Help! (Go)

[Persona]

Mackay said, shortly before the thread got hijacked, that she might try learning Go instead.

This thread is to allow her, or anyone, to do so. I'm sure there's more experienced players than I on here, and I'm now calling you out. Correct me, help me, provide interesting puzzles, generally make things happen.

My question to start it out: Opening theory in Go seemed to make a quantum leap within the last 40 years, from thinking that opening on the 4,4 point allowed too much room inside to recognizing that it gave enough strength towards the center to make it worth playing almost exclusively. Was there a particular player, series, or treatise that gave people this impression?

If people have easier questions, I'd also be happy to handle those.

[Courk]

How do you play Go?

[Persona]

With an air of mystery and joy.


Also, players alternate placing their stones (first player black, second player white) on the board. Stones are placed on the intersections of a 19x19 intersection board. When learning, or in super speed situations, you might also see 9x9 or 13x13 board sizes.

Once a piece is on the board, it doesn't get moved. It can be captured, according to a slightly less-than-simple rule, which I'll describe below.

A player can pass instead of playing a stone on any of their moves. The game ends when both players pass (Like chess, games often end in resignation instead of playing out a lost game).

After both players have passed, you count the area surrounded by each player's stones. Stones you have captured are subtracted from your opponent's area. Whoever has the most area controlled wins. The rules for counting area change slightly depending on where you're playing.

[Persona]

The diagrams here are taken form telgo.com and pandanet.co.jp, which I don't necessarily endorse, they were just some of the first ones I saw.

Capturing:

The important thing to keep track of is how many open intersections are next to a stone or a group of stones. A stone in the corner has 2, on the edge has 3, and in the center has 4.



When all of these intersections are occupied by opponent stones, then the surrounded stone is removed.

This also applies to a group of stones:



The black stones aren't dead yet, because C1 is the open intersection. After white plays there, both black stones are captured.

There's an additional rule to prevent endless capture fights:



Note that here, white can capture black's stone, but black could immediately re-capture white's stone. The rule of "Ko" dictates that a board position cannot be repeated within a game. So Black would have to play somewhere else on the board. If this forces white to respond out there, then black can re-capture. If black's move doesn't demand a response, then white can 'fill in' the empty space and make his stones safe from capture (unless black manages to surround all of them)

[LGB*]

Is there an online version of this for practice? It looks a bit like othello

[Persona]

There is a free play-against-the-computer at http://kgs.kiseido.com/en_US/tutorial/13.html, but the computer makes suicidal moves, doesn't understand when a group of stones will be inevitably taken, and generally feels like it would do more harm than good to show you. And yet, there it is.

You can also muck around http://games.yahoo.com, where plenty of people would be happy to teach with you if you mention you haven't played before.

I don't know of any other play-against-the-computer online sites. This is partially because it is VERY HARD to make a good computer AI for go. No program has yet been written that can beat someone with 2-3 years solid experience, let alone a professional player.

[casinopete]

Re: online version:

There is a program you can download for free to practice on a 9x9 board called igowin. First hit on google will take you to a place to download it. It is a partial version of a larger program called Many Faces of Go, which has frequently been a contender in computer go program tournaments, but is a commercial program.

If you want to play 19x19 against a computer for free, you can look for a recent version of GNUgo, an open source program.

Another option is to log on at kgs.kiseido.com. Their server almost always has a few computer program players open for anyone to play against. They are marked as computer players in the notes section of open games listings there.

An important thing to note is that computer programs are not very strong at go. It should take only about 2-6 months of playing before you are strong enough to defeat any computer program (depending on how regularly you are playing and how serious you are about learning the game). Also, they often make "strange" plays which are easy to capitalize upon. If you really want to improve at playing go, you should play humans.

Of the sites at which I have played go online, kgs is by far the best for new players. The software is well developed for reviewing games, and I have found the people there a lot more friendly and willing to assist those interested in learning.

[Hikaru79*]

I'm an experienced Go player; I've been dedicated to the game for years now. If anyone has any questions about the game, you can e-mail me at any time at adrianp@cogeco.ca, and I'd be glad to answer any questions about the game, or even give some lessons on KGS or IGS

Enjoy Go, everyone!!

[LGB]

Hikaru is a girl's name

[MTGAP]