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DharmaBum's Journal
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Author:  DharmaBum [ Fri Feb 04, 2011 9:23 am ]
Post subject:  DharmaBum's Journal

Hey Everyone,

I'm Currently around 15 kyu and I would like to plan to move up 10 ranks by the time my birthday rolls around in July. This may be a bit of a stretch, me being a university student and not having tons of time to commit to things such as playing every single day.

My current plan:
-Try and play a game once every other day online
-Play a game in person once a week
-Finish the books I currently have (In the Beginning and Basic Techniques of Go)
-With the Smartgo Iphone app do as many life and death problems as my spare time will allow

My University has a Go club started by myself and one other student allowing me to play weekly in person. He is about a 2 dan so it will allow me to play teaching games. I think posting games I play on here for some helpful advice would also be beneficial.

Author:  EdLee [ Fri Feb 04, 2011 10:35 pm ]
Post subject: 

Good luck! Which university?

Author:  DharmaBum [ Sun Feb 06, 2011 12:31 pm ]
Post subject:  Re: DharmaBum's Journal

Thanks, I'm at Ottawa University

Author:  DharmaBum [ Tue Mar 29, 2011 8:24 pm ]
Post subject:  Re: DharmaBum's Journal

I finally have had the time to play a couple of games on KGS. The first of which I won and the second I lost.

Here is the first game.


I feel like my opening was much stronger than my opponents, which resulted in me having an easier time with the game.


The second game was not the same case...


To name one problem with this second match I don't think I dealt with my opponents invasion very well and I think my game was basically sloppy. I have a bad tendency to play before thinking my moves out thoroughly. The timer stresses me out.

If anyone has and specific criticism (I'm sure there's a lot) I would love to hear it!

As far as studying goes, I'm reading into counting which I am not very good at. I'm going to hopefully borrow Attack and Defense from one of my friends at the local club. I also am doing life and death problems on my Iphone instead of paying attention in class hahaha. I'm not having too much trouble with problems graded 15 or 12 Kyu. I haven't made it out to the local Go club lately due to my hectic work schedule but I plan to make it out this week.

Hopefully my updates will be more frequent now that school is a little more relaxed for me!

Author:  topazg [ Wed Mar 30, 2011 2:02 am ]
Post subject:  Re: DharmaBum's Journal

Good luck with the studies :)

Don't worry about the big loss in the second game, your opponent was sandbagging badly, and is a lot stronger than his rank suggests.

Author:  EdLee [ Wed Mar 30, 2011 4:45 am ]
Post subject: 

topazg wrote:
Don't worry about the big loss in the second game, your opponent was sandbagging badly, and is a lot stronger than his rank suggests
Thanks, topazg.

DharmaBum, I deranked your 2nd opponent's account and his other sandbagging accounts on KGS,
one of which went as high as 6k, so don't feel bad.

Author:  Tsuyoku [ Wed Mar 30, 2011 5:26 am ]
Post subject:  Re: DharmaBum's Journal

Some small remarks about the first game:

5: take the other corner when white does tengen on second move.
7: white played a second silly, you can still take that corner.
9: corner... corner... corner...
11: actually, both this and the previous move are out of place. Both of them would be better in the middle, so at K16 or K17, and R10 or Q10.
13: far too small. Consider D10
Remember: Corners, then sides, then anything else.
43: This cut forces white to shut you in.
45: How about C4?

Looks like you've got way better reading skills than your opponent, though. Play a few more and see if you can't gain a rank or two.

Second game is sandbagging. EdLee to the rescue!

Author:  topazg [ Wed Mar 30, 2011 6:18 am ]
Post subject:  Re:

EdLee wrote:
topazg wrote:
Don't worry about the big loss in the second game, your opponent was sandbagging badly, and is a lot stronger than his rank suggests
Thanks, topazg.

DharmaBum, I deranked your 2nd opponent's account and his other sandbagging accounts on KGS,
one of which went as high as 6k, so don't feel bad.


