Portal de Periódicos da CAPES

BEST PLAY IN FANORONA LEADS TO DRAW

2008; World Scientific; Volume: 04; Issue: 03 Linguagem: Inglês

10.1142/s1793005708001124

1793-7027

Maarten Schadd, Mark H. M. Winands, J.W.H.M. Uiterwijk, H.J. van den Herik, MAURICE H. J. BERGSMA,

Educational Games and Gamification

Fanorona is the national board game of Madagascar. The game's complexity is approximately the same as that of checkers. In this article, we present a search-based approach for weakly solving this game. It is a well-chosen combination of Proof-Number search and endgame databases. Retrograde analysis is used to generate the endgame databases in which every position with 7 or fewer pieces on the board has been solved. Then, a Proof-Number search variant, PN 2 , exploits the databases to prove that the game-theoretical value of the initial position is a draw. Future research should develop techniques for strongly solving the game.