In my last three games, I controlled most of the board and two corners, yet I lost one. I understand they took a lot of stones; the other two games were not that way. These were the last three games I played-- please, if someone could explain to me why I lost those games completely – I’m stumped as to why I lost i sure would be gratful
Link the games here, or at least your profile so we can have easy access to them. Thank you.
These are your last three games, excluding one that was cancelled after a single move.
The reason why you lost one of these is simple: you resigned. The other two games were nowhere near finished even though you and your opponent went to counting:
You didn’t control anything, let alone most of the board.
You do not understand the basics.
Have you done the tutorial? If not, you need to do that. If you can’t be bothered doing the tutorial, you should not be surprised if others cannot be bothered to help you.
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oh never mind i just suck it up i guess i don’t like i have said before know how to do any of those things so thanks for the interest at least – i just plug along in the blindness here and maybe something will click for me
Play through this: Tutorial
If you have trouble, ask questions about it in the forum.
If you do not play through the tutorial, and ask specific questions when you have problems, then I think you should stop bothering people with your posts on the forum. It is a waste of everyone’s time.
If you do play through the tutorial, then feel free to ask as many questions as you need to help you understand.
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To all the kind and patient people who are trying to offer cogent advice in this thread
You may want to check out this user’s posting history because he was asking these exact same questions over a year ago
Your mileage may vary
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As I mentioned before, modern AIs take this approach. It takes them about 20 million games to get good.
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@dokbohm This is a huge compliment! GreenAsJade has just compared your GO potential to AI’s like Alpha GO etc… After 20million games you can come back here and teach us all a lesson!
I for one can’t wait. So please get to work and lets us know when you’re done 
never mind---- just tired of the misunderstanding of what is asked every time
While we’re here, it seems timely to mention: I was reminded that there are two Go sites that are better than OGS for beginners:
These each have something that OGS does not: in-game visualisation of “what is happening”
OGS doesn’t have this because it’s a kind of “cheating”.
It strikes me that maybe we should introduce a learning mode that is similar.
Anyhow, I strongly recommend that if you want to play and have it “just click in your mind” then both those sites are better than here, because you have real-time feedback.
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i will try those sites maybe they are not mean spirited as here in their forum sections if they have any
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Ask clearer questions then.
Be honest with yourself @dokbohm, this forum has been more than patient with you. Many people over the course of months have been kind enough to take the time to try to explain the basics to you. You’ve gotten a lot of support
At times people do get frustrated when the advice given is not followed and might react badly when you ask a similar question again.
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ok point well taken---- no more repeat questions— sorry about that–it that does make real sense even if i forget what i said couple of days ago will try harder not to repeat
Imagine a similar situation outside of “cyberspace”.
Like you going to a real Go-club.
Real people
Real boards
Real stones
If you are reasonably lucky, they will welcome you as a beginner and teach you the basics of the game.
At some point they will offer you to play a game - with another beginner maybe.
And as soon as you start playing, they will see that you are blitzing out almost all of your moves. Without thinking at all!
Your mentors/teachers will go “Wow, wow, wow! Man! You have to slow down. After all, Go is a mental exercise.”
And then you will:
- Continue blitzing out almost all of your moves without thinking
- Complain about the quality of the advice given and the tutorials available
- Complain about the complexity of the rules
- Call people names that capture your stones
- Invent your own rules that don’t make any sense from a Go perspective
- Consistently ignore any advice that people who play this game for decades have given you
- Raise the same questions again and again and continue ignoring the answers
What do you think would happen?
Think about it!
What would happen?
I can guarantee you that it wouldn’t take these people more than an hour or two to draw their conclusions and they would all turn their backs on you in no time.
Permanently.
Only here, in “cyberspace”, where your behavior when playing games is less obvious, can you continue your very questionable endeavor.
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Many people understand your limitations when it comes to your memory, but not everybody understands all the time
Some others are tired
Others doubt your sincerity
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We keep circling around the details, but the crux of the matter is that the OP (dokbohm) does not understand what makes a LIVING GROUP - or, on the flip side of that coin, what kills a group and makes it dead without having to capture all those stones
And yes, it’s true - it takes a bit of mental work to understand, because a LIVING GROUP is a complex thing - a sum-of-its-parts - something that takes several moves to build - something that can be interrupted in that process and killed before it has a chance to make life.
People have very patiently tried to explain it themselves, or point the OP to various tutorials, videos, every possible resource etc. The response is always the same - “this is too complicated, I don’t understand, explain it another way… etc”
And then it somehow becomes everyone else’s responsibility that this is all too complicated for the OP - like it’s our job to make the rules of this game easier to understand.
Personally, I find it very difficult to believe that someone with the mental wherewithal to
- work a computer
- navigate a website
- learn a new game
- converse with people in a forum by text
somehow lacks the mental capacity to work through a tutorial or video and learn the most fundamental and basic rule that determines whether a group of stones on the board is alive or dead. Like - it’s literally the single most important aspect of the game without which nothing makes sense, and apparently - it’s completely beyond the OP’s comprehension no matter how hard they try because oh my gosh - they’re so old, and their mind is so feeble, and it’s all just too hard. Boo hoo! Poor them! Doesn’t it just make you want to drop everything and take care of them? Sure. Right. Yeah.
IMHO - the OP is not playing a strategy game - they are playing the GET ATTENTION FROM PEOPLE ON THE INTERNET game - and they are surprisingly good at it. Just look how long they’ve been able to pull off basically the exact same trick (note: before dokbohm was active, the OP was working the same schtick under the username NewOldGuy, so they’ve been active for a long time…)
This trick works on new people, but if the OP keeps trying the same trick with the same people - eventually people don’t want to answer those questions anymore. We already answered them.
The OP lost this game because they don’t understand what makes a living group - they keep losing games because they don’t understand what makes a living group. They win games against other players almost by accident because neither of them understand what makes a living group, it’s just the OP managed to capture more of the edge of the board. At the end of the day - it all boils down to the same thing - so long as the OP does not comprehend what makes a living group, they are not playing Go - they’re just putting stones down at random. My 2 cents. : /
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Are you aware of the fact that you are insulting the people who have been trying to help you make progress for about a year now?
That you are insulting these people who are more experienced players than you are, many of whom have, at one time, followed the advices given to them, namely to play (!) through the interactive tutorials?
That you are insulting them, apparently because you’re frustrated because you hardly make progress – because you don’t heed their advice?
WE understand VERY WELL, it’s just that we give you feedback that you don’t want to acknowledge.
We are NOT “mean spirited” AT ALL, we have been extremely patient with you, and we have, time and again, given you well-meaning advice, remembering how it was for them back when we were newbies.
But sure, keep blaming your doctor because you’re still sick after not taking the medicine that the doctor prescribed.
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well from my point of view - you are mean spirted in your elitist thinking— of your way is the the right and only way to play and its our way or the hyway type of thinking – thats not all of the people that have tired to be helful but a large portion- buti cannot change what you think of me that is for sure - so i will just plug along and try to not ask the same questions twice -