Re: Memorizing Games of Professionals
Posted: Wed Jan 19, 2011 12:50 pm
Sorry, his kgs id is not mine to give out.
Life in 19x19. Go, Weiqi, Baduk... Thats the life.
https://www.lifein19x19.com/
To me this is incredible. As in, I really need to devote some time to the serious memorization of even one game a week. I have frequently played through pro games before, and I will easily remember the first 100 moves or so on a micro time frame without trying, but definitely I would forget that within 24 hours. To memorize an entire game, and be able to replay it a week or more later, must be an entirely different exercise.serapis wrote:In my first two years of playing go I improved largely by memorizing professional games. I began around 8kyu and by the end of the first year I had reached 1dan. A friend of mine, when reaching a barrier of around 1kyu/1dan or so, took an even more extreme path. He stopped playing any go, only studying/memorizing games for about a year. When he was finished he was about 6dan.
Despite my apparent success with memorizing go games as well as my friend's, I can honestly say that I almost never recommend it. It's a quaint idea while you're thinking about it, but spending day after day, week after week replaying previously memorized games and trying to memorize new ones, is unbelievably difficult and anyone crazy enough to go through with it may start hating the game.
I think that, whatever you do to study, the most important thing is keep your mind open. Through the course of my teaching I've encountered students who weren't really trying to learn new things, rather they were seeking validation that what they knew was correct. Whereas, for me, when studying, it's always been essential to keep in mind that everything i know can be wrong.
I wonder if he was also doing tsumego in that year.serapis wrote:He stopped playing any go, only studying/memorizing games for about a year. When he was finished he was about 6dan.
It's true that nothing is proven. But, I have heard of lots of examples of people getting to 1-2 dan in a year through various means, but I have never heard of anyone anywhere gaining 6 dan ranks in a year. The scale of such an achievement is incomparable to making 1 dan in any amount of time.entropi wrote:These individual examples may be true but they do not prove anything. There are also people reaching shodan within one year by playing blitz. Maybe the guy hitting 6d just by memorizing would improve anyway also by playing or just by tsumego.
You are doing many "implicit" tsumego when you study games seriously, maybe there is no need for extra tsumego then. (Can he cut here? Oh no this prevents it indirectly by threatening this exchange. Why does he play here? Oh, otherwise the corner dies.)Dusk Eagle wrote:I wonder if he was also doing tsumego in that year.serapis wrote:He stopped playing any go, only studying/memorizing games for about a year. When he was finished he was about 6dan.
Possibly. If you believe in the "never look at the answers" school of tsumego study, then pretty much any position is a tsumego. I guess it's a question of mental discipline.tapir wrote:You are doing many "implicit" tsumego when you study games seriously, maybe there is no need for extra tsumego then. (Can he cut here? Oh no this prevents it indirectly by threatening this exchange. Why does he play here? Oh, otherwise the corner dies.)
This is a significant part of what got me from 22k to 5k. I found the biggest and quickest advancements in the high DDK (of course), but it makes sense. You're primarily developing your intuition for the Fuseki, Joseki, and Attack & Defense when "memorizing" pro games. This is a huge advantage over your 22k opponent, while only a minor advantage at, say, 8k - when you both know a decent amount about the beginning stages of the game.malweth wrote:I'm a fan of the memorization method of study. Never long term memorization, and ramping up with rank.
- Beginners, play through games quickly without memorization.
- Mid DDK, memorize until the first major fight (typically the spot where you can't remember the next move after more than one pass). (first 20-50 moves)
- Low DDK, memorize the opening and early fighting (first 50-100 moves).
- High SDK, memorize until big yose.
- Mid SDK, memorize until big yose, read well commented games (Appreciating famous games was my favorite).
- Low SDK (and up?), memorize and analyze. Use kifu instead of SGF to improve visualization.
load specific game, date and players and what game, make people guess their next move.daniel_the_smith wrote:Hm, you all are making me want to add features to my website...
I think a lot depends on what you come to a forum for and how you use it. If you're here to goof off, then it won't help your go, although the fun may have a value, but if you're here to mine for ideas and insights, to ask questions and, not least, to help others out, then there may be a lot of gains to be had here.Knotwilg wrote:I know of no person who became great in his art by lurking around on the Internet. There are some truly exceptional people out there, who became absolutely fantastic at what they do. If we want to mimic them, coming here is one of the first things to stop doing.