How to play less passively?

[Fadedsun]

Hi everyone,

New to the forum, but not to Go. I've been playing and learning for a little over a year now. I've spent most of my time playing off-line go with a friend of mine who taught me the ropes. One thing he most commented on is that I play too passively. I even took one of those 'What is your Go style' quizzes and got "passive" as well.

Now, I've read some articles here and there, and also watched some lectures on invasions, but I'm still finding it hard to find the right time to invade, how to attack stones, or if I can even live in a certain area that I would chose to invade at all. But I do know sometimes it's a good plan to sacrifice a stone or two in order to invade.

Currently, I'm reading Kageyama's "Lessons in the Fundamentals of Go" and I'm finding it's helping me somewhat, but I haven't found anything in particular about invasion or attacking in the book. However, I'm currently recalling a passage in the book where he's looking at the whole board during the middle game and trying to find the right move for black to play. It happened to be an invasion in the corner, actually, and he says "First of all, you have to be able to find black 1". Well, that's fair, but he doesn't explain HOW I should change my thought process in order to find these well placed moves.

Any thoughts and experiences from other players that have had similar problems?

Thanks!

[Calvin Clark]

It's probably best to post a game to see if we agree that being less passive is what you need.

Before we get into whether attacking or invasion is a good idea, the usual reason a stronger player may say your play is passive is that you may have the common habit of following your opponent around. In other words, you may be continuing locally, answering your opponent's gote moves as if they were sente. To break that habit is not easy, but it can be done with practice. One thing you can try as an experiment is to try to play each move in the opening in a different quadrant of the board, no matter where your opponent plays. For the first 50 moves or so, the board is often so open that one doesn't incur much of a loss from doing this. Just decide ahead of time:

1st move: upper left quadrant
2nd move: upper right quadrant
3rd move: lower right quadrant
4th move: lower left quadrant
5th move: upper left quadrant
etc.

This will infuriate your opponent. That's okay. Do not worry about whether you win or lose. I can pretty much guarantee at your level that if you lose, it is not because you are doing this.

I should emphasize that this is an exercise and not a general strategy. It actually is often better to answer your opponent's moves when they are thank you moves. So a possible next stage in the exercise would be to make exceptions for your opponent's thank you moves. (There will be many of those. Try not to play them yourself. )

There are of course books on invasion and on attack and defense. These skills take a lot of time and practice and a teacher can definitely help. You may see in a book that "white should be able to live by invading here" and then try the same invasion in your own game and die. You may also try completely unreasonable invasions and live if your opponent can't find the refutation. This is part of what makes go hard.

[Kirby]

I was like this when I was around 7k. Someone said I was too passive, and even if cutting the opponent or trying to kill worked, I didn't try it.

So for awhile, I just threw caution to the wind (is that a phrase?), and cut whenever I had the chance. I didn't worry about dying, and just went for it. The idea was to gain experience with this type of aggression to see (and feel) what could be done.

I don't know if it's good advice to do this - probably it's good to read and make rational decisions. But I think it was a good experience to go crazy for awhile.

Sometimes, nowadays, I am too crazy or too aggressive.

Anyway, good luck.

[cyndane]

Go proverb: If you cut enough, something will die.

Unfortunately it might be you

[EdLee]

Hi Fadedsun,

Welcome.

As Calvin suggested, have your games reviewed; example: post a game here.

[Abyssinica]

I have this same problem, and even when I try to be aggressive people still say I'm too passive.

[Bill Spight]

One thing he most commented on is that I play too passively. I even took one of those 'What is your Go style' quizzes and got "passive" as well.

Now, I've read some articles here and there, and also watched some lectures on invasions, but I'm still finding it hard to find the right time to invade, how to attack stones, or if I can even live in a certain area that I would chose to invade at all. But I do know sometimes it's a good plan to sacrifice a stone or two in order to invade.

Many players, when they think of being more aggressive or less passive, think about invading and living. In a way that makes sense, because if you take away all of your opponent's territory you win. But when people say that a player is being too passive, they mean that he is too concerned with making life, too concerned with holding on to territory, and not taking advantage of the opportunities to attack and kill.

Sakata wrote a great series of books aimed at kyu players, the Killer of Go series. A couple of them were translated into English. In the first voluem, The Killer of Go, he mentions the passivity that players often show to their teachers, who give them handicaps. Sakata says that you should try to kill the teacher's stones. Yes, the result will often be that your stones get killed, but in a handicap game the White stones are initially weak and potentially killable, and trying to kill them will often be correct, and will give you the opportunity to learn from your mistakes. Sakata also recommends life and death problems, but again, mainly with the idea of learning how to kill. Once you learn how to kill, you will understand pretty well how to attack, and how not to play passively.

My suggestion is to take handicaps of 5 or more stones, and come out swinging.

Good luck!

[RobertJasiek]

I'm still finding it hard to find the right time to invade, how to attack stones, or if I can even live in a certain area that I would chose to invade at all.

This is hard not only at your level but at all levels. OC there are principles for it, such as

Invade before the opponent can enclose his moyo.

Attack if you get an advantage or the fight is fair. An advantage can, e.g., be new territory or new influence, (and you will learn about influence only later).

