Ligon, Scott (USA) [FICGS member # 12964]
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Scott Ligon
I run Stockfish in a deterministic configuration and play the move it suggests. My opponents can know in advance how I will respond to any given move. For upcoming games I will use Stockfish 17.1 with a 50 million node search. Previously I used Stockfish 17 at 10 million and 15 million nodes, then Stockfish 17.1 at 10 million and 20 million nodes, but winning strategies for white have been found against each of those settings. Games already running will continue at the setting I started the game with. See forum posts in my thread "Stockfish unbeatable at modest settings?" for details.
If you want a quick draw as black against the 17.1 @ 50 million nodes strategy, I recommend the following line where white's deterministic strategy gets caught in a repetition:
1. e4 c5 2. Nf3 d6 3. d4 cxd4 4. Nxd4 Nf6 5. Nc3 a6 6. Be3 Ng4 7. Bc1 Nf6
Scott Ligon has currently 28 running correspondence chess game(s), won 57, lost 0 and drawn 323 other games against an average elo of 2235, does not play advanced chess (fast time controls), does not play big chess, does not play Go (wei-ch'i, baduk), and does not play poker, finally Scott finished a total of 380 games and is still playing a total of 28 games.
Correspondence chess statistics :
vs. Herbert Kruse (2364) : 50% (40 games, 0 wins, 0 losses)
vs. Bahadir Ozen (2249) : 50% (29 games, 0 wins, 0 losses)
vs. Ilmars Cirulis (2263) : 52% (21 games, 1 wins, 0 losses)
vs. Janusz Swiatek (2243) : 64% (17 games, 5 wins, 0 losses)
vs. Sergey Kireev (2311) : 50% (10 games, 0 wins, 0 losses)
vs. Aniruddha Duttagupta (2259) : 60% (10 games, 2 wins, 0 losses)
vs. Vjacheslav Perevozchikov (2273) : 50% (9 games, 0 wins, 0 losses)
vs. Theodore Mirra (2313) : 50% (9 games, 0 wins, 0 losses)
vs. Stanislas Gounant (2307) : 55% (9 games, 1 wins, 0 losses)
vs. Mariusz Maciej Broniek (2436) : 50% (8 games, 0 wins, 0 losses)
Scott's favorite game is : Chess
Style of play : deterministic
Uses engines : always
Favorite chess player : Stockfish
Search posts and games by Ligon in FICGS games server (only for connected players)
Last messages by Scott Ligon in the forum :
Stockfish unbeatable at modest settings? (2025-07-05 18:11:53)
For anyone looking for a quick draw with black against the 17.1 @ 50 million nodes strategy, I recommend the following line:
1. e (...)
Stockfish unbeatable at modest settings? (2025-06-14 02:43:46)
While analyzing the game I'm currently playing as black against Pineda, I found a winning line for white against Stockfish 17.1 @ 20 million nodes. It (...)
Stockfish unbeatable at modest settings? (2025-05-05 18:48:23)
For future games I will be using Stockfish 17.1 @ 20 million nodes. (...)
Stockfish unbeatable at modest settings? (2025-05-01 04:14:23)
After the harsh words of my previous post, I must now give Pineda some credit. He did exactly what he said he was going to do against Stockfish 17.1 @ (...)
Stockfish unbeatable at modest settings? (2025-04-24 16:36:24)
Yeah you found a line that beat the 10 million node strategy which I hadn't analyzed. Congratulations! I'm not interested in arguing with you about th (...)
Stockfish unbeatable at modest settings? (2025-04-23 15:21:53)
My goal is to find the minimal setting where Stockfish can't be beaten, or close to the minimal setting anyway. The title of the thread shows my point (...)
Stockfish unbeatable at modest settings? (2025-04-23 02:27:39)
At this point all of my games are safely past the point where they could transpose into the winning line I found against the Stockfish 17 @ 15 million (...)
Stockfish unbeatable at modest settings? (2025-04-22 16:09:34)
I have found a line for white that defeats the 15 million node strategy, so it's time for another strategy upgrade. Due to games in progress I won't s (...)
Stockfish unbeatable at modest settings? (2025-03-29 18:24:32)
Stockfish 17 at high depth is just too good though. Your best chance to defeat me is that I make a mistake entering the move. I try to be careful, but (...)
Stockfish unbeatable at modest settings? (2025-03-29 18:03:58)
I think there's a decent chance that the 15 million node strategy is unbeatable, but I can't say what that chance is. Maybe I overestimate it. I have (...)