Close game to 17? on KGS

My first game of the day was with a 17k Russian, who resigned after about 20 moves for some reason. Perhaps called away for something, or perhaps they were frustrated with my laggy moves. Certainly wasn't because they were losing, because they weren't. His resignation made me a 17k. A win is a win, but unless it is earned, I doubt it is to your advantage to have a higher rank than you are entitled to. Regular play will iron out such kinks, presumably.

Next, despite some more heavy lag, a fun game with a 17k? player: Kairo1.

My opponent won the game by 3.50 points. I made many mistakes this game, but I at least managed to surround one of their groups as consolation. My compulsion to keep my groups connected now seems second nature, finally. I ran out of main time about half way through the game (due *I think* to laggy responses, and played the rest in byo-yomi. I.e. pretty much in panic.)

Move 4, I took the enclosure rather than the remaining hoshi - wise?
Move 11, B nicely prevented a solid connection between W's two groups.
Move 44, perhaps solidifying top left at J17 would be better in terms of territory.
Move 54 oddly determined to split black. Better at O8?
Move 80 was greedy and I got rightly punished.
Move 95 a big point, denying a lot of territory to W.
Move 100 very short-sighted.

Loss on OGS to fimko

This game should have been lost at the start, but I somehow managed to escape a stranglehold, but it ultimately did no good, I had no territory, my opponent was one step ahead of me for the rest of the game. Enjoyed this one a lot.

These games can take so long, I can genuinely improve during the course of them. I look back at some of the early moves in this game and can't understand why I made them. Look at the way the bottom right corner is allowed to first get cut off, and secondly doesn't even try to live. Nuts!

My opponent's move 84 was a mistake, it allowed my otherwise very dead large group to escape and live.

The resignation followed an unsuccessful attempt at reduction of the opponent's otherwise massive territory, but my moves were uncoordinated and too separated to be effective, so I spent the whole time trying to keep lots of little groups connected, and ultimately failing.

Lunchtime game with Tim

Met up with Tim at lunchtime for a very enjoyable game. He's roughly 20k. I gave him 3 stones and I won with 78 points to his 50. I made one large mistake, allowing a strategic group to get captured while I was eyeing both defence and attack elsewhere, and missed a couple of ataris due to needless rushing. The one thing I made damn certain of, was to not get cut off. Paid off, it seems.

Haven't captured the game in SGF, but may try to do so on the Palm next time. Or maybe just a photo. Hopefully we'll make this weekly.

My first full game with the bamboo board and yunzi stones from www.weiqistore.com - great to celebrate the first game with a win!

Whoa, I have a KGS rank

On Oct 12th, I played Timmy who is 17k. My provisional rank was 21k, so KGS gave me 4 handicap stones. I won by 8.5 points - talk about close!

Despite winning, I made several bad moves in that game. Again, I lose groups by not reading ahead. Don't get cut off. Just don't. Don't miss ataris. Just don't.

Winning this game gave me an unqualified ranking of 19k. Let's see how that changes over the next few ranked games. Probably up into the 20s again. I certainly feel weaker than the OGS players who are 20 and stronger, although their ranks may be artifically weaker until they've completed enough games against their equals/betters for their own ranks to become reliable. With the slow turnaround on OGS, it can take months to reflect reality.

Still, now I'm on the map, and it's not a bad rank for a beginner! In fact, at the Bristol Go Club I attend every couple of weeks Peter, a 2k player thinks I'm slightly stronger than 19k. We'll see. I'd like to get my games there recorded for analysis.

Still, it pleased me immensely to a) win on KGS for once, and b) finally have a rank.

Another day, another loss

I tried to play a KGS game the next day, and then again a couple of days later, but had to resign both due to lag.

Couple of day later again, I played Windblow who didn't know his rank (but KGS shows maybe about 9k to 16k at the time) and I lost by 53 points. Closest yet on KGS, but not actually close. I was winning the first series of fights, but failed to read ahead simple moves which got my own groups cut off and killed. Serves me right.

Another KGS game, same opponent

A couple of days later I offered another game and the same guy accepted.

10 points better than the last game, but still some large mistakes - groups getting cut off, more missed ataris etc.

First realtime 19x19 game on KGS

With a few 19x19 games on OGS under my belt, and a rank of 26 (some of which was earned, some due to timeouts), I felt more ready for realtime 19x19 games on KGS. So when the opportunity arose, I took it. Like all beginners, I was more interested in getting a good ranking than learning to improve my play, so I sought out rated games as opposed to free games (where your rating is not affected by the result).

On KGS, when you want to play, you have the option of either offering a game yourself, or selecting an offered game. I didn't see any 'appropriate' (i.e. games offered by ranked players of ~30 which would make a win more likely) games, so I offered one of my own. It was accepted by a guy with an ~18 rank, so I expected to lose, but it would all count towards my own ranking. On KGS, you need two wins and two losses to ranked players before your own rank is considered reliable enough to be shown unqualified.

But wow, the biggest shock when coming to realtime play on KGS after a couple of months of OGS is the speed of play required. It looks like the most usual game time option selected is 30 mins each, with 5x30 seconds of byo-yomi time. In addition to the novelty of a time limit, my internet access to KGS is quite laggy, with frequently 30 seconds being taken off my time each move despite my clicking the move pretty immediately. This all conspired to make my play on my first realtime game on KGS a highly anxious one.

I'd like to blame the loss on all of the above, but you gotta be able to make better decisions under time pressure than I did in this game. From stupid cutting points being gifted to the opponent, to failure to notice ataris, I think I was lucky to be only 90 points behind black.

Loss on OGS against miharbio

This game is a lesson in being herded into the edge without the room (or enough effort) to make life.

The activity in the bottom right corner is just weak, but I completely misread the danger presented by move 51, and my response is laughable. Move 53 was exactly right and the group was dead, I just hadn't noticed. Things continued poorly from there on, despite my continued feeling that 'I can get out of this'. I couldn't.

Loss on OGS to boredom

the player that is, not the state of mind.

Enjoyed the beginning of this game, some experimentation and some cockiness. I thought I was doing OK, but my experienced opponent just kept his cool and punished me again and again when I let myself get isolated.

Welcome to my go blog

Despite rapidly approaching 40, I am a comics and manga fan, and it was through the excellent Hikaru No Go manga that I was first introduced to the game of go (also known as weiqi in China, baduk in Korea, igo in Japan).

In the summer of 2009, I began to learn the rules and tried playing against the computer. At the same time, I signed up to KGS and IGS, online go servers that allow you to play against other addicts.

Initial games were played on a 9x9 sized board on KGS, popular with beginners because the normal 19x19 board is pretty overwhelming until you attain a certain level.

Apart from generally sucking at games, the largest handicap facing me is my two kids, the youngest of which is under a year old and frequently robs us of sleep. This, coupled with the fact that a full game of go can take an hour and a half to play, leaves me with a problem of finding time to play enough to progress.

Enter OGS, a turn-based/correspondence go server that allows you to play as slow as you like, a move here, a move there. Not as useful to beginners as losing a few dozen realtime games as quickly as possible, but certainly better than nothing.

This is my first completed 19x19 game on OGS. OGS players are from all over the world, but Meic happens to also live in Wales, UK. Perhaps we'll meet at a tournament one day.

In this game, my battle plan was pretty much assume-your-opponent-will-play-poorly. This rarely happens, and is not an advisable strategy. Also on display is a complete failure to read ahead (even 1 move) on my part. Not a pretty game. But completing a 19x19 game is an achievement in itself for a beginner. At a couple of stages I did ask my opponent whether I should resign there and then, but the question was never answered, presumably missed.