Yi Ch'ang-ho on Evaluating Positions

[John Fairbairn]

I often take notes as I read go books. Actually I am not thereby studying go but trying to keep my shorthand up. Still, as long-time readers will know, I occasionally find a book that impresses me enough to work up my notes into a review. Usually what impels me to do that is seeing something that I believe has not yet been covered in the west adequately or at all. I try to give a peep in at the window.

In this case, though, the nature of the subject seemed to require many diagrams to get the points over, so I ended up doing a pdf file. This in turn means you get to look in through the doorway rather than the window.

YiChanghoEvaluation.pdf

(347.37 KiB) Downloaded 1764 times

[EdLee]

Thanks, John.

[tchan001]

Taiwanese version of this book is currently out of print AFAIK.
李昌鎬 我的形勢判斷
Author/Editor: Yi Chang-ho 李昌鎬
Publisher: Lieyi 理藝
Published: 2001
Format: softcover
ISBN: 9789570438192
Publisher Recommended Price: NTD240

That above has been retranslated by a different Chinese translator into the following Taiwanese version which is currently in print.

形勢判斷
Author/Editor: Yi Chang-ho 李昌鎬
Publisher: Lieyi 理藝
Published: 2013
Format: softcover
ISBN: 9789866706233
Publisher Recommended Price: NTD250

[oren]

Somewhat off topic, but I recently finished a book アマの悪手を直す 2つの形勢判断法 (Fixing amateur's bad moves, two method to evaluate positions) by Yuki Satoshi. The two methods are separating opening where you really can't get a good count and midgame where you can get a count and idea of potential. I don't know how it compares to Lee Changho's yet, but I'm interested enough to also order this book and compare.

Thanks for the in-depth review.

[jts]

Many thanks.

[RobertJasiek]

something that I believe has not yet been covered in the west adequately or at all

Which Western books on positional judgement have you read and which not? Why do you think they have not adequately covered the topic? For a start, see

viewtopic.php?f=17&t=8627

[RobertJasiek]

In the review, these diagrams show, or mainly rely on, sequences of determining 'current territory'.

1, 3, 4 (without move 7), 5, 10, 11, 12, 14, 17, 18 (marks after move 3), 24, 26i, 26ii.

(I sometimes disagree in details of shown or assumed sequences, amounting to a difference of up to ca. 1 point in total in a few diagrams.)

In particular, the imagined sequences for determining current territory rely on peaceful sente reductions, a nature of sente specific to sequences for current territory, passive replies by the defender in front of the attacker's moves, imagined supporting stones of the attacker and more of them later during the game, (partly) proper timing of the moves, subject to the other conditions minimising by the attacker and maximising by the defender.

The term current territory has been coined by me, but the concept is or has been used by Cho Chikun, Lee and others. As can be seen from their moves in positional judgement sequences, they have been aware of almost all the underlying principles written [4] by me, maybe except the principle about two infrequent, but necessary, exceptions and except that Lee also allows invasions.

For the following purposes, Lee suggests other methods:
- invasions, when the attacker's nearby stones are strong (it is unclear in the review whether deire counting is used in this context)
- defense versus invasion regions, which are (alternatively?) counted by deire counting
- territory in front of thickness, which apparently is counted by visual guessing
- moyos (not necessarily counted, but might be represented by 'alpha')

[Mage]

Thanks JF.

[oren]

I received this book a few weeks ago and started going through it. I also highly recommend it to anyone trying to learn how to evaluate positions. Thanks for the review, John.