Going off of this game that you played NEWOLDGUY vs. adityasahu581
Because you don’t have to go after this white block, they are already dead.
Can you tell me why you went after them? Since extra stones don’t help you in the Japanese rules.
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well thanks for asking – i guess my thinking was its better to have a stone, that as in most of my games i never get even a single stone so i went after one or in this case a couple
There is a go variant called “capture go”. That would be what you like to play, some go teachers recommend it, before playing go. The goal is to capture, which is easier to understand. You can use unranked setting and specify on a game offer that you want to play this variant (instead of go)
An important point to remember, if a group of stones is dead then at the end of the game they will count as captures. You don’t have to actually capture them! This is important to remember because instead of capturing stones you can use your valuable move to play somewhere else.
Of course, sometimes it is a good idea to capture stones. But you need another reason, e.g. if you don’t they might be able to make life, if you don’t they might kill one of your groups, etc. If your only reason to capture a group of dead stones is “I’d like to capture some stones” don’t worry about it, they’re likely already yours.
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this last rule is the point i was making before that this game has too many rules, so you don’t want to capature stones but leave them were they lay so at the end you get more points ? and then by leaving them, you can have more of your own stones to do other damage,
i sort of get this concept but then why even capture any stones at all this is the confusing part – its tough being an old sick man trying to learn a new game when the rules daily just keep coming - make eyes don’t make eyes defensive moves instead of offence – soo much to think about, how does one try and keep it simple , playing puzzles seems like more fun than playing the games now – just belly aching a bit - all is good i won one game so things are really ok – just the rules, rules and then when one does this or that, other rules. How does a six-year-old play this game with so many rules and win constantly?
Have you played at Go Browser Game COSUMI - It’s Free! ?
That and https://senseis.xmp.net are how I learned.
Start on Size 5, with you treating Draw as You Win.
Once you do well-enough at that, switch to treating Draw as You Lose.
Once you do well-enough at that, try the following things:
These are not necessarily ordered by difficulty, because I forget their relative difficulty. 
(a)
Treat anything other than you win by the full board as a loss
for you, and even if Cosumi passes, keep playing until you are
extremely confident that you can capture all of the white stones.
(For this, you should play the center intersection on your first turn, since with
anything else, winning by the full board would require a mistake from Cosumi.)
(b)
On your first turn, you are not allowed to play the center intersection.
This can be made slightly harder/easier by treating Draw as a Loss/Win for you.
(No matter how you treat draws, for this I suggest you play adjacent to the center intersection
on your first turn, since my guess is that if Black doesn’t play one of the 5 centermost
intersections on Black’s first turn, then under correct play Black shouldn’t even get a draw.)
(c)
Play on size 6 instead of size 5, and treat Draw as You Win.
(For this, I recommend that you play one of the 4 center intersections on your first turn.)
PureGo, probably the simplest and maybe the most ancient principle, with just capturing rules and more stones on the board win condition, no territory nor any other. Capturing is just a way to get ahead of the opponent, otherwise, it would be a draw most of the time (since each side takes turns to play, and every stone lives, it would be the same amount depends on the even or odd intersections on the board)
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^^^ PLEASE PLAY THIS
That’s not really a rule (it’s a consequence of the rules). Go is a game of efficiency and balance. If opponent’s stones are dead anyway, you don’t want to spend a move taking them off the board.
If those stones become dangerous to you, because your own stones are also lacking liberties, taking them off has more value and becomes worthwhile.
Having much to think about is something I enjoy about Go. But others think less, learned to play decent moves intuitively or automatically, and they enjoy Go too.
Pick at most three things you want to improve, that’s how I try to keep it simple enough and not overwhelming. I can not learn everything, especially not without it taking time. Step by step is the way and there’s nothing wrong with improving by doing something you enjoy.
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I’ve made a section on when to capture below, I’ve also made a section going over some of the rules and some consequences of the rules. I know you might already be aware of some of this, but it might help us to go over some of the basics.
I didn’t realise how much effort this took to write, I may have made many mistakes, and I’m not sure it’s organised as well as I’d like. Hopefully I get my point across.
Overview of some rules and some consequences of the rules
1) Liberties and capturing a single stone
1) Liberties and capturing a single stone
You are likely already aware of “liberties”, these are the empty spaces around a stone or group that must be filled to capture it. How many liberties does this stone have?
