No Longer Blindly Reaching

Numsgil · **#21**

I find it hard to believe anyone could legitimately make dan without doing thousands and thousands of problems. I just don't see how you'd drill in the tesuji, life and death, and shapes otherwise. It'd be like becoming a concert pianist only practicing piano twice a week for 20 minutes. The guys I knew doing music majors were practicing hours a day. It's just the way it is to become good at something.

Some people do have a natural affinity for the game, and if you have a stronger player constantly playing against you that probably counts for quite a bit, but I just don't see anyone getting to dan without significant effort from either problems or the equivalent of problems (game reviews maybe, if you really stop and concentrate and figure out the life and death positions yourself that you missed in game).

Numsgil · **#22**

OtakuViking wrote:

Numsgil, 10000 go problems from 10k to dan sounds absolutely ridiculous. If you need that many, you're not doing it right. You need to mix it up with playing games too. So far I've solved about 2000 go problems, some being opening, endgame and middlegame problems from the graded go problems set... and I'm 1kyu on KGS. So you see ... solving 10000 go problems to get to dan level seems a little ridiculous to me :lol:

Just another follow up (not to derail this thread any more, but I guess it's too late. Sorry hailthorn), is your main account Kamomille? I don't mean to insinuate that anyone that disagrees with me is weaker than they claim! But you haven't played many ranked games, so the sample size is pretty narrow. KGS ranks at low sample sizes are basically pretty random (the +/- factor is several stones). You actually haven't played any ranked games as a 1 kyu yet, even. If you had 50-100 games as a 1 kyu I'd be more inclined to consider you a valid counter data point. A dan in my book means they can play an infinite number of games against other dans and win half of them. Someone who manages to get an account with a game or two to 1 dan doesn't quite count.

Again, I don't mean to be dismissive at all. I'm just saying that if you're presenting yourself as a counter case I'd argue that you need more data points. I don't mean this as a personal attack or anything (it's hard to do unbiased analysis when people are themselves data points :/)

OtakuViking · **#23**

I've hidden my response to Numsgil because I don't want to hijack the thread any more than we've done already:)

Just to clarify. The point of doing Life and death problems is to increase your reading ability. Which helps mainly with your middle and endgame calculations. The point of Tesuji problems is to learn the tesuji and remember it, it's ok to get it wrong, ok to look at the answer. Other types of problems speak for themselves, opening, endgame etc. Notice no shape. Shape comes naturally when you play games, study books like Shape up! Charles Matthews and study joseki.

If you simply glance at a life and death problem, find something that looks like a vital point and immediately jump to the answer. You have totally missed the point of the problem. The solution is not NEARLY as important as the fact that you tried your best to read out all the possible variations to make sure your answer is correct. The main point of life and death problems is simply to train your reading muscle. Life and death problems are usually not limited to shapes found in games, many are artificial and you'll never encounter them in a game. The main point is, I repeat, to exercise your reading muscle.

shapenaji · **#24**

karaklis wrote:

shapenaji wrote:

Most of the time, you're better off with 2-3 10-20 minute games than 1 30 minute game + review.

This is probably not the whole truth. I've seen people playing hundreds and thousands of such games and haven't improved a single stone.

Well, bear in mind I wrote "experience AND experimentation"

It's very easy to do the same thing over and over and not try out new ideas. The important thing is that you're trying out your ideas, not spending a lot of time on a game.

karaklis · **#25**

illluck wrote:

I also think 10k is absolutely ridiculous. I think I did less than 1000 before hitting kgs 1d, and I don't think they were a significant factor (they definitely sped up the process, though).

I did about 2000 tsumego and got stuck at 7k before I burnt out from tsumego. Your improvement is obviously not only dependent on tsumego but many other factors as well.

