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Rules of Go - introductory
Difficulty: Introductory
Keywords: Rules
This page introduces the basic principles of Go rules. It allows you to learn how to play, in general terms and quickly.[12] The board used here is small (5x5) compared to the sizes used in clubs, tournaments and online (typically 19x19). There are several minor variations to the rules of Go worldwide. The rules taught here are essentially the Chinese rules and while the variations matter, they are actually not important in getting the central idea of the game. It is quite easy to adapt to the different sets of rules in common use. The rules given quite formally here are broken down into short sections by topic: Players - Board - Point - Stones - Play - Start - Capture - Suicide - Repetition - Pass - Objective Of these, the first six are descriptive, the section on Capture determines the tactics of the game, and the section on the Objective says in a more precise way that 'go is a game of territory'. The intermediate sections in italics are extra added explanation, not perhaps logically necessary, but intended to be helpful. [1] PlayersThe game is played by two players. We call them Black and White. [2] BoardThe board is a grid of horizontal and vertical lines.
The example board has 5 horizontal and 5 vertical lines. The standard size of board has been 19x19 for many centuries. [3] PointThe lines of the board have intersections wherever they cross or touch each other. Each intersection is called a point. That includes the four corners, and the edges of the board.
The example board has 25 points. The red circle shows one particular point. Go is played on the points of the board, by the placing of pieces that are traditionally called 'stones'. [4] Stones
Black uses black stones (
The example shows a board position with 4 black stones and 3 white stones. The stones are always played on the board points. An unoccupied point is called 'empty'. The game is mostly about controlling[101] empty points. [5] PlayRule of Alternation: Players take alternate turns. The player having the turn puts one of his own stones on an empty point.
White plays a white stone at the point
Sometimes, to complete a play, a player removes stones from the board [7]. Sometimes there are points that may not be played on a particular turn [8] [9]. Instead of playing a stone on their turn (also called a move), a player may pass [10]. So all your legal plays consist of occupying an empty point with a stone of your colour and removing any stones that are captured as a result (see below), or passing. In particular the stones don't move. [6] Game StartThe game starts with all board points empty.
Black always plays first in the game.
In the example Black chooses to start at the point Games played with handicaps start with some stones already in place for Black, or with black placing more than one stone on the board as their first move. [7] CaptureRule of Capture: If a play surrounds the opponent's stone or stones completely, the player captures them and removes them from the board.
(Example 1)
The white stone is almost surrounded. It is adjacent to only one empty point, shown by the square. (An empty point adjacent to a stone or connected group of stones is called a liberty.) It is not adjacent to other nearby points, shown by circles.
Black's move
Black's move
(Example 2)
The three white stones
Black's move
(Example 3)
A play can also surround different stones at the same time even if not all of them are connected along lines. Black's move
(Example 4)
The White play
It does not matter that temporarily a white stone does not have a liberty; after execution of White's play, all stones on the board have at least one liberty again, leaving a legal position. Therefore the play of a single stone on the final liberty of a group or groups of stones causes those to be removed immediately from the board. [8] SuicideA player is not allowed to make a play that removes the last liberty of any of his own stones without doing the same to opposing stones (so-called suicide). This is explained further on Rules Of Go - second tutorial and Suicide.
If Black plays Suicide isn't useful in general, so this rule doesn't have a big practical effect on play. [9] No RepetitionRule of No Repetition: One may not play a move which repeats a previous board position. This rule prevents endless repetition.
White's move
Since repetition of the board position is prohibited by this rule, Black cannot play at the point 2 now in the example. Currently Black must play on a different point. Note that on subsequent turns, the same play may be available as a legal move, because it will not be repeating the same board position. For more on this rule, see ko. Unlike the suicide rule, the repetition (ko) rule has a major effect on the play of games. [10] PassOn any turn a player may pass their turn instead of playing a stone [5] (usually when the player realises no more beneficial moves are available). The opponent then takes their turn. When both players pass in succession, the game ends. Note that repeating the board position [9] is only prohibited for a move. Passing obviously repeats the board position but since two passes end the game, there is no risk of endless repetition. Passing before the game is effectively finished is usually a mistake. The game is over when both players agree that passing is correct. With a little experience one sees that passing when there is no constructive play is natural. [11] Purpose of the gameRule determining the winner: The purpose of the game is to occupy or surround more points than the opponent. At the game end (when both players pass [10]) the winner is the player with the greater number of stones of his colour on the board plus empty points surrounded only by stones of his colour.
13 points score for Black: 7 points occupied by black stones and 6 points surrounded by only black stones.
12 points score for White: 7 points occupied by white stones and 5 points surrounded by only white stones.
In the example, Black controls more points and therefore Black wins the game.
One probably needs to see how the end of the game works out in a few cases to absorb the idea. The players divide the whole area of the board between them, and the end comes when it is quite clear who controls each point (otherwise the game should continue). Instead one can count like this (Japanese/Korean style): At the game end the winner is the player with the greater number of empty points surrounded only by stones of his colour plus the number of opponent stones he has captured. This amounts (almost) to the same thing. See scoring for more detail. But not only does one have to retain captured stones for counting, players then must concede hopeless stones. [12] This page is a first, basic introduction to the game. After reading it you may wish to consult
These pages should help with the first questions arising from practical play. Some of the rules mentioned are treated differently by the various rulesets. This makes little difference to the play of the game, though. It is better not to be concerned about those matters initially. If you are thinking of editing this page, please note the intention to keep the material here very introductory. DiscussionDue to the debates about the way these basic rules are formulated, I have included statements about suicide and scoring being treated differently in different rulesets. I know this was not the intention of the original author and I agree that it complicates the explanation. --Dieter Charles I think the idea of different rule sets should not appear on a page called 'basic'. Perhaps the whole approach is flawed. The question must be what people learn from such a page. Charles Matthews I have renamed this page (was basic rules of go), in the hope that we can make some progress in providing a page that really addresses the needs of those who don't yet know the 'basic rules'.
Bill: I think that there are 2 possible purposes for an introduction to go rules, one for complete novices who want to play the game, but have no live teacher, and one for experienced players who are interested in studying the rules. Despite the fact that I favor territory scoring (but not Japanese rules), I think that the introduction for complete novices should teach area scoring. Probably they should not allow suicide, since most rules they will encounter later do not allow it. Charles I'm fairly certain that there are more than two possible purposes. But I'm entirely in agreement that we should have pages adapted for each purpose. We should also have a page like rules of go - geography? matching rule set to places. Zook: I made a couple of additions to make clear that board repetition is only prohibited for moves, not for passes. This is so obvious that my additions may well be superfluous. Feel free to restore previous version. [101] (Sebastian:) Chapter [4]: "controlling" isn't really a very helpful word for a beginner, or is it?
(Sebastian:) In or before Chapter [7], shouldn't we explicitly explain what a group is? In this context, The best would be to define it before Chapter 7, so we don't have to resort to the inexact and possibly misleading wording "stone or stones".
This is a copy of the living page "Rules of Go - introductory" at Sensei's Library. ![]() |