I'm finding myself scoring only 70% correct as I'm entering the last 2/3rds of Graded Go Problems for Beginners Volume 2. Clearly that means I'm not a solid 20k. Yet KGS ranks me as 9k. Is this because some of the more deep-reading 20k situations (capturing stones, life-and-death, etc) happen infrequently in games?

Presumably this means I won't play much better until I firm-up my reading skills?

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When we try to pick out anything by itself, we find it hitched to everything else in the universe. - John Muir

I believe the "Graded Go Problems for Beginners" underrank the difficulty of the problems. I play as 5k on KGS and am working my way through Volume 3, which is for "20k-15k" - I'm getting into the second half of the book and finding some of the problems rather challenging. I think volume two is good for your level, don't take the suggested ranks too seriously. You may be interested in this page: http://senseis.xmp.net/?ProblemBookGrades

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Underrank is an understatement. I wouldn't expect a real 15-20k to be able to do much with that book - some of the last few problems still trip me up a bit, and I'm a dan.

edit: oops, i was talking about volume 3. well, i guess it still applies, kind of..

Keep in mind that rank is relative to where you play. A KGS 9k is different than a AGA 9k, which is different than a Japanese 9k which is different than a Chinese 9k. You can find a approximate comparison chart on Sensei's Library.

I have also found an odd thing about the Graded Go Problem books. The cover and the back of the book have two different ratings. I have Vol. three on hand and the cover says 20k-15k, but the description on the back says 12k-6k. My own experience says that the stronger rating listed on the back is correct, using the Japanese ranking scale.

Redbeard
Yeah, they changed the info over time to make us western people feel good ^^
But it's funny to see how much weaker "our" ranks are now compared to Japan's in the '90. I would make 10 Kyu then - maybe ^^

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My "guide" to become stronger in Go

It could be worse. IIRC the old Korean system for amateurs only had kyu ranks. 1k amateur was almost pro strength. Imagine what that would mean for the lower ranks

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I've only read volume 4 and it felt okay at EGF 4k, ofc there were some very challenging problems but overall I think it works well with the egf raiting.

Because trying to reduce our brain's 50–100 billion neurons to a single number,
especially at kyu levels, produces interesting margins of errors.

This is thinking too hard. You have no evidence either way, so don't make an assumption about losing that might affect your subconscious!

The suggested ratings for Graded Go Problems are way off.

My guesses for what (AGA/KGS) ratings each volume is most useful for:

I: 20k
II: 10k
III: 6k
IV: 2k

I am 4k and I still do volume 2 as a refresher and volume 3 as a "problems I should be able to solve in an actual game in under a minute" collection.

(I generally am telling people to do easier problems than others suggest, though.)

Volume 3 was almost too easy for me at 6k (one minute per problem might be too much on average). Now being 5k/4k on KGS, I think Volume 4 fits perfect.

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My "guide" to become stronger in Go

I'm really bad at L&D. I'm still working through volume three, and my accuracy is scattershot. It's funny, because I had originally bought volume 4 first (at 8k), then realized that I really needed to start earlier. It was kind of humbling: much like when I realized on GD that I could mostly only understand the posts in the 'beginners' forum. =D

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Someday I want to be strong enough to earn KGS[-].

Thanks all. This was rather revealing about the books.


Thanks for your concern. Perhaps I am giving it too much consideration.

In any case, working out these problems seems to be helping. At the very least, the practice is getting me accustomed to reading further ahead and mentally testing my outcomes.

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When we try to pick out anything by itself, we find it hitched to everything else in the universe. - John Muir

Wow, and I am asking myself how can I be 18k and while I solve 9k problems easy

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Stefany, web programmer

If you look at the prefaces of various Japanese books that use some sort of grading, you will find, I think, on the whole that the meaning is not "you are 20k if you can solve this" but rather, "if you are 20k this is what you need to learn next".

This in turn reflects what would be a graded curriculum that you would follow if you had a pro teacher. If you learned go this way, you would have a rock-solid foundation, one step would build on another, and you would have no gaps in your knowledge for your level.

Learning in the patchy way that is almost inevitable in the west means that you can have a high grade in play but still be bitten in the bum by simple things you don't but should know.