A midweek review of Corewar
May 6, 1993
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I. The Standings:
# %W/ %L/ %T Name Author Score Age
1 48/ 40/ 12 Dragon Spear c w blue 157 357
2 48/ 43/ 8 Agony 5.1 Stefan Strack 154 409
3 46/ 41/ 13 Iron Gate 1.01 Wayne Sheppard 151 83
4 47/ 43/ 10 Backstabber Anders Ivner 150 175
5 46/ 46/ 8 Medusa's v7 Mintardjo & Strack 147 548
6 34/ 21/ 46 Snake Wayne Sheppard 147 15
7 34/ 22/ 44 Night Crawler Wayne Sheppard 145 255
8 39/ 38/ 23 Leprechaun 1b Anders Ivner 141 1167
9 43/ 48/ 9 Sting II Arno Fuhlendorf 139 73
10 31/ 24/ 45 Sphinx v2.8 W. Mintardjo 138 1253
11 30/ 23/ 47 Imprimis 6 P.Kline 137 655
12 29/ 22/ 49 ttest nandor sieben 136 131
13 28/ 21/ 51 ittt nandor sieben 135 132
14 39/ 46/ 15 Sucker 6 Stefan Strack 132 277
15 28/ 24/ 48 +0 Stormbringer Dan Nabutovsky 131 1685
16 27/ 28/ 45 Hobbits Arno Fuhlendorf 126 12
17 38/ 53/ 10 Paratroops v2.1 W. Mintardjo 122 27
18 26/ 32/ 43 FlyPaper 1.1 J.Layland 120 32
19 37/ 56/ 7 XBS Fredrik Ohrstrom 119 1
20 23/ 28/ 49 Nurgle III c w blue 118 8
21 30/ 53/ 17 FireTrap P.Kline 106 0
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II. The Basics:
-Core War Archives are available via anonymous FTP at
soda.berkeley.edu in pub/corewar...
-FAQ for this newsgroup is available via anonymous FTP at
rtfm.mit.edu as pub/usenet/news.answers/games/corewar-faq.z
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III. The Scoop:
Well, this weeks biggest news item is S. Strack's announcement of
a new tournament. Based on the annual 'PeekaBoo' Valentine Tournament,
Stefan is seeking to challenge competitors with a little different format.
This is an elimination tournament, where the winners get to
submit a different warrior for each upcoming round. In order to give
more people a chance he has divided things into expert and novice groups
(I think he used the terms 'stable' and 'unstable' :-).
One player trying to decide whether he wants to go with the big boys is
J. Layland, whose FlyPaper 1.1 was seen momentarily in second place.
Congrats! Unfortunately FlyPaper knocked off a stone or two and fell
into the bottom ten after.
FlyPaper and Hobbits (my guess - replicators) are making the scanners
happy. Today's top five slots are all cmp-scanners.
D. Nabutovsky put up his early-version imp-stone program, Impossible,
to test the waters. Guess it's too hot!
21 4/ 44/ 51 Impossible Dan Nabutovsky 65
Wow, last Fall Impossible would have had less than 20% losses - maybe we
ARE making some progress against imps.
