July 7, 1994 Issue #10
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This newsletter covers the current status of the ICWS '94 Draft hills,
and also attempts to keep up with the latest ideas on how the new standard
will affect corewars in general. I hope you enjoy it!
If you are unfamiliar with the '94 draft standard, you can learn more about
it by reading the FAQ for this newsgroup. In addition, the program pMARS
includes a highly recommended tutorial on the new standard. Feel free
to send me e-mail if you have any difficulty finding either of them, if you
need to have a corewar item mailed to you, or if you have any other questions.
The FAQ is available through anonymous FTP to rtfm.mit.edu, as
/pub/usenet/news.answers/games/corewar-faq.Z
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CHANGES and CORRECTIONS:
The next chapter in Steven Morrell's "My First Corewar Book" is now available
by anonymous FTP to ftp.csua.berkeley.edu (NOTE THE NEW ADDRESS) in the
pub\corewar\incoming as "chapter.2.Z". This chapter provides an excellent
overview on "stones" that every budding corewar expert will want to have a
copy of.
The first ten issues of this newsletter can also be found on
ftp.csua.berkeley.edu as "94warr1.txt.Z". If you missed any issues in the
past, now is your chance to get them.
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The ICWS '94 Draft Hill:
Core size: 8000 instructions
Max processes: 8000 per program
Duration: After 80,000 cycles, a tie is declared.
Max entry length: 100 instructions
The current ICWS '94 Draft hill on "Pizza":
# %W/ %L/ %T Name Author Score Age
1 47/ 32/ 22 Homemade Ice Cream P.Kline 161 1
2 40/ 27/ 33 Torch t5 P.Kline 154 23
3 37/ 24/ 39 Sasami T.Hsu 150 43
4 35/ 20/ 45 Blue Funk 3 Steven Morrell 149 18
5 42/ 39/ 19 Pyramid v5.5 Michael Constant 146 108
6 42/ 39/ 19 Keystone t33 P.Kline 145 130
7 33/ 22/ 45 Ryooki T.Hsu 143 5
8 30/ 18/ 53 Aeka T.Hsu 141 20
9 38/ 36/ 26 Stimpy v2.0 Brant D. Thomsen 140 59
10 31/ 22/ 47 NC 94 Wayne Sheppard 139 343
11 39/ 39/ 21 Christopher Steven Morrell 139 251
12 29/ 19/ 51 Cannonade P.Kline 139 188
13 28/ 19/ 53 Insight v1.0 Brant D. Thomsen 138 50
14 31/ 25/ 44 Lucky 3 Stefan Strack 137 323
15 40/ 43/ 18 SJ-4 J.Layland 137 19
16 41/ 47/ 13 Iron Gate 1.5 Wayne Sheppard 135 307
17 27/ 21/ 53 Blue Funk Steven Morrell 132 330
18 36/ 41/ 23 Sauron v6.0 Michael Constant 132 54
19 41/ 49/ 10 Rave 4.1 Stefan Strack 132 295
20 36/ 43/ 21 Request v2.0 Brant D. Thomsen 129 11
The hill became much younger over the last couple of weeks with the loss of
the two oldest programs. "Dragon Spear" by C. W. Blue was kicked off the hill
at the rip old age of 346. Three cycles later, "Request" by Brant Thomsen
also was overcome, at the age of 347. With the loss of these two fossels,
"NC (Night Crawler) 94" is now the oldest program -- and it looks like it will
be sticking around for a while still. See Steven Morrell's new tutorial if
you're curious how NC does so well.
"Blue Funk 3", "Ryooki" and "Homemade Ice Cream" are three new additions to
the hill that all seem to be doing well. Excited corewar fans everywhere are
anxiously waiting to find out what other exciting warriors Paul Kline will be
cooking up in the future.
