How hard is this problem book? There's a link for downloading it (I doubt it is legal, but you can also see fotocopies of the original, which should be out of copyright) in some links at:

http://senseis.xmp.net/?ShikatsuMyoki

The first few from the (probably illegal) download link don't look that terribly hard at first sight.

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Geek of all trades, master of none: the motto for my blog mostlymaths.net

http://senseis.xmp.net/?ClassicalGoProblemBooks JF says wait until your studying to be a pro for that one.

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I am John. John-I-Am.

Oh, I have this book (a real paper copy, not a pirated one).

It varies a bit, but a lot of the problems are quite hard. They're mostly more difficult than the 'hard' weekly problems at Go Game Guru, if that helps. I don't think you need to be studying to be pro to solve these problems though.

Ruben, you have the six volume Lee Changho life and death collection don't you? Once you can solve all the problems in book six without too much trouble you'll be able to give this book a go. Otherwise, you'll be banging your head against a wall.

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David

Go Game Guru: Learn Go | How to Get Better at Go | Go Game Shop | Go Boards | Baduk TV

No you misquoted JF, he said to try the first three "and then Hatsuyoron you should leave until you are studying to be a pro."

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http://tchan001.wordpress.com
A blog on Asian go books, go sightings, and interesting tidbits
Go is such a beautiful game.

In English it's traditional not to butcher parallel constructions:

{you} {should leave}_{{until studying to be a pro}} {[Shikatsu Myoki] and then [Hatsuyoron]}

I know nothing about Shikatsu Myoki, but JF isn't a man to misplace his periods.

Guess I was lost by the construction of his English. Sorry.
Anyway, I do have pictures of the original copy of Shikatsu Myoki on my blog

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http://tchan001.wordpress.com
A blog on Asian go books, go sightings, and interesting tidbits
Go is such a beautiful game.

Thanks David, jts, cnp, tchan. I also found JF's wording odd, maybe being from a non-English speaking country makes it sound odd.

David, yes I have them and will take me ages to get to the 6th Together tesuji and tsumego vol 1 will take me around 3 weeks from page 0 to a second pass reviewing my errors (I made one pass but didn't mark where I failed, needed a second to find blind spots). I'll probably only do one pass before checking blind spots in the second volumes.

Currently I'm checking the tsumego book... So far I have 11 wrong problems out of mmmm around 60. I think 4 or 5 of them share some kind of mental problem I have in my reading, so it is a good learning so far.

Anyway, I find these books very fun, and I've got the knack of doing tsumego, something I hated in the past.

At which point can I try Gokyo Shumyo, which is easily available?

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Geek of all trades, master of none: the motto for my blog mostlymaths.net

In my opinion: If you want to solve it, I think you have to wait until Dan-level. To get nice ideas and such, you might start around 3-kyu.

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My "guide" to become stronger in Go

More waiting Thanks SoDesuNe!

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Geek of all trades, master of none: the motto for my blog mostlymaths.net

Some of the problems in the middle volumes of the Lee Changho books are either taken from or inspired by the Gokyo Shumyo. If you're going to work through the problems on tasuki's site as I think you previously mentioned on reddit, you're MUCH better off sticking with the Lee Changho series that you already own. Do one book at a time, starting at the beginning, until you can solve each problem in a few seconds. Then turn the book upside down (then sideways etc...) and do it again - it will be a bit slower at first because you're making your brain remember the technique rather than the problem. Once the book feels easy, do the same thing with the the next one and work through the tesuji series in the same way (at the same time is good). If volume one proves to be too hard, start with an easier book and work up to Lee's books. I'd be very surprised if you're not dan level by the time you finish going through volume four of Lee's life and death in this way.

No matter how much some people want to deny it, the truth is that the opening really doesn't matter and your middle game strategy doesn't even have to be that good (and endgame never happens) if you can just kill lots of groups and live everywhere. This is totally achievable, even at the low dan level. But this isn't a magic bullet, it takes time, consistency and hard work acquire the skill. You can easily build a well balanced game on these strong foundations later.

The important difference between these problems and the ones you'll get from tasuki (and other places online) is that the Lee Changho books have very high quality solutions (some of the best I've seen for the most part (excluding a small number of editorial mistakes which exist in most Go books). I know some people have other views about this, but I can't stress enough how important it is to have good quality solutions. If you value your time at all, you want to learn the strongest way to kill, the most ironclad way to prevent ko and the most efficient and profitable way to live the first time round. Those 'small' advantages in technique are what allow you to overpower your opponents and become a stronger player. For most amateurs they're enough to decide many games. Imagine if you could've prevented that ko, or pulled a ko out of thin air in your last game. Imagine if you knew how to play to minimise ko threats, while your opponent let them pile up like a bad debt.

