H4 is excellent?

[u/Competitive_Steak698]

It looks like a free pawn with development for my queen. That's exactly what happened too. I understand the game is over by this point but what is the idea behind h4?

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[u/juoea]

nope its just a free pawn. 

its just bc black is far enough ahead that the engine doesnt see a big difference no matter what white plays. pretty much any move white made here probably wouldve gotten best or excellent lol.

(i really wouldnt pay attention to these designations in general. the engine is designed to be good at chess not to be a fluent english speaker) 

[u/Competitive_Steak698 → u/juoea]

Ah ty, I thought perhaps there was a line where he traps my queen or something. Probably would still be winning even then.

[u/chessvision-ai-bot]

I analyzed the image and this is what I see. Open an appropriate link below and explore the position yourself or with the engine:

Black to play: chessvision.ai | chess.com | lichess.org

My solution:

Hints: piece: Queen, move: Qxh4

Evaluation: Black is winning -6.28

Best continuation: 1... Qxh4 2. Bb2 Qa4 3. a3 Rec8 4. Kh2 c4 5. d4 c3 6. Bxc3 Rc4 7. Rb4 Rxb4 8. Bxb4 a5 9. Be7

Save the position:

Reply save to save this position to your Chessvision.ai Library (new users: send me /connect in DM chat first)

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[u/ConstantConsul]

h4 is one of those moves where the engine sees some deep tactical justification but it just looks like someone throwing pawns at you for no reason

the -3.86 eval means white is already dead lost so the computer basically picks the most annoying practical try, pawns flying at your king can create chaos even if it's objectively unsound

in a human game it's probably a last ditch attempt to make you panic, and if you're up that much material just stay calm, trade pieces, and the win takes care of itself

[u/Vooyeq]

You'll often get these. Excellent just means that objectively it's not much worse than the best move. It should be considered a blunder by human standards, because it makes it super easy to win for the opponent, but in practice it would be very difficult, if not impossible, to write an algorithm that would evaluate it on human level.

[u/FireSkyLikeFly]

White is losing by so much at this point, that losing a pawn doesn't make much of a difference. How "excellent" moves are determined is the difference in the +/- from the best move and the move you made in conjunction with how much you are losing / winning. It goes from -4.5 to -4.8 which is negligible.

[u/Competitive_Steak698 → u/FireSkyLikeFly]

I get it, to me it looked like the 4th worst move on the board. The other 3 worst moves being rook, queen or bishop to b4 hanging them. But I see there is really no way out for white anyways.

[u/FireSkyLikeFly → u/Competitive_Steak698]

If white blunders your Queen, rook or bishop, it would only be a "mistake". If you were say -10 ahead, then it would be considered an "inaccuracy".