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Subject: Re: To build a book or not?

Author: Robert Hyatt

Date: 17:31:49 07/16/02

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On July 16, 2002 at 18:39:53, Gerd Isenberg wrote:

>On July 16, 2002 at 18:25:08, Robert Hyatt wrote:
>
>>On July 16, 2002 at 18:10:59, Uri Blass wrote:
>>
>>>On July 16, 2002 at 17:44:36, Robert Hyatt wrote:
>>>
>>>>On July 16, 2002 at 17:38:02, Uri Blass wrote:
>>>>
>>>>>On July 16, 2002 at 16:52:33, Robert Hyatt wrote:
>>>>>
>>>>>>On July 16, 2002 at 14:32:57, Russell Reagan wrote:
>>>>>>
>>>>>>>On July 16, 2002 at 11:07:10, Robert Hyatt wrote:
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>>However, with _no_ book you leave yourself open for preparation of traps.  I
>>>>>>>>saw Ken Thompson do this to NuChess years ago at an ACM event.  You don't want
>>>>>>>>to leave that kind of "hole" for a major event...
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>Was it a trap set specifically for that engine? Or was it just a general trap
>>>>>>>that many engines fall for when left on their own?
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>Russell
>>>>>>
>>>>>>
>>>>>>Sort of both.
>>>>>>
>>>>>>1.  Ken knew which opening Nuchess would play, as ken was white and they
>>>>>>had a pretty narrow book.  He simply added a line that made them go out of
>>>>>>book pretty early, with a classic trap where they gave up a piece to win
>>>>>>the rook at a1, and thought they were winning an exchange and losing a pawn.
>>>>>>In reality, they lost both pieces plus the pawn, and the game.
>>>>>
>>>>>It is not going to work against Movei even in bullet.
>>>>>
>>>>>Movei evaluates black knight at a1 as clearly less than a knight in normal
>>>>>squares and the difference in evaluation is slightly more than a pawn.
>>>>
>>>>Look out on ICC.  Would you rather lose a pawn or be forced to place your
>>>>knight on A1/H1 for a while?  I would prefer to stick the knight on the
>>>>corner, because that can be corrected later.  Losing the pawn is losing the
>>>>pawn, period.  You can't make it come back later.
>>>
>>>There are often cases when the black knight cannot come out of a1 later.
>>>
>>>I prefer to lose a pawn for a probability of 40% to win the knight and I suspect
>>>that it is more than 40%.
>>>
>>>If the knight is not trapped there is a good chance that the search can get it
>>>out of the corner and it is easier relative to the case that the knight is
>>>trapped because if it is trapped you may need many moves to capture it and in
>>>most of the cases when it is not trapped you can get it out of the corner in one
>>>move.
>>>
>>>I also saw games when Movei beated other programs because the knight of the
>>>opponent was trapped in the corner.
>>>
>>>I think that these cases are more common then the cases when Movei is losing
>>>games because it evaluates the corner too much.
>>>
>>>Uri
>>
>>
>>I used to have a much larger corner penalty.  And found on a few occasions
>>that playing Nh1 to defend the pawn on f2 was the right move.  But the program
>>refused to do so because it thought that having the knight on H1 was worse than
>>losing the pawn on f2.  It was unfortunately mistaken.  :)
>>
>>Big positional scores are perfectly OK.  But you had better be sure that they
>>don't have outlandish side-effects.  This one sounds like it will...  at a time
>>when you least expect it.
>
>Did you mean a white knight on H1?
>May be the corner penalty makes more sence with white pawns on A8 or H8 only,
>where they are likely to get trapped.

I thought Uri said "corner squares".  Which is more dangerous than "corner
squares on the enemy side of the board".  But even then there are probably ways
to exploit a program that thinks a knight on a8 is really bad...



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