A new year brings new...things. New ideas. New goals. New....well, new everything. Last year I tried to set some rather lofty goals. (http://lifein19x19.com/forum/viewtopic.php?f=48&t=6044) All of the information can be found there. And while I think having something to set my eyes on helped, it also had negative consequences. I rose and then fell really hard, and got burnt out as a result.

So I'm back! And with a new journal, too! Here are my plans to improve:

1. Improve my Fuseki/Joseki
-Obvious goal. I really think my fuseki needs work. I need to learn joseki that apply to the fuseki as well. I think if I can better my fuseki, I'll get to 4k. Maybe.

2. Better My Time Management
-The old message I used to get with each game I posted for analysis was that I didn't use enough time. I played flash Go. And I do think I suffered for it. Unfortunately, now I'm doing the opposite. I'm using far too much time. And I'm probably burning precious time in unnecessary situations.

So I'd like to improve my time management.

3. Learn to smile when I lose!!
-I can't put enough emphasis on how important this one is. As ashamed as I am to admit it, I used to get really mad when I lost sometimes. I never escaped, but I'd leave games without saying thanks. And that bothered me after I calmed down. And it bothers me very much to this day that I acted like that.

One thing I've noticed since I came back is that this hasn't happened once. I've managed to take my losses happily. So maybe this is sort of falling away, but it's a very important one if I want to improve.

Maintaining a positive attitude is necessary to growth. It's hard to learn when you're angry (evidenced by my long slide before.)

Study Tools For January/February:
1. 38 Basic Joseki
2. Games Of Iyama Yuta
3. lovelove's How To Become A Dan Series
4. Tsumego

Mission Objectives February:
1. Win Game 4 of my series with Twitchy Go (Hopefully)
2. Get out of the Delta League in ASR (Advance) (Correction: I'm already out of Delta! So advancing higher is my goal!)
3. Watch more games of Iyama Yuta and Yuki Satoshi
4. Advance to KGS 4 Kyu (Setting my sights high)

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Slava Ukraini!

(emphasis added)

Best of luck with everything else in your study journal. But I'm sure you'll understand if I make it hard for you to do this one?
See you on KGS in T-10 hours.

Alright then. Good luck!

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Slava Ukraini!

I suggest you to do some more tsumego at your level. You can easily go through 1 amateur dan purely with tsumego, even though you may know nothing about joseki or other theories.
[edit] Are you still planning to become pro?

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Amsterdam, soon.

I'm with lovelove, you should really do some more Tsumego/Tesuji-problems.

Think of it this way: If your opening is bad, you can always fight your way back in the game. If your opening is superb, but your opponent starts to go crazy, you might lose because he just outfights you.

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My "guide" to become stronger in Go

I've never really studied joseki, mostly just tsumego and playing games. As others have said I suggest you do lots of tsumego and tesuji problems:)

While I am a huge advocate of tsumego, I want to advocate joseki study.
I personally think studying joseki has helped me in my games. This is for two main reasons.

1)It helps alleviate time pressure. If I know a joseki sequence, and judge it to be a good/even result globally I can start playing it without using a lot of thinking time. This is good since I'm invariably in byo-yomi before my partner(You're actually an exception which surprised me when we started our series).

2)Punishing mistakes. This comes from having properly studied a joseki,i.e, proving to yourself that every move prescribed as joseki is in fact the best local move. This process will stick with you in vague ways. You might remember that the hane your partner just played is an overplay. Furthermore if you cut immediately the result is very good for you. On the other hand, their are joseki "mistakes" that are just worth a few points of endgame and knowing that a "mistake" has already punished itself is good too.

As a good example, one time I was able to end the game due to a mistake my partner made in a taisha variant I knew.

Click Here To Show Diagram Code

[go]$$Bc the mistake
$$ ------------------
$$ | . . . . . . . . .
$$ | . . . . . . . . .
$$ | . . X W W W . a .
$$ | . . X X W B . 2 .
$$ | . . X O B B . . .
$$ | . . . O . . . . .
$$ | . . . . . . . . .
$$ | . . . . . . . . .
$$ | . . . . . . . . .
$$[/go]

a is the joseki move and 2 was played in game. Once I got my marked black stones to safety I was able to cut and kill whited marked stones!
I think the taisha might be an especially bad joseki to mess up though. As hopefully non-joseki moves won't end in death most of the time.

