It's been a long time since I've posted here, but  I've since started playing Go some more online (under two different accounts), as well as in real life (go clubs plus the 2008 Rocky Mountain Winter Go Tournament). I started playing again in December '07, and have had my 9k AGA rank reinsured through the recent tournament.

When coming back to playing Go, it's hard to realize where one stands with strategy and tactics, and where one needs the most work to realize their true rank once again. There's many topics that can be rust-covered and creaky, including but not limited to life and death, fuseki, joseki, tesuji, middle game tactics, end game efficiency, shape, sacrifice, snapbacks, capture races.... I could list any and all of the different topcs here.

It can be quite a task to determine which one can be doing the most harm to your game, since one topic may very well bleed into another. Poor understanding of fuseki can compromise your starting board position even if you know how to respond correctly to joseki, and bad choices in joseki can bleed over into bad shape or horrible middle game situations. With all of these topics stringing into one another, it can be difficult to choose a handful of things, or even just one, to focus and study on. However, here are some tips that can help if you feel yourself stagnating.

1) When in doubt, study Life and Death. We've all heard it as a 30k, and we'll still hear it as a 9d. A good knowledge of L&D incorporates many topics, such as reading out the board, determining living vs. dead shapes, and some beginning tesuki. Plus, if your groups don't live, it doesn't matter how strong you are in other tactics.

2) Review a couple of your recent games, and determine where massive point swings occurred. First, check your fuseki and joseki: if you're behind by a massive amount of points in the first 10-20 moves, then this is a serious problem and you need to focus here first. Second, check to see if you maintain your point value into the middle game: if this isn't the case, learn more about attack and defense. If the breakdown of your game happens in the transition between middle and end game, then tesuji, life and death, and endgame might need to be your focus.

3) Practice the art of tenuki, and determining big points vs. urgent moves. Go is a big game of chicken, and if you can take the big parts of the board and intimidate your opponent on the board, then it's more likely that you'll be able to take enough points for the lead.

4) Play some games with good friends, and review the resulting game with them. This is much easier to do in an online setting such as KGS, but it's also easy to do (at least for fuseki and joseki study) in real life. Real life review can also be good for your game as well, since you're forced to remember the moves that you've made, and in replaying those moves, you can more easily remember the major mistakes or awesome moves that you made. Plus, it's always good to have an objective voice that can help you identify weak points in your game.

5) If all else fails, study what you enjoy until your game stagnates, and then study that which you hate. For example, I love studying fuseki, and it just so happens that right now, I believe that's one of the weakest parts of my game according to my last couple of games (whether this is from distraction, lack of concentration, lack of confidence, or imbalance of my studying, I'm not certain). However, once I'm strong again in fuseki and re-evaluate my play, it may end up that I need to study more about tesuji, which is my least favorite thing to study, right next to life and death. However, if that's what I need to study to get past a stumbling point, then that's what I need to study.

6) Always remember that we all play go to have fun. If studying is getting you down or getting too serious that it's no longer entertaining, then take a break. Play some games for fun and don't care about the results. Grab some friends and play an exciting game of rengo. Challenge your memory skills by playing one-color go with a friend until everyone forgets the colors of the stones. There's lots of ways to have fun in this game, and it's not all about studying. :)

It's been around 1 year and 3 months since I've last posted in this blog. I haven't forgotten its existence, it's just that in that time, I have played elsewhere.

At first, I was trying to figure out what I should do for a 'wow, I'm back!' post. The first draft originally listed a lot of the things I was doing *besides* playing Go, but it felt a lot like I was justifying why I wasn't playing, or justifying the tenuki. The tenuki was definitely warranted, I needed to do other things in other places at that time, and I've grown since last year. I could say all the ways that I have, but I don't have the time and I don't feel that narcissistic. :)

There are some things that you remember with a year's passage, such as basic life and death, but the finer points disappear. I stumble sometimes on joseki and fuseki, and don't 'feel' like I read as deeply as I should.

Interestingly enough, sometimes a tenuki is what is needed to grow at the game of go. On a whim last week, nachtrabe convinced me to sign onto KGS to play a game, and even though I lost by many points in an even game, it's possibly the best game that I've ever played against nachtrabe, and he mentioned that I had grown in the year that I hadn't touched a stone. This is after no preparation, just being thrown into a game.

--

Does this mean I'm back on KGS for good? That has yet to be determined. I may sign on tonight, or I may not. I have many things that I'm doing in my life, and I try to schedule in as much as I can. There are some thing that I can't neglect and need to keep the ball rolling on (personal projects mostly). I may have the time to be on tonight, or I may have the time and the courage to show up spontaneously at a go club tomorrow. My Go playing is one of the things that's up in the air currently.

Besides, I need to think to myself: is it wise for me to spend my attention on Go now, or should I play elsewhere?

