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Question for Dan players about Tsumego
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Author:  Eisenhorn [ Sun Jan 18, 2015 4:03 pm ]
Post subject:  Question for Dan players about Tsumego
Hi there!

I didn´t find a similar question in the Forum, so I´ll ask it here:
I ´m interested to know how your (Dan player) Tsumego routine (if any) looks like

-now and in comparison to yout way up from a Beginner
-what´s your opinion how much it helped your progress
-what kind of problems do you do now (hard/easy/only Life&Death??)

I myself like to solve them and was very surprised by a 2 Dan KGS who told me that he rarely does or did them...
Curious to know if that`s the case for many players.
Author:  DrStraw [ Sun Jan 18, 2015 4:16 pm ]
Post subject:  Re: Question for Dan players about Tsumego
Until I reached 3 or 4 dan I probably did more time study time with tsumego and L&D than any other part of the game. I would say that it was essential to my improvement. Since that time I have not studied it much at all, but I do enjoy occasionally going into SL and looking at some of the tougher ones
Author:  Bill Spight [ Sun Jan 18, 2015 5:21 pm ]
Post subject:  Re: Question for Dan players about Tsumego
I did maybe 400 - 500 tsumego from 4 kyu to 5 dan. Now I mostly play around with tough tsumego for esthetic appreciation. :) To show how bad I was as a 4 kyu, I once made a three stone group inside my single eye atari, instead of doing nothing and getting a seki. ;) Still, when I started on Maeda's first volume, the 8-10 kyu problems were easy. So I wasn't terrible at tsumego.

As for how much difference tsumego made in my progress, I would like to say 4 stones, but it was probably less than that. Bear in mind that you pick up a lot that applies to life and death from studying other things, such as the endgame, invasions, joseki, tesuji, and pro games. IMO, the most important study is your own games.
Author:  tentano [ Sun Jan 18, 2015 5:28 pm ]
Post subject:  Re: Question for Dan players about Tsumego
So, doing a few thousand tsumego repeatedly is a little overzealous? :oops:
Author:  DrStraw [ Sun Jan 18, 2015 5:38 pm ]
Post subject:  Re: Question for Dan players about Tsumego
tentano wrote:
So, doing a few thousand tsumego repeatedly is a little overzealous? :oops:


There is a lot to be said for doing easy ones (for your level, whatever that is) over and over until they are hardwired into your brain and don't need any thought when they come up in a game. Once you have mastered those for your level do the same for the next level. As a mid-dan I used to go over Davis' L&D and Tesuji every year, just to maintain the hardwiring.
Author:  Bantari [ Sun Jan 18, 2015 7:06 pm ]
Post subject:  Re: Question for Dan players about Tsumego
tentano wrote:
So, doing a few thousand tsumego repeatedly is a little overzealous? :oops:

Whatever rocks your boat.
This is a hobby, I assume, so if you have fun doing something, do it. Who cares if it too much or too little if you're having fun.

As for me, I can't say I have ever done any tsumego at all, and somehow I bumbled all the way to 5d or so. Others did thousands of them and are still weaker Some others also did thousands, and can beat me in like 3 moves. But I had fun, still do, and will fight anybody who tries to tell me I have to do tsumego when its not fun. If I liked it, I'd fight anybody who tells me to do less.

Its all good.
Author:  tentano [ Sun Jan 18, 2015 7:23 pm ]
Post subject:  Re: Question for Dan players about Tsumego
I just find it so striking how widely divergent tsumego practice is, from not at all to intensely.

It makes it look like it's just a recreational preference, rather than anything you'd actually need.

