Experimenting on myself

Mark356 · Post by **Mark356** » Mon Dec 06, 2010 12:00 am

I'm a little late, but I agree with everyone. Your rank improvement probably won't have any correlation with what kind of study you're doing, because of the time it takes for things to sink in. Plus there's the phenomenon of getting worse before you get better. Also, I'd probably get bored doing only one of those for a month-- I vary all of those kinds of study. Still, it's interesting to have a plan like that. And maybe after, say, only studying pro games for a month, you'll get some sort of insight on how to study pro games that will help you in future study. So good luck, and definitely let us know how it goes!

emeraldemon · Post by **emeraldemon** » Sun Dec 12, 2010 10:50 pm

Quick status report:

I decided to try the "easy problems in volume" approach, and so far I've done all the Beginner Exercises on Sensei's Library. Most were very easy (less than 5 seconds), but I find if I'm not careful I still miss some (maybe 90% correct or so). I think next I'm going to switch to something a bit harder: a friend loaned me Life and Death: Intermediate Level Problems by Maeda Nobuaki 9 Dan. I also think it'd be interesting to go through some of the classic collections on SL like Gokyo Shumyo. I'll report back again when it's time for the evaluation games.

emeraldemon · Post by **emeraldemon** » Mon Dec 20, 2010 6:18 pm

Well, I won a game I probably should have lost:

I was behind when my opponent let me kill a critical group.

Monadology · Post by **Monadology** » Mon Dec 20, 2010 7:24 pm

Glad to see you're doing this, even if any conclusions drawn will need a Lot's wife worth of salt.

I really like the idea of doing it again with reversed order. It seems like it might at least give a little bit more context for the results.

:salute:

Ribab · Post by **Ribab** » Sun Dec 26, 2010 12:10 am

I see the dead group, but if black plays p3, then o2, isn't the bottom right corner dead, and that would make up for the lost group, right?

emeraldemon · Post by **emeraldemon** » Thu Dec 30, 2010 11:40 am

Not sure exactly what you mean, but I'm pretty sure the black stones can't escape capture:

Click Here To Show Diagram Code: [go]$$ I think these stones are doomed $$ | X O X X . . . . . O O O . O . . . O X | $$ | . O X , X . . . . X O X X X X X X X . | $$ | O . O X O X . . . X O O X . . O O . . | $$ | . O O X O X . . . . X X O . O . . X . | $$ | O O . . O X . . . X . X O . O X X . . | $$ | . X O O . O X . . . O X O . . X O X X | $$ | . X X . O . . . . X X O O . . X O O X | $$ | . . . X X X . . . , . . . . . O B O O | $$ | . . . . . . . . . X X O . . . O B O . | $$ | . . . . . . . . X X O . O . O B B O . | $$ | . . . . . . . . X O O . . . . . . . . | $$ ---------------------------------------[/go]

Click Here To Show Diagram Code: [go]$$Bcm1 Black tries to escape... $$ | X O X X . . . . . O O O . O . . . O X | $$ | . O X , X . . . . X O X X X X X X X . | $$ | O . O X O X . . . X O O X . . O O . . | $$ | . O O X O X . . . . X X O . O . . X . | $$ | O O . . O X . . . X . X O . O X X . . | $$ | . X O O . O X . . . O X O . . X O X X | $$ | . X X . O . . . . X X O O . . X O O X | $$ | . . . X X X . . . , . . . . 2 O X O O | $$ | . . . . . . . . . X X O . 4 1 O X O . | $$ | . . . . . . . . X X O . O 3 O X X O . | $$ | . . . . . . . . X O O . . . 5 . . . . | $$ ---------------------------------------[/go]

Click Here To Show Diagram Code: [go]$$Bcm1 But doesn't succeed $$ | X O X X . . . . . O O O . O . . . O X | $$ | . O X , X . . . . X O X X X X X X X . | $$ | O . O X O X . . . X O O X . . O O . . | $$ | . O O X O X . . . . X X O . O . . X . | $$ | O O . . O X . . . X . X O . O X X . . | $$ | . X O O . O X . . . O X O . . X O X X | $$ | . X X . O . . . . X X O O . . X O O X | $$ | . . . X X X . . . , . . . . O O X O O | $$ | . . . . . . . . . X X O . O 6 O X O . | $$ | . . . . . . . . X X O . O X O X X O . | $$ | . . . . . . . . X O O . . 0 X 9 8 7 . | $$ ---------------------------------------[/go]

