A full game of Go with beginner-friendly commentary

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Netherlands Goodspeed
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A full game of Go with beginner-friendly commentary

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Post by Goodspeed »

AKA "The final attempt"

One thing I noticed about people who know about the game but don't play it is that they don't know enough to see the beauty that hides within it. And indeed, the learning curve is so overwhelming that one often gives up before ever having seen it.

Go can seem like just another Chess-like game where you're mostly analyzing as many moves ahead as you can, even though it isn't. I figure one way I could shed light on this is by commentating on one of my own games in a very targeted way. That is, not by going into the many variations that were considered each time, but focusing on the broader strategic concepts, the big picture thinking if you will, that goes into each move. The fact that big picture thinking is such an important part of decision making in this game may, for some of you, help lift it from "just another Chess-like game" to the truly unique and, contrary to chess, strategically fascinating gem that it is. We AoE3 players like strategy, don't we?

Since I play a lot of correspondence Go (meaning you get multiple days per move) it is fairly straightforward for me to do this. I can do it as the game is going on, because these games can take months. My plan is to post an update every time I make a move, with commentary about my opponent's last move and about why I landed on the move I played in response. The bonus: It will help me improve, too.

I started a game against "pursued". I'm white. I've never played against this person before so I have no idea how good he/she is, but we are of the same rank (6 kyu) so I hope we're somewhat evenly matched.
One could follow the game via this link, but there is no need to since I will post full-board screenshots with explanations.

If you've somehow missed my insane introduction to the game, reading it first is highly recommended: viewtopic.php?f=315&t=15086

In the screenshots, the move order will be shown using numbers, where 1 is the first move played.

Of course, anyone is welcome to ask any questions at any point ITT.
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Re: A full game of Go with beginner-friendly commentary

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Post by Mr_Bramboy »

Goodspeed wrote:We AoE3 players like strategy, don't we?
Ceasefire urumi is currently the meta.
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Re: A full game of Go with beginner-friendly commentary

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Post by Goodspeed »

For the record, this first post will be a lot longer than future ones, so bear with me.

Game position:
Image

The first moves have been played. My opponent (black) started in the top right corner. I went in the bottom left corner, he went in the bottom right, and I took the top left.

Go is a game where you need to find the "biggest" move, that is the move that gains you the most territory (the game's all about the map control, we'll call it territory from here). It's standard for the first 4 moves to be played near the 4 corners of the board. This is because it's easiest to secure territory in the corners. If you have a stone near a corner and your opponent tries to take that corner from you (tries to "invade" it), it's easy for you to give him a hard time and gain compensation. If you have 2 stones near a corner, it becomes almost impossible for your opponent to invade it and make it out alive. After these 4 moves, you'll likely find both players attempting to move close to but not quite into the other player's corner, to "reduce" their potential territory, or you'll find them move near their own corner again to secure it.

One thing to keep in mind is that when a stone is behind enemy lines, it is presumed dead until it can prove it's alive. Life and death is an important concept in Go, and one I will not bore you with now, but suffice to say a lonely stone in enemy territory is probably going to get killed. It needs friends.

Viewing the game as a conversation, as we should because it is, this is what happened:
Black asked: "Can I have the top right corner?"
White replied: "For now. Can I have the bottom left corner?"
Black replied: "For now. Can I have the bottom right corner?"
White replied: "For now. Can I have the top left corner?".

And it's black's move.

The sharp among you may have noticed a lack of symmetry. One of these stones is not like the others. That's black's bottom right stone, his second move. This is a good setup for a bit of explanation about opening theory:
This stone is closer to the corner than the others. You may be thinking black has the right idea, after all we've just covered how important the corners are and black made his bottom right corner effectively impossible to invade with just one move. However, we do also need to think of a thing we Go players like to call "influence". You see, every stone exerts influence over a certain area of the board. Where there are stones, there is potential territory and strength we can use when fights (inevitably) break out. We call this influence. The black stone in the bottom right is securing the corner, but it's exerting less influence over the rest of the board. This is an unusual, "territorial" move. As white, we'll be looking to take advantage of this by moving close to that stone in the near future, likely by moving at A.

New Go terms in this post
Territory: Map control. Points. The goal of the game. Each empty intersection "surrounded" by your stones counts as one point of territory. Example: This corner would be worth 9 points for black.
Invade: To move into your opponent's potential territory in order to create your own territory within it. Example: This successful invasion allowed black to create his own territory (again, 9 points) within white's potential territory. The spaces marked with circles are nobody's territory, because no one surrounds them.
Reduce: To move somewhere near your opponent's (potential) territory, often as close to the edge of the territory as possible, in order to reduce his potential to get more.
Secure: To move in or near your own territory to prevent strong invasion or reduction moves.
Influence: The intangible "potential" of any one stone or group of stones, be it in territory or fighting strength.
Strength: A strong stone or group is a stone/group that is not at risk of dying. Strong groups help in fights because they are good to attack from, or to run towards for safety.
Territorial: A territorial move or play style is a move or play style that is very focused on gaining territory, at the expense of influence. Example: Black's move in the bottom right.
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Re: A full game of Go with beginner-friendly commentary