This doesn't actually stop me, though. It just amazes me.
Author:  Bill Spight [ Sun Jan 18, 2015 7:29 pm ]
Post subject:  Re: Question for Dan players about Tsumego
tentano wrote:
So, doing a few thousand tsumego repeatedly is a little overzealous? :oops:


One thing that I do with problems of all kinds is overlearning. As I learned it, the idea is to have somewhat more successes than half the failures. For instance, if I solve the problem the first time, I don't try it again. If I solve it the second time, I try again and if I succeed I don't try it any more. At that point I have one failure and two successes. If I don't get a problem right until the third time I try it, I continue for two more successes. That gives me two failures and three successes. If I don't get a problem right until the fourth time, I go for three failures and three successes. If it takes five times to get it right, I go for four and four. Then six and four. Etc. (But, truth to say, if I don't get a problem right in five tries, it is probably too hard for me at the moment. ;))

Oh, one reason that I did not do so many tsumego problems is that, once I had tried the problems I had at my level, I waited months to try them again, so that I could not simply rely upon memory and recall the solutions instead of working them out. These days it is easy to find a large number of problems at any level, so I would not have to do that. :)

BTW, drill is not the only way to develop the ability to see the answers to problems, or anything else on the go board. Understanding works, too. :)
Author:  Bill Spight [ Sun Jan 18, 2015 7:38 pm ]
Post subject:  Re: Question for Dan players about Tsumego
tentano wrote:
I just find it so striking how widely divergent tsumego practice is, from not at all to intensely.

It makes it look like it's just a recreational preference, rather than anything you'd actually need.

This doesn't actually stop me, though. It just amazes me.


To advance, you normally need to set yourself challenges at the right level. For some people, simply playing does that. But most of us need study, practice, and drill. :)
Author:  Eisenhorn [ Mon Jan 19, 2015 6:12 am ]
Post subject:  Re: Question for Dan players about Tsumego
Thx for the answers, very interesting so far.

tentano wrote:
I just find it so striking how widely divergent tsumego practice is, from not at all to intensely.

It makes it look like it's just a recreational preference, rather than anything you'd actually need.

This doesn't actually stop me, though. It just amazes me.


^ exactly this. I was curious because there are many pages where it is described as THE most important tool for improving. Maybe this is the case for the majority, but it seems like a not-so small number can climb up the ladder with a totally different approach.

Bill Spight wrote:
IMO, the most important study is your own games.


Just started that, and learned a lot from it. But it seems that part is overlooked by many players.
Author:  quantumf [ Mon Jan 19, 2015 7:07 am ]
Post subject:  Re: Question for Dan players about Tsumego
tentano wrote:
I just find it so striking how widely divergent tsumego practice is, from not at all to intensely.


I think it's a jump to describe tsumego practice as widely divergent. On the one hand, you've got a massive (overwhelming) amount of strong players saying tsumego is the key to go strength, and on the other hand, you've got Bantari. Sounds a bit like the global warming thing: >99% of scientists say that we are warming the earth, less than 1% say we are not. You cannot conclude from that there is widely divergent opinion on warming.

The fact that Bantari developed his reading skills without tsumego is fascinating (I'd certainly like to hear more), but it's probable that he is some kind of savant rather than an inspiration to us all.
Author:  HermanHiddema [ Mon Jan 19, 2015 7:30 am ]
Post subject:  Re: Question for Dan players about Tsumego
I've never been a big lover of tsume-go, and have never systematically done them. I would probably be a stronger player if I had had the patience and dedication to study tsume-go seriously back when I was learning. :)
Author:  tentano [ Mon Jan 19, 2015 8:06 am ]
Post subject:  Re: Question for Dan players about Tsumego
Well, Bantari isn't the first I've heard of who didn't do much or any tsumego before reaching somewhere in the dans.

I'm still fully convinced it's what I need to improve, but apparently this isn't a self-evident truth which can be generalized to everyone.
Author:  skydyr [ Mon Jan 19, 2015 8:38 am ]
Post subject:  Re: Question for Dan players about Tsumego
tentano wrote:
Well, Bantari isn't the first I've heard of who didn't do much or any tsumego before reaching somewhere in the dans.

I'm still fully convinced it's what I need to improve, but apparently this isn't a self-evident truth which can be generalized to everyone.


