Winter

[Gabor Szots]

I have put two compiles here:

One is BMI2, the other is non-BMI2.

[xr_a_y]

I don't want to spam forum with every little patch, but version 0.9.5 adds support for Fischer Random / Chess960, which feels like a feature some people care about.

Awesome, just when I started my FRC "Top 20" tournament. Will include Winter in it when you finally release it (waiting also for Minic, Ethereal and GUI bugfixes). It'll probably replace Rybka.

How much can you wait for Minic ? The pondering issue is fixed but I need time to generate the new net for the 3.09 release.

[CMCanavessi]

How much can you wait for Minic ? The pondering issue is fixed but I need time to generate the new net for the 3.09 release.

No problem, as long as it takes. For now all the other engines are playing and I'm fiddling with the schedule to skip all minic and ethereal games. When 3.09 is released, it will play all the games until it catches up with the rest.

[matejst]

Thanks, Jonathan and Gabor.

[Carlos777]

I have put two compiles here:

One is BMI2, the other is non-BMI2.

Hi Gabor,

Could you make a compile for an older cpu like mine (AMD Phenom II x6 1090T)?

I'd like to include this new version in my next FRC tournament.

[Gabor Szots]

I have put two compiles here:

One is BMI2, the other is non-BMI2.

Hi Gabor,

Could you make a compile for an older cpu like mine (AMD Phenom II x6 1090T)?

I'd like to include this new version in my next FRC tournament.

Hi Carlos,

I have updated the compressed file with a compile for ancient hardware. I hope it works for you, I'm not on firm ground with these compiles.

[matejst]

Gabor, I see that your compiles are much bigger than Jonathan's. Could you tell me what is the difference with the old Winter 0.9? In general, the engines seem to be very similar.

Thanks in advance.

[Gabor Szots]

Gabor, I see that your compiles are much bigger than Jonathan's. Could you tell me what is the difference with the old Winter 0.9? In general, the engines seem to be very similar.

Thanks in advance.

I have no idea. When I compile it without the -static flag the size of the exe is less than 1 MB. Maybe the compiler attaches a lot of stuff which is not necessary. I repeat, I have no idea, I do these compilings rather blindly, sometimes not really knowing what I do exactly.

[Carlos777]

I have put two compiles here:

One is BMI2, the other is non-BMI2.

Hi Gabor,

Could you make a compile for an older cpu like mine (AMD Phenom II x6 1090T)?

I'd like to include this new version in my next FRC tournament.

Hi Carlos,

I have updated the compressed file with a compile for ancient hardware. I hope it works for you, I'm not on firm ground with these compiles.

Thank you Gabor, it is working fine!

[jorose]

As some of you may know, I have been active again in recent weeks, though not as active as I once was.

Currently I am working on a new Winter net and training codebase. This time it should be much easier for others to train new networks for Winter should they so choose and also sharing networks will be possible as I will be loading networks with incbin.h, as other projects do as well.

The downside is that for the moment I will be moving away from my handcrafted input features, at least temporarily. I worry this will make Winter less unique and make it harder to control its style, but I have some ideas I would like to try and feel the upsides outweigh the downsides.

One of the things I am trying out, is training Winter on FRC and DFRC games only, perhaps even filtering out the standard start position. This would make it impossible for Winter to overfit or memorize openings from standard chess. This to me makes it a very interesting engine to analyze the early opening in.

It is only very recently that I got everything up and running, so I started the day with Winter having close battles with Fairymax (1900 CCRL...) to a point now, where its most recent test was a 2-0 against Fridolin (CCRL 2750). The following is Winter's game with white. The current dev version of Winter is the only engine of this calibre that I know of that selects the Kings Gambit with white, without any opening book.

[pgn][Event "Computer Chess Game"]
[Site "Jon-Yoga"]
[Date "2022.09.20"]
[Round "-"]
[White "Winter Dev"]
[Black "Fridolin 4.00"]
[Result "1-0"]
[TimeControl "60+5"]
[Annotator "1. +0,10 1... -0,44"]

1. e4 {+0,10/20} e5 {-0,44/16 8} 2. f4 {+0,09/21 6} exf4 {+0,55/14 7} 3.
Nf3 {+0,04/18 5} g5 {+0,39/14 7} 4. d4 {+0,34/18 8} g4 {+0,90/15 9} 5. Bxf4
{+0,23/17 5} gxf3 {+0,81/14 7} 6. Nc3 {+0,19/17 7} fxg2 {+1,56/16 11} 7.
Bxg2 {+0,35/19 6} d6 {+1,50/16 8} 8. Qd2 {+0,44/17 8} Bg7 {+1,83/15 16} 9.
O-O-O {+0,48/17 7} Ne7 {+2,19/15 6} 10. Bg5 {+0,63/18 8} h6 {+2,04/15 8}
11. Bh4 {+0,74/18 8} c6 {+1,76/14 6} 12. Rhg1 {+0,58/17 8} Bg4 {+1,50/14 6}
13. Rdf1 {+0,56/18 5} Qb6 {+1,60/15 9} 14. Qf2 {+0,82/18 4} Be6
{+1,50/15 6} 15. e5 {+0,58/21 6} Rf8 {+0,49/14 7} 16. Bxe7 {+1,74/18 4}
Kxe7 {-0,72/15 8} 17. Qh4+ {+2,02/19 4} Ke8 {-0,07/14 6} 18. Bh3
{+1,84/18 5} Qd8 {-0,49/15 6} 19. Qh5 {+2,86/19 8} Bxh3 {-0,59/17 5} 20.
Qxh3 {+3,35/20 5} Qd7 {-0,56/17 5} 21. Qh5 {+3,66/21 4} Bh8 {-2,05/16 5}
22. e6 {+3,67/22 6} Qxe6 {-2,42/19 5} 23. Re1 {+3,77/24 5} Be5 {-2,50/18 5}
24. dxe5 {+4,85/20 4} d5 {-3,22/19 5} 25. Ne2 {+5,67/20 5} Kd7 {-3,79/16 5}
26. Nd4 {+6,48/22 4} Qe8 {-3,19/16 5} 27. e6+ {+6,48/21 8} fxe6
{-3,45/15 5} 28. Rg7+ {+17,66/24 4} Kc8 {-11,18/16 5} 29. Qg4 {+17,66/25 6}
Nd7 {-12,28/17 5} 30. Nxe6 {+17,66/24 5} Rf7 {-13,14/17 5} 31. Rg8
{+17,66/24 6} Re7 {-14,60/18 5} 32. Rxe8+ {+1000,09/19 7} Rxe8
{-20,26/18 5} 33. Qf4 {+1000,08/19 4} Ne5 {-1000,07/14 1,1} 34. Rxe5
{+1000,06/18 4} a6 {-1000,07/7 0,1} 35. Qf7 {+1000,05/17 7} Rxe6
{-1000,08/6 0,1} 36. Rxe6 {+1000,04/18 5} Kb8 {-1000,08/2 0,1} 37. Re7
{+1000,03/18 6} a5 {-1000,02/3 0,1} 38. Rxb7+ {+1000,02/18 5} Kc8
{-1000,01/1 0,1} 39. Qc7# {+1000,01/19 7}
{Xboard adjudication: Checkmate} 1-0

[/pgn]