Life In 19x19

Some comments on the last game:

Highlights

29 - don't miss chances to force your opponent into bad shape
49 - don't play elsewhere if the stability of major stones is still at stake
65, 69, 73 - contact moves are for offering an exchange, or mutual strengthening, not for attack
93: cut & connect are basics of strategy
132: an overview of the endgame
150: notice how Black lost the endgame
179: bad reading, as you say
207: loss of concentration, as you say

You made a good analysis: bad reading and lack of concentration are two of the most common reasons for losing (next to poor time management and loss of confidence).

How to train reading?

- start out by forcing yourself to read 3 moves deep, EVERY move. This is not needed in the long run, when you'll start reading longer patterns at SOME moves, but at the start this is a good habit
- practice easy reading problems in books
- ladders are good training material

How to train concentration?

- accept that blunders at the end cause losses and no brilliant move in the opening forces the win
- remind yourself to become even more concentrated towards the end. usually we exhaust ourselves in the beginning
- concentrate on number of liberties chains have; count them regularly

Full review

Can I ask you how you make your diagrams?

All by hand.

Cho Chikun' s encyclopedia of L&D

No doubt that's great fun for years to come;
do you already have Graded Go Problems for Beginners, vol. 1-4 ?

EdLee wrote:do you already have Graded Go Problems for Beginners, vol. 1-4 ?

I'd skip volume 1 after 15k. But yes, this.

sparky314 wrote:

EdLee wrote:do you already have Graded Go Problems for Beginners, vol. 1-4 ?

I'd skip volume 1 after 15k. But yes, this.

Yes this what?

Probably Sparky seconding the recommendation to get the books.

I'll second doing Cho Chikun's Elementary to practice reading (looks like you already are) - it really gets a lot easier as you go along since your internal "pattern library" grows and you can more quickly recognise how the situations transpose into ones you already know how to solve.

Knotwilg wrote:Yes this what?

"This." in internet-speak means "I agree."

Yes, seconding the recommendation for the Graded Go Problems series.

I'd also add 1001 L&D and Get Strong at Tesuji in between vol 3 and 4 of the Graded Go Problems.

Thanks for the review and training recommendation Knotwilg

Edlee, I don't have graded go problems so for now I'll stick with cho chikun.


Yesterday I read for the second time chapter 2 of Lessons in the fundamental of go by Toshiro Kageyama and tried to apply this my games of today. I lost one against a 5k but haven't commented on it yet so I'll post it later. The game I post here is against a 13k on KGS. I tried to maintain connections and cut his stones and I think I did well. It was really weird though because I didn't really read anything in this game but ended up ok.



I think he lost because he was overly aggressive in many cases. Many times he chose to atari instead of extending his stone. Also I think I start to grasp a bit the idea of influence. It might not be obvious to others but I feel that before I just surrounded an area and hoped for it not to be invaded while now I realize that not everything will be mine and only use the threat of a huge area to steer the game in a direction I like.

I would like to learn about territory though so I'll force myself to play 3-4 in the opening and watch territorial players.

Hi Laer,

R14.

J3.

P3, you kick B, stands up to o4, then you jump to Q6. Attack.

My only comment, after skimming the game quickly, is that you played much better than a 13k level. Your own comments indicate that you have the right mindset to improve, too. Keep up the good work!

You won this game but there will be other games where your opponent makes an outrageous attempt to live inside solid central territory like yours and if they succeed, will take everything: the corner & sides AND your carefully crafted centre.

After 108, you basically play a "shape game" where you don't have to worry about your surrounding stones, which are rock solid, and can concentrate exclusively on White's eyeshape.

At 158, Black is fully alive and he shouldn't have been.

Replay the game and kill Black between these moves. Keep him to 1 eye. Even 0 eyes should be feasible in this position.

Exercise: http://senseis.xmp.net/?ShapeGame

It has been a long time since I posted here due to time constraints but I am back!

Since last time, I've been to a Go week end where I had the opportunity to lose to a lot of stronger players. It is quite taxing to only play handicap games since even when you're winning you are expecting a trick that will make you lose. But in the end it showed me some moves I never played so it's good. Also I definitely reached my 100 defeats so I can move on to my next goal.

I have started cho chikun L&D and I am around 250 but so far I don't notice any improvement in my games.

EdLee, thanks for the comments as always. AS for the cutting and connecting, I'm still trying to cut everything and hopefully in the future I'll see when it is important and when it is not

dfan, thank you but given the number of 9 stones handicap games I lost to player around 8kuys I am not sure

Knotwilg, this is clearly a problem in my games, I hope Cho Chikun L&D will help me with that.

Here is a game I played today against a 15k in IGS.



Once again, I let him capture a group and live. I think the lesson to take home is to simplify the board whenever I had what I wanted so he cannot make a comeback. However I think I used his weak group appropriately. I chased him to gain territory on the upper side and win. So really I think his mistake was to be too careless with his central group.

As always, comments are welcomed

It has been such a long time since I posted in my journal!

I have been pretty busy the whole month so I dedicated much less time to go. However since I was exposed to new concept just before I think it gave me the opportunity to assimilate the knowledge and I kept improving. It is incredible how a simple concept can increase your strength. The only thing I changed in my game was asking myself 2 questions:
1) do I have a weak group that need protection?
2) does my opponent have a weak group that I can attack?
If yes, I defend/attack and if not I just play a big point.

I completely misjudged my ability to do tsumego on my way to work and it has been a month since I solved one. Despite this, I am doing pretty well for now but it will probably soon be a limiting factor in my progression so I'll just fix myself an objective of 10 tsumego each day and see how it goes.

Recently I also entered my first tournament as a 15kyu and did pretty well with 4 win and 1 loss. I got crushed by a 14kyu but the good news is that he noted each move and will send me the kifu so I'll be able to review this game. For any beginner wondering if they should enter a tournament, I absolutely recommend it. It's a great opportunity to improve and to really think about each move during a game. And after that you can always have advice on your game and make friends with other go player in the area.


To finish this entry, here is a game I played today against a 13k on IGS. Time setting was 10min for 15 stones I think.



I think I was lucky to win, I often chose the wrong direction and let him have a huge territory on the sides. Recently all my games looked like this. I build a huge moyo and let him have the corners and often win. As always, comments are welcomed.

Oh also I started playing on tygem and fox and I really think this is helping me improve. Each server has a style of play so you have the occasion to make sure you are improving and not just finding a style that is particularly suited to a server.

Time to update my journal as I just achieved 13k on IGS.
I had a hard time winning recently but I guess it is good, it will give me plenty of things to think about. Speaking of things to think about, here is my last game. It was against a 13k+ with no komi and I lost by 0.5. I am really puzzled by this game because for the entire game I thought I was winning and I don't really feel like I made big mistakes like I usually do. Any comments to help me understand my loss will be greatly appreciated.



As for tsumego, books are not really practical so I try doing 10 problems at goproblems.com each day but it doesn't seem to be doing much.