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Subject: Re: Nimzo 8 is my favorite to win the Dutch Open

Author: Vincent Diepeveen

Date: 18:33:28 09/25/00

Go up one level in this thread


On September 25, 2000 at 09:22:30, pavel wrote:

>On September 25, 2000 at 08:53:37, Vincent Diepeveen wrote:
>
>>On September 24, 2000 at 22:56:34, Mike S. wrote:
>>
>>>On September 24, 2000 at 22:34:50, Jorge Pichard wrote:
>>>
>>>>Of course that my second choice would have to be the King an experimental
>>>>version of the future CM8000.
>>>>
>>>>http://ourworld.compuserve.com/homepages/thstorm/partic00.htm
>>>
>>>I wonder why Quest (=Fritz) should run on a dual Celeron 433 only?
>>
>>He used dual 433 previous year.
>>
>>>Btw., Nimzo was my favourite for the London WCh. I predicted the outcome (but
>>>the participants didn't stick to my prediction):
>>
>>>http://f23.parsimony.net/forum50826/messages/515.htm
>>>
>>>For the Dutch Open, I think that - in addition to the 4 professionals - Diep
>>>(dual PIII/800), furthermore a new version of Kallisto II, and probably Patzer,
>>>are the dark horses which deserve attention.
>>
>>There are 2 programs dual at dutch open: Diep and Quest.
>>
>>However let's face it that there are 3 programs out there with a real
>>good and especially well tested book: Nimzo and Quest and Tiger.
>>From those only a single program is dual. Nimzo heavily relies upon
>>outsearching its opponents after having an openingsposition that's better
>>for it.
>>
>>The King has a book which is not that bad, but definitely not anymore
>>a 'todays' book. Further The King is an engine which plays very interesting
>>chess at slow hardware. Just sacrafice a pawn and play a cool game. At
>>nowadays programs searching 11 ply or more with very aggressive tunings,
>>that simply is getting a more hard way to play chess, as nowadays they don't
>>only swallow the pawn, but also win the game.
>>
>>apart from that, i doubt whether The King will *ever* win from DIEP,
>>as from testgames it appears that DIEP is the worst opponent for The King,
>>as DIEP is not only outsearching The King positionally (not tactical),
>>but also having more knowledge, so the only advantage the king has against
>>DIEP is better tactics, which nowadays hardly works. This where nimzo's
>>cool tactics work usually excellent as it's backupped by a superb book.
>
>you kidding me !!
>
>can you paste some of the sample games?

Yeah plenty, just go to a chessserver and look to cm7000/6000 and others
playing diep. Note past years at dutch open The King didn't manage to win,
all games for the same reason.

>*ever* win is (more than) a bit harsh IMO, you can come to such conclusion
>because DIEP is not as much commercially available as the king (CM) engine is.
>So only you and few others get the privilege of testing DIEP with CM.

This is not true. I don't test a single game against CM by hand against diep,
i only see games as played on the internet and at dutch open.

CM doesn't allow to play unattended somehow as far as i know.

>by the way I think DIEP has played more tournaments than any other chess program

this is not exactly true. perhaps i play the tournaments you take a look at!

i join basically world champs, dutch champ and german champ. Other tournaments
i usually depend upon whether people want to operate it, though if spain
champ would get organized at a better date i would go there too.

Of course it's true that i join even if it's sure that i have just introduced
a big number of bugs in the program, like for wmccc. Also it would be result
wise perhaps not so smart to join dutch open. despite that i fixed many
of the bugs as introduced before wmccc, i'm just not ready for dutch open
to face the Kure and Noomen books.

>I know of......so how many did it win? (not that it is of any importance)

I won paderborn nearly 2 years ago, after diep fought back from all lost
positions. Like against shredder it was a pawn down, but got to a won
endgame, but then blundered the endgame. It was not so well out of book
against nimzo, but got also a won far endgame, but blew it to a draw too,
despite the loss also in endgame against P.Conners, it also could have
gotten a draw there with a better endgame.

It has a better endgame now and still improving, but in the meantime the
commercial books have gotten really better. Shredder is already having
problems keeping up with the new books, but with superb endgame play it
still manages to keep draws in lost positions resulting in a worldtitle.

