This has happened in games I was winning. When I get disconnected my opponent has immediately left and refused to restart the game when I returned not a minute later. A few times the opponent has started a new game in my absence (which is understandable), so I watched his/her game, and asked to resume after they finished, and was just ignored.

But to repeat, escapers are rare in my experience, even on automatch.

I think you had not a sufficient experience in 10k-20k range players, where escapers are quite common.

No, Go is just an awful spectator sport.

So do people like that start out that way or do they just gradually devolve into it?

Also, what kind of companies give ad endorsements to these guys?

I've seen both, it can be pretty disgusting but I hear it's a lot worse in the Call of Duty/Halo department .

Regarding your second question, I don't think the guy in that video is sponsored but that's not to say bad-mannered players aren't pros and sponsored, e.g: there is a player (IdrA) who is notorious for his bad manners and he is on a team sponsored by Intel, Kingston, Monster energy drink, and Steelseries.

You forgot the occasional Sandbagger.
But from your list the Afk'ers that try to wait you out are my first annoyance, second will be a sandbagger.

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Only a child can ask questions that the wise can not answer.

In my opinion, being away from keyboard is perfectly fine. You have the choice of how you'd like to spend your time. I don't see how it's different from tournaments where someone will get up and stretch, or go to the bathroom while their clock is running.

If you don't want to wait for people to make a move, then use a faster time setting.

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be immersed

I completely agree. But I have run into players that will accept at 25 or 30 minute game and play blitz and when they lose a big group, they will just sit there with the clock running for 25 minutes and then play a move. Usually my clock has run down much more, so I strongly suspect they're hoping my own time runs out.

Another reason to like short main time and byoyomi.

A great topic! Here are my favorite hated groups of people that I've often met during my almost two years at KGS.

0. DDK sandbaggers who like to make fun of 20+ kyus on how "weak" they are. Double minus points for rude swearing.

1. 2 kyus who decline game proposals from puny 3 kyus. Do they think they are too good for 3 kyus or are they afraid of losing to them? I don't know which reason would be worse! There's quite a lot of these guys - I know because my account is currently fluctuating between 2k and 3k...

2. People who barely say "hi" and definitely won't bother to thank for the game. Especially when having my ass kicked severely or after a terrible blunder and resignation, it would put a human touch on the game not to immediately close the game window and open a new game request just like the opponent was some bot to be crushed. (maybe some people think me silly of expecting some kind of "thanks for the game" afterwards)

3. A couple of "4 kyus" who are insanely strong fighters and seem to derive their fun from killing every group their opponent tries to make. My personal favorite is blacktulip who usually doesn't greet the opponent and after crushing them usually says "LOL" in the end. For his benefit, he doesn't do much trash talk though like some of them do, but example game tells a lot of the playing style:

http://files.gokgs.com/games/2011/8/8/blacktulip-ferl.sgf

4. People with "special tactics", who play a very uncommon opening (say two 6-4's and tengen) and playing against them feels like you've been put into some sort joseki/trick move/ladder quiz, where the opponent knows the ground really well, and you don't.

Some of the people in category 4 also belong to category 3, and they seem to just enjoy playing weird openings or other overplays and just making them work due to them being actually few stones stronger than their stated rank.

I don't think I fall into either category, but I don't see a problem with 3 or 4. I open with 3-5s quite often, but I don't think that's a "special tactic"--they are legit (I notice you didn't list 3-5 as such a tactic, but still...).

Not to derile the topic, but Combat-Ex is very far from pro level.

This doesn't seem rude to me, any more than a new variation of a joseki that you didn't know. ( I lost recently to a guy who opened with opposing 5-10 stones. ) It shows us that there is something that we don't understand, and for that we should be grateful to the other guy.

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Help make L19 more organized. Make an index: https://lifein19x19.com/viewtopic.php?f=14&t=5207

Ditto. I lost last night because of a Joseki I didn't know. You can be sure I know it now!

I think #3 is hilarious because I love to win this way:



I even love to lose like this. I think at a certain point most of one's games end in a life or death defeat. After making my joseki mistake last night I went on to lose with the loss of a big group. The big-fight games tend to be deeper and more satisfying (TWSS).

I didn't get a chance to see this SGF (gokgs.com is blocked at work), but if he doesn't trash talk than I expect he's just playing Go like the rest of us. It's up to you to read through and defend your stones or attack his stones. (Totally IMHO:) The beauty of the game is that people meet as equals (and only one can be victorious). The ugliness of the game are the various rating systems, rules sets, etc and the people that take advantage of those systems in an unsportsman like manner.

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Hi everybody,
With respect to jokkebk's points 3 and 4, I think a lot depends on the attitude behind "special tactics".

