I am going to *try* to start a journal to try and keep some track of my studies. I plan to post about once a week in here. Hopefully I can look back on this in a year and see how I have improved.

Right now I notice that I get very emotional when I play. I guess it must be since I am very competative, but i notice sometimes when I get flustered I play by impluse....and since I am new my impulse isnt very good.

I'd like to try to do more life and death as well, but its hard to find time in a day to day schedule. Id rather use my home after i get time to play games than study, but I have been trying to do some during the commute to work.

Two games for this week:

Thanks for the reviews Ed. I still have lots to learn!

Time to get back to now that real life has settled down

Here is a game I played for this week.



If I can find the dedication, I think I would like to start keeping a Go notebook when I play my games. Try to record how I was thinking during each move. Was I paniced, did I have no idea where to play? I think looking at my mental state a few days later could help me to improve my game a lot!

Some comments from a sleepless KGS 1d. I think the most important points are that 1) you played small gote endgame moves in the middle game and 2) some of your moves that were probably meant to attack either did nothing or actually helped your opponent.

31: This is a small endgame play and should not be answered. It doesn't threaten the life of your group.

50: Just f3 would be simple and force white to live in gote. Unless you're absolutely sure you can kill a group, it's often better to just seal it in. Thay way you at least get influence and thickness. If you let the group run out and it lives, you get nothing.

54: d2 takes the corner or cuts white.

56: b f5, w g4, b f10 would attack the e10 group quite strongly.

64: Better at b4, it doesn't leave a ko threat.

70: This move doesn't do much because white has a life with f1 anyway. A move around j5 would strengthen your 3 stones and put some pressure on white. h6 is worth considering, but looks risky in this case.

72, 74: Small, these should be left for endgame. Around j4 is better.

The broken ladder was quite unfortunate, but it's hard to find anything nice after w k4.

118, 120: These don't do much. Interesting areas are k10 and r11.

124: This doesn't do anything at all, white had no reason to reply at o18.

138, 140: Very small and gote.

145, 147: Good moves, now the white group can't really be attacked anymore.

148: Almost dame. A move around l12 would protect the m14 cut and scare the e10 group a tiny bit.

151: r18 would live

172: This doesn't do much.

190: k8 is geta, but white can cut and this group is in some danger anyway.

192-200: Very difficult to live here.

288: d19 first, one more threat.

End of the game: n9 and p5 are still left. And white should fill r13, even though black passed there are threats left.

As jlaire pointed out, the game ended in an unfinished state. You both overlooked the protective play at N-09. Play the dame out before passing. At least for now.

Comments start at 275.

Edit: Added some comments and variations on the opening.

(I commented the game while working backwards. So some of my comments may sound funny at first. )



Edit: I added a variation to show how a gote can be better than a reverse sente. See variation at move 288.

_________________
The Adkins Principle:
At some point, doesn't thinking have to go on?
— Winona Adkins

Visualize whirled peas.

Everything with love. Stay safe.

Thanks for all the great feedback guys. I especially appreciate all the detailed analysis of the endgame! I havent thought much about endgame yet, so this is very useful!

A nice side effect of my go studies is that I have lured a couple people from work into picking up the game too! We are now the weird people at the coffee shop

Im finding a little more time to study, and feel that I am improving slowly. I did find out that there is a go club in the city this week when a stranger saw me and a friend playing. A 1-way trip is an hour long for me though, so im not sure ill be making it out there much. I do think playing with some stronger people in person would be great though.

Heres a game where I got beat up this week

After a long distraction from reality I managed to suck it up and take the long bus ride to the local go club last week It was tons of fun, definitely going to check it out again. Hopefully I can find enough time to make it almost every week. Its nice to play games in person.

I notice that I am getting better at life and death problems, but my play in games seems lackluster. I think I tend to lose focus while playing, especially online.

Here is a recent game, for the interested:

A few notes on the beginning:

14: O4 should be better. Now B can aim at sequences like P2 O2 P4 O3 Q7, and W can't block at P7.

23: Seems to be bad style. After B leaps in with the 3-3 invasion, the 4-3 point and the 3-4 point are miai. Letting W push black down once in each direction is bad. Normally, B exchanges D17 for E16, and only then threatens to connect to C14. After bD17 wE16, then bB16 wE17 would be fine for Black, since Black gets his base in the corner and connects all his stones.

24: W should take D17.

27: Better to push once more (D17) before jumping. B's stones in the corner lack liberties. As things stand, W can either recapture the corner or capture E17 in a ladder.

