Life In 19x19

So, I managed to get a game on DGS against a very strong player at 6 stones. I lost the game, but feels like I didn't make so many dumb mistakes as to make a review useless (or so I hope :p).

I have added some comments myself to reveal more about what I had thought at the time and also hope they may be useful for weaker players.

I would very much appreciate all comments from everyone

illluck wrote:
I have added some comments myself to reveal more about what I had thought at the time and also hope they may be useful for weaker players.

Very useful indeed. How these dan exploits all your weak points.
It is a good lesson for me to prefer joseki above topaszeki

Click Here To Show Diagram Code

[go]$$Bc
$$ +-------------------
$$ | . . . . . . . . .
$$ | . . . . 2 . 4 . .
$$ | . . O O 1 O . . .
$$ | . . X X 3 X O 6 .
$$ | . . . . . X 5 . .
$$ | . . . . . . . . .[/go]

This joseki leaves little room for W to deviate. It gives B sente and a good wall towards his SW. He might want to repeat this joseki in the NE.It was a nice exercise to figure out the w's status on the right edge. But it seems killable. Out of modesty I won't try to review as I am too weak.

Hehe, thanks for the comment

Yes, that was my first instinct, but I think the cut is actually better on the board. White said that I played well in the beginning, so don't be afraid to try that cut out if you have the ladder and support on the left side!

You did quite well in the opening, before things got too complicated. Then you lost after picking a difficult fight against an opponent 8 stones stronger than you . The best advice for a high handicap game like this is to find ways of avoiding such fights. Fight where you have a big advantage, but look for ways to compromise elsewhere. Some more specific comments:

Move 28 could push once more at G12, before going back to capture at B13. Since you know the left side will be completely safe after B13, there is no harm in pushing W that way, and it strengthens your weaker group considerably.

The attachment at move 44 helps W strengthen his weak stone. If W simply stood up at O16, were you planning to cut around N15? That seems unreasonable. So better just to extend around R14, without provoking W to strengthen himself. Or consider a slow but solid good shape move like M17, eliminating any opportunities for W to cause trouble around here.

Move 50 is a do-or-die move which actually captures W, but if it did not, the game would be over. Consider compromising with the J18 nose tesuji. This allows W to capture one stone, but then B gets to squeeze and live easily, for a reasonable result.

Move 60 is good, avoiding a difficult fight. But then B should follow-up at move 62 with the tesuji Q18, giving up the P17 stone to secure the corner. Move 66 is absolutely needed, to stabilize this group; nothing else on the board comes close in importance to this.

Up to move 66, B has actually done quite well. Territory is fairly even, but B still has 4-5 handicap stones of extra thickness.

The game fell apart after the LL corner invasion. B deliberately provoked a very difficult fight up to move 103, passing up several opportunities to get a simpler good result. At move 104, it is still not too late to block at C9, which I guess was your original intention, when you thought it captured W. But look a little deeper, this is still a great move -- it gets a perfect squeeze, forcing W to capture 3 stones in gote, while making immense outside thickness. Try playing this sequence out, then step back and look at the whole board. Do you really need to try for something better than that?

Thanks a lot for the comments!

Move 28 at G12 is very nice! It seems so obvious after you pointed it out, but during the game I was somehow reluctant to let white extend one more time (not realizing that G12 also makes my stone more annoying).

Yes, I regretted move 44. My plan was to keima if white extends up and be satisfied with an easier-to-deal-with sansan invasion. But even if white had extended up I think you are still right in that I should just keima without the kick to strengthen white.

Yeah, I read move 50 out before I played it

Q18 at move 62 I did consider. I decided to not play it because I didn't want white to get the ponnuki-shape in sente. Again, after you pointed it out it makes sense to just settle the corner

You are once again spot on with the comment about 104 at C9. The issue was that I had misread the situation completely and thought I could just capture everything - my bloodthirst dominated what little prudence I had :p But I guess part of the issue there is just in my poor reading.

Once again, thanks a lot for taking the time to make the comments

p.s. I'm not sure if he is 8 stones stronger - I've hit KGS 4d today (though yet to win a game at 4d XD).

move 1 I'd just one space low pincer

move 34 aji keshi no reason to play it now

move 42 - no reason to respond just tenuki

move 44 - yeah i agree this is bad, it strengthens white

move 46 attach under seems okay white can't do sac tesuji that way

move 62 tengen seems weird

move 74 hane underneath instead because at move 82 your ponnuki looks overconcentrated

move 86 slow, too fearful.

move 96 i agree with the variation e4

move 132 this is bad, you can't die here.

move 140 p4 variation looks good

rest of game: too lazy to write comments

summary: It never felt like white was being attacked at any part of the game. The whole point of handicap games is to pressure white, to attack him/her viciously.

cyclops wrote:

$$Bc
$$ +-------------------
$$ | . . . . . . . . .
$$ | . . . . 2 . 4 . .
$$ | . . O O 1 O . . .
$$ | . . X X 3 X O 6 .
$$ | . . . . . X 5 . .
$$ | . . . . . . . . .

Click Here To Show Diagram Code

[go]$$Bc
$$ +-------------------
$$ | . . . . . . . . .
$$ | . . . . 2 . 4 . .
$$ | . . O O 1 O . . .
$$ | . . X X 3 X O 6 .
$$ | . . . . . X 5 . .
$$ | . . . . . . . . .[/go]

This joseki leaves little room for W to deviate. It gives B sente and a good wall towards his SW.

This joseki is good for white. White has a strong shape and a bigger share of the corner than he deserves. In a handicap game the black wall can even get attacked. It does have the advantage of being simple and maybe the loss black makes here per stone is lower than 6 stones / 150 moves (or whoever long you expect a game to last) so giving up a little bit for simplicity is enough to keep hold of the handicap advantage, but once you start compromising like this it is very easy to lose by 0.5 points.

P.S. What does YC mean in title?

Thanks a lot for the comments, Eizero. The comment about contact underneath at 46 is especially illuminating - seems a lot better than game result, I didn't play it because I missed the sacrifice.

@Uber: YiCheng, Chinese client for Tygem, I think (Tom used to be connected to Tygem too if I remember correctly, but it separated out a while back).

Uberdude wrote:

cyclops wrote:

$$Bc
$$ +-------------------
$$ | . . . . . . . . .
$$ | . . . . 2 . 4 . .
$$ | . . O O 1 O . . .
$$ | . . X X 3 X O 6 .
$$ | . . . . . X 5 . .
$$ | . . . . . . . . .

Click Here To Show Diagram Code

[go]$$Bc
$$ +-------------------
$$ | . . . . . . . . .
$$ | . . . . 2 . 4 . .
$$ | . . O O 1 O . . .
$$ | . . X X 3 X O 6 .
$$ | . . . . . X 5 . .
$$ | . . . . . . . . .[/go]

This joseki leaves little room for W to deviate. It gives B sente and a good wall towards his SW.

This joseki is good for white. White has a strong shape and a bigger share of the corner than he deserves. In a handicap game the black wall can even get attacked. It does have the advantage of being simple and maybe the loss black makes here per stone is lower than 6 stones / 150 moves (or whoever long you expect a game to last) so giving up a little bit for simplicity is enough to keep hold of the handicap advantage, but once you start compromising like this it is very easy to lose by 0.5 points.

I got my information from Ishida's Dictionary of Basic Joseki ( III, p 131, diagram 50 ) who states that this joseki is ok for black if D10 is black especially in handicap games. I assume it is even more ok here because D4 and K4 are black. But I am not the type that refers to the Bible to justify my statements. Maybe you and OP are correct that the game is better for black than this joseki.