Author: Bruce Moreland
Date: 18:53:56 08/03/99
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On August 03, 1999 at 21:29:14, Pete R. wrote: >Currently in the Kasparov vs. The World correspondence game there are a number >of endgames that involve races between passed pawns on either side of the board. >While the programs have been quite useful so far, they aren't too swift in the >transition to the endgame when passed pawns are the issue. Where a human player >would push his passed pawn at every opportunity, the programs tend to diddle >around moving pieces, until the pawn is almost promoted, when they suddenly >realize that one side is winning. For example in the following position, > >8/1p1kp2Q/2np4/1p2bpB1/8/3q3P/5PP1/5RK1 w - - > >I ran Fritz 5.32, Hiarcs 7.32, and Crafty 16.12 for many hours, enough to get to >18 ply for Fritz and Crafty. All of them recommend the move g4 for white >(Crafty switches to g4 at 15+ ply), which gets buried by b4!. For example, > >27. g4 b4 >28. Qxf5 Qxf5 >29. gxf5 b3 >30. Rb1 b2 >31. Kf1 Na5 > >and by now they will realize that white is losing. There are a number of >possible endgames coming up involving a race between white's passed h pawn and >black's passed b pawn, and the programs have a real hard time with it. What's >going on here? Pawns are hard to evaluate. A advanced passed pawn can be worth anything between nothing and a whole queen. A rook, on the other hand, is usually worth approximately a rook. Queening threats are hard to evaluate because they are often long-term in computer chess terms, they are similar to long-term sacrifices, which are notoriously hard to evaluate. bruce
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