Pawn endings
Robert inspired me to have a look at the following position with Stockfish
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| White to move |
6k1/ppp2ppp/2p5/8/3P4/4P3/PP3PPP/6K1 w - - 2 1
This is what Stockfish came up with after half an hour and 35 ply.
The values became higher the longer Stockfish was allowed to calculate. That is usually a sign that the position might be winning. Robert has invented a whole new area of investigation here.
And when you fiddle around a bit with the King position it becomes even more convincing
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| White to move |
7k/ppp2ppp/2p5/8/3P4/3KP3/PP3PPP/8 w - - 2 1
And fiddling around with the Kings positions in the Karlsbad structure is even more convincing:
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| White to move |
After 35 ply.
updated the post
ReplyDeleteUpdated again
ReplyDeleteThere were two primary sources of inspiration for me; I’ve included this information in previous comments.
ReplyDeleteGM Emanuel Lasker:
THE REASON OF A VALUATION IS ALWAYS ITSELF YET ANOTHER VALUATION. Finally, ALL MY VALUATIONS ORIGINATE FROM MY EXPERIENCES: my first draws that called forth in me a variety of sentiments; MY FIRST ANALYSIS, WHICH WAS CRUDE AND FAULTY. From then on I valued and continued to value; and WITH PRACTICE I BECAME CAPABLE OF MORE EXACT VALUATIONS. And from this rough material is generated, BY CONTINUED TRIAL AND INTELLIGENT CRITICISM, the series of valuations by which the master arrives at his conclusions.
Lasker noted that the young men comprising the Hypermodern School were remarkable in their attitude toward the classical “rules.” They STARTED their investigations with the classical “rules” as given. He also noted the enormous work they put into bending/breaking/testing those “rules” in ways that had never occurred to anyone else previously. It was their unrelenting effort to examine the most minute details of the “rules” that enabled them to find so many exceptions—and entirely new ways of playing chess.
GM Nigel Davies:
It really doesn't matter what you study, THE IMPORTANT THING IS TO USE THIS AS A TRAINING GROUND FOR THINKING RATHER THAN TRYING TO ASSIMILATE A MIND-NUMBING AMOUNT OF INFORMATION. The reality is that YOU'VE GOT TO MOVE THE PIECES AROUND THE BOARD AND PLAY WITH THE POSITION. Who does that? Amateurs don't, GMs do…
“PLAY WITH THE POSITION” means FIDDLING AROUND WITH THE PIECE/PAWN POSITIONS and then determining WHY that “works” (or does NOT work)!
Summarizing:
JUST SHUFFLE THE FURNITURE!
Instead of just looking at a long (30 moves or more) variation or set of variations and taking GM Stockfish as gospel truth, cajole GM Stockfish to “look wide before looking deep”; not by increasing the number of candidate moves at ply 0, but by restricting the number of candidate moves and “fiddling” with the position in small ways (just as Temposchlucker did in these examples), and then having GM Stockfish take another look (or three or five. . .) at the SLIGHTLY changed position.
“Fiddling around” with ONE position consistently will go a long way toward answering the “WHY?” questions that are raised in a massive number of positions!
Musashi’s “rule” applies:
"To know ten thousand things, know ONE well."
LESS is MORE!
The above is a comment by Robert.
DeleteI fiddled even more around with the last diagram, in order to find the winning method. It turned out that I ended up with a Trébuchet. Maybe it is time to have another look at that. I remember vaguely something with key squares from long ago.
ReplyDelete