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        Team Games >> 2009 One vs TheMob >> Move 25
        
(Message started by: RonWeasley on Nov 12^th, 2009, 2:03pm)

Title: Move 25
Post by RonWeasley on Nov 12^th, 2009, 2:03pm

Fritzlein moves 24s Md5n ed4n hf5n hf6e

I suggest cg4s Dh4w cg3w cg3x Dg4s.

Like what Adanac was saying, Our horse is now like a camel and dogs are now like horses. A natural place for the dog is g3 so it's not a target for the silver horse. In the near future, we have advanced cats that we should worry about being picked off. Silver has advanced rabbits in the east we might eat, which would make harassing the camel with our elephant easier. In the short term, we should identify any quick tactical weaknesses (rabbit on b4, advanced cats) and solidify. I expect rabbit exchanges are the next thing to happen. We're up a whole cat, so I don't mind equal rabbit exchanges.

Title: Re: Move 25
Post by Ice on Nov 12^th, 2009, 4:28pm

I agree. I like that move over flipping the cat with our E.

Title: Re: Move 25
Post by Adanac on Nov 13^th, 2009, 7:07am

on 11/12/09 at 16:28:51, Ice wrote:

I agree. I like that move over flipping the cat with our E.

Me too, our dog is better on g3 than h4.

Title: Re: Move 25
Post by Hannoskaj on Nov 13^th, 2009, 7:27am

At first sight, I would also take the cat with Dg3.

Title: Re: Move 25
Post by RonWeasley on Nov 13^th, 2009, 10:28am

I looked at trapping the cat using an E flip. I wanted later to pull th g5 and h5 rabbits south with the h4 Dog. My worry is that silver would advance the g5 rabbit to g2. This is not a serious goal threat, but it would take time to clean it up while we're fighting in the west. I think it is a risk we don't have to take.

So I still like pushing the cat with Dog ending on g3.

Title: Re: Move 25
Post by chessandgo on Nov 13^th, 2009, 1:05pm

hi,

I wasn't part of the last moves discussion; I see the Mob is doing as good as ever :) A whole cat up and possibly a rabbit to come within a few moves, looks great.

I vote for the D to g3 capture as well.

Title: Re: Move 25
Post by RonWeasley on Nov 13^th, 2009, 4:05pm

We've got some time now. I'm going to be busy this weekend. I'll check back on Monday at the latest to see if any other moves are being considered. Anybody feel free to commit a move as your voice vote, but you don't have to. On Monday, if there are six or more voice votes for a move, and no objections, I'll just make that move. I would consider my preference for the D->g3 capture a voice vote. Looking at the comments, if they don't change, I'll count chessandgo, Adanac, and Ice too.

If the voice votes happen before Monday, feel free to comment on subsequent strategy.

Title: Re: Move 25
Post by Hippo on Nov 13^th, 2009, 5:54pm

Hi, I am new here, I would not be scared by the rabbit going to g2 immediately.
He should take our camel so we have time to move our horse to g3 and cat to e3.
It seems the question reduces to ... it's better to pull h5 rabbit to g4 or h3 or just g5 rabbit to g4 and save one step or do we would like moving our elephant to the west more?

It seems to me the elephant on the west would be required in near future in which case the dog on g3 is better otherwise later the goal attack would be a threat.

I vote for Dg3 as well.

Title: Re: Move 25
Post by Jonathan2357 on Nov 13^th, 2009, 6:16pm

I'm sort of new to this whole game in general, but I like the idea of:

25g cg4s Dh4w Ef4n Ef5w

The idea is that the this forces him to play at least:

25s Md6w Mc6x ed5n _____ _____

lest we save our camel, and the two remaining steps are insufficient to save his cat anyway. In addition, we have a threat of pushing the c5 dog south with the E, or flipping the e6 dog south with the E (towards our H), both of which look bad for him.

(26g Ee5w dc5s Ed5w _____ OR 26g Ee5e de6s de5s Ef5w)

Of course, he can defend these threats, but it gives him something else to worry about.

...

I don't think we have to worry about the goal rush:

25s rh5s rh6s rh4s cg3s

as it can be refuted with:

26g Dg4s de6e Ee5n Md6n

Again, I'm still sort of new at this game, so I might be missing something, but this looks like a good move to me, because of the re-centralized E and the dog threats. I would be interested if it actually is a good move, because that means I'm making significant progress. I would also be interested if it's not a good move and somebody could explain to me why.

