How did you get to your current rank?

[DrStraw]

Last time I took that test I think I came out the same way as you. I never studied much until I got to about 10k. I never anguished much about shodan until I got to 1 kyu. All I did was strife to get better by playing. I did start studying a lot as I approached shodan, but it was with the aim of being able to play better in my games. I still got to 5 dan.

So I don't know that your profile makes you predisposed to that approach.

[Babelardus]

You are right there. It's a trait of the INTJ personality: only start doing something if you think your knowledge about the subject is 'good enough', and for me, in Go, that point is 1 dan. Trying to know everything beforehand often works very well, but for Go, maybe not so much.

Ha, I'm the same way about most subjects (games included), and always get pegged as an INTJ as well (yes, I know, Myers-Briggs is silly, I take these tests for entertainment purposes only). "Luckily" for me, I decided that point was 10 kyu.

Well, the test might be silly, but the INTJ descriptions in the texts I linked fit me quite well regarding most points. (The only point where the test messed up really bad is that I'm 67% introvert. That should have been 150% )

I still got to 5 dan.

I always wonder. It seems that at some point, many people just stop learning and improving; maybe it costs too much effort or time.

I've been looking at the rankings of the one (small) Go Club in my neighborhood. There are some tournament results online, since 2001. The strongest player in that club is 3k. The next strongest player is 5k. They have both been at that level for at least 15 years according to the tournament results. Each year, when one of the bigger tournaments around here is held, some people from the larger cities come down to play in them, and it has been the same 3-4 people who have been swapping titles. They are 2-5 dan, and none of them has shifted a single rank in 15 years either. (I can understand that from a 5d+, but a 2d could have been a 3d or 4d 15 years later.)

I'm seeing the same things in the two chess clubs around here. When I quit the one I was in, in my teens in 1999, I was one of the three strongest players there at a rating of 1835-1850. That's good, but not exceptional. Now, more than 15 years later, the members in those clubs are still the same (apart from the people that were really old already back then, who are dead now), and none of them has improved a single rating point outside the normal fluctuations.

To be honest I have a feeling that it is not useful to join clubs like these. Edit: not only because there's no improvement, but I can't imagine it to be fun to play a club competition with the same 8-12 people for so long. At the start of the competition everybody basically already knows the outcome.

[DrStraw]

Some people (myself included) have other things in lfve which are more important. I still play because I enjoy doing so. I don't study or try to improve because my life has moved in different directions. Family and responsibility will do that for you. That happened when I was in my late 30s, perhaps a little older than you appear to be. I suspect there are many in the same category and you should not belittle their efforts because other interests have moved to the forefront.

[Babelardus]

I suspect there are many in the same category and you should not belittle their efforts because other interests have moved to the forefront.

I don't belittle anything or anyone; I just can't understand/didn't expect that 15 years of playing does nothing towards improvement. That means, as you hit some point or another, you'll *have* to study if you want to improve; just playing is not enough.

[DrStraw]

I don't belittle anything or anyone; I just can't understand/didn't expect that 15 years of playing does nothing towards improvement. That means, as you hit some point or another, you'll *have* to study if you want to improve; just playing is not enough.

Probably not. But just playing seriously probably is. But then that is a form of study.

[Kirby]

Babelardus, you said you wanted to achieve 1d, since you would no longer feel like a beginner. I guess you think you will feel some sort of competency that you don't feel now.

As someone around 1d in strength, I can tell you that "being 1d" does not give me a feeling of competence - if you'd like, I can call you 1d, and you can see what I mean.

I feel competence when I play what I see as a good move, or win a game through ability that I find to be skilled.

But the sad part is, as you get stronger, your perception of what is good changes. If I were 5k, and I suddenly played like 1k (and realized it), it would feel great. I'd feel the skill in what I had achieved.

But if I am 1d, and lose to 1k, it feels terrible. If I could play like 5d now, that'd be awesome. But a 7d wouldn't think so.

So I would say that competency never really comes. But if you stretch yourself for the game you are playing right now - that can feel nice.

[Knotwilg]

I strongly disagree with the idea that losing is the only way to learn.

Quite the contrary: I would say that winning is the better result for learning. There is a simple proof: if you keep winning, your rank goes up and if you keep losing your rank goes down. Now how do you keep winning? By learning the things that matter most for winning. Losses are inevitable events in the course of progress and can be a source of learning, but they should not be strived for. Even in games you won there are moves you can learn from. But at least in a won game there is a decisive point where you won the game (or the opponent made a vital mistake but still you took advantage from it).

Learning a bunch of things and still losing is a source of frustration. It is therefore best to concentrate on those things that increase the probability of winning. These things are different at 20 kyu, where concentrating on liberties is probably the key differentiator, or at 1 dan, where direction of play is the key differentiator. Online, time management is a major aspect that can make the difference. All strong players are good at it too.

What got me from 2k to 2d in a few months was: having a rival whom I wanted to beat and push the handicap, and analysing my games against him for that purpose. I've been a 2d ever since and that was 15 years ago.

These days online go is a major rank booster. Play a lot, review briefly. Get a source of inspiration. Play more and do some problems.

[DrStraw]

I strongly disagree with the idea that losing is the only way to learn.

You seem to be the second to have misunderstood my statement. I don't mean that you only learn from the games you lose and never learn from the games you win. I meant that you have to lose games sometimes, probably about half the time, if you are going to learn. If you win every game you play then you are not being challenged enough and will not be exposed to enough learning situations. I have forgotten the context of the thread but I think I was replying to someone who did not like losing and tried to avoid it by not playing.

[Knotwilg]

Dr Straw - all understood!

