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Subject: Re: Playing style of top engines...

Author: Dann Corbit

Date: 15:03:59 10/18/05

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On October 18, 2005 at 17:12:05, Robert Hollay wrote:

> I apologize if this question sounds odd.
> But if it's true that chess game has a SOLUTION - the perfect chess game -
>then it should be logical that the top chess engines tends to that perfection.
>In other words, they will more and more often find THE BEST move in any
>position.

The ideal chess engine will always make the right move.  There is no engine like
that one yet.

> If so, then their playing styles become more and more monotonous and are
>gradually moving to a uniformity.

I would be interested to see a demonstration of that.

> Weak engines have very different styles, often very aggressive, so they are
>great for weak players to play against. But newer - and stronger - versions of
>these same engines are playing in a much more cautious style (see Golem).

Golem isn't cautious or aggressive.  It plays decent chess and throws in a real
howler once in a while.  I have played many, many games against Golem.

>Similarly, strong engines have "personalities" to make their playing style more
>interesting, but the default personality is usually the strongest.

I think it fairly certain that this is wrong.  It will be the best guess of the
author at optimal, and he will have done thorough testing, but nobody has the
time to do enough testing and there will surely be defects in the default
paramter set.  To know the best settings, 10,000 games at 40/2 would be needed
for each and every adjustment.  That is never going to happen.

> So a "personality", a particular "style", only reduce the playing strength.

Except when it increases it, or causes it to remain the same.

> Is this tendency already noticeable in today's top engines?

It would take a lot of testing to determine this, but before we test we will
have to have a formal definition for 'style' -- harder than you might think, I
guess.

>Are there any
>significant differences in their default styles?

Clearly, the top programs do not play alike.

>Regards, Robert



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