Life In 19x19

Hello! While I am familar with the game Go itself I am not very savvy about Go equipment. For about the last 10 years or so I've been using this $50 Go set my parents got me from a board game shop. The stones were plastic and the board was foldable.

I decided to get myself some nice stones so I bought myself some decent glass stones from Yellow Mountain Imports' Amazon page. They were Size 31, 8.5mm double convex stones. They arrived today and I pulled out my board to try them out and noticed that they seem to be too big for the grid lines on it! They do not line up right on the points as you begin to place stones next to each other.

At first I thought I had ordered the wrong size stones but after pulling out my plastic stones I noticed how much smaller they were than my glass ones and began to wonder if the problem is actually my board.

I attached a photo to show this size difference. Is the board grid supposed to be a certain size?

I would guess that it's your board that is non-standard. You can find some information about standard board sizes here:

http://senseis.xmp.net/?EquipmentDimensions

or here:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Go_equipment

I hope that helps!

In my experience Go is quite a sloppy game where stones never lay regularly on the lines and intersections, also there usually are enough empty intersections so the stones would just nudge each other a bit here and a bit there when being placed. No idea how this would work on a really crowded board, though, if almost all intersections were occupied.

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Welcome, BTW, and congratulations on the new stones

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Bonobo wrote:In my experience Go is quite a sloppy game where stones never lay regularly on the lines and intersections, also there usually are enough empty intersections so the stones would just nudge each other a bit here and a bit there when being placed. No idea how this would work on a really crowded board, though, if almost all intersections were occupied.

The stones pictured look like they fit far worse than usual (though, yes, stones usually overhang a little in one direction).

miraclekid wrote:At first I thought I had ordered the wrong size stones but after pulling out my plastic stones I noticed how much smaller they were than my glass ones and began to wonder if the problem is actually my board.

The Yellow Mountain has a decent reputation and their stones will conform with the standard size. The problem is your board, I can tell just by looking at it that it that it's a bit small.

Properly sized stones will be around 22 mm in diameter. Sadly I don't know the dimensions of a standard board but unless it's from China it'll be a fraction longer than it is wide.

Erythen wrote:

miraclekid wrote:At first I thought I had ordered the wrong size stones but after pulling out my plastic stones I noticed how much smaller they were than my glass ones and began to wonder if the problem is actually my board.

The Yellow Mountain has a decent reputation and their stones will conform with the standard size. The problem is your board, I can tell just by looking at it that it that it's a bit small.

Properly sized stones will be around 22 mm in diameter. Sadly I don't know the dimensions of a standard board but unless it's from China it'll be a fraction longer than it is wide.

Yes, it does seem to be my board. The lines are about 18.5 - 19 mm apart. The plastic stones are about the same too. The glass stones however are about 22 mm. So as they are laid next to each other on the board the size difference starts to build up and they become more and more displaced as you go.

Welllll I had a new board on my 'next thing to get' list but the one I was looking at isn't available anymore from YMI.

http://amzn.com/B000JMD5NI

It doesn't seem to be on their primary website anymore either. I had picked it because it was within my budget but now, heh, I can't remember how much it originally was. Looks like I'm back to finding an affordable (but decent) board. :/

Thanks for the help though everyone!

tchan001 wrote:http://www.ebay.com/itm/3-4-Bamboo-Go-Game-Set-Reversible-Board-19x19-13x13-/310654303933?pt=Games_US&hash=item4854707ebd

I saw that but I find it odd that all their other eBay listings have free shipping (including similar sized items and also much heavier items) but the shipping for this damaged board is $41.60. It feels like to me they are making up the cost in the shipping which feels a bit dishonest to me. It's also against eBay policy if this is the case. :/

This looked good if you want bamboo; even has a 13x13 on the back side.

http://www.ebay.com/itm/3-4-Reversible- ... f725d#shId

Erythen wrote:This looked good if you want bamboo; even has a 13x13 on the back side.

http://www.ebay.com/itm/3-4-Reversible- ... f725d#shId

Hmmm yes that can be considered...

I also found this:

http://www.thegogamestore.com/bamboo-go ... sible.html

Perhaps it is the photography but I like the look of the eBay one you shared more than this one.

these stones would go nice with your smaller sized board
http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B0026J ... rd_i=typ01

xed_over wrote:these stones would go nice with your smaller sized board
http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B0026J ... rd_i=typ01

Thanks! I'll keep those in mind if I ever want to update the stones for my foldable board however I've already decided to just get a board to match my new stones since I had planned on doing so anyhow.