Anyway, that's my two cents. Let me know what you experts think.

Title: Re: Move 25
Post by Adanac on Nov 13^th, 2009, 6:58pm

on 11/13/09 at 18:16:27, Jonathan2357 wrote:

Welcome to The Mob! I like the creativity but this idea introduces one significant danger to our position:

If Fritzlein pushes our horse into the f3 trap on 25s then he has some major compensation for his lost camel: (1) the elephant can immediately return north to hunt down our camel or (2) he can attack in the southeast with his rabbits and horse. He might even do a little of both, if he ties our elephant down to a camel hostage in the northwest while using his strong horse in the southeast.

We could do a modified idea with cg4s Dh4w Re2e Ef4n but then it will just transpose into a similar position on move 26. I'd still prefer to capture the cat now and then we can decide how to position our elephant on 26g after we see Fritzlein's final 2 steps.

Title: Re: Move 25
Post by 722caasi on Nov 13^th, 2009, 7:37pm

I vote Dg3 capture. A sure cat is better than anything long term we could cause.

Title: Re: Move 25
Post by Hippo on Nov 14^th, 2009, 5:23am

Having the cat advantage we are not so interested in sharp positions so safe Dg3 as I already mentioned.

Title: Re: Move 25
Post by mdk on Nov 14^th, 2009, 3:12pm

I vote D -> g3 capture

Title: Re: Move 25
Post by Ice on Nov 14^th, 2009, 5:13pm

For the sake of breaking group thought.

How about:
25g E4fn cg4w Dh4w Re2e ?? We can take the cat next turn with the only save being for Fritz to abandon the camel and it would be a more agressive dog move for the future.

Just thought I'd try an alternative so that we don't miss something that might not be obvious.

( my vote is still for d -> g3 )

Title: Re: Move 25
Post by mdk on Nov 14^th, 2009, 6:39pm

on 11/14/09 at 17:13:17, Ice wrote:

The problem with this and other moves is that it takes extra steps to capture the cat and position our pieces around the f3 trap. This is giving at least some initiative to silver.

Title: Re: Move 25
Post by Jonathan2357 on Nov 14^th, 2009, 7:08pm

Not that it matters, because I'm not in the voting group, but I also like d->g3 capture, after Adanac's comment. (As I said, I'm still new at this, and still miss the occasional hanging piece).

Title: Re: Move 25
Post by Simon on Nov 15^th, 2009, 1:33pm

I think Ice's "breaking group thought" move deserves further consideration. The reason being that it may facilitate moving the horse to g3 and the dog to the other side of the trap.

Title: Re: Move 25
Post by mdk on Nov 15^th, 2009, 7:15pm

on 11/15/09 at 13:33:59, Simon wrote:

I think Ice's "breaking group thought" move deserves further consideration. The reason being that it may facilitate moving the horse to g3 and the dog to the other side of the trap.

The way I see this particular 25g is that if you don't capture the cat with the dog after pushing the cat with the dog then you are using more than 4 steps to capture the cat. Meanwhile there isn't any benefit to moving the rabbit or the elephant this turn since they can just be moved to these places next turn (if this is even where they turn out to be best placed). The f3 trap is under no immediate threat so moving the e2 rabbit definitely does not need to be done this turn. Also Fritz would be blundering to leave a piece on f5 this turn.

It does force Fritz to capture our camel this turn but I assume he will do that regardless of our move. It also prevents Fritz from moving his horse to f6 on 25s although I would be rather confident in assuming Fritz's 3rd step will be used to move the elephant back to d5 after capturing the horse so he won't be moving his horse there anyway. Leaving the silver elephant on d6 would allow us to block his elephant with ours though by moving the gold elephant to d5.

Because of this my conclusion is there is no benefit to doing anything other than capturing the cat immediately since we know we will be using 4 steps to do that anyway and if we do anything else we are simply preventing ourselves from reacting best to silver's move since our move won't be preventing silver's move. At best we will end up transposing to a position that could be achieved after capturing the dog immediately and at worst we will end up in a position worse than capturing the dog immediately.

Of course if someone has some line suggesting otherwise please post it.

_____________________

If we are looking for alternative moves then in this position it seems you would want one that prevents the best gold move for 25s... either by moving the gold elephant to d4 or e5 and then pushing the cat with the dog to g3. However, this seems to be countered by 25s rg5w hg6s Md6w Mc6x ed5n leading to a tactically more complicated position where we definitely seem worse off than simply capturing the cat now. I think it's best to maximize the number of steps we can use in reaction to silver's move.

