Do you count?

[caomorto]

Hi there!

I have a friend that is around 1d (considerably better than me, though) and once told me that he had never count during a game.

Sometimes I face a situation in which I have to choose either to reduce or invade an opponent's moyo. The best course of action is, of course, to count the score and make your choice accordingly, but in real time games I never did this. I try to do a rough estimate (that area is as large as this area, that one is smaller, so I should be ahead/behind), but to actually count the points, I never did that.

How about you? How lazy are you with counting? Do you consider it an important part of your game, or do you consider it something that is only relevant in higher level games?

[p2501]

Very lazy, I did it for a while and it is good practice. Definitely something that makes you a better player.

I usually don't count anymore, maybe just glance at the positions and estimate roughly.

[logan]

I count many times each game. I think the mid/high dans who don't count during a game would be in the small minority. But in rapid-blitz games there's not much time to count accurately, you can only do rough counts (although your time is often better spent reading variations).

[Boidhre]

Generally no. It's a serious bad habit of mine.

In tournaments I usually make the effort once or twice in a game to estimate who's ahead or if its even using the technique of comparing areas of roughly the same size talked about in Attack and Defence. Which is ok I suppose but I don't do it nearly enough in normal games. I can't read well enough to do anything like an accurate count (within 5-10) until mid-late yose though.

[TIM82]

No, but really I should. Got to KGS 1-2d without counting at all, just playing by feel, and I suspect beginning to count regularly to steer strategy would be relative easy way to improve a bit now. Been trying counting in my current Malkovich, and trying to train myself to do it in real life too.

What I do normally nowadays is to just compare visually roughly similar-sized areas: "My corner + that small group together seems as big as his side there...". This is good for verifying leads of >10-15points for either side, but not much more.

[caomorto]

I found out that, in late yose, I can figure out who's ahead if the difference in score is >20. Bellow that, I need to count.

Which I never do, by the way

[wineandgolover]

No

[Uberdude]

I count more now than I did a year or two ago, but still not much. I am impressed by the ability of bigbadwolf (Andy Liu) to count and resign blitz games on KGS he is losing by half a point .

[Bantari]

I count more now than I did a year or two ago, but still not much. I am impressed by the ability of bigbadwolf (Andy Liu) to count and resign blitz games on KGS he is losing by half a point .

I usually count at least 3-4 times during a serious game. Never during fast games.

[Unusedname]

I rarely count. in fact my estimating is so poor on occasion I will win games by 10+ points that I am sure I am losing in the opposite extreme.

I just feel I never have time. I think it would take me a 60-90 seconds to count up the score and combined with my thoughts on my next move this would be way too much time for one move.

[caomorto]

I rarely count. in fact my estimating is so poor on occasion I will win games by 10+ points that I am sure I am losing in the opposite extreme.

I just feel I never have time. I think it would take me a 60-90 seconds to count up the score and combined with my thoughts on my next move this would be way too much time for one move.

I bet the other way around also happens: loosing games you could swear you were winning?

[xed_over]

I try to count, but I really suck at it. I'm often off by 10+ points, and usually in the wrong direction.

[Unusedname]

I rarely count. in fact my estimating is so poor on occasion I will win games by 10+ points that I am sure I am losing in the opposite extreme.

I just feel I never have time. I think it would take me a 60-90 seconds to count up the score and combined with my thoughts on my next move this would be way too much time for one move.

I bet the other way around also happens: loosing games you could swear you were winning?

Sort of. Sometimes I feel like it's a very close game and then suddenly I've lost by 20 points hahaha.

I don't know that I've ever been sure of victory and then lost.

But those games I think are close make me feel bad. Because I'd spend all this time looking for 1 point and 2 point end game moves but my opponent probably just wants the game to be over.

[Toge]

I don't count the score during game. I think it would improve the attacking game, but I'm quite bad at shinogi when situation needs it. In yose spotting double-sente and sente plays is usually enough to get ahead, but advanced tactic of replying sente move with sente of your own depends on accurate counting. These are some of the perspectives to counting.

[LocoRon]

Around my late ddk and early sdk days, I counted a lot, probably a few times in every game.

Now, I only count when playing against a significantly weaker player, and I don't want to completely destroy them (I aim for a 5-10 point victory; although it may actually end up around 20 or so, that is still better than 100+, and more likely to encourage them to play more).