SamT's Study Journal - A Beginner's Journey

SamT · Post by **SamT** » Tue Aug 19, 2014 3:19 pm

Well, then... Good to know. If my random sampling holds true on IGS for the future, I will have lots of experience playing possible sandbaggers/go salons.

SamT · Post by **SamT** » Tue Aug 19, 2014 4:14 pm

One more game before I head out to pick up my wife and kiddo. (I will be glad to have them back, even if that means I can't play/study go as much anymore. Honestly, they are more fun. Lonely monkhood is not satisfying for me.)

Another very nice L19 player decided to play me and give me comments. Yay! Thank you, Nathan.

S2W · Post by **S2W** » Tue Aug 19, 2014 8:58 pm

Hi Sam,

I am not a dan, so take everything I say with a grain of salt, but I did have some comments on game 1.

Ps. I think your opponent was stronger at the opening, but you have more fighting spirit (the life and death is paying off) - in fact I think you would have won if you had played one move differently in the upper right.

EdLee · Post by **EdLee** » Tue Aug 19, 2014 9:33 pm

Hi Sam, S2W,

About the comments in post 48, ( game 1, vs. nikwdhmos ) :

:w10:

the game move, jumping out to F5, is good.
It has to do with :w2:

on Q4.
We must always look at the whole board,
not just a local consideration ( D10 empty. )
After :w10:

jumps out to F5, W has two good follow-up directions:
D6 direction to pressure B's corner,
and M3 direction to counter-pincer :b9:

.
These two directions are miai for W, so this is good for W.
A pincer in the M3 direction works well with :w2:

on Q4.

Of course, the suggestion for :w10:

to jump into 3-3 is
also playable, and certainly not a mistake at these levels.
Good to study the game move :w10:

and its meanings.

EdLee · Post by **EdLee** » Tue Aug 19, 2014 9:47 pm

Hi Sam,

Game 1, vs. nikwdhmos:

:w12:

this is completely wrong. You need to reply to :b11:

,
otherwise you allow B to hane at F2.
A simply local reply is drop to F2 yourself.
As a jump ( G7 ), :w12:

also has shape problems —
it has weaknesses.

:b13:

promptly punishes your :w12:

mistake.

terrible. "empty triangle". Locally, other moves
are better, for example, H5.
But we can already see a trend: you are following your opponent around.

:b23:

-

standard bad habit for B.
All B has done here is to force W to fix W's weakness.
If B plays the push :b23:

, B must follow up by cutting at E9 on :b25:

.

it's good that you fixed the E9 cut.

:b29:

not good.

soft. W is strong locally, you can hane-block at F11 —
very powerful.

:b33:

bad. Similar mistake as :b29:

.

wrong shape. Just extend to M15 is one proper local reply.
Your :w34:

, once again, allows B to hane at M17 and link up.
Similar blind spot as :w12:

.

wrong shape. Homework for you:
if :b37:

hanes at N14 ( instead of o14 in the real game ),
why can you not cut at o14 on :w38:

?

TIM82 · Post by **TIM82** » Wed Aug 20, 2014 12:44 am

Hi Sam,

I don't have time right now to edit an sgf to full comments of any game, but there is one important concept which would help you a lot. Probabaly you have heard about http://senseis.xmp.net/?DisposableStones already, but see for example these situations in games above:

Sunday game:
:w20:

If you play elsewhere, b threatens to capture the two stones and you get to play elsewhere again, you should rejoice. Connecting them is *really* small.
:w44:

There is no reason at all to save these two stones now, and when you try that b should aim to cut them from your corner and then it's much trouble for no gain. E.g. P17 would be much better (what would you do if black took next that instead of P16 as in the game?
:w144: This doesn't even work. Sacrifice at S13.

Game A
:b20:

Don't try to save this stone, let it be. Now you just get a heavy group (son a dead one), later the stone might provide some real possibilities. And if W spends :w21:

to fully capture it you get :b20:

and

elsewhere - very very good.

Game against Nathan
:b44:

you dont have time to worry about these two "cutting" stones, consider e.g. Q6 instead. And if w then P6, take Q7. See situation at move :w48:

: white is connected anyways, and you have weak stones in corner and on the outside.
:b50:

can you really afford to try to save this stone too, considering you have also other groups in the area? I would tenuki. Perhaps harrass C6 stone? (at :w61 I dont get why w doesn't connect at M5 - it seems to me this captures L3 group. Perhaps I'm missing something though?
:b88:

agree with Nathan

regards,
Tuukka

SamT · Post by **SamT** » Wed Aug 20, 2014 5:29 am

Thanks, everyone

Wonderful feedback, way more than expected. I'll start digging into it now

Maybe I'll learn better which stones to let go of.

