Life In 19x19

Hello all! I decided to post a study journal here to organize my thoughts, obtain input and encouragement from others, and put a direct goal forward for my go progress. I started playing Go around April of 2011, played on and off for a while, and essentially gave it up almost entirely by September. Recently, I started playing more seriously and rediscovered the beauty and excitement that first made me interested in the game. Now, I want to focus my studies and actively work toward a goal. In September, I will be relocating to a city with a strong local go club where most of the members are 6 kyu or higher; I'd like to reach around that strength before I go there:

Current level (May 10, 2012): 10-11 kyu KGS
Goal: stable 6-7 kyu KGS
Timeline: by September 2012 (about 3.5 months)

I use the word "stable" because, as Kageyama notes, amateur ranks fluctuate so intensely. Maybe when I'm clear-headed and feeling well, I'll play at an 8 kyu level or better; and then the other day I didn't even notice that a group of my stones had been put in atari. This fluctuation is interesting and teaches me a lot about go and myself, but as I make it to 6-7 kyu, I want to focus on pruning away these repeated mistakes and lending some stability to my strength.

Method:

My biggest mistake early on in learning go was thinking that simply by playing games and reading books like Kageyama, I would become stronger. I never considered doing go problems, tesuji, or anything like that. Since starting over in April, I have begun doing these problems and work in earnest. I've completed Graded Go volumes 1 and 2, and will now work on:

Tsumego/tesuji: Graded Go Problems, volume 3 (all problems) (421)
SmartGo Kifu problems, levels 10 kyu - 6 kyu (all) (several hundred)
Get Strong at Tesuji, all problems (524)

A total of about 1400 problems, coming to about 15-20 problems per day for a three month period.
I plan on doing tsumego for 1.5 hours each day, and tesuji problems for 1.5 hours each day.

Studying: -"Opening Theory Made Easy"
-"Attack and Defense"

Playing: 5 serious games/week, and trying to post one game here in Game Analysis ever other week or so

Questions:
Life and death. I usually do not spend a long time reading all possible variations, and some times my answers (when I check) are not correct. Alternatively, I can spend a long time - 5 minutes or more - pursuing all possible paths, responses, etc., and doing this my proportion of correct answers goes up a lot. I am not sure which way I should use when I do tsumego problems, as they both seem to have their benefits. Which, in your mind, will help me develop my strength most quickly?

Opening. This phase of the game really bothers me. I almost always complete the opening phase either with a troubling collection of weak groups or being quite a bit behind in territory. I really like reading OTME by Otake Hideo, but I would like suggestions for how to practice what he preaches, or general study suggestions to add to my plan so I can become strong in this area.

Invasions. This is the other part of the game that really gets me. "Do tesuji" and "Do tsumego" doesn't seem to help me too much with this part of go - invading, reducing, and crushing or halting my opponent's invasions into my frameworks. What should I add to my study plan to strengthen this part of my game?

Thank you for any advice. I will try to post a recent game in this thread soon.

I think that 3 hours of problems is to much, especially if You plan to play only 5 serious games per week. I would change the number of serious games to 10-12 and cut on the problems time. Problems are great at improving, but by playing/losing/winning You gain experience, that most probably will be important in the future (I'm playing for 6 months so can't say it for sure ).

Others' experiences may differ. But until 6k or 7k, playing a bunch of games helped me improve the most (and the best improvement-per-hour, I think). I first listed to some of Guo Juan's online lectures around 10k, which led to a burst of improvement (the lectures are not just audio, by the way--a board comes up in the browser, so it is like listening to a lecture on KGS).

For some people 1 hr + for a game is quite difficult to schedule, while 3 hrs of tsumego (in 5 minute chunks, or on the subway) isn't hard at all.

I strongly recommend the (free) WBaduk app for the iPad for problems. I've been extremely impressed by the quality of the problems on it and it has become my go to problem source over the past while now. Don't forget to drill easy problems too though, it helps with ironing out those "putting stones in atari" errors I believe.

Also I've found the paid for EasyGo to be excellent.

I agree with jts, scheduling tsumego is much easier than scheduling real-time games.

I agree with the suggestions about study/game proportions. I will probably do 1 hour tsumego, 1 hour tesuji problems, and 1 serious game each night (perhaps 2 games). It is definitely easier to study rather than play, and sometimes I just don't feel like playing, but I understand at this stage its relative importance.

