This one is one variation that has gone down in my Malkovich with Marcus. While black has stones in the bottom left, they're awfully low and far away, so this seems fine to me. It makes the right side the biggest on the board, but even if black takes it, we could tenuki (while our group is strong, it cannot be attacked harshly, so we could take a point about equally large up top). At this point, central thickness is about even, depending on who gets O6/P6. I think that the most likely thing is that black would capture , we would take O6, black would defend, then we would approach the top right, perhaps wide and low. While this seems just fine for us in the overall position, this is not the taisha continuation I expected.
The variation I expected most is something like this:
This is the variation that I expect most, for two reasons: first, I've seen it most, and second, the first diagram (if we get sente to do the approach up top) just looks too good for us. I can't honestly say how this variation will turn out, or who will get sente, because this is the 'Hey, taisha devolves into crazy fights!' variation. While opponents often make mistakes before it gets this far, generally what I've seen from here is that white would get a stable group on both sides and black would get out. Eventually. So if an extension on the top and right sides are miai, the board would suddenly be mostly settled, with us having the lion's share of the points. Obviously, the fights wouldn't necessarily settle us, but, barring tactical errors, they should turn out even or better. If we can keep black's group to mostly dame or stable-with-few-points, we'd be better off for it. And the ladder works for us, by the way.
In the interests of disclosure, this was the non-local alternative that I considered. It seems huge, because pincers are a little hard against it, being so wide. If B jumps into the top left, we can either pincer fiercely or push B low, depending on where they come in. This seems to be well-positioned to work in either case. The reason I decided against it was that, though it seemed huge, it felt a bit less urgent than responding locally.
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Now, if we have a good approach in the top right, we play the right stone high on the hoshi, and I'm happy. So if Black pulls back, this looks fine to me. However, if he pincers, we enter crazy land, and I'm ok with that too.
@chew: I like the taisha, but it's a one way road that disrupts the whole lower right corner of the board into, well, not much. If Black pincers, the chances are we're going to want to come back to the lower right with the taisha, but first let's see what Black wants in the top right and right side.
This is exactly why I didn't want to play out a joseki first - I actually want to see which joseki we want, and I think that rather depends on Black's response. Rather than picking a joseki ourselves and letting Black pick a top right sequence that works for him and against us, I'd rather call for Black to show his hand and then pick the lower right joseki we want.
@TJ: I love it, though your is not quite ambitious enough (see above) Your choice was my second favourite move from my analysis in the hidden observer chunk before you suggested your move.
I dismissed this as horrible, due to a loose pincer here attacking both of our stones on that side. Black can get a pretty good splitting attach going on. There might be some salvation in starting a big fight by pressing after the pincer.
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Redundant wrote:
I dismissed this as horrible, due to a loose pincer here attacking both of our stones on that side. Black can get a pretty good splitting attach going on. There might be some salvation in starting a big fight by pressing after the pincer.
I'm not sure Black has a good loose pincer, because of the gap:
For example, this one allows the two point extension above, which means we can respond to the lower right, perhaps with taisha. And the side hoshi means we can respond at the top as we have a two point extension on the lower side. I figure it's too wide for Black to properly pincer both White stones. It's not the same as with two approaches against 4-4 stones (which is still standard handicap fare, so not unreasonable play anyway when Black has a stone in each corner), as the extra intersection makes a big severity difference.
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To observers:
topazg wrote:
Welcome to Graham's Go Grumbles ...
Hehehehe...a mere four moves into the game and already their captain is unhappy with the troops. I wonder how soon the flogging starts. That unhappiness may explain why half of their moves have been theoretically iffy. Not only is move 6 taking a side when two corners are incomplete, but move 8 makes a hoshi kakari ( which Yang calls a third class move, BTW ) when there was a shimari to be filled in the upper left, and a kakari to be answered in the lower right ( both second class moves ), and they did neither. I'm amazed that nobody suggested the taisha - I'm assuming that it would have been played in preference to R14 if somebody had suggested it.
