Hi there,

I've encountered this exact local situation in a game on tygem yesterday and I was wondering if there is a definate way to kill white in the corner here. I didn't managed to do it in the game and lost the game by 1.5 points in the end so it really made me wonder.

I simply recreated the exact state the board was in locally, it's blacks turn.

Kill the top left corner? No. It has more eyespace than an L+2 group, which is alive: http://senseis.xmp.net/?L2Group. Or do you mean the bottom right corner? If black plays simple moves it's a ko, but with enough outside support he can kill it. What you think is a local situation may not be: for example weaknesses in black's surrounding positions could make a difference.

Edit: Did you play on a 9x9 board? I am guessing perhaps you are talking about the lower right and just used a 9x9 board to make the "local" position, and in fact the top left corner wasn't the corner but the middle of a 19x19 board. That makes a big difference!

If is is black's turn then all he has to do is throw in to remove the eye on the top line and white doesn't have enough room to make two eyes. Black can fill in to make a bulky five and white is dead.

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Still officially AGA 5d but I play so irregularly these days that I am probably only 3d or 4d over the board (but hopefully still 5d in terms of knowledge, theory and the ability to contribute).

I am sorry it was a little unclear but I mean the 3-3 invasion in the bottom right. Don't pay attention to the order of the moves I was just quickly remaking what the situation around the corner looked like.

In that case 2-5 on the lower right should probably kill but it's a bit tricky.

I have heard that, in this case, 3-4 is often a worse move than 2-5 if the goal is to kill the corner. However, I never understand why.... Perhaps an example of how 2-5 is better than 3-4 can help me to understand.

Thanks!