Author: martin fierz
Date: 01:37:37 02/26/04
Go up one level in this thread
On February 25, 2004 at 22:42:08, Robert Hyatt wrote: >On February 25, 2004 at 18:40:06, Bas Hamstra wrote: > >>On February 25, 2004 at 13:46:22, Robert Hyatt wrote: >> >>> >>> >>>What book are you using for Crafty? >>> >>>It will _never_ play 1. g3 as white with any book I have ever distributed. Not >>>that it is a bad move, but it suggests that something is way wrong with the >>>setup you are using for Crafty, at least. >>> >>>Aha. I see you are using the fritz powerbook with max variety... >>> >>>That begs the question of what your "tournament" is supposed to show, since a >>>wide book introduces _lots_ of luck into the outcome, and won't be reproducible >>>by anyone else since nobody uses one common book for multiple engines... >> >>What do you mean "nobody"? Everybody does do it all the time! And a wide book is >>even better, it shows what your search-object (engine) is capable of in a wide >>variety of positions, in stead of playing over and over and over the same few >>"proven" openings. If Crafty is mated in 12 moves in an irregular opening, >>wouldnt' that be interesting to know? Think about it. > >Not if that opening is 1. g3, which neither it nor I (nor most anybody) will >play. Ditto for the 1. f4 openings, the 1. b4 openings, etc. > >I don't write code to handle such cases, if I never expect to have to play them >over the board... > >Now if you choose _reasonable_ openings, that might be another matter. But I >don't particularly like 1. g3 and after having played chess for 40+ years as a >human, I _still_ don't ever play that opening... >> >> >>Best regards, >>Bas. i think bas is very much right. i test with nunn2 positions. these cover a lot of variety, closed and open positions, positions with opposite-side castling etc. you get a better idea what an engine can do if you test lots of different positions, and also what it can't do! i don't understand your take on the opening moves. 1. g3 is a sound move. 1. b4 is slightly weird, and 1. f4 is really weird. i also wouldn't want to test too much with moves like 1. f4 or 1. g4; but 1. g3 is fine - it mostly transposes to some regular opening with fianchetto like some form of catalan or english, which are good, solid openings. it definitely qualifies as reasonable! finally, i have played openings that are slightly unsound just to learn about the resulting positions (e.g. queens gambit tarrasch defence to learn about IQP). you can stop playing them again later, but you will have learned something you can apply in similar positions arising from other openings. for engines the same: if crafty cannot handle positions that come up after 1.g3, there is some kind of problem in crafty.... cheers martin
This page took 0.01 seconds to execute
Last modified: Thu, 15 Apr 21 08:11:13 -0700
Current Computer Chess Club Forums at Talkchess. This site by Sean Mintz.