A DDK's baby steps

S2W · Post by **S2W** » Fri Nov 14, 2014 8:27 pm

might be one of my patented enormous blunders - but I think it lets white off too easy. You are ao string in the area - you should just cut off his escape and crush the little white worm. The move you played leaves behind a big cut that white could exploit later

Again this could be a complete misread on my part:

S2W · Post by **S2W** » Fri Nov 14, 2014 8:49 pm

Ps :b116: is fine - :b146: is a puzzlement. After reviewing the game where would you play instead?

Pps I quite like yose and wish I were better at it (nothing like loosing by 0.5 points to drive that home). I also usually take quite a bit of time over it which I imagine infuriates any sandbagging opponents (probably many of the non sandbaggers also).

mimano · Post by **mimano** » Sat Nov 15, 2014 1:25 pm

S2W wrote:You are so strong in the area - you should just cut off his escape and crush the little white worm. The move you played leaves behind a big cut that white could exploit later

I have looked through your variations, and I now understand the reasoning - it was a bit too long term reading for my skills, but now it makes perfect sense, thank you!

mimano · Post by **mimano** » Sat Nov 15, 2014 3:18 pm

S2W wrote:Ps :b146: is a puzzlement. After reviewing the game where would you play instead?

Well, the variation you showed in the previous post with :b46:

at S15 seems fine to me, isn't it?

S2W · Post by **S2W** » Sat Nov 15, 2014 10:27 pm

Hehe - definitely (I should read my own reviews) - there's my blunder for the game

Edit - with a nod to knotwilg, I also wanted to add a couple of positive comments (with the massive caveat that it's much harder for me to judge good moves than bad ones - so take it all with a grain of salt). Despite a few slow moves, early on I think you played a solid game and had a really good position at move 68 - definitely you played to you level better than your opponent did. In particular I liked that you chose the pincer at 16 to use the thickness that you'd built on the lhs. Also I think it's a good sign that you didn't just follow your opponent around at move 24 but looked for other opportunities (though I'm not 100% confident if there wasn't a better move elsewhere). Finally, I really liked the way that you made sure you were alive and then grabbed the big point at 60.

mimano · Post by **mimano** » Sun Nov 16, 2014 9:28 am

Thanks S2W, that's very encouraging. So I recorded a new loss yesterday. I felt so ashamed by the end of it that I did not want to show it, but after a good night's sleep and a new look at the game, I feel it is quite interesting.

It is the kind of game where I never felt under pressure or threatened or anything, but still, my opponent plays in such a way that, if I had not blundered as I have, he would still have lead by a few points I think. So in that sense I find it very intriguing because I wonder how it is that he was able to outplay me so "softly" as if to say.

I have put some of my ideas in the sgf, and I might have spotted some possible improvements in my game. I have also spotted THE losing move I think - it is very very clear (and comes way before the blunder - the blunder is only the incarnation of the losing move, quite nice really :lol:

).

So as usual I am very interested in your hints, but in particular on this aspect of being outplayed without suffering, which happened in this game. :shock:

S2W · Post by **S2W** » Sun Nov 16, 2014 11:39 pm

Some comments (hidden below)

Main points -
1. Making your opponent live small and building thickness is good - just make sure you make some points too

2. Lone stones are "light" they can be sacrificed easily and often have lots if aji - keep an eye in them to make sure they don't come back to bite

3. Bamboo joints are often very good - but take a second look to see if there is a better option

mimano · Post by **mimano** » Mon Nov 17, 2014 9:02 am

Hi S2W, thanks for your input, enlightening as always! I think you have deserved my official sensei badge of honor already

In particular, your variation to save the black group at the very end rubs a bit more salt in the wound...I had missed that one even when reviewing my game :oops:

Thanks a lot for your continued input.

skydyr · Post by **skydyr** » Wed Nov 19, 2014 7:50 am

One comment:
At :b64:

white just played a move to try and reduce black a bit, because black has a huge moyo. Black does want to capture the one stone that black goes after in the game, but capturing it like this is small. It'd be better to play something like K8, threatening to make a huge amount of territory on the bottom, challenging white's stone on tengen, and also building influence to kill off G3 naturally. If white tries to run with G3 after, the stone at K8 helps cut it off from a lot of its possible support, and black should be able to consolidate the rest of the moyo by attacking it.

