basicprogramming.org 2009 summer competition: We have a WINNER(S) here.

[E.K.Virtanen]

Good morning happy little community.

I received eight programs from a four different peoples. cybermonkey and Grez did send three programs both, while Antti Laaksonen and Otto90x satisfied for only one program.

Now remember, all programs played with a similar deck. By reshufling the deck, results could look complately different.

Anyway, here are the results. We have a double winner, who actually ended in same amount of money twice, with a different programs. cyb, you might want to explain how your programs works here?  

Results of basicprogramming.org 2009 summer competition

Winner
Author: Markus Mangold and Markus Mangold
Programs names: AceyGambler.sdlBasic and adgambler.bas
End declarations; Game ended: AceyGambler.sdlBasic has money left 18848 and  Game ended: adgambler.bas has money left 18848

Third place
Author: Grez
Program name: Grez1

End declaration: Game ended: Grez1 has money left 13792

Fourth place
Author: Markus Mangold
Program name: AceyGamblerLow.sdlbas
End declaration: Game ended: AceyGamblerLow.sdlbas has money left 10330

Fifth place
Author: Antti Laaksonen
Program name: PELURI.BAS
End declaration: Game ended: PELURI.BAS has money left 8000

Sixth place
Author: Otto Martikainen
Program name: AD.CB
End declaration:Game ended: AD.CB has money left 5830

Seventh place
Author: Grez
Program name: Grez2
End declaration: Game ended: Grez2 has money left 4448

Eight place
Author of program: Grez
Program name: Grez3
End declaration: Game ended: Grez3 has money left 3088

To see codes, logs and results, download this.

I did not played another round in this case, since author of winner programs was one and same person.

[E.K.Virtanen]

*ahem*

For cyb;

For he's a jolly good fellow, for he's a jolly good fellow
For he's a jolly good fellow, and so say all of us
And so say all of us, and so say all of us
For he's a jolly good fellow, for he's a jolly good fellow
For he's a jolly good fellow, and so say all of us


Now cyb, take a beer (hell, take a whiskey) and some good cigar and feel like a winner for a while 

[Cybermonkey]

WOOHOOO!  Can't believe it!! As I am still in my shop, beer is strictly forbidden. 
Hehe, and yes, both programs would have similar almost same results.
It depended on the deck, if my programs with a constant factor or the other with a variable factor would gain more money.
Anyway, I will have a look a the other programs, too.
But what to do with the price? Hm ...

[Derek]

Hi,

congratulations CyberM.

Derek.

[Cybermonkey]

Erm, sorry folks, but I downloaded the ZIP-file and detected that EKV used the wrong programs from me. I made an update a week later but my old ones were tested. I already mailed him and I think I should clarify this. As the deck is now visible I made a new game with my programs which I uploaded to the bp.org filehost. I also included the log.txt.
So I thought I improved my programs since they now "know" the correct rules but now they failed.
Here is the result:

basicprogramming.org Summer 2009 competition log for program: adgambler.bas
Money total now is: 13152
basicprogramming.org Summer 2009 competition log for program: AceyGambler.sdlbas
Money total now is: 13152
basicprogramming.org Summer 2009 competition log for program: AceyGamberLow.sdlbas
Money total now is: 8064

So Grez is the real winner ... Congratulations!

[Grez]

But still your programs in the zip (right? I haven't tested myself) beat my program to the ground. I must say looking how simple your program was, I was a bit impressed. So if you made worse version later, then I think that's just a technicality. Especially considering the fact that your two first place finisher are basically the same, you could have just as well sent both the new and old version and won.

Then again, running programs with one single deck is more about luck than about the general goodness of the programs. It's a bit like those autotrader competitions (forex or stock market trading) where some programs make huge profits while some make huge losses. So someone could make the false conclusion that the first place finisher is really could in trading stocks / currencies, when in fact it was mostly luck. If the participants would run on another time, then order might be completely different.

What bothers me a bit with theis whole AceyDucey game is that it's too easy to win. No casino would ever let people play with these rules, as they would be losing money.

[Work_ekv]

Quick reply behind mobile phone.

Mistake was my bad. I have messed the files somehow. Im sorry.

How about new round with a new deck between programs made by cyb and grez?

Got to go back to work.

[Kepu]

Hurrah,     

Congratulations CM

[Cybermonkey]

But still your programs in the zip (right? I haven't tested myself) beat my program to the ground. I must say looking how simple your program was, I was a bit impressed.

Yes, but they don't use the correct rules which bothers me...  

After all it is a matter of luck, so why not playing a new round with a new deck? For my later programs I haven't had enough time for "fine tuning" so maybe because of this they loose although with certain decks they play better as my first ones. Luck.

BTW: The programs are simple because there is no error checking.

[Grez]

Well, I certainly don't mind any way or the other. So if E.K.Virtanen wants to run another round with a different deck that's ok by me. But I don't mind if he don't and we keep the original winners list.

[E.K.Virtanen]

This is a hard one.

cybermonkey did make the best program for the deck i shuffled as "official" competition deck. I guess thats a thing which we all agree here? 

Anyway, cybermonkey did update hes decks, and i messed up with them. Basicly, Grez is the winner. Gladly we are not choosing a president of USA here or related, just having some fun with programming.

Grez and cubermoneky. New deck is created tomorrow morning, you guys have 18 hours time to send new codes or let me know if i use older ones. Ill give you chance to make your codes better, after all, your codes were two best ones, so why not trying to make them even better?

[Grez]

You can use my existing codes. I don't think there would be much point in sending a completely new code now that we've seen competitors code, would there? Still, if Cybermonkey wants to send new (fixed?) version, it's okay by me too.

And in any case, you should give the prize (the 6 month account) to him (I you didn't already) as I won't need it.

[E.K.Virtanen]

Ok boys and girls. I have just played a reround between programs Grez1 by Grez and AceyGambler by cybermonkey. In 18 hours timeline, Grez did not update hes program while cybermonkey did send me an updated program...which i also used instead of old one 

I created a new deck, and played the games. Results were pretty clear.

With a new deck, Grez1 earned total amount of money: 18588. No bad feelings or anything personal Grez, but cybermonkey practically burned your program with total earnings of 36292 

I assume that no on denies the fact, that cybermonkey is the ultimate AceyDucey gambler here, though everything did not went just by the books?

AceyDucey is a hard bite as game from what to arrange a competition like this. On the other hand, joiners must create a program which can play best as they can with any deck. So there is a good challenge, specially for imagination how to create a such a program.

You can see logs, cybs new code and deck by downloading; http://basicprogramming.org/main/files/compo09_reround.zip

Thanks for all the contenders. It was fun to end my "administrational" era with something like this. Hopefully somesort of competitions are arranged in future, so i can join them too.

[E.K.Virtanen]

I assume that no on denies the fact, that cybermonkey is the ultimate AceyDucey gambler here...

Only because i wasnt able to join on this 

[Cybermonkey]

Just luck. A bit of Gladstone Gander...  

I had decks where my program earned about 100 bucks.