Go is a mountain with many paths to reach the top. Some prefer the most traveled path, others a lesser one, and still others to blaze their own trail. Some of the paths are quite direct, some are more circuitous, some are steep and some are gentle, but all of them can lead higher.
Author:  Bantari [ Mon Jan 19, 2015 9:03 am ]
Post subject:  Re: Question for Dan players about Tsumego
tentano wrote:
Well, Bantari isn't the first I've heard of who didn't do much or any tsumego before reaching somewhere in the dans.

I'm still fully convinced it's what I need to improve, but apparently this isn't a self-evident truth which can be generalized to everyone.

Tsumego is a good way to improve.
It trains concentration, mental stamina, visualization skills, and a lot more. All of that very important in Go.

In my case, I got most of that through other means, so the only thing I would have really gotten from tsumego would be shapes. But my position always was that tsumego shapes fall into two categories: (a) those rather common, with minor variances, which I could learn more pleasurably from simply playing more games, and (b) those quite weird, which I did not think I really needed to learn.

When I had time for Go, I preferred to play than to do tsumego.
When I had time for Go AND felt like studying, I had more fun going over pro games and learning about ideas rather than doing the nitty-gritty of tsumego (which I did not feel taught me anything really.)

Still, everybody is different, so if you feel tsumego can help you and you don't mind grinding (or even like doing it) - just go for it. Its all for fun, after all.
Author:  gowan [ Mon Jan 19, 2015 9:25 am ]
Post subject:  Re: Question for Dan players about Tsumego
I agree somewhat with what Bantari said about learning from playing and not needing the weird ones. However, some standard shapes, like variations on "Carpenter's Square", will be difficult to learn just from playing. I see many kyu players and even dan players automatically play the key defense point for the carpenter's square in gote even when it isn't necessary and, vice versa, leave that defense move out and get killed. There are a lot of other standard real-game shapes that are difficult to read out from scratch. So I would recommend studying a basic text like Davies's Life and Death to learn the basic shapes.

As for the "weird" problems, there is a lot to learn from them. You won't find those shapes in your games but you can get a good sense of your weak points in reading. I find that those weird-shape problems really work on reading precisely because they are not recognizable shapes; you have to read it in detail.

I have a Korean life-and-death book which is great study material because I can't read any Korean. I don't even know which color moves first. This is a real-game practice, determining the status for each situation when Black moves first and when White moves first. The book is organized usefully for study because a basic shape type problem is given and the next removes or adds a stone of one color. Now the shape is changed a little but what happens with the status becomes the problem to solve.
Author:  RobertJasiek [ Mon Jan 19, 2015 9:27 am ]
Post subject:  Re: Question for Dan players about Tsumego
Tsumego varies in difficulty from easy (1 sequence, 1 tesuji or known basic L+D shape) via almost easy (a few sequences) and intermediate (ordinary L+D without known shapes or intermediate tactics) to arbitrarily difficult (complicated L+D or other tactics). I might have solved ca. 6,000 problems and invented hundreds. Although this has been important for learning how to solve easy to intermediate problems incl. tesuji, endgame etc., the by far most important thing is acquiring a general understanding and knowledge of how to solve problems when the solution is not obvious. Without such knowledge, reading can easily remain too complex. For the intermediate or arbitrarily difficult problems, I have acquired too little knowledge because too little knowledge is available for them; therefore, I research to invent such knowledge but it takes many years. So what I am left with is sheer reading effort when the applicable simplification techniques still leave a complex problem. I think that everybody needs the ability for doing sheer reading because everybody meets the too complex problems. Whatever else you learn about tsumego, eventually you must also improve on the speed and correctness of your sheer reading.
Author:  Bantari [ Mon Jan 19, 2015 9:38 am ]
Post subject:  Re: Question for Dan players about Tsumego
gowan wrote:
I agree somewhat with what Bantari said about learning from playing and not needing the weird ones. However, some standard shapes, like variations on "Carpenter's Square", will be difficult to learn just from playing. I see many kyu players and even dan players automatically play the key defense point for the carpenter's square in gote even when it isn't necessary and, vice versa, leave that defense move out and get killed. There are a lot of other standard real-game shapes that are difficult to read out from scratch. So I would recommend studying a basic text like Davies's Life and Death to learn the basic shapes.