In addition, the top left group doesn't need strengthening yet at :b66:

. Black can always play the 1-2 point to live, and it feels very passive, as white shouldn't care about that one stone.

mimano · Post by **mimano** » Thu Nov 20, 2014 2:52 am

Thank you for your input Skydyr. Your first remark is actually a real eye-opener. In this game, for some reason, I never even realized I had build a huge moyo, and never tried to actually make anything of it or defend it. Which means that I played without any plan really. Reading your remark, I can see that moyo on the bottom half, it is indeed large and should allow me to play on a larger scale than I did: I just attacked his lone stones in a small way, as you point out.

Your second remark is quite correct as well. In the game, I never thought seriously about making life in the corner for my upper left group, which led me to play small and mostly useless defensive moves aimed at defending this group, one of which is 66 indeed. Now that you point it out, I realize I should not have been so worried about that group.

Thanks!

Uberdude · Post by **Uberdude** » Thu Nov 20, 2014 3:01 am

s14 and f2 are both the same strange shape mistake, better at r14 and f3 to actually defend the cut (and take a liberty from the white stone). White could actually cut at e3 as d3 stones don't have many liberties.

mimano · Post by **mimano** » Thu Nov 20, 2014 6:52 am

Uberdude, you are correct: I was afraid of W playing at E1 and further down the lower side, but F3 indeed protects against both E1 and the cut. I missed that in the game, will try to remember it because I guess it is a pretty common pattern. S14 - same story indeed. Thanks for taking a look at this game.

mimano · Post by **mimano** » Mon Nov 24, 2014 9:54 am

An update without any game today - Even though I did suffer a tough defeat yesterday, I think the roots of my undoing are crystal clear even to me, and it is actually quite interesting in retrospect: My study has been focused a lot on life and death tsumego in the past weeks. I think I can feel the impact of this: and my fighting skills are usually at least on par with my equally ranked opponents, and most of the time I feel I can outread them in close contact play.

But the flip side of this is, that I have neither played a lot, not have I studied a lot the fuseki and related concepts. This appeared in broad daylight in yesterday's KGS game, with an incredibly peaceful game, in which I played the only josekis I know without thinking, and by move 28 the game was more or less over. Not only did I let my opponent build a huge moyo, but I actively helped him do it by playing the "joseki I know" :tmbdown:

Wrong, because as it happens, this joseki let black choose the way he wanted to play it out, and it was in a particularly favorable situation for him. As soon as the sequence was played out, I saw the board and realized I was seriously trailing. This, combined with my lack of invasion skills, made me go for a desperate reduction, which was not enough to catch up. A very enlightening loss indeed...Maybe for once the answer is not "do more problems" but probably "play more, get experience in applying the concepts you read about in your books", in particular opening theory made easy.

On the study front, I am focusing on opening theory made easy. I have read a few pages of lessons in the fundamentals, but even though it makes for an entertaining reading, I find it hard to synthesize and memorize its contents, and the examples are still a bit tough for me to grasp fully. I also have shape up! by matthews to work on, but I will try to finish opening theory first (even though "finish" is a bit menaningless in that instance...I have spent more time on the chapter on deploying the star stone as the rest of the other chapters I have read, because I felt it related to my games, so it is probably a never ending read).

Today, another KGS game, and my opponent was more of a fighter than yesterday's....so it ended well for me :blackeye:

I have been playing a few games on KGS, because it is sometimes difficult to get an automatch on IGS in the evening, because my anxiety is more and more under control I think, and because my KGS rank is stable now, which makes it easier to find opponents...so we'll see, I will probably continue mixing the two sites, which will make for more variety in the opposition and can only be good I guess.

