The stones go walking, and I with them

EdLee · Post by **EdLee** » Sat Jul 05, 2014 5:22 pm

jeromie wrote: but omitting 226 involves confirming that the capturing race works for white (it does, as far as I can tell)
and leaving a huge ko threat on the board.

Which cap race ? What ko ?

jeromie · Post by **jeromie** » Sat Jul 05, 2014 5:52 pm

EdLee wrote:Which cap race ? What ko ?

The capture race would be between his E13 group and my D12 group. White wins by one move in every variation I could see.

I didn't think there was another ko that would develop on the board at that point, so I could have played elsewhere. Honestly, I was probably being overly cautious. I've lost won games by playing one move too few on a group I could have saved. Watching many of my stones disappear off the board in a single move is a surprisingly powerful motivation to change behavior (and improve my reading).

I guess the question at stake here is what is whether a kyu player looking to improve should try and get the most points out of the endgame or merely play the moves that are necessary to win. I'll admit that the former probably offers the most learning opportunity, but I think there is also value in playing moves that reflect the score on the board. Perhaps I'll make maximizing my score in the endgame a subgoal that I focus on in some of my upcoming games.

EdLee · Post by **EdLee** » Sat Jul 05, 2014 8:08 pm

jeromie wrote:The capture race would be between his E13 group and my D12 group.

What's the status of your D12 group ?

jeromie · Post by **jeromie** » Sun Jul 06, 2014 1:54 am

EdLee wrote:What's the status of your D12 group ?

I can't find a path where it's not unconditionally alive, whether or not I play 226. I've uploaded an sgf with a few of the variations I tried. If I'm missing something, could you point me in the right direction?

EdLee · Post by **EdLee** » Sun Jul 06, 2014 3:37 am

jeromie wrote:I can't find a path where it's not unconditionally alive, whether or not I play 226.

That's correct: your D12 group is already alive, so there is no cap race, and no ko.

Each of :white:

226 and

228 is -1 point in gote, worse than a pass.
You removed 2 points from yourself, in gote.

In this game, it doesn't affect the result. But in other cases, -1 point in gote could be a losing move.

Uberdude · Post by **Uberdude** » Sun Jul 06, 2014 6:06 am

When over 100 points ahead I think playing -1 point in gote moves to ask your opponent to resign is fine and not worthy of criticism. Better to review a game you lost by 100 points.

jeromie · Post by **jeromie** » Thu Jul 17, 2014 1:28 pm

Last time I posted a game that I found odd, but it didn't really have a lot of value for review. This time I'll post a game that I lost, which probably offers a better chance of pointing out my errors. I'm often reluctant to post losses, since I often don't feel they represent my best go. I can usually find a number of significant errors in my personal review, so posting the games doesn't always feel like it's of great value. Of course, I might be missing something fundamental.

I also should admit (to myself, mostly) that I don't like showing off losing go. But taking ownership of my poor play is an important part of continued improvement. Not only will it allow me to get valuable feedback, but it's important that I don't play passively out of fear of playing a move that will turn out to be bad later. If I think a move works when I do my best job of reading it out, I need to play it and allow the consequences to come as they may.

This is a game I played last Saturday. I was a bit distracted while playing, so I made some reading errors I may have otherwise avoided. Still, this is my go. I put some of my own comments in the sgf file to give you an idea of how I think about my own games while reviewing them.

Total games as of 7/17:
KGS: 42 games
Tygem: 11 games
In Person: 7 games
Fuego: 1 game
IGS: 3

Total: 64

mitsun · Post by **mitsun** » Thu Jul 17, 2014 5:30 pm

A few comments on an early position:

:b43:

and

are excellent moves to get some compensation for three dead B stones, but things went bad for B in the continuation. It was good practice on your part to try to analyze this position after the game to look for improvements. Let's dig a little deeper.

:w46:

is actually a mistake. Your analysis found a much better response than in the game, but you still got the order a bit wrong. Go back to :b47:

and see if you can find a real tesuji to capture the three W stones unconditionally. This is a fun reading problem, which comes up often in tesuji books and real games, so take some time to analyze it. If you manage to pull this off in a real game, it will be quite enjoyable

jeromie · Post by **jeromie** » Thu Jul 17, 2014 6:00 pm

Oh, of course! The diagonal tesuji at G19 is obvious now. I think the big wall black gets by sacrificing those stones may be better than saving them, though. Either choice is better than what I did, of course!

EdLee · Post by **EdLee** » Fri Jul 18, 2014 5:05 pm

jeromie wrote:The diagonal tesuji at G19 is obvious now.
I think the big wall black gets by sacrificing those stones...

