How can there be “weak” chess bots?

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In today’s day and age, computers are obviously way better at chess than humans, and even the best players in the world have a hard time holding a candle to engines like Stockfish, etc. However, what I don’t understand is how is it possible to have them in different levels of strength. For example, on Chess.com, there are dozens of bots that you can play against depending on your own level. But for the weakest ones, how does this work? One would think that an engine either knows how to play chess efficiently, or it doesn’t. How can you “dumb down” a computer to the level of an intermediate player or even a beginner? Thanks!

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Anonymous 0 Comments

It’s a good question. Creating any sort of a weak bot is simple. Just make it make a move that will obviously put it at a disadvantage (lose a piece, give up an important position, …)

However, it is impossible to make a weak bot that will mimic a weak human.

If you played Chess.com bots, you’ll see that they play in a very weird way. A weak bot will do a couple of decent moves, followed by a totally nonsensical move, for example, moving the king on the third move.

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