In general, capturing a stone in a net is considered better than capturing it in a ladder, because a net does not run the risk of a ladder block on the other side of the board.
On the other hand, if you depend on the capture of some stones to keep your group alive, a ladder is quicker (the opponent is in atari until the end). Using a net can be equivalent to losing a liberty. --MortenPahle
Charles Matthews There is a good example in this variation of the taisha joseki. What the books say is that
and
If this net continuation were good, White could play at in the previous diagram independent of the ladder, thereby avoiding the most difficult variations.
After these plays, however, Black has a good result, and the possibility of a black peep at d remains. Also forces
. Both of these effects are there because the marked black stone is still on the board.
For comparison, the usual result from the ladder variation. White's capture in the ladder forces .
(Note that the standard mistake here is White at a before : this loses sente and is an example of ignoring the 123 principle.)
There is also an interesting tidbit in "Lessons in the Fundamentals of Go" by Kageyama. He states that when there are two ways to capture with one move, then the firmer is correct (choose the firmer capture).
In this example the two white stones can be captured with a geta by playing at a. However, according to Kageyama, the correct move is b, which has a firmer grip on the two stones.
Alex Weldon: There's something about this proverb that bothers me. Unless he also gives an objective definition of what "firmer" means (less liberties? That can't be it, or else a ladder would be "firmer" than a geta), I would read "firmer" to mean "with least aji." But since aji is bad potential, this just boils down to "Given a choice between two methods of capturing, the one that leaves the least bad potential is better," which is starting to sound an awful lot like a circular argument.
DJ: Alex, I think you're basically right (and I do not see any circularity...): I believe firmer does mean with good aji (see also my comments at Non local move versus a local move).
Alex Weldon: The circularity is not in defining "firmness" as "with good aji." The circularity is in stating that out of two ways of capturing a stone (or stones), the firmer way is better. On the surface, it sounds like wisdom, but it boils down to "out of two ways to capture a stone (or stones), the one with better aji is better," which is a tautology.
Dieter: I believe there is this trade-off with ladders and nets.
I believe Kageyama's statement is that the longe range effect of a ladder in general is a heavier burden than the multiple short range aji of a net. As always with heuristics there are quite a few exceptions imaginable. In particular when the range of the ladder is rather short, it will most often be preferred over the net.
BTW, I would not call "the one with better aji is better" a circular statement, but I agree it just shifts the problem to the definition of good aji.
Notochord: Only if you consider aji to be the only characteristic of a position, which is stretching the definition a mite too far, I think. The point is essentially that the issue of aji, of giving those (most usually cutting) stones as little room to maneuver as possible, is often by far the most pressing concern. You should as a general rule play as tightly as possible, and avoid thinking that any move that succesfully makes a capture is just as good for the purpose of capturing as is any other move which does the same. As something of a corellary, I think that a main idea of the statement (Proverb?) is that we should not try to stretch our shape too much in capturing vital stones, in order to (for instance) reach towards some other position, and thus make our move 'less gote', since this usually creates a great deal of bad aji for the opponent to exploit which overwhelms the minor gains made from making a looser, weakly double-purpose capture.
Tactical discussion of Kageyama's example
ProtoDeuteric- I have come to believe that the geta is better than the shicho because the geta is a nice, clean play, as opposed to the shicho, which is much more involved and untidy. Furthermore, I notice that whenever a geta situation arises in real play, I don't feel that either player is unnecessarily taken advantage of. With a shicho, there might be two situations to consider: if I am caught in a shicho, I often think to myself, 'I knew I should have played (that other move),' but if I catch my opponent in a shicho, I feel that neither of us has played to the best of our abilities. Shicho is also a more sinister move, whereas geta is a graceful, elegant move (tesuji?).