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I encountered an infinite loop situation today.
Grey's situation is forced. Orange is risky.

If orange plays 6-2, he pushes the kitten out. Then grey plays 5-1 and pushes orange's kitten out too.

It's not good to let grey turn the kitten into a cat (like 4-1), but that's the only outcome. This will most likely result in grey having a superiority of pieces on the field.
So it seems like the best outcome for orange here is an infinite loop. That is a tie.

I don't know if the mechanics of a draw is built in here by repeating moves like Chess or Go.

Here's a continuation that will still be in orange's favor. You play a kitten on 2-3. This pushes a grey kitten off the board, preventing the all 8-feline rule. It sets you up for a 1 cat + 2 kitten promotion. And grey cannot promote 3 kittens because they're guarding your 2 cats from winning the game.
You might wonder what happens if grey promotes on 4-3:
That's fine. You can promote as well. It's an even trade, and you'll end up with 1 more cat than grey.
You could also play a kitten on 4-2 instead to push the opponent's kitten off the board, and orange is slightly ahead. Grey may respond with a cat on 6-4.

BoopMaster wrote: ↑26 April 2024, 14:27

You may also wonder about putting a kitten on 4-2 instead to push the opponent's kitten off the board and create a threat to win. But this is a very dangerous move for orange.

Code: Select all

Grey: (2 🔲 | 3 ⬛) / Orange: (1 🟨 | 1 🟥) 
🟦🟦🟥🟦🟦🔲
🟦🟦🟨🟦🟦🟦
🟦🟦🟦🟦⬛🟦
🟦🟨🟦🟦🟦🟦
🟦🟥🟥⬛🟦🟦
🟦🟦🟦🟨🟦🟦

This will graduate your pieces at (4,2), (5,3) and (6,4) though, so it is not even creating a threat to win.

Oh, I missed that. I'm not used to staring at emojis. And I keep forgetting if I subtracted a number from the pool or not.

Time to edit!

Hey,

I also wondered about this loops. Of course, maybe you can always find a better continuation than repeating moves, but it does not explain - what will happen if both players decide to repeat (maybe because there is nothing better or maybe because they cannot find it. Or maybe they don't want to take risk - the reason is not important here).

The most simple example of loop is: from the beginning of the game, on player puts kitten on (1,2), and the second on (2,1). Again - what then?

In my opinion, it should lead to a draw after a few repeats.

I haven't checked it, but if I understand it properly, in such situation, a game is simply lost by the player that will run out of time.

For me, it shouldn't work like that.