White's play, although theoretically inexact, is not clearly bad. It is very easy for black to play one or two slack moves and let white take a 30-point side while stitching his misplaced stones into a coherent whole. Black's next move must be surgically precise. Here we switch from abstract principles to tactical considerations.
Noting that a move is theoretically iffy is not the same as knowing a practical way of punishing it. Let's have a closer look at the pros and cons of the various stones: * Our two stones in the lower left are as solid as one could ask for. They seem to lack expandability, for their natural extension is impeded by white's stone at C9. * Our hoshi stone has been kakaried, but there is plenty of room in that corner and the adjacent sides, so I'm not worried. It can be answered with a westward tobi or kiema, or with a pincer of some sort. * Our 3-4 stone in the lower right has corner access for easy life, and if white prevents that, it can slide westward along the side to friends. It could be used to pincer their 5-3 stone. * Their 5-3 stone in that corner has slightly lesser access to the corner, and can slide along the right side. The closest stone along the right side is currently white. * Their 5-4 stone in the upper right is tricky to approach, but someday we should find a way to get the corner before they get an easy shimari. Barring that, since it is high we may want to undercut it around C12 or C13. * Their C9 stone is simply a spoiler, having few good territorial pospects of its own. It seems to do best if it can link to the 5-4 stone. Sliding south to C6 is mediocre territory, but it does threaten to help an invasion of the corner under some circumstances. * Their latest, at R14, can live by sliding into the corner or by sliding down the side.
Putting it in diagram form, the shaded areas below seem to be the tactically important places to play. ( Note that I am not including something around 'a' or 'b'; they are big, but not urgent. All the shaded areas affect the life and/or death possibilities of some stones, whereas 'a' and 'b' do not. )
Putting it in diagram form shows one anomaly: all of the shaded areas are separated by stones, such that a stone played in one shaded area does not greatly affect another, except for the two shaded boxes on the right. This proximity suggests that a move in one of them might seriously change the character of the other.
My gut feel without reading is that our next move should be on the right side. Maybe pincer one white stone? Maybe the other? Maybe one stone that tries to weakly pincer both? That requires some reading, and I'll delay that until I have some suggestions.
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BIC
Hmm, follow up on the lower right, respond at the upper right or split down the middle...yet another interesting position. I'm leaning towards some kind of splitting move at this point.
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Alright, here's my suggestion:
Hmm, another unusual move by white. White must have felt that responding immediately to our kakari would have been too passive. If we've reached the position where white can't afford to respond to a normal approach, then I think this is a good thing. In fact, white's latest reminds me of a ploy used by white in 4 stone games:
I won't go so far as to say that black has been tricked, but the Mt. Fuji formation is very good for white. Specifically, the value is that white's last move is a 2 for 1 deal; it is an extension from both sides. Some might argue that in a handicap game black can afford to play this way, but if you're going to make such passive moves as 6 and 8, why even play go in the first place?
Black may split white with something like this. White will most likely continue by playing jumping exchanges against both corners and then attacking the splitting stone. Black will be in for a real fight since white is four stones stronger, but isn't this the point of playing a handicap game in the first place?
However, there is something nice in our game: white is not four stones stronger. This resort to handicap tactics I think provides us an opportunity. The board position as it stands:
I'll start by saying that I think playing anywhere other than the right side of the board makes no sense, as this is clearly the most important side right now with multiple groups.
They seem too passive and are ignoring some possible moves that I think are very efficient. Basically, i think we need to play somewhere between the white stones. Hopefully, I want to get a move in that does the equivalent of the Mt. Fuji summit stone; I want it to attack both stones at once, or at least exert pressure on them.
