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        Arimaa >> General Discussion >> Botbash question
        
(Message started by: IdahoEv on Jan 8^th, 2007, 4:40pm)

Title: Botbash question
Post by IdahoEv on Jan 8^th, 2007, 4:40pm

At some point in the near future I plan to start a new series of monthly botbash challenges, similar to the two I ran last year (http://idahoev.com/arimaa/). The question is, when? Should I start them now, or wait till after the challenge? If I wait till after the challenge *and* want to start them on the 1st of a month, they may not be starting till April.

There's also the issue of allowing the 2007 CC bots to enter the ladder and stabilize in rating, to allow for accurate scoring of the botbash challenges. But there's also the issue of wanting to have more fun sooner rather than wait till April.

And, is a month the right length of time for these challenges? Last time, Arimaanator so dominated the scoreboard that others lost interest after a few days. I have a new scoring strategy in mind that may help keep more people interested this time, but perhaps a shorter challenge period would also be good.

So, options are:
* Start asap
* Start Feb 1st (first BB challenge will overlap with the 2007 Arimaa Challenge)
* Start March 1st (2007 arimaa challenge will mostly be over)
* Start April 1st
* Start some other time, like January 15, Feb 15, whatever....

Sound off on opinions, so I can go prepare my software (scoring will be automatic this year, to help keep me from falling behind).

I have some devious and diabolical challenges planned this time...

Title: Re: Botbash question
Post by chessandgo on Jan 8^th, 2007, 5:04pm

great ! I'm not much of a botbasher, but I'm looking forward to see this ;)

on 01/08/07 at 16:40:51, IdahoEv wrote:

I have some devious and diabolical challenges planned this time...

like beat the best bot possible with only 2 steps per move ? ;) I don't believe we would go very high with only one step ^^

Title: Re: Botbash question
Post by IdahoEv on Jan 8^th, 2007, 5:40pm

on 01/08/07 at 17:04:19, chessandgo wrote:

like beat the best bot possible with only 2 steps per move ? ;) I don't believe we would go very high with only one step ^^

That challenge (2 steps per turn) is planned as "limited motion, part III", sometime in the future. Limited motion, Part II is different, and in any case neither is the challenge planned for the next one.

The upcoming one opens up a whole new branch of evil handicaps. :-)

Title: Re: Botbash question
Post by Fritzlein on Jan 8^th, 2007, 7:33pm

I'm also more of an interested spectator than a botbasher, but my vote is clearly for a later start. Right now we still have the Computer Championship to keep things interesting, and then there will be qualifying for the Challenge, and then the Challenge itself, and then the postal tourney will start.

It really sucks to discover Arimaa just after the postal tournament starts, because then there is no event you can play in until the next World Championship. That's why you should start on April 1: to give all the noobs who join after that something to do. Also, that will be late enough that we might lure back PMertens...

Title: Re: Botbash question
Post by IdahoEv on Jan 8^th, 2007, 8:00pm

on 01/08/07 at 19:33:23, Fritzlein wrote:

That's why you should start on April 1: to give all the noobs who join after that something to do.

Well, unless I flake out, there will be continued monthly challenges (I have 30+ concepts listed in a text file) so the noobs will still have something to do regardless of when they join. Starting it now (or whenever) would not prevent April noobs from having they joy of a botbash challenge.

The trouble with the CC and challenge is that they are primarily spectatorial in nature. (and, I note, the CC games today are not exactly drawing a large audience, which is no big surprise.)

Title: Re: Botbash question
Post by Fritzlein on Jan 8^th, 2007, 10:40pm

on 01/08/07 at 20:00:20, IdahoEv wrote:

The trouble with the CC and challenge is that they are primarily spectatorial in nature.

Ah, but this year there is a participatory component. From January 28 to February 10, the top two finishers from the Computer Championship will be having a playoff against human opponents to see which will qualify for the Challenge. That qualifying round is something we want as many different humans as possible to participate in. Not that you shouldn't run a botbash event during that time: the number of folks who seriously contend for the botbash prize may be small anyway. I just wanted to point out that this year there will be something for everyone to do in late January / early February.

Title: Re: Botbash question
Post by IdahoEv on Jan 8^th, 2007, 10:53pm

on 01/08/07 at 22:40:48, Fritzlein wrote:

From January 28 to February 10, the top two finishers from the Computer Championship will be having a playoff against human opponents to see which will qualify for the Challenge.

Ahh, this I was not aware of. So then, the remaining question is whether IdahoEv is capable of sitting on his diabolical botbash ideas for 2.75 months!

Probably I'll start one shortly after the challenge, and just run it for not the full month, March 4th-31st or something.

In other questions, Fritz, why aren't you interested in partaking in botbashing yourself?

Title: Re: Botbash question
Post by Fritzlein on Jan 9^th, 2007, 7:39am

on 01/08/07 at 22:53:58, IdahoEv wrote:

In other questions, Fritz, why aren't you interested in partaking in botbashing yourself?

I'm mildly interested, but two things that dampen my interest are

1. Successful botbashing seems unrelated to my chances of winning against humans. It's almost as if botbashing is a different game from Arimaa, in the way that chess puzzles are not chess. You have to play objectively bad moves, and you are looking for ways in which bots don't know how to take advantage of objectively bad moves.

2. The most spectacular botbashes rely on fixable evaluation bugs. What does it do to all the records based on bait-and-tackle if Fotland fixes the evaluation bug in Bomb that allows it? (and he already has fixed the bug...) It seems that simply learning to play Arimaa really well is the greatest humiliation to the bots, because that's something that apparently can't be fixed.

Don't get me wrong: the botbashes are interesting puzzles, and they are fun to try to solve, but they start to get so far away from "real" Arimaa that they might as well be Sudoku.

Title: Re: Botbash question
Post by IdahoEv on Jan 9^th, 2007, 2:49pm

on 01/09/07 at 07:39:25, Fritzlein wrote:

Don't get me wrong: the botbashes are interesting puzzles, and they are fun to try to solve, but they start to get so far away from "real" Arimaa that they might as well be Sudoku.

I suppose that's fair; that's approximately the way I feel about the "endgame" puzzles, since while they match chess endgames such situations never actually occur in Arimaa.

(although in both cases I'd contend that they are still more interesting puzzles than Sudoku. That awful thing was interesting only for as long as it took to learn the solution algorithm, about a week.)

Title: Re: Botbash question
Post by RonWeasley on Jan 9^th, 2007, 3:48pm

Me dad at the Ministry thinks Sudoku is a hoax. If you pay attention, you'll see the numbers change position in the newspaper every day. No way you can get the answer when they do that.