Numsgil · **#26**

OtakuViking wrote:

I've hidden my response to Numsgil because I don't want to hijack the thread any more than we've done already:)

It's a numbers game, you see. To me, X kyu means you've successfully held your own against a wide range of players and styles on numerous occasions. With a wealth of data points we can find a rank that fits the data. That is, it's not a mark of how strong you are currently, but a statistical statement about past performance. See sample size calculator for instance. Let's say we want to be confident that you're 1 kyu instead of 2 kyu. We'd expect you to win 60-66+% vs 2 kyus (a stone is roughly 1 standard deviation). So to determine the difference between 50% (from 2 kyu) and 60%, we want a sample size of almost 100 games. Less than that, and the margin of error swamps the difference between the two ranks. Conversely, go to the confidence interval calculator. Plug in, say, 15 games with a win rate of 70%. The +/- % it gives back is 23%. That means, statistically speaking, a 70% win rate is indistinguishable from a 50% win rate with only 15 games. You could get a 70% win rate at 15 games just playing rock-paper-scissors or flipping a coin and it wouldn't be that unusual. We just can't draw any conclusions without a proper sample size of games.

...

I'd love to play you, but win or lose wouldn't necessarily convince me one way or another. There's a prolific 4 kyu I play against from automatch on KGS, for instance, that just destroys me over and over again. He has like a 80% win rate against me over 11 games. If we remember the sample size thing I talked about above, even those 11 games isn't really enough to know if he's stronger or weaker. It's within the margin of error of 50%. We could do a series, if you want, though. The goal, to be statistically significant, is to win at least games * .5 + sqrt(games) games. The winner is statistically significantly better than the other player. That can be a lot of games, though (it easily reaches dozens of games for almost evenly matched players), and most of my friends get mad at me when I suggest that instead of "best 2 out of 3".

Anyway, yeah, hit me up on KGS. It's a long weekend for me so I'll be on a lot in the next few days. I'll add you as a friend and see if you're on when I am.

illluck · **#27**

I find it a bit amusing that less than 1k problems is considered "hard to believe". As Karaklis says, progress is dependent on a lot of factors. Problems is not a necessary condition for reaching 1d. If anything, I think the number of games played is more meaningful, but even there different players have very different rates of progress. I probably played more than 2k games before hitting 1d, whereas someone with about 700 is almost dan (and surely there are players who reach dan in significantly fewer games).

hailthorn011 · **#28**

Self-Review Game #2:

Let me begin by saying that I enjoyed this game very much. But it was marred by mistakes.

1. Still playing too fast.
2. Failure to recognize Big Moves

Black could have won this if not for a few critical errors which I point out to the best of my ability.

OtakuViking · **#29**

A few quick comments.

Move 7. I understand why you played K16, but O17 already reduces whites potential with that opening. Maybe approach the 4-4 or make an extension of your own in the middle?

Move 9. Playable, but game variation was weird and not very good. White should C16, then black jumps away. But I would play elsewhere... There are bigger things to consider than invasions.

Move 31. Don't cut if you can't follow it up. You just end up with a weak, useless group that you look after. Better abandon those stones and aim at something else.

move 47. Yes:=)

move 51. WEAK. Jump and continue attack.

...no more time, hope it helped:=)

hailthorn011 · **#30**

OtakuViking wrote:

A few quick comments.

Move 7. I understand why you played K16, but O17 already reduces whites potential with that opening. Maybe approach the 4-4 or make an extension of your own in the middle?

Move 9. Playable, but game variation was weird and not very good. White should C16, then black jumps away. But I would play elsewhere... There are bigger things to consider than invasions.

Move 31. Don't cut if you can't follow it up. You just end up with a weak, useless group that you look after. Better abandon those stones and aim at something else.

move 47. Yes:=)

move 51. WEAK. Jump and continue attack.

...no more time, hope it helped:=)

Thanks for the comments! As for your comment on Move 31, I completely agree. Cutting there was a bad decision that hurt me quite a bit in end game.

Eizero · **#31**

okay I'll just give one comment. It is bad to save those two stones at move 29. Those stones are not important.

shapenaji · **#32**

Move 11, what's the rush to settle in the corner? there's barely any room for you there. Learn to play that stone lightly. Consider tenuki-ing from that initial play or jumping out. It leaves aji there later either way, and you can invade when it won't give him a massive useful wall.