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Re: A full game of Go with beginner-friendly commentary

Post by Jam »

I need to get back into this.
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Re: A full game of Go with beginner-friendly commentary

Post by Amsel_ »

How popular is Go in the U.S.? What kind of people am I likely to run into at Go clubs?
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Re: A full game of Go with beginner-friendly commentary

Post by rsy »

Love the dedication bud
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Re: A full game of Go with beginner-friendly commentary

Post by Goodspeed »

Amsel_ wrote:How popular is Go in the U.S.?
Not very, unfortunately.
What kind of people am I likely to run into at Go clubs?
Probably mostly introverts. Patient, compromising people, since the game rewards that. Probably with an average age of 45+. But you never know, things like that are always a coin flip.
Bigger cities often have lecturers as well. Seattle has the best one. https://www.youtube.com/user/nicksibicky/videos
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Re: A full game of Go with beginner-friendly commentary

Post by Riotcoke »

I think it's slowly becoming more popular , my society even had a GO society now
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Re: A full game of Go with beginner-friendly commentary

Post by fightinfrenchman »

I tried to see if there was anything in Lancaster but the name of the game makes it very hard to search for
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Re: A full game of Go with beginner-friendly commentary

Post by Goodspeed »

Try "baduk"
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Re: A full game of Go with beginner-friendly commentary

Post by Goodspeed »

Game position:
Image

Remember when white asked if they could have the top left corner?
Black says no.

This guy likes corners. Already, this is an unusual game.
In the early game, a beginning Go player is taught, it's important to keep a balance of territory versus influence. This player doesn't seem interested in influence so far, though, and is focusing on territory a disproportionate amount. It seems likely that, as white, we'll be coming out of the early game with less territory than our opponent, but a stronger position towards the center and sides of the board. We will need to play somewhat aggressively to take advantage of this.

For now, we have a corner invasion to deal with. This specific invasion at (1) is very common in the early game since AlphaGo popularized it quite recently. Even as little as 5 years ago, a move like this was not seen until, let's say, move 20+. This is yet another, and perhaps the most significant, way AlphaGo has changed the game at all levels of play.
I wouldn't have expected it here, though, because black already has a strong focus on territory (see his move on the bottom right) and seems to be neglecting influence altogether.

This is a move white will need to respond to locally in order to get the most out of his D16 stone. In most variations, black steals white's corner but white ends up with a strong position on the outside which he can use to build territory on the sides of the board. As white, we will choose a response that allows us to "settle" the corner in a way where we get to play the next move elsewhere on the board ("sente"). With our move at (2) we are working towards the following scenario:

Image
pic 1

Another scenario that is still open to us is the following:

Image
pic 2

As you can see black is more confined to the corner in pic 2, which is good for us, BUT importantly he no longer has to respond locally and gets the next move (sente). We didn't get a chance to solidify our top territory like we did in pic 1 with our move at (6). Black in pic 2 might come in at K16, greatly reducing the potential territory we can build with our big white wall.

New Go terms in this post
Settle: To place stones in a way that the area becomes "done" (or settled), meaning neither player will find much use playing another move there until much later in the game, when there are no more big moves to play elsewhere.
Sente: Initiative. The player who is forcing the other player to respond to his moves "has sente". They effectively decide where the next area of contention is. Another way of putting it is "the player who has the next move where he is not forced to respond to an opponent's move, has sente".
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Re: A full game of Go with beginner-friendly commentary

Post by Goodspeed »

Game position:
Image

Things progressed as expected. Black responded a few times to settle his corner, made sure he's not completely confined there with (3). We took a moment to solidify our top potential territory with (4).

Then, black, for the sake of consistency I suppose, invaded yet another corner. At this point we are already getting kind of mad. Black is playing in a way that he must know is objectively inferior. He is banking on our inability to properly use our big advantage in influence to build territory. Justifiably so, because this is something we are hopelessly bad at. Black at this point is going to have 3 corners of solid territory, and white will have nothing but potential. Turning that potential into points is now our primary goal. We will need to do this while keeping all of our groups as strong as possible, so that we have a strong position to attack from later.

I'm calling it now: black will need to try some risky invasions later in the game to reduce our potential, and at that point a big fight will break out which will decide the game.

