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Subject: Re: Ways to beat some computers

Author: Robert Hyatt

Date: 18:59:34 01/22/01

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On January 21, 2001 at 15:08:44, Garry Evans wrote:

>On January 20, 2001 at 10:34:47, Robert Hyatt wrote:
>
>>On January 20, 2001 at 02:38:57, Mark Longridge wrote:
>>
>>>Some of the programs, crafty and gandalf come to mind, let their clocks run down
>>>pretty low (say as low as 30 seconds) near where the game would normally be
>>>close to over. But if the other player is just shuffling wood back and forth and
>>>is playing with an inc, that player can build up a huge time advantage. Crafty
>>>tries too hard to avoid the 50 move rule, and all of a sudden it's got 25
>>>seconds left and a lost position.
>>>
>>>I bet a lot of GM's and some programs do this on purpose. I don't see why crafty
>>>shouldn't go for the 50 move rule instead of a silly pawn push, especially when
>>>it's time is so low. Now the silly draws are becoming silly losses.
>>
>>If I saw this happen I might be concerned.  However, crafty does _not_ let the
>>human get way ahead on time.  It has specific code to prevent this by speeding
>>up itself.  And it _never_ loses on time, ever...
>>
>>
>>
>>>
>>>If the score is -.60 and it's close to the 50 move rule, I figure the computer
>>>may as well take the draw... especially when down to it's last 30 seconds.
>>
>>I wouldn't do that.  The human is much more likely to err than the computer...
>
>
>
>
> I agree the way crafty handles time is extremely well. Would you give your best
>guess on what crafty's rating would be versus humans at 40/2 on the best
>hardware? Please don't say you don't know, because there has been too many
>computer vs human games, you could atleast guess!

I hate to speculate because many won't like it.  But my guess is that it could
legitimately play in the mid-2400 range successfully.  Yes, it would do well
against GM players at times. But they are quite capable of finding book
transpositions that favor them and reach positions that Crafty would not really
understand very well.  If crafty was "unknown" it might do better.  But it
isn't...

Good hardware would certainly help at blitz.. but at long time controls it is
less about depth and more about 'knowledge'...



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