My Week of Go Activities

I’ve started to think of my weekly activities post as a launch pad for my lessons with Clossius, or as Shygost calls him, Colossius, which reminds me of a pretty cool statue.

To prep for creating this blog post I have started to type the details for each game I play into an Evernote file right after I play the game. When I am ready to create a post I copy and paste that Evernote document. Then I insert the game links from OGS.

This was a very active Go week with over 36 hours of activity. I exceeded my goal of playing eight games. I spent eight and a half hours playing go. I started out losing, and got a little discouraged. As the losses began to mount I decided to head over to OGS hoping to kick a little butt and smack some stones on the virtual board. I ended up winning two games that night and feeling a little better about myself. I actually felt as if those two games were too easy. I ended up playing a total of twelve games this week. My goal is eight games, so I increased my game play by 50%

Live Play comes up at the top of the list this week!

Because of homework from Clossius, given during my last lesson, there is a new category in my Go Activities. There are now two Tsumego categories. They are Tsumego Apps and Tsumego 101 Weiqi. They are both the color red. I have been enjoying the 101 Weiqi web site, which is best viewed in Chrome using Goggle Translate. I have not totally figured out the site even with Google Translate. Clossius gave me two links for easy problems to do, and I have been working on them since Wednesday, the day of my lesson.

The Tsumego Apps category includes apps such as Baduk Pop and Tsumego Pro. Clossius suggests that I can use these types of apps when I am lounging. He would prefer that I use the 101weiqi.com website when I am sitting at my computer.

I’ve decided to report on a set of categories which I am grouping as Essential. They are Tsumego, Live Play, and Reviewing My Games. These are the categories that most people probably consider when they think of time spent on go activities. Reporting on these essential activities separately will put my Tsumego practice into perspective. Doing this report requires me to do a little math.

Essential Go Activities      15:35       (hours:minutes)

04:01            25.8%             Tsumego   (Combined)

08:30            54.6%             Live Play

03:03           19.6%              Reviewing My Games

I’ve listed all of the games that I played this week, but some games are not available for review during my Lesson with Clossius. Those game do not have links provided. 

My user names are buzzsaw, goddess, and fearless.  

EYD - European Yunguseng Dojang

AYD - American Yunguseng Dojang

AM - Auto Match (25 min 5 of 30)

YDFL - Yunguseng Dojang Free League Game (40 min 3 of 30)

Games are even except OGS games +/- 1 which have 0.5 komi

Loss    1/17       KGS     goddess-elmi           B+25.5       EYD - NR/4k

Loss    1/18       KGS     buzzsaw-anonymous    B+26.5     YDFL - 6k/3k

Loss    1/19       KGS       imayo0022-fearless      W+R        AM - 5k/6k

Loss     1/20      KGS      fearless-tknrobin         B+16.5      AM - 6k/7k

Loss    1/20      KGS      anonymous-buzzsaw     W+23.5     YDFL - 3k/6k

Loss    1/20      KGS      anonymous-buzzsaw    W+28.5    YDFL - 3k-6k

Win     1/21     OGS        buzzsaw-libersebasm      W+26.5      13k/14k   

Win     1/21     OGS        buzzsaw-hano12              W+R       13k/14k

Loss    1/22     KGS       goddess-saiyo              B+0.5       EYD - NR/4k

Loss    1/22     KGS       Ghopper21-buzzsaw     W+22.5    AYD - 6k/6k

Loss    1/23     KGS       buzzsaw-sirocco                B+19.5        6k/5k

Loss    1/23     KGS       anonymous-buzzsaw          W+R.         3k/6k

Let me be clear. I am not concerned about my Win Loss Ratio. Most games played on KGS in the YD are with players stronger than myself, especially the Free League games where I seek out stronger opponents. Losing means learning.

There are four YD Free League Games with a player who I will call “anonymous”. He has been a great help to me, and to other players at my level in the YD by playing and reviewing games with us. He is 3k on KGS and I am 6k on KGS. I am actually pleased with the amount by which I am losing these games recently. He says I am getting stronger. Our first few games were lost by resignation or large margins. Now I usually lose by an appropriate amount for the rank difference. I did lose our last game by resignation, however.

The reason we played four games this week is that we were attempting to get in a five game series for this season of the Yunguseng Dojang. The rules of the Free League require that players be within 300 rating points of the YD Rating System. The rules also limit the number of games played against any one player to a total of five. 

The night that we played two games we found ourselves 2 rating points short of being 300 rating points apart. YD games were looming in the days ahead, and we wanted to get in as many games as possible on the assumption that we would soon be out of range to play, and might not get to finish our five game series this season. Our records for this week left us in a position to play one more game last night. These games are not available for review because we made an agreement to that effect. This is one of the reasons I went out of my way to play additional games this week.

The AYD League and EYD League games are not available for review because they have already been reviewed by either In-Seong Hwang or one of his co teachers.

I invite anyone who is interested to attend my lesson on Wednesday at 2:00 PM EST in the Clossius Twitch Stream.