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Topic: 2009 Computer Championship (Read 5129 times) |
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99of9
Forum Guru
Gnobby's creator (player #314)
 
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Re: 2009 Computer Championship
« Reply #30 on: Feb 28th, 2009, 4:34am » |
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Gnobot 99%
Rat 1%
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BlackKnight
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Arimaa player #695
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Re: 2009 Computer Championship
« Reply #31 on: Feb 28th, 2009, 1:23pm » |
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Agreed.
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aaaa
Forum Guru
Arimaa player #958
Posts: 768
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Re: 2009 Computer Championship
« Reply #32 on: Mar 1st, 2009, 10:26am » |
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Shouldn't the time between games be at least as large as their maximum possible duration, in this case 8 hours? Otherwise, bots would start sharing CPU cycles if the games overlap, right?
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Tuks
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Arimaa player #2626
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Re: 2009 Computer Championship
« Reply #33 on: Mar 1st, 2009, 10:29am » |
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especially since there are bots like rat who like to prolong games unnecessarily 
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99of9
Forum Guru
Gnobby's creator (player #314)
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Re: 2009 Computer Championship
« Reply #34 on: Mar 1st, 2009, 11:43am » |
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Also, Gnobot's post-game script will hog computer resources and may cause another bot running to time out.
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omar
Forum Guru
Arimaa player #2
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Re: 2009 Computer Championship
« Reply #35 on: Mar 1st, 2009, 5:23pm » |
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Last year the longest game was 56 moves and took about 3.5 hours to finish. Most of the other ones finished within 3hrs.
I usually set them up to start automatically, but this year I didn't set it up that way and have to issue a command to start the game. So I'll be keeping an eye on it and will push the other games out if one is going longer then usual.
Spectators can keep an eye on the server load and processes running from these pages:
http://gold.arimaa.com/logs/
http://silver.arimaa.com/logs/
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| « Last Edit: Mar 1st, 2009, 5:25pm by omar » |
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omar
Forum Guru
Arimaa player #2
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Re: 2009 Computer Championship
« Reply #36 on: Mar 1st, 2009, 9:08pm » |
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Tournament
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I was able to play some games against the CC bots when they were online. Based on how hard a time the bots gave me I would have to say that clueless would be my first choice for winning the tournament this year followed closely by GnoBot. Of course the developers have been working on the bots till the very end and I never played any of the bots at the full 2 min per move on the quad core hardware so their performance could be way different then what I am guessing. But one thing for certain is that this years tournament is very different than the ones we've seen in the past. Unlike previous years where bot_Bomb had very high chances of winning I think it's chances of winning the tournament this year are pretty low. It is quite amazing the David Fotland developed within one year a bot that could stay ahead of the pack for five years. This year is also going to mark a turning point for the Arimaa bots. To be competitive the bots will have to start making use of multi-core CPUs. Since getting more cycles per second is getting increasingly harder, this is going to be the only way for bots to ride the hardware improvement ramp. Humans have enjoyed a six year plateau in bot performance and perhaps gotten a little over confidence in our ability to stay ahead of the bots. Now the fun is really going to begin and we are going to be tested like never before. My expectation is that humans are going to learn a lot about tactics from the bots. Also we are going to learn something intrinsic about the Arimaa game tree. First we are going to notice that there are areas of the game tree that are pro tactics and areas that are pro strategy. Then the real battle for humans is going to be to see if they can steer the game into a pro strategy area while the bots try to steer it into a pro tactics area. If the Arimaa game tree is intrinsically more pro strategy then the humans will be able to maintain the lead; otherwise the bots will close the gap and potentially surpass us just by riding the hardware improvement ramp.
Bot Sharp
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Although David Wu has been making a lot of improvement to bot_Sharp, he felt that it was not quite ready for this years tournament and decided to use last years version. Here is what he said to me in a recent email:
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... I have a current version of the program that is well-tested and far more robust and bug-free than the original in every part that is implemented (almost all of it, in fact), as well as more flexible (actually paying attention to time controls, and such), but I don't quite think I will be able to finish in the next week. As such, I would appreciate it if you could set up last year's version. ...
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Wiki
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I totally forgot to ask if someone could help with the event coverage for the computer championship. I was pleasantly surprised to see that the wiki page for the computer championship was already being updated. If you can let me know who the main contributors are I'll add their names to the tournament page as event reporters. Thanks for the reporting guys
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Janzert
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Arimaa player #247
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Re: 2009 Computer Championship
« Reply #37 on: Mar 1st, 2009, 9:43pm » |
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99of9 did the work of putting together the CC event page on the wiki and has done a great job. Adanac has said that he will be able to fill in a game or two for each round. I will try and fill any other game reports that need it. I hope others will feel free add to or modify any that I do though. Remember it's a wiki, please jump in anywhere you want.
