Is this group dead or in seki?

General Go Discussion
1

Is the white group at the top left of this game dead or in seki?

It would not affect the outcome of the game, I am just unclear on the rules surrounding this.

2

The more I look at it, the more I am thinking that it is dead. I was really surprised when my opponent was able to kill that group. I knew that he could not turn the eye space into a “dead shape” so I thought I was perfectly safe. I guess the lesson that I should learn from this is that you can still kill a group with a large eye space if all of the outside liberties of that group are already filled.

3

It is seki. The scoring dots show that white has 1 territory there but it might not be accurate. There is no territory in seki for anything. Not even eyes. This is according to japanese rules.

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4

It is a seki.

By the way, the group turned out this way not only because its outside liberty was filled, but because black got 2 consecutive moves inside it (D19 is a forcing move that have only 1 conceivable answer at E18).

To avoid it you can either play G19 instead of H19, or play D18 instead of filling in at G19 later.

In you next game be careful and recheck: if you are going to give black a sente move inside your big eye space, will black be able to live inside/kill your group? If Black could then it’s best to give in and play a safe move.

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5

Thanks for the replies. I knew when my opponent played the throw-in move that he was aiming for the sente move in my eye space, but because the eye space was so big, I didn’t think it would get him anywhere. I guess I owe him a big thanks for teaching me otherwise. :blush:

As far as scoring goes, I guess I should have marked the one eye in my seki group as dame so that it did not get counted as a point?

6

The scored area that we spectators see is not necessarily the same that was used to count the score. There is a bit discrepancy in that feature.

My first post was too unclear. I meant to say this too back then :slight_smile:

7

Some evil people (me) are very good at this kind of… endgame move. “Oh he’s just filling in dame, I’d pass and start counting.” There you go, 50 points yose.

Be careful, be very careful, especially when you’re leading :laughing:

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