EDIT: H15, for example, would make sense

Marcus · **#33**

A few comments to add to the advice given above. Caveat to all this advice, be prepared to fail a lot until things start to make sense. I'm a big fan of jumping in and trying new things, and failing a lot to gain experience.

First, concerning your cut at 31 and, more importantly, the follow up. I think cutting wasn't a big issue, even if it was a mistake. The issue began at move 35, where you activated that stone without a plan.

Advice #1: Don't activate stones without a plan.

You touch on this a few times in this thread, where you talk about moving too quickly. I'd like to see you take this a bit further: Identify less important stones (this is the hard part), and leave them alone. When you move without a plan, you make it easy on your opponent. Instead, make your opponent worry about what that unimportant stone COULD do later in the game (or he could spend a move eliminating the threat, which is probably better for you anyways).

Next, Move 63. This is an opportunity to play a double hane (see here). In this case, you would play M15 instead of M16. Learning when you can do this will give you one more tool in your bat-belt.

Move 75 ... read, then cut at P15. White can't hold you in anymore, and P15 threatens the follow-up cut at Q13. I guess my advice here is, check your safety, double-check, then cut. If you read wrong, so be it. Seems like a lot of the time you play a little too safe.

Along the same lines as above:

Move 133 - read, then cut at H7
Move 139 - read, then play F7 (some interesting lines here to read for practice)

=================================

About go problems ...

I haven't done any, at least not formally or thoroughly. I've played around with some on occasion, but I don't solve them as practice.

For me (and I stress that this is not true of everyone), playing is FAR more effective for learning Tesuji, Life & Death, and Shape.

So Numsgil, why am I KGS 2k? (or 3k, if I'm honest; I'm not consistent enough to really lay claim to the 2k I've been awarded). I don't think problems really are the panacea you seem to claim. Everyone learns differently, and the right balance is personal.

hailthorn011 · **#34**

As I have noted before, this game is another prime example of playing far too fast. You don't see it at the beginning, but towards the end I started playing fast again and I ended up losing a lot of points as a result. And this was a Simultaneous game. I was among five of his opponents. The disappointing facts are that I was the only one who lost. I had 3 stones AND a concentration advantage, and I still lost. Since initially reaching 7k (I've lost it since) I'm 0-4. I reckon 3 of those games were well within range, but I lost them because of the pace at which I play.

This may sound like a dumb question, but what is the best way to remedy playing too fast?

Note: This game was not self-reviewed.

Eizero · **#35**

I do not know the remedy of playing too fast because I often play too slow. :p

I`ll just give some comments:

I think c17 for black is a lot better than c16.

*(I think this is the most important) When white plays l2 you should block it, white has to spend an extra move to live with that group while you cut off his weak group.

Also move 54 is almost like passing, black is quite thick there.

I think you`re too concentrated on territory. Most of the time white overplays in handicap games. You should focus on pressuring white as much as possible. You did not really give white a hard time at all.

edit: For example black 64 at m11 is just taking a small point of territory. Instead of that move maybe invade between the two white stones.

schultz · **#36**

hailthorn011 wrote:

This may sound like a dumb question, but what is the best way to remedy playing too fast?

A couple suggestions I've heard:
- (Literally) sit on your hands while you think
- Turn your mouse upside down, takes a second to turn it back over when you want to move
- Put something on top of your mouse (a book, piece of paper, etc.); you'll have to move it which will also slow you down

My biggest suggestion beyond actual physical tricks - keep this thought in mind over your next few games. Go into the game with this as your objective - to play slower. Whenever you're about to make a move, stop and think about other moves (I've heard some people suggest forcing yourself to think about 2-3 more options unless the answer is an obvious atari situation).

I'd play around with some of these different options and see how they work for you. Maybe one will help get you into the habit of slowing down and playing at a pace that is more in-line with what you want to do.

hailthorn011 · **#37**

schultz wrote:

hailthorn011 wrote:

This may sound like a dumb question, but what is the best way to remedy playing too fast?

