Re: Advice request--classic games

"Patrick" <patrick55carroll@xxxxxxxxx> wrote in
news:1158251063.362310.309930@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx:

alexti wrote:
I'm not talking about psychological aspect at all. In this case
chess/go and bridge are uncomparable. In chess/go you always have full
information, in bridge very little information is known directly; so
most of it has to be gathered by analysing other participants'
actions. And, of course, you can't select the optimum move without
knowing the situation, which is not always easy to figure out.

Ah, well, yes--there's a difference between the hidden-information
aspect and the psychological aspect. Guess I jumped too far ahead
there.

In my mind, the two are somewhat related. When I'm playing a card game
(or any hidden-information game), I have to guess or deduce whatever I
don't know for sure (e.g., what's in my opponent's hand). But when I'm
playing *any* game, I'd be wise to also guess or deduce what's on my
opponent's mind. That's a form of "hidden information" too. If I
could read minds and know for sure what my opponent planned to do next,
it would be a huge advantage to me. But even though I can't read
minds, I can sometimes figure out what my opponent must be
thinking--and even that can provide me with a good advantage at times.

For computer-programming purposes, that poses a problem. For human
players, it doesn't; it's a pretty natural thing to do in a game.

I suppose the psychological aspect really comes in when you make a play
with the intention of influencing what your opponent is thinking. For
instance, making a bid or play in bridge which leads your opponents to
think you're setting up for one strategy, so that they'll react to
that, and then suddenly shifting to a line of play which furthers your
true strategy. Or making an unsound move in chess, at a critical
point, just to make your opponent focus on something other than what
you're really planning to do.
In full-information games (chess, go) you can make your moves purely from
the current position. Whatever opponent is planning you can play in
assumption that he will make the best response instead of trying to guess
his plans. (There's a room for psychic moves, especially in blitz games -
sometimes making suboptimal move that leads to a lot of complications when
your opponent flag is about to drop will work better than more sound move
that leads to obvious play).

Misleading bids and plays have place in bridge, but generally they are not
very common. The main reason is that the opponent doesn't know the
situation either and instead of misleading you he risks to mislead his
partner. Besides, without the full information it's often hard to foresee
where misleading action will push the opponents (they may end up doing
something you really wouldn't want them to do). Because of that, one can be
a very good player without using psychs, counter-psychs and similar moves.
But of course, there's a lot of beauty in those victories that result from
psyching (and they're usually remembered much longer than psych-caused
disasters :>)

Alex.
.

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