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Cube decisions that the bots can't fathom

Posted By: Paul Lamford
Date: Thursday, 17 January 2013, at 6:40 p.m.

In Response To: Cube decisions that the bots can't fathom (Timothy Chow)

I know a little about these two positions as I have played them against bots maybe 500 times. I think Masayuki Mochizuki showed in a learned article that the bots do not understand positions like this and rollouts are worse than useless. I average over 20 points a game against XG in the second position, because it wrongly beavers the passes that are all too likely when it gets hit. It cannot "see" the formation of the rolling six-prime. The correct strategy, I think, is to vacate the 23 point in the first position and to vacate the 22 point in the second. Blue hits a shot around 70% of the time, and wins around 80% of those games. Almost all the wins will be beavered by the bot.

In 1999 when I wrote 100 Backgammon Puzzles, the bots thought this was too good, and they still do! In some senses they are the strongest and weakest backgammon players in the world at the same time. What is the true equity of each position? They are probably very similar, and I guess the first is slightly stronger for White, despite the extra BGs. I think I will stick with my 1999 view. No double in either, but just a take, not a beaver, because of the gammons and backgammons. Perhaps around 0.4 cubeless for blue.

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