I started playing in December / January - and got completely sucked into this game in no time by watching youtube videos, reading on Sensei's library (basically reading stuff almost at random) - not sure how much it all helped in terms of my strength but it helped keep my interest and I also played quite a bit of 9x9 against GnuGo since I could do so with just a minute available.

Then I actually started playing quite a bit online after realising that playing in person only was a futile way to progress (No one nearby shared my enthusiasm). And since I was home on leave with my daughter for three months well - whenever she slept I played or read or did puzzles to try to improve - and when I started work again I kept at it for the most part - I don't play that often, a couple of games a week - but I've compensated with going harder on puzzles and playing over pro games and stuff so.

I've always been rather fiercely competitive - but that has really been a hinderance for me with Go, since I so desperately want to be better than what I am I've at times been reluctant to play at all (this only holds true for online games for some reason, when playing face to face I have none of that same tension / anxiety) but I'm working on that so it has gotten better. I'm kind of happy with my improvement even though I've constantly felt that I want it to be faster (though I do realise it will only slow down at this stage) - but it helps to tell myself that I'll never actually be "good" at this game so I can take the time, it's just a hobby (a strange, interesting yet occasionally stressful hobby) heh. So since Go provides an endless amount of things to be fascinated about, to a level that Chess never quite reached for me, I'm just keeping at it and trying not to let myself become to obsessed with rank and progress.

As of today I've played 167 games of 19x19 Go against real opponents and it looks like I can hold 4k on KGS at the moment - In addition I've probably played 40 something 9x9 & 13x13 games against real opponents and hundreds of AI 9x9s.

While I agree that my estimate will probably be very loose, I fortunately don't just 'decide' how strong an engine is; the rankings I'm using for Aya and GNU Go are their actual KGS rankings, and I determine the ranking of other engines (on my computer) by matching them against Aya and/or GNU Go.



I don't hate playing humans... I dislike competition, and by definition, rated games. Maybe I should just get over that and play some games, and que sera sera...



I don't think I can do it; reach 1d without help and without playing people. Maybe I could, but not within a normal amount of time.

Until recently I was copying what I saw in professional games, and I was then also able to reason out why that worked. For the next step in improvement, I don't have the necessary knowledge and experience to reason out why techniques work or not, and thus I can't use them effectively. Just copying them without knowing why is not good enough.

That's the reason why I finally registered here, after two years of lurking, and asked for some game reviews, and it did gain me four stones, as I can now effectively beat engines on an even game, where I previously needed 2-4 stones of handicap.



I like that suggestion.

Sorry, I didn't mean to imply that you personally pulled the rank 4k out thin air (nor that anyone else did), but I could see how it could be read that way.

I wrote a bunch more here and then deleted it because I think I have already said all of it before. I do wish you luck with your go journey, and you should do whatever brings you the most enjoyment!

Thanks. Someday, when I think I'll be ready to play rated games, I'll register at one or more of the Go servers.

In KGS you can set your rank to - (aka no rank) and create games or join games that aren't ranked. I think for many that can be a great way to not get caught up in the competitive aspect of it (but it'd give you an idea about your rank). While I can't really understand not being competitive I can very much identify with what you said about not wanting to start out as "bad" or in the middle - for instance I like to write, but I'm not yet to the point where I'm comfortable showing what I've written because I can tell it's bad, so I want to keep writing for myself until I'm happy enough with my level that I'd be comfortable with others reading it (but I still like to write, even if just for myself). I've tried to not have that mindset for my Go though, and instead I've just accepted that whatever rank I can realistically achieve is still very bad (4k or 4d and you'll still get beat by a 12 year old) - but by playing others I'll get to partake in others ideas and thoughts that will help me explore and understand the game better (aka improve). Had I just been playing computers I think I would have stopped quickly, or never gone beyond 9x9 Go (which to me is closer to Chess than 19x19 if I'm being somewhat hyperbolic). It's cool to see so many different ways to approach and enjoy the game though.

KGS has a teaching ladder.

I'll probably go there. I like teaching (I taught jiu-jitsu and hapkido as an assistant trainer, and photography in the past), even if it's only explaining rules and basic moves to complete beginners. I can then play teaching games against stronger players, fully expecting to lose them, but being told *why*.

As Sai from Hikaru No Go would have said: "Ikimasho! Ikimashooouuu!"

I think the teaching ladder might be the perfect way to get into the online Go scene without jumping right into the middle of a competition.

[/quote]While I can't really understand not being competitive I can very much identify with what you said about not wanting to start out as "bad" or in the middle - for instance I like to write, but I'm not yet to the point where I'm comfortable showing what I've written because I can tell it's bad, so I want to keep writing for myself until I'm happy enough with my level that I'd be comfortable with others reading it (but I still like to write, even if just for myself).[/quote]

Tell me about it. I wrote a few short stories, but only ever put one on the internet, and that was part of a teaching/review setup I helped organize. Several people started writing a story, and we'd put the works in progress online to critique.

