I think there's a little misunderstanding... Baduk beginners in Korea (usually) don't think more than 5 seconds to play a move. They don't know what to think, so they don't think.

[edit] And this is also because most of baduk beginners are unpatient kids.

_________________
Amsterdam, soon.

I cannot speak for others, so I can only speak from my own experience.
I started toward the end of 2002, so it's been just over 10 years.
And during that time, I have not seen even one exception to this:
at DDK levels (especially 15k or less experienced), if they're thinking "too long" on a move,
they're wasting their time. This is 100% true -- I have not seen one exception in 10 years.
(That includes myself, of course. )

We're not saying don't think. We're also not saying play 3-second blitz.
That 5d also did not mean there's literally nothing to think about --
of course there is, and even beginners should think -- the problem is,
their ideas and reading deviate so quickly off course,
that beyond a certain threshold (of thinking time), it becomes a complete waste of effort.

( I'm the first to admit I'm not fast myself. In fact, the exact opposite.
I'm very slow. My time control is Canadian 1 min. + 20 moves / 30 minutes.
I still manage to find players on IGS and KGS who'd play by this setting.
The US Open is 90 initial minutes per person + byoyomi, I like it very much. I'm slow. )

For example, if there is a life-and-death situation that's difficult for
a DDK player, or, a tricky ladder, then by all means take the
time to think. Bill mentioned an average time. For some moves,
it's OK to play within 1 second (if forced), and for other moves, it's OK to
take a minute or two. But if every move takes over 3 minutes, for example,
for a DDK, that's 99% a waste of time, because most of what they're thinking
is wrong -- this is what the 5d meant (I guess).

This is also another perennial question -- we really should have an FAQ --
(along with "how to study shapes?" "how to improve?" "should i study with a pro?"
"how long does it take to make 1d?" "why am i stuck?", etc. )

I've also found there's no way to convince a beginner (or DDK levels) --
especially adult DDK levels -- to think less, and play faster.
(Another futility: to convince the eager teenage beginner their dream
of making pro will not come true.)

I also cannot prove the non-existence of the proverbial teacup orbiting Jupiter.
But I try anyway.

It's OK Ed, I have been convinced to play faster .

I just need to sort out a big countdown clock, as left to my own devices I know my moves will get slower, and slower.. and slower...... while I gaze at the pretty stones.

_________________
Regards,

Peter

Actually, that's a pretty good idea, for beginners and more experienced people alike.
Not only is it more fair (for both players) (and forces you to think fast and sharp at the same time),
but it's also good practice for tourneys.

In a live game, taking longer than and average of about 20 seconds is likely to start annoying your opponent. Unless you've agreed in advance to play a really really slow game, such player may be unlikely to want to play you again.

If you're playing a correspondence game (e.g. on a turn-based server), on the other hand, feel free to take as long as you like. If you enjoy the game more by thinking on your moves for 15 minutes, then by al means do so. Enjoyment is, after all, the main goal of playing for us amateurs.

If you care about progressing, I think you'll learn far more from playing 50 games at 15 seconds per move than you will from playing a single game at 15 minutes per move. Go skill is 90% pattern recognition anyway.

This is all very enlightening.

In chess, which is also based on pattern recognition, blitz games are generally accepted to only be mindless fun, and to improve you must play slow games and really think things through. If a typical game is 40 moves each, a 5-minute blitz game gives you 7.5 seconds per move, and a slow game averages 2 minutes per move, and it is not unheard of to spend 30 minutes on a critical position.

No wonder my games of Go were dragging on for so long ! That is the danger of trying to play the game in a vacuum. Thank you for the clarification.

_________________
Regards,

Peter

Interesting topic.

My one piece of advice would be to avoid mindless play.

Folks who are stuck at DDK for several years are almost always guilty of this. They slap down stones the way they have always slapped down stones, and either wonder why they don't get better or are resigned to the fact they won't.

I believe that averaging 15 seconds per move is pretty reasonable, assuming half are 30 seconds and half are quick (you've already read out the continuation or are forced). Be sure to review the game afterwords though to see where your plans matched with reality, and more importantly where they didn't.

