- Play L3. It's such a big difference between black and white getting this point. This move should appear automatically in your head as the key point after black strikes diagonally on the third line versus your fourth line stone.

_________________
We don't know who we are; we don't know where we are.
Each of us woke up one moment and here we were in the darkness.
We're nameless things with no memory; no knowledge of what went before,
No understanding of what is now, no knowledge of what will be.

Crash and burn!

Ok, this game was a disaster regarding the outcome. Somehow I still feel it a success. I haven't felt that sweat and blood scent of fighting since DDK. (I was quite sleepy at the time of playing this. Probably that was the cause of two serious but stupid mistakes.)



- I'm not fond of . I remembered seeing it in similar situations so I thought of trying it out. was probably a mistake as I ended up cut.
- the intention was to rob white of his influence.
- maybe was one too far?
- was so severe. I've been wanting to play J-14 for several moves but I didn't have the time.
- I'm proud of this little plan which I (unbelievable isn't it) read out beforehand.
- I think is simply stupid. Should have been R-7 or L-3 maybe.
- aww, I wanted to play there. But somehow I managed to counter! Yay!
- I failed to notice :w160:-s significance. I blame my sleepiness.
- I managed to create a KO, yess!
- :b195: Ok, serious question time. I wanted to somehow utilize F-9 as a large KO threat. Was this a good idea or was I simply lucky. I gave my opponent yet another chance to play a KO threat, but! He would only get to profit on one - and I'll be the one choosing which one. Is this a valid tactic, or am I only being ignorant?
- :b203: is a stupid stupid misclick. I wanted to play L-18 but I never ask for undo. Were it not for this mistake I would have been able to save this group by the F-9 threat!

I don't know much about the one space jump down in the upper left, but at it seems bigger to take care of the lone white stone. Both sides would have solid positions, but black's would be higher, and black is more suited to playing an influence game that white, thanks to the 3-3 in the lower right.

and on makes me cry, and white's getting good moves free while black pushes from behind, and unless you can kill the white stones on top cleanly, I don't think the influence is worth it. Certainly not when black gives white the hane.

seems a bit slack to me. Black's already out, and this move doesn't threaten anything. I'd rather directly limit white's bottom, or seal white in on the top, or any number of other things. Maybe just jumping along with another one space jump; white's not going anywhere important. White is low everywhere and has less territory than black, so this should be an easy game for black.

I don't understand to :b63. After , black can just stand up and peep both cuts to give white a weakish group. Giving up the stone seems like it gives white a lot of undeserved center strength.

13: c14 and fight. Note white did bad shape cut of knight's move. White's corner is not alive so if you can keep your cutting stones alive for a bit white will need to come back to passively live in the corner. I didn't actually read the fight is ok, but I'd rather fight and die than make it too easy for white.
17: common greedy mistake: you must play on the top side (e.g. k16). After your atari from the cut you gave white a lot on the left so you need to make sure you get a lot on the top. If white can save g17 in a way that attacks your wall, rather than being a weak or dead group for white then he gets to play on both sides and make points whilst you play dame.

Don't be timid. Attack aggressively with a tight pincer at L16. That's what you built up the thickness for, right? It doesn't help the corner, but white will probably be running for a while, and you'll probably get sente to deal with the corner if you feel so inclined. N17 is a sort of halfway move that neither attacks strongly nor helps the corner very much.

Something like the sequence L16, J14, J12, L14, N15 is what I'd be aiming for. Probably there'd be some forcing moves that either side would/should make along the way, but that's the basic flow of the stones. You're getting almost-territory along the top and building up some potential along the side just as a natural consequence of the attack, which is how go should... go

_________________
1k KGS

The feeling is difficult to describe. It's obviously cool to be victorious yet somehow it's scary at the same time. This game is the second in a row that I crush an 5k and it feels (because it probably is) accidental and undeserved. After the first win I didn't dare to play for days and maybe it would be even longer this time so I thought I'd put the game up here and have some light shed on what I did bad and what I did good. (To be clear I fear that my "better play" would just vanish as unexpectedly as it came.)

