Does anyone else find some of the Chessmaster personalities to be a good
deal easier/harder than their rankings seem to indicate in the
hierarchy? I find it very very hard to beat Buck, for example, or even
Vlad. T.C. also kicks my arse. On the other hand, I can wipe the floor
with Rick. That punk plays the most unsound opening gambits, and when
he initiates a series of exchanges, you can bet you'll come at ahead,
either materially or positionally or both. And I've defeated the
Nimzowitch Grandmaster personality, while Waitzkin, an IM in real life,
I was pulverized by.

Now, I know some of this is playing styles. I'm more comfortable
against certain types of opponents, both on the computer and in real
life. (That's one of the joys of Chessmaster for me--giving me a wide
variety of chess-slub opponents to test myself against, rather than just
one strong engine.) Still, I try varying my play to test myself. I've
found, for example, that Rick makes dumb exchanges and ends up with an
inferior endgame most of the time, whether I play him open, closed,
Black, White, etc. So it's not entirely me.

BTW, I'm talking standard 40/120' here. I don't play blitz or any other
fast-paced variants.

Anyway, wondering if other people have a similar reaction, and also what
opponents are your toughest (and easiest).



John

--


Von Herzen, moge es wieder zu Herzen gehen. --Beethoven