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BGonline.org Forums
Humans will never be as good as bots
Posted By: Higonefive In Response To: Humans will never be as good as bots (neilkaz)
Date: Saturday, 23 July 2011, at 9:20 a.m.
Grunch.
“The hardest habits to break are those of longest standing and most frequent exercise. In backgammon, these are making points and avoiding direct shots. Unless we see a compelling alternative, we tend to make points and avoid direct shots automatically. Our “vision” of the backgammon board includes seeing points “as” strong and blots “as“ weak.”
(Danny Kleinman. Vision laughs about counting with advice to the dicelorn. Larry Strommen edition 1996, p. 60)
This is a somewhat unfamiliar position. Both players doesn’t have men “behind” but advanced in the outfield. At time, both positions are connected. White has occupied the opponents bar point, Black holds two outfield points.
White is outboarded by 2:4. Plack has made his points in order, his board is a weapon. Together with the 8 point, it forms a broken six prime with a hole on 5.
The race is 145:115, after moving, Black is leading by 38 pips.
White has ownership of the cube. By now he has no leverage at all, even if Black is leaving shots. Additionally even a hit would not reach the the doubling window.
Even though White is outboarded, his position is sound. His men are connected, there are more as enough spares to hold the key points until the crisis will arrive. This is a translation of his racing disadvantage.
Blacks weakness is evident. He has 7 points. 7 points are bad. Like a river, a backgammon game is in a constant flow. Points must be broken when the game processes.
“You can break your point with tempo by hitting an enemy blot. Or you may wait until you have imprisoned the enemy on the bar or behind a prime, and break your point then. If you don’t break your point in any of these ways, you must hope for doublets so that you may move both men from the point in unison. Faling that, your point will eventually become a blot for your opponent to hit.” (a.a.O, p. 60)
Candidates:
6/1 5/2. This is safe for the next moment. But it destroys - beside the racing lead - the main positional asset, the strong board.
8/3 8/5. The board stays intact, spares are created, but the position is disconnected.
15/10 5/2. Slots the next point in the house. Black now is leaving two blots, but it might be not so severe because the duplication of shot numbers. But White can hit from his midpoint relatively safe with unstacking it.
14/9 14/11. Black is leaving a double shot. That is a downside. The upsides are many. Slotted points. Hopfroggigng is possible. White must shoot from a key asset. He has to break the bar point. If Black will have a return, White’s position is then severely disconnected. And if you look closer at point 15, it is by now a bridge for a hitted man getting in on 4. Later it is a better root then point 14.
After all, i will vote for saddling the ponys now, going to the O. K. Corral. There is no time waiting in the saloon for good things coming in. Now is the time for a shoot out. And if Black gets away with it, he will take a major step forward to run the position into a safe harbour.
14/9 14/11.
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