TCEC Season 11: 4th and 3rd Division

[JamesTCEC]

Hello Talkchess community. I'm the social media manager of TCEC (assigned by Anton Mihailov, TCEC tournament director). My nick is JamesTCEC in the Twitch chat in the main TCEC page.

Starting with its 11th season in early 2018, TCEC will adopt a league format consisting of four divisions of eight chess engines. The five divisions will be called the Premier, First, Second, Third, and Fourth Divisions. Each division will conduct a tournament which will lead to the top two engines in the Premier Division facing off in a 100-game Superfinal for the TCEC seasonal championship. You can read more information in:
http://www.chessdom.com/tcec-season-11-press-release/
http://www.chessdom.com/tcec-season-11- ... ticipants/

4th Division started on Jan 3rd and finished on Jan 6th. Defenchess, Senpai, Pedone, Ethereal and ChessBrain VB got promoted to 3rd division after playing a double round robin event.

3rd Division started yesterday, Jan 6th, and it will be a 2 x double round robin. The participants are: Fritz, Nemorino, Laser, Defenchess, Senpai, Pedone, Ethereal and ChessBrain VB. This division is expected to last five days and top 2 engines will be promoted to 2nd Division.

Follow the live games in http://tcec.chessdom.com/live.php
Check all past games in http://tcec.chessdom.com/archive.php

[CMCanavessi]

Welcome James! Always following TCEC results, awesome tournament.

[jdart]

The divisions seem a little strange to me. For example, Senpai 2 is rated above Vajolet 2.2.4 on the CEGT list (by quite a bit - 90 ELO os so), but Senpai is Division 4, and Vajolet is Division 2.

--Jon

[Modern Times]

The divisions seem a little strange to me. For example, Senpai 2 is rated above Vajolet 2.2.4 on the CEGT list (by quite a bit - 90 ELO os so), but Senpai is Division 4, and Vajolet is Division 2.

--Jon

Yes, same on CCRL blitz list too (4CPU).

[JamesTCEC]

TCEC doesn't have the enough amount of games in order to have the most accurate ratings for the engines. However, we recalculated new ratings for all engines that you can check in http://tcec.chessdom.com/archive.php in the bottom right. These new ratings take into account past games played by the current and some past versions of each engine.

[CMCanavessi]

The divisions seem a little strange to me. For example, Senpai 2 is rated above Vajolet 2.2.4 on the CEGT list (by quite a bit - 90 ELO os so), but Senpai is Division 4, and Vajolet is Division 2.

--Jon

That's because Senpai is a new entrant in TCEC and Vajolet had already played in Season 10, and the divisions were created having the finishing order of Season 10 while new entrants were sent to division 4. In a couple of seasons, everything should sort itself. Stronger engines will be higher up, while weaker will demote.

Something similar will happen in my tournament (although my divisions are quite bigger than TCEC ones).

[JamesTCEC]

We are at halfway in 3rd Division. Fritz and Laser lead the event with 9,5/14. In the direct matches the engines achieved draws and against the opposition Fritz did not lose a single game, thus making five wins and and nine draws. Laser is with more colorful performance. It has seven wins, two losses, and five draws.

The middle of the table is also balanced. Pedone, Defenchess, Nemorino, and Senpai are within 0,5 points. A wrong step can push any of the engines towards a division medal or relegation.

ChessBrainVB and Ethereal are at the last two positions. Being only 1,5 points from the opposition, they can hope for staying in the division in case of good play in the second half.

3rd Division standings after 14 rounds
1. Fritz 9.5/14
2. Laser 9.5/14
3. Pedone 7.0/14
4. Defenchess 7.0/14
5. Nemorino 6.5/14
6. Senpai 6.5/14
7. ChessBrainVB 5.0/14
8. Ethereal 5.0/14

[JamesTCEC]

3rd Division just ended. Fritz and Laser are promoted to 2nd division and they will play with Jonny, Bobcat, Texel, Vajolet, Wasp and Arasan there. Starting time of 2nd Division will be announced soon.

Final standings of 3rd Division:
No. Engine Score (SB)
1. [Fritz 16] 18.5/28 (238.25)
2. [Laser 1.5] 17.5/28 (228.25)
3. [Nemorino 4.01] 14.5/28 (203.50)
4. [Pedone 1.7] 14.0/28 (194.00)
5. [Defenchess 271217] 14.0/28 (188.50)
6. [Senpai 2.0] 12.5/28 (169.50)
7. [ChessBrainVB 3.61] 11.0/28 145.50
8. [Ethereal 8.77] 10.0/28 140.50