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Branching factor
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<h2 id="see-also">See also</h2> <ul><li><a href="/facts/K-ary_tree/XAMJC3QW">k-ary tree</a></li> <li><a href="/facts/Outdegree/YBdfQ0um">Outdegree</a></li> <li><a href="/facts/Hierarchy/mYJyqFrG">Hierarchy</a></li> <li><a href="/facts/Hierarchical_organization/Edj1h0RE">Hierarchical organization</a></li></ul> <h2 id="references">References</h2> <ol> <li id="fn:1"><p>Levinovitz, Alan (12 May 2014). "The Mystery of Go, the Ancient Game That Computers Still Can't Win". Wired. Retrieved 2014-06-02. The rate at which possible positions increase is directly related to a game's "branching factor," or the average number of moves available on any given turn. Chess's branching factor is 35. Go's is 250. Games with high branching factors make classic search algorithms like minimax extremely costly. <a href="https://www.wired.com/2014/05/the-world-of-computer-go/" target="_blank">https://www.wired.com/2014/05/the-world-of-computer-go/</a> <a href="#fnref:1" class="footnote-back-ref">↩</a></p></li> <li id="fn:2"><p>Laramée, François Dominic (6 August 2000). "Chess Programming Part IV: Basic Search". GameDev.net. Retrieved 2007-05-01. <a href="http://www.gamedev.net/page/resources/_/technical/artificial-intelligence/chess-programming-part-iv-basic-search-r1171" target="_blank">http://www.gamedev.net/page/resources/_/technical/artificial-intelligence/chess-programming-part-iv-basic-search-r1171</a> <a href="#fnref:2" class="footnote-back-ref">↩</a></p></li> <li id="fn:3"><p>Barnes, David. "What is the average number of legal moves per turn?". Chess Stack Exchange. Retrieved 2019-06-01. <a href="https://chess.stackexchange.com/a/24325" target="_blank">https://chess.stackexchange.com/a/24325</a> <a href="#fnref:3" class="footnote-back-ref">↩</a></p></li> <li id="fn:4"><p>Levinovitz, Alan (12 May 2014). "The Mystery of Go, the Ancient Game That Computers Still Can't Win". Wired. Retrieved 2014-06-02. The rate at which possible positions increase is directly related to a game's "branching factor," or the average number of moves available on any given turn. Chess's branching factor is 35. Go's is 250. Games with high branching factors make classic search algorithms like minimax extremely costly. <a href="https://www.wired.com/2014/05/the-world-of-computer-go/" target="_blank">https://www.wired.com/2014/05/the-world-of-computer-go/</a> <a href="#fnref:4" class="footnote-back-ref">↩</a></p></li> </ol>