Update: new version of openingbook Rebel.bin

Hi all,

Here is an update of Rebel.bin, the polyglot openingbook I made for the Rebel engine. With lots of improvements, additions and new variations. To browse through the book you need a GUI that supports browsing polyglot books, f.e. SCID.

Download link:

Download Rebel.bin openingbook

Enjoy the new book!

Noomen TCEC 27 books available

Hi chess engine fans,

Below you can download the TCEC 27 Premier Division book and the TCEC 27 superfinal book made by Jeroen Noomen.

TCEC 27 Premier Division

Noomen S27 DivP book

TCEC 27 Superfinal

Noomen S27 sufibook

TCEC 27 superfinal book: 50 chess classics

The TCEC 27 superfinal book was made by Jeroen Noomen in cooperation with Windfishballad. It will be a continuation of the trend I started in season 25: the selected 50 opening lines are from famous Grandmasters of the past. In the list below you can see which famous grandmaster features in which line. The TCEC 27 superfinal will be a tribute to the great player Viktor Korchnoi: 23 of the lines were taken from Korchnoi's games. Also one of the few still living worldchampions, Boris Spassky, is present with 10 lines taken from his games.

Average length of the lines is 8.6 moves, which is in line with previous superfinal books. Including chess classics comes with a small price, i.e. lines are longer. As usual the great majority of the lines have a very high bias.

Black advantage: there are two lines that start with a black advantage, increasing the chance of a black win.

Personal favourites: my all time favourite lines of this superfinal are #9, #32 and #50.

Higher/lower book exits: the lines were randomly put into the book, but in general a lower exit will be followed by a higher exit.

ECO code distribution

ECO A: 11 lines

ECO B: 13 lines

ECO C: 10 lines

ECO D: 3 lines

ECO E: 13 lines

Move length distribution

4 moves: 3 lines

5 moves: 1 line

6 moves: 6 lines

7 moves: 8 lines

8 moves: 4 lines

9 moves: 8 lines

10 moves: 7 lines
11 moves: 10 lines

> 11 moves: 3 lines

Classic games in the S27 superfinal book:
1: Spassky-Fischer, Worldchampionship game 19, Reykjavik 1972
2: Giorgadze-Kasparov, Debrecen 1992
3: De Riviere-Morphy, Paris 1863
4: Korchnoi-Karpov, Hastings 1971/72
5: Taimanov-Spassky, Ch USSR 1957
6: Spassky-Franz, Riga 1959
7: Korchnoi-Judit Polgar, Prague 1995
8: Grünfeld-Alekhine, Margate 1923
9: Khodzhibekov-Korchnoi, Frunze 1956
10: Korchnoi-Ljubojevic, Palma de Mallorca 1972
11: Ree-Korchnoi, Leeuwarden 1977
12: Korchnoi-Udovcic, Leningrad 1957
13: Teichmann-Alekhine, Berlin 1921
14: Suetin-Korchnoi, Moscow 1960
15: Tartakower-Barcza, Venice 1948

16: Korchnoi-Ciocaltea, Skopje Olympiad 1972
17: Savon-Korchnoi, Moscow 1973
18: Spassky-Planinec, Moscow 1975
19: Korchnoi-Kotkov, Molotov 1956
20: Petrosian-Spassky, Worldchampionship game 12, Moscow 1966
21: Botvinnik-Flohr, Nottingham 1936
22: Kasparov-Andersson, Niksic 1983
23: Byrne-Spassky, Candidates Qf, San Juan 1974
24: Nedeljkovic-Korchnoi, Leningrad 1957
25: Korchnoi-Ciocaltea, Nice Olympiad 1974