The current ICWS '94 Draft hill on "Stormking":
# %W/ %L/ %T Name Author Score Age
1 44/ 29/ 26 Sauron v3.6 Michael Constant 160 3
2 42/ 30/ 28 Killer instinct Anders Ivner 154 26
3 36/ 20/ 43 Twimpede+/8000-d1 Jay Han 152 16
4 35/ 20/ 45 Lucky 3 Stefan Strack 151 14
5 36/ 22/ 42 NC II Wayne Sheppard 150 81
6 36/ 24/ 40 Sphinx v5.1 W. Mintardjo 147 84
7 43/ 40/ 17 Ntttgtstitd Simon Hovell 146 27
8 41/ 38/ 21 Request v2.0 Brant D. Thomsen 144 19
9 38/ 33/ 29 stone-test Stefan Strack 142 1
10 41/ 41/ 18 Sylvester v1.0 Brant D. Thomsen 141 63
11 29/ 19/ 52 ttti nandor sieben 140 37
12 32/ 25/ 43 JustTakingALookSee J.Layland 139 80
13 29/ 20/ 50 ttti94 nandor sieben 138 32
14 30/ 23/ 46 Snake Wayne Sheppard 137 36
15 39/ 42/ 18 Beholder's Eye v1.7 W. Mintardjo 136 93
16 42/ 48/ 10 Rave 4.1 Stefan Strack 135 9
17 39/ 44/ 18 SJ-4 J.Layland 134 30
18 38/ 42/ 21 tiny J.Layland 133 61
19 37/ 43/ 20 Christopher Steven Morrell 131 25
20 36/ 44/ 20 Fast Food v2.1 Brant D. Thomsen 128 39
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The ICWS '94 Draft Experimental Hill:
Core size: 55,440 instructions
Max processes: 10,000 per program
Duration: After 500,000 cycles, a tie is declared.
Max entry length: 200 instructions
The current ICWS '94 Experimental (Big) hill on "Pizza":
# %W/ %L/ %T Name Author Score Age
1 49/ 34/ 17 ivscan6b J.Layland 165 22
2 47/ 35/ 18 Pyramid v5.3 Michael Constant 159 49
3 46/ 34/ 20 Request-55440 Brant D. Thomsen 158 158
4 36/ 17/ 47 Aleph 1 Jay Han 156 20
5 36/ 24/ 40 Variation G-1 Jay Han 148 122
6 43/ 39/ 18 Fscan Jay Han 146 6
7 41/ 37/ 22 Aleph 0 Jay Han 146 21
8 40/ 36/ 24 Stimpy v2.0 Brant D. Thomsen 144 13
9 31/ 23/ 46 NotSoBigImps James Layland 140 18
10 38/ 36/ 26 Lump J.Layland 139 103
11 31/ 24/ 44 Der Zweite Blitzkrieg - 9 Mike Nonemacher 138 120
12 39/ 39/ 22 Vanity IIx Stefan Strack 138 113
13 42/ 48/ 10 Rave B4.1 Stefan Strack 137 119
14 32/ 29/ 39 Lucky 13 Stefan Strack 136 164
15 30/ 24/ 46 Blue Funk Steven Morrell 136 12
16 41/ 47/ 13 Squint Mike Nonemacher 135 96
17 31/ 27/ 43 Splash 1 Jay Han 135 123
18 40/ 49/ 11 Plasma v5 Wayne Sheppard 130 60
19 27/ 23/ 50 Insight v1.0 Brant D. Thomsen 130 1
20 31/ 32/ 37 Sasami / 55440 T.Hsu 130 8
Things still appear to be quiet on the Experimental hill. Personally, I
expect this hill to really pick up as some of the new programs on the '94 hill
start moving over.
I have found it especially interesting how differently programs can do between
the two hills. For example, my program "Request" does much better on the
Experimental hill, while "Insight" does much better on the Standard hill --
both results being exactly the opposite of what I expected!
