An amazing championship with two bots tieing with Daniel for first and Lazy and Shalev apparently missing the cut… Kudos to Simple if you make the cut :)

Link for the lazy: https://littlegolem.net/jsp/tournament/tournament.jsp?trnid=hex.ch.44.1.1

Leela's rating and its constant progress is overwhelming…to be honest I don't see a point of leela's participation in championship any more :(

Force, actually leela had lost the game with daniel here, but daniel didn't calculate well at the end. I think leela should continue playing. :)

Overall I think the bots are very consistent. They are rather good in every position. For us humans instead it depends a lot on luck. In some positions we know what we've to do and in some others we don't. Also in some cases we happen to have the will power and in other cases we do not. I think simpldeep played very well vs me. Arek also played well. I didn't play well at all..

Well, maybe I did play well vs shalev, but that's just one game out of 8.

In every game where the Bot goes first we are starting with a theoretically won position, so all we have to do is avoid making mistakes !

Bill, yeah, even if only just of sheer luck, someone will manage to win. We only have to get rigtht a few initial stones. ;)

The bots are great learning tools. Two things I've noticed is that they tend to prefer the fourth row over the fifth along the short diagonal (during the early game), and that they like combining b5 with the c2 opening (or the equivalent).

Has anyone noticed any other insights from the bots?

Hard to differentiate an insight from a whim :-)

I've spent a lot less time on hex since my son was born, which happened pretty early in the tournament. So for most games I only played properly for the first few turns, then played mostly by instinct. The main exception was my game with leela, where I think I was completely lost even before I stopped having time…

Hopefully by the next time I'm in table 1 of the championship I'll be able to give my games the attention they deserve. I've learned that I'm solidly crushed by all top players if I play by instinct (I think people like Daniel manage to play good hex just from their phones, but I'm not able to do that).

Btw, simpledeep is a very good player now, this is not the first time he beat me.

Shalev you lucked out that  JKB didn't play 21.g9  in game 2033225 !

Congratulations on having a son :)

My son is getting married August 10th :)

I mean 19.g9 :)

Shalev in your game 2033222 it looks like your 9.L4 was way out of the way and yes Simpledeep immediately jumped on it !

The championship is finished. Why isn't the next championships started?

Sorry. My bad. There's a couple of games left.

Looking forward to the next tournament.

Whoooaaaa, actually the best game played this tournament seems to be still going!!!

https://littlegolem.net/jsp/game/game.jsp?gid=2096344

Nice, I didnt expect that guys but this is real nice. I see leelas influences obviously, but still :)

Arek, it looks like Force would have forced  you nicely by playing 31. J5 followed by h7 :)

Arek, why is it the best game played (of course, without discussing specific issues, because it's still going)?

Bill, recently I'm more like Force Minor, don't know why few strong players somehow appreciate my game lately :)

Force,the best part is still to come, there are many variations :)

And the board is almost exactly balanced 50/50 (but not quite) :)

Bill, come into play, what are you doing! The worst it can happen is that you lose! :D

Bill, and if you lose, someone else will win, and aggregate happiness is the same! ;)

I have been very busy with work and family… but your offer is tempting :)

Could you please share your insights regarding my gamę with simpledeep now? :)

Force, this one here: https://littlegolem.net/jsp/game/game.jsp?gid=2097286&nmove=8 ?

B12 looks very out of place, for the rest, who knows.

Havent you talked about championship game?

So far I've only rushed through it scanning for blunders. First that I would call so is 13.l4

but I'm not saying that it lost the game. The opening might be already white but I don't know these days, bots messed with my head :)

I think Force is referring to 2096344 (discussed earlier in the thread), not 2097286

Force, congrats on your well played game with Simple :)

If Simple had played 53.e4 hopefully you would have replied g2 :)

Thanks Bill. I don't remember all the variants, but I think I would play g2 :)