26: Lasker-Pillsbury, London 1899
27: Blackburne-Anderssen, Baden Baden 1870
28: Botvinnik-Tal, WCh 1961 Moscow
29: Sokolov-Karpov, Bugojno 1986
30: Karpov-Ermenkov, La Valetta Olympiad 1980
31: Korchnoi-Mestrovic, Sarajevo 1969
32: Garcia Martinez-Korchnoi, Havana 1969
33: Geller-Spassky, Ch USSR 1955
34: Mecking-Korchnoi, Candidates Qf, Augusta 1974
35: Ljavdansky-Korchnoi, Tallinn 1965
36: Korchnoi-Bukic, Budva 1967
37: Spassky-Olafsson, Moscow 1959
38: Bogoljubow-Tartakower, Vienna 1922
39: Korchnoi-Kuzminykh, Leningrad 1953
40: Korchnoi-Pasman, Beersheva 1978
41: Korchnoi-Geller, Kiev 1954
42: Spassky-Hort, Candidates Qf, Reykjavik 1977
43: Karpov-Miles, Las Palmas 1977
44: Kasparov-Ivanchuk, Horgen 1995
45: Karpov-Korchnoi, WCh 1978 Baguio City
46: Korchnoi-Paoli, Gyula 1965
47: Kasparov-Short, Moscow Olympiad 1994
48: Matulovic-Spassky, Sochi 1966
49: Nimzowitsch-Alekhine, Dresden 1926
50: Korchnoi-Udovcic, Rovinj/Zagreb 1970

Noomen TCEC 26 books available

Hi chess engine fans,

Below you can download the TCEC 26 Premier Division book and the TCEC 26 superfinal book made by Jeroen Noomen.

TCEC 26 Premier Division

Noomen S26 DivP book


TCEC 26 Superfinal

Noomen S26 superfinal book

TCEC 26 superfinal book: 50 chess classics

The TCEC 26 superfinal book was made by Jeroen Noomen in cooperation with Windfishballad. It will be a continuation of the trend I started in season 25: the selected 50 opening lines are from famous Grandmasters of the past. In the list below you can see which famous grandmaster features in which line. The TCEC 26 superfinal will be a kind of tribute to ex-worldchampion Mikhail Tal: 18 of the lines were taken from Tal's games.

In the TCEC 25 superfinal it became clear to me that my usual method wasn't working anymore. Around half of the lines gave a much higher or much lower exit than I anticipated, which made me conclude that it is impossible on my own hardware to estimate the book exit correctly. Hence I asked for help and Windfishballad kindly helped me to analyse several hundredths of chess classics on his very fast hardware, using Stockfish and Leela Chess Zero. From these lines I selected the ones that had the best exits, or the most interesting main lines, or where there was a big difference in exit evaluation, or where engines diverged quite quickly, or a combination of these factors.

Average length of the lines is 8.5 moves, which is slightly lower than the S25 superfinal book, but still quite high. Including chess classics comes with a small price, i.e. lines are longer. As usual the great majority of the lines have a very high bias.

Exits: 43 lines have a Stockfish exit evaluation between +0.82 and +1.01. 1 line is below +0.82 and 7 lines are above +1.01. Thus we have a nice mix of different exits. Note: this are the exits on Windfishballad's machine, the real exits in TCEC might be different due to a different Stockfish version, longer or shorter thinking time, contempt etc. 

Black advantage: there are four lines that start with a black advantage, increasing the chance of a black win.

Personal favourites: my all time favourite lines of this superfinal are #3, #20 and #38.

Higher/lower book exits: the lines were randomly put into the book, but in general a lower exit will be followed by a higher exit.

ECO code distribution

ECO A: 12 lines

ECO B: 14 lines

ECO C: 9 lines

ECO D: 7 lines

ECO E: 8 lines

Move length distribution

3 moves: 1 line

4 moves: 1 line

5 moves: 4 lines

6 moves: 4 lines

7 moves: 9 lines

8 moves: 8 lines

9 moves: 3 lines

10 moves: 9 lines
11 moves: 4 lines

12 moves: 5 lines
> 12 moves: 2 lines

Featured games:
1: Tal - Moran, WCh U26, Upsala 1956
2: Fischer - Tal, Candidates tournament 1959
3: Bobotsov - Tal, WCh U26, Varna 1958
4: Dobropistsev - Botvinnik, Leningrad 1926
5: Borisenko - Tal, USSR Ch 1964
6: Fischer - Rossolimo, New York 1965
7: Stern - Anderssen, Frankfurt 1878
8: Fischer - Perez Perez, Capablanca Memorial 1965
9: Tal - Larichev, Latvian Ch 1954
10: Anand - Karpov, Candidates 1991
11: Tal - Krogius, USSR Ch 1956
12: Tal - Adamski, Lublin 1974
13: Lasker - Chigorin, Hastings 1895
14: Mason - Anderssen, Paris 1878
15: Botvinnik - Lombardy, Olympiad Leipzig 1960

