Author: Christophe Theron
Date: 01:08:24 10/14/03
Go up one level in this thread
On October 13, 2003 at 16:07:28, Joachim Rang wrote:
>On October 13, 2003 at 14:47:32, Christophe Theron wrote:
>
>>On October 13, 2003 at 14:26:23, Anthony Cozzie wrote:
>>
>>>On October 13, 2003 at 14:08:51, Christophe Theron wrote:
>>>
>>>>On October 13, 2003 at 08:31:04, Anthony Cozzie wrote:
>>>>
>>>>>On October 13, 2003 at 08:16:20, Djordje Vidanovic wrote:
>>>>>
>>>>>>Hi,
>>>>>>
>>>>>>while preparing the opening book for Ruffian I decided to use a very good
>>>>>>positional program for Ruffe's sparring partner. I decided on Diep due to its
>>>>>>impressive positional play. Diep also has an interesting and unorthodox opening
>>>>>>book with lots of lines that are worth analysing. No small wonder, the book's
>>>>>>creator is a super strong Fide Master, the author of Diep: Vincent Diepeveen.
>>>>>>
>>>>>>Be it as it may, I matched Ruffian with only a skeleton of the book to be
>>>>>>(meagre 1538 positions for starters) and pitted the positional monster against
>>>>>>the fast searcher. The result was a little disappointing and I must say that I
>>>>>>did not learn much from the match. Of course, bear in mind that these were only
>>>>>>G/5 games, but still...
>>>>>>
>>>>>>Diep had its own rather well researched book, with many home cooked tricks and
>>>>>>traps, while Ruffian was equipped with a wee book that is to grow yet. Diep had
>>>>>>the advantage of a Barton 2800+ while Ruffian played on my old NetVista PIII-933
>>>>>>computer.
>>>>>>
>>>>>>End result: Ruffian 86%, Diep 14%, or 48-8!! My question is: could the
>>>>>>reigning leader of the SSDF beat Diep more convincingly than Ruffian?
>>>>>
>>>>>Two things come to mind:
>>>>>
>>>>>1. I didn't look at all the games, but it looks like Diep opened every game 1.
>>>>>Nh3??
>>>>>
>>>>>2. Diep is more designed for longer time controls. I remember Vincent
>>>>>complaining last CCT about how 60 10 was too short ;)
>>>>
>>>>
>>>>
>>>>TMUEAGAB (The Most Used Excuse After Getting A Beating, tm)
>>>>
>>>>I do not know if the setup of this match is correct and if Diep is really so
>>>>weak, but I know that asking for longer time controls is just a way to spread
>>>>fog.
>>>>
>>>>If a chess program really needs longer time controls to start playing decently,
>>>>then there is something inherently wrong in its design.
>>>>
>>>>In other words, it sucks.
>>>>
>>>>I'm not saying that Diep sucks. Maybe the match setup was not fair for it.
>>>>
>>>>I'm saying that if a program gets such a beating at blitz it does not smell good
>>>>anyway for a longer time controls match.
>>>>
>>>>That's incredible. I hear the same excuse ("it will perform better at longer
>>>>time controls") since the days of the 386. Now that our computers are several
>>>>hundred times faster, the same excuse is still used. It does not make any sense.
>>>>
>>>>
>>>>
>>>> Christophe
>>>
>>>I think it is definitely possible to tune a program for longer time controls:
>>>fewer extensions and a larger eval. OTOH, I don't think we're talking hundreds
>>>of elo points. Maybe 50. (relative performace at short and long time controls)
>>>
>>>anthony
>>
>>
>>
>>It would be POSSIBLE to unbalance an engine to the point that it would perform
>>very differently at blitz and long time controls.
>>
>>In the real world, a change that improves the strength at blitz also improves at
>>long time controls. And a change that gives good results at long time controls
>>has good chances to also give an advantage at blitz.
>>
>>That's why very unbalanced engines are very uncommon. If the developpement of
>>the engine has followed even a semi-scientific approach, and even if the author
>>intended to improve it only for long time controls, this engine will also
>>perform well at blitz.
>>
>>
>>
>> Christophe
>
>
>Hi Christophe,
>
>that sounds quite different to your first post: "there is no such thing as
>relative strenght difference at short and longer time controls". I agree with
>you, that in generally an improvement will be valid for blitz and long tiem
>controls. But there might be exceptions, don't you think so?
>
>regards Joachim
Of course. You can write a very unbalanced chess program.
But it is also possible, and not really difficult to write a balanced chess
program that performs as well at blitz and at long TC.
All the top commercial program show this.
Christophe
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