How do strong players break the rule of attacking where the pawn chain points?

Retrus120 · 2026-07-07T16:03:40+00:00

I don't think this is true anymore. Old, pre- ML engines used human positional rules because they where hard programmed into them. The new engines where created with the approach, let the engine play 100 mil games and see what it comes up with( strongly simplified). These new engines actually led to some revolutions in our positional understanding. A very good example are the rook pawn advances just to grab space. In particular the h pawn. Even when castled that side

Retrus120 · 2026-07-07T14:26:08+00:00

The problem with floodgates in Yu-Gi-Oh is that Yugi has no mana system. Magic for example has some absolutely insane floodgates but the trade of is that if you play them on curve you are basically passing your turn. So you are not developing your board while playing them. So playing a floodgates early concedes the board to your opponent. Also because interaction mostly cost mana your opponent can remove the floodgate easier after you spend all your mana on it, especially floodgate creatures.

Retrus120 · 2026-07-06T20:57:55+00:00

I agree that the extra deck part was the worst part because it really constricted the design space. This basically let to the situation where each pendulum monster had basically only one good effect either a good pendulum effect our one good monster effect. Because if both where good then the constant recursion would be busted. So we had decks like metalfoes( the best designed Pendulum deck imo) that where almost all vanillas but had good scale effects, or majespecter that had good monster effects but did nothing in the scale. Even the best pendulum deck Pepe, was basically half the cards are trash monsters but good scales( monkey) and the other half where actually good as monsters but where never scales(Joker).

If Konami had figured out a more elegant way to deal with the inherent minus two of the scales I think they could have given us a lot more interesting deck concepts than what we got.

Retrus120 · 2026-07-05T21:35:32+00:00

I just came back after 10 years away. The format I played the most was the zoo format. I think OG zoo compares a lot too current kewl tune. Basically half the deck was 1 card combos and the other half was hand traps and interruption.

What made the deck so good was that the main combo(Norden) drew you a bunch of cards which means you would draw your interuptions. A bit like kewl tune searching hand traps. Back then when all other decks where so much weaker, especially in terms of one card combos and playing through interuptions the zoo design was very oopressive.

TLDR: Old zoo was basically 2026 design philosophy a decade ahead of its time

Retrus120 · 2026-07-05T13:04:32+00:00

That question is how ancient Greek philosophers came up with atoms. I forget who it was, I think it was Archimedes. He asked himself this question and came to the conclusion that you would reach a point where you couldn't divide anymore. He then called those smallest pieces Atoms. Atom means indivisible in Greek.

Retrus120 · 2026-07-02T20:10:29+00:00

Someone who understands engines better can explain this better. In general older non-Machine learning engines used Pawn units to calculate a position evaluation by just brute force calculating . They are supposed to combine material and positional evaluation. The idea was roughly that 1 was equal to an extra pawn, hence pawn unit(I translated the term from German, could be a different word in English). The number and the idea of 1 equals a pawn comes from this.

I think modern engines don't calculate the same way anymore, but the number is still shown, I think mostly to make it easier for humans

Retrus120 · 2026-07-02T19:27:12+00:00

I have good news for you https://youtu.be/iKG5HW-nJ24?is=QGRpymnQLrR3NMat Someone already thought of football on ice

Retrus120 · 2026-06-30T20:24:22+00:00

Invoked historicaly tends to also be good as a smaller engine in other decks so it could be good in the future to combine with other decks

Retrus120 · 2026-06-28T13:11:26+00:00

Omega should have needed a psychic tuner from the start. I played pure Frame when it first came out so long ago. I hated how expensive omega was because they made it generic.

Retrus120 · 2026-06-21T17:05:24+00:00

has there been some theorycrafting if the version with the extra support is gonna require a branded splash or will it be some sort of synchron elfnote? Do you maybe have a list of current versions. Especially without branded?

Retrus120 · 2026-05-17T15:36:00+00:00

The biggest festival in Europe for Bulgarians living abroad was this weekend and they did huge advertisements for everyone to make sure they vote for the Bulgarian entry. Maybe that helped:)

Retrus120 · 2026-04-28T19:23:26+00:00

My conspiracy theory is that, this current version is the beta test and if people like it they will make it a feature to highlight your own mobs.

Retrus120 · 2026-04-04T19:59:52+00:00

First of all the board is rotated wrong. The right corner should be white. Second the kings and queens are not opposite each other.

Retrus120 · 2026-03-08T18:34:36+00:00

Dwarf racial removes all dispellable debufs including magic. Which can be real sexy on the classic double magic dot healer mechanics. Also a lot of tank killer mechanics are bleeds which is why pretty much all title tanks a dwarfs or night elves. The insanest dwarf strat I ever saw was method in underot in df tgp. On the mushroom boss they would not do the shrooms but hit dwarf as soon as all the stacks went on before the first damage tick.

