Stockfish discussion thread

[Solista]

15. Dec 2023: Slow mover option on Stockfish dev has been removed. This is a mistake. Stockfish uses time differently in long time controls than in blitz games. It also makes a difference whether you play with bonus time or without bonus time! There is also a difference whether you play on PlayChess.com with a CTG book or with a Polyglot book. PlayChess does not recognize polyglot books! The engine always pulls at the same speed. If you play with a CTG book, the engine will move more slowly if you previously played from a CTG book. Stockfish developers are good laboratory experts, but the practice on the servers (Lichess is also one of them) is different. I want to be successful in practice, so I will continue to implement the slow mover option.

[Prometheus]

15. Dec 2023: Slow mover option on Stockfish dev has been removed. This is a mistake. Stockfish uses time differently in long time controls than in blitz games. It also makes a difference whether you play with bonus time or without bonus time! There is also a difference whether you play on PlayChess.com with a CTG book or with a Polyglot book. PlayChess does not recognize polyglot books! The engine always pulls at the same speed. If you play with a CTG book, the engine will move more slowly if you previously played from a CTG book. Stockfish developers are good laboratory experts, but the practice on the servers (Lichess is also one of them) is different. I want to be successful in practice, so I will continue to implement the slow mover option.

I totally agree with you

[Solista]

Simple example (there are many more): I play on Lichess Bullet 1+0 with a large and deep polyglot book. In the endgame (and soon with all 3456men Syzygy) I still have 45s left on the clock. At least I can quickly improve this by setting the slow mover higher to 115 or 120. The engine then takes a little more time. But what if there is no slow mover?

My settings are the following (just a few examples), optimized for my hardware and my engine:
PlayChess 5+0 --> slow mover 95
InfinityChess (currently closed) 11m + 3s --> slow mover 156
LiChess 1+0 Bullet --> slow mover 115.

The slow mover was set so that my engine takes the time as evenly as possible, so that the entire time is used. The books used also play a role. I don't want to miss it!

[Anton101]

[massimilianogoi]

Posts moved. Please follow the rules or I'll start to lock the threads.

[Solista]

From my practice: On the server, many games have 100 or much more moves. I also have a slow laptop where Stockfish only manages 1400 kns. My opponents usually have 7000 up to 40000 kns. Nevertheless, I manage a draw in 99%! I'm playing with a very deep book optimized specifically for slow hardware. Practice has shown me that I get more points with this hardware, if I reduce the slow mover. With a value of 100 it often becomes critical in the endgame. The slow hardware makes more mistakes in the endgame. It works better with a low value of 80 to 85. In the middle game (with an optimized book) the engine is still strong enough for everything, but in the endgame it is clearly better, because it has more time. I for one would never want to play with only 1400 kns against 20000 kns and a slow mover of 100.

[massimilianogoi]

Do you have Syzygys installed? That would help.

From my practice: On the server, many games have 100 or much more moves. I also have a slow laptop where Stockfish only manages 1400 kns. My opponents usually have 7000 up to 40000 kns. Nevertheless, I manage a draw in 99%! I'm playing with a very deep book optimized specifically for slow hardware. Practice has shown me that I get more points with this hardware, if I reduce the slow mover. With a value of 100 it often becomes critical in the endgame. The slow hardware makes more mistakes in the endgame. It works better with a low value of 80 to 85. In the middle game (with an optimized book) the engine is still strong enough for everything, but in the endgame it is clearly better, because it has more time. I for one would never want to play with only 1400 kns against 20000 kns and a slow mover of 100.