The answer is four: I have marked these with crosses on the image below. One way to easily count liberties is to count the number of black lines coming out of a stone. Once a stone has zero liberties, it is captured.
Here the stone has three of its liberties filled, the unfilled space is marked with a cross:
If we fill this, the black stone is captured:
2) Groups, group liberties, capturing a group of stones
2) Groups, group liberties, capturing a group of stones
Stones of the same colour form a group if they are connected horizontally or vertically. These are a group of stones:
These are two different groups of stones. They are not one group, because groups are not connected diagonally:
A group of stones can be captured if the group’s liberties are filled, i.e. once it has zero liberties. Here is a group that is almost captured:
After filling the last liberty, it is captured:
Again, another group is nearly captured:
And now it is captured:
3) Suicide, eyes, capturing groups with eyes
3) Suicide, eyes, capturing groups with eyes
Look at this situation. What happens if we place a white stone on the cross?
We would get this:
But hang on, something doesn’t look quite right. How many liberties does the white stone have? The answer is zero. But if it has zero liberties then it has been captured. As soon as you play the white stone it is instantly dead. This is called suicide and it is an illegal move. You will find that if you attempt to do this in a game on OGS you will be prevented from even placing the stone.
There is one important exception! If you are filling the last liberty of an opponent’s group then you are allowed to. Your opponent’s group is captured, and you stone lives. Here is an example:
The black group above has one liberty, marked with the cross. If that is filled then although you would think the white stone has zero liberties, the black group has zero liberties, it would then be captured: this means we are allowed to place the white stone and get this result:
One way to think of this is that capturing the black group creates liberties for the white stone so it does not count as suicide for white.
If we look at the first example again, the black group there had five liberties, I’ve marked these with crosses below:
If we attempted to place a white stone in the corner, as shown below, the black group still has four liberties:
So the black group would not be captured, thus this placement of the white stone is illegal.
Let’s try and put some of these concepts together. Look at this group below, it has 13 liberties marked with crosses:
Now, to capture it we need to fill all the liberties. But there is one problem, the centre liberty is completely surrounded by black stones. Such a point is called an eye of group. What happens if we try to fill this eye?
The black group would have 12 liberties, but white would have zero. This is suicide, and illegal. How could we possibly capture the group? Is there some way we could place the white stone in the eye, even though it wouldn’t have any liberties? Remember the exception I mentioned, if you are capturing a group of stones then it is not suicide. What happens if we fill the outside liberties first, like so:
Now the black group has only one liberty. If we now try to fill this eye the black group has zero liberties and so will be captured, thus it is now legal to place the white stone in the centre:
The group is captured!
Now let’s consider this group, how many liberties does it have?
The answer is 18. There are 16 on the outside, and two eyes in the middle. Now, of course, if we want to capture we cannot immediately play in either of the two eyes because this would be suicide. Let’s follow our previous strategy of filling the outside liberties first:
We end up with this, the group now has two liberties, both of them are eyes. Now we have a problem, playing in either of these eyes would reduce the liberties from 2 to 1, for example:
But the black group would be left with one liberty, while the white stone would have zero. This is suicide, and an illegal move. If we tried to fill the other eye, the same thing would occur. We would somehow need to place two white stones at the same time, but you cannot do this in Go! You can only play one stone on your turn! What does this mean? It is impossible to capture the black group. The black group is said to be alive.
This is an important point. When people say “a group with two eyes cannot be captured”, do not think of it as some arbitrary rule that someone came up with. Once you know about groups, liberties, capturing, and suicide, then as a consequence of these rules any group with two or more eyes cannot be captured.
4) The ko rule
4) The ko rule
This is not too relevant to what we are discussing, but I thought I’d put this here anyway.
Look at the below example. White’s turn to play. White only has one liberty, and black has two. If white does not capture the black stone, then black will capture the white group.
So white captures.
Black has a problem, they have one liberty (marked with a cross), if they play somewhere else white will capture the group on the next move. Black wants to play at the triangle, but can’t. Why? The ko rule. If one player captures a single stone, then the other player cannot immediately recapture. Black MUST play somewhere else, if black does that first, and for some reason white does not capture the black group, then black may recapture the stone.
To be clear, if we had this situation:
And then white placed a stone like this:
Black IS allowed to take the white stone:
Why? Because white did not CAPTURE a stone. The ko rule is: if one player captures a single stone, then the other player cannot immediately recapture.
