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Subject: Re: The importance of opening books -- a simple experiment

Author: Arturo Ochoa

Date: 07:30:42 02/18/05

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On February 18, 2005 at 04:50:13, Uri Blass wrote:

>On February 18, 2005 at 04:25:37, Sune Fischer wrote:
>
>>
>>>>These so called "killer books" are always used by very strong engines on top
>>>>hardware.
>>>>The killer books seem to work best against weaker engines on weaker hardware.
>>>>Now isn't that odd? :)
>>>
>>>Killer books are in most of the cases for rich people who can pay for book
>>>makers so it is not a surprise that they work against engines with weaker
>>>hardware that do not have time to prepare.
>>
>>That could be the reason, but the point is that it won't show a lot because
>>these engines are so strong already that they would have won even with a bad
>>book.
>>
>>It would be far more interesting to give Beowulf a 700 Elo book and then go
>>wipeout Shredder & co in the big tournaments. :)
>>
>>>I also do not beliebe in 700 elo but I certainly believe that they can improve
>>>the performance by 100-200 elo in a tournament when part of the opponents.
>>>
>>>If you have statistics of  a lot of games that you get 70% against some program
>>>with line A and 50% against the same program with line B then choosing line A is
>>>important.
>>>
>>>If you have similar statistics for many programs then it may give you
>>>significant increase in performance in tournaments.
>>
>>I tend to think the effect is mostly psychological.
>>
>>I can see how comming out of book with a +0.6 score against an equal opponent
>>must feel like half a victory, and it's not hard for me to imagine that some
>>would call that totally winning :)
>
>I am not talking about score but about statistics
>
>It is possible to test engine A against engine B in many openings.
>
>If opening X leads to 50% and opening Y leads to 70% then opening X is better
>against engine B(it does not mean that it is better generally against
>everything).
>>
>>>Even with no special preperation against specific opponent you may have
>>>statistics that your program  score 60% with 1.e4 c6 2.d4 d5 3.f3 and only 50%
>>>against the same opponents with 1.e4 c6 2.d4 d5 3.e5 so of course opening
>>>preperation can help significantly in tournament.
>>
>>I believe such is thing is possible, but increasing your score from 50% to 60%
>>is still not much more than 50-100 Elo.
>>
>>-S.
>
>I agree so I do not think general preperation can give you more than 50-100 elo
>preperation against specific opponents can give you another 50-100 elo so the
>general improvement in tournaments can be 100-200 elo.
>
>Uri

Again the question: how do you know that? Have you ever run any test that holds
your suppositions? If you tune very well a book against a specific opponent and
your opponent is similar in strength and you get  the 90% of the score. What is
the elo of your engine against this engine? Only 100-200 elo.

Provide facts......



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