The current ICWS '94 Experimental (Big) hill on "Stormking":
# %W/ %L/ %T Name Author Score Age
1 48/ 12/ 40 Variation M-1 Jay Han 184 2
2 46/ 30/ 24 Request-55440 Brant D. Thomsen 162 54
3 40/ 20/ 40 Lucky 13 Stefan Strack 161 20
4 46/ 36/ 18 Raiden Richard van der Brug 157 3
5 45/ 35/ 19 Vanity IIx Stefan Strack 155 8
6 35/ 18/ 47 Bakers Dozen Wayne Sheppard 153 13
7 40/ 30/ 31 Sauron v2.4 Michael Constant 150 5
8 30/ 15/ 55 Imperfection v2.3 Michael Constant 146 48
9 36/ 31/ 33 Variation D-1 Jay Han 142 15
10 44/ 47/ 10 Rave B4.1 Stefan Strack 141 9
11 42/ 46/ 12 bigproba nandor sieben 138 12
12 41/ 46/ 14 Dagger v7.0 Michael Constant 136 14
13 40/ 48/ 11 The Count Jay Han 132 44
14 27/ 23/ 50 BigImp Alex MacAulay 132 95
15 30/ 29/ 41 jmpWetPaper-94x-a J.M.Pohjalainen 131 1
16 26/ 23/ 51 BigImps James Layland 129 114
17 31/ 35/ 34 Veeble Jr. T. H. Davies 126 16
18 28/ 37/ 34 Industrious Stefan Strack 119 4
19 29/ 40/ 31 Open Arms Stefan Strack 117 7
20 29/ 41/ 30 Test Stefan Strack 116 6
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HINTS and HELPS:
When I first put together the program "Insight", there were several things I
was thinking about. Perhaps most of all was the thought that if I quickly
threw something together I could have have the first program on the '94
draft hill that uses A-field indirection. (I'm still not sure if that is the
case.) However, beyond that, I wanted to create a simple program that I
could use to discover weaknesses in other's programs. I suppose, in that
regard, "Insight" is rather similar to James Layland's DJN stream experiment.
(B.T.W. If you want to know why "Insight" and "Stimpy" did so well against the
DJN.F program, simply look at the decoy!)
The fact that "Insight" is actually managing to stay on the hill is simply a
nice bonus.
;redcode-94
;name Insight v1.0
;author Brant D. Thomsen
;strategy Stone/imp-spiral
;strategy Uses A-field indirection
;strategy Submitted: @date@
;assert CORESIZE == 8000
step equ 3039
init equ step+1
gate equ -12
impstep equ 2667
cdist equ CORESIZE / 22
dat.A #1, #1 ; Large decoy to slow DJN streams,
dat.A #1, 1 ; while still remaining unique
dat.A #1, @1 ; in case of CMP scanners.
dat.A #1, <1
.
.
.
dat.BA 1, >1
dat.BA 1, *1
dat.BA 1, {1
dat.BA 1, }1
stone spl #gate, <gate
loop mov data, *init ; "data" placed here by last hit,
; to create a "perfect" imp-gate.
add #step, loop
djn.F loop, @loop ; Last hit is actually here
data dat.F <gate, #0
start mov stone + 4, @boot
mov stone + 3, <boot
mov stone + 2, <boot
mov stone + 1, <boot
mov stone + 0, <boot
;Binary imp launch
; 3 point, 10 processes -- generated by bimp
spiral spl 16, {cdist * 1 ; Use the B-field of
spl 8, {cdist * 2 ; the SPL and JMP
spl 4, {cdist * 3 ; instructions to
spl 2, {cdist * 4 ; decrement locations
jmp imp + 0, {cdist * 5 ; in hopes of an early
jmp imp + impstep, {cdist * 6 ; advantage
spl 2, {cdist * 7
jmp imp + 2 * impstep, {cdist * 8
jmp imp + 1, {cdist * 9
spl 4, {cdist * 10
spl 2, {cdist * 11
jmp imp + impstep + 1, {cdist * 12
jmp imp + 2 * impstep + 1, {cdist * 13
spl 2, {cdist * 14
jmp imp + 2, {cdist * 15
jmp imp + impstep + 2, {cdist * 16
; Jump to stone
spl @boot, {cdist * 17
spl @boot, {cdist * 18
spl 2, {cdist * 19
jmp imp + 2 * impstep + 2, {cdist * 20
jmp imp + 3, {cdist * 21
imp mov.I #-100, impstep
dat.F #1, #1
dat.F 1, 1
boot dat.F #0, #2550 ; Bootstrapping distance
; Will be overwritten by the imp-spiral
end start
The stone is certainly nothing to get excited about. The bombs are moved to
the location being referenced by the location the stone is pointing at, in the
hope that it will point to something important. This is usually a safe
gamble, although it is not always the case. In fact, the imp I use for the
imp-spiral deliberately has a non-zero A-value to keep me from bombing it.
