Laerthd study journal

[EdLee]

Hi Laerthd,

G085-oegf:



C7.

C7.

var: W would not A1, W would connect A5, B dead.

[Knotwilg]

Hi,

- At 73 you say "not sure if this is good or not". What do you think about 75? And what does that say about 73?

- How do you evaluate the upper left corner?

- Overall, this game gives an impression of having been hastily played. I would suggest you make an effort to play very seriously, think a few moves ahead before making an important decision, evaluate the relative strength and relative importance of groups ... The randomness should go out of your game. Once you play consistently at your alleged 5k level, you will be able to improve in a focused manner. In fact, if you play consistently serious games, your rank will already improve by itself. It doesn't mean you have to play longer games, just be more focused on basic 1-2-3 sequences and evaluating stones;

[Laerthd]

Hi Ed,

yeah not a good move. Don't know why I didn't notice anything in the review.

I knew the corner did not go well but I can be happy that it did not go worse.


Knotwilg,

- I actually don't know how to evaluate 73 and 75. He got to reinforce his group but I still have a foot in his territory. I would say that as long as I use these stones as a threat for moves played in the upper part it is ok. What I should not do is run with them.

- The upper left? In the final result I took a useless loss here because of D13. But except for this, I was satisfied with the result. If you mean is it alive at move 97, I think it is.

-

Overall, this game gives an impression of having been hastily played.

Well it actually wasn't
By 1-2-3 sequence, you mean read 3 moves every time?

[Knotwilg]

Hi,

Sorry if my reply was too candid, but I can only judge from the moves. You are 6k but some of your moves are 25k, which means that some of them are 1d - that's the good part . So how do you get to play consistently closer to 1d level? I thought you needed to bring your play at the level of your understanding. Now I understand that your understanding needs to improve in this aspect, because you don't see 73 and 75 as bad moves in the analysis stage.

Why are 73 and 75 "beginner moves", lacking basic understanding?

Because the Black group at the bottom is dead (and you know it!). The surrounding White stones have lots of liberties so they are not under any kind of pressure. They can remove the dead group at will or may not even have to. This means your lone stone, from which you play a diagonal move at 73, is a worthless stone. It is not a cutting stone anymore, even if it looks as one. Visualize the bottom group removed. Would you still defend your stone?

Sure, 73 requires an answer from White, so it is not THAT wasted. But 75 adds a third stone to the waste group and does not require an answer. It's a pass move. Which is why I call it 25k level: it's as if you don't know what's going on here.

In some cases it is ok to add more stones to a dead or wasted group, if it forces the opponent to capture and invest even more stones in the capturing process, now or later. This is called "aji". Not in this case though: the opponent will likely live with the surrounding stones without having to capture the group. This makes your other stones "not aji" but wasted.

To know that the black group is dead, is about 6k level knowledge. To defend a useless stone is a 25k mistake.

If you can keep this concept from this game, you'll improve.

[Laerthd]

Hi Knotwilg,

Sorry if my reply was too candid, but I can only judge from the moves

It wasn't and even if it was I'll take any criticism possible whatever the form

I am actually 12k on IGS but after a winning streak I got bored with the leveling up and tried a 5k account where I am getting destroyed. So I guess it makes sense that you see a rushed 6k game. Thanks for explaining, your point might seem obvious but I did not know it

[Laerthd]

Game of the day, against a 11k, komi is 0.5

Overall I was happy with the game but did not know how to approach the top left corner and the right side (but hey, that is only 2/9 of a goban ). My opponent was driving a lot during yose, I should maybe look a bit more into it. Also, I let one of my group get killed by mistake but in the end I am not sure I was that worse off.
As always, comments welcome

[BlindGroup]

Overall I was happy with the game but did not know how to approach the top left corner and the right side (but hey, that is only 2/9 of a goban ). My opponent was driving a lot during yose, I should maybe look a bit more into it. Also, I let one of my group get killed by mistake but in the end I am not sure I was that worse off.
As always, comments welcome

Here are some comments on the early part of the game. I thought you played well! And a number of the moves where you were skeptical of the logic seemed reasonable to me.

[EdLee]

Hi Laerthd,

Notice that W has weak spots at C5 and C3.

Could become heavy; could lead to messy fights.
Just o3 or o4 is OK.

C16.

