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The author received a free copy of the book in exchange for his review.
'Fighting Fundamentals' by Robert Jasiek offers a comprehensive guide to fighting by categorising types of fights, telling about what to aim for and by showing fighting techniques and strategies.
The book is – as usual for Jasiek books – printed on high quality paper. The text and all the diagrams are sharp, easy to read and through the use of paragraphs, bold and italic type the text is structured very well.
Since a discussion arose on the subject: I too think a change in the font to a non-serif typeface could enhance the reading experience.
Combined with an enduring binding all of it presents – notwithstanding the preference regarding the font – an excellently processed and durable Go book.
A final preliminary comment regarding the language: Jasiek is noticeably not an English native speaker. His writing is improving with every book though and this one is the best I've read from him to date. Nevertheless, he still favours a more “technical writing style”, that occasionally is a bit dry to read.
Jasiek begins with the explanation of various basic terms, which are used throughout the following chapters. In general, these terms are easily understood by a player who is already familiar with a few Go books.
There is a discussion, though, as to how Jasiek (slightly) changes the meaning of some (primarily Japanese) terms and defines them on his own accord and thus (partly) in contrast to their definition in other Go works.
It is important to note that within Jasiek's work, only his definitions are applicable, which are clearly mapped out in the second chapter.
At the start of each big chapter (chapters 3, 4, 6, and 7), Jasiek gives the reader a couple of problems, which – I assume – should be solved by using the knowledge gained in the following sub-chapters. The answers can be found at the end of the chapter.
Although I find the approach very useful, it became clear quite soon that those local positions were just a test of reading strength (or experience) most of the times and could be solved easily without knowing the following sub-chapters or couldn't be solved at all because one is simply not strong enough in raw reading.
I would have preferred a different approach, like the use of only whole board problems (there are a couple in the book, too) similar to 'In the Beginning' and solely at the end of the book. The reader gets points (and explanations) regarding the chosen region or the specific move and thus can get an idea of how well he or she has understood the book's concepts.
I think it would also be great to add a reference to the particular (sub-)chapter that deals with each problem's situation and handling.
This approach would mean less focus on a specific sequence but more on a sense of direction. I feel, and got encouraged by this book, that this is also a very important aspect in fights. Although the later chapters make it quite clear – and truly so – that without sufficient reading skill one's own fighting skill will also be lacking.
Nonetheless, the answers to the problems are very extensive and help to understand the problem.
Chapter 3 jumps directly into the main theme and deals with the different types of fights.
Jasiek differentiates between 13 types of fights from the Mutual Settling Fight over the Splitting Attack to the Capturing Race. Every type of fight is explained very well and especially the diagrams with sequences from pro games illustrating the point of the fight are excellent and one of the clear highlights of this book. Generally, the chapters follow the approach of explanations first and examples later.
My only suggestion would be using less moves in one diagram (over 60 moves in rare cases are not pleasant to read) and maybe adding the move range to the diagram. It provides for an easier read, where the reader can keep his flow instead of focussing on deciphering the diagram and almost forgetting what it should illustrate.
Furthermore, Jasiek not only uses pro games to illustrate good play, he also shows variations which would violate (among others) the general principle of the fight and subsequently writes about the change in result and thus making the explanation much more lively.
To a certain extent this is needed because Jasiek sometimes tends to over-generalise with his general principles.
For the Mutual Settling Fight this is: “A mutual settling fight must be fair.” For the Capturing Race is stated: “In a capturing race, do not spend even one move too few or many.”
Of course Jasiek does a good job in explaining (enriching) these principles within his text but I feel that as principles these are quite one-dimensional. True in all cases but truly useful?
Naturally, there are other general principles that do a better job in giving guidance. For instance the general principle for Reduction is: “A player destroys the opponent's region if this is more valuable than constructing the player's own regions.”
In the end, counting in the really superb choice of pro games, the given variations and the explanations, every type of fight is thoroughly explained and can be fully understood even when the general principle might be too generalised.
Chapters 4 and 5 describe the aims of a fight, namely primary and secondary aims.