Note that diep lost end of 99 also the spain champ title by losing to
tiger in the one last round. It appeared that this was also a lost bookline.

I was using some rather old openingsbooks (from 20 years ago) and some
lines are completely refuted. I had prepared the line that came on the
board, but it is nowadays seen as won for black.

So it's obvious what i and MANY others should focus at right now: improve
book.

Like nimzo in wmccc 2000 came out of book against SOS with +mate_in_12.
12 moves later...

Zchess came out of book against nimzo with over a pawn down, lost the
pawn and the game real soon.

Most engines aren't far from the strength from nimzo.

In fact i don't have much respect for nimzo as an engine. It's just
an aggressive tuned engine which is tactical real strong, good blitz program,
excellent in doing nothing. But compared to most other engines it is
much worse.

I'm amazed people keep on betting on this engine.

I find my own program, zchess, SOS, The King, Gandalf and many others
miles better as Nimzo.

Yet i doubt whether The King's book will ever get to equal standards with
nimzo.

As long as nimzo can win games with a +mate in 12 score on its screen,
then it can still go for tournament wins.

Yet even with a piece up out of book against shredder it couldn't win!

With a pawn up against diep short after book (pawn win was forced by
book) in dutch open 1998 it couldn't win against DIEP.

I'm amazed people bet on nimzo. It's made to solve testsets and to
finish games from a won position. Obviously with material up after book
you *can* chose for this approach, and i'll never blame Chrilly for that.
he has made something that sells, simple as that!

In the end most people are not
very in depth studying programs. They just care for the number of points
it scores and whether it solves a few tactical shots in testpositions which
all programmers saw already years before the user saw it.

If i manage to not only get a better book, but also test in which lines
diep plays well, then i'll bet it will do real well too. Right now i'm
loaded with other work, so i can't do that within 3 weeks time.

Zchess book will also improve bigtime. I'm sure Insomniac too.

I think James Robertson also was bigtime dissappointed in WMCCC about how
many games were won just on book. People just don't realize it till they
join themselves in a world champ, or when they analyze games of it.

I would have had 2 titles at least with a better book with DIEP and with
the current endgame of it. Zchess would have perhaps already had a world title
if jaap v/d herik had done a fair pairing, and nimzo would not
get close to winning any tournament if people would have a better book.

Obviously it will be only a matter of time before books improve of the
different programs. Mine for sure will. Zchess for sure will.

The King i doubt. Its book was never real bad, but it's simply not getting
free points like nimzo does. Shredders book is not bad, but definitely
a mile behind Kure/Noomen.

Most engines will remain losing points because of it, yet a number of them
will improve this.

Getting out of book with +mate in 12 is just unbelievable.

Note that Kure book to human standards still sucks. A human is MUCH better
prepared as any todays playing engine is.

Of course with exception of SSDF testing, as you test against something
from which you know what it is gonna play. I'm relating here to tournaments.

I'll be really amazed at dutch open if nimzo doesn't get a few games with
over +2.xx out of book.

In human-human games with players at masterlevel, that *hardly* happens,
and i say this considering that most people already consider engines at
a much higher level as master. At 2600+ level i think only once each so
many years grandmaster make by accident a blunder in the opening. Like
Karpov did some years ago playing Nh6 or so after which Qd2 or something won
a piece directly. So it is not *intentionally* played. Just an error.

This huge 'weak' chain is something people forget.

But if you just care for points scored, just sleep on then....

>Pavel

>>I don't see however how nimzo can ever win from Tiger, and nimzo has
>>the disadvantage that it faces dual machines. Nimzo sure will run at
>>a new machine. Jan usually has the latest hardware for it.
>>
>>I don't know whether Frans buys new hardware, nevertheless for Quest
>>it seems it doesn't matter that much anymore as it already gets quite
>>deeply.
>>
>>The only few programs profitting from hardware at dutch open will be DIEP,
>>The King (assuming he changed his pruning a bit) and many programs who are
>>very young and not exactly title favourite like Xinix.
>>
>>I would be amazed if Kallisto shows up.
>>
>>>(This time, I think the winner is at least among those I've mentioned...)
>>
>>>Regards,
>>>M.Scheidl



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