After the failure with aspiration windows I decided to implement PVS . The idea here is that, with proper move ordering the first move is usually the best. That being the case, it makes sense to search all of the moves after the first with a minimal alpha/beta window, the goal being to prove or disprove the first move was best rather than to get a usable score. If the first move is in fact best, you’ve saved some time. If not, you have to research with the “regular” alpha/beta window.

This result is a little surprising and depressing. I’m not going to give up on PVS, but clearly the time isn’t quite right for it. I’ll have to revisit it later. This leads me to believe I should take a step back and look at move ordering. It seems to me that if PVS is a loss, that could mean the “first move is best” assertion is wrong more than we’d like, meaning move ordering is not where it should be. There are some tasks on my board related to move ordering, such as deferring losing captures until after non-captures and implementing a static exchange evaluator to aid in ordering the quiescence moves. I’ll leave the branch open and revisit this when move ordering has improved.