Life In 19x19

Hi everyone,

I'm looking for a modern introduction to joseki. I'm around 10k EGF and I haven't really studied joseki that much. Of course I could still pick up "38 Basic Joseki" by James Davies, but I'm guessing a lot has changed since 1973; or at least that's the impression I get when reading recent commentaries by professionals. Even "The 21st Century Dictionary of Basic Joseki" by Takao Shinji might be outdated, since it was written in the pre-AI era.

My question is twofold: should I care about new ideas around josekis as proposed by AI (and professionals)? And if so, which place would be a good place to start? AlphaGo Teach seems interesting, but I'm not sure how to use it without commentaries, as to get an impression behind the underlying ideas.

Cheers!

Even "The 21st Century Dictionary of Basic Joseki" by Takao Shinji might be outdated, since it was written in the pre-AI era.

It is, however...

should I care about new ideas around josekis as proposed by AI (and professionals)?

• (*)Human sequences like those in Takao still have very useful local shapes and techniques ;
• Superhuman engines are superior to humans in many aspects, especially in global evaluations ;
• Study what you find most enjoyable and fun ( and useful, for you ) ;
• Very important aspects of kyu level studies: fighting skills -- see (*) above ;

Thank you for your answer, EdLee!

Do you think Davies' book is still useful? I'm not aiming for memorizing joseki, since I find the ideas behind the patterns much more interesting (the fun part). I'm just looking for a reasonable introduction that will help me feel more confident playing corners sequences. However, I'd like to avoid playing josekis that most people deem bad these days.

I don't think there is an English dictionary featuring post-AI joseki (yet). (There must be plenty in other languages.) Your best bet at this point for English-language content is probably videos, although they're kind of scattered around. The New York Institute of Go has some joseki videos, for example, but I think the modern variations are geared more towards stronger players.

In any case, even at 10k I think it's worth knowing the basics of some of the new ideas, like the early 3-3 invasion and attach-and-hane to the star point, if only because some of your opponents will play them.

Hi Jæja,

Do you think Davies' book is still useful?

My personal opinion is the most important aspect of kyu level studies is fighting skills.
As such, I recommend anything that helps you improve your fighting skills, even joseki books written 200 years ago; specifically, the parts where they teach you good local techniques.

As for global evaluations of a particular move you're interested in, ask superhuman engines, which are widely available these days.

@Jæja: I am 7k EGF, so around the same level as you. The book "38 basic josekis" won't cover some of the recent variations, and covers many josekis that are never played at our level. On the other hand, at our level, very few josekis are needed, probably less than 20. Each time my opponent deviates from the variations I know, I have a look at josekipedia.com, or explore variations with LeelaZero, I think that's enough.

However, if you are not very familiar with 3-3 invasions, you may want to have a look at the page
https://senseis.xmp.net/?44Point33InvasionJoseki

since they are frequently played in modern games.

So many good suggestions in such a short time. You are amazing!

I didn't know about Josekipedia and I'll definitely check that out.

I also have some recommendations, although it's deviating from the original topic (books ):

Go Pro Yeonwoo's lesson on the attach and hane joseki
Young (Sun Yoon 8p) Baduk Cafe has a many interesting videos, many of them discussing joseki.

I'm happy to hear more suggestions

You should care.

And I share my personal joseki dictonary. There are exactly 4 josekis in it. (Black moves first in every corner).

Click Here To Show Diagram Code

[go]$$B
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$$ | . . . X . . . . . . . . . . . . O . . |
$$ | . . . , . . . . . , . . . . . X . . . |
$$ | . . O . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . |
$$ | . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . |
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$$ | . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . |
$$ | . . . , . . . . . , . . . . . , . . . |
$$ | . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . |
$$ | . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . |
$$ | . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . |
$$ | . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . |
$$ | . . . X . . . . . . . . . . . . X . . |
$$ | . . . , . . . . . , . . . . . , . . . |
$$ | . . O . . . . . . . . . . . . . O . . |
$$ | . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . |
$$ | . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . |
$$ ---------------------------------------[/go]

Lower right is not well known to the pros

The joseki dictionary of our time is called Lizzie (Long name Lizzie & Leela Zero & KataGo, just download a current version of Lizzie to get them all)

I'm a big fan of using AI to try learn and evaluate Corner patterns.
That said, one of the key themes is that AI are really good at playing consistently with a whole board situation. I find it liberating - don't always worry if a move is "joseki" or not, just make sure that your reason for playing it makes sense in relation to the rest of the board.
When studying joseki I'd say these reasons are at least 10x more important than the sequences.

I would look for a combination of resources. Davies is okay - there's some brief comments on the reasons behind moves, but josekipedia (pretty excellent) will likely tell you that many of the sequences have fallen out of favour.

There is a go saying,

Learn joseki, lose two stones.

OC, that's not exactly true, but playing by rote is not a good idea. To quote my late wife:

At some point, doesn't thinking have to go on?

OC, over time you will pick up good ideas about how to play certain situations. That's all you really need, in the joseki department.

One problem with learning joseki is that players often fail to play elsewhere in time. In fact, you sometimes hear players talk about coming back to a corner "to finish the joseki," as though they hadn't already finished it.

IMX, which spans decades, the best use for me for joseki books was in reviewing my own games and finding out how to play positions I had messed up or was unsure about. Today, we don't have any joseki books we can trust to tell us how to play such positions, but we do have AI programs that can point out probably mistakes (even they are not perfect ) and suggest other ways to play. Furthermore, unlike most joseki books, they take the whole board into account. Also, joseki books do not always have the mistakes your opponent might make and, thus, they don't say how to deal with those mistakes. No problem for the bots.

Don't worry about joseki books, use KataGo or Leela Zero or other bots.

Just another tip: you can scroll through the first 50 or 100 moves on go4go. I was speaking with a Chinese ama 5-dan at our club and he was a big fan of updating his brain's joseki knowledge from clicking through all the games that appeared on the website that day. That will also give you ideas on how the josekis are continued in the context of the whole board. You will also bolster your feeling of shapes this way too.

Instead of 38 Basic Joseki, consider Easy Learning: Joseki but it is also pre-AI. For AI, also study 3-3 under 4-4 josekis.

Online-Go Joseki has a 'Current' tag that is for joseki played post-AI.

In actual analyzing soon you will have to use a combination of AI and Josekipedia (much more variations than the online go joseki dictionary)

RobertJasiek wrote:Instead of 38 Basic Joseki, consider Easy Learning: Joseki but it is also pre-AI. For AI, also study 3-3 under 4-4 josekis.

That book sounds interesting and the reviews are favorable. I only noticed while writing this reply that you're the author Do you know a good place where I can pick up the book online?

emerus wrote:Online-Go Joseki has a 'Current' tag that is for joseki played post-AI.

That's a very nice suggestion! I'm a huge fan of OGS, but I hadn't checked out the joseki explorer. The people behind OGS are excellent developers I'll definitely give it a try.

Gomoto wrote:In actual analyzing soon you will have to use a combination of AI and Josekipedia (much more variations than the online go joseki dictionary)

That position looks so scary