Title: Re: Move 25
Post by Adanac on Nov 15^th, 2009, 7:34pm

on 11/14/09 at 19:08:43, Jonathan2357 wrote:

Not that it matters, because I'm not in the voting group, but I also like d->g3 capture, after Adanac's comment. (As I said, I'm still new at this, and still miss the occasional hanging piece).

You're part of the voting group now ;) Anyone can join at any time and all new Mobsters are welcome.

Your suggestion was actually pretty creative and it's great to have new ideas and fresh perspectives. Offering a free horse to distract Fritz away from our camel was definitely worth a consideration.

Title: Re: Move 25
Post by Simon on Nov 15^th, 2009, 8:15pm

mdk, the idea behind my support for the move was that if we want the horse and dog to switch sides of the trap, then one of them is going to have to pass above or below the other, making a southward step of the dog (bringing the horse and dog to the same rank) a wasted step (or more than wasted). So ignoring Fritzlein's possible responses, if we eventually want a piece arrangement of say, H on g3, D on e3, R on f2, E on f5, then we save 2 steps by doing Ice's move now instead of taking the cat with the dog now.

So this move is somewhat of a gamble that Fritzlein can't complicate the situation enough to make the saved steps wasted. I am not confident of this at all, as it looks like Fritzlein can block the dog crossing with his elephant. But anyway, the point of the move from my perspective is the exact opposite of yours, i.e. I think it is a less incisive move that may save time in the long run, rather than a more incisive move that wastes steps.

Title: Re: Move 25
Post by mdk on Nov 16^th, 2009, 12:31am

on 11/15/09 at 20:15:03, Simon wrote:

Adanac, the idea behind my support for the move was that if we want the horse and dog to switch sides of the trap, then one of them is going to have to pass above or below the other, making a southward step of the dog (bringing the horse and dog to the same rank) a wasted step (or more than wasted). So ignoring Fritzlein's possible responses, if we eventually want a piece arrangement of say, H on g3, D on e3, R on f2, E on f5, then we save 2 steps by doing Ice's move now instead of taking the cat with the dog now.

So this move is somewhat of a gamble that Fritzlein can't complicate the situation enough to make the saved steps wasted. I am not confident of this at all, as it looks like Fritzlein can block the dog crossing with his elephant. But anyway, the point of the move from my perspective is the exact opposite of yours, i.e. I think it is a less incisive move that may save time in the long run, rather than a more incisive move that wastes steps.

I'm sorry if you feel that I was attacking your ideas Simon - I definitely support everyone contributing and I certainly don't have all the answers. You have definitely caused me, and I'm sure I'm not the only one, to examine the position more closely. Also I do think Ice's move is a good move and I was overly harsh in my criticism of it - I am worried, however, that it allows for greater counterplay. Either way though, we end up in a position where I think we can confidently say we are ahead.

It seems I have miscounted - the move does use fewer steps to position the pieces in the way you suggest. However, I think playing Ice's move allows silver a greater opportunity for counterplay since Ice's move commits 2 steps (or 3 if we capture with the horse) to our next move (since we will want to capture the cat). That only leaves 2 (or 1) steps to react to Fritz's move.

My guess is that either way Fritz plays 25s Md6w Mc6x ed5n ed6s ed5s

Also, playing around with the position makes me think that getting a dog to b3 is more important short term than getting the rabbit to f2 though.

Title: Re: Move 25
Post by RonWeasley on Nov 17^th, 2009, 9:44am

I looked at 25g Ef4w Cg4w Dh4w Re2e. This is like Ice's move with E->e4 instead of E->f5. I was surprised that I liked it.

I always think defensively. I'm looking at the east where silver has h+rrr which is just like the camel-rabbit support in Fritz's book. In the west silver should try an e-d attack which is just like the usual e-h attack. One way to defend both of these is for our E to mind the eastern h while our H threatens taking the western d hostage. The problem is that our nicely centralized H can still get cut off from the west so the e-d attack can't be prevented.

This leaves us with trying a more balanced defense with the H's facing off in the east and the E's and smaller pieces facing off in the west. That means we want H on g3 instead of our D. Earlier posts indicate we take now with D->g3 if we want the D to stay there, and we delay the capture if we ultimately want H->g3. I'm now thinking we want H->g3. This means we want our E to go west.

