Chess programming is fascinating but it seems for me that it has somewhat stalled in creativity in terms of classical (non DNN) engines. They all seem to use improved versions of min-max/alpha-beta. Which results in computer players that are extremely powerful but also quite dull. This is because they assume that the opponent will play perfect game and will do it at the full strength of the engine.
Basically there is no point playing against the engines at full strength as a human, since it will beat almost any human beyond grandmaster level. And that’s for weaker engines – the medium tier ones will regularly beat grandmasters and the top ones around the stockfish tier will probably not loose 1 game in 100 plays.
That considered I’ve wondered what’s possible dropping the assumptions about perfect play of the opponent. Some probabilistic models of opponent or different way of rating whole tree of moves in the context, instead of position only. For example considering the alternative moves and how difficult it would be to play perfect game for the opponent, it might be better to play combination with a lot of traps with possibility of loosing some position if the opponent plays perfectly. Current engines wouldn’t play such kind of move because they’d assume (via min-max/alpha-beta) that opponent will have perfect answer. Of course, if the opponent is an engine it will, but against humans it would make things much more interesting.
Basically there is no point playing against the engines at full strength as a human, since it will beat almost any human beyond grandmaster level. And that’s for weaker engines – the medium tier ones will regularly beat grandmasters and the top ones around the stockfish tier will probably not loose 1 game in 100 plays.
That considered I’ve wondered what’s possible dropping the assumptions about perfect play of the opponent. Some probabilistic models of opponent or different way of rating whole tree of moves in the context, instead of position only. For example considering the alternative moves and how difficult it would be to play perfect game for the opponent, it might be better to play combination with a lot of traps with possibility of loosing some position if the opponent plays perfectly. Current engines wouldn’t play such kind of move because they’d assume (via min-max/alpha-beta) that opponent will have perfect answer. Of course, if the opponent is an engine it will, but against humans it would make things much more interesting.