Hmm. The atari starts the ladder if they decide to nobi and effectively reduces the stone to one liberty. The net leaves it with two liberties and my group to the right with only one more. The net leaves a ko threat, so does the ladder I suppose but a lesser one. Aji, well I don't really understand that at all.

It's however two moves to kill the stone with the net and one with the atari which might be the difference between good and bad aji? I'm pretty tired so I could be all kinds of wrong here!

You're doing fine. If you have Kageyama's Lessons in the Fundamentals of Go, it's in there somewhere.
(I have it, but not with me at the moment, so I cannot provide the page number. )

The net also leaves 2 peeps for W.Think funny business.

My try at reviewing your last game. I think that your fuseki is fine, trying to spot big moves is reasonable although you could work on it a bit. Especially try to focus on not doing "passing moves" and playing more games/doing tsumegos so that your reading ability improves a bit. But you are very strong 15k. :-)

hermitek,

sequence to move 13: In the game black has big moyo on the right side with almost no weaknesses in the top right. And although it could've been maybe executed a bit better, the idea and result was imho very good.
In your variant after b M16 and w N14 black has to worry about M16 stones and since there is white stone at R14, black group at P15 isn't really strong either.

move 27: OK.

Some food for thought on Ed's move 13 sequence.

In the game variation, Black allows White to get onto the 4th line and starts pushing him from behind - sure, it keeps a good wall facing the right hand side, but not only has White got very reasonable territory, the D16 stone allows White to expand nicely along the top edge.

In Ed's variation, White's attempt to resist gives Black a little more complications to consider, but gives White at least as many. Firstly, White's corner is a lot smaller, and secondly, White's N15 stone risks becoming a burden. If he extends to N14, Black can play P13 (O13 instead may be ok to resist White responding wO13 bP12 wN11, but it does allow for cut complications, and White's simply securing 5th line territory for Black anyway, so Black can't complain). Now, after bP13, White not only has to look after N15 else Black's moyo potential grows considerably (and so doesn't have time to play K16/K17), but he also has to accept that with once Black settles across the top, White has no development potential and no weak Black groups to harrass.

I'd certainly play Ed's variation every time

Very interesting everybody, thanks.

Your games are like potato chips. You can't comment on just one.

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

Visualize whirled peas.

Everything with love. Stay safe.

Thanks Bill, plenty to think about there.

Continuing from where Bill left off ...

absolutely must be atari at P6. This move gains B a lot of strength in the center and messes up W shape. If W allows B to capture, the game is over, so it is certainly sente. Do not miss important moves like this! If you take away just one lesson from this game, this is it.
is very passive. The B wall above is quite strong, and you should try to use it to the fullest extent possible. S9 or R8 would be a positive approach, boldly staking a claim a large territory. The game move settles for much less than you have earned.
is a huge blunder, completely reversing the balance of strength in the center. This is a game loser, incomparably larger than the few points from the captured stones.
and the follow-up connection underneath with B12 is a great high level move, congratulations for spotting it! (Although the direct cut at D14 would also be good, given the weakness of the W group above.)
unfortunately was too timid, missing the big picture. You can treat the stones at C10-C11 lightly, as W has already answered them submissively, so if W later cuts at D11, giving them up is not so big. Now is the perfect time to attack the weak W group above! Look at moves like F11 or F12 or G13, which really put W on the spot.

Thanks mitsun.

Another ASR game, this time against my perpetual opponent mus. My 54th ranked game on KGS.



Full of mistakes, including a rather huge one where I didn't read a seki at the end. :/

That said, I was happy enough with the result given the complete mess that I made of the fuseki and yose (if I'd played correctly in response to the threatened seki it was a 21 point winning margin). My play in the top right was dreadful for instance and several times I got distracted from what I'd planned, e.g. I played a sente move meaning to get back to a pushing battle and proceeded to forget about the pushing battle.


That all said, I'm very much enjoying getting even games against much stronger opponents. I think I'm learning a lot by doing them.

Oh, and I'm sure mus would appreciate a few pointers here.

Me and Drewch finally had a game. I made some major blunders here, including missing a ladder! My weakness tactically shines through yet again. Enjoyable game though.



Feeling more lost than usual while playing, maybe that's a good sign?

Your 54th KGS ranked game

Thanks Ed.

Both of you are still completely oblivious to broken shapes and ladders.

Q: "What's the problem?"

A: Me playing at 6am after not getting any sleep.*

I stared and stared at that group going "there's something about that shape..."


*Though really, even then missing a ladder twice is unforgivable.

Hmm, in retrospect (after getting some sleep), it sounds like I'm making excuses for poor play. I didn't mean it that way. I should have been able to spot the ladder regardless of how much sleep I'd gotten or not gotten. I was more than with it enough to be playing to be honest and any parent of young children knows there's no such thing as optimal form with a toddler who's not sleeping well etc.

Myself and Drewch are going to do a Malkovich game. We figure it'll show any important flaws in our thinking processes.

A win for a change. In a review after this I was told that I was being too aggressive and that this was the major problem in my play in the game. I'd appreciate some thoughts on this statement.