by H.G.Muller » 11 Dec 2018, 13:54
I have never tuned this myself, but the mobility bonus you propose is exactly the opposite from what one usually sees in other engines. E.g. Fruit uses 1 for Q, 2 for R and 4 for N and B, per reachable square.
As for the Pawns: you write two times rank 6, where I suppose that in the second case you mean rank 7. For rank 6 you could differentiate between passers and non-passers. In micro-Max I use bonuses of 80 and 160 cP, which could be a bit too aggressive, especially since micro-Max is ignorant about passers, and thus gives the 80 cP also to 6th-rank non-passers. Joker does know that distinction, and gives no bonus to 6th-rank non-passers at all. This is then probably an underestimate of their danger; I once saw it lose horribly against a 1000-Elo weaker opponent because it allowed an enemy Pawn to advance to h6, trapping its King on h8 and binding its Rook permanently to the back rank for preventing a checkmate there. Even 6th-rank non-passers can be a real pain in the ***.