16: Prins - Tartakower, Hastings 1945/46
17: Korchnoi - Tal, Candidates Moscow 1968
18: Belavenets - Botvinnik, USSR Ch 1939
19: Euwe - Alekhine, Worldchampionship 1935, game 14
20: Deep Blue - Kasparov, 6th matchgame New York 1997
21: Alekhine - Euwe, Amsterdam m 1926
22: Savon - Tal, Moscow 1971
23: Kasparov - Short, London 1987
24: Aronson - Tal, USSR Ch 1957
25: Kmoch - Alekhine, Amsterdam 1936
26: Anderssen - Zukertort, Aachen 1868
27: Benko - Fischer, Portoroz 1958
28: Tal - Hort, Moscow 1975
29: Botvinnik - Ragozin, Moscow 1947
30: Tal - Padevsky, Moscow 1963
31: Nimzowitsch - Alekhine, New York 1927
32: Keres - Botvinnik, Moscow 1956
33: Timman - Spassky, Hamburg TV 1982
34: Morphy - Loewenthal, London 1858
35: Yudovich - Botvinnik, Leningrad 1934
36: Botvinnik - Panov, Leningrad 1939
37: Darga - Tal, Bled 1961
38: Timman - Karpov, Belfort 1988
39: Euwe - Alekhine, Worldchampionship 1935, game 20
40: Tal - Pohla, Parnu 1971 
41: Karpov - Timman, Amsterdam 1988
42: Anand - Koshy, India Ch 1988
43: Appel - Tartakower, Lodz 1938
44: Bondarevsky - Botvinnik, USSR Ch 1940
45: Tal - Taimanov, USSR Ch 1954
46: Taimanov - Tal, USSR Ch 1969
47: Tal - Bronstein, USSR Ch 1959
48: Nimzowitsch - Tartakower, Karlsbad 1929
49: Tal - Andersson, Wijk aan Zee 1976
50: Karpov - Seirawan, Roquebrune 1992

Noomen TCEC S25 books available

Hi chess engine fans,

Below you can download the TCEC 25 Premier Division book and the TCEC 25 superfinal book made by Jeroen Noomen.

TCEC 25 Premier Division

Noomen S25 DivP book


TCEC 25 Superfinal

Noomen S25 sufibook

TCEC 25 superfinal book: chess classics from the past!

The TCEC 25 superfinal book was made by Jeroen Noomen and will be something completely different from what you were used to. Inspired by GM Matthew Sadler's excellent book 'Re-engineering the chess classics' - a book that I can recommend to every chess enthousiast! - I decided that it was time for a change.

The TCEC 25 superfinal book consists of:

• 5 own picks that were never selected before in one of my previous TCEC books
• 45 chess classics, i.e. 45 opening lines taken from games of the Great Masters of the past; also including a couple of lines from human world championship matches

What famous players are part of this superfinal book:

• Boris Spassky
• Bobby Fischer
• William Steinitz
• Anatoly Karpov
• Max Euwe
• Alexander Alekhine
• Paul Morphy
• Savielly Tartakower
• Siegbert Tarrasch
• Mikhail Botvinnik
• David Bronstein
• Carl Schlechter
• Emmanuel Lasker
• Mikhail Tal
• and several other well know chess masters from the past

Average length of the lines is 8.9 moves, which is considerably higher than previous superfinal books. Including chess classics comes with a small price, i.e. lines are longer. As usual the great majority of the lines have a very high bias.

The main selection criterions were: evaluation roughly between 40% and 60% winning chance & the position should be complex enough. I skipped the 'no mass exchanges' criterion. There are also a couple of lower book exits, if I thought the line was still interesting enough to give it a try. The S24 superfinal clearly showed that lower exits also can lead to wins.

I relied on Leela evaluations for the book exits, as Stockfish's evaluation is volatile and might go up or down by as much as 0.3 within a short period of time, making the estimation of the book exit (too) uncertain. Leela's evaluations for the superfinal openings are between +0.70 and +1.10, for the Leela version I used.

Black advantage: the are six lines that start with a black advantage, increasing the chance of a black win.