As it happens, I have set up a second KGS especially to try out unusual fuseki and original ideas. Because it is very difficult to get people to play with you when you have no rank, I had to start out around 8k/9k and use automatch to work "Yosh" up to 1k (my current level on KGS). Of course, I was worried opponents would think I was setting out to have cheap fun at the expense of weaker players, so I have tried stating right at the start that I was 1k, using the account for experiments, and offering to review. Unfortunately, the usual experience is to win heavily, and to see the other player disappear immediately afterwards without saying thanks.

Now, I have also had the experience of meeting a player with an unconventional, arguably bad style. There is a 1k player from Russia who gave me a good kicking two or three weeks ago. He played the "bad" approach to the 3-4 point, but blew me away with better fighting skill. I was a bit downhearted, but I decided to survey this player's games, and I found out three things of interest: a) he or she has their very own fuseki pattern (Q16 D17 K17 would be the kind of shape) b) knows the "noseki" variations of the 3-4 point very well and c) is a very resourceful fighter indeed. I also noted that a lot of the Russian`s opponents were abusive toward him (comments of the flavour "tu es le premier connard"). I would not say that I sympathised with or admired the Russian player, but I can't help feeling a certain grudging respect for him or her. After all, they have done nothing more rude than to play quickly and uncoventionally, but with some real skill to back it up with.

In my own case, I have been investigating the 6-6 point and, with white, "no fuseki" go. I have worked out some plans to go with the 6-6 point, and I would like to test them against players of around the same rank. "Yosh" should reach that point soon, so there should be no accusations of sandbaggery. After that, if my ideas have worth I should find "Yosh" has the same ranking as my main account, "Himiko". For what it's worth, I am testing two hypotheses:

1) In No Fuseki go, white does not have a disadvantage, and should therefore be able to use it to avoid a large-scale game (i.e., sanrensei or Chinese) if she does not want to play one.

2) When Black tries 6-6 points and similar super-large-scale openings, White should respond in kind, as thoughtlessly playing too conventionally can allow Black to build too large, too quickly. I also believe direction of play is especially critical in such fuseki.

I think there is a big difference between this kind of experimentation and what I like to call "go clowning" (a "go clown" is my epithet for somebody who has given up on trying to become stronger, and is simply focussed on winning by any means possible, no matter how undignified). What I mean is don't just assume your opponent is clowning; it may be that they are throwing you live grenades rather than custard pies, and that you can get stronger by learning how to catch the grenades and throw them back!

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Learn the "tea-stealing" tesuji! Cho Chikun demonstrates here:

I disagree. I think I enjoy watching Go more than playing sometimes. It's awesome to watch two strong players go at it. Like, I remember countless nights watching players like Smartrobot or MilanMilan on KGS and that never got dull. I've even watched live Go matches between Korean professionals.

I'm probably part of a niche crowd though.

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Slava Ukraini!

I don't really hate any kind of player as long as the game is fun, but it is annoying to play against someone really greedy when you wanted a serious game instead.

Some players simply don't know when to stop creating weak groups
http://files.gokgs.com/games/2011/8/10/ ... castro.sgf

I think I was a bit unclear on this point when I wrote it. With "4 kyus" I meant that these people seem closer to 1 kyu / 1 dan level, but keep their 4k rank artificially by resigning a portion of their games - for example by resigning from a winning position with a comment like "you are so weak" and then proceeding to trash some other unsuspecting 4-5 kyu.

I do like fighting games myself, but watching game records of players who obviously are way stronger than their opponents, where the opponent hopelessly try to stay alive with their groups or win semais, only to lose one local fight after the other and finally resign in shame only to be answered by "LOL" or "u r so weak" type of comments does pass the "annoying" threshold in my books.

A very valid point and a good post also, very interesting to read. I think my objections to this category of players comes mainly from a few bad experiences (one guy mainly used 6-4 opening as a prelude before he ripped me to shreds, I got the feeling he was way stronger than his given rank, another one used two 5-4's to invite 3-4 approaches where he would then use the same trick play twice to get the upper hand in the opening).

Also, I tend to do a lot more "silly" mistakes when playing against unfamiliar and uncommon openings, and when losing such a game (or suffering local loss) I feel less beaten by my opponent and more beaten by the "uneven terrain" so to say. There's nothing objectively bad about this, actually those games will probably improve my play more than the ones played on familiar openings, but for some reason it's still annoying. It's likely because I value in go mostly grasping of the general concepts and good reading, and less the specialized knowledge of a joseki or opening, which you can study to a "pro level" even as kyu player (especially if you concentrate on a single opening or a few joseki).

Maybe I either need to improve enough so I stop making silly mistakes and can adapt better, or perhaps it's time for me to start really studying joseki and theory of different openings...

That would be entirely obnoxious!

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