Emergo Problem 10
1. c45 | d6b4x | |
2. b53x | bd4x | |
3. c3e5x | d4f6x | |
4. eg5x | f75x | |
5. f64x | f53x | |
6. a12 | f35x | |
7. a2c6x | f53x | |
8. c64x | c53x | |
9. c42x | c31x | |
10. g56 | c13x | |
11. c24x | f35x | |
12. f46x | |
Bold notation indicates the player had in fact a choice of
moves. This is an idea of
Ron Jacobsen
who comments on Emergo in the letter below. I'm carefully considering
his suggestions to fix white's first move advantage after the
entering stage is over, and welcome any input on the subject.
Christiaan Freeling. |
Dear Christiaan,
I appreciate the opportunity to contribute to your publications (be they electronic or
otherwise) on the game of Emergo. This letter contains an example from actual play that
might be instructive in your Emergo Tutor. It also led me to a composed problem that you
might want to include either in the tutor, or on the Problem Page of your website.
But first I have a couple of comments and suggestions.
-
1. Emergo contains a very large number of completely forced moves as compared with
most other board games. As a result, I think it is useful in the notation to distinguish
between forced and unforced moves. When I record my games, I typically put the unforced moves
(including those where there is a choice of capture) in bold type face.
When reviewing a game record, this notational convention makes it easier to see who is
maintaining the initiative, how balanced the fight was, and where the critical decision
points were.
-
2. With regard to notation for problems, I think the term Clear in X
should be used when White is expected to capture all enemy pieces in X moves,
rather than just establish a won position. This is the equivalent of 'Mate in X' used in
chess, but in Emergo, 'mate' just doesn't sound right.
Also, again because of the large number of forced moves, I think that 'X' should
refer to the number of unforced moves. (Thus, in the problem given later
in this letter, I have specified 'Clear in 8' because white has 8 decisions to make,
even though the full lines are 12 moves long). This is important because in chess
(and I suppose other games) a problem which contained a lot of forced moves for Black would
be considered very ugly and not be taken seriously by real problemists. But you can't
avoid the forced moves in Emergo, and indeed creating very long sequences of forced moves
has artistic merit. (If fact, the first construction problem for Emergo enthusiasts probably
ought to be to construct the longest possible chain of forced moves.) By limiting 'X' in
the problem specification to only the unforced moves, we imply that the forced moves are
recognized to be of no strategic significance, and therefore are not to be considered as a
blemish on the problem.
-
3. I was wondering how you think it is best to quantify a side's material advantage in
Emergo. I assume this would be a topic in your Emergo Tutor. I like to count 'expendable'
pieces, which is the number of pieces a side has available to sacrifice without giving
back any captured pieces. This is the measure I use in a discussion below.
-
4. Finally, as you point out on your homepage, it is very difficult for Black to break
White in a correspondence game. The initiative is just too powerful. It seems to me that
this begs for a rule change to fix the problem. While I think it may be hard to reduce
the value of the initiative and remain true to the essence of Emergo, I do think it should
be possible to change the mechanics of the entering stage to create a more even fight
for the initiative. I think that someone should test the following two rules to see
if they balance the game.
- (a) Pieces can be placed on empty spaces without restriction during the entering stage,
but no jumps occur until all pieces are entered. Forestalling the jumps would allow the
construction of more complicated piece arrangements whose resolution down to a favorable
initiative would not be so easily managed by White as in the current game.
- (b) Allow one or both sides to 'reinforce' one or two pieces (i.e., build a stack of two)
during the entering stage. This would allow some defense against feeder combinations as a
two man stack cannot be as easily decapitated.
Sincerely, Ron Jacobsen
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