Leela Chess Zero Makes Mind-Blowing Piece Sacrifice!

[Dann Corbit]

LC0 is better at quiet positions than stockfish.
So for instance, for an opening, the analysis of LC0 is more reliable than Stockfish.
For tactical positions and endgame, Stockfish is much stronger.
That is why they are of equal strength. When there are no obvious or tactical moves, LC0 knows what to do.
When a tactical situation arises, or when we reach the endgame and SF is hitting 80 plies, SF knows what to do.

If SF were absurdly better at analysis than LC0, then how would it be possible for LC0 to win major tournaments?

[jp]

LC0 is better at quiet positions than stockfish.
So for instance, for an opening, the analysis of LC0 is more reliable than Stockfish.

Do you mean better at quiet positions in the microbullet games so many people seem to love?

If you mean in analysis, or at very long time per move, please give examples of these positions.

At very long times (not endgames), they typically give very similar lines.

[Milos]

If SF were absurdly better at analysis than LC0, then how would it be possible for LC0 to win major tournaments?

Analysis and tournaments have very little in common especially that tournaments are at best rapid and in huge majority of cases just blitz.
Go around CC players and try to find some whose principle analysis engine is Lc0.
Analysis is not just press a button and forget (even though you might be doing it that way).
Lc0 doesn't have hash (its cashed moves are in no way replacement for hash just for faster running) and that is a total killer in any analysis (and it's not only Lc0, MCTS engines are not useful for analysis, period). Since you can't go forward and backward and get any useful result of it.

[jp]

Analysis is not just press a button and forget (even though you might be doing it that way).
Lc0 doesn't have hash (its cashed moves are in no way replacement for hash just for faster running) and that is a total killer in any analysis (and it's not only Lc0, MCTS engines are not useful for analysis, period). Since you can't go forward and backward and get any useful result of it.

And if you do just press a button and forget, Lc0 needs huge amounts of memory or it will run out and abort. Not everyone has 512GB RAM (but good luck to those who do!).

[Dann Corbit]

If SF were absurdly better at analysis than LC0, then how would it be possible for LC0 to win major tournaments?

Analysis and tournaments have very little in common especially that tournaments are at best rapid and in huge majority of cases just blitz.
Go around CC players and try to find some whose principle analysis engine is Lc0.
Analysis is not just press a button and forget (even though you might be doing it that way).
Lc0 doesn't have hash (its cashed moves are in no way replacement for hash just for faster running) and that is a total killer in any analysis (and it's not only Lc0, MCTS engines are not useful for analysis, period). Since you can't go forward and backward and get any useful result of it.

TCEC uses long time control and two 2080 TI cards.
It is on par with Stockfish with 176 cores at slow time control in that setting.
No matter how you look at it, LC0 is a brilliant engine (except for tactical shots and endgame)

Edit: Correction, make that 4x 2080 TI GPU cards.

[Dann Corbit]

Analysis is not just press a button and forget (even though you might be doing it that way).
Lc0 doesn't have hash (its cashed moves are in no way replacement for hash just for faster running) and that is a total killer in any analysis (and it's not only Lc0, MCTS engines are not useful for analysis, period). Since you can't go forward and backward and get any useful result of it.

And if you do just press a button and forget, Lc0 needs huge amounts of memory or it will run out and abort. Not everyone has 512GB RAM (but good luck to those who do!).

I have only 128 GB RAM, but I have allocated a 2 TB swap file on super high speed SSD. LC0 has no problem analyzing overnight using two 2080 TI super cards.
I think it would be a great choice for correspondence analysis, especially during the opening phase.
Now, there is analysis time control longer than correspondence (I have analyzed a position for well over a week before). And perhaps LC0 would be a bad choice for that, but for most purposes you don't need to be a millionaire to use it for analysis.

[Milos]

And if you do just press a button and forget, Lc0 needs huge amounts of memory or it will run out and abort. Not everyone has 512GB RAM (but good luck to those who do!).

Yeah, that's another thing, didn't even wanna go there. The way how Lc0 caches moves is just atrocious. It's basically 2kB per node (in SF hash is few bytes large).
But anyway since going back and forth is useless, for long term analysis with Lc0 one doesn't benefit much from cached moves, so one can just limit them to a million or default size and that's it.

[Milos]

I have only 128 GB RAM, but I have allocated a 2 TB swap file on super high speed SSD. LC0 has no problem analyzing overnight using two 2080 TI super cards.
I think it would be a great choice for correspondence analysis, especially during the opening phase.
Now, there is analysis time control longer than correspondence (I have analyzed a position for well over a week before). And perhaps LC0 would be a bad choice for that, but for most purposes you don't need to be a millionaire to use it for analysis.

That's because you use only the dumbest push button and forget type of analysis. I can spend 12 hours of compute time and get 10x better analysis than you leaving SF or Lc0 analysing something for a week. Sure, it requires some interaction and know-how, but then again, it's a matter of quality not quantity.

Additionally, I don't even wanna go there, but you don't seem to know much about CC. Even in early opening, when you are analyzing deep, most of analysis is about avoiding the traps and certain types of endgame, because most of your lines will be deep enough to reach there. And using Lc0 there would be a suicide. That's another reason why push analysis button and forget is pretty dumb and useless approach in CC.

[Dann Corbit]

I have only 128 GB RAM, but I have allocated a 2 TB swap file on super high speed SSD. LC0 has no problem analyzing overnight using two 2080 TI super cards.
I think it would be a great choice for correspondence analysis, especially during the opening phase.
Now, there is analysis time control longer than correspondence (I have analyzed a position for well over a week before). And perhaps LC0 would be a bad choice for that, but for most purposes you don't need to be a millionaire to use it for analysis.

That's because you use only the dumbest push button and forget type of analysis. I can spend 12 hours of compute time and get 10x better analysis than you leaving SF or Lc0 analysing something for a week. Sure, it requires some interaction and know-how, but then again, it's a matter of quality not quantity.

Additionally, I don't even wanna go there, but you don't seem to know much about CC. Even in early opening, when you are analyzing deep, most of analysis is about avoiding the traps and certain types of endgame, because most of your lines will be deep enough to reach there. And using Lc0 there would be a suicide. That's another reason why push analysis button and forget is pretty dumb and useless approach in CC.

Yes, all those TCEC wins are purely lucky.
Only a fool would consider LC0 engine analysis.
You already told us that the IM who liked the bishop sacrifice knows nothing, and I am sure you could give him some nice chess lessons.

[Dann Corbit]

Meanwhile, Stoofvlees is giving Fire a bludgeoning in the current game like an angry Canadian beating the brains out of a baby seal.
Current standings have three programs above Stockfish, all of which are NN.