Ask HN: Who Plays Go?

[thangalin]

I play on http://www.gokgs.com/ sometimes, with the same name.

I'm not super incredible (maybe 2 dan). At my peak, when I was studying in Japan, I was close to 5 dan. A week before leaving Kyoto, I hooked up with a buddy (who was also visiting) to challenge the locals at a smoke-filled Go club. He was perhaps 2 dan at the time. We walked in and slaughtered the room. They could not match us. Ah, but they insisted we return the following evening.

We did.

Waiting for us were some of their strongest players. I was seated in front of Kyoto's most ruthless amateur player, who must have been a scrappy 7 dan. He was a squat old man with grizzly eyes and a staunch, "I'm gonna' mess you up" attitude. The desire for revenge in his gaze was unmistakable.

The knives came out, we threw down dragon after dragon, chase after chase, launching attack and counter-attack, the board was intense. Eyes of groups were abandoned, trades were made, and the shrewdness of his plays were like his gaze. In the end he won four out of five games, and I learned a lesson in humility. It was a great experience, would do it again in an eye-blink.

Go is such an amazing game, with a rich history, pervasive through Asia, and unsuspecting in its simplicity. It's also a great way to make friends around the world, and meet some truly remarkable people.

Any dan players care for a game?

[Kilimanjaro]

Your intro read like prose. In a few short paragraphs I felt I was reading a novel.

You have the touch. Are you a professional writer?

[thangalin]

Thank you. My profession is software. I write letters on topics I feel strongly about, though. I then (e)mail them to really important people and pretend they get read.

http://davidjarvis.ca/dave/letters/

[yaskyj]

Not sure what you mean by prose. His writing was prose, so was yours.

[nandemo]

Do not play go. Just stay away it from it. I started to play go in Brazil while in high school and got addicted to it. Eventually I came to Japan to play go (I won't disclose the details because it'd be really embarrassing).

Later I came to Japan to study Computer Go in grad school. I planned to to stay for 2~3 years. It's been 7 years now. I don't play go anymore, but I do harder stuff (karaoke, clubbing, etc). It's been a sort of gateway drug for me.

PS: by the way, the reason an American 2-dan can slaughter a Japanese 2-dan is simply because the scales are different, mainly due to inflation in Japanese ranks. If you're AGA 2-dan (or say, European 1-dan) you should really upgrade yourself to 4-dan when coming to Japan.

[eob]

It sounds like a good story waiting to be told, not embarrassing. So many of our lives are spent following the path society has carved out for us; it's refreshing and interesting to hear about someone who had a desire outside of the mainstream and followed to an extreme.

Did you join one of the go cram schools?

[mark_l_watson]

In the late 1970s I played both the women's world champion, and a year later the South Korean national champion in exhibition games. They both mentioned that I was about 2 kyu but experience getting bruised up by an 2 dan amateur makes me think that my rating is less than that - so I would not be a good opponent for you.

My older brother taught me to play when I was eight, and we played fairly equally for about 10 years, Then, within a year's time, I was consistently giving him 9 stones.

Also in the late 1970s, I wrote a Go playing program I called Honnibo Warrior which played poorly. I sold it cheaply for the Apple II (written in UCSD Pascal) and actually made some real money selling the source code.

[thangalin]

I've had a design in the works for a few years that is a completely network-based Go AI. The idea is nothing new. It involves multiple computers, each assigned one problem from a board position. One computer might be responsible for calculating ladders, one solves tsumego problems, one to look at influence, one to apply joseki, another for yose, and so forth. Each of submits their top ten moves, in the allotted time, to a master engine. The master engine evaluates the moves (possibly using Monte Carlo simulations) and selects the best.

The idea was more about the framework than the actual worker machines. The ability to add and remove different problem solvers on the fly appealed to me. One of the problem solvers, for example, could be your program, or GNU Go, or a program that runs ten Go playing AIs simultaneously, returning the "best" move from each.

[sams99]

I used to be 2-4k but had trouble holding 5k* on igs a few years ago. If I started playing now I would probably struggle holding 8k.

Life, my daughter, 2 personal projects and work got in the way.

I miss the social aspect of Go, I find the internet incarnations are too sterile. I love having a tea and a chat while playing, I spend enough time staring at the screen.

Would probably play again if I found the right group.

Pushing the upper kyus would require way too much work than I am willing to commit at the moment to the game.

Love Go, it is truly eye opening.

Talking about smoke, my Go teacher "Mr No" used to smoke 200 cigarettes a day in Go clubs in Korea.

[thangalin]

That's crazy!

The scene here fizzled a bit when a few events happened around the same time, involving babies and our strongest players. I much prefer to play in person than online, for the same reasons you mentioned.

I am planning on taking a trip next year, with a stop in Korea. Any recommendations for (smoke-free) Go clubs?

[RiderOfGiraffes]

I was once 11 kyu and improving, but I realised I was getting totally absorbed in the game. As a latent obsessive compulsive I gave it up. I'm pretty sure it was the right choice, but I retain deep respect and admiration for the game. Far, far better than chess.

Deep down I wish I still played ...

[ludwig]

You made the right choice :)

I got to about 7 kyu, and then it suddenly hit me. Balance is key. Therefore you should concentrate on those aspects of your life which have become more urgent. I haven't played very much after that realization.

In my view, Go (or any other hobby, really) would stand in one corner of the board. Your family, personal life, and work would be at the other three corners. As the situation on the board evolves, you would choose your best play. Focusing too much on any one area would leave you over-concentrated. It would be too inefficient. You'd easily secure one corner but lose the other three.

But then, if you spread yourself too thin all over the place, trying to please everyone, including yourself, that would leave you with a vulnerable position that could fall apart at any moment. That's clearly not good either.

However, if you patiently settle your stone formations before moving on the next area, if you gain strength in one corner/side before expanding towards another, if you are fluid in your decision making process when choosing a direction (life does throw you stumbling blocks doesn't it?), THEN you'd be a wise man indeed :)

I do make it a point to participate in a local yearly tournament (five games over two days) whether I feel ready or not. One day, though, I will come back to Go in full-force.

I'm also ludwig on KGS, btw. If anyone fancies a game, you can always reach me via twitter (@ludwig1024).

[kindly]

I think it probably was the right choice. I see it as a game that I will enjoy in retirement, and look forward to it.

I actually played it instead of doing well in my math degree. I am only about a 4ku in real life (played in the odd competition). I gave up after the degree for similar reasons.

I love the game as compared to chess there is real strategy involved. I am dyslexic and I find calculating locally hard i.e the kind of calculating you do in chess (dyslexics are bad at sequencing). However, in go, you have full board considerations and I am above my grade in those. In go that means I need to take a lower (than my grade) handicap from stronger players but am bad at fighting.

[Morendil]

Stuck at 2kyu on KGS for two years, I've set the game aside temporarily, until my life situation is such that I can immerse myself in serious study. Love the game - got half a shelf of books including Invincible.

There's a saying, "Go is life". Learning the game will tell you an incredible amount about yourself, about determinism and chance and skill, about depth and limits and building knowledge and passing on knowledge.

For a software person there is a lot to learn about complexity and patterns. There are deep lessons about not fooling yourself, about the idea that a strategy for success emerges in surprising ways from ridiculously simple rules and facts of the underlying material.

There isn't much of a gap between Go's simple rules (alternating play, capture, ko) and software's fundamental elements (sequence, iteration, choice) in terms of simplicity, and likewise these simple rules combine to yield complexities that challenge the best human minds.

[thangalin]

Hurdling the kyu wall, for me, required a leap of insight into understanding how to use thickness for attacking. The basic idea you probably already understand: when you have a wall (or otherwise fortified position), drive your opponent's weak forces into that area. As you do so you will get another wall. If this wall faces your own position, great! If it faces an enemy position, a wall gives you the opportunity to invade or reduce the op-position.

Go beautifully combines strategy and tactics. In what other board games can you take a strategy like, "Besiege Wei To Rescue Zhao" and implement it, tactically, in various ways?

I had a conversation with a project manager. He said that we should zip the development source files over to the test machine. I suggested that the test machine should be outfitted with the repository client (CVS) because it would be simpler solution, technically. How the goal is accomplished is not nearly as important as the goal itself. Both zipping the source and executing a "cvs update" solve the problem. And both are tactical ways of solving the strategic problem: test the latest development version in an isolated environment that is similar to production.

In "Besiege Wei To Rescue Zhao" the strategic concept is to parry an attack on your forces by attacking a weak (yet slightly more valuable) enemy force. I like to think of it as the Three Kingdoms problem. Kingdom A and B are friends, but not Kingdom C. When Kingdom C attacks Kingdom B, Kingdom A can rescue B in two ways: running to B's defense or by counter-attacking Kingdom C. Counter-attacking is usually best, to avoid the least amount of bloodshed. After you've attacked a weak opponent group, you've managed to create a stronger position that you can leverage to support the group that was being assailed.

Other elements that Go and programming have in common: intuition, aesthetics, and recursion.

[kia]

By the way Go is one of the most challenging games for AI:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Computer_Go

[gjm11]

I play, but not nearly often enough. I'm probably somewhere around 12k, far below thangalin's level. If there is any such thing as objective quality in board games, go is objectively the best game anyone has come up with yet. Wonderful, wonderful game. But also dangerously addictive. The fact that it's basically impossible to play a quick game doesn't help.

[edanm]

"there is any such thing as objective quality in board games, go is objectively the best game anyone has come up with yet"

Could you please elaborate?

[kapilkaisare]

I was entranced with go via "Hikaru No Go", a Japanese anime about a boy who discovers the game through a spirit seeking the elusive 'hand of God'. I am currently at 9 kyu but am trying to better my game.

Unfortunately there aren't too many Go players where I am, and this makes Go as a point of social focus difficult, as it often is in chess over here.

[ludwig]

> Unfortunately there aren't too many Go players where I am

Put yourself on the map, just in case! http://igolocal.net/

[cjbprime]

Same here -- watching all of Hikaru no Go motivated me enough to get to 1-dan. Great anime.

[igravious]

Hi thangalin,

I'm "grooviest" on KGS. I'm only 7 kyu so you'll need to up-skill me to 1 dan so I can give you a nice game (hint hint). My relationship with Go is turbulent. Currently we are in an addictive (God, it's sooo addictive) phase and she is breaking my heart. My one regret in life is that I was 30 years old before I learned how to play. All those wasted years playing chess. sigh I recently moved from my native land of Ireland to snowy central Finland and one of the first things I did was find me a Go club - hello the Tengen Go Club of Jyväskylä, nice people all round.

[thangalin]

That's quite the adventure! Our time zones might not let us play in real time. Facebook has a Go playing app. I'd be happy to play a teaching game with you.

[edanm]

I've never played, but I'd be happy if someone could point me to the best place to learn.

[muloka]

Easiest way to pick up the basic rules and gameplay is through:

The Interactive Way to Go: http://playgo.to/iwtg/en/

Its also available in 32 other languages: http://playgo.to/iwtg/

--

Beyond that I recommend 9x9 games, on Windows download yourself a free copy of iGoWin: http://www.smart-games.com/igowin.html or on OSX or Linux check out GnuGo.

--

There's also a Linux live cd/distro with lots of learning tools by the name of Hikarunix: http://senseis.xmp.net/?Hikarunix

[sams99]

If you want to learn, the easiest way to start would be on a 9 by 9 board using a program like gnu-go.

Computers are awfully predictable and have a hard time even on a 9 by 9 board.

Next up, I would look at checking out a local Go club, maybe read a book or two, maybe check out igs/kgs.

[baby]

You have a really good tutorial on www.gokgs.com Plus you can play there with begginers.

[kurumo]

http://senseis.xmp.net/ is not bad

[blue1]

The "learn to play go" series of five books by Janice Kim is the best.

[cageface]

It's a fascinating game but coding seems to fatigue the same bits of my brain that coding does, so I spend my recreational time doing things a bit more brainless, like Warcraft.

[gcao]

Hi thangalin,

Nice to see your post about Go. I'm from China and have been playing Go for more than 20 years. I started to play in high school and improved a lot in college. My current ranking is AGA 5~6D. I don't play very often recently except play turn-based games on my own web site (www.go-cool.org).

Because of my addiction to the game, I even created a variation of Go, Daoqi, which removes border of Go board and makes all positions have same importance. This new game gives players a new and different enjoyment.

I'm also a programmer and have spent a lot of time on side projects. I created a Javascript based game viewer (github.com/gcao/jsgameviewer), a Ruby on Rails application which integrates with a Go forum (http://www.go-cool.org/app)

Like I said, I'm happy to see your post and comments from fellow Go players. Hope I can play with you one day.

[gastlygem]

哈,我一定在tom論壇見過你!

[swah]

Care to explain why your level decreases without practice?

[thangalin]

Go is deep. So deep that you could spend a lifetime studying only to yourself on your deathbed still discovering new techniques and concepts.

The first ability people tend to lose after not playing is reading. That is, visualising a sequence of moves (without playing them) on the board and judging the positional value (similar to chess, but with astronomically more possibilities). Reading requires concentration, pattern matching (shape, tesuji, vital points), and guesswork.

After reading -- the tactical part -- some higher-level concepts get lost. Forcing plays (kikashi), inducing moves, estimating the value of thickness, obscure joseki, fuseki theory, and more.

There are /so/ many concepts and techniques to Go that unless you are actively studying and playing, it is nearly impossible to keep everything at the forefront of your mind.

[gcheong]

I don't know if this is what you mean, but Kyu levels are ranked lowest to highest in decreasing numbers (lower number = higher ranking) but Dan levels are ranked lowest to highest in increasing numbers.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Go_ranks_and_ratings

[thenduks]

Similar to riding a bike, playing an instrument, writing code or cooking -- you never 'forget', but you definitely do get 'rusty'.

[clvv]

I lived in China during my childhood, and one of the things that I was involuntary involved in was playing Go, my parents simply made me do it. Despite the fact that I didn't really like it, I still kept learning it for several year. And by the time when I finally convinced my parents that I was not going to or even want to be a professional Go player, I was amateur 4 dan by Chinese standard, and I was about 10 years old. I stopped playing since then, but I can still pick it up and play once in a while, maybe with a skill level of around 2 dan I guess. Look back from now, Go looks interesting, but when I was forced to learn it at the age of 7, it was all boring and dull.

[spacemanaki]

This whole thread makes me want to start learning how to play again. I don't think I have played more than about half a dozen games but it is by far the on of the most compelling games I've encountered.

[kgosser]

I've tried to pick it up, have not found any clubs or anything in Milwaukee, so I've had to play via computer. Due to that, I haven't been able to pick it up as much as I'd like.

[chops]

Another Milwaukeean!

The little bit that I played was also online. I didn't (and still don't) know anyone that played, either in person or online, so I haven't had anyone I can just bombard with questions. Whenever I played online I just got slaughtered, and any pleas for "what am I doing wrong" generally went unanswered.

Occasionally, I'll hit up http://goproblems.com and I struggle with all but the most obvious answers.

Despite reading a book or two about the game, and the handful of games online, it just never clicked. But I remain fascinated by the game and am on the constant lookout for someone who actually knows how to play. It's been a while now since I last tried to play, but I'm always down.

[justinweiss]

I just started playing casually earlier this year and I'm about 13-15k on DGS. I really liked the players on KGS, but it's hard for me to find an hour or two of totally uninterrupted time. DGS is so perfect for the slow pace I like to play that I wrote an iPhone client for it: http://dgs.uberweiss.net

When I started playing, it was frustrating and confusing. Now, it's still frustrating and confusing, but it's also so much fun.

[Tarks]

I play, can't even remember how I heard of it but my girlfriend and I learned together a few months ago, I've just got another friend hooked on it too. Having SmartGo Kifu on the iPad and the free go Client from Pandanet has made it easier to learn.

Funny thing is, a co-worker caught me playing it, then while he was slaughtering me in a lunchbreak another couple of guys came out of the woodwork too ^_^

I find it very cool that there's just one piece that can be used for everything.