Why did you start playing Go?

[Bantari]

I'm trying to convert some of chess player friends into this game, and they want to know why other real people start playing such an "obscured game" since apparently, all the other articles about why Go is great is not enough for them.



I know about this game through Hikaru no Go and Weiqi Shaonian. Also, another motivation is because of the Four Cultivated art of a Scholar; Which is: Go, Instrument, Calligraphy and Poetry. I play the violin (instead of guqin, but it's close enough). Not half bad of a poet(won some minor award), and my calligraphy is decent enough. So now Go is in there to complete the list. Of course, it's also a great tool to meditate after a long day by replaying old game.

So why/ how did you start playing?

Chess players start playing Go when they feel Chess is not enough or they just feel adventurous. If they like chess and are happy with that, they have little reason to switch. Just like Go players have little reason to switch to chess if they are happy with Go. One of the worst things one can do, in my opinion, is to try to present Go as somehow "better" than chess - it is not! Its just different.

[EdLee]

Go as somehow "better" than chess - it is not! Its just different.

In your opinion.

IMO, chess is very deep and beautiful, and people have been studying and enjoying it for hundreds of years (over 1,000 years even?)

IMO, so is Go.

I think it's bad form to cast chess in a negative light when promoting Go.

I can appreciate two things, A and B, and I can find A better than B,
but I don't need to present B in a negative light to promote A.
B is good, IMO, but A is better.

Just because it's bad form to present B negatively next to A
also does not automatically mean that A is not superior to B.

Go and chess are different, but IMO not "just different";
I find Go not only better, but vastly superior. That's my opinion.

[peti29]

My father introduced GO to me and my younger brother when we were children. I think he learned about the game at his workplace from some colleagues. My father didn't want to overwhelm us with too much guidance so he only explained the basic rules (two eyes to live, the KO rule, etc), plus he was a beginner too. So we knew nothing about fuseki, moyos, josekis, not even the monkey jump.

We just played large scale fights and I loved how I could turn the world upside down: how my "snake" running for its life suddenly became the hunter. I also loved the shapes I could make. I invented "super" shapes that would grant me victory (which were in reality not all that great, e.g. I remember one of my favorites: the triangle that consists of a large knight jump and two small knight jumps).

Strategy was nothing more than an advice from my father: don't start fighting right away, scatter some stones across the board first.

I loved the game. But my brother didn't - as I always won. So before long he refused to play even a single game, even rarely. (In return I got to refuse to play button soccer - I still can not get what could ever be fun in that game...)

So I guess the unfulfilled desire to play GO just ingrained into me as I grew up not playing GO.

I was around 20 when I noticed that I could play GO on the Runescape site. I think it was 13x13 and without chat. I won a lot of games as I think my opponents didn't even know what the game was about. But there was this one guy, Manado (I still remember his name) who would always crush me. He always started by playing in the corners which was strange to me. I started to mimic his style but he would still win. So I started to search for other servers to play GO where I could communicate with the other players so I found KGS.

And I've been playing there on and off ever since (had to recreate my account multiple times due to it getting deleted because of inactivity during longer breaks).
Lately it became kind of an end of the day activity for me: listening to music while playing 1 or 2 games a night.

[Bantari]

Go as somehow "better" than chess - it is not! Its just different.

In your opinion.

IMO, chess is very deep and beautiful, and people have been studying and enjoying it for hundreds of years (over 1,000 years even?)

IMO, so is Go.

I think it's bad form to cast chess in a negative light when promoting Go.

I can appreciate two things, A and B, and I can find A better than B,
but I don't need to present B in a negative light to promote A.
B is good, IMO, but A is better.

Just because it's bad form to present B negatively next to A
also does not automatically mean that A is not superior to B.

Go and chess are different, but IMO not "just different";
I find Go not only better, but vastly superior. That's my opinion.

And precisely because if it a matter of opinion, you cannot generally say which is objectively better. I see Go players often trying to use this argument to entice chess players to start playing Go.

Both Chess and Go cannot be appreciated until you have achieved some level of understanding, and that takes time.

Personally, I have invested a lot of time in both games, and while I like Go better, I still cannot say which game is "superior", even in my opinion. Both are incredible, and both stretch the human abilities to the max and beyond. Both are far too deep for me, or anybody else I know or ever heard of, to fully explore or "solve". Both allow for creation of almost limitless ideas. And both can consume your life.

Why do you think Go is "superior"? I have asked this question to many players, and most times when I drilled down what was at the bottom of that was that statement was nothing more than "I like Go better, so it must be superior" - or something like that. I am just curious if you have any better reasons than most, you are a pretty deep thinker.