For the Korean 5D who wonders what folks are thinking about, he needs to know that he sees patterns instantly, while weaker players think, "If I go here, and he goes there, then I go here..." This is a time consuming, but important process.

For the record, I am a slow player, though I prefer to be labeled thoughtful.

_________________
- Brady
Want to see videos of low-dan mistakes and what to learn from them? Brady's Blunders

If an unknown opponent plays me with just 20 seconds thinking time each move, I would most likely don't play him again because he obviously does not treat the game seriously. A live game is not your everyday disposable KGS game.

It's okay when both agree on a time limit but by default games in my Go club do not have time limits. We even leave games unfinished.

_________________
My "guide" to become stronger in Go

At an average of 20 seconds per move, a game takes about 90 minutes to completion (45 minutes each). You would consider that "not taking the game serious"?

Everyone is different, but the bottom line is life is short. Regardless of how strong you are and the arrogance of Korean 5 dans, if you are seriously thinking about this, then you are serious about improving. Of course, there is a whole other lecture about books and studying life and death and you need to be doing that, but you need to play and that is the focus of your question.

You need to play different people, and hopefully some folks a little/ a lot stronger than you to improve. While they should be happy to bring someone with your good attitude along - they will not want to spend their whole evening doing it. So play pretty fast. When I play weaker players at club they will often apologize for their slowness. I will be blunt, either responding "Yeah, you need to play faster" or "Well, this is a really complicated situation, so taking some time here is prudent" Don't waste the stronger player's time - resign when you are behind and then ask for a couple of points where he/she thinks you went wrong. You are much more likely to get a brief lesson if you resign in a timely fashion or at least do not labor over a hopeless endgame for an hour.

In general - play quick games - not blitz - but games of an hour or less, I guess between half hour to an hour.

Once in a while though, at least one game a week if you are playing alot - slow down and play a serious game with someone close to your rank. Review that game with a stronger player if you can. I think a balance of quick (NOT BLITZ) play for experience, and a couple of serious games every once in a while is best.

A game should last exactly 40 mins. One second longer or shorter than that and you are doing it wrong.

I long for the day when I can reach the DDD ranks.

Granted, I skipped the word "average" in your post : /
I just like the idea to take my time while playing Go, it's for me an important aspect of the game. You might be right, longer thinking times do not neccessarily make my moves better but they make the game more enjoyable for me.

But actually it's good to hear that several stronger players seem to be offended by taking too much time. If I ever play in different clubs, I will rowel myself.

_________________
My "guide" to become stronger in Go

If you enjoy longer thinking times, then by all means use longer thinking times. As I said, the purpose of playing is to enjoy ourselves. Just make sure that you and your opponent are on the same page. Don't make your enjoyment come at the cost of his. Personally, I don't mind if my opponents want to use a lot of time, but I would consider it polite if they asked whether it is OK beforehand.

If I visit a new club, I like to know what people expect. Every club is different, after all.

Personally, I just try to match my opponent's speed. I'd like to play good go at any speed. If my opponent learned as a child and instantly plays moves, I want to be able to beat them on those terms. If they're contemplative, I want to be able to squeeze just as much understanding from the board.

You can always have better instincts playing fast, and on a 361 point board after the very first moves and before the very last there's always more to read and count. Even if you get muddled reading past a certain distance, there are positions we leave intuitively as aji to be developed later based on how everything else turns out: you can always go back to those positions and read more of what could be accomplished, what stones would let you accomplish more, and how you might get those stones down. You can always go to long shot invasions and see if maybe there is a tricky path to life you can find.

A beginner doesn't know joseki, proverbs, basic shapes, etc... These are all things that help shave thinking time dramatically. A beginner has more to think about. A more experienced player can quickly play joseki moves, hane at the head of two stones, extend before sacrificing, play vital points and so on in many situations. I also don't find anything wrong with a 2 hour game although 4 hours may be too much. I've had games of Catan go longer than that. Also, we're just talking about one side's moves here. The other side might be a typical beginner that slaps down stones in 5 seconds or less.

