Guess rank game

Forum Games
41

This is just a game. Hiryuu can be right or wrong and there is absolutely no reason why he has to explain his reasoning

1 Like
42

Well, I guess most of the players who wanted to participated already left their guess. Oh, I wanted to ping everyone, but I guess I can mention only 10 people in my post. That means we have more than 10 participants! I guess go community lacks simple fun games.

Here’s a summary:

  • karmalia 23k
  • Chachapuma 16k
  • Conrad_Melville 14k
  • Kosh 12k
  • spatula 12k
  • hiryuu 10k
  • Pond_Turtle 8k
  • BHydden 8k
  • kyulearner 6.5k
  • MrMartin 5k
  • StephenC20XX 3k
  • bugcat 3k
  • wurfmaul3 1d
  • SanDiego 2d

Some clearly expressed that they think it’s a trick game. But I really didn’t want to trick anyone. I thought if I looked too hard into the game, I’d be imposing my own understanding how a certain level game looks like. Yeah, I choose weird opening to make it harder, but other than that I looked only at circumstances of the game. I wanted a close ranked live game between equally strong opponents that went into counting (to get some endgame). Players also needed stable rank, valid-looking history, and not be friends. I also disclosed the length of the game to give everyone idea how hard they were thinking. Now that everyone pointed out ton of mistakes I’m also thinking they weren’t trying hard enough, but on the other hand, if they always play like that, shouldn’t their rank reflect that? Anyway, since people didn’t like my game, let’s have someone else pick the game for round 2, ok?

Now the answer.

Answer

3k game
https://online-go.com/game/12812252
So the winners are:
@StephenC20XX and @bugcat
Congrats!

Let’s take a break for a couple of days to discuss the result and disparage me for picking such a bad game. And after that have someone else pick a really good game for round 2?

13 Likes
43

Well, this is certainly my biggest Go achievement to date :smiley:

I was a confusing game, but it just looked to me like the players were 5/6 stones stronger than I am with the exception of some mistakes that looked rather obvious to me. I think it seemed more likely though that some low SDKs play several 20 kyu moves than 20 kyus playing 200 low SDK moves.

Thanks for posting the game S_Alexander, this was fun.

5 Likes
44

To be honest i did’nt expect a result like that, I am an avarage 9 kyu player. Maybe I could’nt understand some moves. But the first move was really weird. So I can never say that they are really good players. I played against a 3kyu player he was really strong. He punished my weak shapes. After that game I saw that becoming a 3 kyu is a really hard thing for me therefore my goal is now to be 5 kyu till the end of this year.

This was my game which actually i lost at 80. move

I liked this event so I am really looking for the next guess rank game event.

45

Like you, I too will only post once to humor your post.

This is a guessing game where no one is obligated to provide any justifications and any reasoning provided is optional.

That being said, just to humor you, let’s assume that this is a scenario where we are obligated to provide justifications. Here are some reasons why i don’t have to.

1. I already did.
My criticisms of smurph’s and @SanDiego’s posts had justifications in that exact post already, I countered @SanDiego 's claims that a weird opening doesn’t prove ones strength. A logical answer was given to a question of a logical nature. No variations were required. His claims made with that line had no variations either, so I don’t see why mine requires any. Apparently he felt entitled to demand otherwise.

2. The justifications were already provided throughout the thread
Unlike Sandiego’s speculative assertions that the players were dan-level were few and far between, my claims of the players not being Dan have been pointed out as confirmed mistakes all throughout the thread by multiple people. @SanDiego himself could not be bothered to expend the energy to look through them himself and expected me to compile it in my post for his own convenience, to which I am not obligated or inclined to entertain. @bugcat likewise too could not be bothered enough to look through the posts to notice this but decided to mouth off a generic line without caring about the particular situation before scurrying off to avoid taking responsibility for his post.

@spatula simply blocking directly at H10 was so much better.

3 Likes
46

Oh come on, don’t ruin the game and calm down guys. There is no reason to get upset over somethig like this :slight_smile:

I liked the game @S_Alexander too bad I did not manage to guess in time :frowning: If noone else wants to, I will be happy to post the next one :slight_smile:

8 Likes
47

Maybe the true meta game that emerges among the posters of games will be to see who can generate the most acrimony among the responders. In which case, your calm and rational manner isn’t going to get you very far at all!

48

Some people didn’t, others did, fair enough. The weird opening is what tricked me into taking a closer look. The choce of a game with a no-fighting policy and a close result also muddied the waters, so well done.

I think it would be fair (or maybe add some spice) to give the two players a hint on what happened behind their back. Personally I have a word or two to say to black, as no kyu player should be allowed to open on a 5-9 point! On a more serious note, I’d be interested to hear the reasoning behind that opening.

49

It was fun for me. I was impressed by the calmness of the game, and the opening looked nice to me. At first I considered 5 dan and even 6 dan. Then I saw the endgame wasn’t very good so I guessed they are a bit weaker than me, therefore 1 dan. I didn’t think they were trolling (except for the unorthodox opening), I just thought they played thoughtlessly at times. Had I analysed the game more carefully, and realized that move 191 is bad, maybe I would have guessed differently. When StephenC20XX guessed 3 kyu, I actually thought “damn, that’s reasonable”. But I also thought it might be correct that it’s a one-player game after spatula’s guess. I would explain what made me think the players are strong, but at the moment, neither the link to the original game nor the link to the copy works for me.