I asked the question to chess players too, with same results.
Everybody thinks their game is "superior".

PS>
I find this whole talk about "superior" slightly egalitarian, this is another reason I am interested in asking about it, since it often comes from people who do not seem to think in those terms. But I think it automatically assumes that if Go is "superior", chess must be "inferior", and so while we are the smart folks playing a "superior" game, they are the bums stuck with "inferior" games, and if they want to be smart they would, of course, switch. Because who would be satisfied with "inferior" when they have the "superior" within reach?

So personally, and from experience, I see the games as "just different", and the above is my justification for wording it so.
Still - interested to hear your arguments.

[TheCatLver]

Go as somehow "better" than chess - it is not! Its just different.

In your opinion.

IMO, chess is very deep and beautiful, and people have been studying and enjoying it for hundreds of years (over 1,000 years even?)

IMO, so is Go.

I think it's bad form to cast chess in a negative light when promoting Go.

I can appreciate two things, A and B, and I can find A better than B,
but I don't need to present B in a negative light to promote A.
B is good, IMO, but A is better.

Just because it's bad form to present B negatively next to A
also does not automatically mean that A is not superior to B.

Go and chess are different, but IMO not "just different";
I find Go not only better, but vastly superior. That's my opinion.

And precisely because if it a matter of opinion, you cannot generally say which is objectively better. I see Go players often trying to use this argument to entice chess players to start playing Go.

Both Chess and Go cannot be appreciated until you have achieved some level of understanding, and that takes time.

Personally, I have invested a lot of time in both games, and while I like Go better, I still cannot say which game is "superior", even in my opinion. Both are incredible, and both stretch the human abilities to the max and beyond. Both are far too deep for me, or anybody else I know or ever heard of, to fully explore or "solve". Both allow for creation of almost limitless ideas. And both can consume your life.

Why do you think Go is "superior"? I have asked this question to many players, and most times when I drilled down what was at the bottom of that was that statement was nothing more than "I like Go better, so it must be superior" - or something like that. I am just curious if you have any better reasons than most, you are a pretty deep thinker.

I asked the question to chess players too, with same results.
Everybody thinks their game is "superior".

PS>
I find this whole talk about "superior" slightly egalitarian, this is another reason I am interested in asking about it, since it often comes from people who do not seem to think in those terms. But I think it automatically assumes that if Go is "superior", chess must be "inferior", and so while we are the smart folks playing a "superior" game, they are the bums stuck with "inferior" games, and if they want to be smart they would, of course, switch. Because who would be satisfied with "inferior" when they have the "superior" within reach?

So personally, and from experience, I see the games as "just different", and the above is my justification for wording it so.
Still - interested to hear your arguments.

While I hold myself to be a strong "middleman", I have a distinct preference to Go over Chess for one main reason:

I find Chess to be rather brutal. In chess, your main objective is to kill. As a pacifist, this was my first turn off. When politician/ruler/leader in general says they are avid chess player, it often left a sour note in my mouth. This denote that they often have a mindset of "regrettable" sacrifice. If you had watch the first Shrek movie, remember when that dwarf-king said something about how many will die to rescue the princess but it's a sacrifice he's willing to make? I don't want to even imagine that those who lord over young soldiers to think of LIFES as pawn. In Go, I like to think of the board as strategic placement, one can play an entire game with out needing the removal of a single stone. Even when a group is "dead", it's more like a POW, but not of necessarily death. (Are you following or do I sound mad?)

There are many more reasons, but those have already been group to more "mainstream" one. This is the only one that I feel that no one (as far as I know) has ever posted so far.

[Unusedname]

While I hold myself to be a strong "middleman", I have a distinct preference to Go over Chess for one main reason:

I find Chess to be rather brutal. In chess, your main objective is to kill. As a pacifist, this was my first turn off. When politician/ruler/leader in general says they are avid chess player, it often left a sour note in my mouth. This denote that they often have a mindset of "regrettable" sacrifice. If you had watch the first Shrek movie, remember when that dwarf-king said something about how many will die to rescue the princess but it's a sacrifice he's willing to make? I don't want to even imagine that those who lord over young soldiers to think of LIFES as pawn. In Go, I like to think of the board as strategic placement, one can play an entire game with out needing the removal of a single stone. Even when a group is "dead", it's more like a POW, but not of necessarily death. (Are you following or do I sound mad?)

There are many more reasons, but those have already been group to more "mainstream" one. This is the only one that I feel that no one (as far as I know) has ever posted so far.

