Can Komodo give knight odds in standard chess to a master?

[Jesse Gersenson]

http://u.komodochess.com/games/gilden-knight.pgn

[carldaman]

Final result was a perfect 3 to 0 sweep by Gilden. Komodo never really had a chance in any game, although it did last 140 moves in game one and 100 moves in game 3. Gilden played remarkably well, never making any serious errors, certainly none that jeopardized the wins, and this just two months before his 75th birthday! Considering that grandmasters make oversights left and right against Komodo, it's hard to explain this. Of course knight odds is much larger than the two pawns or less we normally give GMs, but that hardly seems like a full explanation. Gilden doesn't even own a computer, and I suspect that if I gave him one he would just use it as a table to put a chessboard on! No one predicted this result or even came close. So much congratulations to Larry G, and we will surely be inviting him back for another match at some more suitable handicap.

The problem with this handicap in its present form is that the human master is not only up a piece but also has all the compensation . Komodo would have be play a lot more aggressively in order to at least cause some tactical complications (where the human could make exploitable mistakes), or it doesn't stand a realistic chance.

In the last match, Larry Gilden had an easy time steering the game into solid/quiet positions and making needed simplifying trades almost at will. Not a good recipe for the knight-handicapped Komodo.

CL

[JJJ]

If Komodo needs to be more agressive, a good test would be to play against it with agression raised at this handicap and maybe keeping contempt.

[Lyudmil Tsvetkov]

anyone able to post here replayable games?

thanks in advance.

[lkaufman]

In view of the match loss, I ran a test to see if Komodo can give knight odds to a decent engine. I chose Fritz 11 running on 1 core, with Komodo able to use all 4 cores on my laptop. Time limit was 15 min plus 5 seconds, one third of the human match level but still much slower than blitz. Contempt set at 100 (I used 150 vs. Gilden). Alternating knight handicap.

Fritz 11 on 1 pcu is rated 2853 on the CCRL 40/40 list, which actually seems a bit low since it is several versions improved from the Fritz that defeated then-World Champion Kramnik in a match. I would bet on Fritz 11 1 cpu in a match with Magnus Carlsen, though it might be close.

Much to my surprise, Komodo (same version that played Gilden) won by 13 to 7 (12 wins, 6 losses, 2 draws). So in rapid chess, Komodo can decisively defeat a Magnus Carlsen level engine giving it knight odds, but lost all three games to a nearly 75 year old player with a FIDE rating of 2114. Pretty amazing difference. Perhaps Fritz 11 doesn't know to simplify when ahead, I don't know about that, but this surely isn't the whole answer. In most of the winning games Komodo whipped up a strong attack on the king, something that was never even a dream against Gilden.

Must be something to learn from this.

[carldaman]

In view of the match loss, I ran a test to see if Komodo can give knight odds to a decent engine. I chose Fritz 11 running on 1 core, with Komodo able to use all 4 cores on my laptop. Time limit was 15 min plus 5 seconds, one third of the human match level but still much slower than blitz. Contempt set at 100 (I used 150 vs. Gilden). Alternating knight handicap.

Fritz 11 on 1 pcu is rated 2853 on the CCRL 40/40 list, which actually seems a bit low since it is several versions improved from the Fritz that defeated then-World Champion Kramnik in a match. I would bet on Fritz 11 1 cpu in a match with Magnus Carlsen, though it might be close.

Much to my surprise, Komodo (same version that played Gilden) won by 13 to 7 (12 wins, 6 losses, 2 draws). So in rapid chess, Komodo can decisively defeat a Magnus Carlsen level engine giving it knight odds, but lost all three games to a nearly 75 year old player with a FIDE rating of 2114. Pretty amazing difference. Perhaps Fritz 11 doesn't know to simplify when ahead, I don't know about that, but this surely isn't the whole answer. In most of the winning games Komodo whipped up a strong attack on the king, something that was never even a dream against Gilden.

Must be something to learn from this.

Since Komodo is facing a human (75 yrs old at that) you'd have to tune Komodo to take more calculated risks in such Knight-odds games. One thing that makes humans uncomfortable is double-edged, complicated, chaotic positions where it feels like walking a minefield, despite being up a piece.
This is probably easier said than done, since being down a piece effectively gets in the way of creating those counter chances it needs.

Nonetheless, since you're starting from a lost position, with "nothing to lose", taking increased risks seems like the only approach that has a realistic chance of succeeding. After all, Komodo was able to overcome such a deficit in chess960/FRC, if memory serves correctly.

[Lyudmil Tsvetkov]

In view of the match loss, I ran a test to see if Komodo can give knight odds to a decent engine. I chose Fritz 11 running on 1 core, with Komodo able to use all 4 cores on my laptop. Time limit was 15 min plus 5 seconds, one third of the human match level but still much slower than blitz. Contempt set at 100 (I used 150 vs. Gilden). Alternating knight handicap.

Fritz 11 on 1 pcu is rated 2853 on the CCRL 40/40 list, which actually seems a bit low since it is several versions improved from the Fritz that defeated then-World Champion Kramnik in a match. I would bet on Fritz 11 1 cpu in a match with Magnus Carlsen, though it might be close.

