[Other] A fun game

After finishing with the protocols I decided to work a bit with the time management. The next version of Mediocre will have a ton of changes; uci support, time management, a bunch of new winboard/uci commands supported, command line and more. But nothing that actually improves the calculation, although time management will help winning games of course.

I will go through what I did to the time controls in my next post. And then say a word or two about the WinBoard and UCI protocols.

Before that though here is a fun game Mediocre played against himself with 1 minute time controls (which he handles exceptionally well with the new time mangement I might say).

 1.d4 d5
 2.c4 c6
 3.Nf3 Nf6
 4.Nc3 e6
 5.Bg5 dxc4 (end of opening)
 6.e4 b5
 7.e5 h6
 8.Bh4 g5
 9.exf6 gxh4 
10.Ne4 Nd7 
11.Ne5 Nxf6 {(Nxf6 Nxc6 Bb4 Ke2) +0.85/4 0}

A typical example of the horizon effect. Black pushes back the horizon just enough with the check to miss the capture of his queen. White did not see the queen capture either, he also only saw the bishop checking. Since Mediocre's quiescent search only calculates captures, an inbetween check can be devastating.

On the next move black realizes his mistake. He will not be able to move his queen after Nxc6 since Nxf6 will be check mate with the two knights!

12.Nxc6 Nxe4 {(Nxe4 Nxd8 Bb4 Ke2) -1.88/4 0}
13.Nxd8 Bb4+
14.Ke2 Kxd8 
15.f3 Nf6 
16.a3 Ba5 
17.a4 Rb8 
18.axb5 Rxb5 
19.Qc2 e5 
20.Rd1 Bd7 
21.Qxc4 Rxb2+
22.Ke3 exd4+
23.Rxd4 Re8+

White has put himself in a whole lot of trouble, he will have to give back material or be mated. Ke3 is met by Rd2 mate. And Kf4 by Nh5 mate. Quite clumsy by white, but oh so nice. :)

24.Re4 Nxe4 
25.fxe4 Bb6+
26.Kd3 Bb5 
27.Kc3 Bxc4 
28.Kxb2 Rxe4 
29.Bxc4 Rxc4

The rest of the game is a display of poor endgame technique, but it gets the job done. :)

30.Kb3 Rg4 
31.Rd1+ Ke7 
32.Re1+ Kd6 
33.Rd1+ Bd4 
34.h3 Rf4 
35.Kc4 Ke5 
36.Re1+ Re4 
37.Rb1 f5 
38.Rb5+ Kf4 
39.Kd3 Ba1 
40.Kc2 Bd4 
41.Kd1 Bc3 
42.Kc2 Ba1 
43.Kd1 Bc3 
44.Kc2 Ba1 
45.Kd1 Bd4 
46.Kc2 Be5 
47.Ra5 Kg3 
48.Rxa7 Kxg2 
49.Ra6 f4 
50.Rxh6 Kxh3 
51.Kd3 Re3+
52.Kd2 Kg4 
53.Kc1 h3 
54.Kd2 Bc3+
55.Kc1 f3 
56.Rg6+ Kf5 
57.Rd6 f2 
58.Rd5+ Be5 
59.Kd2 f1Q 
60.Kxe3 Qe1+
61.Kf3 Qh1+
62.Ke2 Qxd5 
63.Ke1 h2 
64.Kf2 Qd2+
65.Kf1 h1Q# 0-1

Considering the poor evaluation algorithm and shallow search depth with the fast time control (4-5 ply on average) I am quite impressed by this game. There are some typical horizon mistakes, but nothing too bad.

Here is the game in .pgn format with full thinking 'comments' from both sides. fungame.pgn