Which diagonal tesuji ? Do you mean hane ? (On which move? )
Who is sacrificing which stones ?

jeromie · Post by **jeromie** » Fri Jul 18, 2014 5:47 pm

I did mean hane. I realized my mistake right after I posted (from my phone while trying to get a bath ready for my daughter :-)

) but decided not to go back and fix it at the time. And actually, it's bath time again. I'll answer the rest later. :-)

jeromie · Post by **jeromie** » Fri Jul 25, 2014 11:42 am

Sorry for the long delay in reply. That bath took longer than expected. ;-)

EdLee wrote:
jeromie wrote:The diagonal tesuji at G19 is obvious now.
I think the big wall black gets by sacrificing those stones...
Which diagonal tesuji ? Do you mean hane ? (On which move? )
Who is sacrificing which stones ?

I was looking at the G19 hane for black move 47. After move 45 white can definitely capture black's H18 group, so I figured that was where I was to look for capturing the white stones.

If white takes the F17 stone on move 48, black can still capture his stones. So it looks like a better move for white is to play F15 and put the black stones at G16 in atari. If white extends twice (to F14) he can either connect his f15 group to the h15 stones or capture the group at the top, depending on how black responds. However, I must admit that looking at the game a few days later, black will have the option to cut at J16 or H13 and leave black with two weak groups, so capturing the stones does look better. If black sacrifices the H18 group, all of the white stones on the top become safe and white can use them to harass black later. Time brings often brings clarity. :-)

I've attached another version of the same game that includes a few of the variations I'm talking about in the above paragraph. I'm sure I've left a few things out or played some suboptimal moves, but I hope it communicates my idea. (Some of the old comments are no longer accurate, but I didn't remove everything. The relevant branches are on variation 3 of move 47.)

Thanks, Ed, for encouraging me to look through the consequences of my moves in a bit more detail.

jeromie · Post by **jeromie** » Fri Jul 25, 2014 12:05 pm

This journal entry is not concerned with any particular game I've played; it's just a collection of thoughts about my recent play and progress.

I've taken great joy in a number of my games lately. I had a couple of games where I was able to take a small lead in territory on the sides at the cost of leaving my opponent a significant amount of outside influence and then turn the center into a jumbled mess where neither of us got very many points. It's fun to look at a large expanse of the board and think, "I can't make territory there, but I bet I can make it so that my opponent can't either."

I've been slowly working through James Davies' Tesuji, and I'm almost done with it. I only get about 60% of the problems completely right (i.e. read out the best line for both sides), but the book has done a lot to open my eyes to moves I should consider. I'm sure it will be worthwhile to work through it a second time when I'm stronger. I also finished Graded Go Problems for Beginners volume 3, which I have on my iPhone and started working through it a second time. It's a good companion to Tesuji, since I see many of the same type of moves in a different context. I recently bought the pdf version of Robert Jasiek's Easy Learning: Joseki. There hasn't been anything written about it online aside from Jasiek's own comments, so I'll post a review after I've finished reading through it at least once.

I occasionally wish I had recorded some of the high handicap games I have been playing at the local club. When I first started playing go I didn't think I was likely to play 8 and 9 stone games, but they're actually a lot of fun. The biggest challenge is trusting my own reading and not playing slack moves and hoping that the handicap stones will save me. Playing what I consider to be the "right" move against an opponent with superior reading abilities is intimidating, but I learn a lot from it. I've actually been pretty successful at winning those games, though that's hardly the main point in a high handicap game. Fortunately, I've also learned a lot along the way.

Overally, I've been having fun with the game and seeing definite progress. It looks like I'll be a solid SDK on KGS by the end of the summer. I've held a 9k rating for a couple weeks now, and I think I'll likely get to 8k by the end of the summer. It feels a lot different than when a few fluke resignations pushed my rank up that high and I feared being slaughtered when paired with an even opponent! I actually expect to win every game I play, and when I lose I can usually see several moves I could have played differently upon review. There is still a tremendously long path ahead of me, of course, but the little bit of progress I've made has been encouraging.

Marcus · Post by **Marcus** » Fri Jul 25, 2014 12:39 pm

jeromie wrote: I recently bought the pdf version of Robert Jasiek's Easy Learning: Joseki. There hasn't been anything written about it online aside from Jasiek's own comments, so I'll post a review after I've finished reading through it at least once.

I will be interested in your review of this.

It sounds like you're having a grand time learning as you go. If you ever want a friendly game on KGS and I happen to be on, let me know. I think us L19 folks should ALL play each other more often ... :mrgreen:

jeromie · Post by **jeromie** » Fri Jul 25, 2014 6:36 pm

Marcus wrote:
It sounds like you're having a grand time learning as you go. If you ever want a friendly game on KGS and I happen to be on, let me know. I think us L19 folks should ALL play each other more often ...

Thanks; I'll take you up on that. I think it'd be a lot of fun to play some of the folks from the forum.

Life In 19x19

The stones go walking, and I with them

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