S2W · Post by **S2W** » Wed Aug 20, 2014 6:18 am

Hello Sam,

Some ideas on Game A - again I've only been playing for a year more than you so treat them as suggestions rather than hard fact.

S2W · Post by **S2W** » Wed Aug 20, 2014 7:13 am

And game b

SamT · Post by **SamT** » Wed Aug 20, 2014 8:28 am

S2W wrote:Hello Sam,
Some ideas on Game A - again I've only been playing for a year more than you so treat them as suggestions rather than hard fact.

You are still many levels better than me, so at least it's usually a *better* direction. Thank you for your feedback. All of it was helpful; the Game A stuff was especially so. Nice to see different ways I could've stayed in the game.

Update: I just saw your post of the Jsweet game. Some really interesting variations there

SamT · Post by **SamT** » Wed Aug 20, 2014 9:12 am

TIM82 and EdLee,

Great feedback from both of you.

Obviously, I need a heck of a lot of work figuring out:
1) moves that are better shape
2) which stones are disposable, which aren't

I can read "shape up" some more for #1, that might help. But #2... I am not sure how to learn this other than by doing.

I am not sure how to find drills on which stones to keep and which stones to let go of. I really could use some of those.

(preaching about Deliberate Practice, complaining hat Go's selection of drills is not broad or granular enough)

(/preaching)

Tenuki Drill
In order to address my tendency to follow the opponent around and stay permanently in gote, I might try a "tenuki drill" I saw online somewhere, but I am pretty sure I will end up in a lot of losses for me. It may still be worth, it tho. The drill, as described was:

You must play tenuki every move.

Like I said, it will lose me the game, most likely, but it will also probably teach me to look at the board as a whole, and look for different opportunities for mutual damage/sente. I might try this on WBaduk, where I am an ant and have not even distant dreams of success.

EdLee · Post by **EdLee** » Wed Aug 20, 2014 11:52 am

SamT wrote:You must play tenuki every move.

Hi Sam,

SamT wrote:it will lose me the game, most likely, but it will also probably teach me to look at the board as a whole,

Good. Enjoy.

TIM82 · Post by **TIM82** » Wed Aug 20, 2014 1:29 pm

SamT wrote:
Obviously, I need a heck of a lot of work figuring out:
1) moves that are better shape
2) which stones are disposable, which aren't

I can read "shape up" some more for #1, that might help. But #2... I am not sure how to learn this other than by doing.

I am not sure how to find drills on which stones to keep and which stones to let go of. I really could use some of those.

It's not all there is to sacrificing stones, but the examples I highlighted tried to be about situations where you built a great juicy lump (or target...) of stones doing nothing* next to your opponents strong position.

* important stones either cut your opponents stones into multiple groups which are not completely alive yet, or connect your groups / build your own position in a meaningful way. A stone or two stranded next to your opponents strenght do neither. Not even if you connect them to you other stones ( even if you mess up one potential area of your opponents by doing this, he is likely to get forcing moves chasing your stones and just build potential elsewhere with those, and you got nothing in the process, and the board got more settled).

So to sum it up: if you have stones next to opponents strong position, treat them lightly, be ready to sacrifice, unless they cut the opponents position into multiple unstable groups. If opponent spends a move to complete the capture, you get a free move elsewhere, which is probably bigger. This holds for beginning of the game. After that, keep looking whether stones which appeared elsewhere have made it interesting to utilize some previously stranded stones.

SamT · Post by **SamT** » Thu Aug 21, 2014 11:39 am

I received my copy of Weiqi Dingshi Daquan last night. It's the joseki text that Hushfield and his fellow students were using in china. I started it last night, and I was a little worried, because many of the diagrams were identical to ones I had already memorized in Ishida. Then, today, I got a little further in, and started learning whole new sequences that I had not run into before. Good stuff!

It's a challenge decrypting the book, even with the miracle-that-is Google Translate (it will translate a pic from my phone!). Still, the translations themselves are way off, with the word White sometimes translated as "Since", and constant reference to "Bits" and "Bit Legislation", which I am guessing either mean move/stone, or standard move.

And there was one section that is still a mystery to me because Google was convinced it was about "loving the cars".

There were several miraculous passages that were crystal clear, with Google even translating the word to the word "tenuki". Still, it's a great book so far, and I'm only 25 diagrams in.

And I'm learning Mandarin as I go, study of which I had abandoned 2 years ago.

SamT · Post by **SamT** » Thu Aug 21, 2014 11:40 am

No luck with the Tenuki drill so far. I do it for about 12 moves, and then I can't stand it anymore.

Life In 19x19

SamT's Study Journal - A Beginner's Journey

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