Here's a possible continuation:
25g Ef4w cg4w Dh4w Re2e
25s Md6w Mc6x ed5n ed6s ed5s
26g He3e Hf3e cf4s cf3x Cd3e
26s rg5w hg6s hg5n Dg4n
27g Ee4n rf5s Ee5e Dg5s
27s cb5w Rb4n dc5s ed4s
28g rf4s rf3x Dg4w Ef5w Ee5w
28s dc4w Cb3e db4s ra4s
29g Ed5w Ec5s Dc2w Cc3s
29s de6s de5s Ce3e de4s
30g Rf2e Cf3s Df4w De4w
30s hg6s hg5s hg4w rh5s
31g Ec4w Rb5e Rc5e Rd5n
31s ca5e cb5e cc5n cc6n
32g Eb4e db3n Db2n Ec4n

Feel free to blow holes in this analysis and please think about what our position will be near move 30. I think we will be doing a real vote this time. Ideally we could start voting tomorrow if there's no further discussion.

Title: Re: Move 25
Post by Hannoskaj on Nov 17^th, 2009, 11:12am

A quick thought:
looking at what moves we could not play after taking cat, I've thought of Ec4 since Silver would block us.

So that a natural possibility is
25g Ef4c4 Re2f2

Notice that Silver cannot simultaneously take camel (and keep us from defending it on next turn), defend horse and defend cat.

I have not looked further into it.

Title: Re: Move 25
Post by Hannoskaj on Nov 17^th, 2009, 2:26pm

Autoreply, but really different thoughts.

We have many strategical options (I do not talk about the current move).
We may try to defend symmetrically.
Then either Ron's (or Ice's) suggestion or my previous one.

We may also try to keep to defend asymmetrically. As noticed by Ron, it's hard to use our horse efficiently, then.

We could play more or less for chasing rabbits and protecting them (a4, b4, g5, h5...)

Another option would lean much more toward aggression.
Indeed I think any move by Silver is much slower than by us since we still have a back row. All his rabbits save one have left the last row, so it looks very weakened.

We could then play
25g takes cat (Dg3)
25s takes camel Ed4 (otherwise WE have the central elephant and I cannot see what could be dangerous for us.)
26g Ef5 Re2f4

Tactically:
The threat de6d6 Ef5e6 Rf5 almost requires 26s Re7f7, otherwise this major defensive rabbit is frozen.
In the lines I've looked at, Fritz cannot afford to pull the b4 rabbit to fifth row, since it becomes a strong secondary threat with our elephant. So that he needs playing ra3, pushing the Rb4 to a4 with dog, before threatening to have a b3 dog. That's slower, especially since if he plays ra3, the c3 trap must be defended.
Our elephant is free to roam on fifth rank, typically going after current dc5 or the c6 trap if Silver's elephant switches side.

Anyone with THE right 26s in this line?

Title: Re: Move 25
Post by Simon on Nov 17^th, 2009, 3:25pm

on 11/17/09 at 09:44:29, RonWeasley wrote:

I looked at 25g Ef4w Cg4w Dh4w Re2e. This is like Ice's move with E->e4 instead of E->f5. I was surprised that I liked it.

I like it too.

Title: Re: Move 25
Post by mdk on Nov 17^th, 2009, 4:41pm

on 11/17/09 at 09:44:29, RonWeasley wrote:

This looks better to me than Ice's move at first glance - moving the elephant west makes more sense to me too. I don't really think your proposed 26s is a good move for silver though given we seem to have a strong response. I think it would be better to look at lines aiming for a e+d attack of c3 for 26s and 27s. Don't have time to post more now though.

Title: Re: Move 25
Post by Simon on Nov 17^th, 2009, 5:41pm

If we can't afford to move the elephant too far west until the horse is on g3 due to the hrrr threat (which I think may be the case), and if other than that all we have to worry is an attack in the west (as mdk suggests), then I think RonWeasley's move is definitely better than the immediate cat capture since it completes the rotation freeing the elephant sooner.

I think any problem with Ronweasley's move would have to be a vulnerability in the east and so far I don't see a sufficient vulnerability to be a problem.

Title: Re: Move 25
Post by jdb on Nov 18^th, 2009, 7:13am

Capture the cat.

Silver has at least three rabbits that are exposed. He will only have five pieces left. There is no way he can cover both our traps and still defend his back line.

