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Subject: Re: Please, say in few words what can reduce the "branching factor".

Author: Robert Hyatt

Date: 06:19:33 09/20/99

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On September 20, 1999 at 07:19:53, leonid wrote:

>On September 19, 1999 at 22:10:39, Robert Hyatt wrote:
>
>>On September 19, 1999 at 21:51:12, leonid wrote:
>>
>>>Please, say briefly what can reduce the "branching factor". I hope
>>>that something very simple I am missing in this aspect. My branching factor
>>>is only reason to feel me humiliated about my game. Maybe different logic
>>>lead to different "factor"? Do somebody came through the similer experience?
>>>And if it was so, what was the reason that you found?
>>>
>>>Thanks,
>>>Leonid.
>>
>>
>>There is only one way to reduce the 'branching factor'... that is to use a
>>purely selective search algorithm, where you throw out moves at every ply
>>without searching them at all.  IE alpha/beta reduces the branching factor
>>from about 38 to sqrt(38).
>>
>>You can reduce the 'effective branching factor' by using null-move, or any other
>>idea that selectively reduces the search depth for selected branches...
>
>I use alpha-beta already (found it some 8 month ago) and do my move ordering
>after the material advantage that each move give. I use also the best moves from
>the previous searches. But how about the null move? I never used it for one
>simple reason, my idea is that null move give you the speed but make you
>loose the precision from your search. In other words, null move is good way
>for speeding the game but lead sometime to wrong moves. True or not true?
>
>Leonid.


It will give you two plies of deeper search.  It will make some errors happen.
But overall, it is stronger (for me) than non-null-move searches.  IE when I
play crafty vs crafty with null-move disabled, crafty wins more games will
null-move on than with it off...



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