Beating the Clock

entropy-gated premoves · 15-second chess

You can't out-search the engine. So out-clock it. A premove is a commitment made before the opponent's move resolves — safe when their move is predictable, a gamble when it isn't. Predictability is exactly the entropy of the opponent's move distribution, which the relaxation engine already computes.

1 · Low entropy means predictable — so premove-safe

Opponent moves from real games, bucketed by the entropy of the engine's belief over their reply. Bars = how often the most-believed move was the one actually played (a depth-1 premove would have fired). Threshold H ≤ bits.

premove would hit   miss  ·  dashed line = premove threshold

2 · When does committing a ply deeper pay?

Expected seconds banked per move at commitment depth 0 (react), 1 (premove the reply) and 2 (Manny's last-last premove — chain two predicted plies). Depth-2 compounds prediction risk: it only wins where the line is forcing (low H).

react premove-1 premove-2 (last-last) · above 0 = time banked

3 · The 15-second verdict: accuracy beats volume

Projected clock vs the fraction of moves you premove, at forced-grade (71%) and prep-grade (90%) accuracy. A missed premove costs react + input + penalty — more than just reacting — so cheap premoves are a trap. Where a curve dips under the red 15s line, you survive.

The engine can model your strategy as a distribution — but it never sees your committed premove, and it can't win the plies you never spent. The human edge in ultra-bullet is a latency game, not a search game: premove the forced, wait for the fork. Predict a specific opponent with their own style fingerprint and it sharpens — the machine can't read your mind, but you can read theirs.

← the Logic engine (where the entropy comes from) · Fingerprints →

Beating the clock: entropy-gated premoves in 15-second chess

challenge accepted
15 seconds a side. You can't out-search the engine — so out-clock it.
mind = blown
Premove only where the opponent's move-entropy is low. chess_logic already computes it.
mind = blown
Without premoves you flag before move 20. Entropy-gated, you survive — and the machine can't see your commit.