Life In 19x19

Hello, I'm new to this forum and I have a question. I recently played a game of go on a website and I didn't know the rule for designating opposing stones within your territory when the game is being scored. After I designated two groups of my opponent, the game report said I won by about 100 points. Does a group have to have 2 eyes? Does it have to connect with the edges of the board? Please answer this because I don't want to be ripping people off of a good game because I'm accidentally cheating.

Galen

You should remove only "dead" stones, i.e. stones that cannot be saved against capture. All other stones are alive and remain. You should play it out if the situation is not clear to you, in order to determine the "cannot be saved" part. This can be learned quickly from players who have passed beyond the beginner stage.

Territory are then those points that "reach" stones of a given colour.

Click Here To Show Diagram Code

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

For example, this would be a finished game. I mark black territory with 'b' and white with 'w':

Click Here To Show Diagram Code

[go]$$
$$ -----------
$$ | b b X O w |
$$ | b b X O w |
$$ | X b X O w |
$$ | b X O O w |
$$ | b X O w w |
$$ -----------[/go]

The following is unfinished:

Click Here To Show Diagram Code

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

I mark the territory again:

Click Here To Show Diagram Code

[go]$$
$$ -----------
$$ | . . . . . |
$$ | . . X O . |
$$ | X . X O . |
$$ | b X O O . |
$$ | b X O . . |
$$ -----------[/go]

All other points still reach stones of both colours. The players should close off their territory on the top.

galen wrote:Does a group have to have 2 eyes?

Yes. Do you already know, what an eye is?

galen wrote:Does it have to connect with the edges of the board?

No. Two eyes and the group lives.

galen wrote:Does a group have to have 2 eyes?

Sort of. It needs to have the ability to make two eyes. For example:

Click Here To Show Diagram Code

[go]$$
$$ -----------
$$ | . X O . . |
$$ | x X O O O |
$$ | x X O X X |
$$ | . X O X . |
$$ | X X O X O |
$$ | O O O X O |
$$ | . . O X . |
$$ -----------[/go]

In the upper left, black can make two eyes. No matter where white moves, black can play one of the two "x" points and create two eyes. So the upper left is alive.

In the lower right, black cannot split into two eyes. In the lower right, black is dead.

White's group in the middle, meanwhile, has two eyes already, and is alive.

Thanks so much for answering! I understand now. Well by the rules I accidentally cheated against the player I played, the game should have been around a 50 point victory for me instead. We were both beginners and were both confused so this helped me alot! Thanks again!

Galen

The way I like to think of it is that alive/dead is not an extra rule but just a shortcut. It saves you from having to methodically plunk down stones on all the liberties of groups that can't avoid capture anyway. (But of course you can still do that if the players don't agree to the "shortcut".)

EDIT: Whoops, sorry, I didn't notice how old this thread was.

MountainGo wrote:The way I like to think of it is that alive/dead is not an extra rule but just a shortcut. It saves you from having to methodically plunk down stones on all the liberties of groups that can't avoid capture anyway. (But of course you can still do that if the players don't agree to the "shortcut".)

EDIT: Whoops, sorry, I didn't notice how old this thread was.

Unfortunately you can't do than in japanese/territory rules without losing points. You need to use hypothetical play there.

Helel wrote:I can see some people spending years there!

I don't see who you're referring to...