Author: Slater Wold
Date: 20:36:05 02/01/04
I got the privilege to operate Rebel 12, and also Falcon in CCT6. Rebel 12 was running on my desktop P4 3.0Ghz, running a version of Rebel that Ed had e-mailed me just a few days prior. It also had a new book from Jereon. Falcon was running on my P4 2.0Ghz laptop; Omid decided just to use CP 5.3 for the easiest setup on ICC. I won't comment on the Falcon games, Omid was there watching every single one of them, and I paid much more attention to Rebel. Omid can comment on his games, if he cares to. On to the games! Game 1: Black against Amateur: This was probably one of the more exciting games Rebel played. Standard book, good play by both in the middle. On move 30, IM Schroer said "...textbook game, but Rh5 looks misplaced.." Ironically, Rebel opted to trade a pawn+rook for a knight a few moves later, that setup a dangerous passer on h that Amateur would eventually have to give his rook for! Excellent play by Rebel, and Will kept me laughing almost the entire time! 0-1 Game 2: White against The Baron: This game had an interesting opening, and Rebel was very active with its king. Rebel put some pressure on blacks king, and got a couple of passers. Again, excelleny play by Rebel. 1-0 Game 3: Black against Yace: Yace hadn't lost a game yet, and neither had Rebel. We went *20* moves in book, and when we came out, Rebel was down a lot more than I liked. The score fluctuated from -1 to +1 over the course of about 15 moves. In the end, Rebel had traded off pieces it needed to sustain at least a draw. Yace's passers proved to be more deadly. 1-0 Game 4: White against Thinker: Despite a decent opening, Rebel played without a plan most of the game, and just simply couldn't come up with anything to do. I, and most, were surprised by this game. Rebel seemed to get outplayed by an amateur. 0-1 Game 5: Black against Bodo: Rebel outsearched Bodo, and got a pretty textbook win. Joel (the author) had fallen asleep, so I didn't get to talk to him much about the game. Bodo was kibitz'ing, but after looking at the monitor for almost 12 hours, its spam confused me. :) 0-1 End of day 1 with 3 wins, and 2 loses. Not what most expected from #4 seeded Rebel. But hey, just as Will told me early that morning, '..on any given Sunday..' Hopefully, we would do better tomorrow. Game 6: White against BlackBishop: Pretty standard opening, and good moves in the middle by both sides. The board appeared (to me) to be getting more and more locked, and I was starting to get nervous about a draw. [D]1rb5/p5k1/1npq1p2/2N1p3/1P2P1p1/PQ2P1Pp/4B2P/5RK1 w - - 0 36 Qd1 here pretty much breaks open the position, and give white a huge lead. Good play by Rebel! 1-0 Game 7: Black against Ruffian: Yikes! Ruffian was doing excellent, and this was going to be a tough game. Rebel had a good choice of book play, and did pretty well in the middle. It was a pretty tough game, and I won't pretend to know exactly what happened. It was pretty evident that Ruffian getting 2M nps on that G5, outsearched Rebel, and eventually got the best of it. 1-0 Game 8: White against Arasan: Tough opening for Arasan, and it didn't take long for Rebel to pounce all over Arasan's king. Like Jon said, this was mostly won by a great book. 1-0 Game 9: Black against Bringer: I had played Bringer earlier, with Falcon, and remembered the game fairly well. I did not expect what would eventually happen. Rebel played a solid opening, and decently in the middle. White had very little space, and the position was cramped. I expected Rebel to simply outplay Bringer, but as the game went on, it appeared more and more to be drawn. In the late endgame, Rebel blundered, and Bringer took Rebel down quickly. Tough break. 1-0 Rebel would end the tournament +5 -4 =0. A disappointing result, for the engine that had gone a week and almost 100 games on ICC with only 5 loses (and was seeded 4th in the tournament). I try to keep in prespective that Rebel is honestly a new engine, still being ported, tested, and tried in the Windows environment. Given the chance it is a very potent chess engine, but still has problems from time to time. All things considered, it was a terrific tournament. Volker and Schroer did an excellent job, and I cannot thank them enough for their time and effort. Thanks to all who participated. Congratulations to Bob. And good luck in CCT7!
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