Another example, white to play:
White captures the black stones.
Can black take the white stone? Yes:
Why? Because white did not capture a single stone, but two. The ko rule is if one player captures a single stone, then the other player cannot immediately recapture.
5) Seki
5) Seki
Again, this is not too relevant to what we are discussing, but I thought I’d put this here anyway.
If black tries to kill the white stones on the right, as soon as a black piece is placed on the board the black group will have one liberty, white will then kill. If white plays a piece, the white group will have one liberty, then it will die. Neither player will want to play there. This is called seki, or mutual life. I wanted to mention this because it is a way to live WITHOUT two eyes.
If have a group that is in competition with your opponents group, and both groups are struggling to survive, one may die and one may live. They could both live. BUT, if it is not possible for both groups to make two eyes each, you could both still survive via a seki.
6) Passing, and ending the game
6) Passing, and ending the game
Here is a game that is almost finished. It is white’s turn.
White decides there are no more moves worth playing, so they pass. It is now black’s turn. If black felt like there were still valuable moves left to play, they would be allowed to. However, in this case, black decides that there are no more worthwhile moves, so they pass as well. Once both players pass in a row the game goes to scoring. Any stones which cannot make two eyes are considered dead and removed from the board. Both players agree the stones with squares on them are dead:
How do we know the stones are dead? Well, both players agree to it. If one player disagrees they may resume the game if need be and play out the moves to see.
After removing the dead stones you can score the board:
White has 23 points from territory, black has 22. White additionally gets extra points from whatever the komi is, and both get extra points based on the number of captures.
But what happens if white tried to capture the dead stones?
white plays 1, black passes on 2 as there are no good moves, white captures with 3. Now let’s count the territory:
White has 21 points from territory, while black’s is unchanged. The three black stones were already dead, so the extra white stones didn’t gain white anything. Worse, white ended up losing points by filling their own territory.
When to capture
Sort of. The idea is that every time you do one move, there is another move you could have done but chose not to. If the stones might live, then you might be confronted with a decision: kill them, or play elsewhere. Maybe it’s more valuable playing elsewhere, maybe not. If the stones are clearly dead, just leave them.
A note on chess
In chess if you are in a position to capture the opponent’s queen this could be a big opportunity. But there may be bigger opportunities.
What to do in this image?
You could capture a queen:
But it is best to checkmate:
It would be even worse to capture in this scenario:
Why? Now your opponent will checkmate you:
Just like in chess, capturing can be useful but it is not the goal. In Go capturing can be useful, but ultimately you want to surround empty points.
Why capture?
So why do we care about capturing? Look here, white to play:
Now, black surrounds five empty points, so it seems that these will be worth five points at the end of the game. You may not see it, but there is a way to kill the group:
Black can no longer make two eyes, so it will ultimately die. You might not be able to see why so I suggest you set this position up on a board and try to survive as black. You will find that, as long as white plays well, it will be impossible. Here is just one example of black trying to survive:
Black plays 1, white 2, then black 3. Now black only has one liberty, so white captures:
Now, it is true that white has gained some points by capturing, they captured 8 black stones and so they gained 8 points. What about those five points black originally surrounded? Now black does not surround them, so at the end of the game they do not get those five points. In the image above there are 8 empty spaces in the white group. This means at the end of the game white will get 8 points from the capture of the stones, and 8 points from the empty space they surround.
This is important: Why do we can about living groups and making two eyes, or about capturing stones? Because you get points from surrounding empty intersections on the board, if your group can be killed then your control of the empty points it surrounds is tenuous. If you can kill an opponent’s group, that group can’t surround empty points.
Sure, capturing gives you points simply because captured pieces are worth points. But it can also help you gain territory, prevent your opponent from gaining territory, or both.
One important point, if it had been black’s turn to play, they could have lived:
Now this cannot be killed. If you are not sure why, try playing the position out on a board.
Some examples of when not to captrue
Let’s consider this situation. It’s white’s turn, nobody has made a capture yet, and it’s an even game (no komi):
Let’s say you want to capture some stones in the top right. We then get this:
White starts to capture the top right group with 1 while black starts to close off their territory with 2. White continues to capture the two black stones with 3, black starts to creep around the corner with 4. White notices, defends with 5, and both players secure the weak points with moves to 7. Now black keeps passing as they have no good moves left, white continues with the capturing moves until 11.
