Fritz 18: Evolving Genius

[AdminX]

The moves are comming from this 'unknown' internal engine.

I have given this enigma a name! I call it the embedded 'Sandbagger'.

[swissman]

Sad that Fritz be still Windows only.

Yes it‘s sad for ChessBase.
No macOS (M1 Max chip) version. No money.
BanksiaGUI is better and it will be much better. No money.

Sad for ChessBase is an exaggeration. The relatively few Mac
or Linux users are probably not worth the effort to port ChessBase
to these platforms. And Banksia GUI better than ChessBase is probably
a pipe dream, considering all the possibilities both programs offer.

[BrendanJNorman]

Sad that Fritz be still Windows only.

Yes it‘s sad for ChessBase.
No macOS (M1 Max chip) version. No money.
BanksiaGUI is better and it will be much better. No money.

Sad for ChessBase is an exaggeration. The relatively few Mac
or Linux users are probably not worth the effort to port ChessBase
to these platforms. And Banksia GUI better than ChessBase is probably
a pipe dream, considering all the possibilities both programs offer.

When I was using a MacBook Pro, it was a piece of cake to run windows in an emulator and still have access to my chess programs.

No need for iOs versions when you have VMware.

[BrendanJNorman]

Yeah I think I misunderstood your original statement. My bad. Yeah I have no idea how that Easy Mode works, but its reasonably fun.

By the way, has anyone managed to use Fritz 18 in another GUI? I added it to Banksia, but it always crashes.

Yes, the program is only a few days old, it going a bit fast here too. In a month, maybe the conclution is somthing else.
And sorry if I say something obvious, I'm not an expert in Fritz. I have had many Fritz's in the past but they have usually been used the first 1-2 days before I forgot about them, just like all the chessbooks in my shelf that only collecting dust.

The Fritz 18 (Glikgo) engine works from Aquarium.

When testing I try to be objective, but of course I like the new Fritz and how they try to create a nice playing machine for human. I don't think it is any disadvantage that the use an internal engine for all these training modes. It is the end result that count, and it looks nice.

Yep. Agree with you. My second thought is that F18 is well worth the money.

[BrendanJNorman]

Yes, you can play an engine match against Glikgo, but this wasn't the topic.

Some more:
It does not use the external engine for moves in either Friend mode or Rated game under Training (Classical menu), here it start the engine so it could look like it use it (you see it in task explorer). But no positions are sendt to the engine, it just sit there waiting. The moves are comming from this 'unknown' internal engine.
To play against the external engine you have to start the game as long or blitz game (home/level menu).

I also saw when fidling with this that it send 'setoption name UCI_ShowWDL value true' .
You turn this option on with rightclick in the analysis pane (Display win probability). Tested with Stockfish 14.1

Yeah I think I misunderstood your original statement. My bad. Yeah I have no idea how that Easy Mode works, but its reasonably fun.

By the way, has anyone managed to use Fritz 18 in another GUI? I added it to Banksia, but it always crashes.

Hmm, It worked for me on my laptop using the Banksia GUI, I had no crashes over here. I just pointed Banksia to the path where Fritz 18 was installed.

C:\Program Files (x86)\Common Files\ChessBase\Engines.uci\Fritz 18

Thanks mate, I think I pointed it to the engine file itself, but not the folder path. I'll give it another try.

[BrendanJNorman]

For the record I think these are the types of positions that Fritz 18 can help one improve at, but I do understand that you do not care for it's style of play.

I've gotta say, this Fritz is fun to play against, although I find the hints distracting and prefer to just play the weakened engine in silence/with no hints.

[pgn][Event "Fritz 18 Easy Game"]
[Site "?"]
[Date "2021.11.18"]
[Round "?"]
[White "Norman, Brendan"]
[Black "Strong Club Player (Fritz)"]
[Result "1-0"]
[PlyCount "77"]
[EventDate "2021.11.18"]

1. Nf3 f5 2. d3 Nc6 3. e4 e5 4. exf5 Bc5 5. Nc3 d5 6. g4 Nf6 7. h3 h5 8. g5 Nh7
9. Nh4 Nxg5 10. Bg2 d4 11. Nd5 Nf7 12. Ng6 Rh7 13. Qf3 Qd7 14. f6 Qd6 15. fxg7
Rxg7 16. Nf6+ Kd8 17. Nh4 Bb4+ 18. Kf1 Qe6 19. Nxh5 Rh7 20. Qg4 $1 {Super} Bf8
21. Ng3 Nb4 22. Ng6 Qf6 23. Nxf8 Bxg4 24. Nxh7 Qa6 25. hxg4 Nxc2 26. Be4 Kd7
27. g5 $1 {Defying gravity} c6 28. g6 $1 {Undeterred} Nd6 29. g7 $1 {Hot move}
Rg8 30. Nf6+ Ke6 31. Nxg8 Nxe4 32. Nxe4 Qxd3+ 33. Kg1 Qxe4 34. Rh3 $1 {Sharp}
Qe1+ 35. Kg2 Qe4+ 36. Kh2 Qe1 37. Rf3 Qe4 38. Rf6+ Kd7 39. Rh6 $1 {Fancy Fritz
resigns} 1-0[/pgn]

Time for some more tinkering!

Nice games, I liked that move order you chose to bring about the Kings Gambit as white. I bet that game had your adrenaline going!

Thanks Ted.

Yeah I was hoping to get this line...

[pgn][Event "?"]
[Site "?"]
[Date "????.??.??"]
[Round "?"]
[White "?"]
[Black "?"]
[Result "*"]
[PlyCount "11"]

1. Nf3 f5 2. d3 Nf6 3. e4 fxe4 4. dxe4 Nxe4 5. Bd3 Nf6 6. Ng5 *[/pgn]

Which is a very promising pawn sacrifice in this dutch move order (and with which I have a 100% score with), but when Fritz deviated I was like "Err King's Gambit is already owned by the Fischer variation and you're playing it with a tempo down!"

Definitely got a bit hairy there though, and I was always worried (unnecessarily) about certain checks and how much compensation I get after ...Nxa1.

Turns out my intuition was right.

You seem to be a decent player too, what's your Elo/USCF?

Maybe one day we can play some training games on Zoom.

Good way to train aat LTC without worrying about cheaters!

[AdminX]

You seem to be a decent player too, what's your Elo/USCF?

Maybe one day we can play some training games on Zoom.

Good way to train aat LTC without worrying about cheaters!

Sure thing, I will send you a PM with my details.

[Eduard]

Yep. Agree with you. My second thought is that F18 is well worth the money.

The Fritz 18 GUI is surprisingly good. Better than Fritz 17 with Update 24. ChessBase did everything well this time. The new features are really interesting.

[Eduard]

I wanted to put "No Scaling" on the board (layout) and get this message:



Is that a BUG?

[Cornfed]

Yep. Agree with you. My second thought is that F18 is well worth the money.

The Fritz 18 GUI is surprisingly good. Better than Fritz 17 with Update 24. ChessBase did everything well this time. The new features are really interesting.

And I just noticed this on the Chessbase website...explains the sparring feature.

https://en.chessbase.com/post/fritz-18- ... liancies-2