I played five ranked games, won 2 (including the one above) and lost 3. I'll put up some more analysis in a bit, I think I'll probably put at least one of the games on the game review forum for comments.

emeraldemon · Post by **emeraldemon** » Thu Jan 06, 2011 8:08 pm

A quick recap:

I played a bunch of games last week and this week, my final record was 5 wins, 8 losses. This is pretty frustrating: every time I break into 1 kyu, I lose and go back to 2 kyu. It's hard to say what effect the L&D had, perhaps I didn't do enough of them, or chose too easy problems. Mostly I did the Beginner Exercises on SL. 300 problems over a month gives about 10 problems a day, most of them were quite easy. If I do this again I'll pick harder ones.

This month: Replaying Pro games, starting with the most recent Samsung final, which just ended:

[sgf-full]http://igokisen.web.fc2.com/15scf1.sgf[/sgf-full]

karaklis · Post by **karaklis** » Fri Jan 07, 2011 2:14 pm

Are you going to memorize this professionals' match or just replay it? Do you have game commentaries?

emeraldemon · Post by **emeraldemon** » Fri Jan 07, 2011 6:06 pm

I don't have game commentaries for these, although I may spend some time later on Invincible, which does have lots commentaries. I'm basically memorizing them: I replay it until I can reproduce it without looking at the record. I often forget them shortly after though.

Stable · Post by **Stable** » Sat Jan 08, 2011 1:59 am

This is a really intersting idea, keep it up! There's lots of places with a few commented games available for free online, and it would probably help you to use them. eg there's 38 at go4go here: http://www.go4go.net/v2/modules/alex/sample.php

aleisme · Post by **aleisme** » Fri Jan 14, 2011 5:01 pm

I like the plan and ideas you have to see if any one field of study well help you improve more than another, but i think to get serious results on which helps you to improve faster you would need weaker people, but not so weak they dont understand what they're studying. probably around 15-10k. although id love to see a study involving people that have just learned the game over a long period of time (6 months?) with each field of study playing a ranking game about once a week. im sure the people playing games would improve most initially...but i wonder if they would plateau earlier than those doing a specific study

emeraldemon · Post by **emeraldemon** » Sat Jan 15, 2011 1:59 pm

aleisme wrote:I like the plan and ideas you have to see if any one field of study well help you improve more than another, but i think to get serious results on which helps you to improve faster you would need weaker people, but not so weak they dont understand what they're studying. probably around 15-10k. although id love to see a study involving people that have just learned the game over a long period of time (6 months?) with each field of study playing a ranking game about once a week. im sure the people playing games would improve most initially...but i wonder if they would plateau earlier than those doing a specific study

This sounds good, but I cannot make myself weaker :lol:

And I cannot make others volunteer to be my guinea pigs. I suppose I could try to draw some DDKs in with offers of reward (maybe game reviews)?

aleisme · Post by **aleisme** » Mon Jan 17, 2011 9:37 am

emeraldemon wrote:This sounds good, but I cannot make myself weaker

And I cannot make others volunteer to be my guinea pigs. I suppose I could try to draw some DDKs in with offers of reward (maybe game reviews)?

well you certainly won't with that attitude

sadly I doubt getting anyone to commit to such monotonous training would be possible, as would making them continue regularly with the study...I suppose if I open up an orphanage I could get the appropriate number of test subjects that I am capable of controlling to the proper extent.

...anyone care to help open up an orphanage or donate children to the cause? :twisted:

Perception · Post by **Perception** » Mon Jan 17, 2011 2:50 pm

I feel like if all you're going to do is tsumego for a month you have to do a lot of it.

I was away without internet or a go board with me for the past two weeks only problem books so I did a lot of problems in that time. I don't think 10 a day, unless they are difficult problems and it takes at least a few minutes per problem, is going to help much if it's all you do (not playing or studying anything else).

I can't comment on the pro game memorizing/studying since I haven't done a lot of it (yet) but I'll be interested to hear how much you did and if you feel like it helped.

emeraldemon · Post by **emeraldemon** » Mon Jan 17, 2011 4:17 pm

It's true, I didn't do as much tsumego as I hoped I would do. And I haven't done as much pro study as I hoped I would do. But I only devote so much time in my life to go, I have to do some other things also

. I think that perhaps enthusiasm should be part of the experiment: If I find myself really enjoying pro reviews, maybe I do it more than I did tsumego, with the relevant effect.

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