Ooh, you have uber KGS adminny privileges? I never knew :D

Congrats on your vigilance!

Author:  DharmaBum [ Wed Mar 30, 2011 7:23 am ]
Post subject:  Re: DharmaBum's Journal

I kind of thought my opponent was a lot stronger than his rank suggested.

Thanks for the feedback and thanks Edlee!

Author:  Loons [ Wed Apr 20, 2011 8:47 pm ]
Post subject:  Re: DharmaBum's Journal

How's sticking to your daily/weekly game schedule going?


Unrelatedly, Kerouac's book has been sitting on top of a pile of books not that far from where I'm sitting now. I've yet to open it; what's the urgency with which I should address this situation?

Author:  kaimat [ Tue May 03, 2011 7:54 am ]
Post subject:  Re: DharmaBum's Journal

Loons wrote:
How's sticking to your daily/weekly game schedule going?


Unrelatedly, Kerouac's book has been sitting on top of a pile of books not that far from where I'm sitting now. I've yet to open it; what's the urgency with which I should address this situation?


Read it immediately, it's a short book.

Author:  DharmaBum [ Mon Nov 21, 2011 10:05 pm ]
Post subject:  Re: DharmaBum's Journal

Well my first attempt turned out to be quite the disaster. Now that I've moved across the country I'm ready to take another swing at my goal of hitting single digit kyu!

I played a game tonight, it was the first one in a while. I would appreciate any criticism :)


Author:  jts [ Mon Nov 21, 2011 10:48 pm ]
Post subject:  Re: DharmaBum's Journal

Hope this is helpful.

6: B just made an armpit/shoulder hit, a type of contact move. W usually wants to stretch out to take advantage of being one move ahead locally.

10: I would pincer. I like the fact that the pincer is also an extension from r8 (which makes it more complicated for B to attack the pincer, I think). (I think I've heard that q14 isn't really good for W in this situation, but it's probably not suboptimal enough to make a difference.)

12: There are two stones in contact: so hane.

20: Solid connection: B could cut and atari immediately!

36: For this move to work, you need to first play s14, then play s16 (an atari), then this threatens to cut.

40: S12 is atari.

52: This was a contact move: don't jump away and leave your stone vulnerable.

Skipping ahead a bit...

96: Great example of a pointless move. Most of the time most of your stones are strategically or tactically vital, so when one gets ataried, you save it without thinking. Here, capturing the stone is almost worthless (seriously - why would it matter if he captured it? It's a two-point gote), so you would rather surround o8 or double approach d4.

98: Wrong direction, imho. (1) You want to attack from your weaker stones to drive him towards/along your stronger stones, where he'll be more vulnerable. (2) You want to attack in a way such that your attacking stones build up power around a valuable part of the board... like the bottom.

104: Great, this is a decent move - build up your power down here, get power at a distance to harass m8. (You could also do it the other way - play some moves threatening m8, then wheel about to attack p4. Just remember that contact moves strengthen the group you are attacking, distant moves weaken it.)

106: Ack, strengthening him for no profit :(

116: Too small: doesn't threaten the corner, just 10 points in gote.

128: Just play h9, and he's cut off. Huge victory.

Good game. My main suggestion: think move about contact moves. The only reason that playing first anywhere is an advantage is that when the enemy comes close, you are one move ahead. If he touches your stone and you jump away, you throw away your local advantage. Sometimes this is good (for example, when his surrounding position is so strong that you don't have a local advantage anyway), but more often you want to stay one move ahead by playing locally.

Author:  EdLee [ Mon Nov 21, 2011 11:08 pm ]
Post subject: 

A few ideas early on. 100% basic shape problems.

Author:  DharmaBum [ Tue Nov 22, 2011 4:26 pm ]
Post subject:  Re: DharmaBum's Journal

Thanks for being thorough Edlee and Jts. I've taken a look at your comments so now i'll try and imporve my shape problems :)

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