WCCC vs TCEC Chess Engine Competitions..

[supersharp77]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/World_Com ... ampionship

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Top_Chess ... ampionship

By chance happend across the WCCC tourney details and had No Idea Stockfish has never won the competition and that Komodo is the defending champion (3 Times Running) Also had no idea Shredder has been boycotting the TCEC competitions (although I thought they were entered into this years Premier Div..Not sure) Quite a lot of elite names of Chess engines have won the WCCC Chamiponship including Kaissa, Cray Blitz, Hiarcs, Deep Junior, Sjeng, Komodo, Rybka (DQ'ed) Shredder Fritz Deep Thought etc.. but No Houdini or Stockfish...Surprising and very controversial. They demand "Equal Hardware Specs" How will the LC0 & similar NN engines fit into these specifications? Interesting days ahead!




1 1974 Stockholm 13 Kaissa
2 1977 Toronto 16 Chess 4.6[2]
3 1980 Linz 18 Belle
4 1983 New York 22 Cray Blitz
5 1986 Cologne 22 Cray Blitz
6 1989 Edmonton 24 Deep Thought
7 1992 Madrid 22 ChessMachine (Gideon)
8 1995 Hong Kong 24 Fritz
9 1999 Paderborn 30 Shredder
10 2002 Maastricht 18 Deep Junior
11 2003 Graz 16 Shredder
12 2004 Bar-Ilan U 14 Deep Junior
13 2005 Reykjavík 12 Zappa
14 2006 Torino 18 Junior
15 2007 Amsterdam12 Zappa[wccc 1]
16 2008 Beijing 10 HIARCS[wccc 1]
17 2009 Pamplona 10 Junior, Shredder, Sjeng[wccc 1]
18 2010 Kanazawa 10 Rondo, Thinker[wccc 1]
19 2011 Tilburg 9 Junior
20 2013 Yokohama 6 Junior
21 2015 Leiden 9 Jonny
22 2016 Leiden 6 Komodo
23 2017 Leiden 4 Komodo
24 2018 Stockholm 8 Komodo
^ Jump up to: a b c d Rybka originally won the WCCC in 2007 -2010, but was later disqualified for plagiarising code in a controversial decision.
World Chess Software Championship[edit]
From 2010 a new tournament was introduced and held at the same location and during the same period as the World Computer Chess Championship. The rules for the World Chess Software Championship state that competing programs must run on machines with identical hardware specifications. Time control is game in 45 minutes with 15 second increment.[3][4]

Event # Year Location Participants Winner Hardware
1 2010 Kanazawa 9 Shredder[5] Intel quad core Xeon 2.66 GHz, 8MB Hash
2 2011 Tilburg 5 HIARCS Intel Core2 Duo, 1.7 GHz, 2MB Hash
3 2013 Yokohama 6 HIARCS Intel quad core i7, 2.7 GHz, 16MB Hash
4 2015 Leiden 8 Shredder [1] Intel quad core i7, 2.7 GHz, 16MB Hash
5 2016 Leiden 7 Komodo Intel quad core i7, 3.4 GHz, 16MB Hash [2]
6 2017 Leiden 7 Shredder Intel quad core i7, 3.4 GHz, 16MB Hash
7 2018 Stockholm 9 Komodo Intel quad core i7, 1.8 GHz, 16MB Hash

[Dann Corbit]

Wccc is and has long been utterly irrelevant. A few Europeans will disagree. Their opinions are irrelevant also.
Wccc is watched by a tiny smattering of European chess nerds.
Tcec is watched by hoards of enthusiasts.
Wccc does not even follow their own rules.
I find them utterly repulsive, despite my flaming love for computer chess.
My fervent hope is that the whole slimy ship should sink quietly into the sea and Fide should recognize the error of their ways and back something sensible like Tcec.
IMO, YMMV

[Modern Times]

Well, Stockfish has never won because it has never entered.

