What about certain end-game positions in chess? For example, (King+Rook) v. (King+Rook)?
Or, in some very closed positions where both sides can still freely move their pieces, but because of the closed pawn structures, everything is "stuck" and neither side can do anything useful?
It is not simple at all to tell when you've reached the end of the game in some situations, certainly not for beginners, and maybe not even for some experienced players.

Ed, I think there's a rather important difference there. In Chess, even the rawest beginner knows that the aim is to checkmate one's opponent's king - and that the game is a draw when both sides agree that neither player has any chance of doing so. So, if the players reach a position from which it is clear that neither of them can make any progress, I don't think it will seem strange to them to acknowledge the game as drawn (and therefore over). (Of course, if these are beginners, or even just weak players in general, it may be that both think the game is drawn when more skilful play by one of them would result in a win. But the concept is still there that, if neither side thinks they can achieve anything, a draw is the result.)

Contrast this to what happens in go. Rather than there being one specific goal, the winner is defined simply as the player with the biggest score at the end of the game, the latter being somewhat ill-defined to the beginner. One can only really define the end as "that point beyond which neither player has any beneficial moves left", but one can't really begin to tell when that is without having played at least a few games.

So I think that there is a genuine difficulty here in go, which doesn't exist in chess. I learnt only about 7 months ago, and I don't remember personally having much trouble over this point - at least not for long - but I have since played games against several beginners (my local club is essentially a university one, so naturally has a fairly large turnover of players), and seen that this difficulty definitely does exist for some.

Except for Korean Rules, this is only strategy. Under other rules, the game ends upon successive passes and each beginner is able to count to two of them.

Whether or not life and death are part of the rules is really a non-issue when teaching beginners. You will need to teach them about life & death anyway, because you can't really play go without it. It is fundamental to understanding the game. If I only have one session with beginners to teach them, then I will do my utmost to make sure that making eyes is still part of it.

What is far more important when teaching beginners are things like enthousiasm, encouragement, support and patience.

As far as I am concerned, if two 30k players think that a group is alive, even though it is dead, it is alive for scoring.

If one player disagrees, they should show the refutation.

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be immersed

Hi Herman,
I have an exact opposite approach. For my first lesson with raw beginners, I don't talk about eyes.
I think it's much better for them to discover eyes on their own (for instance, from capture Go).
If they ask, "When does the game end?" or "How do you know when it's over?"
I reply, "That usually takes a few weeks to learn."I agree completely.

Actually, I agree with much of what's expressed so far in this thread.
To raw beginners, I say, "The rules are very simple (and elegant), but the game is very rich and beautiful and deep."

Note that I only do this when I have only one session with them. On a normal beginners course, eyes do not come up in the first lesson, then its all about playing stones, liberties, capturing, etc. But if I have only one session, say some two hours, then I will end it with a simple explanation of the concept of eyes to make your groups permanently safe. Something they can take home and apply if they want to continue playing.



I think its great if they discover them on their own, and I will certainly praise them for doing so. There are plenty of people out there, however, that will not discover them, at least not inside a reasonable time frame. And I'm not going to wait until they've played 50 games for it to happen, because I don't think there is extra value in the self discovery at that point. Mostly, it'll just be endless frustration at their groups getting caught.

Of course every student is different, and some student will prefer to work things out on their own, while others prefer being told. That is a thing for the teacher to judge, and can be quite hard. Either course of action can lead to people getting frustrated, either at you not telling them or at themselves for not understanding it by themselves.



That would frustrate me as a beginner, I think. To me, it feels like you're refusing to tell me something that sounds like it should be really basic information: "When does the game end". I would tell them something along the lines of:

"The game is over when both players pass, and you pass when you think you cannot make extra points anymore. Of course it takes a while to understand when there are no more points to be made, because you need some tactical insight for it, so if you're unsure feel free to ask me for help."

And then if they ask me for help, I will help them. Not by pointing out what points they can still score, of course, but by asking them which areas they think are theirs, which stones they think are dead, etc. If they agree, I help them count, even if there are still points to be made.



Yes. I use similar descriptions.

I think something along the lines of "Although the rules are not hard to learn, that does not mean the game is easy" is als oa fair warning for some students

Territory is a difficult concept, because it relies on life and death. So understanding when the game's over is hard, if you want to use territory to score it.

Area, on the other hand, does not depend on life and death at all. A point on the board where one of your stones stands or an empty point surrounded by your stones is part of your area. That's all there is to it.

It is very easy to understand when the game's over, if you are using area for scoring. The game's over when the whole board is completely divided between Black and White. They start the game with an empty board, they gradually fill it with stones, finally every point belongs to either Black or White. The game is over and the areas can be compared. Whoever has larger area wins.

I find this very simple, indeed.

It's much more difficult to explain how to capture stones, in my opinion. The end of game and scoring is easy.

A mistake is harmless. But if the players are baffled, that is a different story.

Talking about refutations already imagines that our beginners are more sophisticated than they would really be, IMHO.

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Occupy Babel!

Nope, I did not say that was the only info I am willing to give or that I'd refuse to answer any more questions.
Of course, if they have more time and would like to know more details, I'm happy to tell them.
And the tone of delivery makes a big difference, like what you said about enthusiasm and support.

For years, I used to say along the lines of "There comes a point in the game where nothing more can be gained by either side,
and so when both players agree the game is over, it is over; and then you count." (Similar to yours;
I think most people have very similar "standard" replies.)
However, my experience was that almost invariably beginners would have a blank look on their faces,
as if this was more puzzling and confusing. Which makes complete sense, because
they lack the experience to know what any of this means. They simply have to play to find out.
Which brings us back to the point that all this takes time.

There are a few ways you can judge whether the rules of a game are simple.

Practical knowledge:

1. How long does it take to explain enough of the rules so that a beginner can start playing casual games?
2. How likely is it that the beginner will remember those rules a few days or months later, even if they don't play in the intervening time?

Complete knowledge:

3. How much would you have to know to adjudicate any disputed game in any tournament, anywhere?

I think for go, the practical knowledge required is fairly basic. On point 2, I think go is better than chess. On point 3, I don't know enough about chess to comment. Just as children learn to play baseball, football, chess, etc. without mastering the huge official rule books for these games, any beginner can learn to play go without worrying themselves about the details too much.

However, the complete knowledge level is embarassingly hard to reach for go, especially considering that it does not need to be. There are unfortunately many rulesets, and that complicates the issue greatly. Even worse, no ruleset is well-known enough that you can expect all players to know it. Saying "such-and-such a ruleset has simple rules" is not helpful to a beginner if no one plays that way. Esperanto has a simple grammar and no irregular verbs, but somehow the world has not been convinced to drop all their native languages to speak it.

I think it is honest and proper to warn beginners that there are some different rulesets, but that most of their differences only take effect at the very end of the game, and that the differences only very rarely affect who wins or loses.

The idea of simplicity in any game to me comes down to what is required to play. Things like life and death, basically anything else I think is a branch of the fundamentals of the rules. If you know that a shape with no liberties and dead and the rule of ko, you can play. I've taught 6 year olds how to play with those two rules. They take a long time to come up with rules and the need a reminder of what's alive or dead at sometimes, but their response is always "ooooh", instead of "really?!". Much like other games of simplicity, the nuances of the game may disguise it's deceptively simple nature but one of my favorite chefs of all time said, "simplicity is the last thing a master learns". Just because someone constantly asks questions about this and that doesnt' change the fact. If you had two beginners and explained the rules and left them to it, they could play a game. Not very well but they at the very least could do it.

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