Chapter Six. Blocking Off 6.1 Open skirts and crawling plays Plays on the fourth line are much used in modern go, despite the open skirt they leave on the second line. They emphasise influence over territory. Proper shape to block off is essential, since attacking play alone isn’t enough. {{Dia 325}} White has slid under a fourth line play. How should the game continue? {{Dia 326}} Black normally plays back with a diagonal at 1....
Books
Part Three. Practical Fighting Chapter Seven. Eight Faces of Cutting 7.1 Windmills to pancakes {{Dia 451}} {{Dia 452}} There are a number of fundamental patterns in cross-cut fights. The first is the plain extension Black 1 here. Proverbially, it is better from Black than any of the four ways to play atari: Cross-cut? Extend! {{Dia 453}} {{Dia 454}} The point is that Black 1 in the left-hand diagram turns out badly, if Black needs 3 also, and White can capture in a ladder....
Chapter Eight. Attach-Extend Mysteries 8.1 The common cutting points {{Dia 512}} This attach-extend pattern is played by Black to become solid, and move across the gain line. But in fact it leaves a number of cutting points (A for White, D after White B, Black C, and E for Black). {{Dia 513}} {{Dia 514}} Trick plays (White’s cutting point matters greatly). (Left) A ko fight, and Black has a threat at A....
Chapter Nine Escapology Making an exit The point of view in Chapter 6 was simply to describe good shape for blocking off, and for preventing it happening to you. In the middlegame the need to escape will add another dimension. There is more to escape than just avoiding being shut in. Escaping is about finding a way out to the centre with a weak group. If your weak group cannot escape, it may actually die....
Part Four. Vital Points and Shape in the Opening Chapter Ten. Extensions and Invasion Points 10.1 The two-point extension is stable {{Dia 669}} This extension with a two-point gap is the fundamental building block for play on the sides. Much of the ordinary reasoning about finding a base for groups in the opening centres on extending in this way. Of all the ways to construct a two-stone group on the side, this one is the most stable....
Chapter Eleven. Cramp 11.1 Two-point extension: the placement {{Dia 708}} {{Dia 709}} This chapter gives the other side of the story on the two-point extension. When it is cramped by two White stones, as shown in the left-hand diagram, it can be attacked in many ways. The placement (right) at 1 or A is something of a revelation, when you first discover it. {{Dia 710}} {{Dia 711}} Next if Black blocks at 2, White should play 3 in the left-hand diagram; the other choice (right) can be criticised....
Chapter Twelve. Outnumbered 12.1 Calculated risks There are several good reasons why you may want to leave a situation on the board, and play away. In the realm of tactics, you may wish to ignore a ko threat, or ladder-breaker. That is, you expect a greater advantage by playing elsewhere. There can also be good strategic reasons. Opening strategies from hundreds of years ago showed both players ignoring the plays of the other....
Part Five. Theory Chapter Thirteen. Theory Applying to Effective Play 13.1 Doing the necessary, or losing the plot? The central character in Pushkin’s Queen of Spades is led to his downfall by overriding his cherished principle, of ‘not risking the necessary to gain the superfluous’. In go, it is often hard to understand how to distinguish the two. One aspect of improving your strength is to shed all unnecessary plays. In a sense this is more important than making good shape....
Chapter Fourteen. Haengma The final two chapters of this book have something in common. They both touch on more advanced topics that can be said to require middlegame thinking. That is, they push on beyond the circle of ideas in the Introduction and early chapters, to deeper aspects of fighting. They also concern ways of playing that may appear dangerous to those who haven’t studied them. This chapter looks at examples of what Korean players call haengma (literally, the moving horse), a kind of distillation of the feeling of movement on the board that accompanies the development of groups....
Chapter Fifteen. Sabaki The sabaki concept is one of the most important developed in the Japanese tradition of professional go. {{Dia 856}} {{Dia 857}} This example occurred in 13.3. White should have planned how to play before arriving in this position. (Left) Black has played an extra marked stone, to cover the possible cut in the attach-extend formation. After that the marked white stones are in White’s view disposable, non-key stones, and may be sacrificed....