"The notion of "contempt" implies that Houdini will try to avoid draws by evaluating its own position slightly too optimistically. The Contempt level can be chosen between 0 (none) and 2 (aggressive), the default value of 1 should be a good compromise in most situations."
Im sure Dr Wael & others will choose 2
2 = Aggressive
Contempt 2 adds some king safety imbalance, leading to a more attacking style.
Insanity: doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results.
Albert Einstein
May I ask what do you believe is the ELO improvement over 1.5a? Or is it just enhanced feature improvements?
Thank You
PS: I like the fact that 10% goes to UNICEF.
Update: Just noticed the 25 Elo.
"Good decisions come from experience, and experience comes from bad decisions."
__________________________________________________________________
Ted Summers
"The notion of "contempt" implies that Houdini will try to avoid draws by evaluating its own position slightly too optimistically. The Contempt level can be chosen between 0 (none) and 2 (aggressive), the default value of 1 should be a good compromise in most situations."
Im sure Dr Wael & others will choose 2
2 = Aggressive
Contempt 2 adds some king safety imbalance, leading to a more attacking style.
You got that right my friend
_No one can hit as hard as life.But it ain’t about how hard you can hit.It’s about how hard you can get hit and keep moving forward.How much you can take and keep moving forward….
Ok, checking out Houdini 2.0 and the uci options. I have some questions about optimal settings for mate search and contempt. If doing a mate search, would it be better to set Contempt = 0 (No Contempt), Contempt = 1 (Default) or Contempt = 2 (Aggressive)?
From the Users Guide: "It is usually not recommended to activate the contempt for analyzing positions". Does this also apply when doing a mate search?
Here are the descriptions of these options from the Users Guide ...
Mate Search
Maximum search depth for mate search.
Default 0, min 0, max 99.
If set, this option will usually speed-up a mate search. If you know that a position is "mate in X", you can use X or a value slightly larger than X in the Mate Search option. This will prevent Houdini from going too deep in variations that don't lead to mate in the required number of moves.
Analysis Contempt (checkbox)
Activate Contempt for position analysis.
It is usually not recommended to activate the contempt for analyzing positions. When contempt is active, the score of the analysis will be optimistic (over-evaluated) for the side that is to move. That means that if you use Analysis Contempt the evaluations will change depending on whether White or Black has the move. For example, from the start position, when you do an analysis with Analysis Contempt (and Contempt value 1) you could find a best move e2-e4 scoring about +0.3 for White. If you then play e2-e4 and analyze for Black you could find a score close to +0.0. If you do the same without Analysis Contempt, you should find a consistent +0.15 score whether it’s White or Black to move.
Contempt
Level of contempt to avoid draws in game play.
Default 1, min 0 (none), max 2 (aggressive).
The notion of "contempt" implies that Houdini will try to avoid draws by evaluating its own position slightly too optimistically. The Contempt level can be chosen between 0 (none) and 2 (aggressive), the default value of 1 should be a good compromise in most situations.
· 0 = No Contempt
The evaluations are accurate and identical for both sides. This is recommended for position analysis in which you analyze alternatively for White and Black. The starting position evaluates as approx. +0.15.
· 1 = Default Contempt
Contempt 1 is primarily based on piece value imbalance, Houdini will value its own pieces higher than the opponent pieces, so will only exchange them if there’s a clear positional advantage in doing so.
This also means that the score is evaluated optimistically for the side to move (at most 0.15 pawn). For example, the starting position evaluates as approx. +0.30 when analyzing for White and +0.00 when viewed from Black. This is only recommended for position analysis if you always analyze for the same side.
· 2 = Aggressive
Contempt 2 adds some king safety imbalance, leading to a more attacking style.
The contempt settings are fairly mild and have little impact on the objective strength of the engine. It’s hard to say which will give the best results against a given opponent, it may depend on the style and strength of the opponent. One could envisage more pronounced contempt but this would start to degrade the engine’s objective strength. By default the contempt is only activated during game play, not during infinite analysis. If you enable the Analysis Contempt checkbox, Houdini will also take into account the contempt for infinite analysis.
