DDK Travails 6

 

Next travail was a win I should have lost against a 16. He timed out basically but was in the lead. The game was fairly even and I was trying out some fighting techniques (maybe ill-advisedly)

Anyway the mistake was in handling a 33 invasion I thought I was strong enough to kill but it turned out I wasn't..

Start point

The best way to handle is not to extend but to  instant hane (as it gives a handy tigers mouth). The AI oppo would give up here but if the opponent is keen and carries out an extension of hane then apparently Black just let's white live and piles into White's bottom territory. It looks like if played properly (ho ho) there's about 28 points black can remove from white at the top and right sides and possibly about 15 pure points at the top. White gains 15 points from the invasion so it's actually evens. 

Not sure I would have the capacity to work that out but I can see the logic at least..

Next up a match against a 13 kyu. I was planning on trying out a new opening (or at least a new way of gaining influence in the opening. As it stands I had Black so had the base position out but neither of the shapes I was hoping to use played out properly. The first had an armpit hit of my 1 space extension. I pincered but that was not optimal (not neccesarily negative either). The best line for my play preference seems to be

Basically White gets bottom and black right..As it stood I could have killed and a bunch of stones but didn't. On the other side my large knight/33 strength position was invaded but a default position was taken. Maybe next game..

Nope next game I had white. I won but did let an invasion I should likely have killed live whereas an invasion I launched (that won the game) lived when it likely shouldn't. Let's look. It was a moyo game 

Here was the invasion, I decided my lower central was stronger than the top so blocked that extension. He then  took a wide extension

The defence was ok until here

My thoughts were that he will push out at B and I will atari but then he will eat up more space so I protected but running it through. Close though. Maybe a second central stone in defence in future and allow the 33 invasion would have been better..

The key thing to note is that by pushing the Q10 group Black auto cuts himself off so has 2 groups to handle. Might be easy enough for a SDK..

Anyway my invasion should have died here

So basically it was a long shot and I was gambling on a mistake. What I should have done is better against his invasion. Returning to that IF I had made 2 stone central pillar instead of reinforcing the corner if he 33'd I could actually attack the 33.

At this point Black could break in at the top and White could let him and break into the black left at the same time. Interesting synchronisity!

Two games now a win and a loss - but for both games I actually played calmly which is a huge improvement for me. 

For the win things to improve including not letting invasions live

Why I played 127 I am not quite sure. A cut can be laddered. Anyway I also seemingly forgot the 6 in a row that would get and life. To counter the loss of points I did manage to get a hail mary invasion to live via an opponent mistake, but it should have died..I will take it..

For the loss the improvement I want to look at two things, the first was a common enough corner position that I judged incorrectly was alive (without mistake by oppo) but it turned out it wasn't

Start position

And dead

Next we have the other corner. I was setting up the KO but my opponent poked it and I wasn't sure what to do (I lived in the end but again should likely have died)

AI recommends the following

Start Position

So something like

The AI version is actually more along the lines of 'ignore the corner and use this to break out to kill a central black group..

Next game was a moyo battle with me getting the lucky internal high 1 space approach after my opponent chose the unusual choice of extending the other corner. It was a weird game with Black then approaching my 44 getting pincered and choosing to have a small amount of territory rather than taking my corner. Lots of little mistakes by both players so let's just run over them. My first blunder was here

Without much thought I didn't want to allow the 2 groups to separate - it doesn't matter though as the left group is alive (and interestingly I wasted another stone here later when I should have dared my oppo to kill me..) as it stands blocking encroachment into my enormous moyo was important. My next mistake was not taking the boxy 5 when I could (and i KNOW this)

After all even if he pushes out whats he going to do?

Now what he could do it to use that push to poke from the 33 point and live in the top right corner instead! but even that poke looks defensable

Start point 

Now there is lots of way to play but this seems to have the most of chance of causing a defensive f-up

Final DDK travail in this post will be from a Benkyo league game I won by 0.5 points (no Komi with White).

First up we have this position, now I knew my 'skirt'  (as the Japanese say) was open at the bottom

but blocked blacks encroachment into my moyo. The recommended play looks like

Basically sealing both in return for letting Black shrink my alive left group.

BUT I was already behind and bar some minor errors neither of us made many mistakes so my issues arose in the opening. Specifically when I pincered I should likely have allowed Black out and instead instant 33'd

as so

I am unsure but this might have led to a freer game and not the moyo monster this one turned into.