Boidhre, have you used SmartGo Kifu? It's amazing. When I save up some more iPad app money, I'll look into WBaduk and EasyGo.

Are Guo Juan lectures free? How much do they cost?

I have SmartGo Kifu, I find it very useful but I prefer the problem sets in the other two apps. WBaduk is free, so get that now!

Guo Juan lectures are 1 Euro each for a month or 99 Euro for a year's subscription.

Boidhre wrote:Guo Juan lectures are 1 Euro each for a month or 99 Euro for a year's subscription.

I was confused about this quote at first (I may be the only one), but I see what you mean: You can either pay 1 Euro for each lecture and listen to it for a month. Or you can get a year subscription for 99 Euro and listen to as many lectures as you want.

judicata wrote:

Boidhre wrote:Guo Juan lectures are 1 Euro each for a month or 99 Euro for a year's subscription.

I was confused about this quote at first (I may be the only one), but I see what you mean: You can either pay 1 Euro for each lecture and listen to it for a month. Or you can get a year subscription for 99 Euro and listen to as many lectures as you want.

Yeah, sorry, I was very unclear there.

You don't have much time, but let's say you can improve that fast.

One thing to keep in mind is that the KGS rating system will not keep up with you. See KGS Rating Math on SL.

So you will need to create new accounts.

You don't have much time, but let's say you can improve that fast.

One thing to keep in mind is that the KGS rating system will not keep up with you. See KGS Rating Math on SL.

So you will need to create new accounts.

Snorri, interesting point. I suppose I don't care about my kgs rank too much, only my strength - if I am consistently playing strongly against 7 or 8 kyu players, I will be happy even if my numerical rank is not climbing in proportion.

I know that to get through to SDK and to stabilize my playing strength, I will need to change some fundamental ways of thinking about the game and my moves. Sometimes, when I completing tsumego problems and reading, I am not sure if I'm working the right muscles. Then, playing games and making similar mistakes, I also feel that I'm just practicing bad habits.

How can I snap out of this?

I will look into Guo Juan - but there are SO MANY lectures! Which ones are the best? I don't think I can afford $128+ for a year's subscription right now, but $1.25 / lecture does add up. Any suggestions from kyu players who've gained from these lectures?

Thank you all. I'll be sure to update on my progress.

Snorri. I improved about 2 stones a month when I was kyu until about 3kyu and KGS had no problem keeping up with me. So I think that won't be much of a problem. In the end, when I reached 2k my account got stuck and I had to create a new one to not become a sandbagger so what you're saying is true. But I think he should be fine from 10k to 6k.

As for your questions about how to get better at opening and invasions. Guo Juan has alot of lectures where you do opening problems and she gives you the answers in lectures. I only watched some when I became a dan, but there are 3 levels from beginner to dan level problems. I suggest this if you have a few pennies to spare. (1 euro for 1 lecture, pretty cheap). If this doesn't interest you. I can recommend playing over pro games, preferably on a real board and looking at how they play in the opening. Studying some common openings like Orthodox, chinese and mini-chinese is also a good way of improving fuseki strength. You can find lots of useful lessons on dwyrin's youtube channel, some of these concern themvselves with such common openings. Just search for him on youtube I cba to gief link.

About invasions, my advice is the same. Guo juan lessons, pro game review and reviewing your own games. The most important thing to remember about invasions is that you don't always have to kill it as long as you profit from attacking the invasion. Think of it as transferring territory elsewhere. If he lives in your framework, you build some potential somewhere else which will equal the territory you lost. if he keeps invading everything you create, take a deep breath and look for a way to split his groups and kill one of them. Easy win.


And kudos to studying tsumego and tesuji. It is the best way to improve fast and make your strength real.


Hope this helped.

tchan: Yes, I've read those awesome posts before and I really appreciate your site. I generally stick with the "read out all variations, slowly but surely, until certain of the answer" method, but it does take a lot longer and frustrates me more when I see I've spent an hour studying and only completed 12 or 15 problems. But I will stick with this method as it seems to be best.

nyuubi: Thank you for the words. I am going to stay away from deeply studying pro games for now until I am stronger, but I will definitely take your advice and check them out for opening and how to handle invasions. As for Guo Juan, can you recommend any specific lectures?

For all strong players reading this journal, does this generally match the approach you took to becoming strong?

Again, thank you all.