Contrary to this. My favorite part of Go is how much easier it is to sacrifice.

When I sacrifice in Go I can understand what I'm getting (Whether I'm right or wrong).
I can see that I wanted influence on the outside or strength to attack a different area of the board and I lost 4 or 5 stones on the side.

But in chess I could never set up a sacrifice just for position. I suppose I just never got to the level of play where putting my opponents piece in a bad spot made sense. Because wouldn't I also be putting my piece in a bad spot?

And then if he takes my piece I'm down points. And sure I might move him off a position but it would only take them one turn to move back to that position, as opposed to go where moves are permanent.

Of course the main strategy I learned in chess was to use tactics to get ahead by one piece (or pawn) and then trade off everything else and win with your last piece. So sacrificing a piece and not cashing in within the next 2 or 3 moves through forced sequences was a horrible thought for me.

[Rowen]

I'm an avid fan of Manga/Anime and Japanese culture in general. In my pursuit to learn more I decided to try my hand at the Japanese language - learning it has been slow. So, I decided to look for a board game that I could use as a motivational tool while learning the language. Two games stood out - Shogi and Go, both looked appealing and I had a hard time choosing between the two. Ultimately Go won out simply because I was able to google more information about it (Its scary to think I might have been a Shogi player - not that there is anything wrong with that). Once I decided on which game to devote my time I stumbled across Hikaru no Go and immediately watched every episode in marathon fashion - then read the Manga.

Sadly, I dived into the world of Go head first, quickly became overwhelmed and have not played a game since around Jan-Feb of this year. I'm planning to slowly return thanks to a few study journals I read here - namely Abyssinica's. They are motivational and show me how others learn and absorb the game. At the moment I just feel I have no clue what is going on and feel I should - So, taking it slow will hopefully get me to where I want to be in a few years. Which, is to read a post and not scratch my head or wonder what everyone is talking about.

[Abyssinica]

I'm planning to slowly return thanks to a few study journals I read here - namely Abyssinica's. They are motivational and show me how others learn and absorb the game.

I don't think my study journal is very interesting; I just post what I did for the day in relation to Go. Some days I don't even do that much!

[EdLee]

Why do you think Go is "superior"?

Hi Bantari, unfortunately I don't have any really deep, profound reasons --
I'm quite sure you've already heard of all of them:

morgan-freeman-painting.jpg (167.51 KiB) Viewed 5473 times

happy.jpg (10.74 KiB) Viewed 5473 times

I find the painting of Morgan Freeman beautiful. (It's not a photo; it's an iPad finger-painting by Kyle Lambert.)
I also find the pencil drawing beautiful. I think the painting is "better".
If I must come up with reasons for it, I can; but the assessment is instantaneous.
It's intuitively and immediately obvious to me. But if someone feels no way,
the pencil drawing is much better, then that's their opinion.

( I can also easily imagine some unique circumstances -- for example,
someone has a terrible accident that leaves them in a coma or paralyzed
for an extended period of time, and finally, through amazing care and hard work,
they regain their motor functions to the point where they can draw a happy face --
that's also very powerful, touching, and moving. And I can also appreciate
the pencil drawing with such a story.
But now, we imagine said person making the Freeman painting. )

It's very similar with Go: the beauty, the elegance, and the depth are also
intuitively and immediately obvious to me.

The reasons (for me) only came afterwards:

• Chess represents a feudal society where people are divided into classes,
  from the weakest and the lowest (the pawns), to the strongest and most powerful (the queen),
  to the very bizarre combination of weak & infinitely important (the king).
  (It goes without saying this is true also of XiangQi and Shogi,
  since they all came from some ancient Indian source.)
  In Go, all the pieces start out equal; I find this more beautiful.
• Chess starts with all the pieces set at prearranged positions.
  In ancient Chinese Go, they also used to preset certain and stones,
  but later, Japan freed up this requirement.
  This one is more arbitrary, but I find the empty Go board more beautiful.
• In Chess, different pieces have different rules.
  These rules, naturally, have changed slightly over the years.
  I seem to remember reading somewhere that the last rule added was the en passant ?
  Casting aside the unresolved Go rules unification (between China, Korea, and Japan),
  I find the rules of Go much more elegant and beautiful.
• I hope in our lifetime, we see the computer beat the top Go pros (top pros having to take handi stones!).
  Deep Blue beat Kasparov in 1997; it was one reason I lost interest in chess
  and got interested in Go a little later.
  (Of course, people are still very enthusiastic about chess; with prodigies like Carlsen, etc.)
• Chess is all or nothing (kill the king; or a draw ).
  Go is more "sharing." This one is a wash because as we know, both are actually super nasty.

