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Subject: Re: Engine question: best tactical /positional - not necessarily strongest

Author: Mike S.

Date: 18:39:44 03/04/03

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On March 04, 2003 at 20:42:05, KIRK SEARS wrote:

>Which engine or engines out right now are considered the best tactical and best
>positional, not necesarily strongest.
>
>I am guessing at what I have read on this message board that Nimzo/Hiarcs are
>strong tactical engines and Shredder and Rebel are the strongest positionally.

Opinions will be very different about that.

I got the impression in recent tests, that Shredder 7 and Rebel 12 (i.e. beta5
of the beta-1 release) are also quite fast tactically. I used my own testset for
that, purely tactics.

>Most I assume are somewhere in the middle, but which ones best fit into either
>category?

Among the engines I have tested so far (some top engines are missing), I got the
best results from Fritz 7 NoMMX(*), Schweinehund (~Nimzo 7.32), King
3.12d/Sel.10 and Nimzo 8. But there are several more results which are very
similar (Shredder 7.SE, Ruffian 1.0.0, Hiarcs 7.32). I guess also, that Hiarcs 8
and CM9000/King 3.23 would most probably be within that group.

*) runs only in older Fritz GUIs, or with an old CPU without MMX

The engines mentioned found 19 or 20 solutions of 24 on A1200, Fritz 7.0.0.8
(and i.e Tiger 14) etc. scored slightly less, with 17 solvings. The test ratings
take the solving times into accont, too.

http://meineseite.i-one.at/PermanentBrain/quick/quicke.htm
(includes an excel file with Athlon 1200 results)

For the positional strength, I have an older results table of the WM-Test (where
Fritz 8 wasn't included yet), where Fritz 7 was best in the positional part with
36 positions, solving 26. The CM9K settings "Pillen" and "Utz12n", Aristarch 4.5
and Deep Fritz 7 have also achieved good results, followed by Shredder 7 and
Deep Fritz (6).

http://www.computerschach.de/test/index.htm
(The WM-Test has also parts about king attack and endgame)

Speaking of tactical strength, the following is the *easiest* positions in my
Quicktest suite:
[D]3B4/1R3p1k/2p4p/2Pp3r/3P4/4Q1K1/6P1/3b1q2 w - - id Quick-24;
Who is able to find White's idea for a draw? No computers allowed this time...
:o))

Regards,
M.Scheidl



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