A very nice kill Robert

Hmm, I was neglecting that high dans don't typically play handicap games at tournaments. Actually, do any EGF players habitually play rated handicapped games?

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With dan promotion tournaments like the Oteai going the way of the dodo, professional dan ranks mean almost nil. The Koreans give dan promotions to pros who promote baduk overseas so that they will be given more respect by westerners who still believe that dan ranks mean something. People have even been promoted to 9 dan for their "long service".

To hear Koreans pros talk about it, there is effectively no difference between 1p and 9p these days. 1p pros have reached world championship semi-finals. 1p pros have beaten top players in many meaningful games in major tournaments (both blitz and long). Strong amateurs have beaten several top Korean pros the last few years in meaningful games. At most, there might be a stone difference between the weakest pros (women/seniors) and the strongest pros. Most currently active pros will be within a half-stone of the top players. You hear this sort of thing frequently on Baduk TV whenever low dan pros are shown.

Also, if anything, expect the range of strengths within the pro ranks to narrow. Amateurs are getting stronger and stronger (more access to professional games and other study materials) while the number of new players admitted to pro associations has grown slowly. As I've noted above, a handful of the strongest Korean amateurs are likely stronger than many pros. This might change if they start admitting more new pros wholesale, but somehow I doubt that will happen any time soon.

Having said that, how many stones do you think the weakest active Asian-born pro could give the strongest European player and expect to win 50% of his games? Somehow I suspect that it might be close to or less than 1 stone. This doesn't mean that the strongest European player can expect to pass the pro exam in an Asian country as newly minted pros are quite strong these days.

Few notes.

In 1997, when I came to Korea to become insei, I was regular 5-dan. I got 6th place in Russian championship few month ago. I was weaker than Lazarev or Detkov, but sometimes was able to beat other top players like Bogdanov,6d or Sahabutdinov, 6d.

In Korea I lost some games on 3 handicap vs top Korean amateurs. Also, I played few games with Kang Hun, 9p (that time he was one of the best professionals in Korea) on 4 stones - without success.

I feel that the right handicap between regular European 5d (2500 rating in EGD) against top pro is 3 stones. Of course, we have to talk about 1-1 games only. Simultaneous games with teaching or retired pros on EGC are another story. I remember the game, Yurij Plyusch, 5d won against Muraoka, 9p about 7-8 years ago - it was an even game, but played in simultaneous.

Few other examples.
In 1987 Saijo Masataka visited USSR and played some games with top USSR players. He lost on 3 stones to Ivan Detkov 6d, but beat Valerij Soloviev,6d on 3 stones. I have a magazine here at home with game records.

If you feel (I believe that Robert thinks so) that 2 stones are enough for him to beat top pro:
About 20 years ago, Cho Hunhyun 9p (that time Korean #1) played the match with other top pros. Professionals, who challenged him in title matches: Paek Sungho, Kim Soochang, Chang Suyoung and others. Match was played with changing handicap after every game. He won few games, giving them 2 stones!

Another good thing to remember: Some professionals are very bad at handicap Go. Lee Changho, 9p for example. He likes to play honest moves, instead of using overplays

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About the quality of the game, showed by Robert.
I saw this event and remember it well. It was played by different pros from 1p to 9p. Every pro wanted to finish it quickly (imaging playing sim. game on 100 boards!), so average time, used by pros per move, was close to 5 sec. Many moves were played just in 1 sec.

Pay attention to White 76 or L17. Was it a pro-level move? Small yose move here. Of course, it was necessary to defend the weak group on the right.

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When ranks were first instituted in the 17th century, a 1 rank difference meant taking Black, a 2 rank difference meant alternating Black and 2 stones, a 3 rank difference meant taking 2 stones, etc. So taking 5 stones meant a 9 rank difference. There were 2 ranks per stone.

By the early 20th century there were 3 ranks per stone. By the 1970s or 1980s there were 4 ranks per stone. Now handicap games between pros are rare, so who knows?

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Everything with love. Stay safe.

No. Top pros (i.e. the few players much stronger than average 9p) are another class. Also, 2 stones (against average 9p) are not enough "to beat", but "to get closest to 50% winning chance (closer than 3 stones).



O well, kyu players have to start taking handicaps because they are weak at using them;)

Svetlana and (IIRC) you dropped out early because both of you had played a tough tournament game during the day and were exhausted. Those pros staying in the simultaneous were playing seriously. They took their time whenever they considered it necessary. In particular, when a life and death problem was on the board (I saw it in several of those games), they all took their time (with the exception of Catalin, who jested "a kikashi" when playing aji keshi to hand over the problem to the next, hopefully stronger, pro). Contrarily, I played all my moves immediately whenever the professionals arrived. When all professionals had their chance to find a rescuing sequence and the Chinese woman (6p, I think) arrived for her second time during the final life and death problem, she resigned.



But such moves are quite a few professionals' style in handicap simultaneous games! They grab more and more territory before they plan the final shinogi show. It just did not work against me:)

Robert, what do you think about the right handicap between you and Ilya Shikshin?

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I do not know; I have played too few games against him: My real world slow game score against him is 1:0 (Ing Cup St. Petersberg):) Of course, that was several years ago, when he was still young.

Small board, lighting or server games each require a different handicap (if we assume that handicaps make any sense at all).

I am sure that he has no chance to beat me in a slow H3 game. I have absolutely no idea whether he has a chance in a real world slow H2 game. I only know that I do not have a chance in an even game.

In an even game, he would win by something like 11.5 points (or resignation), to make a wild guess.

Cho Hunhyun is a special case. This is a man who literally (correct usage of this word) won every single tournament in Korea in the SAME year a couple times. The closest approximation of his dominance over his Korean contemporaries is Go Seigen's dominance in his 10-game matches. Seo Bongsoo, who was the only person to even mount a challenge to Cho, lost something like 60+% of his games to Cho. Paek Sungho, Kim Soochang, Chang Suyoung are all players who couldn't beat Seo Bongsoo in the title challenger matches to get to Cho (the title holder). Cho could probably have beaten down Seo to a BBW handicap and Seo could probably have beaten everyone else down to a BBW handicap.

Cho is probably the worst example to use here as he was an extreme outlier. Even Seo would be a bad example given his dominance over everyone except Cho.