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Metaphysician wrote: ↑Tue Apr 07, 2020 4:57 pm This will be exciting to watch!
I'm going to stick with my prediction that Komodo will win comfortably.
I apologize if these questions have already been answered, but
1. Which version of Komodo will be playing? Will GM Smerdon be told which version he's playing against?
2. What will Komodo's contempt settings be, and will Gm Smerdon know them?
Thank you, GM Kaufman.

We'll use our current dev. version (not NN), in MCTS mode, at least for the first day. If it plays poorly or we see problems, we may switch to normal Komodo for the second day, but my plan is to stick with MCTS as it seems to score better vs. humans at odds. Yes, Smerdon knows this.
I haven't decided on the Contempt setting yet, so Smerdon can't know this. I'll probably play test games Wednesday and Thursday night to help me decide on the best value. It will certainly be between 100 and 250.
This match is getting far more advance publicity than we imagined. Hundreds of comments on Facebook, chess.com etc. Most people expect a lopsided result, they just don't agree on who will be the big winner!

This will be quite interesting indeed; thanks to the Komodo team and chess.com for putting on the event!

lkaufman wrote: ↑Tue Apr 07, 2020 7:19 pm This match is getting far more advance publicity than we imagined. Hundreds of comments on Facebook, chess.com etc. Most people expect a lopsided result, they just don't agree on who will be the big winner!

I have a feeling that the people thinking Komodo will score a lopsided victory just don't understand how huge knight odds are for a strong player, especially at such a relatively slow time control

lkaufman wrote: ↑Fri Apr 03, 2020 5:30 pm

Laskos wrote: ↑Mon Mar 16, 2020 9:28 pm

lkaufman wrote: ↑Mon Mar 16, 2020 4:17 pm

MikeGL wrote: ↑Mon Mar 16, 2020 10:49 am Sounds exciting. Thanks for the heads up.
Ballpark score could be 3.5 - 2.5 win for Komodo.
All draws plus 1 win for the engine.

Well, as Tal reportedly said when told that Bobby Fischer said in the 1960s that he could give knight odds to any woman chessplayer, "Fischer is Fischer, but a knight is a knight" (or something like that). I believe that eventually Komodo will win a match like this, but not this year, we need a major breakthru for that to happen in my opinion. We did beat MVL in a (fast) rapid match at handicaps averaging about a 2.0 eval for him, but knight odds is way more than that. In the opening, a knight is worth nearly four pawns, so even with the first move, White is down about 3.5.

Very interesting.

2 GM wins, 4 draws. In this range, I guess. In other metric, something like 80-90% range that this young active GM won't lose the match.

Having played some test games of Komodo vs. myself and my son Ray under similar conditions, I'm now inclined to agree with your forecast of 2 GM wins and 4 draws. I think it performs about as well as a FIDE 2400 would with no handicap.

I had some simulations some time ago, having a low node Leela as "human", and full Leela (net 11261), regular Komodo and Stockfish (just contempt for them) as "full engines". Komodo and Stockfish seem indeed close to 2400 FIDE +/- 100 or so (maybe even a bit lower). But full Leela (11261) on a strong GPU seems to be above, at 2500 +/- 100. It even managed to win one game against low node Leela (200 nodes/move IIRC with 1541 T40-derivid net) in LTC games. And draw several for a total of 50% Armageddon score against what I calculated to be a 2500 FIDE low node Leela. Komodo and Stockfish performed much worse, but I didn't try Komodo MCTS.

TIL that Stockfish is a commercial engine.

MonteCarlo wrote: ↑Tue Apr 07, 2020 9:49 pm This will be quite interesting indeed; thanks to the Komodo team and chess.com for putting on the event!

lkaufman wrote: ↑Tue Apr 07, 2020 7:19 pm This match is getting far more advance publicity than we imagined. Hundreds of comments on Facebook, chess.com etc. Most people expect a lopsided result, they just don't agree on who will be the big winner!

I have a feeling that the people thinking Komodo will score a lopsided victory just don't understand how huge knight odds are for a strong player, especially at such a relatively slow time control

In general, this is a fair statement, but some grandmasters are among those predicting a huge Komodo win, while others predict the opposite. I suppose the most informed predictions would be by MVL and Nakamura, since they have played handicap rapid matches with Komodo, but I haven't heard if they have made any prediction. None of the many GM opinions I've heard have been from any of the many GMs who have actually played matches with Komodo. FM Larry Gilden, who has lost two knight odds rapid matches to Komodo, thought that a GM should still win such a match.

We got a top commentator for it, former Ukraine champion GM Evgenij Miroshnichenko, now about 2600 FIDE, but nearly 2700 FIDE in 2009. This is not chess.com commentary, but chess.com will feed him the game moves.
But I'm getting worried about the result, because I played two games against Komodo MCTS tonite under the match conditions and won them both. It didn't play badly, but it didn't manage to set enough problems for me to avoid simplifying and winning the endgames. I don't usually win against Komodo at knight odds, but usually I play 10' + 5" games, the 15' + 10" time limit seems to make a huge difference for me. We'll try to figure out if changing settings or version might help, but there's nothing obviously wrong to fix. A horse is a horse, of course, of course...

lkaufman wrote: ↑Thu Apr 09, 2020 5:30 am But I'm getting worried about the result, because I played two games against Komodo MCTS tonite under the match conditions and won them both.

Is it too late to change the match conditions?! In what detail are they specified now?

MonteCarlo wrote: ↑Tue Apr 07, 2020 9:49 pm This will be quite interesting indeed; thanks to the Komodo team and chess.com for putting on the event!

lkaufman wrote: ↑Tue Apr 07, 2020 7:19 pm This match is getting far more advance publicity than we imagined. Hundreds of comments on Facebook, chess.com etc. Most people expect a lopsided result, they just don't agree on who will be the big winner!

I have a feeling that the people thinking Komodo will score a lopsided victory just don't understand how huge knight odds are for a strong player, especially at such a relatively slow time control

^^^ THIS.

It ought to be an easy win for the GM

GM Kaufman,
Thank you for answering my questions.
Good luck in the match!

jp wrote: ↑Thu Apr 09, 2020 6:45 am

lkaufman wrote: ↑Thu Apr 09, 2020 5:30 am But I'm getting worried about the result, because I played two games against Komodo MCTS tonite under the match conditions and won them both.

Is it too late to change the match conditions?! In what detail are they specified now?

Yes, too late. Now I'm 3.5 out of 4. Komodo beat my son 3 to 1, and he is stronger than I am now, in fact he just tied for first in an online event with GMs in it. And it was 10.5 to 2.5 vs FM Gilden. No obvious problems. Maybe it's my vast experience playing Komodo with handicaps. Usually I do poorly at faster time controls, but 15' + 10" is enough time for me to play well. Still very strange.