[supersharp77]

Wccc is and has long been utterly irrelevant. A few Europeans will disagree. Their opinions are irrelevant also.
Wccc is watched by a tiny smattering of European chess nerds.
Tcec is watched by hoards of enthusiasts.
Wccc does not even follow their own rules.
I find them utterly repulsive, despite my flaming love for computer chess.
My fervent hope is that the whole slimy ship should sink quietly into the sea and Fide should recognize the error of their ways and back something sensible like Tcec.
IMO, YMMV

Interesting Comments Dann..Rechecked TCEC and it does indeed seem that Shredder is not entered into the competition
(a Boycott..and why?) 64 Is better than the 32 engines..would love to see Prodeo or Crafty in there plugging away with perhaps some SF Clones & SF Learning http://www.chessdom.com/wp-content/uplo ... -Cup-3.pdf

[mwyoung]

Wccc is and has long been utterly irrelevant. A few Europeans will disagree. Their opinions are irrelevant also.
Wccc is watched by a tiny smattering of European chess nerds.
Tcec is watched by hoards of enthusiasts.
Wccc does not even follow their own rules.
I find them utterly repulsive, despite my flaming love for computer chess.
My fervent hope is that the whole slimy ship should sink quietly into the sea and Fide should recognize the error of their ways and back something sensible like Tcec.
IMO, YMMV

You have more faith in TCEC then I have.

But I have no major issue with any competition. And I would not like to see them destroyed. I just would not use TCEC or WCCC as my only data points. If you are spending money on a chess engine. Or deciding what engine is best as a tool for analysis.

Even for the casual user who wants the best chess engines. There are many good testing sites, and resources at hand. And it would take minimal effort in finding the best engines.

And in our current era most of the best engines are free. So people can test what is best for themselves for their hardware. With a little time and effort.

I personally do not waste too much time watching the same engine versions lose season after season in TCEC. It is more interesting at the end, and only to see if I predicted the outcome correctly.

[IanO]

WCCC has been on a steady decline since 2000 and has been historically irrelevant since 2010 with the expulsion of Rybka. The rating lists have been a far more reliable and inclusive measure of progress since 2005. And TCEC should be applauded for including the full range of top engines, with only a few exclusions (Shredder, Hiarcs), whereas the WCCC has had a lot of trouble attracting *any* of the top engines. Of the top three contenders, only Komodo has attended recently.

The one benefit to the WCCC is that it is open hardware, so that supercomputers, clusters, and these days GPUs have a place to compete. I am really hoping that AlphaZero or LeelaZero choose to compete this year. A Leela vs. cluster-Jonny matchup would be quite fun!

[leavenfish]

Of the top three contenders, only Komodo has attended recently.

Team K...does like it's paper titles.

I've said that...it stirs up strong emotions, but seriously, it's either a nice vacation or a really good chance to tag 'World Champion' to the product - it is a commercial undertaking afterall.

It's kind of like a World Championship where the likes of Carlsen, Caruana, Vachier-Lagrave and such do not show up while others like Shankland, Marin and Hillarp Persson show up...Shankland wins and gets crowned "World Champion". It's fair (in a weird way) but a joke.

[chessmobile]

FIDE and WCCC have a cosy relationship, I’m all for WCCC but to claim the title of World Champion engine seems a bit misleading to the average punter. When most people hear of World Champion in any endeavour they assume that somehow that is the best in the world. FIDE should just stick with Human chess and the WCCC organisers should look for some other self promotion and save themselves paying FIDE for the pleasure.

[Dann Corbit]

Of the top three contenders, only Komodo has attended recently.

Team K...does like it's paper titles.

I've said that...it stirs up strong emotions, but seriously, it's either a nice vacation or a really good chance to tag 'World Champion' to the product - it is a commercial undertaking afterall.

It's kind of like a World Championship where the likes of Carlsen, Caruana, Vachier-Lagrave and such do not show up while others like Shankland, Marin and Hillarp Persson show up...Shankland wins and gets crowned "World Champion". It's fair (in a weird way) but a joke.

Team K is not afraid of any competition, including tcec, ccrl, cegt, etc.
When you buy a copy of Komodo, a portion of the proceeds go to Don's widow. They did not have to do that.
Will you brand them cowards? I brand them true hero's. Those are few and far between.

[chrisw]

FIDE and WCCC have a cosy relationship, I’m all for WCCC but to claim the title of World Champion engine seems a bit misleading to the average punter. When most people hear of World Champion in any endeavour they assume that somehow that is the best in the world. FIDE should just stick with Human chess and the WCCC organisers should look for some other self promotion and save themselves paying FIDE for the pleasure.

They certainly don’t have a “good relationship”. Read the FIDE Ethics committee report on the WCCC organisers.