Now, we will go for the variation from last post's pic 2. We envision the following:

Image

We are okay with black getting the next move (sente) after the corner stuff, because we judge black (9) worse than it would've been in the previous post. We have a good response at (10), which attacks black's stone at (9) and at the same time has the potential to link up with our top group. That way, we would be building a huge top territory.
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Re: A full game of Go with beginner-friendly commentary

Post by Jam »

One player starts off with no corners, that's unusual. Will be an interesting game for sure
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Re: A full game of Go with beginner-friendly commentary

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Re: A full game of Go with beginner-friendly commentary

Post by Goodspeed »

kami_ryu wrote:Does C9 give black that territory on the left side of the board.
Yeah that's likely if we reply at D10. Something like this might happen:

Image

As you can see white ends up with sente (gets the next move elsewhere) and this is important because he then gets to expand his top territory, which is starting to look pretty scary. The holes in the wall marked with an X are not actually holes; black would get blocked if he tries to infiltrate:

Image
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Re: A full game of Go with beginner-friendly commentary

Post by Kawapasaka »

What is the Go equivalent of Japan divine-striking the last guardian of a 150wood treasure you were working on for 2 minutes then teleporting straight back to their base?
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Re: A full game of Go with beginner-friendly commentary

Post by Goodspeed »

When you build a big territory, your opponent overextends and invades it, you should be able to kill them easily but you fuck up and all of your points disappear.
There's a chance this happens in the game ITT.
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Re: A full game of Go with beginner-friendly commentary

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Re: A full game of Go with beginner-friendly commentary

Post by Goodspeed »

No these are good questions.
Is there a mathematical reason that O17 is the next move to get territory after K16? It's 4 spots laterally. Is this like... safer or more efficient compared to playing N17 or P17?
I wouldn't say mathematical but there are reasons yeah.

3-space extensions (meaning there's 3 spaces between stones, so actually 4) are typically not recommended because they leave good invasion points for the opponent. Black can easily find use for a stone placed at M17, and reduce our potential. However, it's fine in this case because if he invades at M17, we can use the attack on that stone to strengthen our potential to the left of it like so:

Image

We block his entry to our territory with (2). Black only has one way to run and that's the center of the board. We simply follow him. He has to also keep his corner stone in mind, and ends up having to protect it with (7). Meanwhile, white's territory marked with the Xes has become impossible to invade and is worth over 50 points. Black's group is still not safe, either. It looks like a bad result for black, though maybe the AI would disagree with me on that. It often does :P

So since black's invasion at (1) (M17) is not that scary we are okay with leaving that vulnerability. N17 wouldn't leave the vulnerability, but would lose us some points. Also, it would put less pressure on black's Q16 stone. Black might ignore it and play another big move at (2):

Image

The reason we're not playing P17 is because something like this would happen:

Image

If you move too closely to an opponent's stone, you allow them to decide the direction of play. You have to respond to their moves. Because black has an extra stone in the area, he ends up being able to reduce our top potential from the outside while developing his own potential on the right side. Black Q10 is starting to look scary.
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Re: A full game of Go with beginner-friendly commentary

Post by [TLDT]Amsterda »

Are double-numerical coordinates rarely used outside of Japan? Anyway I'm noob but we could play if you want. Btw pls play nr 20.
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Re: A full game of Go with beginner-friendly commentary

Post by Goodspeed »

[TLDT]Amsterda wrote:Are double-numerical coordinates rarely used outside of Japan?
They are used when talking about points that exist in all 4 corners. Like the 4-4 point is the standard move we played in the early game. 4-4, meaning 4 from one edge and 4 from the other edge. The invasion my opponent used twice so far is commonly known as the 3-3 invasion. https://senseis.xmp.net/?44Point33InvasionJoseki
Anyway I'm noob but we could play if you want.
Any idea how "noob"? Have you played online at all?
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Re: A full game of Go with beginner-friendly commentary

Post by [TLDT]Amsterda »

Goodspeed wrote:
[TLDT]Amsterda wrote:Are double-numerical coordinates rarely used outside of Japan?
They are used when talking about points that exist in all 4 corners. Like the 4-4 point is the standard move we played in the early game. 4-4, meaning 4 from one edge and 4 from the other edge. The invasion my opponent used twice so far is commonly known as the 3-3 invasion. https://senseis.xmp.net/?44Point33InvasionJoseki
Anyway I'm noob but we could play if you want.
Any idea how "noob"? Have you played online at all?
Less than 5 games online I think, maybe 10 games irl with a couple of years between a lot of the games. The games irl were mostly against someone who got to max amateur 1 dan and I lost all games by a pretty wide margin. I don't know exactly how bad I am but wouldn't expect to win a game.
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Re: A full game of Go with beginner-friendly commentary

Post by Goodspeed »

Max amateur is 9 dan, but 1d is already no joke. At my local club (city of 72000) the best player we have is 2d, go figure. He could give me 9 handicap stones (meaning I'd start the game with 9 stones already on the board) and probably still win.
I'll play if you want, but I would recommend playing against other beginners. It's a little more rewarding when you have a chance to win. Maybe someone from here is up for it ;) I'd be happy to review your games either way, that can help you improve much faster.
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Re: A full game of Go with beginner-friendly commentary

Post by fightinfrenchman »

Well here we Go
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