The only real downside I've found is that it takes a lot of time to learn joseki. I probably spend at least an hour learning one relatively simple variation. So it might not be the best return for your effort.
However, joseki are so interesting! I've really enjoyed studying them.

Since tsumego were suggested, I can add that to my list. But I want to ask one thing about problems, is it okay if you don't get them on your first try?

I use SmartGo and it automatically tells you if you're doing it right or wrong with each move you play. So I'm under the impression it's better to get it on your first try.

Any thoughts?

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Slava Ukraini!

Play your move when you think that move is 99.9% correct. Don't care about the time that takes to solve a problem. It'll naturally become faster as you solve more and more problems.

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Amsterdam, soon.

I'm still with lovelove =)

One thing I like to add: If you can't solve a problem after thinking about it for a long time (your evaluation) then look at the solution. Some moves/themes just need to be known to be found later on ; )

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My "guide" to become stronger in Go

… reminds me to search for that 45 rpm vinyl single I still must have somewhere … “Misty Mountain Hop” was on the B side of »Black Dog”




Thanks for reminding me of olden but golden times


(yes, I’m that old )

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“The only difference between me and a madman is that I’m not mad.” — Salvador Dali ★ Play a slooooow correspondence game with me on OGS?

Led Zeppelin is my favorite band. I'm not old enough to have been around in their heyday, but I listen to them all the time.

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Slava Ukraini!

So to summarize the events of today:

I lost to Twitchy Go for a THIRD straight time. Today's game was a bit more unbalanced than the other two games because I played dismally. But I feel the review really helped with that. The game is posted here: http://www.lifein19x19.com/forum/viewtopic.php?f=12&t=7583

So because my series with Twitchy Go might be ending soon, would anyone like to be my next opponent for a best of seven game series?

Other than that, I plan to spend some time solving tsumego. And for light reading, I plan to continue reading The 1971 Honinbo Tournament. This is actually for enjoyment purposes rather than learning.

And tonight I may or may not begin Opening Theory Made Easy. I feel that my fuseki is sharply bringing down my game. If I could get better footing in the first 30 or so moves, I feel everything else will slowly start to fall into place.

The reason I may not begin Opening Theory Made Easy is because I plan on watching the Female Kisei game. Watching pro matches is always fun. Although I suppose if there's enough time in between moves I could always read.

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Slava Ukraini!

The game is 30 second byoyomi with occasional minute long breaks for reading. This is not like the open kisei finals.

Oh yeah, you said that. Thanks for reminder!

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Slava Ukraini!

This game was embarrassing. Not only did I mess up the left side due to lack of global awareness, I tried to kill with dead stones!

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Slava Ukraini!

On the left, after move 54, black can force at A9 and then push through the C4 gap because white doesn't have enough liberties to block.

When white approached the top right, however, I think it was from the wrong direction, because it induces black to play a strong low stone on the side where it neutralizes white's influence somewhat. After that, white tenukied from that stone, so you could look forward to a strong attack on it later if white doesn't reinforce. I suspect it was played as a ladder breaker for exactly the kind of cut you saw in your joseki, so if you want to break it, perhaps an unorthodox response like n16 for black was in order, instead of R14. Black could also double approach the bottom left instead, as the two situations are fairly miai. If white responds and black ends in sente, it's a clear win when black returns to the top right first.

Some comments, ideas etc. : )



I'm not a fan of re-approaching in the bottom left by the way. I think with the open skirt, the value of this side is pretty low.

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My "guide" to become stronger in Go

Thanks for the review! Easy to understand.

He noted I might have fared better if I had taken into consideration the ladder breaker at the top right. And you point out things I definitely feel I should be seeing. Maybe tsumego should have more prevalence in my studying regimen than I thought.

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Slava Ukraini!

Today started off pretty bad. I was on a seven game losing streak, so I didn't have high expectations going into the KGS tournament today. Fortunately, I managed to go 2-1 today in tournament play. My opponents were ranked: 11k, 3d, and 4k.

But I'm not satisfied with my overall play. I feel like I'm still playing more like an 8 Kyu or weaker at times. And my win against the 11k was probably lucky. I wonder if he should have just taken the Ko.

I guess I feel these were nothing but luck. Either way, I do feel better going into the last two games tomorrow.

Anyway, here are the tournament games:

Game 1


Game 2


Game 3

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Slava Ukraini!