most of Crafty's many fans are a bit older.
Prof. Bob Hyatt wrote computer chess history but much more important are all the helps he give most of us many years.
Now, v25.3 is the last official Crafty, v25.6 JA a modernized Crafty, however it came about.
Strange things have always happened in the community, honestly ... we can produced much more stuff as the author from John Sinclair and we would be much more afraid.
According to the rumors I've heard, the official Crafty is supposed to be more powerful. Back in the day, hundreds of rumors were circulating every year, but unfortunately, that's becoming less common.
I am looking in both versions.
Seems to be right that Crafty 25.3 is a little bit stronger but we know ... Elo is misleading, and we're just rushing blindly into battle armed with nothing but Elo.
Let us look on an easy stat:
Code: Select all
points 1:0 1/2 0:1 % m-avg 1/0<45 rk
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090. Crafty 25.3 HCE xb 183,0 60 246 994 14,08 74 0/ 63 - 63 00#
---. Crafty 25.6 HCE JA xb 178,0 63 230 1007 13,69 78 0/ 20 - 20 ---
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v25.3 = 2812
v25.6 JA = 2805
But is is really 2812 if Crafty lost from 1300 games 63 under 45 moves to mate?
Crafty has actually always had a glaring weakness in king safety. It's a goldmine for a Grandmaster with 2600 Elo if they like to play vs. Crafty. A lot of older very strong engines have such problems, like Rybka or Shredder. Not Zappa, Hiarcs, Junior and so one.
But now ...
v25.6 JA (a little big weaker) comes with only 20 games lost under 45 moves to mate.
63 to 20 ... what for a difference!!
Such things you will never see in the official ratinglist system, if you looking on Elo only.
So, the clear better version is v25.6 JA and not v25.3.
Peoples that modernized Crafty do a great job!
Best
Frank
) 