That said, the 30s/1m recommendation is somewhat arbitrary. The main point I wanted to make was that thinking a bit about every move is a good habit and is preferable to thinking insanely long about a few moves (and not thinking about most moves!) at a point when deep reading is not a skill one possesses. Adjust the actual numbers to your own tastes.

Games I play at the club are a relaxed affair, we are there to have fun after all, and people play at their own pace. Some are fast, some are slow. Games usually last somewhere between 30 minutes and 2 hours. We don't use clocks, and they are rarely if at all used in club play in the UK, but it seems using clocks in clubs is normal in some other countries.

Well said, Herman. However, I think that you would agree that both sides should be considerate. I consider a player who signals his opponent to move quickly during a game to be far ruder than a player who plays at a pace that his opponent does not like. The first form of rudeness seems to be far more prevalent than the latter. That said, it is best to avoid conflict altogether if possible. In that regard, your method of inquiring about preferences beforehand seems like excellent practice. Also, I find that proper handicaps help alleviate asymmetric time usage.

FWIW: There have been so many times when players on KGS have said immature things to me for taking "too long" to play in automatch games. These are games in which my opponent specifically decided to seek games with the time settings that were ultimately chosen! This makes me suspect (only suspect, but still...) that people who complain about their opponents' time usage are probably throwing temper tantrums based on self-centered and self-serving faulty logic. One of the benefits playing on Asian servers is that Asian temper tantrums show up as random glyphs.

Interesting and useful post for me as well, to get an understanding on sensible time controls for a DDK.


I have been having some trouble playing too quickly , and alas sometimes automatically, and making some very stupid mistakes like missing ataris, potential ladders and cuts.

I'm always a bit apprehensive that my (usually) stronger opponent might get irritated or laughing behind my back (while I'm trying to figure out if an obviously dead/alive (L,J..) group to him/her is alive )

Well, I see that this discussion has heated up.

I had planned to write a long post drawing largely upon my own experience and observations. But let me start with my main conclusion. I am not sure what I am going to say after that.

I think that a better question than how long should a beginner think is how should a beginner think?

I can't say that I really know the answer, except that I am pretty sure that a beginner should not do deep calculation of variations.

That said, that is not what I did during my first year. Well, I did start out not reading at all. But before too long I was trying to read out local situations as best I could. Even so, my games lasted about 1 hour (15 sec. per move or so, on average). Still, what catapulted me into the SDK range (to about 7 kyu) was stopping after I had done my reading and taking a second or two to look at the whole board -- just look. Often I would see a better move somewhere else. My local reading would usually pay off later. This is the kind of thing that Kotov makes fun of, but all I can say is that it worked. I jumped about four stones in a week.

I learned go when I was already an expert at bridge. Bridge is a faster game than go. Freddie Sheinwold said that he preferred a quick mistake to a slow one. It was much less embarrassing. Terence Reese advised, Don't dither. In chess Kotov makes the same point without stating it directly. No disrespect to my SDK friends, but when they take two hours to play a game, my guess is that there is a lot of dithering. One idea that I picked up from Botvinnik about studying your own games --which every serious player should do, even beginners --, is to note which plays you think about the longest. Such positions are usually difficult for you, and you can benefit from studying them. I found that noting which plays took me more than 1 min. worked for me.

When I comment on a game here I will often just suggest one or more moves. It isn't just that I am saving myself time. When reviewing kyu games I have found that a common response when I suggest a play is, "I never thought of that." What good is all your thinking if you never even consider the best play?

Which brings me back to my question about how to think when playing go? It seems to me that most SDKs should broaden their scope, so that they are more likely to consider the best play. But beginners? How should a beginner think?

P. S. There is tension between playing to win and playing to learn. IMO beginners should play to learn.

_________________
The Adkins Principle:
At some point, doesn't thinking have to go on?
— Winona Adkins

Visualize whirled peas.

Everything with love. Stay safe.