When Code Meets Class: Stockfish and Reckless agree to restart TCEC Superfinal in Spirit of Fair Play
In a spirit of goodwill and cooperation, with a virtual handshake, the Stockfish and Reckless teams present a peaceful solution in the face of a challenging force majeure situation.
During the first games of the historic duopoly breaking TCEC Superfinal Reckless started at high speed. However, attentive community members noticed the speed was roughly half the speed compared to the Premier Division. This, with a high probability and as per TCEC web admin Aloril tests, was caused by an updated compiler version.
Tournament director Anton Mihailov contacted the responsible parties and after productive and friendly discussions with both teams, a decision was taken. TCEC S29 Superfinal is to be restarted from game 1. Reckless will be compiled again with different version of Rust. No changes in the Reckless version will be made. Stockfish team, Reckless team, and TCEC team are all in agreement on the decision.
Reckless team noted, “We are aware of the situation and that it’s a compiler + machine issue as stated directly by Aloril. We also understand that many games have already been played and that Stockfish is expected to win the match under any conditions. That said, we would appreciate considering an intermediate solution: keep the version the same, replace the binary, and do a full restart from game 1.”
Stockfish team said, “We are happy to have the Reckless team update the compiler toolchain and recompile the SuFi code version. We are open to both options of restart from current standings and a restart from scratch but we feel that the latter is a TD decision. We encourage adding some rustc / g++ meme to TCEC chat.”
Tournament director Anton Mihailov commented, “It’s truly inspiring to see a friendly resolution to a difficult situation. TCEC has a strong and well-designed rules system that ensures fair play and equal conditions for all competitors. Yet even the best frameworks can face unprecedented cases. What sets TCEC apart is that its authors and participants consistently rise to such challenges, finding solutions in a professional, respectful, and collaborative spirit. I’m proud to be part of the most amazing chess community!”