Here is another tournament game which I lost. Time limits were 50 minutes each.
Both players are European 4 kyu.



Any help will be gratefully received.

I have been practicing life-and-death problems, but with no signs of improvement so far.
In fact, I have lost my last six games. In one of these, the other player was simply too strong,
two were lost due to overlooking big ataris near the end of the game, two were lost through overattacking
and one was a one-point loss where the opponent had 3 handicap stones. There are no records of any
of those games, so I posted this one, where perhaps the fault was not attacking enough.

Go is hard. (That should be my sig.)

Edited to correct a typo in the title. Does that even work?

Thank you for adding your own comments, they were interesting to read.

Just what I noticed on a quick playthrough, take with a grain of salt.

i think you're right, should be at D10.

I don't think you can make this cut. What if black plays B3?


probably better to just play r14 or q14

I think maybe R8. Safer, at the cost of a little endgame.

It may be too ambitious, but that's because black is thick, not because the players are 4 kyu
Any attack would have to start with a footsweep around s14 I think.
Anyway I'd just connect at F12. Black still has a lot of problems.

black's all connected now, white's attack failed before it got started

feels small. J17? M3? P3? There's some risk of a cut at F13 also.

pretty sure white can block at S6, the cut doesn't work.

:w101: Maybe let them go and play O4?

:w109: What about L3 instead?

:w123: can't play a, black can capture with O6.

:w133: You have a clever play here: R4 is sente, because it threatens a ko. Then you don't have to respond to this move.

Emeraldemon: thanks for your comments on the game. I may risk arguing about one or two points, but that will be a separate post.


Thanks for the feedback. You may be interested in some of the games that
Battousai posted on YouTube, in which he talks as he plays.
Here are links to three games he played on Tygem.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=I6eXOaDFUsw
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nBfYuj1aQ70
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7CYu-os8vJY

Here is a link to a game he played on KGS, though the world-weary disdain is strong in this one.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XBslnPveMKI

And here is a link to a game he played on IGS.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=endscreen&NR=1&v=jJGLJX6lEoo

Starting from any of these, you can easily find more.

Thanks, I enjoy Battousai's videos.

I think your main problem in this game was playing too loosely, leaving weaknesses behind without realizing their severity.

is close to an overplay. There is already a cutting point at D13 and now you create another one at D10. It looks like B cannot cut yet, so you can play this way for a while, but sometime soon you will need to go back and add a defensive move. If you do not want that obligation, it would be good to continue simply with D10. Now the cut at D13 is no longer possible (please verify), so if B jumps out, W can take sente.

is too thin. This should be C8, to help defend the cutting points W has left behind. After B cuts, W may be able to handle the fight, but it is painful to see the W wall crumble.

W handled the fight quite well up to move 47, getting a reasonable result. You did not comment on the cut at move 42. Was this meant to be a sacrifice to gain forcing moves outside? If so, congratulations on your reading, that was a good plan. (Emeraldemon, take another look, and see if you agree.)

is bad but praiseworthy -- bad because the B stone is already captured, praiseworthy because this time you did go back to fix your perceived weakness. Sente is very valuable at this stage in the game, so it is worth some reading to see if you can omit this defensive move. Maybe you can assure the capture in a more positive way, say by pushing at F4, which is probably sente.

feels like the wrong direction to me. The right side is more open than the top side, so it seems more appropriate for W to extend from the corner than to pincer. In addition, though it may not look like it, the pincer is potentially very dangerous. If B simply jumps out to O15, W will have three weak groups in this area. After W defends the corner, it is a very real possibility that B can drive the M17 stone towards the E13 group and engineer a double attack.

blocked the wrong side, as you realized a few moves later. The general rule is to block to block the wider side, in order to stake out the largest area possible. But since W lacks an extension along the right side, B gets an easy invasion, with room to make a base in either direction. In addition, the cut at N16 is left behind as a serious weakness, given the strong B position to the left.

could certainly capture the two B cutting stones cleanly, as you remarked. This would be another praiseworthy but possibly inefficient move. You really need to read to the best of your ability whether the B stones can escape and cause trouble. Then trust your reading and play accordingly. Even better, count the game and see whether a safe capture gives you enough territory to win.

In this sort of position, the attachment at L4 can be quite powerful. The aim would be to force B to into a low position below, while building up center strength. Of course, if W manages to cut off some B stones and start a fight, that would be even better, considering the strong W positions on both sides.

The actual is quite a nice move, but a good part of its power is threatening invasions like H3 or J4 or M3 below, and W never got to do any of that.

to is an interesting trade. It seems a shame to give up the attack on the weak B stones, but I think W gets adequate compensation for this to be playable. Or was this a misread, not noticing that the W cutting stones get captured?

is a nice invasion, but it leads to a very complicated fight. Also, I do not think B can make a very large territory around there even with another move. I would prefer to play first in the upper right. The W stones there are starting to look weak, and keeping them strong is worth a lot. S14 is a huge point, undercutting the B base. R13 would be even better if it worked, say after descending to S16 to threaten the corner. W could also just play something really simple like L15, taking care of weaknesses first, letting B worry how to defend.

should block at S6, saving a full move, because B has to live in gote in the corner. Alternatively, after playing the game move, W should tenuki, as S6 is just a small endgame move once the corner is alive.

After B pulled out his cutting stones with , the fight gets too complicated for me.

To mitsun: thanks a lot.