Lessons in the Fundamentals of Go: How to Study Joseki

Kageyama’s chapter on How to Study Joseki in Lessons in the Fundamentals of Go is an illustrated warning to all would-be joseki memorisers. Sure, Kageyama says, you can go about blindly memorising all the joseki you want, but there are a few things to remember:

* There are tens of thousands of joseki.

* Joseki sequences must be played with sensitivity to the entire board.

* Just because a move is in a certain joseki doesn’t mean it isn’t the worst possible move in the universe, given the whole-board situation.

* If you don’t know the reason for each and every move in a joseki, you might fall to bits when your opponent plays a move that’s not in the joseki sequence you’re following.

Kageyama states that studying joseki is indeed key to becoming stronger, but the focus of such study should be on understanding each and every move, so that when one looks at the board, one can find the right move for the circumstance, rather than just blindly recreating a pattern.

There are, of course, some good diagrams showing how standard joseki moves can be suboptimal with respect to whole-board situations and how punishing joseki mistakes can go wrong when one doesn’t understand the purpose of each move in a joseki.

As previously stated, the proper study of joseki isn’t the very next thing on my go to-do list. I don’t feel I have subtle enough understanding of go to understand why a certain move is the very best possible move in a given circumstance. I can make some guesses, but that’s about it at the moment. For now, I’ll continue to experiment with different openings in my own games, trying out various variations so that when I get to the study of joseki, I’ll have a repertoire of personal experiences upon which to draw.

As most of the rest of what I got out of the chapter is heavily reliant on the diagrams, I think I’m going to leave it at that for now.

Lessons in the Fundamentals of Go: The Struggle to Get Ahead

This chapter in Kageyama’s Lessons in the Fundamentals of Go is divided into two sections, one discussing situations where lines of stones are in contact (or a close to each other) and the importance of making the types of moves that keep your stones ‘ahead’, and a discussion of entering an enemy’s framework before it is too late…and how to do so sensibly.

This chapter is dense with interesting discussions of common positions.  There are some analyses of joseki and fighting tactics that I feel would be worth rereading after starting a proper study of joseki, or after reading, say Attack and Defence.  As usual, I have very possibly made mistakes in my interpretations.  (Hmm. Maybe I need to come up with a standard disclaimer.)

The struggle to get ahead

• When rows of stones touch, the situation may be more urgent than it might seem.  The struggle to get ahead is often very important.
• These sorts of situations are where the ‘hane at the head of two stones’ proverb often comes into play.
• Of course, when you hane, be prepared for the cut.
• Don’t invade at the 3-3 point too soon – yes, you get a little profit, but it also gives the opponent huge centre influence.  Wait until giving the opponent such influence doesn’t matter so much.
• Don’t crawl any longer than is necessary – get ahead at the earliest possible moment.
• Pressing moves can sometimes help the opponent get ahead.  Perhaps when playing them, it might be useful to think about them from the point of view of the opponent attempting to get a step ahead?
• Perhaps one could say that a reason that pushing from behind is usually bad is that it helps the opponent’s stones get ahead?
• One-point jumps into the centre can be seen as a struggle to get ahead.  Just as one looks for opportunities to hane when lines of stones are in contact, look for opportunities to make knight’s moves when lines stones are one-point jumping into the centre.

Entering the enemy’s sphere of influence

• Do not jump right in the middle of the enemy’s sphere of influence.
• If someone jumps right in the middle of your sphere of influence, stay calm and don’t make lots of crazy attacking moves that end up wasting the potential of your position.
• Look, estimate the score, okay?  Just, start practicing this.
• You need to know if you’re ahead so that you can decided whether to play slow sensible moves or to take drastic action.
• When entering an enemy’s sphere of influence, don’t be too greedy!  You can’t expect lots of territory.
• In the enemy’s sphere of influence, be prepared to give up stones in order to gain leverage.

Note to self: revisit the section on the shoulder play framework reduction, the probe in Diagram 25 (this has bit me before!), the last eight diagrams, and the earlier discussion about this joseki sequence.

4-4 Point Joseki: A Brief Introduction

Well, I have avoided the study of joseki for quite some time. In general, I intend to continue this trend, at least until I am a bit stronger. I keep hearing from stronger players that it is better to understand the reasons behind moves than to blindly follow some prescribed formula.

That being said, there were two things that drew me to William S. Cobb’s 4-4 Point Joseki: A Brief Introduction: (1) I was playing a lot of handicap games, and the same situations kept cropping up, and (2) it was a convenient size for carrying about whilst traveling.

This book is useful outline of several common approaches to the 4-4 point, and some of the common responses found in the beginning of the game. There are only 16 A6-sized pages of discussion and 26 pages of problems with commented solutions, so it is more of a catalog of common situations than a move-by-move detailed analysis.

Most patterns felt quite familiar from endless hours of playing GnuGo blitz games when I can’t sleep, but it was interesting to have a glimpse of insight into what responses are deemed to be a good result for both sides in various situations.

Coming from the point of view of someone who has not studied joseki at all, it did whet my curiosity about why certain moves were made.  There were several statements like “If White wants a moyo style game…” or “Black may want to control the right side.  In that case…” which made me wish there were more diagrams.  (The author recommends several books for further reading.)

The problems were useful in continuing the discussions started in the earlier chapters.  I found some of them quite difficult.  (I’ve got a lot to learn about whole board thinking!)

As far as a take-home message for this reading, perhaps I’ll just focus on a statement in the preface which informs the rest of the book (skipping out some of the discussion in between):

Two basic principles figure in almost all situations:

• Get out into the centre.
• Make a base.