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BGonline.org Forums
Othello Quiz 2015
Posted By: Timothy Chow In Response To: Othello Quiz 2015 (othello)
Date: Saturday, 24 October 2015, at 8:36 p.m.
O.K., I finally got around to trying this quiz. I haven't looked at any bot info yet.
1. White has a huge pip count advantage but is highly inflexible. I think we should be trying to force her to expose another blot. 15/9 6/1* is the obvious way to try to do this, creating 13 root numbers. The obvious downside is that White has 11 hitting rolls from the bar, but 4 of these expose a second blot, and the rest, though very bad for us, are not necessarily fatal because we still have an anchor and a partial prime. If we don't hit, then there are various possibilities, but I'm not seeing any that give White any really bad rolls. For example, 9/3 8/3 forces White to rip up her 6pt with 52 or 42, but it doesn't actually create another blot immediately. Of course maybe the right idea is just to focus on containing one checker, but I'm going to try 15/9 6/1*.
2. Now we're the ones with a huge pip count advantage. I don't see any reason to volunteer a shot. Our most problematic number seems to be a 5, since 65 55 54 53 force us to play the 5 from our 6pt. So I don't like stripping the 6pt with 8/5 6/5 since it blots immediately with a roll of 53. We could play 5/1 which has the advantage of no immediate blotting rolls, but it does nothing to solve our bearin problem. I will go with 8/5 2/1 since it bears in a checker, and only 62 blots immediately.
3. Playing safe looks too conservative here since the race is close and there are gammons to be won. (Besides, don't Othello quiz problems have a unique best move? It's hard to imagine that 16/10 and 16/11 5/4 differ much in equity.) If we hit and are hit back, then I think usually White just cashes, so we can treat that as a single loss. If we hit and White dances then I think we have a good chance of picking up the second blot, so we win a reasonable number of gammons. So I hit, 6/1*. Then 2/1 gives us two direct cover numbers for our blot without creating more blots.
4. White has a stronger board and plenty of spares so I think we have to hit for tempo. I would play bar/24 2/1*(2) 7/6, attacking rather than priming, even though it probably makes it slightly easier for White to escape her straggler.
5. Here, on the other hand, priming looks better than attacking since White has no real threats, and we can make 5 out of 6 points with 13/8. For the 3, I would play 13/10. Leaving a blot on the midpoint is no biggie when White has two blots in her board. We want to maximize ways to make the 4pt.
6. It seems that whenever I think an Othello problem is easy, I get it wrong. I'm not seeing a credible alternative to 6/1* 5/1. Everything else leaves a lot of shots anyway so why not hit, gain a tempo to hit White's other blots and prevent her from making a point, and potentially start a blitz?
7. We're way behind in the race with the stronger board and more checkers back so that points to a bold play that maximizes contact. I would try bar/20 13/10.
8. Now we're way ahead in the race so I don't like hitting blots and giving White a path back into the game. That leaves 20/9 and 9/3 8/3. It's not so common to break the golden anchor this early in the game but White has no ammo to attack with. The 9pt is valuable whereas making the 3pt looks inflexible to me. 20/9.
9. Again this looks easy so I'll probably get it wrong. 24/20 6/5. We're behind in the race and White has an advanced anchor so it is thematic to bid for an advanced anchor of our own with 24/20. The checkers on the 6pt belong on the 5pt so let's put one of them there. This "wild" play is not so wild since White has no board and her 1's and 3's are duplicated to hit.
10. Who's holding whom? White is a little low on time but I don't think that it's a realistic plan to prime her, given our poor structure. So my plan is to try to clear everything safely. The checkers on the 12pt are already ideally positioned where they are as close to home as possible without being in direct shot range, so I'm not moving them. At first I wanted to clear a point with 10/8(2) or 8/6(2), but then I went through all the rolls and both plays create a number of immediate blotting rolls. I don't see a reason to volunteer a shot so I'm going with 10/9(2) 8/7(2), which leaves no immediate blotting rolls (if I calculated correctly).
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