Saturday, I had the pleasure of attending the Rocky Mountain Winter Go Tournament in Boulder, Colorado. The tournament was organised by David Weiss, and had 56 participants, one of the largest turnouts in an open tournament in Colorado. I went registered to play as an AGA 11 kyu, while my friend Cecilm[21k] registered as 10 kyu. We were both part of bracket D, which ranged from around 10 kyu to 14 kyu. There were five brackets total, ranging from 7 dan to ~18 kyu.

My first game started a little late due to my opponent being 10 or so minutes late, so it allowed me to calm down a bit, watching others start their games and hearing the clicks of the stones on the goban. Once I actually started, I was playing against a 14 kyu and was to give three stones handicap. The opponent was a child (three of my four games were against children, oddly enough), but she was very nice and courteous (as were all the other children, I must add.) I started out the day with a confident streak, since in the game I truly had sente for most of the game. She followed my lead practically everywhere on the board, so I had the power to tenuki whenever I wanted, taking most/all of the big points. This also allowed me to become comfortable with the clock settings (45 absolute plus 5 30-second overtime periods).  Once the game was over, the point spread was fairly large so we didn't even bother counting (all that counts is whether you win or lose), so I got my first tournament win.

My second game was against an 11 kyu, so we played an even game, with me as black. This game, I failed in three major areas: botched fuseki, missed a large atari, and managed to let a dead corner live. I had the capability of winning if I had followed even *one* of these points, but missing all three was relatively embarassing. I lost this game by around 20-30 points.



Bad Wolvie!
With this game behind me, Cecil and I both went to lunch. Both of us were 1-1 at this point, and we talked about what happened in our first two games. After eating some chinese food, going over my botched fuseki, and playing through the beginning of a Shusaku game for fun, it was on to round three!

My third round was also an even game, but against a fairly small child that delighted in playing around with his bowl. I honestly don't remember too much about this game, except that at some point I ran out of black stones, so we did a prisoner exchange so I could finish yose and filling in dame. I won this game by a fair amount, and the child's father helped his child with the counting. He was incredibly fast at arranging the stones and counting territory.. it was awesome to see how skilled he was.

My fourth game started out fairly early, as my opponent was rather anxious to start his game. Cecil had lost to this opponent for his first game of the tournament, so he told me watch out and good luck. This opponent was also 14 kyu, so I gave three stones, but it sure felt like he was a bit stronger. For this game, I really had to pull out my RAWR (thx Agilis), and attacked a lot of his weak structures and did a couple of clever moves to catch his stones and gain more territory. The only bad thing that I did in this game was underestimate the importance of a ko, which allowed a dead group that he had to live. Regardless, I won my fourth and final match.

At the end of the tournament, we had four people in our division that had 3-1 records, which were myself, Cecil, and my second and fourth opponents. We couldn't figure out who got first or second by absolute record, and we couldn't do it by who won against each other, since everyone that played had won against at least one of the winners and lost to one as well. It came down to how the *other* opponents that we had played did (basically, who played the strongest opponents), and so my fourth opponent won first, and my second opponent won second. I didn't win anything in that case, but I still learned tons, had a wonderful time, and enjoyed the company of some of the most incredible, humble, and courteous people that I've ever met. It was truly a wonderful event, and I thank everyone who I had the pleasure of meeting, and David Weiss for organizing the tournament.

This weekend was another retreat to a cabin in the mountains with my friends. Since half of them play Go (mainly because Cecilm and I introduced the game to them), I did get some games in. Both times I lost against Cecilm, one time because my beginning game was way off, and the second one I could have made the score very close, but I lost a group due to a basic atari that I didn't see. The group would have made the score fairly close. However, from playing in real life, I've figured that for all intents and purposes, people attempt to play a couple stones higher than they would on the internet, and there's also the psyche-out factor involved. Maybe that's why I don't play Texas Hold'em. ;)

I signed up for an AGA membership today. It's something that I've been putting off until recently, when I heard that there's a free tournament in Boulder this weekend (AGA membership required). Hopefully I signed up for the AGA in time to play in the tournament, but if I didn't quite make it, I've asked if there are any rules on spectators. I do hope that I can make it to this one though, since I have no idea when another tournament will be in Colorado.

Currently on KGS, I'm floating around a 19-20k ranking. I simply don't play enough games regularly to get a solid ranking. I should fix that sometime... but not tonight, for it is pool night. ;)

Edit: I'm now all signed up for the tournament! :O

I promised an entry when I received my new goban, so here it is! :D

I've had my old goban for a while now, it was purchased at It's Your Move and immediately went home with me for some atari go. This was a relatively long time ago, before I really got interested in Go. When I did start studying, I took that set with me every weekend for 4 months while visiting my parents. It's a relatively small board, with plastic bowls that have lids that should hold the stones in but never do, and small one-sided glass stones.

