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Date: 21 Feb 2007 10:29:02
From: CoreyWhite
Subject: Big Bang Chess on my iMac
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When playing games, perhaps the most simple is tic-tac-toe. The game
has two simple strategies, one is defensive and the other offensive.
It is not hard at first to learn how to tie games when playing an
opponent. And then the next stage in development comes after you
learn how to beat an opponent. You really can only employ either
strategy when you get to make the first move, and your opponent will
quickly learn what you are doing either way.
In order to tie games, you only have to control the center of the
tick- tac-toe board, and block your opponent from attacking
diagonoly. Then you can systematically block his attempts at moving
laterally across the board.
Now if you want to win their is a sure fire guaronteed way to do it,
if you know how to fork your opponent. Just put your first piece in
the corner of the board, and after he makes his next move you put your
next piece to the left or right of the center, as far away from the
first corner that you placed your piece. Then regardless of where he
moves next you can place your piece in the center of the board. This
gives you an advantage because you can now win either laterally or
diagonally. And if he deffends either advance, you can take him with
the other.
I suppose if you were playing a real human, your opponent could
automatically fore-see the end result of you initiating the game with
your X or O, in one of the corners, and immediately try and control
the center. So this doesn't always give you an advantage, if someone
knows how to play defense.
But the same logic applies to other board games like chess and
checkers. You have to learn all of the algorithms that can be used to
fork an opponent, and learn all of the methods of deffending yourself
from effective attacks. In order to play you have to be pre-imptive
in assuming your opponent won't see your attack coming, and when
defending you have to be paranoid of how any offensive move could lead
to checkmate.
It isn't easy to transfer strategic insights form tic-tac- toe to
chess (or any other game), at least no practical ones: Tic-tac-toe has
only a handful of valid positions, less than there are possible moves
in some chess situations. Thus tic-tac-toe is fully understood,
whereas for chess one relies on heuristics, e.g. occupy the center
early develop your pieces fast keep your peaces defended avoid moving
one peace twice during the opening keep your king hidden away protect
your queen avoid double pawns don't move knights to the border keep a
rook behind your passed pawn keep a rook behind your opponent's passed
pawns, etc...
Look up Game Theory. From a mathematical point of view, chess and
noughts-and-crosses are both "zero-sum", complete infomation games
therefore, in theory, both have completly repeatable results (with
perfect play all games give the same result white/black/draw). Tic-Tac-
Toe is always a draw, and no one knows for chess. And I'm not sure
what anyone has to say about checkers.
My theory will eventually be solved but for now remains scientifically
untestable. However, when I am playing Chess on my iMac, I am able to
beat the game. I play black when using the strategy. So I try and
protected my self defensively, and stale mate the computer. I watch
for the possibility of lateral and diagonal attacks, and once I
successfully build a good defense I spot a weakness in the computers
offense as it tries to put me in delima and fork me with a combination
attack. That is when I take out half of his strategy, and always seem
to whipe him clean.
So it seems to be working. The game I am playing is called Big Bang
Chess, and my strategy keeps knocking the computer out. Once I am
ahead a castle and a knight, or bishop, I have the game set. The only
problem is the computer asks to resign once I have him locked down.
And there seems to be some bugs that are crashing the software when I
have the computer by the balls. The software just closes down and
crashes. So I'm going to call tech support and report the problem.
It might be one of those "features" you can't do anything about. It
is the first time I have had any problems with my iMac, and I just
hooked it up yesterday.
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Date: 06 Jun 2007 16:16:05
From: Macchess
Subject: Re: Big Bang Chess on my iMac
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CoreyWhite a �crit :
> So it seems to be working. The game I am playing is called Big Bang
> Chess, and my strategy keeps knocking the computer out.
Try the chess program that is included with the Mac. It is a lot
stronger.
Overview of chess programs on the Mac: http://macchess.internetcontact.be
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Date: 21 Feb 2007 15:39:18
From: Kenneth Sloan
Subject: Re: Big Bang Chess on my iMac
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The only way to win is not to play.
