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Unsettled

 

Unsettled Three
  Difficulty: Beginner   Keywords: Tesuji, Life & Death

[Diagram]
Diag.: corner

When a unit only has three interior spaces in a row for eyes, it is unsettled.

In both cases in the diagram, if white plays at the marked spot she'll live. If black plays there, white will die.


[Diagram]
Diag.: unrealistic example

Now we get to the intended topic... If you can create a shape inside the eyespace of your opponent which, after capture, leaves your opponent with a dead Nakade, you will kill your opponents group. The marked space is the problem. If white doesn't capture there, she'll die next turn.


[Diagram]
Diag.: unrealistic example

But if she captures with 1, black plays 2, killing the group.



[Diagram]
Diag.: White is dead

In fact, already here, white is dead. In general, a four-space nakade which has two stones in it is dead.


[Diagram]
Diag.: Black kills

On a related subject, the presence of cutting points or other weaknesses can be used to reduce a four-space nakade to a three-space and hence dead shape.
On the left, black can reduce the four-space nakade to a three space because white has a cutting point and finds herself in damezumari. She would like to play at 'a' to create an eye at the circled point, but that would put herself in atari. The other option she has is to connect at the circled point, but that leaves a three-space nakade, which already has a black stone on the vital point.

Obviously, white shouldn't even respond to black 1, as her group is dead as it stands.

Similarly, other and larger seemingly live eyespaces can be reduced because of the presence of weaknesses. See Nakade for an example of such a (very) large eyespace which at the end only gives one eye.

--MortenPahle



This is a copy of the living page "Unsettled Three" at Sensei's Library.
(C) the Authors, published under the OpenContent License V1.0.