Much to my surprise, Komodo (same version that played Gilden) won by 13 to 7 (12 wins, 6 losses, 2 draws). So in rapid chess, Komodo can decisively defeat a Magnus Carlsen level engine giving it knight odds, but lost all three games to a nearly 75 year old player with a FIDE rating of 2114. Pretty amazing difference. Perhaps Fritz 11 doesn't know to simplify when ahead, I don't know about that, but this surely isn't the whole answer. In most of the winning games Komodo whipped up a strong attack on the king, something that was never even a dream against Gilden.

Must be something to learn from this.

Since Komodo is facing a human (75 yrs old at that) you'd have to tune Komodo to take more calculated risks in such Knight-odds games. One thing that makes humans uncomfortable is double-edged, complicated, chaotic positions where it feels like walking a minefield, despite being up a piece.
This is probably easier said than done, since being down a piece effectively gets in the way of creating those counter chances it needs.

Nonetheless, since you're starting from a lost position, with "nothing to lose", taking increased risks seems like the only approach that has a realistic chance of succeeding. After all, Komodo was able to overcome such a deficit in chess960/FRC, if memory serves correctly.

I suggest Gilden plays at least 2700.

[carldaman]

In view of the match loss, I ran a test to see if Komodo can give knight odds to a decent engine. I chose Fritz 11 running on 1 core, with Komodo able to use all 4 cores on my laptop. Time limit was 15 min plus 5 seconds, one third of the human match level but still much slower than blitz. Contempt set at 100 (I used 150 vs. Gilden). Alternating knight handicap.

Fritz 11 on 1 pcu is rated 2853 on the CCRL 40/40 list, which actually seems a bit low since it is several versions improved from the Fritz that defeated then-World Champion Kramnik in a match. I would bet on Fritz 11 1 cpu in a match with Magnus Carlsen, though it might be close.

Much to my surprise, Komodo (same version that played Gilden) won by 13 to 7 (12 wins, 6 losses, 2 draws). So in rapid chess, Komodo can decisively defeat a Magnus Carlsen level engine giving it knight odds, but lost all three games to a nearly 75 year old player with a FIDE rating of 2114. Pretty amazing difference. Perhaps Fritz 11 doesn't know to simplify when ahead, I don't know about that, but this surely isn't the whole answer. In most of the winning games Komodo whipped up a strong attack on the king, something that was never even a dream against Gilden.

Must be something to learn from this.

Since Komodo is facing a human (75 yrs old at that) you'd have to tune Komodo to take more calculated risks in such Knight-odds games. One thing that makes humans uncomfortable is double-edged, complicated, chaotic positions where it feels like walking a minefield, despite being up a piece.
This is probably easier said than done, since being down a piece effectively gets in the way of creating those counter chances it needs.

Nonetheless, since you're starting from a lost position, with "nothing to lose", taking increased risks seems like the only approach that has a realistic chance of succeeding. After all, Komodo was able to overcome such a deficit in chess960/FRC, if memory serves correctly.

I suggest Gilden plays at least 2700.

Positionally, you're probably right. I doubt he's the same tactically, but Komodo never got to challenge him in that area. Credit goes to Mr. Gilden for playing to his strength, rather than Komodo's.

[lkaufman]

In view of the match loss, I ran a test to see if Komodo can give knight odds to a decent engine. I chose Fritz 11 running on 1 core, with Komodo able to use all 4 cores on my laptop. Time limit was 15 min plus 5 seconds, one third of the human match level but still much slower than blitz. Contempt set at 100 (I used 150 vs. Gilden). Alternating knight handicap.

Fritz 11 on 1 pcu is rated 2853 on the CCRL 40/40 list, which actually seems a bit low since it is several versions improved from the Fritz that defeated then-World Champion Kramnik in a match. I would bet on Fritz 11 1 cpu in a match with Magnus Carlsen, though it might be close.

Much to my surprise, Komodo (same version that played Gilden) won by 13 to 7 (12 wins, 6 losses, 2 draws). So in rapid chess, Komodo can decisively defeat a Magnus Carlsen level engine giving it knight odds, but lost all three games to a nearly 75 year old player with a FIDE rating of 2114. Pretty amazing difference. Perhaps Fritz 11 doesn't know to simplify when ahead, I don't know about that, but this surely isn't the whole answer. In most of the winning games Komodo whipped up a strong attack on the king, something that was never even a dream against Gilden.

Must be something to learn from this.

Since Komodo is facing a human (75 yrs old at that) you'd have to tune Komodo to take more calculated risks in such Knight-odds games. One thing that makes humans uncomfortable is double-edged, complicated, chaotic positions where it feels like walking a minefield, despite being up a piece.
This is probably easier said than done, since being down a piece effectively gets in the way of creating those counter chances it needs.

Nonetheless, since you're starting from a lost position, with "nothing to lose", taking increased risks seems like the only approach that has a realistic chance of succeeding. After all, Komodo was able to overcome such a deficit in chess960/FRC, if memory serves correctly.

I suggest Gilden plays at least 2700.

Then I must be close to 2900 myself, based on our head to head results in tournaments this century. So Carlsen should be seeking a match with me

[cdani]

Must be something to learn from this.

At least that the engines are tuned to play against engines Of course we all know this.
Also that is possible to tune an engine to play much safer when ahead.
Also that the tuning of an engine actually gives it a concrete character, and having a character is against the optimum. Of course this is also in human beings, as intelligence is contrary to structures or preconcepts.
So nothing new, but another evidence to add to what already we know that engines are really not good players in some aspects.