Here is the game, I'm black:


- first dilemma. Q-17 or R-16? Q-17 is maybe better direction of play but that would give white a lot of territory and force him to invade the top right. I might as well give up some of my top right for weakening the R-14 stone.
- I momentarily considered the double hane but I didn't want white have a ponnuki there - I remember that being bad with San Ren Sei.
- though I wanted to keep R-14 from connecting.
- I like because it (mostly) connects K-16 and it creates influence and it strengthens my top right group and it limits white's access to the center.
- I was not sure in this move. But I wanted to play it, so I said let's do this. It turned out very luckily for me.
- I think it was a big mistake from white to let me have this ponnuki there.
- after some harassing I saw that I can't surround that dragon. I thought by going into the bottom right I can either build a wall to hurt that dragon or take some points. I got points...
- this clamp was really inviting - though later I didn't really know what to do with it.
- I wanted to attack M-3 later, thus the 3 space jump.
- next few moves I was just trolling around: "you gotta give me _something_ eventually"
- :b105: I actually read this sequence ahead! And my trap even worked!
- :b111: giant moyo complete
- :w122: I was careless. Now my trap was deactivated. I played some bad moves in the area later, trying to somehow reactivate the trap.
- :b129: now was the time for the double hane! But I didn't see B-16 coming... I ended up ok and then went back to reenable my trap (which I think was a mistake).
- :b165: but then I realized I can still save my stones!
- :b175: I thought this was going to be KO. I think it should have been. But I don't know the sequence for that.
- :b187:
- "I want my stones in sente."
- "Nope."
- "Ohhhohohoho. You're gonna regret that."
- :b221: at the time I played the monkey jump, I just wanted some reduction. I didn't see the white group was in so big danger.

9: you played the kosumi but you don't know the joseki? Look in a joseki dictionary. Study Takemiya's games, he often played that kosumi with san ren sei. (9 is good, 11 is wrong). After that your direction was all confused and inconsistent with san ren sei. 15 said you want to stop white connecting. You can pass and white can't connect.

I now feel like I have to add myself to this topic.

I am stuck at this level, and I feel lost.

I will now attempt to stop all theory learning and simply focus

on doing tsumego only + playing games.

This will be extremely boring and I just hope I can break the

barrier.

You might be lucky like me where the only actual barrier at this point is

1) Reading ability
2) Willingness to put effort into reading on every move
3) Willingness to consider 3-5 alternate moves on every sequence (Even simple things like joseki and kicks)
4) Taking your time

Luckily it's the easiest place to improve in terms of knowing exactly what to do and just how to do it. Just add boat loads of tsumego (Always helpful even if this wasn't the main issue) and try to force new habits in regards to taking your time.

A very bad decision. Theory is as important as reading ability. Without reading, theory cannot always be applied well. Without theory, one does not always know what to read.

Most people who don't progress despite major time investments are reading too many theory books and are doing not enough practice. A temporary stop to reading theory and invest in tsumego-play-review may be a good cure to that. Of course you shouldn't put the new concepts aside forever and a day.

I really weaker then you so it's difficult for me to help... but... I'm the proud owner of an optimistic translator ...
so let's give it a try :



oh... ok... that's the same here...
but let's see what happend with the rest of your message ...



Of course any situation is different and I don't want to put words in your mouth... I suppose that being a bit disapointed when reaching a wall is just "normal"... I'm just trying to give you a bit of "energy" but if my message doesn't make in sense in your situation, just forget it...

_________________
Converting the book Shape UP! by Charles Matthews/Seong-June Kim
to the gobook format. last updated april 2015 - Index of shapes, p.211 / 216

I would say very much not a case of "one size fits all".

You probably need your games gone over in more detail than just the moves made (for example, how many seconds before making that move). Not just that you are making mistakes but trying to determine why you keep making them.

There may be bad habits to be broken.

It is far from clear to me how one manages to break a habit like "impulse to follow".

Kageyama's theory of walls blocking progress is basically that you've reached a certain point where you've gotten things figured out, and are now able to play fancy moves that break the rules of good moves within your level. However, to get beyond that level, you need to look back and focus on the fundamentals again. These are the simple and basic things, like reading, shape, positional judgement, kiai, etc. that you need to refine as concepts again and again as you get stronger.