A couple suggestions I've heard:
- (Literally) sit on your hands while you think
- Turn your mouse upside down, takes a second to turn it back over when you want to move
- Put something on top of your mouse (a book, piece of paper, etc.); you'll have to move it which will also slow you down

My biggest suggestion beyond actual physical tricks - keep this thought in mind over your next few games. Go into the game with this as your objective - to play slower. Whenever you're about to make a move, stop and think about other moves (I've heard some people suggest forcing yourself to think about 2-3 more options unless the answer is an obvious atari situation).

I'd play around with some of these different options and see how they work for you. Maybe one will help get you into the habit of slowing down and playing at a pace that is more in-line with what you want to do.

Thanks for the advice! I'll definitely have to give these tactics a shot!

hailthorn011 · **#38**

This is a game I played with Marcus, as you can see. He decided to go with the Kobayashi fuseki. This was my first encounter with the opening, so I wasn't really sure how to respond to it and that ended up costing me severely. However, I decided to do a bit of study on it because of that. I checked Sensei's Library and a pattern database.

The pattern database I used gave me this situation:

However, I wasn't sure if this was accurate or not thus far. I'm trying to study this fuseki as I'm sure it's going to start coming up more and more frequently. And if my game with Marcus is any indication, I need to study it as much as possible. Well this and the Chinese fuseki.

So, I decided this week to reserve a decent amount of time studying fuseki and all their variations.

For this one though, what do y'all think? Does it seem good or not. The possible moves for Black are labeled by importance from A onward, A being the supposed best choice, of course. I'm not trying to doubt it, but I'm suspicious.

hailthorn011 · **#39**

I'll begin by saying that yes, I used very little time in this game, and I didn't try and make myself slow down in this game. I played with my traditional instinct style. However, I ended up destroying White in this game. This does go against my newfound goal of playing with patience, but this game really has me wondering if I play better in my traditional style or by playing slow. I don't really know.

However, I'm definitely not going to abandon playing slow altogether. I know there are definitely times when it is best to sit back and really get a good look at the board, but I don't think I should spend more than a minute on every single move. That's just me though. When I played Marcus, I used a lot of time. He ended up giving me more time because I had used a lot of it up, but using that time hadn't really benefited me too much.

Either way, I really need to improve if I'm going to be ready for the Meijin Qualifiers on KGS in 8 days! I can't wait!

schultz · **#40**

hailthorn011 wrote:

I'll begin by saying that yes, I used very little time in this game, and I didn't try and make myself slow down in this game. I played with my traditional instinct style. However, I ended up destroying White in this game. This does go against my newfound goal of playing with patience, but this game really has me wondering if I play better in my traditional style or by playing slow. I don't really know.

However, I'm definitely not going to abandon playing slow altogether. I know there are definitely times when it is best to sit back and really get a good look at the board, but I don't think I should spend more than a minute on every single move. That's just me though. When I played Marcus, I used a lot of time. He ended up giving me more time because I had used a lot of it up, but using that time hadn't really benefited me too much.

Either way, I really need to improve if I'm going to be ready for the Meijin Qualifiers on KGS in 8 days! I can't wait!

This is always a fine balance - using your time. And that's one of the reasons in my post above that I said to play around with it and find something that you are comfortable with.

One of the big things to realize/learn is when you need to spend time reading, and when you can get away with playing faster. Easier said than done! (And I'm terrible at it, by the way.) In normal games I have a tendency to play way too slowly. This drags games out and I'd probably benefit from getting myself to play a bit faster.

Speaking to playing fast - your opponent in that game was also playing faster than you. So the only real conclusion I can get from that is you are better than him at fast games - not necessarily better in fast games all together. For some semi-related anecdotal evidence: when I play my friends in (face-to-face) blitz games, I normally trounce them (apparently my reading is better at them when we're all blitzing like crazy men). When we play slower games, though, I have really close games with no "guaranteed" winner. So, your mileage may vary.

No Longer Blindly Reaching

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