Composition of basic heuristics for the game 2048

2048 is a simple and intriguing sliding block puzzle game that has been studied for several years. Many complex solvers, often developed using neural nets are available and capable of achieving very high scores. We are, however, interested in using only basic heuristics, the kind that could be conceivably employed by human players without the aid of computation. A common way to implement a 2048 solver involves searching the game tree for the best moves, choosing a move and scoring the game board using some evaluation functions.