SmokeYou - quiet man 2 Open 48-hour Ladder game

Strategy Guide - Information Management

Example Game #1
SmokeYou - quiet man 2
Open 48-hour Ladder game

This game illustrates the priority that can be placed on information. Watch as both players hide their pieces while maintaning an agressive posture.

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Green 12: Green moves a recon to where Yellow's 1 can capture. The 1 was visible to Green which makes the move that much more unusual. I can hypothesize that some major pieces are behind the Recon and Green might have been probing for a quick attack but I didn't get too fixated on that hypothesis. It's also possible that Green had just reached the limit of his advance and opted to go forward rather that backward. The Recon, being already known to Yellow, was then a good piece to trade off.

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Green 13: Green recaptures with a 1 on d5 which was to be expected as he knew Yellow would capture on that square with a 1. More interesting this move is Green's accompanying comment: "Can't let you see what is behind 5d :-)." which seems to refer to the move of the 2 forward to block the Yellow Recon. I found this rather perceptive as Green has not yet seen the Recon on c4. Certainly, guessing Recon for the c4 piece is reasonable, a Recon would be expected in the front row on that half of the board and move 12 did not reveal one making the b4 occupant the likely suspect. Still, acting on that and dangling the 2 on c5 was a gutsy play.

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Green 15: Green has presented the pieces on e5 and e6 as either a Sab or a 5. I make a note.

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Green 16: Green captures the Recon on c4 sight-unseen. That Yellow didn't capture Green's 1 first pretty much meant that c4 was either a Sab or a Recon and in either case Green's trading a 1 for it was reasonable. I'm pleased with Green's perceptiveness and I'm confident that this game is going to get very interesting.

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Yellow 16: I reveal one of the masquerading pieces to be a Recon.

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Yellow 19: I place the 3 on d5 next to one Recon and the 1 on f4 next to another. If I can exchange a 1 or Recon for a Recon I am perfectly willing to exchange the 3 for his third Recon.

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Yellow 21: I reveal another hitherto unseen piece by playing the 1 to h5. That brings to 8 the number of pieces that Green has made visible. Green has also taken a Recon sight unseen, but is likely treating the captured piece as a Recon so lets call it 9 known pieces. Yellow only knows 6.

The advance of the 1 is a logical continuation of what has come already. Yellow suspects that the is a Recon on h6 or i6 and Yellow is going to make a play for that Recon as well.

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Yellow 22: I was a little disappointed not to find a Recon on h6. There are a lot of ways to play this, some of which include the capture on d6 but I opted for a little misrepresentation by trying to pass the 2 moving to i4 as a Recon. If I didn't have a cluster of Recons there already I would have played the Recon from f4 to g4 as it was already visible, but tha would have necessitated moving the 4 from g4 to h4 which is what I would have expected Green to plan for.

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Green 34: An interesting move. Green has been making nice progress the last 10-15 moves . . .he's been advancing without revealing much. Showing the 5 is an interesting play in that it tosses a new variable into an equation that favored Green to this point. Green had an edge in space and an edge in information but now information is equal (or slightly, if temporarily, in Yellow's favor) while Green also trades off an advanced piece. Green must be pretty happy to get the 4 for the 5 while still having all four of his Sab's hidden. Yellow, on the other hand, has two Recon's still hidden and is aiming to reveal the e5 and e6 pieces, both of which have been represented as Sabs or 5s already in this game. Time will tell if the 4 was worth what Green gave-up here.

An interesting aside here on initial set-ups. Yellow is playing with an unprotected base. That means that Green does not need to keep a Sab around to get to the base (Recons are better now). However, with this trade, Green needs to keep as many Sabs as possible around to handle Yellow's extra 5. Yellow, extra piece in hand (no decoy in one of the corners) is more than likely playing to win on the board without a base capture, so he does not need to retain Sabs either. So, if both players have protected a base, swapping the 5 for a 4 is relatively better than making the exchange if one (or both) of the players do not have a protected base.

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Yellow 37: Yellow gives a 2 for a Recon. I like to give the 2 for the Recon in general. Here, because Green has 4 Recons remaining and has already revealed many Yellow pieces the play is more debatable. I know, however, that Green is tracking which of his pieces have been revealed. However, at this point I have 2 recons he has not seen and I would like to keep them hidden . . . removing his eyes will help. The advantage of keeping them hidden is this: if he does not know what pieces I have seen or what pieces are Recons he is hampered in his ability to bluff. I know SmokeYou is a very good bluffer, I'm going to work to limit his options. Also, I suspect that the speed at which pieces are being revealed will decrease dramatically.

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Green 42: Green offers a trade of 1s. I decline as finding a removing his Sabs is my priority at the moment. 1s are useful for such things.

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Yellow 43: The 1 played to h5 is a "?" to Green. It's here serving two purposes. 1. Keep the Recon on h7 at bay. Give the option of a simultaneous h5:h6 and i5:i6.

