I'm ready for revenge!

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bret
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I'm ready for revenge!

Post by bret » Tue Sep 07, 2004 4:34 am

Against Chessmaster that is ... let's get something going Greg. I can start on October 10th.

Congrats to sumdeus for being the new net-chess ... arggg slowchess champ.

keithstuart
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Post by keithstuart » Tue Sep 07, 2004 1:10 pm

Now this is something well worth waiting for

go get it Bret :D

gmiller
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Post by gmiller » Tue Sep 07, 2004 3:44 pm

As they say in Ghostbusters, "Choose thy destructor!":

Fritz 8
Chessmaster 10
Junior 8
Shredder 8
Crafty

I've been meaning to set up a computer so that anyone can make such a challenge without any input from me. Hopfully I can have that set up by Oct. The computer will likley be either an AMD Athalon XP 2000 or 1800.

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Post by keithstuart » Tue Sep 07, 2004 4:44 pm

When you set thatup Greg wil there be any limit to the number of games the computer can play in at any given time?

Also how would it work without any input from you? Surely you'd ahve to make the moves for the computer

Also i'd love to have a crack at the Computer even if it will thrash me :(

bret
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Post by bret » Tue Sep 07, 2004 5:52 pm

I really didn't want to know the Chessmaster version that I would be playing. I really didn't think you would have Chessmaster 10 ... and I sure didn't want to hear Athalon 2000 .... Isn't that equal to about a 2.5Ghz P4? Chessmaster 7000 was the last version I was able to beat, but those were game/60, not correspondence. Let's go with the Chessmaster 10. What's the time? 30+1 or just 75d?


gmiller wrote:As they say in Ghostbusters, "Choose thy destructor!":

Fritz 8
Chessmaster 10
Junior 8
Shredder 8
Crafty

I've been meaning to set up a computer so that anyone can make such a challenge without any input from me. Hopfully I can have that set up by Oct. The computer will likley be either an AMD Athalon XP 2000 or 1800.

gmiller
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Post by gmiller » Tue Sep 07, 2004 6:14 pm

An Athalon 2000 is equal to a 2Ghz Pentium, I think it's actually a 1.6Ghz processor. I'm glad you chose CM becuase it doesn't look like Fritz, et al can be automated the way Crafty, GNUChess and ChessMaster can. For liscensing reasons, I probably shouldn't install CM 10 on another computer, so you'll be playing a different version. The time can be whatever you want if I get it totally automated. If not, lets go with 30+1.

Keith, I only plan to allow one game at a time. I'm not sure how I'll prioritize who gets to play yet. The ChessMaster engine (TheKing.exe) can be automated by pretty much any chess interface. GNUChess, Crafty and many other engines all use the same method for automation, and I've already done GNUChess on the "Play the Server" link from the main page.

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Post by keithstuart » Wed Sep 08, 2004 1:38 am

Just out of interest how do chess computers select openings?

Is it totally random or do they have set rules for selecting one

bret
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Post by bret » Wed Sep 08, 2004 8:54 am

keithstuart wrote:Just out of interest how do chess computers select openings?

Is it totally random or do they have set rules for selecting one
They have an opening book which they select their moves from. The moves are weighted so that some moves are selected more often than others. An example is that Chessmaster 7000 would answer 1.e4 with d6 25% of the time. To top it off, Chessmaster 7000 is a sorry Pirc player! If you can remember 20 moves you can beat Chessmaster 7000.

1.e4 d6 2.d4 Nf6 3.Nc3 g6 4.Nf3 Bg7 5.Be2 0-0 6.0-0 c6 7.h3 Qc7 8.Bg5 b5 9.a3 Nbd7 10.Qd2 Bb7

It's rare today when both sides are done with the opening in ten moves. Now let's go to work on him.

11.Bh6 Bxh6 12.Qxh6 a6 13.Ng5 e6? 14.Bg4 Rae8?? 15.f4 Qb6 16.e5!! dxe5 17.fxe5 Qxd4+ 18.Kh1 Qxe5 19.Rae1 Qxe1 20.Rxe1 The black Queen is gone. Of course Black will keep playing until the end, but you are now 3.5 up on him :-) Different time controls has little effect on this line in Chessmaster 7000. He may shuffle around his move order but he will still play the line. Now you can beat Chessmaster 7000 25% of the time as white. I hear Chessmaster 10 has big holes in it's opening book.

--bret

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Post by gmiller » Wed Sep 08, 2004 11:36 am

In what research I've been conducting on automating ChessMaster I've found out the opening book isn't part of the engine at all, and it's apparently the same way with Fritz, Junior, and Shredder. The book is part of the GUI, and even though the engine is running, the engine isn't allowed to select a move until there are no more book moves left. I'm guessing tablebases are probably the same way.

The "Winboard" engines like GNUChess, Crafty, etc all have the book and tablebases selected by the engine.

As for how they're selected, I'd imagine the developers prioritize which line to use based on how well the program does against it. There's certainly some randomness built in so you're not playing the same opening over and over.

cohonas
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Post by cohonas » Wed Sep 15, 2004 4:01 pm

I would love to have a go against a chess engine at some point, maybe after the other guys who already signed up? maybe even a collaboration between two players against a chess engine?
I found my exhanges off the chess board with davidswhite to be pleasent, cool and funny, if he is up for "us against the machine" so am i.
What do you guys think and what would our odds be? :D

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Post by davidswhite » Thu Sep 16, 2004 1:47 am

I'd be more than willing to join forces with cohonas in tackling a chess engine.
I'm thinking of say, Chessmaster 3 or Fritz 2...or we could combine with
Bret in his scheduled loss against Chessmaster 10.
Seriously,in collaboration with cohonas,I'd not feel intimidated by any
single-processor engine and believe that at the very least we'd have
great fun.

gmiller
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Post by gmiller » Thu Sep 16, 2004 9:58 am

I've got Chessmaster 3 on my cell phone running in Frodo. Well, I haven't actually installed it yet, but I've got the image ready to go. But I don't think it would put up much of a fight.

bret
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Post by bret » Thu Sep 16, 2004 6:40 pm

I'll step aside and let cohonas and davidswhite play the game together.

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Post by davidswhite » Fri Sep 17, 2004 1:14 am

No,don't!
The whole idea,as far as I'm concerned,is that if you're unable to
singlehandedly overcome the silicon beast,then cohonas and I would
together try to do so.
If you're able to suceed where I,alone,would expect to fail, then all of our
hats would go off to you and there would be no need to bring in our
reinforced reinforcements.
Anyway,Bret my old friend,your shot at revenge is a nobler endeavor and
I wish you success.
Best regards,David

cohonas
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Post by cohonas » Fri Sep 17, 2004 5:44 am

I agree with david, please follow your original plan!

I was just inspired by your revengeful quest and have, more than i like to admit, lost to computers at OTB time controls and thought at longer time controls and the collaboration of a great player get some revenge over the machines on behalf of humanity :D

So you just go ahead and take the first game bret, then the others who already said they wanted to have a go in the order it was requested.

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