[Babelardus]

Babelardus, you said you wanted to achieve 1d, since you would no longer feel like a beginner. I guess you think you will feel some sort of competency that you don't feel now.

That would be be an adequate assessment. I have to admit of course that one 1d is not another 1d; my benchmark will probably be the KGS scale.

The fact that there is a cutoff point (1k -> 1d), and not a continuous scale such as ELO-rating in chess, makes this 'worse'. In chess, you can just say: "I want to reach 1800 ELO", or any other arbitrary point. While that obviously works in Go as well ('I want to reach 5k'), the fact that the 1k -> 1d cutoff is there makes it feel as if you're 'not done yet.'

I don't like to feel as if I'm not done yet. I know, it's a completely arbitrary thing. I can well imagine that there are players who feel that they're done as soon as they break the DDK barrier, just like there are chess players who feel that they're good enough when reaching the 'serious point' of 1800 ELO.

The next cutoff would be dan -> 1p, but because of the fact that 1p is impossible for me to obtain (I'd put that as being equal to 2500 ELO in chess, where you become grandmaster/professional), there is no point to ever be looking at that.

But the sad part is, as you get stronger, your perception of what is good changes.

True enough. There are some things that I see stronger players do a lot, while I always think: "That can't work. That move can be cut so and so." However, it's never cut. When *I* try it, it *is* cut, exactly the way I'd expect. Maybe I'll start a topic about that.

[Kirby]

I understand your feeling. It can be applied to other parts of life, too. In my current case, getting a PhD in math or computer science did not seem feasible given my family situation. But a master's degree did. So I ended up pursuing a master's degree, and found some feeling of accomplishment from it.

Still, this feeling was somewhat temporary. I know many people more skilled than me in both the fields of mathematics and computer science. My degrees or credentials don't change this.

So these days, I still think satisfaction in these areas can only come from doing something interesting in the field itself.

Anyway, good luck!

[Knotwilg]

Despite the current hype of everything being possible, given dedication, I believe skills are depending on being gifted for a good deal. Not only will the potential be determined by gift rather than effort, but more importantly the motivation that fuels the effort, needs a decent amount of positive feedback, i.e. success. Myself I got this kind of success in things like writing, singing, maths, the game of go ... but not in for example playing the guitar. I have definitely put the hours in, I just coulnd't achieve the results some others, even kids, seemed to get effortlessly. It really doesn't suffice to put the proverbial 10 000 hours into it. These hours should be fun as well and fun comes from reward. Few are those who enjoy being beaten up on the goban for 10 000 hours.

So it IS possible that you're stalling at the beginner level. I definitely enjoy being a low dan more than being a beginner and while I'd enjoy being 5d, it's not true the level of frustration is the same as back when I was a 6k. I think 6k is a hard wall to hit. You've learned enough to make an image for yourself of what your go should be like, but you're still weak enough to be destroyed by a gifted youngster who learned the rules just a few months ago.

[Babelardus]

I understand your feeling. It can be applied to other parts of life, too. In my current case, getting a PhD in math or computer science did not seem feasible given my family situation. But a master's degree did. So I ended up pursuing a master's degree, and found some feeling of accomplishment from it.

Heh. I understand. I have an eyesight problem; I'm on the verge of legally blind. Some people in our school system seem to equate that to being stupid, and my parents were given the advice to put me in school at a low level, because otherwise, I 'couldn't keep up.'

In the end, I refused to accept it and did *ALL* the levels, up to the master degree (in computer science), losing a year with each switch, which caused me to finish my studies at 26, almost 27, instead of the normal 21-22.

I'm thinking about doing a PhD in computer science, part time... but that will take 8 years at the very least. I don't know if I'm able to do it; I don't know if I'll have that sort of dedication. The pay is not high enough to do it full time at my current age.

Still, this feeling was somewhat temporary. I know many people more skilled than me in both the fields of mathematics and computer science.

Even if I ever do get a PhD, there will be people who know more, can do more, and are just better in the field of computer science. There always are. My intelligence is quite far above average, but it also falls far short of brilliance. I actually have to *STUDY* to understand stuff at master level... but with some people, it just looks like as if they just glance through a book and know everything that was ever invented about the subject.

I can't do in Computer Science (or computer chess) what someone like Ken Thompson has been doing since 1969. I sometimes feel as if the entire computer *and* computer chess world we know today are built by Ken Thompson himself. That guy is a living legend; a Da Vinci in the field of computing. I wouldn't be able to ever come close to what he did in the last 45 years, even if I had 450 years to live.

Such is life

Anyway, good luck!

Thanks, same to you.

[Babelardus]

Well, on playing on KGS... Damn.

I finally created an account there, and played against the bots in the computer room to get my rank settled so I wouldn't start out by sandbagging. After I lost a game against a 7k bot speedbot (10 seconds a move) in which I blundered away a 40 point dragon that needed one move to connect, my rank settled at 10k without a question mark.

In the review the score estimator reported I was at 30 points ahead, if I had played the proper move. So I'm probably stronger than KGS 10k, but still; I now have a settled rank.

OK, time to start playing humans.

The first one to accept said nothing and resigned.
The second said nothing and let his time on the first move run out.
The third one to accept a challenge just said "Hi dude" in the chat and resigned.

Sigh. Maybe I'm just unlucky, but I instantly know why I've avoided online play since I tried it first (15 years ago) with chess.

[Majordomo]

Just bad luck - I had the same issue when I started, but since then I've not had a bad encounter except for one escaper.

You could also try other servers, like OGS - but there is no guarantee you won't come across poor opponents (in the poor manner sense), but they are vastly outnumbered. Try setting a game description that shows more of what you are after.