Re: [gnugo-devel] playing with handicap

[Paul Pogonyshev]

David G Doshay wrote:
> When people are given many handicap stones they know that the other
> player is stronger and will try to cut them apart. Does GNU Go modify
> its playing style to try harder to stay connected if it starts with a
> large handicap? Or are the same patterns and evaluations supposed to
> lead to an acceptable result because of the overall influence of the
> handicap stones?

I'm not particularly familiar with those parts of the code, but I
believe there is nothing like that conditioned specifically on
handicap.  GNU Go is written to not depend on move/game history as
much as possible, i.e. it tries to decide given the position at hand
only.

However, there are strategic decisions based on terms of score lead.
If GNU Go believes it is ahead by a lot, it will value connections
and certain other moves more.  Of course, it will consider itself
far ahead in the beginning of handicap game when playing black.  That
should be what you want, right?

Paul