As you say - you see them play it. Once they do it once, they should not do so again if they study their own games. This is how I learned. And it was more fun than going over tsumego which might or might not ever come up in my games.

The only way something is difficult to learn from playing is when it never comes up. But then you might not really need it.
Author:  Bill Spight [ Mon Jan 19, 2015 9:42 am ]
Post subject:  Re: Question for Dan players about Tsumego
quantumf wrote:
tentano wrote:
I just find it so striking how widely divergent tsumego practice is, from not at all to intensely.


I think it's a jump to describe tsumego practice as widely divergent. On the one hand, you've got a massive (overwhelming) amount of strong players saying tsumego is the key to go strength, and on the other hand, you've got Bantari. Sounds a bit like the global warming thing: >99% of scientists say that we are warming the earth, less than 1% say we are not. You cannot conclude from that there is widely divergent opinion on warming.

The fact that Bantari developed his reading skills without tsumego is fascinating (I'd certainly like to hear more), but it's probable that he is some kind of savant rather than an inspiration to us all.


Strong players know their own experience and know what their teachers and other strong players say. That is not to be discounted, but it is opinion, not scientific knowledge. Informed opinion, of course, but opinion nonetheless. Tsumego, while important, has not always been advised as the key to go strength. Honinbo Shusai Meijin advised studying pro games. Hard to beat that advice, since pro games have everything. :) In one New Year's issue of Kido magazine back in the 1970s, each Nihon Kiin pro was asked to give advice on how to improve at go. Some of them said tsumego, but it was a small minority. The main advice was to play a lot, and there were other variants, such as to get a rival and to play Black with three stones. More specific advice was to play thickly. But again, these are opinions.

Were I to give advice, based upon my own experience, it would be to play the whole board. That's pretty much the opposite of tsumego. ;) Next I would say, sacrifice stones. That's a kind of thick play, OC. I do not recall any tsumego which said, Black to play and lose the corner. ;)

There is a saying that chess is 98% tactics. But even for chess Znosko-Borovsky says, "Do not entangle yourself in a maze of calculations" (How Not to Play Chess). By contrast with chess, go is largely strategy. But when I was learning go, many, if not most high dan Japanese amateurs were fighters, not strategists. You hear that today about high dan Chinese amateurs. Not much has changed in that regard. ;) It does not follow, however, that focusing on tsumego is the best way to improve.

As a sometime student of the brain, I am confident that there are dozens of go skills, most of which have no name. Tsumego improves some of them. But by definition it cannot improve all of them. Why not study everything? :)
Author:  Elom [ Mon Jan 19, 2015 9:43 am ]
Post subject:  Re: Question for Dan players about Tsumego
If you want to be a 5 dan who reads better than a pro, do thousands of Go puzzles.

If you want to be a 5 dan who knows every trickplay and has better positional judgement than a pro, go through hundreds of pro games and understand hundreds of Joseki.

If you want to be a pro, quit wasting time with the above. Instead of breakfast, do 100 Go puzzles (and do ten pushups for every one you get wrong). Instead of lunch, read 100 Go books. Instead of dinner, replay 100 pro games. Rinse and repeat for 10 years and you might stand a chance.

Since I assume you're a normal human being like me and therefore not trying to becoma a pro, let's not worry too badly ;-)

Jokes aside, your safest bet is to do mostly problems which are not too challenging, and solve lots of them. If you want to change things up, throw in the occassional hard puzzle. Seems to be a method that stood the test of time :)

Maybe studying is more student-specific than we like to admit.
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