Author: Robert Hyatt
Date: 14:35:34 10/13/98
Go up one level in this thread
After reading this thread, I decided to run a test myself. I started off with 20 games of crafty vs crafty, white having KQ and no tablebases, black having tablebases. At 20 seconds per move, this ended in 20 wins for white which surprised me. I took several different positions (20 in total) most of which were mate in 30 or greater and gave crafty 20 secs/move using 1 cpu on my ALR. All wins. I didn't expect this. I then repeated this at 10 secs/move. All wins. I then repeated it at 5 secs/move. All wins. I was going to try 1 sec but decided that to the computer, this is far easier than I thought. It seems that the simple heuristic drive king to the edge, then to the corner, is enough. It didn't play it perfectly, but it never slipped more than 2 moves from optimal at any single move. And when it started off at mate in 34, the "game" never went past 40 moves. So, I retract my original feeling, that KQ vs KR is hard with the KR side having a database. It seems it is a "trivial" ending regardless of having them or not. Most surprising...
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