My dad, who originally was the one who taught me chess and likes the pursuit of anything intellectual, saw how much I enjoy playing go, and wanted to get me a new go set for Christmas. He researched into boards, stones and bowls, but didn't know what to get, or what I would like. Instead, he gave me $300 towards buying a new go set. Combined with my Christmas bonus from work, I was suddenly poised to get an awesome set!

The three 'pieces' of my set are as follows:

• Agathis Table Board
• Set of Shin-Kaya Bowls
• 7.0mm Jitsuyo Grade Stones

The pictures on the website are of much better quality than my webcam pictures (you can see the shell stones really well in Samarkand's pictures), but that won't stop me from showcasing a couple of pictures! :D

(Warning: these pictures are dark, my webcam didn't like the lighting in my room.)


Here is the whole go set, with one of my favorite corner openings.


The bowls, stones, and board, with opposing stones to show contrast.


A close up of one of the lids and some stones. I wish you could see the shell stones.. they're absolutely beautiful.


Even though this picture is fuzzy, you can see the grain on the bowls. A really nice touch.

I'm extremely happy for this set. Originally I was a bit worried about the thickness of the stones, but in handling them, I think that they're a nice size, and should be easier to hold for any beginners whom I play with (cough: my friends).

Everything came in perfect shape, and Samarkand shipped everything in a HUGE box with tons of packing peanuts and bubble wrap. They were informative and prompt with all of my status requests, and also informed me when things were being delayed (such as their shipment getting held up in customs.)

I definately recommend this set to anyone who is looking for a moderately-priced go set. :)

Happy New Year to everyone out there (read: all 3 of you) that read my blog! Before you ask, no, my new year's resolution was not to play more go or get to a certain ranking. However, my resolution is extremely short, very convoluted, and may very well lend itself to go if that's the path that my mind takes. What's the resolution? It sounds so silly and simple that I won't divulge it here. :)

Now, on to the extremely belated entry, now with new subsections!

Go and Everyday Living

A lot of what I've learned from go has lended itself rather easily to my daily living experience. I thought I'd highlight a couple of them here to spread the wisdom and what not.

The Experience of Trying Something New: This is something that I've struggled with, and continue to struggle with on a daily basis. Learning go is something that I've thought about for a long time (2 years, if I recall correctly), and just started learning recently. This sudden decision to do so was actually in conjunction with other things in my life that were also sudden (moving out of my house and going across town with only a week's planning, for instance). It also allowed me to start thinking about doing new things and having new experiences. Everyone needs some of those now and again. :)

The Ability to Tenuki: This really helps in personal relations where I best not be involved, or situations in which I have no control. I'm still a youngin', prone to know people that are destined to have "create and propagate as much drama as possible" be one of the controlling mantras in their lives. It's quite sad that while I try and do positive things with my life (job, family, close friends, my hobbies, etc), there are some people that take it upon themselves to attack me for no clear reason at all except to see a reaction. This has happened a couple times recently, all from one person in particular, but I won't spread the unnecessary gossip to a go blog. Needless to say, I could have responded to each and every one of these, preparing a counter-argument for every single accusation and false statement, and played this needless fight across the board that was started with a weak and needless attack (it could even be called false sente). Why waste all of my stones (energy) when I could be doing something more productive? Herein comes tenuki. I simply play elsewhere. I play the biggest move on the board, be it concentrating on work, spending time with my friends and family, or deriving enjoyment and pride from my interests.

The Right to Lose: Everyone loses sometimes. Especially in go. You need to lose some to win some, and be defeated soundly to learn anything important. That doesn't mean you have to like being defeated, you just have to tolerate it.

New Beginners!

Between Cecilm[22k]  and myself, we've addicted three people to the game of go, and have interested at least four others. Once my new board and stones arrive (details when it arrives), we'll have two great boards to play on and several other smaller boards that people can play on. I'm attemping to start 'go parties' in my circle of friends, where a bunch of people just sit around and play go. We can play games and discuss problems and tsumego. It should be a lot of fun once I get around to organizing the first one. I'll let you know how it turns out!

New Year's was the first unofficial 'go party', since I urged people to bring their go boards to play some games in my upstairs loft bedroom. It became the runaway hit of the evening, with games going on until 4am on January 1st. Surely that much go addicted some of my friends even more. :)

Study, Study, Study

I've been doing more studying than playing lately. I've lost the drive to play online somewhat, but I'm reading through Davies' Life and Death currently, at the suggestion of nachtrabe[-]. I'm quite proud that I used the knowledge of that book recently, in where I saw and correctly reduced the territory of one of my opponent's groups into a rabbity six. It's a reassuring fact to me, especially when sometimes I have trouble translating go theory and problems into real-game situations consciously.

