Answers.Body: <p>Houdini may be worthwhile checking out.  See link.</p>
  
  <p><em><a href="http://www.cruxis.com/chess/houdini.htm" rel="nofollow noreferrer">http://www.cruxis.com/chess/houdini.htm</a>
  (4th paragraph down)</em></p>
  
  <blockquote>
    <p>"The Chess Club Live Facebook page phrased it like this: "If there
    ever was a computer descendant of the romantic players like Morphy,
    Anderssen, Spielmann, Marshall, Bogoljubow, Tal, Nezhmetdinov, Shirov,
    Morozevich it would be Houdini. Houdini is the current World number 1
    chess engine and plays in a very romantic style."</p>
  </blockquote>
  
  <p><em>I didn't notice when the quote was from because the last time in the TCEC Championship that Houdini was #1 was 2013.</em>  </p>
  
  <p>I use Houdini 5.  I can attest to the romantic style of play.  Quite a change when you are used to seeing how Komodo or Stockfish play.  Settings are relatively user friendly. </p>
  
  <p>It is a commercial engine but the developers do offer Houdini 1.5 for free.</p>
  
Answers.ContentLicense: CC BY-SA 3.0
Answers.CreationDate: 2017-11-09T01:22:06.363Z
Answers.Text: Referencing section 1 of your opening post.  I have played games where it made sacrifices that made me feel like I was gaining the upper hand but either due to poor play on my part, the strength of the engine or a mix of both Houdini won.
Answers.UserDisplayName: hangejj
Answers.ContentLicense: CC BY-SA 3.0
Answers.CreationDate: 2017-11-09T01:19:06.007Z
Answers.LastActivityDate: 2017-11-09T01:19:06.007Z
Answers.UserDisplayName: hangejj
Answers.Body: <p><a href="http://support.stockfishchess.org/discussions/questions/224-explanation-of-some-of-the-settings" rel="nofollow noreferrer">Stockfish</a>, among several others (e.g. Fritz), has an aggressiveness parameter; you'll want to look in the 'Play Style' setting, or words to that effect, in the UCI.</p>
  
  <p>A more aggressive engine has a higher propensity to make potentially unsound material sacrifices; it translates to positions where accurate play leads to an advantage, though assessing the ease of finding the refutation is beyond me.</p>
  
Answers.ContentLicense: CC BY-SA 3.0
Answers.CreationDate: 2017-11-08T05:44:32.450Z
Answers.Text: (-1). The option has been removed from Stockfish for several years. See https://github.com/official-stockfish/Stockfish/blob/master/src/ucioption.cpp.
Answers.UserDisplayName: SmallChess
Answers.ContentLicense: CC BY-SA 3.0
Answers.CreationDate: 2017-11-08T05:45:47.383Z
Answers.Text: Furthermore, this answer is irrelevant to the question. The question is about looking for an engine playing dirty tricks, not aggressiveness. There's nothing in the answer that is relevant.
Answers.UserDisplayName: SmallChess
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Answers.CreationDate: 2017-11-08T04:55:42.593Z
Answers.LastActivityDate: 2017-11-08T04:55:42.593Z
Answers.UserDisplayName: Ken Wei
Body: <p>Are there any chess programs, which play gambits? I have two solutions in mind:</p>
  
  <ol>
  <li>It tries to offer situations where one of your moves looks quite promising on the short term (3-5 moves), but later it turns out to be disastrous.</li>
  </ol>
  
  <p>Or the opposite:</p>
  
  <ol start="2">
  <li>It tries to reach positions, which look bad for you, but there's a single line (hard to find), which can save the day.</li>
  </ol>
  
  <p>I guess the difficulty of writing such programs can be that it's not trivial to decide which lines are easy to be found by a human and which aren't. (And that also depends on the skills of the player, so some parameters would be required.)</p>
  
