HSC Season 6 Week 8: Othello

[missioncontrol]

51 - 13

[aftermac]

13-0

 

Glad I decided to play one last game tonight!

 

Shouldn't the challenge be who can shutout the computer with the lowest score? This would mean you made the quickest work of the computer. Either way, I accomplished my goal for the week...

 

Edited October 24, 2008 by aftermac

[aftermac]

This does count seperate from my previous post, right?

 

I'm not sure... in the challenge Ze_ro says: "Eliminate all the oppositions pieces from the board, and you win the game by default!"

[+Random Terrain]

51-13

 

 

I think that's about as good as it gets for me. Must have taken me over 20 games to beat the computer by more than what I did before. Now I'll go back to playing Othello on my web site. At least that has an Undo feature.

[shadow460]

40-24

Edited October 24, 2008 by shadow460

[Lauren Tyler]

If I can't beat the computer on the easiest setting (I think I only beat him once, and that was with a sudden turnover on the last move,) then I doubt I'll do well on the hardest setting. If I get any better I'll give a try.

[Lauren Tyler]

51-13

 

 

I think that's about as good as it gets for me. Must have taken me over 20 games to beat the computer by more than what I did before. Now I'll go back to playing Othello on my web site. At least that has an Undo feature.

 

I'd kill for a GNU Othello or some other PC version that's of a good quality.

[Hornpipe2]

I'd kill for a GNU Othello or some other PC version that's of a good quality.

 

Iagno comes pre-installed with a lot of Gnome-based Linux distros...

[aftermac]

15-0

 

Slight shutout improvement.

 

[Lauren Tyler]

I'd kill for a GNU Othello or some other PC version that's of a good quality.

 

Iagno comes pre-installed with a lot of Gnome-based Linux distros...

 

I don't use Linux. Sorry. ^^;

[Deteacher]

The tips really helped! Thanks! New score for me: 47-17.

 

Still can't figure out how to force a shutout. Level 3 is pretty tough, but I'm happy with the win!

[+Nathan Strum]

This will have to do it for me this week. Took me forever to win one.

 

48-16

 

[aftermac]

17-0

 

Raised my shutout score again...

 

 

...and just in case the challenge is separate (has that been determined?), I improved my non-shutout score too.

 

50-14

 

[SeaGtGruff]

51-13

 

How's this for the scoring?

 

If there's a shutout:

 

64 - Winner's Squares = Empty Squares

Winning Difference = Empty Squares + 64 = 128 - Winner's Squares

 

If there's no shutout:

 

Winning Difference = Winner's Squares - Loser's Squares

 

That way, a shutout is better than a non-shutout, and the lower the shutout score, the better the win. So the best score so far is the 13-0 shutout, which would be a winning difference of 128-13=115!

 

Michael

 

[SeaGtGruff]

On second thought, the difference varies by 2:

 

64-0 : difference 64

63-1 : difference 62

62-2 : difference 60

...

33-31 : difference 2

32-32 : difference 0

31-33 : difference -2

...

2-62 : difference -60

1-63 : difference -62

0-64 : difference -64

 

So if there's a shutout, maybe the difference should also vary by 2 for consistency?

 

...

62-0 : difference 68

63-0 : difference 66

64-0 : difference 64

...

0-64 : difference -64

0-63 : difference -66

0-62 : difference -68

...

 

Let's call it a rating instead of a difference. That would give the following general formulas:

 

Winner's rating = 192 - 2*winner - 4*loser.

Loser's rating = -(192 - 2*winner - 4*loser).

 

For example:

 

32-32 : player's rating = 192 - 2*32 - 4*32 = 192 - 64 - 128 = 0

 

64-0 : player's rating = 192 - 2*64 - 4*0 = 192 - 128 - 0 = 64

 

0-64 : player's rating = -(192 - 2*64 - 4*0) = -(192 - 128 - 0) = -64

 

62-0 : player's rating = 192 - 2*62 - 4*0 = 192 - 124 - 0 = 68

 

0-62 : player's rating = -(192 - 2*62 - 4*0) = -(192 - 124 - 0) = -68

 

So by this rating method, the best score so far is 13-0, which is a rating of 166.

 

Michael

[ClassicGMR]

34-30

 

I played for roughly 5 hours across 3 days and I FINALLY won one game on Game 3. That's TOUGH and it's all I can take!!

[+Nathan Strum]

I played for roughly 5 hours across 3 days and I FINALLY won one game on Game 3. That's TOUGH and it's all I can take!!

Glad it wasn't just me. The best I could do for the longest time was a 32-32 tie.

 

I think the only reason I finally won, is the computer made a stupid move that gave me one of the corners. But I'll take it.

[+Random Terrain]

I played for roughly 5 hours across 3 days and I FINALLY won one game on Game 3. That's TOUGH and it's all I can take!!

Glad it wasn't just me. The best I could do for the longest time was a 32-32 tie.

 

I think the only reason I finally won, is the computer made a stupid move that gave me one of the corners. But I'll take it.

As long as I avoid the danger spots, I can beat the computer almost every time, but it's hard for me to win by more than 37 most of the time.

[LoneWolfSeth]

31-33 the closest i got to beating the vcs

[shadow460]

Has it been decided if the difference in the carts matters? I'm seeing that most of the folks using text carts with no pips on the board are scoring lower than those using carts that do have pips and supposedly a picture label. I've been too lazy to dig out my picture label cart...perhaps I should.

[Hornpipe2]

Has it been decided if the difference in the carts matters? I'm seeing that most of the folks using text carts with no pips on the board are scoring lower than those using carts that do have pips and supposedly a picture label. I've been too lazy to dig out my picture label cart...perhaps I should.

I suppose it only really matters in the case where a player is going for a shutout - in that case, the picture-label plays a little more predictably and you can set up repeat games. With the text-label it will show randomness in the play so it is tougher to trap the VCS in the same way twice.

 

However for most "full" games I doubt the difference is very significant as the player is likely to be trying different things each game, too.

[shadow460]

43-21 on the picture label version with pips. I noticed a difference almost immediately between this and the text version.

[Kurt_Woloch]

OK, here's mine: 28 - 36 (twice).

[Ze_ro]

For the purposes of fair competition, I would recommend that you allow one version or the other, but not both.

I agree that there are differences, but I think they are relatively inconsequential for a relatively friendly competition like this. If you feel you can exploit the difference, then go right ahead.

 

How's this for the scoring?

A little too complicated for my tastes. I'm ranking things first by how many points you scored, then by how FEW points the computer scored. Also, I'm ranking shutouts separately (If at the end of the week, anyone has only posted a shutout, then I'll include the shutout in the main scores according to the above criteria).

 

Shouldn't the challenge be who can shutout the computer with the lowest score? This would mean you made the quickest work of the computer.

I would argue that higher scoring shutouts are far more difficult because as more pieces are laid out, there are far more options available, making it much harder to lose all your pieces.

 

--Zero

[Lauren Tyler]

Unless I can play on Level 1, which I still stink at, I'm afraid I'm sitting this week out. ^^;