I remember when I first learned about the shoulder hit, for example. It was amazing! I had this tool to reduce my opponent's budding framework rather than make a risky invasion. But then I started playing it in all my games, because it was so great, and often losing. As I understood it better, I got a better sense of when it's appropriate to deploy, and when it isn't, and I stopped using it as much in situations where something else would be better. Now it's a bit more clear-cut when it's great and when it's horrible, but there are still a lot of cases in the middle where it seems like a possibility but I still have trouble judging if that's the right move. Again, with time, I expect to clarify this more.

The other thing to realize is that when you are, say, 20k, a quick once-over of material on the fuseki could easily improve your game by a few stones, since the idea of a 2 space extension for a base or making a corner enclosure may be quite novel to you. Just learning what sente and gote are can also give a big boost. However, once you get to a certain point, not only have you already digested the broad overview, but everyone else has too, and you need to refine it. Then you'll get to a point where everyone has digested that refinement, and you need to refine it again... but you can only refine it as far as your reading will allow, so you need to improve that too.

Welcome to the grind that is getting stronger.

So what do you suggest I do? How do I return to the fundamentals?

Study and practise the fundamentals. I.e., read about them, apply them to your games and practise reading [of sequences] (which is a particular fundamental that cannot be learnt only from reading about it).

Now, this was easy to answer:)

Well, what are the fundamentals? Practice them.

To be more specific, I'll add an incomplete list here:

- Read, because nothing answers questions about a position like an exhaustive answer.
- Read deeper, because you can and should stretch, and you may get to a better answer.
- Don't let your shape get broken.
- Count, or know roughly how you stand, so you know how to proceed ( i.e. all out moves to prevent a loss, solid moves to maintain a win)
- Don't strengthen your opponent's weak stones
- Strengthen your weak stones
- If there is miai on the board, make sure you get one of them. This is just as important in the endgame. Sente isn't sente if you can do the same amount of damage to your opponent.
- Kiai: don't play submissively. Actively resist if possible. This does not apply when your opponent plays a thank-you move, but make sure it's actually a thank-you move.
- Don't ruin aji with sente moves before you know how you want to use that aji.
- Know which stones are important, and which aren't.
- Know which direction is bigger.
- Have a goal behind an attack. That goal should not be killing unless there's no other way to win. In kyu games particularly, sometimes you have to kill an unreasonable invasion, but if there's a way you can win without killing, it's often better.
- Strength makes areas smaller. Play in bigger areas.
- Strength of groups is relative.
- Don't play thank you moves.
- Don't take away your own liberties.
- Go is not about making territory. Territory arises naturally through the flow of the game.
- Know what sente is. Know what gote is. Are those moves actually sente, or do you just want them to be?
- Also, don't respond to gote moves. Just because it will be sente at some point doesn't mean it is now.
- You don't need to save that group (especially in gote), so long as you get more elsewhere. More may not be directly tangible.
- Keep your stones connected. Cut your opponent's stones.
- Know when a fight is fair, and when it isn't. Play accordingly.
- Use your influence (and not for directly making territory early on).
- Know how to distinguish what part of the game you are in (early, middlegame, endgame) and play accordingly.

This list is far from exhaustive, of course, and I'm sure lots of people will have quibbles with it. The key, though, is that many of these are things that you think you know at a given level, but to move on to the next, you need to refine them. Maybe that move you thought was sente before isn't, because it was played too early, or because you have a more devastating move to play instead. Maybe that move that seemed forceful actually leaves you with liberty problems 5 moves down the line, but you couldn't read that far before. Maybe that move you normally respond to doesn't actually threaten your group, but only a few points, and you can tenuki since you are confident you will live. On the other hand, just because you will live doesn't mean you should automatically tenuki

Why?!

I was thinking in terms of playing near strong groups as opposed to weak groups. Perhaps I phrased it poorly, though.

Certainly if there are two opposing strong groups nearby, an area generally becomes dame. If you play close to your own strength, it's often inefficient, while if your opponent plays there, they may end up with a weak or small group without much compensation.

I'm certainly open to other opinions on this, though.