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Yellow 44: A quick on the neglected side. It doesn't work out well. I reveal a Recon on each side, but am going to get no threats out of this. As I have 4 recons to Green's 3 keeping as many pieces hidden as possible is to my advantage. Still, to quote the message I sent with the move: "I think I need to establish my potential for recklessness to keep you honest in future matches. :)"

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Yellow 50: After several moves of simply not allowing my pieces to be revealed, I reveal his piece on f6. This piece happens to be a Sab, making 2 of his that I have revealed. The more of these I can see the better my 5 stands against his 4. This piece had long ago been represented as either a Sab or a 5 so I come up with the Sab in support suspecting Sab or 5. Because my Sab on f4 is a "?" to Green and I have at least 1 of every type of piece as yet unrevealed there is almost no risk in my move. He can't gamble a big piece against the unknown f4 and my 3 on g5 can take off a small piece if he captures on f5.

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Green 51: Green retreats the Sab. The Sab is more valuable to him than the Recon at this point.

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Yellow 51: Hiding the 1, which is unknown to Green, on the left. The g7, h7 and h8 pieces are "?" to Yellow, but only the 3on g5, 5on i4 and Recon on f5 are known to Green on that side of the board. I give Green a chance to make a mistake.

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Green 52: Well played. He mentions with the move that there were a lot of ways he could have gone here.

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Green 53. Offering to swap Recons. Not a good move for Green in my opinion as dropping down to two recons here could be troublesome.

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Green 54: Offering a Sab + info for a Recon trade. Yellow jumps on this though Recon takes Recon and then, if Green's Recon recaptures, Yellow can play 3 takes Recon leaving Green with 1 Recon on one edge of the board and Yellow with 11 unidentified movable pieces is probably at least as good. However, I opted for the less risky play that was consistent with my aim since trading the 4 for the 5 . . . remove Green's Sabs.

An aside on positioning. There is some odd positioning in this game. All the visible recons alone in the center was amusing, but some other idiosyncracies should be explained. Yellow has a 5 on the a file and a 4 in the back. Normally, big pieces want to be where the action is or where it will be. In the absence of action or expected action they should be where they can reach future action . . . usually this means near the center. Here, however, I have a 5 on a4 and a 4 on g2. Both of these pieces are "?" to Green and by keeping them on odd squares I am hoping to gain an element of surprise when they are revealed. Also, I will attempt to represent different pieces as a 4 and as a 5 elsewhere on the board.

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Green 55 - Yellow 56: With my 56th move I sent along the following note:

"That was an interesting move on your part. When you played the piece to e6 protecting the Recons you represented it as a 3 or higher.

I then played a piece, which I don't believe you have identified, to e3. I was thinking this forces the relocation of the e5 and e6 pieces because I am now threatening 3 takes e5 and e3 to e4.

By your not retreating, I am now left wondering if either you have a 3 on e6 and are willing to sacrifice the Recon and exchange 3s for the chance that my e3 move was a bluff coupled with moving my 3 out of the way your Recon so you can identify the e3, g4, g5 pieces OR if you were thinking that if I failed to take on e5 it would show the e3 piece to be less than a 5. Or, perhaps, I'm reading too much into this. :)"

It may remind some of an exchange from The Princess Bride, but the move sequence reminded me of my Dark Chess games with Ricardo Poleschi (tenuki). With Ricardo, I could assume a certain level of insight on his part and set my trap accordingly. Could I do the same here with SmokeYou? I had played the unknown piece to e3 on my 55th move assuming Green would recognize the threat and back-up. Green did not and I'm left guessing whether or not he didn't see the threat or if he saw it and bluffed back. In the short term, I opt to keep the 3 on f5 to block his Recons while I work to reveal his ? on e6.

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Green 57 - Green sends a message with this move indicating an incoming attack, but I'm not really buying into it. It is, of course, possible that Green will charge up the middle hoping to blindly strike 2 or 3 of my back-row pieces. I have done that myself and consider it reasonable gamble, but I don't think that's happening here. Even if it was, my base is safe where it is. Green needs to acquire more info before he can attack and I suspect he is looking for a reaction here.

An aside, I happen to have my base in the corner in this game and I do try to move it around. I have a slight preference toward keeping it in the middle as I find it easier to defend there, but remaining unpredictable is paramount.

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Yellow 59 - Green offers to trade 3s, but I decline. He has an extra 2, so I'd rather not make it more powerful by trading off a piece that can take it. Also, the is working as a nice road block. Of course, there is always the chance that I would capture so the piece on e6, which I have not identified, is almost certainly a 3+.

I also allow Green the chance to capture on b4. Green declines, as expected as my Recons are worth little at the moment as I have three remaining and Green has only seven moving pieces that are unidentified. I played the 1 back to a3 so he could not see it by playing the Recon over, this also muddies the waters on which of my unknowns (now on a3 and b3) I am representing as the big piece that protects the 3 after the hypothetical 2 takes Recon and ? on b6 goes to b5, 3 takes 2, ? takes 3.

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Green 61 - The Recon moves forward revealing the Sab.

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Yellow 61 - My Sabs are of minimal value to me, so I swap off. I am now a legitimate threat to swap a 3 for a Recon. I still have 10 moving pieces that Green has not identified and they all become 5s if I can remove another of Green's Recon. :)

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