Engine adjustment! And how to be better!

Hello Chess.com

I have often wondered if the power of the engines really helps you when it is analyzing up to 30 moves ahead. (maybe the huge advantage is coming from move 30 first.)

No human can comprehend this extend of analysis. (maybe top GMs).

Therefore i have thought that for players like me it would be an advantage if you could change the depth settings on the engine to maybe only 8 or 10 moves ahead.

Is this a possibility? And how do you think about this?

So what i'm implying here is, that i would rather like to know if i did a mistake, that takes effect within the next 8 moves rather than some kind of positional mistake, that my opponent has to play accurately against for the next many moves to be able to take the advantage. And whether this is possible to do when you analyze your games or not? 

First of all it is the general forum.

Secondly, the answer you gave is absolutely meaningless.

Are you talking about Chess.com analysis, or analysis on your own PC? For manual engine analysis, the Arena GUI will typically show engine analysis for all of the plies in the engine analysis window. (You might have to disable the UCI filter setting to see plies under about 8 ply.) Using a UCI engine that also has multi-PV capability is a bonus, and you can also use the variation board to explore the variations.

Engines are supposed to tell you the good moves and give you an evaluation of the position. So for me it doesnt make sense wanting to reduce their power.

What you are looking for is a friend/coach to discuss the games with, not a machine.

Not really, just instead of relying on the "best move" see the line in which that move ends up an inaccuracy or a mistake.

go on ebay and buy one of the old chess computers, some play around 2000 level or less, probably still a few around. I used to have an old Kasparov computer at one stage. was easy enough to beat but it did make you think and better than being crushed like a bug by a 3000 rated mosnster

The trick is finding them. I searched most of my installed engines, and I found only two that allow setting a max search depth that also work in analysis mode. They were both Winboard engines that don't have multi-PV capability. For the record, they were ZChess 2.0 London, and Chessmaster 10's "The King 3.33". (I had imported the CM10 engine into Arena via a Wb2Uci adapter.) If there's a way to do it using free UCI engines, I couldn't figure out how.

Well sure, getting a stronger friend/coach to help you is much preferable to using a computer, but those options aren't always possible. I was assuming that he just wants to avoid having the program point out 12-move deep tactical shots that he'd never spot on his own.

Then what the hell does he want to use the engine for?

And having a 12 move deep tactical shot is very rare.

He can pay someone to analyze games with him, he is from Norway, he must be rich.

*Denmark*, lol.

Um, to point out shorter range tactics that he missed.

I hope these are not online opponents you are trying to trick. A suspicious person might think you were trying to beat online opponents with an engine that was weak enough that it would not create suspicion on the analyser

Of course not. Just wanted some different tools to analyze my games. But I have grown to love the chess.com analyzer just fine. Especially after i found out you can add lines. 

Best regards everyone and thank you for your help.

You'd have to be a very suspicious person to think that.

Anyone wanting to cheat would just use Fritz or something to show the best 5 or so moves in any position together with the evaluation and pick the one which looks most natural. They wouldn't bother looking for weaker engines

I wasn't having a go at Trigger, just saying that I believe the OP's question was innocent

  None taken, wouldnt say I was paranoid, sadly the problem is all to real. I do enjoy catching them though. It is like a new hobby. I am almost dissapointed when people dont cheat

Lost count, but in the last month alone it would be around Ten that I have reported and succesfully had banned, even the ones that IpswichMatt refers to can be caught, they think they are being clever but they really are not