Living in a region presumes prior verification by reading. (This is hard and above your current level. However, the following helps a bit.) The first invasion stone should have at least two follow-up directions (so that the opponent cannot prevent all of them).

An invasion group has to live.

I'm reading Kageyama's "Lessons in the Fundamentals of Go" and I'm finding it's helping me somewhat, but I haven't found anything in particular about invasion or attacking in the book.

If you want more specific literature, ask in the Go Books subforum. Obviously, you also need to improve life and death reading.

[wineandgolover]

If you want more specific literature, ask in the Go Books subforum. Obviously, you also need to improve life and death reading.

Robert, I've knocked you for self-promotion before. Let me take this opportunity to compliment you for your approach in this thread. Well done!

[John Fairbairn]

It is true that pro teachers often have to chide their amateur pupils for being too passive. But the remedy is not to become "aggressive", which seems to be almost the universal western response.

The Japanese term used most often is that you need to have a sekkyokuteki (i.e. positive) attitude. (And again 'attitude' is important - you have to be prepare to be positive for the duration, not just the next move or two.)

Furthermore, 'attack' in Japanese go is 'semeru', which is related to 'semaru', and this is also a very, very common term in go. It even has the status of a technical term. It means 'to put pressure on', and in this is a big clue to the true meaning of attack in go. It is not (except in extremis) the Highland charge favoured by so many western players. It is the gradual pressure of the boa constrictor. When you are playing a handicap game with a teaching pro, your goal is to pressure him by ensuring you always having more stones in a given area than the pro. Obviously you need to go beyond that and learn how to resist when he attempts to negate your numerical superiority by making your stones overconcentrated, and you need to be able to apply the coup de grâce when the time comes, but pressure must come first. Pressure can have other rewards. You may cause him to end up overconcentrated, or you may gain valuable points by means of ijime (bullying - picking up points with a series of free forcing plays).

To put this in a glib way: Western generals believe in shock and awe. Oriental generals believe in awe and shock. Therein lies the meaning of Chinese shi, which western military men are still wrestling with. And surely it makes sense that an Oriental game would be designed to reflect Oriental thinking. Clausewitzism doesn't sit well in go.

[illluck]

As others have mentioned above, the antonym of passive is not necessarily aggressive, but rather active (though playing more actively will tend to result in more aggression as well). Things to try are making an effort to tenuki (play elsewhere) whenever possible (if you are wrong, you will quickly find out that you misread and can learn from it), look for weaknesses in opponent's shape (and make sure not to help your opponent patch up by playing exchanges that strengthen their shape unnecessarily), and maintaining a fighting spirit (if the opponent makes moves that try to bully you, look to see how you can fight back rather than submit).

Edit: Another thing to watch out for is to not accept opponent's decisions as being right by default. If the opponent plays elsewhere, don't assume that he read out that another move is not needed - read carefully and call him out on it if you think you can get an advantage.

[Bill Spight]

Western generals believe in shock and awe. Oriental generals believe in awe and shock.

And then there are those who believe in aw and shucks.

[Bill Spight]

I rarely talk about aggressiveness, but in terms of becoming a "Killer of Go" it seemed appropriate.

For inspiration, here is a handicap game in which White was one of the fiercest fighters of all time. Neither player gave any quarter.

[gowan]

Maybe something to think about is not always "passively" responding and following the opponent around. When your opponent plays, see whether you could play somewhere else. And when your opponent plays and you feel you have to defend, look for a move to play that threatens or leaves a follow-up for yourself. I think this is the sort of thing John Fairbairn spoke of as positive attitude.

[Calvin Clark]

There are times I think there are really only two classes of mistakes in Go: overplay and underplay. One expects too much, the other too little. The causes of both are myriad. A play that appears to be an underplay to a stronger player may, to the actual player, be caused by:

1. Weak reading of the pessimistic sort, causing one to overestimate threats that stronger reading could refute.
2. Bad positional judgement, e.g., thinking one is far ahead and can play conservatively.
3. A misplaced intention to play in a certain "style" without regard to the actual board conditions.
4. Psychological problems such as feeling intimidated by a stronger or more fearsome opponent.
5. Absentmindedly playing a fixed pattern that is too passive for the board situation.
6. Winning games by playing that way.

and many others...

Overplay may be caused by:

1. Weak reading of the optimistic sort: i.e., not reading out your opponent's strongest replies.
2. Bad positional judgement. Thinking you are losing by so much that you have to try something desperate.
3. Being trained by players who constantly overplay, therefore getting the idea that it's normal. (I mention this because some players have shared this experience.)
4. Ego.
5. Tequila.
6. Absentmindedly playing a fixed pattern that asks too much for the position.
7. Having a strong desire to be more aggressive.
8. Poorly formed strategic concepts.
9. Winning games by playing that way.

and many others...


I was recently reviewing "Attacking Vitamins", a Baduk TV series. In it there are a couple of interesting episodes that cover the difference between the way amateurs attack and the way professionals do it. There are comments like: "this attack looks too severe to be that of a professional." I was struck by the number of slow-looking preparatory moves used by pros vs. amateurs in attacking. The teacher (an 8p Korean pro) is funny, and said he asked many pros about attacking and almost everyone said: "it is not my specialty." Which itself is food for thought...