The relation is as follows: “While primary aims are the means to achieve secondary aims, the latter express what a player really wants.”
Additionally, Jasiek states that at least one primary and one secondary aim should be achieved.
In general, primary aims deal with (threatening to) attack and defence and secondary aims deal with making territory, influence or Aji alongside the (threat of an) attack or defence.
Both chapters together can be seen as an extensive discussion of not only (the importance/severity of) multi-purpose moves (which are also part of chapter 6), but of the proverb that you should attack to profit elsewhere (literally: attack to make territory). Both chapters also show that a fight is not fought for the sake of fighting and that you shouldn't let yourself be sucked into meaningless (or bad) skirmishes.
As in chapter 3, Jasiek does a very good job of explaining different aims and illustrating this with pro games and/or other diagrams.
In chapter 6, the most extensive chapter in this book, Jasiek moves from 'What to fight for' to 'How to fight' (mainly attacking and defending life).
This chapter works well as a link between the previous chapters, showing multi-purpose moves in different type of fights, which play for a primary aim (often a threat) and thus fulfilling a secondary aim.
Basically, it is the big conclusion and the chapter where in my opinion the most can be learnt. It is also the chapter which best shows that your fighting strength is roughly equal to your reading strength – and experience where reading alone does not suffice.
As in the previous chapters everything is explained really well and the examples from pro games are simply a delight.
The last chapter about strategy coats everything which was taught before with a couple of strategic theorems. It is relatively short and basically deals only with where to fight (“valuable regions”) and what to fight about (“important stones”), principles for the attacker and for the defender and reductions and invasions.
The focus clearly lies on reductions and invasions. The book mainly tries to teach the reader when to apply which (or how and when to defend against them) and that invading generally works best when there are two choices available (mostly living inside or connecting to the outside).
This chapter also provides for good explanations and splendid diagrams.
After reading the book, one question comes up: How does knowing the different categories of fights (chapter 3) benefit your development as a Go player?
I feel that the later chapters about the different aims of fights give a clearer picture of what to strive for.
One could also say they overlap anyway because the fights one will enter should be based on the aims chosen beforehand. It's not that one will try to start a Mutual Settling Fight for its own sake but to defend life for one's group. Allowing an exchange not because one likes this particular type of fight but to fulfil important aims.
Didactically speaking, I feel that it would have been better to merge chapter 3 with chapters 4 and 5. Now it seems a little bit redundant and torn apart, which makes it harder to study.
To summarise: Jasiek's 'Fighting Fundamentals' offers a lot of content.
It surely deserves the title and is to my knowing the most detailed work about fighting in the English language. Jasiek's effort to present his teachings can only be applauded in this book, too, and I'm not growing tired of saying that the illustrating pro games are excellently chosen, like most of the diagrams.
But it is a textbook and as such it requires work and multiple readings to get everything out of it.
I feel that a large part of this workload could have been diverted into a problem section (see above), where the reader can train and see where he or she is at. Right now, one reading is simply not enough to understand let alone remember everything important. Just starting all over again is necessary, but feels inefficient because the effort is not focussed into the troubling parts.
Still the knowledge is there and the book is definitely worth the read(s).
As with other Jasiek books, I have to be quite more conservative regarding the appropriate rank to get the most out of this book. Jasiek states EGF 13k-5d, I'd say ideally you should be around 5k on KGS (circa EGF 9k?) – as a general estimate. There is of course nothing wrong with starting to read the book when you are weaker than KGS 5k, you can certainly grow with it.
My main reasons to state that around KGS 5k would be ideal is – for one thing – the way the diagrams are presented and explained. Most of them show advanced play (professional games) and are too scarcely commented for a beginning player (in my opinion DDKs). I feel that the ability to judge the positions is generally not that developed at this stage.
For another thing, Jasiek mainly teaches principles and reasons for fights and not specific moves, so understanding is far more important to incorporate those in your games. The rest depends on your reading skill and experience.
Christopher Junkers – EGF 2-kyu
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