And my nomination for the Optimist Trophy:
Program "miniscule" (length 2) by "Iain Scott"
(contact address "eoin@ecr.mu.oz.au"):
;strategy
;strategy if it's really small, no one will find it
Yeah, right. :-)
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IV. The Outlook:
4 35/ 18/ 46 Snake Wayne Sheppard 152 1
1 49/ 41/ 9 Cleaver Wayne Sheppard 157 1
2 34/ 22/ 44 Test II Wayne Sheppard 147 1
10 43/ 47/ 10 Sting II Arno Fuhlendorf 138 1
9 45/ 45/ 10 Zipp 440 c w blue 144 1
5 46/ 41/ 13 Emerald 4 P.Kline 151 1
3 33/ 21/ 45 sub-type-i c w blue 145 1
2 33/ 21/ 46 Test II 1/2 Wayne Sheppard 146 1
8 40/ 42/ 18 sub-type-bs c w blue 138 1
9 31/ 21/ 48 Chimera v3.5 W. Mintardjo 140 1
2 37/ 27/ 37 FlyPaper 1.1 J.Layland 147 7
10 42/ 45/ 14 Iron Gate 1.1 Wayne Sheppard 139 1
8 43/ 47/ 11 Medusa's +7.2 Mintardjo W. 138 1
5 32/ 20/ 48 Snake-crawler Wayne Sheppard 144 1
8 41/ 43/ 16 Iron Gate 1.02 Wayne Sheppard 139 1
9 46/ 44/ 10 Glass House 2.0 j.layland 147 1
7 44/ 46/ 11 Paratroops v2.1 W. Mintardjo 142 1
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V. The Quick Look:
21 10/ 43/ 47 TS3 W. Mintardjo 78 0
20 28/ 57/ 15 XBS Fredrik Ohrstrom 99 1
21 11/ 70/ 19 6809 Rudi Cilibrasi 52 0
21 7/ 84/ 9 BANG David K. Peck 30 0
21 29/ 55/ 16 Harm c w blue 104 0
21 19/ 74/ 8 Tiny Iain Scott 64 0
21 19/ 72/ 9 bomp Harvey 66 0
21 27/ 73/ 0 simp Unknown 81 0
21 22/ 74/ 4 68010 Rudi Cilibrasi 70 0
21 23/ 62/ 14 68020 Rudi Cilibrasi 85 0
21 16/ 74/ 10 Dwarf George Gorman 57 0
20 25/ 37/ 38 Paper Wayne Sheppard 112 1
21 34/ 61/ 5 Scnfo Fredrik Ohrstrom 107 0
20 24/ 51/ 25 Sting Arno Fuhlendorf 96 1
21 21/ 79/ 0 ptest Unknown 63 0
21 16/ 71/ 14 quick Cliff Fitzmorris 61 0
21 1/ 89/ 10 BigImp David K. Peck 12 0
21 19/ 79/ 2 Circus David K. Peck 58 0
21 5/ 57/ 37 Estone Mestern 53 0
21 25/ 71/ 4 Invest Andre van Dalen 79 0
21 5/ 64/ 31 MiniMe David K. Peck 46 0
17 39/ 45/ 16 Wimp 6 Brant D. Thomsen 134 1
20 10/ 41/ 49 rabbit W. Mintardjo 78 1
21 8/ 84/ 9 Acrobat David K. Peck 32 0
21 6/ 64/ 30 Anarchy David K. Peck (95dpe 49 0
19 24/ 24/ 53 Hobbits Arno Fuhlendorf 123 1
21 9/ 71/ 20 Leecher David K. Peck 47 0
21 5/ 93/ 2 Carnival David K. Peck 17 0
21 1/ 50/ 49 Confused Jay Han 51 0
21 18/ 64/ 19 FineHook David K. Peck 72 0
21 28/ 54/ 18 FireTrap P.Kline 102 0
21 13/ 85/ 2 Hellfire David K. Peck 40 0
21 11/ 74/ 16 Ice Cube c w blue 48 0
21 10/ 60/ 31 MeAndYou David K. Peck 59 0
21 21/ 70/ 10 New tiny Iain Scott 71 0
19 38/ 50/ 12 Shredder c w blue 125 1
21 18/ 63/ 19 SinkHook David K. Peck 73 0
20 33/ 59/ 9 Sunburst Jay Han 107 1
21 7/ 88/ 4 The Borg Rudi Cilibrasi 26 0
19 39/ 47/ 13 Wimp 6.1 Brant D. Thomsen 132 1
21 37/ 52/ 11 Zipp 440 c w blue 122 0
21 6/ 78/ 16 Batallion David K. Peck 35 0
21 9/ 88/ 3 Biohazard David K. Peck 29 0
21 2/ 87/ 12 Defensive David K. Peck 17 0
21 18/ 65/ 17 Latchhook David K. Peck (95dpe 71 0
21 36/ 61/ 3 Sunburst1 Jay Han 110 0
20 36/ 52/ 12 Wimp 6.11 Brant D. Thomsen 120 1
20 31/ 54/ 14 ministone j.layland 108 1
21 19/ 57/ 24 s-n-a_1.0 Cliff Fitzmorris 81 0
21 0/ 53/ 47 test v0.1 Raistlin Majere 48 0
21 25/ 62/ 13 Early Bird c w blue 89 0