These are all some options. I rejected d and c because I feel that if we are going to actively pincer one stone it should be the bottom one, as the unbalanced corner is a more volatile position since white can't just jump into the corner. Although it was a tough call, I next rejected e because I feel that it is too much in no man's land; it is too distant to quite act as a pincer on either corner:
This is just one possible continuation, but due to our high position white should have a fairly easy time diving under. I don't want to split low, because I don't want to give white a chance to attack that stone:
Both of these pincers seem like reasonable moves. A is certainly tighter and exerts pressure on the white stone. However, I think that b is the better choice. This is because it has the dual purpose of pressuring the other white stone. We've all heard of extension-cum-pincers, well this seems to be a pincer-cum-pincer. How can we pass up the chance to try and do two things at once? It is very hard to predict where things will go from here, but here's some possibilities:
I think in this position our groups are all stronger than white's, and so we should welcome an outcome like this where we hold both adjacent corners. And in this position it's our move. So to conclude:
This is my suggestion. I believe white has given us the opportunity for an active dual-purpose move, and we must seize it.
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To observers:
I like Jedo's logic that gets to the right side. The pincer seems good, but I must read a bit. If I can get two other pincers nominated I will be a happy captain.
White has two choices... run at a or b, or play c,d... If White runs the black plays at e pincering again... while creating base... If white plays c,d then Black now has two weak white groups to attack...
I agree with my teammate's analysis; the right side is most important, and a pincer seems like the right play. I am not fond of any of the high pincers generally, and not fond of any of the wider pincers in this specific case. A wide pincer of either white stone (a-d) does not put quite enough pressure on the other; the non-pincered stone always has room for a 2-space extension. So they all feel like half-measures, and I hate half-measures.
So that leaves tight pincers e and my choice for . Of the two, I feel like using the 4-4 stone for a pincer is more natural, trading away the corner is acceptable, and the most common joseki gives us a natural continuation.
Ostensibly, the joseki ends with sente for us, though black usually wants another move here. Either extending the wall upward, neutralizing the aji of somehow, or extending along the side. Here an extension in the vicinity of a (maybe not exactly at a, but the general area) is dual purpose. Several other paths white could choose in the upper right have similar results.
If white chooses the variation where he jumps up and gets a floating wall, I think that's fine; I think that joseki is weak for white generally. I also think white playing away from the pincer would be good for us.
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My suggestion for
I was really put into a dilemma here because I decided the best move would be the pincer, however, Jedo suggested the high version of the pincer I want to play... I really think the low version is better... To me a high pincer would be better if we had a stone around (a).... In my mind high pincers are mostly used to create walls and that wall would be better served with a stone at (a)....
So after much deliberation I decided to make the low pincer my move.... Since we have sente I think it is the best thing to do... white will either run at (z) or try to make base with (y), then we can pincer again at (h)....
If white tries to make base at r or s he ends up with two weak split groups... Black still has sente...
So even though I think we should give Joaz more options then a few pincers... I think I have to go with this..
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I thought this would be a good way to play my first malkovitch, since this way most of the hidden comments would have nothing to do with my moves. Yet I can still relate to the feeling of thinking that observers are making fun of your moves
Some additional comments now that all the black moves are in
I think we've given Joaz 3 good choices to choose from, and I think the fact that they are all pincers are fine since that's what the situation requires. A final defense for my suggestion: I played high and not low because I think that making our splitting stone more resilient against and attack and more power to attack with outweighs playing low to prevent white from making a desperate dive for a base. I pincered the bottom and not the top stone because I think a pincer with a 34 stone is more severe. And I played loose and not tight because I wanted to help exert some pressure against the white stone at the top. Fwiffo makes a good point about not playing half measures, but since the two space high pincer is a very common response regardless of what else is going on, I hope that it is fittingly severe against the stone it pincers.
Edited to remove confusion
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Last edited by Jedo on Tue Nov 02, 2010 9:55 pm, edited 2 times in total.
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Black team discussion:
My dislike for high and wide pincers may be mostly a style thing.