White has 19 points of territory and two captures, for a grand total of 21 points. Black has 28 points of territory, winning the game.
White can do better, the stones in the top right cannot make two eyes (if you don’t believe me, set up a demo board and try!). Instead of wasting valuable moves playing up there, there is a better move on the left:
White starts to go around the corner with 1, black defends, and they both play out moves to 7. Now they both pass. Both players decide the black stones at the top are dead, so these count as prisoners for white. Now white has 26 points in territory and two captures while black has 22 points in territory. White wins! (Note: if you test it on a board, you might discover that white gets an even better result by playing their stone at 2 instead of 1).
Here is an example of where you must make a choice. Again, white to play, no captures so far, and no komi. Look in the top right, if white plays there first they will kill the group. If black does, it lives. Look at the left side of the board, white has an opportunity to push down the left side of the board:
What happens if you go for the capture?
Try and count the score. The black stones in the top right are dead, that’s 6 prisoners for white. Once they are removed from the board there are 22 empty points surrounded by white. That gives 6 + 22 = 28 points. Black surrounds 31 empty points with no prisoners. Black wins.
But what if white did not go for the capture, but pushes down the left side of the board:
Here white plunges in with 1. Black tries to stop it connecting with the stone at 2, white threatens to connect with 3, black defends at 4, white secures the cutting point with 5, and black saves its lone stone with 6. White tries to push further with 7 down the bottom and black tries to stop their progress. White again threatens to connect the white groups with 9. Black prevents the connection with 10.
This game isn’t finished here, but try and eyeball how much potential territory white is starting to gain here and compare that to what it could have gained in the top right with a capture. Also compare how much territory black has lost compared to what it had in the capture example. The game proceeds:
White ends up with 15 points in territory, black has 14. White wins.
It doesn’t matter if you don’t fully follow each of the moves. The point is this: just like the example of taking the queen in chess, it was more fruitful to play elsewhere. In one variation taking the queen lost you the game. Same thing here, you have an opportunity to capture pieces and an opportunity to take territory on the left. In this case going for the capture loses the game, but going for the territory gives white a win. Of course, sometimes in chess when there is an option to take the queen you should. Sometimes in Go when you have the option to capture you should, other times you shouldn’t. It’s all situational.
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Others have made great contributions here, and I hope you go through their messages. I just have one comment on something you said.
Not capturing dead stones, is not a rule. Maybe an example will help you, imagine a boxing match, no rule is stopping you from punching the air, or punching your own self.
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I could never recomend enough Mark 5000 “Stone development for beginners” and “Tactic tutors”. They helped me a lot. Asking the comunity to review some of my games was also a huge help. And joining my local club (but you have to be lucky enough to have one close by) was also great. Now I am privilegiated because I have a 7k friend teaching me, but those two courses, that are free in OGS were huge for me prior to that.
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@mark5000 is a great author and teacher of Go, especially on 9x9. I encourage you to read anything he writes!
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yes this mark fellow sounds very helpful – speaking of helpful after many days of people stone walling me to get info while i play - i have just recently come across really nice helpful players who give of their know;eadge in a helpful way so nice to play people who are into the game at a teaching level of sprts and freindly to boot – so many others are just down right boors – but such is life i guess
I feel like the everyone teaches and is taught in turn (at least through ddk) culture was more alive when I started learning, but that might be rose colored glasses. I still try to keep it alive when I get matched with newer players
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I’ll offer some personal perspective if it’s all right. I’m not a new player but quite low-level still (don’t expect to get out of the ddk’s in my old age), and I don’t know if my opponent would welcome my comments, or if my 18k comments could be helpful at all. I sometimes overcome this feeling, and not all reactions are positive…
So, I’d advise the OP to indicate to the opponent somehow that you would like them to point out your mistakes or their clever tricks. If they are like me they may open up!
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@NEWOLDGUY Greetings! Sorry for this lengthy post, but I thought I’d share some reaction to your outreach above…
Rather than respond with more deep expert knowledge as others have been so kind to share (which I clearly lack!) I’ll reply in my innocence as a new Go player.
FYI, I’m also an older player (geezer, to be candid) starting out. Decades of chess, but this “go” thing is an overwhelming new world to me.
