I just played a game against a 13k (who at some point in the game ranked down to 14k). Overall, the beginning of the game was something I’d never really seen before. My opponent doggedly went after territory, at the expense of getting mostly surrounded. I made a mistake early on where I lost one of my two corners, but the sheer amount of potential and the wall I had at that point made me feel like I should have been able to make up more than enough points to win. As the game went on, I made a few more mistakes that cost me stones and influence, until I eventually resigned. I hear “you shouldn’t let yourself get surrounded”, and that giving up vast amounts of influence to your opponent in the early game is a bad, bad idea (from Dwyrin/BattsGo), which makes me feel like I must not have been using the influence properly, or that there was some fundamental mistake I made early on that left too many weaknesses exposed.
I also noticed a few situations where my opponent played moves that seemed pointless, or too slow. I tried to play elsewhere and try to profit from these moves, but I’m not sure I did that properly.
Ideally, if someone could review the entire game and simply highlight/mark moves that were bad/mistakes and why, that would be great. I don’t need entire sequences played out (as I will play out suggested moves myself). Barring the entire review, an analysis of the first 100 or so moves would probably be sufficient to help me understand what went wrong.
And a couple of moves I think I should have played differently:
- Move 8 - I didn’t feel this move put any pressure on my two stones, which is why I played elsewhere instead of making a base. Was this a mistake?
- Move 11 - I played here feeling like I had seen this move before, and it seemed like a multi-purpose move. Looking at Waltheri and Josekipedia, I fee like I should have played elsewhere. Recommendations?
- Move 12 - This move seemed slow and nonthreatening, so I played away. Did I miss something?
- Move 46 - I think I should have played at S6 to try to save part of my corner. Perhaps this is too late, or the wrong idea.
- Move 61 - I played K3 as a Ko threat (expecting him to respond), as my read had indicated I could split his group and possibly kill the lower left area. This seems like a bigger move (although the split worked, killing the group failed). After he instead captured the stones (move 62) where we were fighting Ko, I followed through. Should I have moved on to something larger at this point?
- Move 121 - Should I have skipped this move, and instead gone for a base extension of my black stones in the top left? Seeing as how directly thereafter the wall was disconnected and therefore dead? Or is there a better move in the bottom left corner that white would have to respond to?
- Move 165 - I should have played at P14 to prevent the connection. Is there a problem if I play there? I’m not able to tell if further down the line it would come to bite me.
- Moves 166-end - I was just trying to win back some points that I had lost. Was there something I should have tried differently, or was the game too far gone (assuming my opponent avoids any silly mistakes)?
Sorry for the massively long post, and thanks in advance!