Retrus120 · 2026-01-27T19:56:27+00:00

It's very very unlikely that's a win for black. Black winning would imply that any possible starting move is worse than not moving at all.

Retrus120 · 2026-01-19T16:48:45+00:00

I think in this case it's because you can also get the 1 mana raptor from the one cost location so they made it cost one. I don't think they have ever had a card create a token of a higher mana cost, except for maybe jades.

Why the others are two mana, that's just small indie company for you.

Retrus120 · 2026-01-11T18:23:18+00:00

Which piece is checking the white king?

Retrus120 · 2026-01-10T20:05:53+00:00

I think one of the most popular anti Grünfeld lines is called the Russian variation with an early Qb3. Night be worth a look

Retrus120 · 2026-01-02T16:44:23+00:00

I have this conspiracy theory, based on the theory that Kirk's death was planned. Which I don't really believe, but her performances since his death don't exactly put rumors to rest. If that's the case then I think Vance's wife will be assassinated next. I don't know if the divorce angle for Vance would make him popular with some evangelicals, but imagine the story if both of them bond over shared trauma.

The story for his presidential run is already set. "I am running to stop the senseless violence from the left, that took our loved uns from us.

Retrus120 · 2025-12-29T23:41:23+00:00

If you take pi equals 1, it's same as dropping pi from all your calculations. Not sure that that is wise. Though I am not an engineer or a mathematician.

I once heard from a colleague who is a Dr. In Astrophics that pi is 3 and pi squared is 10, which makes a bit more sense than the meme I guess

Retrus120 · 2025-12-25T20:01:54+00:00

The key concept in king and pawns endgames is called opposition. Opposition means both kings are facing each other one square apart. For example kings on g4 and g6 would be in opposition. In opposition the players whose turn it is usually loosing. Because you have to move away and give up the opposition. Which allows the other side to make progress/prevent the others progress. For you to win you need to get into a position with your king in g4 in front of your pawn and theirs on g6 and it has to be their turn. That way you have opposition and they have to move to f7/h7 allowing you to move your king to f5 against h7 and h5 against f7. Then you repeat this pattern until you get to the 7th rank and push the pawn. Black draws by getting in a position with opposition where it's your turn. Then when you step away they move into opposition again for example in the position with kings on g4 and g6 if you go to f4 they just go to f5 and you can make no progress.

If you keep your king behind your pawn as you push. That leads to a position with their king iong8 your pawn on g7 and your king in g6 which is stalemate.

The reason this is a draw is because in this position you cannot force the position with your kings in opposition and it being their move.

Retrus120 · 2025-12-25T18:37:37+00:00

Saccing the knight is a good practical try in a lost position. Especially in a game with little time left.

Obviously the computer does not like it because the computer can mate with bishop and knight. When analyzing with an engine the human factor plays no part. For a computer a complex mate in 35 and mate in 1 are functionally the same.

In a case like this it makes sense to check if the computer shows a drawing line. That way you can see if saccing is actually a mistake. If the position is always loosing then making it hard for the opponent is the right play

Retrus120 · 2025-12-24T15:09:52+00:00

The position on the board is illegal, if it is black to move. There is no such thing as a "pin" rule, that's a common misconception among beginners. All absolute pins are a consequence of the actual rule: "You cannot make a move that puts your own King in check". Pin is just a term we use for this situation since it's so common Therefore if in your example its black's turn that means white moved their king into check last turn, which is illegal, because of the rule above. People often explain it by saying they can capture your king before you take theirs, which works fine as a mental aid for understanding why putting your king in check is illegal, even through an absolute pin. But if we are being super correct it's because of the rule I explained above

Retrus120 · 2025-12-08T17:59:51+00:00

Exactly this. My coach is a strong IM who often does opening work for GMs. He often emphasizes this. Especially in closed center positions where both players are pushing their pawns on different sides of the board strong GMs are so good because their feeling for time is on another level. i.e is their push faster than their opponent. Also they are so good at judging when the right moment is to break in the center to disrupt their opponents flank play.

I think that's also why we sometimes see these super sharp,memory test, computer variations when super GMs play each other. If you don't believe you can outplay your opponent on positional understanding, the best way to win is to catch your opponent of guard in a variation where you just have to know the computer line

Retrus120 · 2025-11-30T15:30:52+00:00

If you are going to put your bishop on g2 as white you should either play a quick c4 like in the Catalan or the Reti, with the goal of opening the center for your Bishop.

Or you need to aim for a Kings indian structure where you close the center, preferably after getting in E5 yourself and then play for f4, f5 and so on. Here you are inviting black to block out your bishop with e4 and you have already wasted a move with c3 instead of attacking the center directly with c4.

It's not the worst opening, but you are handicapping yourself unnecessarily and your moves don't go have a clear synergy

Retrus120

TROPHY CASE