CoreyWhite wrote:
> When playing games, perhaps the most simple is tic-tac-toe. The game
> has two simple strategies, one is defensive and the other offensive.
> It is not hard at first to learn how to tie games when playing an
> opponent. And then the next stage in development comes after you
> learn how to beat an opponent. You really can only employ either
> strategy when you get to make the first move, and your opponent will
> quickly learn what you are doing either way.
>
> In order to tie games, you only have to control the center of the
> tick- tac-toe board, and block your opponent from attacking
> diagonoly. Then you can systematically block his attempts at moving
> laterally across the board.
>
> Now if you want to win their is a sure fire guaronteed way to do it,
> if you know how to fork your opponent. Just put your first piece in
> the corner of the board, and after he makes his next move you put your
> next piece to the left or right of the center, as far away from the
> first corner that you placed your piece. Then regardless of where he
> moves next you can place your piece in the center of the board. This
> gives you an advantage because you can now win either laterally or
> diagonally. And if he deffends either advance, you can take him with
> the other.
>
> I suppose if you were playing a real human, your opponent could
> automatically fore-see the end result of you initiating the game with
> your X or O, in one of the corners, and immediately try and control
> the center. So this doesn't always give you an advantage, if someone
> knows how to play defense.
>
> But the same logic applies to other board games like chess and
> checkers. You have to learn all of the algorithms that can be used to
> fork an opponent, and learn all of the methods of deffending yourself
> from effective attacks. In order to play you have to be pre-imptive
> in assuming your opponent won't see your attack coming, and when
> defending you have to be paranoid of how any offensive move could lead
> to checkmate.
>
> It isn't easy to transfer strategic insights form tic-tac- toe to
> chess (or any other game), at least no practical ones: Tic-tac-toe has
> only a handful of valid positions, less than there are possible moves
> in some chess situations. Thus tic-tac-toe is fully understood,
> whereas for chess one relies on heuristics, e.g. occupy the center
> early develop your pieces fast keep your peaces defended avoid moving
> one peace twice during the opening keep your king hidden away protect
> your queen avoid double pawns don't move knights to the border keep a
> rook behind your passed pawn keep a rook behind your opponent's passed
> pawns, etc...
>
> Look up Game Theory. From a mathematical point of view, chess and
> noughts-and-crosses are both "zero-sum", complete infomation games
> therefore, in theory, both have completly repeatable results (with
> perfect play all games give the same result white/black/draw). Tic-Tac-
> Toe is always a draw, and no one knows for chess. And I'm not sure
> what anyone has to say about checkers.
>
> My theory will eventually be solved but for now remains scientifically
> untestable. However, when I am playing Chess on my iMac, I am able to
> beat the game. I play black when using the strategy. So I try and
> protected my self defensively, and stale mate the computer. I watch
> for the possibility of lateral and diagonal attacks, and once I
> successfully build a good defense I spot a weakness in the computers
> offense as it tries to put me in delima and fork me with a combination
> attack. That is when I take out half of his strategy, and always seem
> to whipe him clean.
>
> So it seems to be working. The game I am playing is called Big Bang
> Chess, and my strategy keeps knocking the computer out. Once I am
> ahead a castle and a knight, or bishop, I have the game set. The only
> problem is the computer asks to resign once I have him locked down.
> And there seems to be some bugs that are crashing the software when I
> have the computer by the balls. The software just closes down and
> crashes. So I'm going to call tech support and report the problem.
> It might be one of those "features" you can't do anything about. It
> is the first time I have had any problems with my iMac, and I just
> hooked it up yesterday.
>
--
Kenneth Sloan [email protected]
Computer and Information Sciences +1-205-932-2213
University of Alabama at Birmingham FAX +1-205-934-5473
Birmingham, AL 35294-1170 http://www.cis.uab.edu/sloan/
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