Download presentation
Presentation is loading. Please wait.
1
Madhura Gajendragadkar Tianqi Wang
White versus Black Madhura Gajendragadkar Tianqi Wang
2
Hypothesis In this project, we focus on the following questions:
Does White play better than Black in most games? Does the first move advantage affect subsequent moves? Does Elo rating affect the first move advantage?
3
Does White play better than Black?
Weaver Adams and Vsevolod Rauzer claimed that White is winning after the first move 1.e4, while Hans Berliner argued that 1.d4 may win for White Grandmaster (GM) András Adorján wrote a book series: "Black is OK!", arguing that the general perception that White has an advantage is founded more in psychology than reality Jonathan Rowson wrote that “the conventional wisdom is that White begins the game with a small advantage and, holding all other factors constant, scores approximately 56% to Black's 44%”
4
The first move advantage
The first-move advantage in chess is the advantage of the player (White) who makes the first move in chess. There are differing opinions on whether the advantage actually leads to a win or has no significant impact on the outcome. This is what we explore in this project.
5
Related studies ‘Do Initial Strategies or Choice of Piece Color Lead to Advantages in Chess Games?’ by Sameer Ponnaluri and Mary J King investigates popular opening moves like King’s Pawn, King’s Indian Attack, Queens Gambit, and English. They concluded that opening and defense strategies affect the outcome. ‘Move-by-Move Dynamics of the Advantage in Chess Matches Reveals Population- Level Learning of the Game’ by Ribeiro et. al. studies chess matches spanning 150 years. They conclude that the average advantage of White is 0.17 pawns and is exponentially increasing due to the increasing abilities of chess players over the years.
6
Bias in the dataset White has an advantage bias in the current dataset we are using However, we are not studying the outcome, but rather the effectiveness of each move made by both players We consider the ASD and IPR values rather the win, loss, or draw scenario This also takes into account the level of play which may or may not be at expected level according to the Elo rating of the player (off days, careless mistakes, errors in judgement)
7
What is elo rating? The Elo rating system is a method for calculating the relative skill levels of players in zero-sum games like chess. A player's Elo rating is represented by a number which increases or decreases depending on the outcome of games between rated players. Our dataset contains Elo ratings from 1025 to 2800 which we have analyzed over an interval of 25 points
8
What is asd? ASD stands for the Average Scaled Difference
This is the difference between the evaluation of the top move that the engine predicts and the actual move made by the player It is averaged over all the moves in the game
9
What is ipr? IPR stands for Intrinsic Performance Rating
We chose to use IPR because it analyzes individual moves rather than the outcome of the game It is a metric that measures accuracy
10
IPR and asd comparison We conducted a small experiment where we compared the ASD and IPR values for players of all Elo ratings The results are represented as line graphs and scatter plots that depict: X-axis: Elo ratings Y-axis: ASD/IPR values for white and black
11
Scatter plot: asd comparison
12
ASD Mean difference Source SS df MS F Prob>F
Groups Error Total
13
Observations for asd The ASD decreases exponentially with increase in Elo rating This says that players at a higher level make moves closer to the engine’s best move predicitons There are no significant differences between White and Black in terms of the ASD
14
zASD comparison
15
Observations for zASD We observed the following:
The zASD for White was significantly greater than that for Black between the 1600 to range of Elo ratings It was also greater for a few observations around the 2500 Elo rating For other ratings, the zASD values are interspersed with no marked difference for White or Black
16
Zasd Q-Q PLOT
17
Zasd white
18
Zasd black
19
Scatter plot: ipr compariosn
20
Ipr mean difference Source SS df MS F Prob>F
Groups Error Total
21
Observations We observed the following:
The IPR exponentially increases with increase in Elo rating The values are extremely close for White and Black and show no significant difference for any particular Elo rating
22
conclusion White or Black has no significant impact on the IPR or ASD and it remains very close for all Elo ratings The zASD is greater for White most noticeably around the 1600 to 2000 Elo range Overall, the first move advantage does not drastically impact the outcome of the game in terms of IPR or ASD but does hold some sway over the zASD
23
References Papers: ‘Rating Computer Science Via Chess’ by Kenneth W. Regan ‘Do Initial Strategies or Choice of Piece Color Lead to Advantages in Chess Games?’ by Sameer Ponnaluri and Mary J King ‘Move-by-Move Dynamics of the Advantage in Chess Matches Reveals Population- Level Learning of the Game’ by Ribeiro et. al. Links: Graph tools:
24
The turning point in my career came with the realization that Black should play to win instead of just steering for equality -Bobby Fischer
Similar presentations
© 2025 SlidePlayer.com. Inc.
All rights reserved.