Stone placement

Is it like the motion of snapping a Shogi koma (see Hidetchi’s “special lesson” video)?

Surely it’s one or the other, either the sound or the placing technique, and if it’s both it will almost certainly sound different depending on the stone and board materials being used, because I highly doubt one can get the same sound from different boards with different stones.

Even the surface with which the board sits on can make a difference.

I’ve a Katsura board for example that really only produces a dull sound no matter how heavy or light one slams a stone down. Even with glass stones there won’t be a sort of “click”. On the other hand other types of wooden boards would certainly produce a sort of click.

In any case, I don’t think I really understand so I probably can’t help. Apologies, hopefully someone else will be able to.

I am intrigued as to exactly what’s the difference. Is it specifically tailored to make a click?

I did think of this, but one will hardly get the snapping sound if one does it with wooden pieces on a vinyl board for example.

I doubt that even Wilcox’s technique would make a click against a vinyl board. The click comes from the stone being clicked against the board.

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It’s not. People who tell beginners off for placing their stones “wrongly” piss me off. Welcome new players, don’t chide them. There was a British player who went on the radio to talk about Go following the AlphaGo match. He spent something like 10% of the allotted time telling the presenter he was placing the stones wrongly. Pretty pointless on an audio medium, and irrelevant unwelcoming junk. I died a little inside.

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Audio medium? Should be difficult to go into variations around Lee Sedol wonderful move of game four too…
But yes there are more things to say as how to hold a stone.

Is this something like what you’re looking for?

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Yes, that “dan player technique” does look exactly like what I remember. The stone is placed precisely, then clicked. It is very impressive, especially when your moves are unexpectedly good, as Bruce Wilcox’s always were. I have no idea how to do that. So, I’m wondering if anyone has an instructional video. I’m sure lots of players would like to learn this technique.

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I think in the comments yeonwoo said she might make another video explaining it.

She clearly says it’s just a secret dan technique :wink:

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I think she is just holding the stone in the typical way, letting a point closer to the edge touch first, and then forcefully sliding the stone off of the finger while snapping the center on the stone down on the board.

I don’t think there is any key secret technique, but instead just a matter of practice and experience.

Is that just another analogy for being a dan player?

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I guess I should clarify, there is the key technique of making two impacts, while briefly breaking contact between the board and the stone in between.

The initial contact is the stone clicking against the board when it is brought in at an angle. This is a contact point closer to the edge than the center. Then, when sliding the stone off the supporting index finger, the key is to pivot the stone into a flat position, making use of the fingers to do so, rather than rocking the curve of the stone against the board. This momentarily breaks contact with board, before the center comes down to hit the board again. Effectively, you are rocking the stone into a flat position using the curve of the stone against your finger, instead of against the board, to generate a slight lift of the edge. However, while combining this with a general downward push the stone, you can do this while having the smooth downward movement of the center of mass of the stone.

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I have a set of half-flat stones (single-convex or “one-side-convex”). My impression is that getting a nice click is much easier with those, since the flat bottom of the stone makes that whole bottom impact the board together (you still have to go for the “click” intentionally, touching just the tip of the stone in place and then finally clicking, but getting it to actually click is easier than with biconvex stones).

For the same reason of having a different shape though, it also sounds somewhat differently than in the video, like a “harder” click probably. In the video it sounds more like a “softened click”, not sure how to explain it.

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Nope it’s definitely dan magic :rofl:

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