Life In 19x19

There have not been many posts in this section recently. To fix that, here is
the first of two games from the recent BGA tournament at Bracknell.

This one was played against my most frequent opponent. We have met 6 times
in the last 12 months. For some reason, all our games turn into large-scale
life-and-death battles. Probably it's because I am a determined old man and he
is a stubborn old man. Large-scale battles are fine, of course, but I'd be
particularly interested to hear how this game could have been simplified with
advantage to either side.

I added extensive comments to educate the double-digit-kyus and to give the dan
players a laugh.

I am White. Both players are 4kyu. My opponent has improved a lot in the last
6 months; I have not. His chief weakness is that he does not think long enough.
At the end of this game, I had used the full 60 minutes, but he had only used about 17.



EDITED to correct various typos and infelicities.

I guess your opponent is Roger Daniel.

Uberdude wrote:I guess your opponent is Roger Daniel.

I, on the other hand, could not possibly comment.

Some single-move ideas, mostly suggestions for simplification:

16 @ D11 -- no weakness for B to exploit
24 @ E12 -- perfect shape
28 @ G11 -- induce B to add another stone
32 @ H5 -- run out with good shape
44 @ E16 -- keep B split, let him live small
46 @ F17 -- jump ahead, leave no weakness
48 @ G17 -- same idea, take territory, let B connect
52 @ F17 -- must capture B stone and live in corner
56 @ B15 -- shape tesuji, worth reading out
66 @ A16 -- nothing to lose, lots of decent ko threats
74 @ Q15 -- keep B separated
80 @ L15 -- sequence L15-L17-K17-L18-M18-K18-O18
86 @ J6 -- kikashi before connecting (give B two empty triangles)

mitsun wrote:Some single-move ideas, mostly suggestions for simplification:

Many thanks for these suggestions.

Some variations.



Edit: Thought better of a thing or two. End of comments at move 16.