My default is to play a tight pincer at the same height as the approach stone (i.e. I'll pincer a high approach stone with a high pincer) to confront it directly. I don't feel right doing something else without a fairly specific reason. A low pincer of a high stone or a high pincer of a low stone allows them to sorta slide off one-another which is a sensation I find uncomfortable.
One specific exception in my pincer preferences is for the high approach to the 3-4 stone. In that case I'll usually do a 2-space high pincer or one-space low pincer, which are both much more common than the one-space high pincer.
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EVERYONE SUGGESTED A PINCER!!
The next few days are busy for me. Due to having three really good suggestions, I may have to wait until I have some time to read a lot. I'll try to post by Friday.
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For observers and teammates:
Tewari analysis suggests that there is a problem with the Q8 pincer. White can play the simple, natural extension at 10, and now is threatening to connect under at 'a'. So eventually - indeed probably very soon - we have to play 3:
Now this looks too heavy. Once we have to play 3, we would rather have 1 at 'b'. So once we realize that this will be the preferred placement of stones in that area:
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Black internal
Joaz makes some good points, but I do have some ideas. If white plays as shown it does not make sense to descend at 3 as in Joaz's diagram, since as he says that is inefficient. Instead we can play like this:
Our last move I think here is pretty powerful and I think it will be hard for white to answer without letting black either get a huge corner or overpowering influence. And to reiterate, my fear of playing low is that white will not play as shown, but will instead do something like the following to attack our splitting stone:
Maybe something like this? I don't mean to cause internal strife, just trying to give some more explenation about why I chose my move
_________________ "There are no limits. There are plateaus, but you must not stay there, you must go beyond them. If it kills you, it kills you. A man must constantly exceed his level." -- Bruce Lee
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Black internal chat:
Jedo wrote:
Maybe something like this? I don't mean to cause internal strife, just trying to give some more explanation about why I chose my move
A discussion of the pros and cons is healthy. Indeed, it is exactly what this form of go was intended to provoke. It serves to enlighten those who are weaker and amuse those who are stronger.
Jedo wrote:
Joaz makes some good points, but I do have some ideas. If white plays as shown it does not make sense to descend at 3 as in Joaz's diagram, since as he says that is inefficient. Instead we can play like this:
Ok, this does get us some influence, and it avoids the tewari issue in my previous post, but it seems to have lost the crucial character that it had: it fails to put pressure on BOTH groups, which, by my understanding, is the whole point of playing on that side.
We would have three stones attacking one - and it is still not dead - while their R14+R11 group is unperturbed. Then they can play like this:
Our last move I think here is pretty powerful and I think it will be hard for white to answer without letting black either get a huge corner or overpowering influence. And to reiterate, my fear of playing low is that white will not play as shown, but will instead do something like the following to attack our splitting stone:
I'm not sure that having them attack our stone on that side is a problem ( as long as they can't kill it, of course. ) I thought that we wanted them to fight on the right side of the board; that the primary point of a pincer over there was to make them fight.
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Black internal chat:
fwiffo wrote:
...My default is to play a tight pincer at the same height as the approach stone (i.e. I'll pincer a high approach stone with a high pincer) to confront it directly. I don't feel right doing something else without a fairly specific reason. A low pincer of a high stone or a high pincer of a low stone allows them to sorta slide off one-another which is a sensation I find uncomfortable...
Again, I really like Fwiffo's line of reasoning. Now let's see what it looks like in practice.
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Chew Terr
, we would take O6, black would defend, then we would approach the top right, perhaps wide and low. While this seems just fine for us in the overall position, this is not the taisha continuation I expected. 
is not quite ambitious enough (see above) 
Your choice was my second favourite move from my analysis in the hidden observer chunk before you suggested your move.
:
somehow, or extending along the side. Here an extension in the vicinity of a (maybe not exactly at a, but the general area) is dual purpose. Several other paths white could choose in the upper right have similar results.
