Author: Mike Hood
Date: 09:31:52 10/26/01
Go up one level in this thread
On October 25, 2001 at 14:12:37, Uri Blass wrote: >On October 25, 2001 at 12:02:29, Robert Hyatt wrote: > >>On October 25, 2001 at 06:37:00, Mike Hood wrote: >> >>>There have been a lot of posts (over the years) about how to make engines >>>weaker. This is an interesting question that I'd like to revive. I mean, it's >>>not just about getting to the top of the SSDF list. Very few people who buy a >>>current chess program at its full unleashed power stand a chance of even drawing >>>against it. It's a matter of playing enjoyable (and instructive) chess in your >>>spare time. >>> >>>I'm disappointed with most of the handicap levels in chess programs. Everything >>>from "Drunken Assassin" to "Paranoid Scaredycat" delivers poor chess, making >>>stupid blunders that anyone with an ELO rating over 1000 can take advantage of. >>>The only successful handicapping that I've seen is limiting the ply depth of the >>>search. Limiting the ply search of an engine to 4 (or maybe 6) ply leads to the >>>engine playing solid but beatable chess. Maybe I'm just speaking from my own >>>limited perspective as a 1550 player, but I have the impression that the >>>blunders made by a plydepth-limited engine are very "human". >> >>I don't think this works. I ran some tests on one of the chess servers once >>with a very limited search depth and still saw ratings of over 2200 at times. >> >>Bruce ran a version of Ferret on ICC with a time limit of milliseconds per >>move and it too was in the 2200 range if I recall correctly. > >I think that one of the problem is that the games of ICC are usually blitz and I >guess that the poster talks about 2 hours/40 moves and not about blitz. > >I agree that the style is not similiar to humans because humans do tactical >mistakes that 4 plies is not going to do even at 2 hours/40 moves. > > >>The problem is that against weaker players, even shallow searches see through >>their simple tactics, and you _still_ have the full positional evaluation of >>the program, with weak squares, pawn structure, king safety, etc. to guide the >>program. >> >>If you reduce the search depth, you only reduce tactics. You won't find a >>1200 player that understands much about pawn majorities, weak pawns, king >>safety, etc. > >The poster is 1550 player and not 1200 player. > >Uri Thanks, Uri. You're right... I was talking about games with longer time controls. I usually play using 30/75'+24/60'+60' (the time controls used in my chess league). I've never got to grips with Blitz. For me chess is about thinking, not about rapid reactions. But that's my personal problem, and not so relevant to my post. It's more of a general question. I think a good handicapping strategy should work for players with any sort of ELO rating, from 1000 to 2200. (I presume stronger players would rather play without a handicap). Maybe the parameters need to be set differently, but the strategy should be the same. One (of many) ideas I've had is a strategy that is parameterd by setting a handicap value. If the value is 100, the meta-engine would make sure that after making its move the evaluation is no more than 1 pawn better than its previous evaluation. A handicap value of 0 would lead to the meta-engine choosing a move which makes the evaluation as closely as possible the same as the previous evaluation -- effectively awful play! This is how I originally thought Chessbase's Friend Mode works, but it's evidently more complicated than that.
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