Knotwilg · Post by **Knotwilg** » Mon Nov 24, 2014 10:35 am

Hi Mimano,

A few inline comments, for what they're worth (don't attach too much importance at other people's opinions and paradoxes)

mimano wrote:My study has been focused a lot on life and death tsumego in the past weeks. I think I can feel the impact of this: and my fighting skills are usually at least on par with my equally ranked opponents, and most of the time I feel I can outread them in close contact play.

Good! That gives confidence.

an incredibly peaceful game, in which I played the only josekis I know without thinking, and by move 28 the game was more or less over.

This is a bit of an illusion: even though playing standard corner patterns without thinking is a bad habit, it doesn't lose the game at our level, let alone that by move 28 the game would be over. It may make the game a bit difficult and a more healthy statement would be "I did not know how to continue".

This, combined with my lack of invasion skills, made me go for a desperate reduction

This is an interesting concept: usually we speak of a desperate invasion, going "all out". A desperate reduction would be one that you know will not nearly reduce enough but will rather cement the opponent's victory. Could be. I'd leave the option open that the game was still not over, without having seen it of course.

Maybe for once the answer is not "do more problems" but probably "play more, get experience in applying the concepts you read about in your books", in particular opening theory made easy.

I'm fully with you on the importance of playing, but tsumego can really never harm your game. It shouldn't consume too much time. However, your plan to read and apply "Opening theory made easy" is a very good one.

I have been playing a few games on KGS, because it is sometimes difficult to get an automatch on IGS in the evening, because my anxiety is more and more under control I think, and because my KGS rank is stable now, which makes it easier to find opponents... so we'll see, I will probably continue mixing the two sites, which will make for more variety in the opposition and can only be good I guess.

Ah! That online go anxiety got what it deserved. Well done.

mimano · Post by **mimano** » Tue Nov 25, 2014 2:23 pm

Thanks for your comments Knotwilg. I live in a tiny village in the country side, I never have the slightest opportunity to discuss go with anyone except on this forum, so it is very motivating to have this conversation with you all.

Indeed, I feel fairly confident about my reading ability at this stage (i.e. against opponents of my rank - I know I am still very weak in relative terms ;-)

), but I would like to avoid falling into a pattern where going for the fight is my way of winning games, which might be detrimental to mastering fundamentals, and therefore to my future growth as a player. I'd rather take my time and build solid foundations. So I think I need to balance my studying slightly differently, and maybe spend that bit more time on fuseki and other strategic concepts, but it is only a matter of tweaking my regimen - I would not want to lose the momentum I have with tsumego, and the confidence it gives. Moreover, as I improve, my opponents will be better and better at reading, so I need to get ready for that as well.

I have to say that tsumego is probably my favorite activity in the game. I have always been keen on doing mathematical riddles and puzzles, and I feel the same when I face a tsumego: a small intellectual challenge, which I love to take on.

About the online game anxiety, I think I am getting a grip on it. I am really not that attached to ranking or anything. I think the origin of this fear is quite different from fear of losing the game, or a rank. There was a time when I used to play chess online, and I never felt anything like that. But then, I see chess as a short, violent battle, where you need to destroy your opponent. So really, the way you carry out the actual destruction does not matter much, all means are good! In go, I feel much differently, as if I was in the process of conceiving the game with my opponent, and somehow, I want us to create something worthy of the time we will spend on it. So I think my anxiety comes, more than anything else, from the fact that I might not be able to raise to the challenge, and may produce a disappointing, dull game - maybe the correct word is a "crude" game. Losing or winning is on another level (of course, all things being equal, I prefer winning to losing!), and this alone would not prevent me from playing, since I am fairly conscious that, ranks being what they are, you should win on average 50% of your games. My skill being on the increase, and my knowledge feeding my creativity (ever so slowly but still), this feeling is on the decline, because I get more confident that I will be able to produce at least a little something worthy of interest for me and my opponent, I think.

I might post the game later on in order to illustrate the "desperate reduction" - what you describe is exactly what was going on in my mind when I went for it ! :lol:

Life In 19x19

A DDK's baby steps

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