Gold's position is much more compact, with only one exposed rabbit.

Title: Re: Move 25
Post by Simon on Nov 18^th, 2009, 12:16pm

He may have more vulnerable rabbits, but if it comes to a race the big question is who can take over a trap and force the other player to retreat first. It's not clear to me that it's us; those advanced rabbits are an obstacle until we take them, he has a horse in position to defend the east, his pieces are advanced in the west etc. And if we have to retreat to defend in the west we may suddenly be in big trouble in the east, particularly if we will have moved our horse to assist in defending the west.

Besides, if we rotate our horse to g3 and free the elephant to counter Fritzlein elephant in the west it looks to me like we are in a good, non-race position. So why race? Those rabbits aren't going to retreat, we can take our time capturing them.

Title: Re: Move 25
Post by RonWeasley on Nov 18^th, 2009, 12:36pm

Make closing arguments, please. I will start a vote tomorrow if there are no new compelling ideas.

I am still favoring 25g Ef4w Cg4w Dh4w Re2e over 25g cg4s Dh4w cg3w cg3x Dg4s because it leads to the strategic position I prefer more quickly.

Title: Re: Move 25
Post by Hippo on Nov 18^th, 2009, 5:07pm

OK if the next plan is H->g3 the "half cat capture" with saving the trap looks like the best option. Fritz cannot gain by delaying the camel capture and it seems to me he cannot interrupt the plan.

I am new to playing against good humans so my strategical thinking trained mostly on bots does not navigate me well ... so I would probably mostly watch the discussion rather than voting.

Title: Re: Move 25
Post by RonWeasley on Nov 19^th, 2009, 8:23am

One thought on voting. If you don't have a preference, for whatever reason, and especially if you think you're not experienced enough to choose the best move, please vote anyway and put the moves you like, but can't decide on, in a tie for number one. The tie lets others decide among those and you record your preference for those over the other candidates. The tie can be for a place other than first if you have a first place candidate.

The biggest advantage is that I will know that an additional mobster has voted. I won't know who, but it lets me see that a quorum has been reached and I may be able to end the voting early and save time on our clock. I realize there's a risk that a flood of no preference votes may induce an early closure before enough preference votes are made, but usually mobsters with a preference are voting promptly anyway. Lately we are getting about 8 votes total and I'm trying to encourage more participation from those less opinionated.

Title: Re: Move 25
Post by Hippo on Nov 19^th, 2009, 10:50am

on 11/17/09 at 09:44:29, RonWeasley wrote:

Here's a possible continuation:
25g Ef4w cg4w Dh4w Re2e
25s Md6w Mc6x ed5n ed6s ed5s
26g He3e Hf3e cf4s cf3x Cd3e
26s rg5w hg6s hg5n Dg4n
27g Ee4n rf5s Ee5e Dg5s
27s cb5w Rb4n dc5s ed4s
28g rf4s rf3x Dg4w Ef5w Ee5w
28s dc4w Cb3e db4s ra4s
29g Ed5w Ec5s Dc2w Cc3s
29s de6s de5s Ce3e de4s
30g Rf2e Cf3s Df4w De4w
30s hg6s hg5s hg4w rh5s
31g Ec4w Rb5e Rc5e Rd5n
31s ca5e cb5e cc5n cc6n
32g Eb4e db3n Db2n Ec4n

It was mentioned already, but I would rather expect
26s cb5w Rb4n dc5s ed4s. But either way I support now this variant more than Dg3 capture.

Title: Re: Move 25
Post by RonWeasley on Nov 20^th, 2009, 12:24pm

We had 8 mobsters vote and the result was ... a tie. The winners were the trap the cat with D->g3 and Ef4w cg4w Dh4w Re2e. I flipped a coin, as is appropriate for a tie, and the Ef4w cg4w Dh4w Re2e move won.

If we lose, we can blame it on this move.

Title: Re: Move 25
Post by Hippo on Nov 21^st, 2009, 1:23am

on 11/20/09 at 12:24:02, RonWeasley wrote:

Do I understand it well that voting si get from this discussion? Or is the voting somewhere else?

Title: Re: Move 25
Post by Simon on Nov 21^st, 2009, 11:08am

No, you send an email to RonWeasley asking to be added to the voting group and when a vote occurs you get an email enabling you to vote. See the "About this Game" thread. Voice votes occur here of course.