You got a bad result here not because of ,
but because of the follow-ups , .
Important to distinguish the OK moves ( )
from the not-OK moves ( , ).
Common mistake/misconception to blame the wrong moves.
( "Not sure about this invasion ( ), got a bad result." )

F17 or C18.

B18. ( W A17 gote. )

( , ) Due to .

Due to .

Maybe o3, C3 bigger.

, o3, C3, big.

J13.

Bad. Give up the 3 useless stones.

, W ataris twice, o16 and N16,
then turns and pushs through at N17:
W has miai of M18 and P16.

[Laerthd]

Hi BlindGroup,
Thanks for the comments. I think you are right about F17 at move 11. It is weird how simple things like counting the number of lines are not obvious when I play.

Ed,
So for you I should use to invade the corner? Isn't that a bit early?
Thanks for the other comments as well.

It is weird because I feel that often I am in a bad position because I care too much too late about my stones and never care about them before. Like where I let my stones be separated but then try to save the 3 stones.

As for my progress, I hit 11kuy on IGS today. I wanted to be 11kuy before august so right on time.
I did not review the game yet but I won by 0.5 so it is a must. I'll edit this post with the review.

Edit: here is the commented game. I think I nearly lost because I did not make use of my influence at the bottom. I should think more often to shoulder hit.


In the meantime, a much stronger player looked at my games and told me that I basically don't know any fundamentals. He said it with more tact but this was the idea. So I am a bit lost. I thought I made some errors but I had the basics figured out more or less. I guess you cannot expect a game to be interesting for thousand of years without having the longest tutorial ever.

[EdLee]

Hi Laerthd, You're welcome.

So for you I should use to invade the corner?

I never said any such thing.

If you already knew about the weak spots C3 and C5, then the comment didn't give you any new info.
Did you? If not, then there's new info in the comment. ( Re: your reviewer's comment about your basics. )
The operative word is "notice".

[Knotwilg]

In the meantime, a much stronger player looked at my games and told me that I basically don't know any fundamentals.

While this may be a true observation (or summary of his observations), it is not helpful.

In my reviews, I try to isolate one area for improvement to focus. In your case, from this particular game, I chose "recognize wasted stones and avoid adding more weight to them". You can focus on this in your next games and post them for review. If you continue making this mistake, we can understand why, talk about the proper way to think and point out techniques to recognize wasted stones and ways of avoiding adding weight. If you solve it by yourself, new areas of improvement will surface as the next important thing.

Based on one game we cannot tell for sure what is the biggest flaw in your game. Moreover, all people make multiple kinds of errors at the same time. However, it is my reviewing style to at least try and isolate one major flaw and encourage you to fix it. I find this more helpful than leaving a player bewildered with the vast amounts of knowledge they are lacking.

[Bill Spight]

In the meantime, a much stronger player looked at my games and told me that I basically don't know any fundamentals.

While this may be a true observation (or summary of his observations), it is not helpful.

Well, it should be. Fedya, who is around 6 kyu, faces the same problem. It is obvious from his games and his comments that other players around his strength have a better grasp of the basics than he does. But where can he learn the basics? With so many go resources in English these days, why can't he find literature covering the basics? I think it's out there, but somehow it does not seem so easy to find. I shrug my shoulders and say to check out Sensei's Library and Go Problems. But I am not sure how much of the basics they cover and how well. The beginner problems that I have looked at on SL are quite good, though.

[Laerthd]

Hi Ed,
No, to be fair, I did not know about C3 and C5.
But I am not sure I understant you comment in parentheses (also, I now know what is a operative word)

Hi Knotwilg,
I think this is a useful remark. Sure your remark on a concrete flaw in my games is more useful but given that I thought I had mastered the basics, a reminder that it is not the case is welcome.
But you are right, focusing on one error is probably more efficient.

Hi Bill,
Yeah I think defining the basics is a difficult task. Sensei library is interesting but I find it to be quite a mess. Hopefully after alphago master starcraft it will go back to go and find a smart way to classify knowledge about this game.

[EdLee]

Hi Laerthd

No, to be fair, I did not know about C3 and C5.
But I am not sure I understand you comment in parentheses

Include C3 and C5 as part of your basics.

[Laerthd]

As always, it has been a long time since the last post. I had not much time to play this month but I recently played a game where I was globally happy with my game. However I lost and even with the errors I have identified I still lost a lot more points.

Here's the game: