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Hey guys, I've been trying out Go, I think at least a few of you play it, and I was hoping you could help me out. So I learned the rules yesterday, watched some matches on yt and then played ten or so games on KGS. Holy fuck I got shat on. I think I scored maybe a dozen points in total, most games I resigned early because my opponent had ten times the number of pieces I had and theres no way I was gonna make something happen. I was playing turbo newbie, I was embarrassed.
If you've never played Go before its a pretty simple game (lol).You place stones on a grid to capture territory and your opponents pieces then at the end you tally up your points. Its rules are significantly simpler than chess. That said the game is dauntingly complex. There shear number of possible moves you can make each turn and number of different positions that can arise are unfathomably large and I'm not familiar with any of them. Honestly it felt like I was playing bw for the first time except I was only using the mouse and I didn't make more than four workers. By the third game I was more or less randomly placing pieces just to see what happened. My best game (from my ridiculous newbie perspective) was when I stopped trying to think about it like chess and started trying to fit my pieces into formations I saw players do on yt.
Still, it was intriguing. I like how a simple set of rules gives rise to this complex beast; it feels a lot like math to me. I was having fun trying to understand why my opponents moves were so much better than mine, anyway I want to keep playing. That said, I need to build up some knowledge before I go back online and I was hoping you guys could help. Can someone recommend me a book on go openings and theory, sort of like the books for chess. I went to b&n but they didn't have anything on the game (which was surprising, its pretty popular isn't it?). Also can anyone recommend a bot either for the itouch or the computer. I googled it but I couldn't find anything that looked like what I wanted. I know the bots aren't as strong as the ones in chess but thats alright. I'd settle for one that does nothing but block simple captures. I just need to play a reasonable game against something. So a book and a bot and maybe some online resources? I don't the first thing about the game or the community, any help at all is much appreciated. Thanks for read, have a nice day
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Some good beginner's resources:
Sensei's Library, a Go wiki. Has several "Beginners should train this way" approaches. http://senseis.xmp.net/ My personal favourite is this one. http://senseis.xmp.net/?BeginnerStudySection
In Go, the opening is actually not too important to learn. You'll want to know a few really basic things so that you don't make TOTALLY stupid moves, but unlike Chess, the opening is really fluid in Go, and thus harder to learn. Mainly you'll learn principles.
The most important thing to study (According to the smart peoplez) is Go problems, or tsumego. They increase your reading (Ability to see several moves ahead) and are invaluable in building your ability at fights, which is apparently how most beginner Go games are decided. You can find tsumego online, or for a book of really basic ones, look into Graded Go Problems for Beginners, Volume 1. (You probably don't need to spend money on a book though.)
Igowin is a Go bot, but it only plays on 9x9 boards. 19x19 is the standard, but I like 13x13 for beginners. 9x9 seems too small to play a real game, but 19x19 is just too big and I feel lost.
Despite my knowledge, I've started and stopped Go repeatedly without ever sticking with it for more than a week or two, so I'm also a beginner. If you like, I'll give you some games on 13x13. I might still be better than you, I don't know, but at least it shouldn't be a one-sided curb-stomping. We could play some 'first capture' games too, to increase your skill at avoiding obvious captures. (It's like regular Go, but capture a stone and you win.) Feel free to contact me via PM.
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This playgo.to link is what I used when I started with it, was one of the best sources I found.
On the other hand I quit rather soon after, lack of people to play IRL was kinda discouraging to me. =/
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I've played a couple games against a hard bot and had my ass handed to me. The game ridiculously complex at the high levels.
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A good intro book is "Go: a complete introduction to the game" by Cho Chikun. It gives a good gloss over every aspect of the game. When I started Go, I just read this book then started playing games online.
The only other books I've read are "Fundamentals of Go" by Kageyama and "In the beginning" by Ikuro Ishigure. Fundamentals is like a second primer on all subjects and Beginning is essentially an in-depth look at opening theory. Both good books on their respective subjects.
But to improve, just play a lot of games and review your losses.
As for credentials, I'm also pretty new to the game so don't take my word for gold. I've been playing for about a year and am 4k on kgs.
Also during your road to improvement, be wary of taking the advice of any players on kgs who aren't high dans. Most of the information you receive is flawed on some level so take it all with a grain of salt (including the advice I just gave you above on how to start). Go is a pretty complicated game, so you don't want subscribe to a flawed mode of thought that will just end up limiting your potential/improvement in the game. Personally, I don't give much advice to anyone about certain moves in games because I'm pretty sure my response is probably incomplete (or totally wrong) in so many ways.
But (despite having just blasted my credibility to shit) the best way to improve is to play a lot of games and review your losses.
Go is the toughest but most fulfilling game I've ever played in my life. Even more than (dare I say) sc2 or bw. But those games are fun too. :D
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How do you guys play, if you do online?
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On June 23 2012 10:20 mizU wrote:
How do you guys play, if you do online?
http://www.gokgs.com/
Go is awesome! 
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This sounds like exactly the situation that I'm in, as well. Super noob that knows the rules and have gone through a book or two, but still get rolled by other beginners. I guess I'll peruse some of the books you guys recomended in here when I find the time, and will take another crack at playing Go online. If anyone else is a super noob and wants to play someone else as terrible as they are, shoot me a PM and I'll see when I have free time.
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EPT