50

@AdamR I was thinking to make this game run continuously with short rounds to get this forum a little bit more lively. Waiting an answer for a week would be a little too long for sure, so maybe 3-4 days each round? I was also thinking of writing a script to choose a game so even the one who posted game could guess. Anyway, looking forward for your game pick.

The biggest constraint on the game pick was equal rank. I wanted to make rank equal so we won’t have to guess rank for white and black separately, but turns out most of ogs games aren’t equal.

2 Likes
51

That would be awesome :smiley: I must say choosing the game really is hard. One does not want to “trick” others, but at the same time I want the game to be interesting somehow. After seing a lot of games I thought maybe not thinking too hard about it really might be the best way to chose :smiley:

anyway, since the discussion about the original game seems to have quiet down…

Guess the Rank, round TWO!

The game seems to have lasted almost 2 hours! :open_mouth: (but in later game I believe a lot of it were byo yomi)
Both players were the same rank at the time of play (both are a different person :stuck_out_tongue: ) and I believe they were not just messing around. How would you rate them?

4 Likes
52

Thanks for posting another game Adam.

Guessing first seems like a poor strategy but I’ll do it anyway and say that these are 13 kyus.

1 Like
53

I’ll be a little more generous and say 10k. Reasoning follows later.

The fact that it’s a 2 hr game does muddy the waters a bit (who plays 2 hr games except for Turtle?) but ah well.

Reasoninghttps://online-go.com/game/12895418
2 Likes
54

9k. This guess is as good as any other. If I were Adam, I’d pick a 9k game after 3k game.

Opening is beginner-looking: put some stones on star points and be happy. Not following up two corner approaches is not very good. R6 is more advanced but I’ve seen it in lower kyu games too. G4 could be anything. There’re crappy moves all over the place, but I kinda see what they want to do. And upper-right was joseki and white knew something about that cut. I feel like I’m horribly wrong, and they’re actually even stronger than that.

Edit: This guessing game is pretty nice because many players don’t actually know how ddk or sdk play. Players mostly know only what people close to their rank do.

3 Likes
55

i guess this may be 14kyu

56

The shoulderhit at move 14 is a joseki move, but a slightly rare one that wouldn’t expect a lot of SDK players to know. Indeed, I remember hearing Clossius say last year that he wasn’t familiar with it.

The fighting in the lower left corner seems quite strong to me. Each players tries to take the best result within the bounds of what is reasonable; neither of them pushes for too much. And by move 27, neither of them has ended up with a poor position there, like an eyeless group or a long stretch on the second line.

Strong also was the play on the left side after Black’s invasion. Consider that White makes a solid connection on move 42 in anticipation of continuing with D12 as he does in the game, rather than playing D13 which at a superficial glance would be more efficient.

There is one move that I don’t understand, which is why Black sacrificed the bottom side territory on move 97 when it looks to me that he could have blocked at N4 and captured the white group.

But that aside, the consistency of moves in the game that are reasonable, make good shape, and produce acceptable results leads me to think that these players have a lot of strength in local play and are above my level. I would guess that they are 2d.

3 Likes
57

I think @bugcat may have it exactly right again, but since I don’t want to piggyback on her analysis, I will venture 3d. At first I thought these players were strong DDKs, as others have said, but then I thought about how the board looked at the end. The scattered complicated arrangement of the stones resembles what I have seen often from mid- to high dans. It is notable that White has only 2 groups, and Black has just 3 groups. I don’t see this kind of board from DDKs, or even weak SDKs. Move for move, they play in that baffling, disjointed style that I associate with very strong players. Somehow they keep the balls in the air as they juggle several situations, and then link things up in the end. At first I thought the odd treatment of the sanrensei was DDK, but now I think it is just a strong player’s experiment. Similarly, F13 seemed odd at first, but then I saw that it is an aggressive bid for a large moyo. Black’s invasion of that incipient moyo seemed awkward, but was surprisingly effective in the end.

The one anomaly is Black’s inexplicable loss of the middle right side, which he could have saved at move 191 (or am I looking cross-eyed and am missing something?). The loss of those stones and territory amount to a 44-point swing, I think. Was it a conscious choice to take the upper right rather than save those stones? Is the upper right actually worth as much (I can’t tell)? Alternatively, it must be a blunder (maybe something distracted him–who knows). The loss there accounts for the large difference in score.

3 Likes
58

The rhs looks to me like an intentional trade that didn’t quite go as expected. Play was solid and definitely way too many tenukis for a kyu game. I’ll say one dan.

2 Likes
59

I am shocked. Shocked to find out that some people are guessing dan level. Have you even played through the complete game, move by move, at least once? Remember, it’s a 2 hour game!

:o

1 Like
60

I have, I’m mid SDK and regularly play against mid levels dans… the game feels stronger than my play but weaker than mid-dan… so it’s either very strong SDK or weak dan game

2 Likes