Janzert
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Fritzlein
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Arimaa player #706
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Re: 2009 Computer Championship
« Reply #38 on: Mar 2nd, 2009, 9:28am » |
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on Mar 1st, 2009, 5:23pm, omar wrote:
The logs on silver.arimaa.com clearly show that Rat never stopped running. It was eating up one CPU even after the next game started, so clueless only had three CPUs to work with instead of four against sharp. The game should be aborted if it is still going on, and invalidated if we catch it too late.
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omar
Forum Guru
Arimaa player #2
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Re: 2009 Computer Championship
« Reply #39 on: Mar 2nd, 2009, 10:05am » |
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I've sent the following message to the TD and will wait on his response to see what we should do.
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Prior to the bot_Sharp2008CC vs bot_clueless game the
bot_GnoBot vs bot_Rat game occured and finished with
bot_Rat losing due to time. I checked the arimaa.com
server and did not find any problem that could have
caused the time out. However, I did not notice that
bot_Rat was still continuing to run and did not exit
after the game timed out.
After the bot_Sharp2008CC vs bot_clueless had started
Karl noticed that bot_Rat was still running and
notified me. I immediately killed the bot_Rat process
so that it does not consume any resources and effect
bot_clueless. It was around move 13s when I killed
the bot_Rat process. I then tried to call you, but
was informed that you were out.
I will let the game finish, but just wanted to notify
you about this situation. I'll also post a message
on the forum.
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Janzert
Forum Guru
Arimaa player #247
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Re: 2009 Computer Championship
« Reply #40 on: Mar 2nd, 2009, 10:32am » |
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I would think since it could only hurt clueless' play and clueless went on to win anyway that it didn't have an effect on the game outcome.
Janzert
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omar
Forum Guru
Arimaa player #2
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Posts: 1003
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Re: 2009 Computer Championship
« Reply #41 on: Mar 2nd, 2009, 11:41am » |
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True; and even at the time I became aware of the problem clueless was in a strong position.
But after thinking about this, I think I see why Fritzlein suggested stopping the game. If the game had turned out that clueless lost; the TD most likely would have decided that it should be replayed. Thus, clueless would be getting two chances to win the game. So it makes sense to stop the game immediately if we become aware of such a problem.
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aaaa
Forum Guru
Arimaa player #958
Posts: 768
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Re: 2009 Computer Championship
« Reply #42 on: Mar 2nd, 2009, 12:42pm » |
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I think there should be an automatic process that checks whether the computers are completely unoccupied before it starts a championship game.
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Fritzlein
Forum Guru
Arimaa player #706
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Re: 2009 Computer Championship
« Reply #43 on: Mar 2nd, 2009, 2:15pm » |
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on Mar 2nd, 2009, 11:41am, omar wrote:| But after thinking about this, I think I see why Fritzlein suggested stopping the game. If the game had turned out that clueless lost; the TD most likely would have decided that it should be replayed. Thus, clueless would be getting two chances to win the game. So it makes sense to stop the game immediately if we become aware of such a problem. |
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Yes, I think the principle of not getting two chances is essential. One could argue that it is not fair to clueless to restart after 13 moves because clueless already had a great position. But if clueless had had a bad position, then we surely would have restarted the game. This means that losing a CPU was a bonus for clueless rather than a detriment. Either it gets to play on from a winning position, or it gets a free restart. That's not fair to sharp.
I think that even now the game should be invalidated and replayed for the same reason. I think everyone agrees that we would have invalidated the result if clueless had lost, so the only fair thing to do is invalidate the game even though clueless won.
And for future reference, next time a problem is discovered mid-game, I highly recommend that the game be suspended immediately. We always have the option of resuming from the suspended position if that later on seems like the fairest thing to do. The computers won't use the extra time to rest or strategize or gain any kind of advantage in between. The bad thing about playing on before making a decision is that delay can create the perception (if not the reality) that the ultimate decision was affected by how the rest of the game played out. That applies not only to this specific case, but other situations as well.
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Fritzlein
Forum Guru
Arimaa player #706
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Posts: 5928
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Re: 2009 Computer Championship
« Reply #44 on: Mar 2nd, 2009, 2:18pm » |
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on Mar 2nd, 2009, 10:05am, omar wrote:| Karl noticed that bot_Rat was still running |
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Credit where credit is due; Janzert is the one who noticed Rat was still running; I just read his comment in chat.
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