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        Arimaa >> General Discussion >> Blindfold Arimaa
        
(Message started by: CraggyCornmeal on Jul 19^th, 2015, 7:22am)

Title: Blindfold Arimaa
Post by CraggyCornmeal on Jul 19^th, 2015, 7:22am

Clyring and Browni have written a program for playing Arimaa blindfolded!

You submit and receive moves using notation, never seeing the actual board.

(I realize that Clyring and Browni are far better suited to explain their program, but Clyring told me there's no thread about it yet, so I thought I'd kick things off.)

The program is here (http://pastebin.com/8cQn2fjF) and you can read Clyring explaining how to use it in the chatroom archive (http://arimaa.com/arimaa/chat/arch.php) on July 19, 2015, from 08:50 to 10:15 UTC.

I'll try to summarize the the process:

1. Start a bot with you playing gold.

Being gold prevents you from seeing the bot's setup before you can get the program started. It also allows you to set up the program without losing any clock time.

Even if you're a strong player, you'll want to begin with a really weak bot, like ArimaaScoreP1. Or play a CC bot like GnoBot2004CC to give yourself extra time to get oriented on each move.

2. Hit Ctrl+Shift+J. The JS console will open in a new window.

3. Paste the script from here (http://pastebin.com/8cQn2fjF) into the JS console and hit enter.

The board on the game window will vanish!

4. Widen the game window a bit so you can see the bot's whole setup when it comes in.

5. Choose from three types of functions to send moves in the JS console:

• sendset('') is for setup moves. For example, sendset('RHCEMCHR/RRRDDRRR') creates the gold 99of9 setup, and the silver version would be the same thing in lowercase. The / separates the front row from the back row.

• send('') requires standard arimaa notation. For example, send('Ed2n Ed3n Ed4n Hb2n').

• sh('') allows for a mildly shortened Arimaa notation, decompressing consecutive steps. For example, sh('Ed2nnn Hb2n').

6. The bot's moves will appear in the game window.

7. Have fun! Don't despair over your initial horrific failures. Delight in the opportunity to exercise your mind.

You can laugh at my first attempt (http://arimaa.com/arimaa/games/jsShowGame.cgi?gid=358681&s=w). I got confused and timed out on move 4!

Clyring shows what you can achieve with a little practice (http://arimaa.com/arimaa/games/jsShowGame.cgi?gid=358674&s=b).

Tips:

• If When you send an illegal move, the JS console will say, "The gameserver rejected your move." No worries, you haven't lost the game. Just send another move. Hopefully this time it'll be legal.

• The bot's setup may appear out of order. For example, in my game I received "ra8 rb8 rc8 dd8 de8 rf8 rg8 rh8 hb7 ra7 cc7 md7 ee7 cf7 rh7 hg7". It's just a standard 99of9, but I thought the horses were on a7 and h7.

• When playing as silver, open the JS console and hide the board from yourself before looking at the bot's setup.

• Don't forget to type an x for captures. For example, send('Ed5n Ed6e Ee6e Ef6x Hb2n') or sh('Ed5neex Hb2n').

• If you get flustered or disoriented, just send a simple one-step move like sh('Ed2n').

I've only played one game of Blindfold Arimaa and I know virtually nothing about coding, so I apologize if my instructions could be better. But this should be enough to get you started, and I'm sure Clyring or Browni will answer your questions.

I don't know much about screen readers, but I think this program could also allow blind people to play Arimaa. This may not be its intended purpose, but it would be incredibly cool.