The wall

[Bill Spight]

bill: man of your strength commenting on this game...i respect your patience.
i think for DDK's game should be reviewed by SDKs whith patience
how can you comment on a game that is 99% wrong... lol

Vann has talent. He should not be picking up bad habits from DDKs or SDKs. Let him pick up bad habits from dan players.

[Needo]

Try commenting and reviewing a set number of games each week/month. During the review try to find three places where you could have made a better move, and then do the same thing for your opponent's moves. Make a note of what your plan was when you played tenuki on three moves. Obviously there are more things to do on a review. But if you are anything like my self you will drop it quickly if it becomes too much work. After you do this for a few games, you will become aware on a new and deeper level while playing your games. Once you see the benefit, you can add more goals to accomplish in your reviews. Or, you can review a larger percentage of your games. Also, for the fun of it, try playing a few high handicap games. These games are a great exercise in learning how to fight.

[VannLucas]

Thank again for the advice guys. Bill, I've looked through the variations on the game you reviewed. It's funny, looking at the stuff you pointed out it really does make sense. I'll take your advice on playing some 9x9 games, I'm sure they'll help.

Again, everyone thanks for the constructive advice! Here's hoping two weeks from now (Staying off KGS as much as I can this week as advised, and I am on vacation - with my board, stones, and books - the week after. That said, I should be playing a few real-life games, as well as recording the games as I got a hold of kifu papers, which should be fun) I'll be posting the complete opposite to my first on this topic.

[Hushfield]

bill: man of your strength commenting on this game...i respect your patience.
i think for DDK's game should be reviewed by SDKs whith patience
how can you comment on a game that is 99% wrong... lol

Seriously? Magicwand, how can you consider yourself a go player if this is your attitude toward other people trying to learn from their mistakes? Your post is the first one ever that made me look for the "dislike this post" button.

[Tryphon]

We have a "like" button, but we need a "love" one and Bill clearly deserves it

[karaklis]

I remember when I was still DDK, Joaz and Bill were the only ones commenting on my matches. That deserves a special thanks again.

[Magicwand]

bill: man of your strength commenting on this game...i respect your patience.
i think for DDK's game should be reviewed by SDKs whith patience
how can you comment on a game that is 99% wrong... lol

Seriously? Magicwand, how can you consider yourself a go player if this is your attitude toward other people trying to learn from their mistakes? Your post is the first one ever that made me look for the "dislike this post" button.

why? what did i say?
i at least tried to comment and reviewed his game and decided that it was pointless.
inundating him with correction is not a good way to learn at his stage.
i can not and will not comment on 200 different mistakes and it is pointless.
that is why i respect bill's patience for he does something i wouldnt do.
but is this what he needs? i dont think so. reviewing the game is not what i think he needs.
he needs to study simple life and death to acquire his reading first.
and he probably needs more 9x9 board game because 19x19 is beyond the scope of his ability.

[VannLucas]

I'm sorry that you feel that way about my games. But I did point out that currently I am not playing to my best. Yes, my reading is off. But my teacher (1d) commented on this too, because it is usually my best attribute. Prior to these two weeks I won 19x19s, 13x13s and 9x9s. Though the latter two I do not play much. I have won both with and without handicaps on either side and set time out to study various tsumego at least once every two days.

I'm not saying this in the way of "You don't know what you're talking about" because I believe you do have some valid points. I probably would not be able to fully grasp comments on all my moves (That said, as it is an SGF I can keep coming back to it and re-review it until I do grasp all that was pointed out,) but more along the lines of "you've met me and observed my games when I've been in a rut." This is not my best ability at all, not even my "okay" ability, and I hope you'll see that when I'm back on form and posting games.

[xed_over]

inundating him with correction is not a good way to learn at his stage.

I believe you are right here.

i can not and will not comment on 200 different mistakes and it is pointless.

so, what I usually try to do when reviewing beginner games is to look for and comment on the two or three type of mistakes that they make the most often, or one or two areas for largest potential improvement. That way they've got a couple of things to focus on for their next games.

[cdybeijing]

My friend, there is no such thing as a wall at DDK. I say this seriously.

Even if you lose 50 games in a row, you are learning something every game, or you are consciously discovering your weaknesses.

You'll take a big jump sooner or later. Keep at it - it's a good fight to be in.

There are three walls for DDKs.

20k, 16k, and 12k.

False.

[SpongeBob]

bill: man of your strength commenting on this game...i respect your patience.
i think for DDK's game should be reviewed by SDKs whith patience
how can you comment on a game that is 99% wrong... lol

Seriously? Magicwand, how can you consider yourself a go player if this is your attitude toward other people trying to learn from their mistakes? Your post is the first one ever that made me look for the "dislike this post" button.

You are SDK, why didn't you post a review?

[daal]

Just another point. The game Bill commented on was played very fast. At speeds like that, you're just playing on instinct. I hope not all your games are that fast, because in order to develop your instinct, you need to spend more time thinking.

I think that one's mood affects one's instinct, and while fast games can be fun and useful, playing them in the middle of a losing streak probably isn't going to get you past any walls.

[VannLucas]

That was the first fast game I'd ever played. My games normally have 45 mins + 5x30 byo-yomi. The other person set that up after I joined.

[Hushfield]

You are SDK, why didn't you post a review?

A very good point. Vann, here is my review of one of the games you posted. The focus is mainly on a couple of strategic concepts in the early stages of the game, as you'll acquire middle game fighting skill mainly from doing tons of tsumego. The main theme of my review is re-examing the purpose of the 3-3 invasion, and how to handle it when you're on the receiving end.

inundating him with correction is not a good way to learn at his stage. reviewing the game is not what i think he needs. he needs to study simple life and death to acquire his reading first. and he probably needs more 9x9 board game because 19x19 is beyond the scope of his ability.

Magicwand, that is much more like it. Now you are identifying what you feel are problems in VannLucas' approach to studying. I'm sorry if I offended you earlier, but just going "lol, noob!" is not a very contructive way to help other players. On what you say about playing smaller boards, I have heard many other strong players say this as well, so perhaps this is something you could do Vann, (perhaps it's also something I should do ^^, but since I haven't played 13x13 or 9x9s in years, and have mainly worked on my reading through tsumego, I don't know whether it is necessary.) So to echo the advice of other players: keep doing tsumego to improve your (middle game) fighting strength.

I don't agree with magicwand that doing reviews of your own games is pointless at your level, because scanning your own play for mistakes, thinking about where a game turned sour, etc. will definitely help you improve. It will take quite a lot of time, however, and the equal amount of time worth of tsumego might help you improve faster. Just do what you feel like doing, if you're not up to doing tsumego on a certain day, then just review one of your own games, or games of players that are 1-3 stones stronger than you. Hope this helps, and keep at it. Also, if you would like to play a teaching game or whatnot, just pm me.

Cheers,
hushfield

[zinger]

bill: man of your strength commenting on this game...i respect your patience.
i think for DDK's game should be reviewed by SDKs whith patience
how can you comment on a game that is 99% wrong... lol

Seriously? Magicwand, how can you consider yourself a go player if this is your attitude toward other people trying to learn from their mistakes? Your post is the first one ever that made me look for the "dislike this post" button.

QFT.