Author: Paul Clarke
Date: 06:45:03 10/13/04
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On October 12, 2004 at 06:46:37, GuyHaworth wrote: >On October 11, 2004 at 18:38:04, Duncan Roberts wrote: > >>http://www.cs.ualberta.ca/~chinook/ >> >>Breaking News! >>We have achieved a milestone in our quest to solve the game of checkers. The >>White Doctor opening (10-14 22-18 12-16) has been solved: it is a draw. This >>means that our program when playing Black (the weak side) will never lose. When >>playing White, our program will never lose and may win (if the opponent makes a >>mistake). You can view our solution to the White Doctor opening here. >> >>Data reuse. Openings transpose into each other. Each additional opening >>increases the chances for reusing the results of one opening on another. The >>only obstacle remaining to completely solving checkers is compute cycles. With >>the current resources we are using, finishing checkers will take a few years. >>With enough resources, the game could be solved in a few months. Contact >>jonathan@cs.ualberta.ca if you have a cluster of computers with at least 3 GB of >>RAM and 300 GB of local disk per machine sitting idle! >> >> >>duncan > >This is very interesting. Just for clarification for non-checkers players: > > >a) Is 'Black' the side playing first. Yes. > Was it reckoned to be 'weaker' by virtue of playing first? Warning: my checkers (*) knowledge is mostly from reading _One Jump Ahead_, so don't take the following as definitive. In competitive checkers the opening three moves (two Black, one White) are chosen by ballot in order to prevent the players drawing too easily. In the White Doctor opening the Black moves selected are not good, leaving Black in a weak position from the outset. >Anyway, assuming Black is the first player, it sounds like 8*8 checkers is at >least a draw for the first player. I believe that the White Doctor is one of the more critical openings for Black, so that sounds plausible. I guess we'll find out in a few years, or less. (*) Or "draughts" for us Brits, but I'll stick to "checkers" to avoid confusion with International (10x10) draughts.
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