Comments.ContentLicense: CC BY-SA 3.0
Comments.CreationDate: 2017-11-08T14:08:56.303Z
Comments.Text: I'd first consider picking up a gambit opening book, that could lead to some interesting play with the computer (but only during the openings).
Comments.UserDisplayName: PenumbraBrah
Comments.ContentLicense: CC BY-SA 3.0
Comments.CreationDate: 2017-11-08T14:38:11.617Z
Comments.Text: @TheHonestAtheist: thanks. When I try to google this, i always get real chess books in the results only :) or generic info pages.
Comments.UserDisplayName: Crouching Kitten
Comments.ContentLicense: CC BY-SA 3.0
Comments.CreationDate: 2017-11-08T16:40:10.187Z
Comments.Text: I googled for something like `gambit chess opening book bin` (notice the extension `bin`) and found this site: http://digilander.libero.it/taioscacchi/programmi/saros-page.html
Comments.UserDisplayName: PenumbraBrah
Comments.ContentLicense: CC BY-SA 3.0
Comments.CreationDate: 2017-11-08T16:44:40.063Z
Comments.Text: Also, similar question: https://chess.stackexchange.com/questions/9029/engine-not-necessarily-playing-strong-but-attractive
Comments.UserDisplayName: PenumbraBrah
Comments.ContentLicense: CC BY-SA 3.0
Comments.CreationDate: 2017-11-08T16:47:35.973Z
Comments.Text: If you're looking for an aggressive style engine (think "plays like Tal"), this forum was interesting (http://www.open-chess.org/viewtopic.php?f=7&t=2355) and the corresponding suggested engine: http://www.pkoziol.cal24.pl/glass/index.htm
Comments.UserDisplayName: PenumbraBrah
Tags: <software><gambits>
Title: Are there any 'romantic' chess programs?
ThreadText: # Are there any 'romantic' chess programs?
  
  (Asked by: username_0 on 2017-11-07)
  
  Are there any chess programs, which play gambits? I have two solutions in mind:
  
  1. It tries to offer situations where one of your moves looks quite promising on the short term (3-5 moves), but later it turns out to be disastrous.
  
  Or the opposite:
  
  2. It tries to reach positions, which look bad for you, but there's a single line (hard to find), which can save the day.
  
  I guess the difficulty of writing such programs can be that it's not trivial to decide which lines are easy to be found by a human and which aren't. (And that also depends on the skills of the player, so some parameters would be required.)
  
  **Tags:** software, gambits
  
  > **Comments:**
  > **username_1**: I'd first consider picking up a gambit opening book, that could lead to some interesting play with the computer (but only during the openings).  
  > **username_0**: @TheHonestAtheist: thanks. When I try to google this, i always get real chess books in the results only :) or generic info pages.  
  > **username_1**: I googled for something like `gambit chess opening book bin` (notice the extension `bin`) and found this site: http://digilander.libero.it/taioscacchi/programmi/saros-page.html  
  > **username_1**: Also, similar question: https://chess.stackexchange.com/questions/9029/engine-not-necessarily-playing-strong-but-attractive  
  > **username_1**: If you're looking for an aggressive style engine (think "plays like Tal"), this forum was interesting (http://www.open-chess.org/viewtopic.php?f=7&t=2355) and the corresponding suggested engine: http://www.pkoziol.cal24.pl/glass/index.htm  
  
  ---
  
  ## 2 answers
  
  ### Answer by username_2 on 2017-11-09. Score: 1
  
  Houdini may be worthwhile checking out. See link.
  
  *<http://www.cruxis.com/chess/houdini.htm>
  (4th paragraph down)*
  
  > "The Chess Club Live Facebook page phrased it like this: "If there
  > ever was a computer descendant of the romantic players like Morphy,
  > Anderssen, Spielmann, Marshall, Bogoljubow, Tal, Nezhmetdinov, Shirov,
  > Morozevich it would be Houdini. Houdini is the current World number 1
  > chess engine and plays in a very romantic style."
  
  *I didn't notice when the quote was from because the last time in the TCEC Championship that Houdini was #1 was 2013.*
  
  I use Houdini 5. I can attest to the romantic style of play. Quite a change when you are used to seeing how Komodo or Stockfish play. Settings are relatively user friendly.
  
  It is a commercial engine but the developers do offer Houdini 1.5 for free.
  
  > **Comments:**
  > **username_2**: Referencing section 1 of your opening post.  I have played games where it made sacrifices that made me feel like I was gaining the upper hand but either due to poor play on my part, the strength of the engine or a mix of both Houdini won.  
  
  ---
  
  ### Answer by username_3 on 2017-11-08. Score: -1
  
  [Stockfish](http://support.stockfishchess.org/discussions/questions/224-explanation-of-some-of-the-settings), among several others (e.g. Fritz), has an aggressiveness parameter; you'll want to look in the 'Play Style' setting, or words to that effect, in the UCI.
  
  A more aggressive engine has a higher propensity to make potentially unsound material sacrifices; it translates to positions where accurate play leads to an advantage, though assessing the ease of finding the refutation is beyond me.
  
  > **Comments:**
  > **username_4**: (-1). The option has been removed from Stockfish for several years. See https://github.com/official-stockfish/Stockfish/blob/master/src/ucioption.cpp.  
  > **username_4**: Furthermore, this answer is irrelevant to the question. The question is about looking for an engine playing dirty tricks, not aggressiveness. There's nothing in the answer that is relevant.  
  
  ---
  
  