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Ask HN: Who Plays Go?

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61–70 of 99 posts

Re: Ask HN: Who Plays Go?

#61
post #47

Care to explain why your level decreases without practice?

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

Re: Ask HN: Who Plays Go?

#62
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.

Re: Ask HN: Who Plays Go?

#63

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Architecture in a nutshell: http://i.imgur.com/IZ52u.png A list of 10 moves from 30 different machines, even using a heavy-weight protocol like SOAP, would be nearly instantaneous. I would favour a light-weight format such as JSON, though. For other applications, I agree, network bandwidth would be a possible bottleneck. My initial idea was to have each engine return ten moves, in sequence, with the first move being…

Cool stuff. Do you already have an API for people to write their own solvers -- something that passes a board state and an interface to return ranked choices? How do you stop people on the network from overranking their own AI's choices (assuming this were an open project)?

I do not have an API for solvers. There would have to be a registration system, possibly white-listed by IP address.

Re: Ask HN: Who Plays Go?

#64

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?

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/

Re: Ask HN: Who Plays Go?

#65
post #39

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…

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?

Re: Ask HN: Who Plays Go?

#67
post #47

Care to explain why your level decreases without practice?

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.

Re: Ask HN: Who Plays Go?

#68
post #43
post #29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"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?

I'm not sure I could. (If I could, I'd probably be able to omit the hedge at the start.) But here's the best I can do. 1. The rules of go are very simple. (Well, kinda. Use, say, the Tromp-Taylor ruleset.) 2. The resulting game is very subtle, in e.g. the following senses. (a) For any game, define an "increment" to be how much better you need to be than someone else in order to beat them 75% of the time. Then the num…

Could you elaborate on #3? In particular, the "good taste" part.

Re: Ask HN: Who Plays Go?

#69
I sometimes hop on KGS, but I'm very rusty. Probably ~17k. Wonderful game. I teach it to the kids in my programming class whenever we have a few moments of free time (usually day before Thanksgiving, etc).

Re: Ask HN: Who Plays Go?

#70
post #68
post #43

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm not sure I could. (If I could, I'd probably be able to omit the hedge at the start.) But here's the best I can do. 1. The rules of go are very simple. (Well, kinda. Use, say, the Tromp-Taylor ruleset.) 2. The resulting game is very subtle, in e.g. the following senses. (a) For any game, define an "increment" to be how much better you need to be than someone else in order to beat them 75% of the time. Then the num…

Could you elaborate on #3? In particular, the "good taste" part.

In most games of skill, some moves "feel right" or "look good" to good players, and part of becoming a better player is acquiring the instincts that make better moves feel better. This is certainly true in go; you need to feel "no, black shouldn't play there, because it makes his stones overconcentrated in that area" or "white should do that, because the shape it makes is beautiful" in a lot of situations. It's partly pattern recognition, and partly developing somewhat-quantitative strategic instincts.

(Be cautious about believing anything I say too much. I'm a pretty weak player.)

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