Catching Scent of Victory

Description: In the second volume of The Heart of Go Series, O Rissei 9P discusses twenty of his own games and various strategies that he devised during them. Though it is intended to serve as a guide for developing your intuition in the game, it is a very advanced book that is beyond the scope of what kyu players will be able to comprehend. It should be seen as a collection of game commentary from O Rissei 9P with advanced analysis and content.

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Friday Go Forward: Week 37

Overview

After attempting to try and play one real time game every day (and then every other day), the realities finally set in and I decided that the only work around to not going long periods of not playing go was to ramp up my activity on Nova.gs. As much as correspondence games do not hold quite the same value as real time games (since your thoughts are often disjointed and your ideas are constantly changing which means you might not like the plan you came up with 2 days ago), I have found them to be a convenient and effective way to ensure that I’m not rusty when it comes time to play a game in real time. Otherwise, things have been pretty solid and I’m continuing onwards with my training regimen. Till next week!

Games

• KGS - 0 games
• DGS - 3 ongoing games
• Nova - 8+ games

Training Menu

• 20 minutes of Reading Training (i.e., Life & Death, Tesuji, etc.)
• 20 minutes of Go Theory Study (i.e., Joseki, Direction of Play, etc.)
• 20 minutes of Experience Training (i.e., Play or review a game)

Reading Material

• Finished Jump Level Up 4.
• Started and finished Scent of Victory.
• Started working on Otake’s Secrets of Strategy.
• Started working on Jump Level Up 5.
• Worked on The 1971 Honinbo Tournament.

Video Lessons

• Becoming a 5 Kyu - Lesson 12
• Becoming a 5 Kyu - Lesson 13
• Becoming a 5 Kyu - Lesson 14
• Becoming a 5 Kyu - Lesson 15
• Becoming a 5 Kyu - Lesson 16
• Becoming a 5 Kyu - Lesson 17
• Becoming a 5 Kyu - Lesson 18
• Attacking Vitamins: Lesson 1

Earlier today, I was reading Otake’s Secrets of Strategy by Hideo Otake 9P when I stumbled upon an interesting quote:

In the opening there are no predetermined shapes. - Otake 9P
I know that it might seem terribly obvious to some of you, but it struck me as rather profound when I read it.

Otake was discussing the fact that many amateur players play joseki faithfully believing that since they are joseki it can’t be that bad. He considers this a huge flaw with our rationale because joseki are only as good as the position it was meant to be used in. So when he said that “there are no predetermined shapes” in the opening, it opened my eyes as to how unimaginative I have been with my openings lately.

Perhaps this quote will cause me to start playing some very odd experimental games where I lose and drop rank; but if it means that I’m developing my own creative style as I play, I have a feeling it will be an enjoyable journey: win or lose.

For this week’s bonus review, we will be going over my third game from the Canada Go League where I suffer a one-sided defeat. There is no excuse for the mistakes I made (both strategically and tactically), but the only thing I will say in my defense is that I tried out a lot of new experiments this game. And the thing to realize about experiments is that they often blow up in your face. This is a great example of one of them. Haha. xD Enjoy!

Over the past weekend, I decided to ramp up my activity on Nova.gs for a few reasons:

1. I want to support the developers by helping improve their user base and become a part of the founding community.
2. I was not playing enough games (in real time) and needed some outlet for me to practice applying things I am learning while trying new things out. By doing so, I’m hoping that my in real time games will become stronger.
3. As much as correspondence games are harder for me to play since I feel like my thoughts are constantly disjointed, I figured it would help me with practicing constant whole board thinking and positional judgment before each move.
   In terms of my overall emotions though, I’m in this weird limbo with go. Normally when people are conflicted on their journey, most might describe it as being at a fork in the road. Recently for me however, I feel as if I’m standing in a forest while surrounded by a dense fog. There is this sense of stumbling one step at a time without quite knowing where I’m headed. I’m trying a lot of different things, but I’m feeling rather lost in terms of what is holding me back.

To be clear though, this emotion is different from feeling burned out. I still enjoy all the time I spend on go, but I’m starting to wonder whether any of it is helping me get stronger. But no matter, I just have to have faith in my training regimen and move forward with what I enjoy. As long as I do that, I believe that I’ll be able to make more sense of this when I finally emerge from this haze.

Perceiving the Direction of Play

Description: In the first volume of The Heart of Go Series, Kobayashi Satoru 9P focuses on an important concept many players are unfamiliar with: the direction of play. As a critical component in any game, Satoru familiarizes the reader with direction of play though positions of his own games to illustrate direction of play in regards to fuseki, joseki, and fighting. This is an advanced book that should be read after one already has a basic understanding of direction of play.

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Friday Go Forward: Week 36

Overview

This week has been a continuation of trying to really dig deep when it comes to being consistent about maximizing my quality of training in a set amount of time. There has been a couple of days where I ended up slacking off, but I feel like it’s been good progress and that it should get better over time. I will admit that I do miss playing live games, but I know that it has been unrealistic of me to do so since it really consumes a lot of time whenever I do. So as of late, I have decided to increase my activity on Nova.gs* in order to ensure that I don’t get rusty. I hope that more of you will join me over there so that we can play more games!

*And just in case anyone is wondering, Nova.gs allows you to play both live games in real time along with correspondence games. It’s pretty sweet!

Games

• KGS - 1 game
• DGS - 3 ongoing games
• Nova - 6 games (3 finished : 3 ongoing)

Training Menu

• 20 minutes of Reading Training (i.e., Life & Death, Tesuji, etc.)
• 20 minutes of Go Theory Study (i.e., Joseki, Direction of Play, etc.)
• 20 minutes of Experience Training (i.e., Play or review a game)

Reading Material

• Finished Jump Level Up 3.
• Finished_ __Perceiving the Direction of Play_.
• Started and finished Master Play: The Style of Lee Changho.
• Started working on Jump Level Up 4.
• Started working on The 1971 Honinbo Tournament.

Video Lessons

• Becoming a 5 Kyu - Lesson 6
• Becoming a 5 Kyu - Lesson 7
• Becoming a 5 Kyu - Lesson 8
• Becoming a 5 Kyu - Lesson 9
• Becoming a 5 Kyu - Lesson 10
• Becoming a 5 Kyu - Lesson 11

Master Play: The Style of Lee Changho

Description: In the first volume of Yuan Zhou’s series “Master Play,” Zhou provides amateur players with insight into the legendary Lee Changho. Zhou provides two in-depth commentaries on two of Lee Changho’s games to illustrate Lee Changho’s brilliance and why his famous “calm and solid” style it is so effective. Very useful for kyu players who find themselves consistently in violent games.

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For your second bonus game review, we will be continuing with my second game from the Canada Go League! Similar to what I mentioned in last week’s game, though my opponent was supposed to be in the 5-6 kyu range, I was not going to be underestimate my opponent.

Overall, this game is a good illustration of recognizing when to tenuki and how it is important not to let your opponent seal you in without good reason. In addition, I hope that this game will help you see my decision process when trying to figure out whether something is worth responding to or not. Hope you enjoy!