Did I let computer escape?

Normally I'm hammered left right and center but here is a game where I felt I could of done better (I was black)

Although haven't analyzed it deeply, here are some questions. Why 44... hxg6? Perhaps h6 as it would be protected from the white Knight in some future. Then 45 ... Ba2? That lets the Bishop be cornered and apart from the threats, it's not effective there. What about Be2?

Exchanging the pieces is not an advantage here IMO, Bishop has more power than Knight in most end games, faster maneuvering, more reach!

Anyway 48 ... exd5 is the give-away. The King still can outrun the advancing d pawn but not after giving it a "free" move to e6. The difference is one King step.,,,,

The mistake was you playing for a win in a drawn position.
A common error...trust me on this. 🙁



Here you played 43... Ka5 trying to push home your passed pawn.
Now the Black King cannot get into the White's e-pawn 'square' so then
a timed d4-d5 will create a passed e-pawn which the Black King after exd5
and e6 will not be able to stop.

So it looks like 43....Kc6 giving up all hope of winning stops all the d4-d5 tricks.

After you played 43....Ka5 it played 44.g6.



Your hackles your have risen here. Computers do not play moves like this unless
it's to stop some deep human unfathomable checkmate in 20 moves or it has done
some cold calculation. This looks like the latter.

So having determined you probably do not have a checkmate in 20 moves you
have to stop and figure out why it played 44.g6. These things do not blunder pawns.

It is obviously planning d4-d5 and a pawn on g6 of any colour stops or slows down
Be2 and Bh5 moves which allows the Bishop to cover the queening square e8.

Here.



You played 45...Ba2 and it now has an easy win with 46.Kb2 swapping
pieces and playing d4-d5. The King can run back instead of taking of d5
but after dxe6. The Black King has to take to long way round to get to e7
due to the double e-pawns controlling d6 and d7.
Meanwhile the White King picks up the b-pawn and plays Kc5.

45...Be2 had to be tried. In answer to 46.d5 exd5 47.e6 you may
have b4+ and Bb5. I cannot see a 100% White win but fear the worst,
I've no idea how deep it went when playing g6.

44.Ne3 without g6 still wins if the Bishop goes to a2 but it
would not have been expecting that. It's a blunder.

Originally posted by greenpawn34
The mistake was you playing for a win in a drawn position.
A common error...trust me on this. 🙁

[fen]8/6pp/1k2p3/1p2P1P1/2bP3P/2K5/2N5/8 b - - 0 43[/fen]

Here you played 43... Ka5 trying to push home your passed pawn.
Now the Black King cannot get into the White's e-pawn 'square' so then
a timed d4-d5 will create a passed e-pawn which the Bla ...[text shortened]... still wins if the Bishop goes to a2 but it
would not have been expecting that. It's a blunder.

Hi GP,

I love this post, especially the remarks about 44. g6. My initial impression was that it was a brilliant positional move based on what you were thinking and on the idea that the pawns were now weak and frozen in place for later harvesting. Shades of Ulf Andersson!

I also thought the way you did, that the computer must have justified this by calculating, so I plugged the position into Komodo 8 to compare.

Komodo 8 gives 44. Ne3 as winning, and the next 4 candidates (of which g6 is one) as dead even. I think it confirms your analysis, as the black king moving to the a-file is simply a losing move.

My guess is that the OP's computer at "level 7" could not see beyond a certain point, and so went with an evaluation to it's horizon that looked the most promising.

An alternative is that the computer at "level 7" does not always play the top-rated move (if level 7 is not the computers top level), and so played an inferior one to meet the requirements of playing at that particular level.

Hard to say, but chess programs have heuristics and algorythms that go beyond brute calculations, and this might be one of those times.

In any event, this is a very nice position from which to learn, with valuable lessons to carry forward.

Hi Paul,

So it saw something it liked or didn't like and tossed the g-pawn.

Thought I was missing something really crafty when I could not see a solid win after Be2.
(I nearly never posted because I'd look foolish (again!) for missing it.
I gave the computer too much credit. I thought these things no longer fell foul to
the 'horizon effect'. Wonder what it saw and when it stopped looking.

Hi thanks Greenpawn for the analysis. I was thinking "man I've got you" with trying to play Ka5. Was an enjoyable game though!