Fortress

The rules of this game can be found here.

Jan Wolter previously reported a Fortress win rate of 20.24%. My solver reports a similar win rate:

See Michael Keller's article How to Win at Fortress.

Chessboard

Chessboard is the same game as Fortress, except that the player can choose which rank to use as the base of the foundations. Essentially, the player gets to choose one of 13 different games of Fortress to play (whichever one seems the most favorable). The odds of being able to win at least one game out of 13 Fortress deals is about 94.7%, so this might seem like what Chessboard's win rate should be. However, it's actually a fair amount less: 73.2%. I suspect a major reason for this, is because for deals that have few available moves at the beginning of a game (or if it is otherwise difficult to empty any columns), choosing a different base rank won't help this situation, unless doing so allows cards to be played to the foundations that open up additional moves.

Any comments are welcome, please send to Mark Masten at:

Last modified January 27, 2022

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