20 36/ 50/ 14 Eclipse II P.Kline 122 1
21 12/ 54/ 34 Homunculus Pi Qan 70 0
20 23/ 25/ 52 Nurgle III c w blue 121 1
21 11/ 87/ 2 ToxicWaste David K. Peck 35 0
21 0/ 43/ 56 Warp Speed Iain Scott 57 0
20 35/ 55/ 10 sub-type-s c w blue 115 1
21 1/ 38/ 61 test v0.4d Raistlin Majere 63 0
21 7/ 89/ 4 Dracula 1.0 Rudi Cilibrasi 26 0
21 23/ 47/ 30 Eclipse III P.Kline 98 0
18 39/ 46/ 15 Emerald 4.1 P.Kline 131 1
21 10/ 78/ 12 Love Bomber Iain Scott 41 0
19 28/ 51/ 21 Emerald City P.Kline 106 1
21 30/ 41/ 30 FlyPaper 1.0 J.Layland 118 0
21 7/ 83/ 10 Glass Houses Unknown 32 0
21 15/ 80/ 5 Ground-Zero+ E. J. Andrews 51 0
21 10/ 61/ 29 Parasite v 6 Roderick Easton 59 0
21 22/ 27/ 51 Silver Paper W. Mintardjo 117 235
21 30/ 58/ 12 Vamkill Orff Fredrik 103 0
19 24/ 26/ 50 sub-type-b+r c w blue 122 1
21 20/ 79/ 1 coloured tiny Iain Scott 60 0
20 27/ 41/ 32 Desperate I (b) Brant D. Thomsen 114 1
20 39/ 53/ 8 Glass House 2.0 j.layland 124 1
20 32/ 39/ 29 Plasma-Advanced Wayne Sheppard 124 1
21 16/ 75/ 9 bomber (v. 1.A) Th.F.Telkamp 56 0
21 28/ 59/ 13 BSLIV - my style P.Kline 97 0
20 38/ 53/ 10 Glass House 2.01 j.layland 123 1
20 33/ 43/ 23 No Ties Allowed 1.1 Wayne Sheppard 123 1
21 13/ 86/ 0 scan v0.1 -test- Th.F.Telkamp 41 0
19 37/ 47/ 16 Iron Gate testing..... Wayne Sheppard 128 1
21 3/ 97/ 0 2 handed coloured tiny Iain Scott 9 0
20 15/ 46/ 39 Trident [version 2] W. Mintardjo 85 1
21 0/ 93/ 7 Loving Stun Bomber Iain Scott 7 0
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VI. The Hint:
Here's an idea to make yourself a little more resistant to imps. An imp-spiral
kills you if it overruns your code and you have fewer processes running than
it does. You will outrun the spiral and execute garbage instructions.
Many programs use gates to keep the imps away, and some put a simple
imp (mov 0,1) following their code to provide an escape. But another way
to avoid being killed is to have more processes than the imp-spiral.
Let's say you are executing a standard reverse core-clear:
spl 0,<-10
mov bomb,<-12
bomb dat <-11
which will become a perfect gate once it completes clearing core.
If you set it up so that only one process enters the spl-0, you will have
three processes active at any one time (one is going to die at 'bomb').
If the imp-spiral has more than three processes (it will), and it overruns
you before you are ready, you will die. Instead, if you can drop multiple
processes into the routine, you won't die - you will just be overrun by
the spiral and follow it around until the timer runs out on the battle.
You get one point for the tie, and rob him of two points.
The simplest variation (and the fastest core-clear) is to use this form:
spl 0,<-10
mov bomb,<-12
jmp -1,<-12
bomb dat <-11
But if you don't want the extra length, you could try some other way of
getting multiple processes in.
Incidentally, even a partial gate like the above before completion, can
be effective against Night Crawler whose imp-spiral is so short that
one or two lucky hits will kill it. (It's the stone that's hard to find :-)
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VII. The End:
Paul Kline
pk6811s@acad.drake.edu