Hi

I learnt to play go many years ago but have never stuck with it for more than a few months each time I play for various reasons but mostly due to lack of opponents when I didn't have a reliable way to access any servers.
Over the last few months I started playing correspondence games and that got me back into it and for the last few weeks I have been playing live games a lot more frequently than I have been able to before. I'm making this journal to encourage me to keep going with it and so I can see my progress.

At the moment I mostly play on OGS but rarely also KGS and IGS. My current rank is 16kyu on OGS but I want to improve as much as I can. I have mostly been focusing on playing a lot of games, I sometimes do tsumego but not often and I haven't read any books yet.
I think I am bad at reading so I want to work on that so I will start doing tsumego to try and improve it. Does anyone have any suggestions for good tsumego collections for DDK that don't cost too much? As a student, I don't really want to spend much money on books or anything just yet. If I am still going with this in half a year or so I will get some.

I will probably just post some of my games on here and some thoughts about how I'm doing and stuff. I will try to put up at least one a week.

So this is the first game I'm going to post, mostly so I can figure out how to put sgf files into posts. Its from a couple of weeks ago but it is the last game that I have played that has been really close, most of the games I have played since then were won/lost by larger margins or were resigned.

Some thoughts:


There's a lot of basic stuff you could gain a lot from by going over...

- Hane at the head of two stones
- Broken shape and toothpaste go
- Not playing on the 2nd line early on
- Avoiding empty triangles.
- Not playing out broken ladders, or other moves that clearly don't work.
- Checking if you need to reinforce before doing so.

How long have you been playing, and how many games do you think you have under your belt?

Thanks. I originally learnt to play go around 7 years ago when I was 12 but I never really played much because I had no one to play against. It wasn't until the last year that I have really been playing and even that hasn't been all to frequent. As for number of games played, I think I have around 60 on OGS so probably a little bit under 100 when including the other servers I used to play on.

Thanks for the list of things to go over.
Some of the things in the game that I played through I had thought would turn out well because I'm not very good at reading ahead, I would not consider a key move by the opponent and so it turns out terribly.
What do you mean by toothpaste go?

It's kind of a jokey description of a white group being forced between two black ones, as if black were squeezing a toothpaste tube.

http://senseis.xmp.net/?SqueezingOutTheToothpaste provides a bit of a description. It's pretty much the same as broken shape. That is, a situation where one side is cut into two groups but the other is not cut in return. The closer together the stones are, the worse this is for the cut side.

So this is a game I played the other day, it was a correspondence match on OGS. I'm playing black and I win by 4.5.
I think my opening could definitely be improved

It will sound a bit harsh what I'm saying but I think you are lacking the basic techniques to play on a large board. Many of the local exchanges seem to have no meaning and are left behind while still essentially vulnerable.

Take

With White has just reinforced his stones and he threatens to separate the black stones, destroy black's potential and capture a large corner (the sequence is left as an exercise; it is 9 moves deep but pretty straightforward). Black does not reinforce his weak stones but plays elsewhere. Next, White doesn't execute the (obvious) threat and also turns his attention elsewhere. The position is very "hot" in the sense that all previous stones played in that area will get a whole different significance depending on who plays first there. Still no one does until much later.

My advice is to play a decent number of 9x9 games to see what happens locally when close combat arises. In 9x9 there's almost no "playing elsewhere" and you can learn a lot about liberties, connections, quick and natural formation of territory ...

Although a long read, I always recommend "Haengma tutorial for beginners" at Sensei's Library for players that still need to acquire the fundamentals.

Enjoy!

Hi Knotwig Thanks for the reply. I don't think you are being harsh. I would prefer people point that out now so I improve my techniques sooner so I can get better.

So at should I have played at P4 to protect against the threat?

Thanks for the advice. I haven't really played much on 9x9 boards. I think I preferred playing on 19x19 when I started playing but I will start playing more on smaller boards.

I will give "Haengma tutorial for beginners" a read when I get the chance.

Thanks again

is just one example

There are many instances where a "diagonal opposition of stones" remains unatouched by both players, despite the fact that locally the one who plays first to create a situation of 2 stones against 1, has a great advantage.

Expanding on that, when a stone has 2 such diagonal oppositions and threatens to break through their virtual connection (also know as a "peep") it is natural to connect the 2 stones into a chain of 3.

Such basic techniques are covered on Sensei's Library too as "basic instinct". You don't have to follow them blindly, but following them more often than not, will lead to a more consistent game.

The game starts making sense long after the opening, as has been pointed out; but don't worry too much about that right now.

I have a couple of reading questions for you.

(1) White 122 fails to kill your group. How should White have played? (More than one correct answer, but one is a proverb you should know.)

(2) Black 159 is a typical tactical mistake (at R5 is better). How does White punish it?

Thanks for the questions

1) White should have played at F18 to kill my group. I assume you are meaning the proverb The enemies key point is yours. I can't see another way to kill the group.
2) I think white punishes blacks move at 159 by forcing me to play R5. I can see how playing at R5 initially would have been better

1)

The "natural" way for White 121 is to play H19. This narrows the eye space. The proverb about using hane to kill is simple:

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

At F18 to kill is a failure. At E18 also works.

2) On the right side of the board, Black has many cutting points: O9, M10, L12, N13, P12 ...

This is very dangerous: even three cutting points close together can be a problem. We can see here that if White cuts at L12, Black at M12 is necessary to defend.

So, when Black plays S5, rather than R5, something bad can happen, after White plays P6 and Black plays R5. The question is how White should best play, to take advantage? It is little difficult to see.

I think White should start at L12, Black at M12. Then White M10. This sets up a double atari, meaning Black will lose something. Black L11 takes, White M11, Black connects at L12. Now what?

White O9 then definitely breaks in. Presumably Black P9, White O10.

What is quite hard to read (in advance) is whether Black now has to defend at the P12 cutting point.

So I haven't played much recently as I have had lots of other stuff going on so I don't have any games to post but I should have some next week. I thought I would post a short update.

Last week I went to a go club for the first time. I got to play a couple of games and everyone was really friendly. Its a bit of a way away so I probably wont attend very often. I really enjoyed it and it feels very different being able to see and talk to my opponent. I think I thought more about each move before placing a stone so I think I was playing better than normal but I kept getting distracted by all the noise as it is in a pub.

I know people who enjoy the pub vibe; I prefer the (relatively, more) quiet coffee shop.