the dorbel daily

Showing posts with label bots and backgames. Show all posts
Showing posts with label bots and backgames. Show all posts

Sunday, 10 October 2010

Bots and Backgames

A correspondent offers as an opinion that the positions I showed in the last post should not even be doubles. The reason that he offers for this is, "That bots do not understand backgames". This is an opinion that is held by my many people, some of whom should be listened to because they are respected thinkers, some of whom are merely parrotting what others have said.
Let's sort out some nomenclature. White in the last post is "playing a backgame", i.e. holding two points in the opponent's home board with the hope of generating shots later, hitting one or more checkers and winning the game in that way. Red is "defending against a backgame", i.e. trying to bear in and bear off without leaving any shots, or surviving them or indeed winning after being hit.
Do the "Bots can't play Backgames" set think that the bots play them poorly, or defend against them poorly, or both? I'm not clear on that. Do they think that they play the checkers badly or do they think that they are very badly wrong in their assessment of the possible outcomes of the game to decide upon cube action? Somebody enlighten me here and I will be very pleased to hear opinions, ideally backed up with some data.
Some people I know produce positions, usually composed, that the bot will handle in a very odd way, I accept that, but I don't think that that is evidence that the majority of games are played badly. I also know positions where the bot can be well off the money in non backgame positions.
I will be very happy to play the first position from the last post as a prop, either double against no double or I will pay White a point to take the cube. Props can be set up and played on Gamesgrid. Any takers?
Alternately I will be very happy to take snowie playing either side against a human, each player to take the same side for, say, 50 games. Any takers? A sporting 5 euros a point shouldn't kill anybody and might settle the discussion in this case at least.