Here are the weekly Go problems for week 81.
Black plays first in all problems and all solutions are labeled ‘correct’. Have fun!
Easy Go problem
Black can paralyze white with a single blow to the vital point.
Intermediate Go problem
To defend against a double threat you need a double defense. How can black respond to white A?
Hard Go problem
If you can find black’s beautiful tesuji, you can avoid the fiendish variations. It’s all in the first three moves.
Still want more Go problems?
You can find Go books packed full of life and death problems, tesuji problems and other valuable Go knowledge at the Go Game Shop.
Discuss other possible moves
If you have any questions or want to discuss any of these problems, please leave a comment below at any time. You can use the coordinates on the problem images to discuss a move or sequence of moves.
You can also download the solutions as a PDF or SGF file by clicking the links below each problem.
About David Ormerod
Thanks for the problems David, very instructive as always, And useful for real games.
No worries jangalf, and thanks to you too
In the hard problem, I “felt” the first move then got the message of the intermediate problem for move 3. So I really needed to start thinking from move 5 onwards.
So you get a grasp of how professionals can read those pesky situations: they are probably very good at sensing the happy path right away.
Great construction of a problem set!
Yes, I think a lot of it is memorized and internalized lines of play that appear again and again.
A friend of mine who’s a very strong chess player said that often when you use a tactic you’re very familiar with, then even if the other player does something strange that you didn’t explicitly consider, it rarely ever works. Go is fairly similar.
Of course it’s the one time when it does work that catches everyone out. I guess if you have 8 hours or more of thinking time and you’re someone like Lee Sedol or Sakata, you can find the exceptions.
“A friend of mine who’s a very strong chess player said that often when you use a tactic you’re very familiar with, then even if the other player does something strange that you didn’t explicitly consider, it rarely ever works. Go is fairly similar.”
Yes, I think this is part of the stronger players’ trust in shape yet increasing mystery as to why exactly their moves are working. Or maybe it’s just me :p
I get that feeling too sometimes, especially when I’ve been playing and solving problems fairly regularly. It feels like someone else is coming up with good moves for you
In this case the instructions for the hard one made me feel confident to try what felt nice, and I got it right within 10 seconds. In a real game, I would have played away because I would not realize there is something at all :\
Haha, well done mafu
It’s a pity I already knew the shape in hard problem. Tesuji is beautiful indeed. I love counter-intuitive attachments like that, but they are rarely seen even in tesuji books.
A tesuji rather like that came up in this game from the 2008 Miejin tounrnament on move 120:
http://www.go4go.net/go/games/sgfview/18995
Interesting
, it’s not quite the same, but I guess white was aiming at O17 next. I’m sure I’ve seen this sort of move played in several pro games, but I can’t remember any examples right now.
I like them too, and I think they’re often overlooked in amateur games, but you have to be pretty sharp to spot these momentary openings.
Even if you knew the shape, the position itself is very complicated and I spent a long time reading this before making the problem.
For the easy problem, how about white P4 after N3? Then if O2, Q5 and Black cannot keep it all connected.
You are right, but it’s a heavy way of playing for White.
That’s possible too, especially if the ladder favors white, but I wanted to keep things simple, since this was the easy problem.
I’ve updated the problem and added some more book keeping stones now. The problem with examples that resemble real games is that there are always so many possibilities.
this game sucks
get on my level
U just suck at it, so you are jealous of those who are good. If you don’t like it, then go away.
Hi David, thanks for the great problems, as always. In the intermediate problem, variation 16, is there a reason to not atari from above with 6?
No, black can atari there too. The important moves are 1 and 3 in diagram 2.