I can probably come up with "more," but once again,
these conscious factors came afterwards; for me,
the beauty and the elegance of Go were a gut instinct, instantaneous and immediate.

[TheCatLver]

Why do you think Go is "superior"?

Hi Bantari, unfortunately I don't have any really deep, profound reasons --
I'm quite sure you've already heard of all of them:

morgan-freeman-painting.jpg

happy.jpg

I find the painting of Morgan Freeman beautiful. (It's not a photo; it's an iPad finger-painting by Kyle Lambert.)
I also find the pencil drawing beautiful. I think the painting is "better".
If I must come up with reasons for it, I can; but the assessment is instantaneous.
It's intuitively and immediately obvious to me. But if someone feels no way,
the pencil drawing is much better, then that's their opinion.

( I can also easily imagine some unique circumstances -- for example,
someone has a terrible accident that leaves them in a coma or paralyzed
for an extended period of time, and finally, through amazing care and hard work,
they regain their motor functions to the point where they can draw a happy face --
that's also very powerful, touching, and moving. And I can also appreciate
the pencil drawing with such a story.
But now, we imagine said person making the Freeman painting. )

It's very similar with Go: the beauty, the elegance, and the depth are also
intuitively and immediately obvious to me.

The reasons (for me) only came afterwards:

• Chess represents a feudal society where people are divided into classes,
  from the weakest and the lowest (the pawns), to the strongest and most powerful (the queen),
  to the very bizarre combination of weak & infinitely important (the king).
  (It goes without saying this is true also of XiangQi and Shogi,
  since they all came from some ancient Indian source.)
  In Go, all the pieces start out equal; I find this more beautiful.
• Chess starts with all the pieces set at prearranged positions.
  In ancient Chinese Go, they also used to preset certain and stones,
  but later, Japan freed up this requirement.
  This one is more arbitrary, but I find the empty Go board more beautiful.
• In Chess, different pieces have different rules.
  These rules, naturally, have changed slightly over the years.
  I seem to remember reading somewhere that the last rule added was the en passant ?
  Casting aside the unresolved Go rules unification (between China, Korea, and Japan),
  I find the rules of Go much more elegant and beautiful.
• I hope in our lifetime, we see the computer beat the top Go pros (top pros having to take handi stones!).
  Deep Blue beat Kasparov in 1997; it was one reason I lost interest in chess
  and got interested in Go a little later.
  (Of course, people are still very enthusiastic about chess; with prodigies like Carlsen, etc.)
• Chess is all or nothing (kill the king; or a draw ).
  Go is more "sharing." This one is a wash because as we know, both are actually super nasty.

I can probably come up with "more," but once again,
these conscious factors came afterwards; for me,
the beauty and the elegance of Go were a gut instinct, instantaneous and immediate.

[schawipp]

I think the only strong fact in the "chess vs. go discussion" is that Go has a significantly higher complexity level despite its comparably elemental rules. I like both games and for me, both complexity levels are more than enough. All the other mentioned arguments rather seem a matter of taste (IMHO).

BTW I started with Go about four years ago when I accidentially stumbled across game a store on a trip in Potsdam. They offered a variety of different Go boards and stone sets - which is not what you usually expect to find in german game stores - and I was appealed by its look and spontaneously decided to buy one

[PeterN]

Someone at work started a club up running at lunchtimes, I was interested in seeing what it was so played a few sessions. It fizzled out and then a few months later randomly remembered about it at a weekend when I was a bit bored and decided to download that online client that had been mentioned. Down the rabbit hole I went.

When I was younger I used to play chess, but never really got into it, and have probably played less than a dozen games in the last 20 years and I fully suspect I am most definitely the equivalent of a 20-30k. I prefer the idea of building bases and attacking from them opposed to just lobbing pieces at the other side to capture, though this comparison may well stem partially from a lack of chess ability.

PeterN

[PeterPeter]

I play Go because I reckon once our alien overlords arrive, they will keep all the human Go-players as pets. I expect it will amuse them to see how primitively we play the game compared to them.

[KoyoToya]

hey there, I believe I owe you a teaching game. but I started playing go because it mentally challenges me and I need that. your friend should definitely try it as it is much more complicated

[Bonobo]

Avoided this thread so far b/c there are so many reasons …

But one thing I like to say is, “Playing Go gives me this funny tickling in my brain.”


Cordially, Tom