33: W's "armpit hit" is practically like a contact move. Play O16 to maintain your numerical advantage locally.

35: From this point, you should be able to read out the next few moves. W will double-peep, you will connect in one direction, W will cut, and then what is your best reply? If you already know now that with 39 you will abandon this stone entirely, it is better to play another point.

45: To me, this seems too anxious about W's potential. You'll probably end up with a weak group. Better to reduce lightly while strengthening a weak stone or expanding your own potential.

Thanks JTS!

I made it to go club again this week! The game is so much more exhilarating in person. I wonder what it is about playing with people face to face that makes it like that.

Here's a game I played on KGS. Obviously I handled things incorrectly. This player just gave me oooodles of influence and I lost the game. It's very frustrating to lose like this!

Some comments:

Move 10: Black approached from the wrong side and created a weakness with his one space jump. But when white plays this keima, white is backing off and giving black more room to maneuver. Consider Q14 instead to keep up the pressure.

Move 12: Good, I think. Keeps white's group strong and makes things harder for black later on in the top right.

Move 20: Consider a two-space extension instead to make a base.

Move 28: It's much more urgent to reinforce the other stone. You can sacrifice C12 in exchange for cutting off C9, and black will have to take another move to kill it. The sequence that occurs leaves black with a strong group peeping at white's open skirt in the bottom left. White's group there could now end up in trouble.

Move 44: Just connect?

Move 48: I'm inclined to connect at D16 instead. Black is left with broken shape.

Move 64: It's more important to kill the corner with a hane.

Through 89: This sequence has worked out well for white, forcing black to the second line. However, some of the captures of stones on the first line, etc. were not actually sente for white and black should have ignored them to climb higher or cut off white's corner group.

Move 90: White can extend one space farther, or pressure the not yet alive black group on the left by cutting, which ruins the corner for black.

Move 92: White can hane to cause black problems.

Move 94: White has a giant prospective territory in the middle. When white plays here, it induces black to play into that moyo. Capping, even thought this is on the fourth line, would be better locally. The other option is that there is a big checking extension left on the right side.

Move 102: White is encouraging black to break into his moyo again.

Move 112: The capture of this stone is very small compared to black linking his cutting stones with the right side.

Move 132: This stone is very small, and black's inside group is practically alive now. This means that white's prospects in the center have just evaporated.

Move 183: It didn't happen in this game, but white's corner is still open to invasion, with the threat of connecting under to the top side. By this point the game looks over anyways, though. Black has the vast majority of the sides and corners, and once black got a living group inside white's center, there was nothing left. Black ended up with almost as many points in the center as white. If you are going to play in this way, it is vital to keep the moyo intact and to cut and kill anything on the inside while maintaining the integrity of the outside boundary. Sacrificing a few stones to preserve the center is much better than the alternative.

Because there's this huge wealth of body language available, that by comparison, makes playing online feel like you're playing blind.

Your opponent is giving away all kinds of clues -- does he know this joseki/tesuji? Can I bluff this overplay to catch up? I see him exploring variations with his finger on the table, did I read it correctly myself? Is he worried, over confidant?

I've definitely noticed that I much prefer either playing in person (with anyone) or playing somebody that I already know online, and I think it has to do with seeing my opponent as a person rather than a black box. This was true for me to the extent that until I found a club I could go to regularly, I could never stick with go for more than a couple months at a time. Certainly, the interaction surrounding the game and afterwards is much more interesting.

Thanks for the comments skydvr. I guess I should work harder on assessing the value of moves as I am in the state of the game. It's much easier to analyze the game when you arent in it though.

I guess I wrote off body language. I guess something processed processed subconsciously. Now that you mention it though, it is probably the reason. All the subtle changes in a person as you play a game must really add to the excitement.

Heres a recent 2 stone game I played on IGS. I end up losing by 2.5 points

did not jump out on the bottom, so I decide to take this point for . With moves through to I get sealed in, probably not the best result, but the corner is large.

I try to take the outside, and get an attack going on the lonely white stone.

I felt good with the two separated weak groups.

Leaning for strength

At B112 I felt quite good, though this group later dies to ko.

B114 I was aiming for the bottom and left here.

B130 is a mistake.

B150 maybe h5 is better?

W193 puts my group into ko. I play a tertible ko threat and my group dies. Maybe :b204 should have been a move like n13?

simply pasting in the full text seems to work better than the otherwise recommended attachment url link.

Yeah, that would have been a better ko threat I think, but why play a ko at all?
Why not play :B194: @ N19 instead?
Then it looks to me like miai for life at a or b

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