UCECL Rules
1.0) Engine Qualification
Engines competing in the UCECL must be:
1.1) Engine Choice
The initial UCI chess engine list was chosen by the tournament director using input from the CCRL and CEGT rating lists, TCEC, and Google. Commercial, free, open, and closed source engines are all accepted with the expectation that commercial engines must be purchased by the tournament director. Because money does not grow on trees, commercial engines may not be the most up-to-date as engines that are released free to the public. Preference will be given to engines that are actively under development.
1.2) Engine Configuration
1.3) Engine Ratings
Engine ratings will start at 2800 across the board and be updated at the end of every season using ELOstat. UCECL engine ratings are not meant to compete against other more rigorous rating lists available online but are intended to give an idea of relative engine performance under UCECL conditions. New versions of the same engine will start with a fresh rating of 2800
1.4) Engine Updates
Engines will be checked for updates before the start of the UCECL season. The newest version of a UCI engine will be used unless the engine is commercial or unstable. A commercial engine may or may not be updated on the tournament director's prerogative since an out-of-pocket cost is usually associated with each engine upgrade cycle. Engines will only be updated during the off-season after a champion has been crowned and before the new season starts. Engine updates will not be allowed during a season or between season stages.
1.5) Engine Stability
All engines competing in a UCECL season will be run through a mock round to make sure they are stable enough to compete. Should an engine develop stability problems during the season, it will be dropped once the current season stage is complete. Should an engine crash during a game, its opponent will be adjudicated as winner. During the off-season, unstable engines will be replaced before the next season if concerns are still present
Engines competing in the UCECL must be:
- UCI Compatible
- Publicly available
- Stable
- Custom opening book compatible
- Aquarium 2014 GUI compatible
1.1) Engine Choice
The initial UCI chess engine list was chosen by the tournament director using input from the CCRL and CEGT rating lists, TCEC, and Google. Commercial, free, open, and closed source engines are all accepted with the expectation that commercial engines must be purchased by the tournament director. Because money does not grow on trees, commercial engines may not be the most up-to-date as engines that are released free to the public. Preference will be given to engines that are actively under development.
1.2) Engine Configuration
- Large Pages = OFF
- Ponder = OFF
- Tablebases = OFF
- Hash = 1024MB
- Pawn Hash = 256
- Eval Hash = 256
- Threads = 6
- Opening Book = Perfect2012c (8 Book Moves Allowed)
- Own Book = Disabled
- Book Learning = Disabled
- Position Learning = Disabled
- All other options = Default
1.3) Engine Ratings
Engine ratings will start at 2800 across the board and be updated at the end of every season using ELOstat. UCECL engine ratings are not meant to compete against other more rigorous rating lists available online but are intended to give an idea of relative engine performance under UCECL conditions. New versions of the same engine will start with a fresh rating of 2800
1.4) Engine Updates
Engines will be checked for updates before the start of the UCECL season. The newest version of a UCI engine will be used unless the engine is commercial or unstable. A commercial engine may or may not be updated on the tournament director's prerogative since an out-of-pocket cost is usually associated with each engine upgrade cycle. Engines will only be updated during the off-season after a champion has been crowned and before the new season starts. Engine updates will not be allowed during a season or between season stages.
1.5) Engine Stability
All engines competing in a UCECL season will be run through a mock round to make sure they are stable enough to compete. Should an engine develop stability problems during the season, it will be dropped once the current season stage is complete. Should an engine crash during a game, its opponent will be adjudicated as winner. During the off-season, unstable engines will be replaced before the next season if concerns are still present
2.0) UCECL Competition Details
The UCECL comprises of five different stages. Multiple tiers will be present from stage 2 onwards if the total amount of competing engines is greater than 20.
2.1) Season Stage 1: UCECL Qualification Round
2.2) Season Stage 2: UCECL Group Round Robin Elimination
2.3) Season Stage 3: UCECL Group Head to Head Double Elimination
2.4) Season Stage 4: UCECL Semi-Final
2.5) Season Stage 5: UCECL Final
2.6) General Rules:
The UCECL comprises of five different stages. Multiple tiers will be present from stage 2 onwards if the total amount of competing engines is greater than 20.
2.1) Season Stage 1: UCECL Qualification Round
- All Engines
- 9 Round Swiss
- Time Control: 25min + 10 sec for game
- Top 20 engines qualify for Stage 2 Tier A
- Next 20 engines qualify for Stage 2 Tier B
- Any engines outside of the top 40 do not qualify for the stage 2
2.2) Season Stage 2: UCECL Group Round Robin Elimination
- 4 groups per tier
- 5 engines per group
- Groups are seeded in round robin format based on the results from stage 1
- Inter-group double round robin competition
- Time Control: 90min/40 moves + 30 sec then 30min + 30 sec for game
- Bottom 2 engines in each group are eliminated from competition
- Remaining 3 engines move to stage 3
2.3) Season Stage 3: UCECL Group Head to Head Double Elimination
- Top seed in each group from stage 2 receives a bye for the first round of matches
- 2nd seed and 3rd seed in each group will play each other:
- 10 game match
- Time Control: 90min/40 moves + 30 sec then 30min + 30 sec for game
- Tie break: 10 game match at same time control
- Winner plays 1st seed:
- 10 game match
- Time Control: 90min/40 moves + 30 sec then 30min + 30 sec for game
- Tie break: 10 game match at same time control
- Winner moves on to stage 4
2.4) Season Stage 4: UCECL Semi-Final
- Group A winner to play Group D winner
- Group B winner to play Group C winner
- 20 game match
- Time Control: 90min/40 moves + 30 sec then 30min + 30 sec for game
- Tie break: 10 game match at same time control
- Winner moves on to stage 5
2.5) Season Stage 5: UCECL Final
- Semi-Final winners play each other
- 40 game match
- Time Control: 90min/40 moves + 30 sec then 30min + 30 sec for game
- Tie break: 10 game match at same time control
- Winner is season champion for tier
- Loser is season runner-up for tier
2.6) General Rules:
- Standings in the Aquarium 2014 GUI automatically perform tie-break calculations that will be used in stages 1 & 2
- Should further tie breaks be necessary in stages 1 & 2, the tournament director will run a sudden-death head-to-head match until a winner emerges with colors being assigned by a random number generator for the initial match and alternating every match after
- Because of the head-to-head nature of stages 3 to 5, a clear winner will be chosen based on over-the-board results using tie break matches as defined above until a clear winner emerges. Both engines in stages 3 to 5 tie break matches will be given an equal amount of games with both white and black
- Automatic GUI move limit adjudication will not be used
- Automatic GUI score adjudication will not be used
3.0) UCECL Software
3.1) UCECL Hardware
- Chess GUI: Aquarium 2014
- Ratings Calculation: ELOstat 1.3
- PGN Manipulation: pgn-extract, 40H-PGN Utility Suite
3.1) UCECL Hardware
- CPU: AMD FX-6100 (Zambezi) 6-Core @ Stock 3.3ghz
- MB: Asus M5A78L-M LX Plus
- RAM: Kingston 8GB DDR3
- HDD: 500GB WD Blue
4.0) Website Updates
- The website update process is mostly manual and updates will be done once every 24 hours or as often as possible
- PGNs of each stage will be available for download after each stage is completed