As such, I too struggle more than I’d like and I fall far short when trying to play a full game - even on 9x9. Can become downright demoralizing.
So in that context, here’s my humble suggestion:
The best kind of leisure activities are those that we enjoy because they produce some balance of relaxation, satisfaction, and challenge. And an appropriate level of challenge at that!
Too easy? = Boring. Too hard? = Frustrating. (Neither of which would inspire us to continue playing much, if at all.)
But if I understand correctly, you have enjoyed playing level-appropriate puzzles? Perhaps exploring which kinds of eyes work… vs which are false? How to spot atari, and other essential moves? Some insights into how ladders work (or don’t)?
If so, here’s my simple suggestion: Why not simply continue to enjoy these?
Why beat yourself up forcing yourself to play full games (even 9x9, with its own unique strategic variations vs larger sized boards) when you aren’t currently enjoying doing so?
As you likely know, there are some truly wonderful puzzle-oriented resources out there (including the “Learn to Play Go” and “Puzzles” links on this site). These offer great ways to gain step by step insights. They offer incremental bite-sized satisfaction as we grasp how these Go rules play out when put into action.
Put differently: Just because others enjoy playing full out Go games against opponents doesn’t mean that’s going to be a source of enjoyment for you.
There’s nothing wrong with spending your leisure time savoring these brief puzzles - while avoiding the confounding frustration involved in 1-on-1 games.
Yes, perhaps after an open-ended period of time enjoying puzzles, you may begin to feel the urge to play against others at entry kyu levels on smaller boards. And in this case, it may prove to be a source of enjoyment after all - applying the skill and pattern recognition you’ve gleaned through puzzles and learning modules.
But if not? So what!
You’ll still have the opportunity to continue to play the universe of puzzles to your heart’s content. Perhaps that’s what your own personal enjoyment may be about? You don’t have to get your satisfaction and joy in precisely the same way that others do. I think we’re both old enough to know better. 
Keep delving into the parts of the Go community and resources that lift your spirits - and avoid those that just aren’t working for you (yet). Some day, if they do, it’ll be worthwhile. But there’s no rush to find out. 
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Another suggestion when you feel bored to play is to read books even if you don’t have yet the knowledge to play like they want to inspire you. Not a waste of time at all if you enjoy it.
Play 19 board if you feel bad on 9. Well, it’s big yes but you can move to play somewhere else when something is going wrong (which is in fact a wise strategy at any levels).
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Let me tell this may be wrong. Age brings more limitations with blunders, lack of good reading (like not seeing an atari) as limitations due to concepts and ideas on the game.
It’s true that reviewing the game with your opponent is not so common on internet, and I do regret it myself as I’m more a face to face kind of player. On a go server, the time it takes you to ask and they already started to play one more game with someone else…
I don’t think it’s malicious or egoistic, it’s more about what players expect from a game on internet. You can still go against the trend, you could probably encounter players happy to share their views on the game with you.
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Ok, so since you’re trying to un-pickle your brain - I was hoping I could give you some terms and concepts that might help you understand this landscape better. It’s not another set of rules or guidelines - I’m trying to help you understand how this game works, and what you can do within it. If you’re approaching this game through a chess mindset - it seems like you keep looking for some formula for what you should be DOING, and being frustrated that no one can give you one. Instead, I’m going to help you with what you should be SEEING - putting words to the various actions and moves you will see, so that you can put yourself in context, and figure out your next best step based on that fresh information.
Try to think of Go as a military strategy game - your Go board is the map that displays troop positions - both yours and that of your opponent - as you try to take control over some un-inhabited island out in the ocean, and add it to your empire. Each stone represents a whole garrison town full of soldiers, weapons, food, and equipment you’ve air-dropped onto the island in question - trying to hold that area for the good of your empire until reinforcements arrive.
In isolation those garrisons aren’t very powerful - they can get surrounded and captured fairly quickly. Their power lies in networking - their ability to link up together into larger structures. Their main job isn’t JUST to keep the invaders out - it’s to surround empty points of land, because once the conflict is over the soldiers need to plant crops and grow food. Always keep this in mind - your goal isn’t just to build walls - it’s to stake out as much empty space as possible between those walls.