Highest/lowest book exits: the highest and lowest book exits are paired together and will be played in the first half of the superfinal. 

My expectations: Everything is possible: strings of draws, many wins, many lines leading to double wins. The finalists will be very strong and rather close in playing strength, so it's getting even harder to find lines that lead to a decisive result. So I just want exciting games, lots of fun and interesting takes by the engines on very well known games by the masters of the past. 

ECO code distribution

ECO A: 9 lines

ECO B: 11 lines

ECO C: 13 lines

ECO D: 9 lines

ECO E: 8 lines

Move length distribution

3 moves: 2 lines

4 moves: 1 line

5 moves: 2 lines

6 moves: 7 lines

7 moves: 5 lines

8 moves: 3 lines

9 moves: 8 lines

10 moves: 7 lines
11 moves: 7 lines

12 moves: 6 lines
> 12 moves: 2 lines

Source games
Line 1: Spassky - Polugaevsky, USSR Ch 1961
Line 2: Pachman - Fischer, Portoroz 1958
Line 3: Based on Steinitz-Paulsen, Baden Baden 1870 
Line 4: Karpov - Spassky, Moscow 1973

Line 5: Euwe - Alekhine, World championship match 1935 (g30)

Line 6: Byrne - Fischer, New York 1966

Line 7: Own pick, taken from a theoretical article on Chesspublishing.com

Line 8: Fischer - Geller, Skopje 1967

Line 9: Own pick, taken from my Rebel openingbook

Line 10: Morphy - Consultants, 1858

Line 11: Own pick, theme: if black can get away with 2... c6, then 1. e4 d5 must be a draw

Line 12: Karpov-Dorfman, Moscow 1976

Line 13: Kopylov - Koroliov, correspondence USSR 1981-83

Line 14: Alekhine - Capablanca, AVRO tournament Holland 1938

Line 15: Euwe - Alekhine, World championship match 1935 (g10)

Line 16: Alekhine - Levenfish, Karlsbad 1911

Line 17: Tartakower - Bogoljubow, London 1927

Line 18: Tarrasch - Mieses, Baden Baden 1925

Line 19: Karpov - Korchnoi, Candidates final 1974 (g2)

Line 20: Euwe - Alekhine, World championship match 1935 (g8)

Line 21: Fischer - Seidman, New York 1959

Line 22: Alekhine - Yates, Hamburg 1910

Line 23: Fischer - Evans, New York 1963

Line 24: Sultan Khan - Menchik, Hastings 1932

Line 25: Own pick, taken from a GM Sadler video

Line 26: Botvinnik - Bronstein, World championship match 1951 (g21)

Line 27: Euwe - Yates, Hastings 1931

Line 28: Euwe - Alekhine, World championship match 1937 (g19)

Line 29: Capablanca - Dus Khotimirsky, St Petersburg 1913 

Line 30: Alekhine - Grigoriev, Moscow 1919

Line 31: Burn - Tarrasch, Vienna 1898

Line 32: Tarrasch - Tartakower, Berlin 1920

Line 33: Fischer - Najdorf, Santa Monica 1966

Line 34: Englisch - Tarrasch, Hamburg 1885

Line 35: Fischer - Udovcic, Bled 1961

Line 36: Euwe - Alekhine, World championship match 1935 (g26, the pearl of Zandvoort)

Line 37: Schlechter - Tarrasch, Monte Carlo 1903

Line 38: Lasker - Napier, Cambridge Springs 1904 (with a little twist) 

Line 39: Karpov - Tseshkovsky, Moscow 1976

Line 40: Kasparov - Andersson, Tilburg 1981

Line 41: Tal - Fischer, Candidates tournament, Zagreb 1959

Line 42: Euwe - Najdorf, Candidates tournament, Zürich 1953

Line 43: Own pick

Line 44: Korchnoi - Karpov, Moscow 1971

Line 45: Spassky - Fischer, World championship match 1972 (g3)

Line 46: Zinner - Alekhine, Podebrady 1936

Line 47: Fischer - Tal, Candidates tournament, Curacao 1962

Line 48: Reshevsky - Botvinnik, Moscow 1946

Line 49: Alekhine - Nimzowitsch, Vilnius 1912

Line 50: Karpov - Hort, Malta 1980