If you learn from problem sets that have weak solutions you'll only learn to play weak moves. You'll spend more time unlearning all that later. Even worse is the school of thought that tells everyone that you don't need solutions. That's partially true when you already have a comprehensive understanding of shape and are strong enough to read a problem out completely. When I do easier problems I often don't need the solutions anymore. However, when I do hard ones, I still get some problems wrong, no matter how hard I try. When I get them wrong, I usually learn a new tesuji or something else to watch out for by looking at the solution. It finds the weaknesses in my reading and fixes them. If I didn't look at the solution I'd continue in the naive belief that I'd solved the problem and would keep using my inferior moves.

I'm going on about this because I find it very regrettable to see enthusiastic players who love Go and really want to improve work through a whole lot of problems and not start seeing results. A lot of people lose motivation and give up at that point and usually it's because they've followed the stupid advice about doing problems without solutions.

Advice that may apply to pros and very strong players (and many pros don't even agree and do look at the solutions) doesn't generalise to everyone. Would you honestly tell a 30kyu, "OK here are some practise problems, but just look at them, don't check the solutions. And these books over here, don't even read any of these, just work everything out from first principles and you'll be fine."

It's a pernicious and specious piece of advice that gets parroted from player to player and I think it's a load of rubbish.

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David

Go Game Guru: Learn Go | How to Get Better at Go | Go Game Shop | Go Boards | Baduk TV

Thanks for your post David.

You know I started with the "Don't look at the solutions!" school... But I have to say that you were right all along. It started with Cho's Intermediate problems. I started with them and had a hard time knowing for sure if I had the right answer. I "downgraded" to Cho's Elementary, which were easier... But, alas! I realised I have a problem visualising making eyes in the first line (you know, a row of stones in second), this is where I found that having answers would have helped me to grasp when I could really make one eye false. I figured them out in the end (they're not that hard!), but then I started YCHs books. And as you put it: the solution lines are very good. Not only are the solutions clear, the book also offers wrong lines and maybe variations in answers. Which is perfect: I'm always getting to know the best answer.

As for flipping the book... Neat! I hadn't thought about it, but now I realise it is clear: I don't want to crush my opponent in just the lower left corner This means it will take me quite longer to advance in the books, but at least the knowledge will be consistent. Thanks!

By the way, how many seconds are "a few seconds"? Some problems (for example, problems involving making a false eye while threatening a snapback in first line) I can read in like 5 seconds, but problems involving shortage of liberties can go from 10 to maybe 50 or 60. I don't think I spend more than one minute per problem, but I'm also not checking it: I usually do around 30-40 problems in 15-20 minutes.

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Geek of all trades, master of none: the motto for my blog mostlymaths.net

Similar to the tip in my tidbit

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http://tchan001.wordpress.com
A blog on Asian go books, go sightings, and interesting tidbits
Go is such a beautiful game.

Indeed tchan001. I always try to check all paths and try to refute my play. Most of my failures are because white can get a ko with good play, and I always overlook this kind of moves (silly of me!)

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Geek of all trades, master of none: the motto for my blog mostlymaths.net

For me this is under 10 seconds, because that's what I need to play blitz competitively ; )

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My "guide" to become stronger in Go

Good one I would need a better connection to do so, I can get 5 second lag

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Geek of all trades, master of none: the motto for my blog mostlymaths.net

And I've heard different advice from other strong players. I think your advice is in the minority.

It's not my advice. It's paraphrased from Korean Baduk Classic Life and Death Drills which is written by Li Ang 李昂 and Li Yue 李月. Notice that Li Ang is definitely a pro.

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http://tchan001.wordpress.com
A blog on Asian go books, go sightings, and interesting tidbits
Go is such a beautiful game.

Might be one of the reasons why western Go is so weak =P

I just second what GoGameGuru said. I had to learn this the hard way since the actual advice to brute-force the solution and never look at the answer was giving to me, too, at the very start of my Go career. Luckily I rejected it a couple of weeks later.

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My "guide" to become stronger in Go

If you have no Sensei near by, there is no one who can tell you "right" or "wrong".
Without any feedback, you will have difficulties to learn.

So looking at the solution makes sense. Under the precondition that you evaluated the pros and cons of the variations as far as you were able to do. And sometimes a bit further.

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The really most difficult Go problem ever: https://igohatsuyoron120.de/index.htm
Igo Hatsuyōron #120 (really solved by KataGo)

Except this has been heard from Asian pros...