There is no “OGS Japanese rules”, only the OGS implementation and explanation of Japanese rules. We try to follow it as accurately to the official as we can through moderator decisions like this one.
If this is no longer accurate then perhaps it would be a good idea to remove it from the site as your members are currently playing by these rules. I’m sure you can see that this is a little contradictory and misleading.
Just to be clear, I am not seeking to overturn this result. I am just flagging up that the decision flies in the face of the published site implementation and explanation of Japanese rules.
This should be helpful, preventing such confusion and ambiguity in the future.
Thanks for all the work on that! I’ll have to set it up on a board I think and follow along, but it’s laid out in a fairly nice way with the notation 
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What is the main takeaway lesson here? There is no good reason anyone should play go using Japanese rules. 
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@jascha such tables are very common to help understand some fine points. However you can’t expect them to cover 100% of the rules.
I work in computing, and I see that all the time with software license terms.
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For all area scoring rulesets on OGS repetitions are forbidden due to super-ko rules. So the result would be: no moderator ruling needed.
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But what would be the status of the groups and the result/score of the game?
Ironically, this table you seem to be saying trumps the official Japanese rules here, also says the game is over after 2 passes, which you tried to say earlier…
So precisely how do you determine which rules need to be obeyed and which don’t?
Hi BHydden, and thanks for your comments.
It seems to me that we were playing on OGS. The rule set we were playing under is Japanese. The information provided on this site is the only information we have as to how the Japanese rules are to be interpreted here.
I do not claim to be the arbiter of how these rules are interpreted but I think that it is reasonable to assume that the information published by the site as to how it interprets the rules might be accurate or reliable. Otherwise it seems strange to have published such detailed and specific information here in the first place.
In answer to your remarks:
At no stage I did I say that the OGS rule-comparison table trumps the official Japanese rules, it just indicates how the site interprets them. (Otherwise why have it on the site?).
2 passes is not the end of the game, both players have to agree to end the game. The same table says clearly that if play resumes from the Stone Removal Phase, the opponent of the player to resume the game plays first. I’m sure that you must have played at least one game in your life in which you resumed play after 2 consecutive passes because you didn’t agree with your opponent about the position. The site allows for that by asking both players to agree that the game has ended. If they do not agree, play continues.
“So precisely how do you determine which rules need to be obeyed and which don’t?”
I obey all the rules, I’m not aware of any other way. It is apparently up to the moderators to make these decisions when these very rare triple-ko situations occur, I’m just suggesting that perhaps those decisions should be in alignment with the detailed (and only) information published by OGS.
It doesn’t seem that crazy to me.
One way to achieve that would be to remove the rules comparison table, as it is clearly in conflict with moderators notions of the official Japanese rules. That would end any confusion, leaving moderators free to interpret the rules without contradicting the rule-information published on the site.
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@jascha : as @BHydden pointed out, the table says that two passes end the game. So what allows you to claim the opposite? Probably an external reference you used 
I’d like to modify this that instead of removing it altogether, a link should be provided for a more detailed description.
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I feel @jascha has a good point. There had been previous discussion about the implementation of rule sets on OGS. And the scoring phase was mentioned I think. My limited understanding of Japanese rules is that after two passes, of there is a dispute then the situation is played out on a separate board and the result then applied to the situation as it was on the original board after the two passes. Whereas the ogs scoring phase resumption takes place on the same board with the result of the dispute resolution being applied to the final played out position.
So I agree that ogs doesn’t follow Japanese rules exactly in all circumstances. And it might best to explain the variations somehow. In this case I think @mekriff has the solution: add a link and explain that ogs is attempting to implement the Japanese rules and the ogs guidance is subordinate, within the limits of the technology. Or some such “clarification”
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@teapoweredrobot I kind of agree with you, and my suggestion would also be to add links to the official rules.
But I’ll give you one more: no online server I know of applies the rules exactly, and nobody wants that anyway. For example, the Japanese rules make playing dame a necessity before scoring. Watch any official match and you’ll see them do it. OGS doesn’t implement it, other servers don’t either, would you really want it?
I think it’s nice and interesting to have legal conversations on games like this one, let’s keep it that way and not go to legal battles.
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@SanDiego you are right of course. I’m not attempting to start or continue a battle. I just thought it might be helpful to support the idea that minor tweaks to documentation could be included to cover unusual circumstances (and typical deviations in the case of dame filling).
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I’m a pedantic Dame-filler, so … yes 
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@teapoweredrobot Just to clarify, my last comment was not directed at you or anybody in this thread. Sorry if it felt that way.
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Just to add since I am surprised it was not mentioned: in this particular situation we have a white group which is alive in double ko https://senseis.xmp.net/?DoubleKo, a situation which in turn creates infinite ko-threats for black. At the same time, that same black group has a “dead ko” (the separate one on the left) in it https://senseis.xmp.net/?DeadKo. A dead ko is a ko in an otherwise dead group, so that black cannot “win” the ko, and thus the only thing that he can actually threaten by taking the ko is to keep the group on the board.
Any situation in which we have at the same time a dead ko + infinite unremovable ko-threats creates a situation called moonshine life https://senseis.xmp.net/?MoonshineLife [The “self contained moonshine life” example there is exactly the same situation analyzed in this thread]
“Moonshine life” is actually dead in the three most used rulesets, but because of different reasons in each case:
- Japanese: this was explained in the thread. Under hypothetical play analysis, there are no ko-threats allowed other than passing, and so black dies.
- Chinese: There is a special item in the rules which explicitly says “Moonshine life situations are dead”
- AGA (and similar superko rules): This should be resolved by actual play using superko, which forbids repetition. If it were actually played that way, black would be forced to recapture in order to avoid capture, but he would not be allowed to do so because of superko, thus black would end up dead when actually playing it.
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Thank you elsantodel90, that is a clear/useful/accurate description of the situation.
I did not know about “Moonshine Life”, so thanks for broadening my go knowledge!
I think it is safe to conclude that the result was the correct one under Japanese rules (despite the fact that sensei’s library also says; “Modern rulesets continue to disagree over the position’s status”).
It seems clear then that the OGS rule set comparison table is just plain wrong in its ‘Japanese -Super Ko’ section and needs updating as it clearly allows board repetition and states the game is annulled in this situation. Players using OGS should be able to rely on the information provided by the site so that page need updating/removing.
Again, thanks for taking the time to read this thread!
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p.s… I love that this is the oldest known Go rules dispute, dating back to a Japanese monk called Nyobutsu in 1253…!
Fascinating that is is still being debated more than 700 years later…!
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