Lyudmil Tsvetkov wrote:what I am seeing is mostly white wins.
I honestly can't wait, for you to have the time to share with us some details, about those games you mention. Things like TC, CPU, number of threads, syzygy probe depth and limit, starting position... in the meantime, what we saw, was the 27th EMT, a tournament that ended, for the first time (IIRC), with a 90%+ draw rate. And those are unfiltered numbers, I'm not taking into account the couple of players who were happy to lose games, or the many book loses that took place, throughout the event. I will only mention a couple of games from the guy who "won" the event.
I put an emphasis on the term "win", because the definition is really peculiar: "to get possession of by effort or fortune". I'm on the side of effort, while Arno considers fortune to be enough, as his words reflect in this small exchange:
Round 1
[pgn][Event "27th Engine Masters, Sunday August 27, 13 Rounds, 12m+1s, 16.00 ST"]
[Site "Infinity Chess"]
[Date "2017.8.27"]
[Round "1"]
[White "Soloman"]
[Black "KhalidOmar"]
[Result "1-0"]
[ECO "C77"]
[WhiteElo "2494"]
[BlackElo "2426"]
[WhiteEngine "stockfish_17082014_x64_modern"]
[BlackEngine "SF Eman 0.9 x64 BW-CTG"]
[EventType "Swiss"]
[WhiteTeam ""]
[BlackTeam ""]
[PlyCount "205"]
[TimeControl "720+1"]
1.e4 {[%emt 0][%B]} e5 { [%eval -0.05/1][%emt 3]} 2.Nf3 {[%emt 0][%B]} Nc6 { [%eval -0.05/1][%emt 0]} 3.Bb5 {[%emt 0][%B]} a6 { [%eval -0.05/1][%emt 0]} 4.Ba4 {[%emt 0][%B]} Nf6 { [%eval -0.05/1][%emt 0]} 5.d3 {[%emt 0][%B]} Bc5 { [%eval -0.05/1][%emt 0]} 6.c3 {[%emt 0][%B]} b5 { [%eval -0.05/1][%emt 0]} 7.Bb3 {[%emt 0][%B]} d6 { [%eval -0.05/1][%emt 0]} 8.Bg5 {[%emt 0][%B]} h6 { [%eval -0.05/1][%emt 0]} 9.Bh4 {[%emt 0][%B]} Bb6 { [%eval -0.05/1][%emt 0]} 10.a4 {[%emt 0][%B]} g5 { [%eval -0.05/1][%emt 1]} 11.Bg3 {[%emt 0][%B]} b4 { [%eval -0.05/1][%emt 0]} 12.Nbd2 {[%emt 0][%B]} Rb8 { [%eval -0.05/1][%emt 0]} 13.O-O {[%emt 0][%B]} O-O { [%eval -0.05/1][%emt 0]} 14.h3 {[%emt 0][%B]} Be6 { [%eval -0.05/1][%emt 0]} 15.Bc4 { [%eval 0.34/28][%emt 26]} Qc8 { [%eval -0.05/1][%emt 0]} 16.Re1 { [%eval 0.40/30][%emt 42]} Re8 { [%eval -0.05/1][%emt 0]} 17.Rc1 { [%eval 0.40/29][%emt 28]}[/pgn]
This wasn't a blatant book loss, but the out of book position gave white a clear advantage, that just kept climbing. Statistics aren't definitive, but a 62.5% for withe, coupled with a 0.40 evaluation by Soloman's SF at move 17 (depth 29), are enough to figure out when the game was lost.
And now for the wrapped gift. Round 4
[pgn][Event "27th Engine Masters, Sunday August 27, 13 Rounds, 12m+1s, 16.00 ST"]
[Site "Infinity Chess"]
[Date "2017.8.27"]
[Round "4"]
[White "Soloman"]
[Black "Paul"]
[Result "1-0"]
[ECO "C77"]
[WhiteElo "2507"]
[BlackElo "2522"]
[WhiteEngine "stockfish_17082014_x64_modern"]
[BlackEngine "stockfish_17082609_x64_modern"]
[EventType "Swiss"]
[WhiteTeam ""]
[BlackTeam ""]
[PlyCount "167"]
[TimeControl "720+1"]
1.e4 {[%emt 0][%B]} e5 {[%emt 1][%B]} 2.Nf3 {[%emt 1][%B]} Nc6 {[%emt 0][%B]} 3.Bb5 {[%emt 0][%B]} a6 {[%emt 0][%B]} 4.Ba4 {[%emt 0][%B]} Nf6 {[%emt 1][%B]} 5.d3 {[%emt 1][%B]} Bc5 {[%emt 0][%B]} 6.c3 {[%emt 0][%B]} b5 {[%emt 0][%B]} 7.Bb3 {[%emt 0][%B]} d6 {[%emt 1][%B]} 8.Bg5 {[%emt 1][%B]} h6 {[%emt 1][%B]} 9.Bh4 {[%emt 0][%B]} O-O {[%emt 0][%B]} 10.O-O {[%emt 0][%B]} Bb6 {[%emt 0][%B]} 11.a4 {[%emt 1][%B]} g5 {[%emt 1][%B]} 12.Nxg5 {[%emt 1][%B]} hxg5 {[%emt 0][%B]} 13.Bxg5 {[%emt 0][%B]} Na5 {[%emt 0][%B]} 14.Bc2 {[%emt 0][%B]}[/pgn]
Paul's game is almost a joke. Black exits the book at move 13, leaving white's book move with almost an 82% score in favour. This is one of those cases, were stats clearly crunch engine evaluation. Paul's SF was still giving a 0.00 score at move 18, depth 30. 3 moves later, it was admiring defeat with a much more realistic 1.55 for white, at depth 29.
The situation became so surreal, that at a point, some of the higher ranked players, still without a single "win" in their pockets, started asking for friends to give them the full point. Whether they were being serious or not, that's something you can always hide behind a smiley, but the bottom line is, what credibility do these events hold anymore? Let's not forget that Soloman was tied first in the ICUC, despite a lackluster performance (17th place!).
At one point, people will start to ask themselves just how much luck can simply be luck, and not something else entirely.