What genre do you write in? In my case, it's fantasy.



That doesn't matter to me. The only thing I want is to achieve a consistent strength comparable to a 1 dan on KGS/IGS or so. Then I am (at least in my mind) out of the beginner stage, just like when reaching black belt in a martial arts.



Apart from playing online, the computer is my only option.

My closest Go Club plays only once a week, on wednesday, in the side-room of a bar, between 21:00 and 00:00. The first (and last) bus departs at 0:25 there, and I'll get home at around 1:00. That's impossible. I have to get up at 6:30 to go to work the next day.

I really think that you have the wrong attitude to this game and that you have very little chance of ever getting very strong. You concentrate too much on not losing and on being shodan. Neither of these is appropriate.

Losing is the only way to learn. I tell my students that if they never make a mistake they will never learn anything. Just play the game and enjoy it. Rank is totally irrelevant, although I understand that in today's society, which erroneously emphasizes success, that it hard to accept defeat while learning.

I can assure you that if you forget about rank and just concentrate on playing you will reach shodan much more quickly.

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Still officially AGA 5d but I play so irregularly these days that I am probably only 3d or 4d over the board (but hopefully still 5d in terms of knowledge, theory and the ability to contribute).

Not true; losing is one way to learn,
and while it is important, it's definitely not the only way.Also not true. This came from over-generalization.
( There's a logic fallacy in there somewhere. )
If we never make a mistake, we miss out on lessons that can only be learned from those mistakes.
However, it doesn't mean we don't learn anything.
The knowledge space is vast:
There are still plenty of valuable lessons to learn, without the losses.
That's why it's beneficial to review lost games as well as won games --
our mistakes are present in both.

I disagree that I have no chance of ever becoming very strong. This topic led me to do this personality test, with the following result:

Personality: INTJ: Architect, Mastermind



After reading this explanation and that text, my way of trying to learn Go fits exactly as would be expected with this personality type... with all the advantages (studying very fast, learning everything there is to learn, etc), but also with all the pitfalls (learning everything there is to learn, and then never using it because one may be afraid that it's 'not good enough').



You are right there. It's a trait of the INTJ personality: only start doing something if you think your knowledge about the subject is 'good enough', and for me, in Go, that point is 1 dan. Trying to know everything beforehand often works very well, but for Go, maybe not so much.

The conclusion of this is that I should alter course and not try to learn and discover everything myself because it will take too much time. I've decided to register at KGS, and then play the bots there until I start losing and my rank stabilizes, to prevent sandbagging as much as possible. Then I'll switch to playing people around that rank.

Ha, I'm the same way about most subjects (games included), and always get pegged as an INTJ as well (yes, I know, Myers-Briggs is silly, I take these tests for entertainment purposes only). "Luckily" for me, I decided that point was 10 kyu.

Last time I took that test I think I came out the same way as you. I never studied much until I got to about 10k. I never anguished much about shodan until I got to 1 kyu. All I did was strife to get better by playing. I did start studying a lot as I approached shodan, but it was with the aim of being able to play better in my games. I still got to 5 dan.

So I don't know that your profile makes you predisposed to that approach.

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Still officially AGA 5d but I play so irregularly these days that I am probably only 3d or 4d over the board (but hopefully still 5d in terms of knowledge, theory and the ability to contribute).

Well, the test might be silly, but the INTJ descriptions in the texts I linked fit me quite well regarding most points. (The only point where the test messed up really bad is that I'm 67% introvert. That should have been 150% )



I always wonder. It seems that at some point, many people just stop learning and improving; maybe it costs too much effort or time.

I've been looking at the rankings of the one (small) Go Club in my neighborhood. There are some tournament results online, since 2001. The strongest player in that club is 3k. The next strongest player is 5k. They have both been at that level for at least 15 years according to the tournament results. Each year, when one of the bigger tournaments around here is held, some people from the larger cities come down to play in them, and it has been the same 3-4 people who have been swapping titles. They are 2-5 dan, and none of them has shifted a single rank in 15 years either. (I can understand that from a 5d+, but a 2d could have been a 3d or 4d 15 years later.)

I'm seeing the same things in the two chess clubs around here. When I quit the one I was in, in my teens in 1999, I was one of the three strongest players there at a rating of 1835-1850. That's good, but not exceptional. Now, more than 15 years later, the members in those clubs are still the same (apart from the people that were really old already back then, who are dead now), and none of them has improved a single rating point outside the normal fluctuations.

