Hello,

I just started go and did play some games against the computer on 9x9. I am having trouble taking territory against strong players, here is a game of me against a 15k player:


I can't understand how he could take so much, couldn't get territory at all. I surrendered at the end. Do you guys have any advice on my play?

Contact moves, e.g. your third move don't work as well on the larger boards. Consider approaching from a distance. Especially with stones on their own.

Avoid creating many small groups that lack eyes. You can easily end up dying everywhere.

was on a key shape point for that eye space but is not going to help you if they can make eyes elsewhere, e.g. here it could make one at A16 for sure and could run down if it needed to because of the E13 stone.

Always ask yourself before you atari if them pulling the stone/group out helps them or you more. Sometimes it's best not to atari.

Other than that, always consider if trying to save a group of stones will bring you more trouble than they're worth. If they aren't cutting your opponent's stones into two groups they're probably not that important unless there's only one or two of them. By corollary avoid creating groups of stones that aren't doing much for you.



Others may have more/better pointers. Welcome to the game.

Hi, welcome to Go! Don't be discouraged even though it seems like a hard game, but once you got the basics it becomes so much simpler yet also more complex

Best advice: Lose your first 100 games quickly.

Anyways, I've added pointers and basic must know knowledge for you in the first 50 moves. If you study this then you can beat the opponent in your game with no trouble I think.

Another note I forgot to mention. TO make life for your stones, you can extend 2 spaces from a single stone on the third line on the side.

Thanks for the super fast reactions! This is great advice man! I never thought of this! I will try to apply this new advice, I really appreciate your help!

I'm glad we were able to help