Your goal is never to drive your opponent from the island - or kill them completely. You win by simply controlling a teensy little bit more - just 0.5 more points of land in order to win. You win by grabbing up what’s available and linking your towns together as efficiently as possible.
As such, it’s useful to think of yourself as a strategist and tactician - deploying your troops, and doing your best to keep them alive at the same time as you’re trying to take over this island. A lot of the terms of this game echo this type of military language. So let’s get down to the nuts and bolts and put names to some of the various things you can do
So your main goal is to turn unclaimed parts of the board into 100% secure territory. The thing is - it doesn’t happen all at once. Areas of the board go through various stages of being secure
Claimed Area - a part of the board occupied by one or two of your stones, may still be vulnerable to invasion / reduction. Here you can say that Black approached or claimed the upper right corner, and White claimed the lower right, etc. As you can see from the score estimator, each stone’s hold on that area is very tenuous.
Enclosed Potential - held more securely by a group or framework of stones, less vulnerable. Here you can say Black’s group enclosed the upper right corner, and White’s group enclosed the lower right. The score estimator shows that each group’s hold on their area has become more secure. The reason the lower right is less certain, is the score estimator knows that Black is about to play next, and it’s being cautious in case Black plays the 3-3 invasion in the lower right.
Secure Territory - all of your stones have secure connections, the opponent may reduce by 1 point at the border, but there is no way this part of the board can change hands. As you can see, the score estimator may be iffy about a few points near the lower border, but other than that, it’s confident that the enclosed areas are secure territory.
Feel free to see my variations here if you want to play around with it
So, your garrison towns start isolated and far apart, but after a few dozen airdrops, they’re surrounded by reinforcements, and they can call their side of the wall secure - they don’t have to worry about it any more.
The other important thing to remember is that some parts of the island are much more valuable than others, because they’re MUCH easier to enclose and defended
So here they’re color coded as follows
Corners - YELLOW - most valuable
Sides - ORANGE - next most valuable
Middle - RED - least valuable, most costly to defend
Think back to the island you’re trying to take over - the ocean forms a natural border at the edges, so you don’t need to build walls there. The parts on the corners take only 2 walls, the sides take 3 walls, the interior takes 4 walls.
When you think about it that way, the island becomes somewhat of a pie-eating contest. There’s all this FREE REAL ESTATE just sitting there, ripe for the taking. If your opponent approaches an unclaimed area, you probably want to send some troops in there as well, just to make sure you grab some portion that area. However, once you’ve finished that particular interaction (i.e. - settled your stones, made a base) your next best move might be to claim a different unclaimed area of the board
So, you start off an empty board and a single stone - let’s say you have Black.
You have the whole board open to you so you grab any of the 4 corners, since they are the most valuable beach front real estate - usually that means you play at either the 4-4 point or the 3-4 point on that corner
Once all 4 corners are claimed, you can either choose to
Enclose one of your corners, or
Approach one of your opponent’s corners
Again, you’re taking these actions because you’re trying to put your stones in those parts of the board that are most valuable. Trying to keep as much of your corner for yourself (enclosing) is as valuable as trying to take some portion of your opponent’s corners (approaching)
While you are making choices, your opponent can surprise you and make their own choices as well:
Move 5 - Black approaches White’s corner
Move 6 - White ignores the sente move, and approaches Black’s lower right corner
Move 7 - Black defends with the Kick to enclose more of the corner
Move 8 - White extends up (defending itself by creating more liberties)
Move 9 - Black settles their group to enclose more of the lower part of the corner
Move 10 - White makes a base to enclose part of the right side
So, as I hope you’re noticing, there are LOTS OF CHOICES for each step - approach, enclose, attack, defend. Which one are you supposed to do? Which one is better? Well that’s the thing about Go - there is never going to be one right answer for any of these questions. It all comes down to
- What is your playstyle
- Are you evenly matched with your opponent, or is one more skilled than the other?
- Do you want to roll the dice on a bunch of high risk / high reward gambles, or do you want to grab as much potential as you can in the most safe, straightforward manner?
In this game, you have a list of priorities, and a set of actions that you can take towards those goals. So a big part of Go is telling yourself a story about what happened so that you can figure out what the next best step might be. Let’s talk it through using this example.
So White just played move 10, that means Black has initiative (sente)
Now Black can play it safe and enclose the upper right corner, knowing that White will respond by trying to enclose the left side. This is each side safely grabbing free pie while it’s sitting there for the taking.
