Black escapes  

Here we see a generic side situation. If it is Black’s turn, the marked stone is saved easily. For White to capture black, she must place a stone that interferes with the process by which Black escapes.

Some killing moves

As you can see above, all of the marked white stones kill black. There are many such combinations; these are just a few examples.

The sente moves  

The marked spots are sente against the Black stone : a White move at any of these spots threatens to capture Black.

Alternatively, if and have not been exchanged, White can play at any of these points to defend against the cut at .

A White move at one of these spots is sometimes called the Maeda method.

Note that if a White stone is added at either of the spots marked w, the leftmost and rightmost moves no longer work, because of a double atari at the other w.

Defence against double atari  

Given , White can defend against (w above) with to keep captured.

A related tesuji in joseki

A tesuji somewhat related to maido:

Common Joseki  

This is a shape that occurs in a common joseki. As players of reasonable strength should be able to see, white needs to protect the cutting point at a.

White cooperates  

However, if white plays above, black takes an excellent shape point, creating a crocodile's mouth, and white cannot be satisfied. The same will occur if white protects the cutting point with either of the tiger's mouth plays (marked a). White must use maido to gain a good result.

The joseki move  

is a joseki move; x and y are also joseki. As you can see, after the exchange at a, at b, matches in the fourth example in the killing-moves diagram above.

Etymology

Maeda?

“Maido” could be a misspelling of “Maeda” as in the Maeda method (see the introduction).

Pavilion?

maido (舞殿)  

togo 2012-11-24: I did a bit research with dictionaries, wikipedia and some googling: The maido/maiden/maidono (舞殿) is a small pavilion in shinto shrines, where weddings, dances and music are performed. It can also be called kagura hall (神楽殿), referring to its original use. Often it is a very prominent roof standing on non-prominent beams. The connection to Go is probably the characteristic triangular shape of its roof hovering above the ground.

"extended maido"  

On the funny side, at real-life maido there often is an extension (probably added later) which could be referred to this killing extension in Go.

See also

• Maeda (disambiguation) — other uses of “Maeda”
• https://www.youtube.com/watch?app=desktop&v=HfrDs7aOJd0 — a video by tuerda (4d North American amateur) which discusses this position and gives many applications

Notes

[1] Imagist 2006-11-20: I'm not actually sure what Maido is, beyond the explanation above. I was taught it by a dan player at a go tournament, but I never got a real definition from him. From his explanation, it seemed like it could be: 1) capturing by understanding the process of an escape from that capture or 2) various moves that work for the same purpose. If anybody knows more, please add to this!