kranium wrote:Lyudmil Tsvetkov wrote:It is not at all clear to me where were books used and where not.
I'm sure opening books were not used...
In the early self-play games things like 1.a3, 1.a4, etc. were probably tried by AlphaZero...
eventually it learned that 1. e4 or 1. d4 had the highest success rates.
Books or no books, I think AlphaZero would still demolish SF8.
Just look at this game 9, it was a decent French Defence by SF8, but it was dismantled with
amazing tactical and strategic shots by AlphaZero which seems to be beyond the reach of alpha-beta engines.
[pgn]
[Event "?"]
[Site "?"]
[Date "2017.12.06"]
[Round "9"]
[White "AlphaZero"]
[Black "Stockfish"]
[Result "1-0"]
[TimeControl "40/1260:300"]
[Termination "normal"]
[PlyCount "103"]
[WhiteType "human"]
[BlackType "human"]
1. d4 e6 2. e4 d5 3. Nc3 Nf6 4. e5 Nfd7 5. f4 c5 6. Nf3 cxd4 7. Nb5 Bb4+ 8.
Bd2 Bc5 9. b4 Be7 10. Nbxd4 Nc6 11. c3 a5 12. b5 Nxd4 13. cxd4 Nb6 14. a4
Nc4 15. Bd3 Nxd2 16. Kxd2 Bd7 17. Ke3 b6 18. g4 h5 19. Qg1 hxg4 20. Qxg4
Bf8 21. h4 Qe7 22. Rhc1 g6 23. Rc2 Kd8 24. Rac1 Qe8 25. Rc7 Rc8 26. Rxc8+
Bxc8 27. Rc6 Bb7 28. Rc2 Kd7 29. Ng5 Be7 30. Bxg6 Bxg5 31. Qxg5 fxg6 32. f5
Rg8 33. Qh6 Qf7 34. f6 Kd8 35. Kd2 Kd7 36. Rc1 Kd8 37. Qe3 Qf8 38. Qc3 Qb4
39. Qxb4 axb4 40. Rg1 b3 41. Kc3 Bc8 42. Kxb3 Bd7 43. Kb4 Be8 44. Ra1 Kc7
45. a5 Bd7 46. axb6+ Kxb6 47. Ra6+ Kb7 48. Kc5 Rd8 49. Ra2 Rc8+ 50. Kd6 Be8
51. Ke7 g5 52. hxg5 1-0
[/pgn]
not sure if 18.g4!, 30.Bxg6! and other would be found by current engines.
[d]r2qk2r/3bbppp/1p2p3/pP1pP3/P2P1P2/3BKN2/6PP/R2Q3R w kq - 0 18
After 17...b6 of black, can some engine consider 18.g4! in this position?
xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
[d]4q2r/1b1kbp2/1p2p1p1/pP1pP1N1/P2P1PQP/3BK3/2R5/8 w - - 6 30
After 29...Be7, can current engines consider 30.Bxg6! here?
Would be nice if we can try to feed some difficult epd positions into AlphaZero,
to estimate its ELO strength.