Or Black can take a risk, invade the left side at 7D, knowing that White will try to pen it in from the top and bottom left, and it might have to run out to the middle to stay connected because it won’t have room to make life on the left. The funny thing is - the score estimator for both of these variations was just about the same - Black ahead by 0.5 points - still anybody’s game.
Feel free to play around with the demo board and take a look at all the branches of the variations - things can go lots of different ways depending on the choices made along the way
Because there are SO MANY choices available each time sente passes from one player to the other, it’s good to think of this game as a Choose Your Own Adventure story that you’re writing in real time. You have to be able to describe the risk / reward landscape you’re in so you can put yourself in context in terms of
- What’s the next most valuable area of the board
- What is your opponent’s weakest group? (your next best place to attack, or grow in that direction)
- What is your weakest group? (where is your opponent next most likely to attack?)
Here is the full list of game priorities. I wrote these up for the 19x19 game, but they apply to 13x13 very well also:
1: The Opening:
- Claim freely available potential in order of corners > sides > middle
- Create large extensions / prevent large extensions
- Create small extensions, prevent small extensions
As soon as all the edge potential on the board is claimed, we move onto the next set of priorities
2: Early Midgame:
- Expand your claimed potential away from the edge and into the middle
- Push into the middle from both sides of one extension to create an enclosure
- Prevent your opponent from creating an enclosure
- Claim any unsecured edge or corner potential
As soon as half of the remaining potential is claimed, we switch to
3: Late Midgame:
- Expand your frameworks into whatever unclaimed areas remain
- Push tendrils from living groups into poorly secured section of your opponent’s potential to reduce eyespace
- Close up the poorly secured sections of your own frameworks
- Connect any weak groups at risk of getting stranded without making two eyes
As soon as all of the major battles on the board are resolved, we switch to the final set of priorities
4: Endgame:
- Close up the remaining gaps in your borders in such a way that you retain sente for as long as possible (even move sequences) rather than exit in gote (odd move sequences) and pass sente to your opponent
- Play on any points near your borders that could be used to make eye space by your opponent
- Play moves which force your opponent to fill in their eyespace
- Resolve any ko threats
- Fill in any empty dame points (points which do not change the score either way) to make score counting easier
- Both players pass and accept the results
STRONG GROUPS AND WEAK GROUPS
So, a weak group is any group of stones that is at risk of being surrounded if it cannot make two eyes and guarantee life in that part of the board.
Take a look at this example here - White is chasing Black’s left middle group from the top and bottom. Even though there might be reinforcements close, Black has no choice but to run to the middle and connect, because there’s nowhere on the left side where it can make two eyes - White can attack from both sides.
On the other hand, Black’s two other groups on the upper and lower right are both unconditionally alive. White might reduce those groups somehow, but they have enough room near the edge that they could always make some eyes and live. As such, Black can use those groups to attack - to push out from those border and attack White knowing they can’t be surrounded and killed. Strong groups can attack. Weak groups have no choice except to run or capture stones to create eye shape.
CONNECTING OR CUTTING
So, one thing that gets a lot of beginners in trouble is they don’t keep track of their weak groups. Usually this comes from cutting and not thinking about the consequences. What do I mean by cutting?
So in this game, stones can be cut apart and separated - the thing is - usually means that both players have mutually separated groups.
Here, Black has two stones marked with O’s
1: White separates the 2 Black stones
2: Black protects with a Tiger’s Mouth, putting the attacking stone in atari
3: White extends down. Black has 2 cut points at A and B and they can only close one of them
4: When Black connects at A
5: White cuts at B (or vice versa). All the lone stones extend safely away, resulting in four mutually separated groups. Black’s two groups cannot reconnect unless they capture some of the White stones in between.
Beginners who approach the game with an emphasis on fighting and capturing often cut without considering the risks to their cutting stones. More experienced players understand that not all cuts are created equal, and weigh that decision based on the chances their stones face once they’re stranded in enemy territory, and have to run to reinforcements, or make life in a small space.
So, I know that’s a lot but just take your time and see if you can digest that - try to see that Go board as an empty map, and those stones as troops who are counting on you to keep them alive.
See if you can follow those priorities, enclose parts of the board with your groups, push your enclosed potential away from the middle, and grab as much of that island as you can keep. Good luck.
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