Hi all, this discussion about ratings and playing strength of Go programs on 19x19 and 9x9 with and without handicap stones etc. is exactly the field I try to find an approach in my tournaments!
Most classic Go programs were designed only to be as strong as possible in 19x19 and seamed to be much weaker in 9x9. Most newer Go programs were designed to be as strong as possible in 9x9 and seam to be much weaker in 19x19. Meanwhile some programmers make efforts to optimize their Go programs for all three boardsizes 9x9, 13x13 and 19x19 so there could be NOW a new possibility to use these programs and their playing results to propose a new standard correlation of the kyu and dan grades between the different boardsizes and with different komi / handicap stones! I remember when HandTalk won my first 9x9 tournament in 2000 the author Chen Zhixing sent me his 2001version of GoeMate for further tournaments and answered, it was never optimized for 9x9 and it should be possible to make a much stronger 9x9 Go program - perhaps he even tried some efforts in this direction, I never heard more of him since... All the years, GoeMate from Chen Zhixing and Go++ from M.Reiss were the two strongest 19x19 Go programs in the world but important tournaments with motivating prize money became rare. In my now ongoing tournament with 100 games/pairing for 19x19 I started to let play GnuGo 3.7.11 on different levels (10 and 15) against Go++ version 5.0, GoeMate2001, FunGo, ManyFaces v11 and some other older Go programs. I plan reporting results+games on a special web site I am working on. In 2008 I want to include some of the newer available Go programs like MoGo or Leela or ask for new versions of all the other new top Go programs around...! My aim is to add one new version or new program with up to 1000 19x19 games played every month, to have my new 9x9 tournament continue running aside with the same engines and to let play weaker programs again with handicap! Stefan Jacques Basaldúa wrote: > > Don Dailey wrote: > > The assumption is that 1 Dan 19x19 = 1 Dan > > 9x9 and on average this will be true. > > That is precisely my point. It is a very strong assumption because > 19x19 has lots of things: joseki study, global board evaluation, etc. > that do not exist in 9x9. This assumption is only an approximation. It > is like guessing that a world champion 100 meter runner will also be > a world champion long jump athlete. That may happen (Carl Lewis), but > usually it is not the case, although the correlation is evident. > Perhaps the word champion in 19x19 is in the top-50 at 9x9. Nobody will > be surprised if a 3 dan beats a 5 dan consistently in 9x9, because it > is a different game, but of course, a 10 kyu won't have a chance. > > The correct answer should be: dan does not exist for board sizes other > than 19. And it is impossible to define a consistent scale made of 30 > levels for 9x9. Perhaps 9x9 has only 10 or 12 levels. Defining a step > in level as being a standard deviation above the other player in the > normal distribution that justifies the Elo system. > > (BTW. The best proof that the 19x19 level does not match the 9x9 > level are the UCT programs themselves.) > > Jacques. _______________________________________________ computer-go mailing list computer-go@computer-go.org http://www.computer-go.org/mailman/listinfo/computer-go/
