THE PERFECT 7-PIECE CHECKERS DATABASE¹

Article type: Research Article

Authors: Trice, E. | Dodgen, G.²

Affiliations: Hatfield, Pennsylvania, USA

Note: [1] This note is an abbreviated and updated version of the article The 7-piece perfect play lookup database for the game of checkers published in Advances in Computer Games – Many Games, Many Challenges (eds. H.J. van den Herik, H. Iida, and E.A. Heinz), pp. 211-230. It is partly republished here with the permission of the authors, editors, and publisher for which the Editorial Board of the ICGA Journal would like to thank the persons involved.

Note: [2] Gothic Chess Federation. GothicChessInfo@aol.com; GilDodgen@cox.net, http://www.GothicChess.org

Abstract: Many research teams and individuals have computed endgame databases for the game of chess which use the distance-to-mate metric, enabling their software to forecast the number of moves remaining until the game is over. This is not the case for the game of checkers. Only one programming team has generated a checkers database capable of announcing the distance to the terminal position. This note examines the benefits and detriments associated with computing three different types of checkers endgames databases, demonstrates a 253-ply solution to the longest win in the 7-piece checkers database, and demonstrates a winning improvement to a common checkers ending dating back to 1756.

DOI: 10.3233/ICG-2003-26403

Journal: ICGA Journal, vol. 26, no. 4, pp. 229-238, 2003