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Subject: Re: Century 3 may be the best positional player.

Author: Ed Schröder

Date: 23:28:40 12/11/00

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On December 11, 2000 at 22:30:02, G. R. Morton wrote:

>On December 11, 2000 at 19:49:35, Terry Ripple wrote:
>
>>On December 11, 2000 at 19:21:56, G. R. Morton wrote:
>>
>>>Century 3 is touted as a superb (the best?) positional chess player, which my
>>>own non-scientific tests on well known GM actual game positions seem to bear
>>>out.  Are there are any formal positional test results?  Does any strong player
>>>(besides the reviews at the Rebel site) have an opinion Century 3’s positional
>>>play as the best (whether or not it may make it to the SSDF top few)?
>>-------------
>>The SSDF list only proves that what ever program is on the top of the list was
>>the best at that time in beating other chess programs under similar conditions
>>but doesn't prove that it's the best at winning against very strong players at
>>tournament time controls of 40 moves/2 hours.
>>
>>Rebel Century 3.0 was fine tuned to play it's best against strong human
>>opponents and there for it is possible that it might not be the best program
>>when it is matched against one of the other top programs. I believe that one of
>>the reasons for this is that the more knowledge a program has it can't think as
>>deep into the position because it is a slower thinker compared to the tactical
>>monster "Fritz" that has less knowledge to slow it down, so it has more time to
>>think deeper because of it's faster search. ( Just my opinion )
>>
>>Regards,Terry
>>Regards,Terry
>
>I think you’re right. Actually I’ve heard this opinion before: I recall someone
>(Schroeder ?) having said that positional knowledge is worth only about another
>ply or two of search depth.  That may be true for winning against other
>software, but not for the use of software as a sort of chess instructor
>substitute.
>Having a superb positional playing software, I believe,  (even if it is not
>among the top SSDF few) is more valuable for instructional purposes since it
>would be plenty adequate for tactical instruction but yet provide one with lots
>of examples of good positional play that a non-master needs to see in a variety
>of positions. Good tactics can be seen and studied in a ton of books, CDs, etc,
>but (non-trivial) maximal positional moves are not as readily to be seen.
>
>Regards, George

I believe that marking a program as best positional player is something
very subjective which hardly can be proofed. I have my own favorites and
when I look at the evidence for my choices it is all very vague. I think
that in the end it is all a matter of taste provided you had a good look
at the program first. The latter IMO means you will have to play intensively
with a program (months) before building a final opinion and even that is
arbitrary and subjective :)

Ed



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