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Subject: Re: This position puzzles me

Author: Anthony Cozzie

Date: 18:56:48 01/20/04

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On January 20, 2004 at 21:22:47, Geoff wrote:

>Hi
>
>I was just looking at a game my program lost to see where it went wrong
>
>[D]r3k2r/pp1n1ppp/2p2nb1/3p4/3P4/1QN1PPq1/PP2B1N1/R1B2RK1 b kq - 0 2
>
>I am a fairly weak chess player but looking at the above position  my intuition
>that the position is about equal must be wrong? CM9000 reckons that white is
>ahead by at about +1.6.
>I would say that although black is approx 1 pawn down on material, its position
>is fairly solid, and blacks queen is starting to really mess up whites king
>safety. blacks bishop is nicely placed, knights are ok too and blacks pawn
>structure is sound, blacks king is not under pressure.
>Hence I guessed it looked about equal, my program also reckoned so with a score
>of 0.01.
>
>Where is my intuiton wrong on this one, at a glance what should tell me white
>has got a good advantage ?
>
>           Regards Geoff

OK, Zappa gives White +1.2 in the static evaluation and +1.9 after some search.

The reasoning is simple.

White is up a piece for 2 pawns.  To make this worse, White has the two bishops.
If Black does not mate the white king, or gain more material, white will win.
End of story.  N+2P will _always_ lose against the two bishops. So the question
is, is white's king in danger.  Zappa says no, and I agree.  The only attacking
piece black has is the Queen (none of the Knights or the Bishop can easily add
to the attack) and White has several defenders near his king.  End result: big
plus for white.

 = (-1.21)	Depth: 0/0	00:00:00.00	1N
1... Qg3-c7 2. e3-e4 d5xe4 3. f3xe4 Ke8-c8 4. e4-e5 Nf6-h5 5. Ng2-h4 Nh5-g3 6.
Nh4xg6 Ng3xe2
 = (-1.94)	Depth: 11/19	00:00:35.76	25154kN

You can see that Zappa thinks it can take over the center and trade off several
pieces.  With a white pawn on e5, Black's "attack" is over . . .

anthony




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