke5 Kd8 Kd4 Ke8 Kd5 Kd8 Ke5 Ke8 Kd4 Kd8
>>Kd3 Kc8 Kc2 Kd8 Kc3 Ke8 Kb2 Kd8 Kc2 Ke8 Kc3 Kd8 Kc4 Kc8 Kb3 Kd8 Kb2 Ke8 Ka3 Kf8
>>Kb4 Ke8 Kc4 Kd8 Kb3 Ke8 Ka2 Kd8 Kb1 Ke8 Kc1 Kd8 Kd2 Ke8 Ke3 Kd8 Kf3 Ke8 Kf4 Kd8
>>Ke3 Kc8 Kf2 Kd8 Kg2 Ke8 Kg3 Kd8 Kf2 Ke8 Kg2 Kd8 Kh2 Ke8 Kg1 Kd8 Kf1 Ke8 Ke1 Kd8
>>Kd1 Ke8 Kd2 Kd8 Kc1 Ke8 Kd1 Kd8 Ke2 Ke8 Kd3 Kd8 Ke4 Ke8 Kf3 Kd8 Kg3 Ke8 Kh2 Kd8
>>Kg1 Ke8 Kf1 Kd8 Ke1 Ke8 Ke2 Kd8
>>
>>bruce



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