Colour bug during self-play Hex, Havannah

3 replies. Last post: 2003-08-23

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Colour bug during self-play
  • Alan Turing at 2003-08-22

    Dear Hex Forum,

    Today I noticed, to my great surprise, that not only could I invite myself to a game of Hex on my player info page, but I could also accept the invitation and start playing. This is not necessarily an oversight by Richard, and even if it is, playing against oneself might be a good way to try out different strategies.

    However, on my second move (I decided not to swap) the piece I placed was red, even though it was the blue player's turn. The programmer in me thought: “Aha! The site checks if the red player equals the player who just made the move, and places a red piece if true, otherwise it places a blue piece.”

    If we're to keep this “self-play” feature on the site (and I repeat, I think it's great) we've at least got to do something about the color bug. Otherwise the red side is surely going to win.

    The game I'm talking about is game #73980, by the way.

    Sincerely,

    -- Alan

  • David J Bush ★ at 2003-08-22

    I doubt Richard ever intended people to use this “feature.” If you wish to analyze your games or any Hex position, I recommend the freeware Jhex. You would need a Java Runtime Environment, which is also free. I could try to help if you have any difficulty getting it to work. My email is twixt@cstone.net

    Jhex allows you to examine and store entire branching trees of variations, not just a single line. It has lots of nice bells and whistles. BTW Jtwixt is also available on the same website.

  • Alan Turing at 2003-08-23

    Thank you. :) I already have JHex, though I haven't gotten around to learning it really well yet. What I hear you saying, David, is that hex players don't need the self-play feature at lg because we already have JHex.

    I, too, doubt that Richard has considered what happens when one invites oneself to a game. That's why I wanted to discuss it. My guess is that he will either disable the possibility altogether (the easy alternative) or rewrite the colour selection code (which, I imagine, requires slightly more work).

    I have not tried out the effects in other games, but I imagine that they are similar. Maybe the easiest option is just to make it impossible to invite oneself. Although I still have trouble letting go of the idea. :)

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