A hex Go variant in search of a name (and players)

Go Variants
21

From a handicap game I just played against one of the bots,
here is a status problem for this board:

     -------------
    / O - - - - - \
   / # O - - - # # \       For each possible number of outside liberties,
  /   # O O O O O O \      what is the status of White's group?
       # # # # # - - \
                - # - \     (  White is Os  ,  Black is #s  )
                   # - >
                      /
22 
     -------------
    / O - - - - - \
   / # O - - O # # \       I must be missing something; Isn't white alive like
  /   # O O O O O O \      this, regardless of outside liberties?
       # # # # # - - \
                - # - \     (  White is Os  ,  Black is #s  )
                   # - >
                      /
23

Well, you’re missing the possibility of Black playing first.

24

In that case, it seems to me that white lives with two outside liberties, and dies with one.

These kinds of patterns are very useful to study for application in fast moving games. You should make a library of them. I have to make the Board Canvas have more shareability than just exported SGFs. It’s on the feature board:

25

“In that case, it seems to me that white lives with two outside liberties, and dies with one.”
At least one of these is not correct.

Yes; making Game Review communal would be nice.

26

I am going to change my answer to say that White lives with a single outside liberty.

Spoiler

For some reason I was playing A rather than B for move 6, even though the White group has two liberties and does not need to kill the stone at 5

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image495×499 97.6 KB

27
Spoiler

I suppose in some instances Black would do better to play the kosumi here. But white still lives in this scenario. If Black plays 5 instead of 3 it reverts back to the previous diagram.

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image495×499 96.4 KB

28
Spoiler

Yes; that is correct.

     -------------
    / O - - - - - \
   / # O - - - # # \    Filling the last outside liberty is sente,
  /   # O O O O O O \      but Black can't do any better here.
       # # # # # # - \
                  # - \


     -------------
    / O - * * * - \
   / # O - * * # # \       When Black fills the last outside liberty,
  /   # O O O O O O \    White makes 2 eyes by playing any of the 5 *s.
       # # # # # # # \
                  # - \


     -------------
    / O - - a - - \       If White ignores Black filling the last 
   / # O - - b # # \      outside liberty, then Black kills with  a  or  b .
  /   # O O O O O O \
       # # # # # # # \
                  # - \

I had been thinking b was just better - because it leaves White with only 3 liberties,
whereas a leaves White with at least 4 - but indeed, there might be instances where
Black loses the capturing race in each case, but a lets Black live inside and b doesn’t.