Life In 19x19

Positional judgement has often been cited as a skill that certain players have, Cho Chikun and Yi Changho for example. I wonder if there have been any specific strategies to counter positional judgement skills, much as there have been many strategies to counter strong local reading. Also I expect that a player who was good at counting would intentionally obfuscate and make counting harder, are there any especially good ways to make counting more difficult?

I would have to guess that one of the hardest to count is when there are many groups which are not completely alive but almost impossible to kill. With such groups it is really hard to know how much territory they will final cover.

So I think that if you don't settle shapes and have lots of small fights it will be very difficult for most people.

Do you work from a template for these posts, Smooth? Have you noticed that every time, people just scratch their heads and say "that doesn't make sense?"

SmoothOper wrote:Positional judgement has often been cited as a skill that certain players have, Cho Chikun and Yi Changho for example. I wonder if there have been any specific strategies to counter positional judgement skills, much as there have been many strategies to counter strong local reading. Also I expect that a player who was good at counting would intentionally obfuscate and make counting harder, are there any especially good ways to make counting more difficult?

I would think you want to attack this from the other direction...If you make a position that is hard to count, then the person who has better counting skills will be better off (because they will be more accurately counting a difficult position). Instead if you make a position that is easy to count, you can both count accurately, and their skill is not a major advantage.

Mef wrote:

SmoothOper wrote:Positional judgement has often been cited as a skill that certain players have, Cho Chikun and Yi Changho for example. I wonder if there have been any specific strategies to counter positional judgement skills, much as there have been many strategies to counter strong local reading. Also I expect that a player who was good at counting would intentionally obfuscate and make counting harder, are there any especially good ways to make counting more difficult?

I would think you want to attack this from the other direction...If you make a position that is hard to count, then the person who has better counting skills will be better off (because they will be more accurately counting a difficult position). Instead if you make a position that is easy to count, you can both count accurately, and their skill is not a major advantage.

Sure, I agree that complexity would play into the hand of the better counter.

SmoothOper wrote:Sure, I agree that complexity would play into the hand of the better counter.

It's kinda the same with reading... If someone read better than you, instead of trying to make the situiation too hard for him, it's a better idea to just make it easy for you

hyperpape wrote:Do you work from a template for these posts, Smooth? Have you noticed that every time, people just scratch their heads and say "that doesn't make sense?"

My impression is that SmoothOper has a healthy portion of skepticism that walking the beaten path is the best way to get somewhere, and although his shortcuts may lead him deep into the woods he seems perfectly content with what he finds there. For every beehive he steps in, there's probably some honey, and when he comes to a river, there are probably some fish.

SmoothOper wrote:Positional judgement has often been cited as a skill that certain players have, Cho Chikun and Yi Changho for example.

Wrong. Every player do a positional judgment many times through a whole game. So marking Cho Chikun or Yi ChangHo as examples (which means you think it is something extremely rare) is just showing how strong your ignorance is about the subject.

SmoothOper wrote:I wonder if there have been any specific strategies to counter positional judgement skills, much as there have been many strategies to counter strong local reading.

No. Positional judgment is just a judgement you do during a game. This groups is weak, this is strong, there is a weaknes, there is a wall, ok then, natural flow of a game is right there, I should play in that direction, and in this kind of position I can try to achieve that. End of story. How would you like to interrupt your opponent's thinking, hmm?

SmoothOper wrote: Also I expect that a player who was good at counting would intentionally obfuscate and make counting harder, are there any especially good ways to make counting more difficult?

Boom! The wheel discovered again!
This is the proof that you should play more, get stronger and than think again about all thing you write about.
It is so obvious that any player will complicate things if he see it as a chance to win a game...

"(...)Are there any special good ways to make counting more difficult?" Yes. Put a stones in a special order...
And more serious answe would be: Complicate a game. How? Invade. Fight. Cut. Read as far as you can. Threat five groups at once. How to do it? Play more games, watch pro games, do tsumego, do tesuji, gain experience, become stronger. This is the way.

SmoothOper, please answer what do you think a positional judgement is? What is a definition you use which force you to ask such strange looking questions?

No player who is good at obfuscation would wi||ingly reveal his tricky tactics. However, perhaps this post may prove enlightening should you have the mental fortitude to plumb its depths and decipher whatever crypts may lurk!

Do you think is possible to convolute a position without actually knowing how to properly calculate the positions value, if so I imagine at a certain level of convolution, no one could count the territory, until very near the end. Maybe this is the risk aspect that Yi Sidol, is so famous for.

It does not become much more complicated than requiring (partial) quiescence of the active fights: read to get a quiet position, for which a count can be determined.

I think the issue is that any inability to count the position comes from difficult reading the position. And the advantage is not that your opponent can't count, but that he can't read the sequence of moves that he needs to avoid losing ground.

hyperpape wrote:I think the issue is that any inability to count the position comes from difficult reading the position. And the advantage is not that your opponent can't count, but that he can't read the sequence of moves that he needs to avoid losing ground.

I was thinking more along the lines of combinations of sequences leading to a scenario where even if they were read correctly, someone may miss a sente point here or there.

SmoothOper wrote:

hyperpape wrote:I think the issue is that any inability to count the position comes from difficult reading the position. And the advantage is not that your opponent can't count, but that he can't read the sequence of moves that he needs to avoid losing ground.

I was thinking more along the lines of combinations of sequences leading to a scenario where even if they were read correctly, someone may miss a sente point here or there.

...then they're not reading correctly?

hyperpape wrote:

SmoothOper wrote:

hyperpape wrote:I think the issue is that any inability to count the position comes from difficult reading the position. And the advantage is not that your opponent can't count, but that he can't read the sequence of moves that he needs to avoid losing ground.

I was thinking more along the lines of combinations of sequences leading to a scenario where even if they were read correctly, someone may miss a sente point here or there.

...then they're not reading correctly?

See if you don't count then you read wrong