90'+30" free engines tournament

[Ray]

Just for something completely different from normal CCRL work, a one-off tournament:

Hardware etc
Dual Core Opteron 185 2.6GHz
Arena GUI
90'+ 30" with ponder on
512MB hash each engine
5-men tablebases + Scorpio 5-men bases
book latest HS-12moves.abk
round robin, 4 rounds, 112 games

Engines
Colossus 2007d (UCI)
Crafty 21.6 64-bit (winboard)
ET Chess 13.01.08 (winboard)
Frenzee Dec07 64-bit (winboard)
Hamsters 0.6 (UCI)
Movei 00.8.438 P10 (UCI)
Scorpio 2.0 64-bit (winboard)
Trace 1.37a (winboard)

Notes
- Unfortunately some engines I wanted to use don't ponder, so couldn't be included

Feel free to predict which engine may win

[Shaun]

My guess

Frenzee Dec07 64-bit (winboard)

Shaun

[Ray]

I'll post an update when the first cycle has finished (28 games)
So far, Movei is in front but with so few games things could change. But, my pick is Movei

By the way - it's really cool seeing engines ponder, it's the way it's meant to be !

Also very cool in Arena to see a winboard engine playing natively against a UCI engine, no adaptor !

[Ray]

First cycle (28 games) is completed.

Standings:

5.5 Scorpio 2.0 64-bit
4.5 Movei 00.8.438 (10 10 10)
4.0 Hamsters 0.6
3.5 Crafty 21.6 64-bit
3.5 Frenzee Dec07 64-bit
3.0 ET Chess 13.01.08
2.5 Colossus 2007d
1.5 Trace 1.37a

Pgn is attached for those interested.
The book is still in development by Harry (and I'm on the 3rd version of it now, it has been replaced during the tournament). I'm sure Harry would welcome polite feedback if anyone studies the openings.

I've seen some very nice games so far. And it's really nice seeing engines pondering, very natural

Trace was always going to struggle in this company, but I hope it picks up a little.

[Harry Schnapp]

Hello Ray,
I have reviewed the opening lines of the 28 games.All Super balanced: 22 x up to +- 0.31 , 3 x up to +- 0.59 3 x up to +- 0.64
I am happy,my work has been worth.
Many thanks,
Harry

[Ray]

Thanks Harry, that's good to know ! Thanks for the book

[Ray]

Harry,

I really like this book. Books are a very personal thing. Some people like a book with a very narrow range of standard, common openings. But I prefer to see a wider range including some not commonly played, to see how the engines deal with them and to provide interesting games. This book seems to have a good variety of openings. They must be balanced of course, and as you say they all have been so far

[Ray]

Well Scorpio had a really bad run in the 2nd cycle and dropped from 1st palce to 3rd place.
So Movei is now leading and Frenzee moves up to 2nd place.

Standings after 2nd cycle:

10.5 Movei 00.8.438 (10 10 10)
9.5 Frenzee Dec07 64-bit
8.0 Scorpio 2.0 64-bit
6.5 Hamsters 0.6
6.5 Colossus 2007d
6.0 Crafty 21.6 64-bit
5.5 ET Chess 13.01.08
3.5 Trace 1.37a

pgn attached for those interested

[Harry Schnapp]

Hello Ray,

The openings from the second cycle :
18 x up to +- 0.30. 3 x up to +- 0.41. 6 x up to +- 0.55 1 x up to +- 0.60.

Best regards,
Harry

[Ray]

Thanks for checking Harry, that's great

[Ray]

Standings after 3rd cycle:

15.0 Movei 00.8.438 (10 10 10)
14.0 Frenzee Dec07 64-bit
12.5 Scorpio 2.0 64-bit
10.5 Hamsters 0.6
10.0 Colossus 2007d
9.0 ET Chess 13.01.08
8.0 Crafty 21.6 64-bit
5.0 Trace 1.37a

pgn attached for those interested

[Harry Schnapp]

Hello Ray,
The openings from the 3rd cycle:
24 x up to +- 0.37 1x +- 0.49 2 x up to +- 0.66 1x +- 0.95

Best regards,
Harry

[Harry Schnapp]

The game with +0.95 (Scorpio-Frenzee)was a draw. Evaluation after 12 opening moves:Rybka(+0.11),Zappa Mexico(+0.12),Loop(+0.06)Deep Shredder(+0.52),
Hiarcs(+0.43),Naum(+0.38).
Regards,
Harry

[Ray]

Thanks for checking that out Harry

[Ray]

FINAL STANDINGS

Code: Select all

1: Frenzee Dec07 64-bit      19.0/28 ···· ==0= 0=== =1=0 =111 0111 11=1 1111  231.75
2: Movei 00.8.438 [10 10 10) 18.5/28 ==1= ···· =110 =1=1 1=== 11=0 01=1 11==  244.25
3: Scorpio 2.0 64-bit        16.5/28 1=== =001 ···· 11=0 ==== =011 1=10 1011  217.50
4: E.T.Chess 13.01.08        14.0/28 =0=1 =0=0 00=1 ···· =111 011= 1001 ==0=  190.75
5: Hamsters 0.6              12.5/28 =000 0=== ==== =000 ···· 1=10 1011 =110  162.00
6: Crafty 21.6 64-bit        12.5/28 1000 00=1 =100 100= 0=01 ···· =0=1 =111  159.75
7: Colossus2007d             12.0/28 00=0 10=0 0=01 0110 0100 =1=0 ···· 1=11  152.00
8: Trace                     7.0/28  0000 00== 0100 ==1= =001 =000 0=00 ····  101.00

Yes, Frenzee stole the victory from Movei right at the end of the tournament !!
I really enjoyed this little tournement

pgn fiels atatched for the 4th cycle, and another for the entire tournement

[Harry Schnapp]

Hello Ray,
The openings from the 4th cycle:
24 x up to +- 0.32. 2 x up to +- 0.58. 1 x +- 0.61 1 x +- 0.84

Best regards,
Harry

[Ray]

Thanks Harry. I like the book (not that I'm any sort of expert to be able to judge). But it seemed to have a good variety of openings which led to some very interesting looking games, which is what I like

[Shaun]

An interesting tournament....

Frenzee seemed to dominate the weaker engines more than Movei...

I must test the new versions of Frenzee...

[Ray]

Thanks Shaun. I really enjoyed this tournament for lots of reasons:

- my first tournament with Arena
- winboard engines running natively alongside UCI with no adaptor needed
- it was great watching the engines ponder, very natural
- different time control, and engines manage it differently compared to how they manage a repeating time control
- new engines I have never run before, e.g Frenzee Dec07 64-bit, Scorpio 2.0 64-bit
- new book from Harry
- tournaments can be quite exciting !

I'm definitely going to run another. Just have to sort out what it is. Ideas welcome. This time I'm thinking of 2CPU ponder on using the Intel Quad, but mixing some strong single CPU engines with weaker ones on 2CPU (Martin style !) to add some unpredictability ! Not sure yet, I have to do some research...

[Martin Thoresen]

I'm definitely going to run another. Just have to sort out what it is. Ideas welcome. This time I'm thinking of 2CPU ponder on using the Intel Quad, but mixing some strong single CPU engines with weaker ones on 2CPU (Martin style !) to add some unpredictability ! Not sure yet, I have to do some research...

Martin-style, I like that! Keep up the good work Ray!