Here's how it does against the current hill:
Homemade Ice Cream: 08/59/33 (i.e. Insight v1.0 wins 8 times)
Torch t5: 21/32/47
Sasami: 15/28/57
Blue Funk 3: 04/03/93
Pyramid v5.5: 37/14/49
Keystone t33: 33/36/31
Ryooki: 00/10/90
Aeka: 00/12/88
Stimpy v2.0: 45/27/28
NC 94: 07/16/77
Christopher: 60/05/35
Cannonade: 03/06/91
Lucky 3: 04/08/88
SJ-4: 55/26/19
Iron Gate 1.5: 39/41/20
Blue Funk: 03/05/92
Sauron v6.0: 60/27/13
Rave 4.1: 57/30/13
Request v2.0: 20/32/48
Insight v1.0: 02/03/95
The scores are also fairly traditional. As you would expect from a straight
DAT bomber, the program does well against Scanners and poorly against paper-
type programs.
The scores against the vampires on the hill are especially interesting. This
is because "Insight" has a built-in anti-vampiric element. (Whenever the fang
is targeted by the stone, the A-value it finds is automatically traced and
bombed.) The only vampire "Insight" doesn't do well against is "Request",
which is specifically designed to withstand attacks on the address its fangs
point at.
Perhaps the one lesson I can give you from this program is that it may be a
good idea to use _non-zero_ A-field values on you SPL #, JMP #, MOV #, and
DJN # instructions. As there are no true A-field scanners out there, (they
either look at the B-field or both fields,) it will probably give you a slight
advantage to use a non-zero A-field on these instructions if the B-field is
non-zero.
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Looking to the Future:
There are some interesting issues that are cropping up on the future of
_The_'94_Warrior_. This newsletter's original (and present) purpose is to
ease and encourage the transition of the corewar community to the '94 [draft]
standard. However, judging by the difference in the number of submissions to
the '88 and '94 hills, and by the current level of competition on the '94
hills, it is my opinion that the transition has already taken place.
I am also running up against the interesting problem of running out of ideas
for hints that apply exclusively to the '94 standard. Either we need to add
some more features to pMARS, or I'll need to start using more general hints
instead. (There's always IJZ, of course ... )
One other issue that needs to be dealt with is, quite honestly, the amount of
time that is required to generate these newsletters. With my new job and
upcoming marriage making large demands on my schedule, I find that I am
spending more time working on this newsletter than in actually writing corewar
code. The result of this is that it is becoming more and more difficult for
me to keep up with the latest redcoding techniques and to continue to generate
a quality newsletter.
I will be happy to continue to produce _The_'94_Warrior_ until someone better-
qualified volunteers, but there will need to be some changes made. The
newsletter will need to have less depth to it, or be produced less frequently,
and the subject matter will need to be more oriented towards corewars in
general -- and less towards specifics of the '94 standard.
What I would like from each of you is a list of what you would like to see
most in future editions of the Warrior. Which parts of the current newsletter
format do you like and dislike the most, and what new features would do the
most to encourage, entertain, and educate the corewar community? What
specific topics would you like to see covered?
As always, your comments, suggestions, criticisms, and submissions are
encouraged and appreciated.
--
Brant D. Thomsen Man will occasionally stumble over the truth,
(bdthomse@peruvian.cs.utah.edu) but most times he will pick himself up
University of Utah and carry on. - Winston Churchill
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