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Comment by yuvadam | Hacker News Reader

Are you suggesting he's cheating on move 1?

The reddit comment posted in this post says the following:

"...Now Magnus is required to play 1 move before resigning so he did so. He's basically saying: "I won't play with a known and admitted cheater, so I'm going to resign any game I'm forced to play with him" rather than doing a weird dance about skipping tournaments or forcing tournaments to not include Hans if they want Magnus to attend." - enfrozt

I'm not an expert, but I understand chess well enough to know that if a person at that level is going to cheat, they can't just play their own game and then let the computer tell them what moves will save them. They have to use the computer throughout the whole game and slyly use a combination of their moves along with computer-suggested moves. Early moves that are off the mainline but suggested by a computer would provide an interesting and safe avenue for a cheater to get his opponent off their game.

So yes, IF he was cheating, he likely would have started cheating on move 1.

Definitely not great or an expert at chess but I don't think you're correct.

I've definitely heard that knowing that puzzles are much easier for GMs/etc because they know there is a winning move in that situation. Checking the board periodically with an engine to know the evaluation would also let you know when there is a very good move to play.

Absolutely no, other GMs such as Daniel Naroditsky said that at that level they only need to get assistance at a couple of critical moments.

You cannot make that assumption at move 3.

Even at a very low intermediate level of chess, you can easily know an opening like this for 8 - 10 moves across 2 - 5 variations. I know cause I do.

Master Level Prep of the Kings Indian goes 20 moves deep across 5 - 8 possible variations. This has been demonstrated over the board several times.

It's trivial to find opening theory lessons on youtube on playing the kings indian defence covering 5+ counter lines going 10+ moves deep, even on weird lines. And then there are books about this opening.

There is zero value in starting to cheat on move 1.

The first 5-10 moves are extremely explored and chess players at this level have memorized which is the best reply in each case, what are the possible alternatives that are better for their own game style, what are the alternatives that are worse for the opponent game style, what are the unusual but not bad alternatives that can surprise the opponent. There are whole books about that. Whole libraries. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chess_opening

Probably cheating after the 5 or 10 or 15 move if the opponent did something interesting may give someone an edge, but getting help in the first of second move it's unbelievable at this level.

Note that there is a whole page in Wikipedia about all the possible good possible second move of Niemann: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alekhine%27s_Defence

It's not at all material to the point you're making, but to nitpick: Hans's first move was actually 1. d4 and thus the Wikipedia article you should be linking to is that of the Indian Defence [0], not Alekhine's Defence!

[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Indian_Defence

It kinda looks like it.

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