Playing More, Wolvie?

I plan to play more, I honestly mean that. Right now I feel stuck at where I am, hence the studying. I think that through studying, starting go parties (which literally means teaching beginners), and watching the occassional HnG, that I'll start playing more often and with more confidence.

I am now officially back and playing on a semi-regular basis! \:D/

During November, I participated in National Novel Writing Month, or Nanowrimo. I was not the only insane one participating in this, but instead I was part of thousands of people who wanted to give this challenge a try. This was my third Nanowrimo that I've participated in, and participating with me was my roommate Acturi. We wrote many many words, had some ups and downs, but we eventually got through it, gleefully showing at least 50,000 words before the end of November 30th!

The novel, for those who are curious, is mostly about go. There are other things that happen besides go, such as sex, fighting, backstabbing, and coffee. The game of go, however, is something that my four main characters all have in common, and it brings some people together, and tears others apart. I also had many different themes in this book, such as looking at the game of go as a model of the universe (and playing accordingly), and looking at the universe as a model for go (and also playing that accordingly).

When writing this novel, I would sometimes log onto KGS and play a game or two, and surprisingly, I jumped up dramatically in rank, from a solid 28k to an unstable 20k?. From my games, I'd wager that I may be a 22k or 21k though, but that will stabilize in time. When people have asked what I've done to have a sudden rank change, I tell them "err.. nothing?", and this is mainly the truth. Occasionally I will look at some tsumego while on my lunch break, and twice in November, I dinked around on goproblems and did some 30k and 25k time trials.

The leading cause of my sudden jump has now been deduced to "your subconscious has digested the information that you've been exposed to, and now you can finally use it!"

December has unofficially been declared my go playing/studying month. I'm not sure how well I'll fare with this, since this weekend I'll hopefully be up in a cabin in the Colorado Rocky Mountains with some friends. Rest assured, I am bringing some books and my ghetto goban, and one of my friends that is coming also plays go. It'll be a nice start to a hectic month, where holidays may try and triumph over playing go. Oh well, either way I'll be happy. :)

Time for bullet points! :D

• I've been sick for the past week or so, and I've taken time off of playing games on KGS during this time. I tried playing once while I was sick (last Friday), and managed to lose by 90+. I'll start playing again once I feel 90-100% better.
• In this downtime, I've been practicing tsumego and thinking a lot about the fundamentals of go (cutting, connecting, etc). When I have time, I do the 30k and 25k time trials on goproblems, which seem to help me keep at my regular playing level.
• I'm participating in Nanowrimo this year (this is my third attempt, I started doing this in 2003), and this time the basis will be around Go. I am using the "Tarot readings as plot points" method. I have created 4 characters that the story will be based around, which I have also done Tarot readings for character creation. I can tell you right now that the novel may have its happy points, but overall it seems like it will be one heck of a depressing novel. I'm really excited about it though, and it will allow me to get more into the game of Go. Since I want to make the novel approachable to all people, I'll need to explain how the game works and delve into even more technical parts of the game as the novel progresses. That way, I'll be able to see if I truly understand the basis behind Go, since in order to explain it, one needs to know it.

That's it for right now.. I hope I start feeling better soon so that I can play games! (I'm hoping to play Saturday.. but we'll see how I feel then! :D)

I didn't play any ranked games today, but that's alright, for in its place I got one free game and one teaching game. :D


wolvie [28k] vs. goeasyonme [?] : W+Res
My first game, I think I lucked out, since I feel that I got away with a LOT in the game. B started out with a very interesting opening (see the .sgf for more details), and I should have responded sooner and wrecked the moyo. This game inspired Agilis to give me a crash course in fighting, so we started a training game.


Agilis [10k] vs. wolvie [28k] H9 : W+8.5
This game hasn't been reviewed yet, but I think I did learn a lot about fighting from this game, since I was pretty much *forced to* by Agilis' moves. I was leading until I was caught in a nasty snapback in the endgame, which nachtrabe said was worth about 25 points. :(

Hopefully tomorrow or the next day I'll get the game reviewed by *someone*, and become even stronger. :D

Oh, and I may have gotten more people interested in learning go. \o/

I'm still on my winning streak, it seems. I'm still learning a lot from the games though, so it's cool. :D


wolvie[29k] vs. toastcrumb [30k]: W+21.5
Points to work on:
- Reading out moves. I still make some unnecessary moves because I'm not reading out what could happen.
- Life and Death. I assumed a group was alive, and they ended up dying a most miserable death. This will also help out towards reading.

As a result of this game, my rank went to a solid 28k. We'll see if it stays there. :D

My other three books that my brother gave me for my birthday came in, so I'm happy that I'll have some really good reading material once I get past my first 50 games. :)