To be honest I have a feeling that it is not useful to join clubs like these. Edit: not only because there's no improvement, but I can't imagine it to be fun to play a club competition with the same 8-12 people for so long. At the start of the competition everybody basically already knows the outcome.

Some people (myself included) have other things in lfve which are more important. I still play because I enjoy doing so. I don't study or try to improve because my life has moved in different directions. Family and responsibility will do that for you. That happened when I was in my late 30s, perhaps a little older than you appear to be. I suspect there are many in the same category and you should not belittle their efforts because other interests have moved to the forefront.

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Still officially AGA 5d but I play so irregularly these days that I am probably only 3d or 4d over the board (but hopefully still 5d in terms of knowledge, theory and the ability to contribute).

I don't belittle anything or anyone; I just can't understand/didn't expect that 15 years of playing does nothing towards improvement. That means, as you hit some point or another, you'll *have* to study if you want to improve; just playing is not enough.

Probably not. But just playing seriously probably is. But then that is a form of study.

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Still officially AGA 5d but I play so irregularly these days that I am probably only 3d or 4d over the board (but hopefully still 5d in terms of knowledge, theory and the ability to contribute).

Babelardus, you said you wanted to achieve 1d, since you would no longer feel like a beginner. I guess you think you will feel some sort of competency that you don't feel now.

As someone around 1d in strength, I can tell you that "being 1d" does not give me a feeling of competence - if you'd like, I can call you 1d, and you can see what I mean.

I feel competence when I play what I see as a good move, or win a game through ability that I find to be skilled.

But the sad part is, as you get stronger, your perception of what is good changes. If I were 5k, and I suddenly played like 1k (and realized it), it would feel great. I'd feel the skill in what I had achieved.

But if I am 1d, and lose to 1k, it feels terrible. If I could play like 5d now, that'd be awesome. But a 7d wouldn't think so.

So I would say that competency never really comes. But if you stretch yourself for the game you are playing right now - that can feel nice.

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be immersed

I strongly disagree with the idea that losing is the only way to learn.

Quite the contrary: I would say that winning is the better result for learning. There is a simple proof: if you keep winning, your rank goes up and if you keep losing your rank goes down. Now how do you keep winning? By learning the things that matter most for winning. Losses are inevitable events in the course of progress and can be a source of learning, but they should not be strived for. Even in games you won there are moves you can learn from. But at least in a won game there is a decisive point where you won the game (or the opponent made a vital mistake but still you took advantage from it).

Learning a bunch of things and still losing is a source of frustration. It is therefore best to concentrate on those things that increase the probability of winning. These things are different at 20 kyu, where concentrating on liberties is probably the key differentiator, or at 1 dan, where direction of play is the key differentiator. Online, time management is a major aspect that can make the difference. All strong players are good at it too.

What got me from 2k to 2d in a few months was: having a rival whom I wanted to beat and push the handicap, and analysing my games against him for that purpose. I've been a 2d ever since and that was 15 years ago.

These days online go is a major rank booster. Play a lot, review briefly. Get a source of inspiration. Play more and do some problems.

You seem to be the second to have misunderstood my statement. I don't mean that you only learn from the games you lose and never learn from the games you win. I meant that you have to lose games sometimes, probably about half the time, if you are going to learn. If you win every game you play then you are not being challenged enough and will not be exposed to enough learning situations. I have forgotten the context of the thread but I think I was replying to someone who did not like losing and tried to avoid it by not playing.

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Still officially AGA 5d but I play so irregularly these days that I am probably only 3d or 4d over the board (but hopefully still 5d in terms of knowledge, theory and the ability to contribute).

Dr Straw - all understood!

That would be be an adequate assessment. I have to admit of course that one 1d is not another 1d; my benchmark will probably be the KGS scale.

The fact that there is a cutoff point (1k -> 1d), and not a continuous scale such as ELO-rating in chess, makes this 'worse'. In chess, you can just say: "I want to reach 1800 ELO", or any other arbitrary point. While that obviously works in Go as well ('I want to reach 5k'), the fact that the 1k -> 1d cutoff is there makes it feel as if you're 'not done yet.'

I don't like to feel as if I'm not done yet. I know, it's a completely arbitrary thing. I can well imagine that there are players who feel that they're done as soon as they break the DDK barrier, just like there are chess players who feel that they're good enough when reaching the 'serious point' of 1800 ELO.

The next cutoff would be dan -> 1p, but because of the fact that 1p is impossible for me to obtain (I'd put that as being equal to 2500 ELO in chess, where you become grandmaster/professional), there is no point to ever be looking at that.



True enough. There are some things that I see stronger players do a lot, while I always think: "That can't work. That move can be cut so and so." However, it's never cut. When *I* try it, it *is* cut, exactly the way I'd expect. Maybe I'll start a topic about that.