BQM 364

Imagist: This game record comes from Janice Kim's fifth book, The Palace of Memory. The example focuses on the shape of (capping at the head of two stones), but the move that I find interesting is . I can see how is large enough to tenuki after , but the , exchange seems obviously loss-making. Why exactly is big enough to allow ?

LukeNine45: Did Black win? Maybe it wasn't big enough ;)

Chris Hayashida: Not that it matters in this case, but is a hane and not a cap. Not answering the kakari with is a small loss, but not as big a loss as one might think. I suspect that weakening the left side might be bigger than answering with and then having to respond later to a white play at a. I'll let someone stronger comment on this diagram.

xela: I'm probably not the "someone stronger" that Chris is looking for, but I did search through GoGoD and found two games in which this exact position occurs. Both games involve the same two players, same colours, and white wins one out of two!

The position after in the top diagram is a common one, and at is indeed the most popular response: 57 games in my collection, but white wins 32 out of 57.

in the diagram above is a big move simply because it makes possible. Here are the next few moves:

Next black played at a, and then white at either b (7th November 1995; white wins by resignation) or c (28th August 1995, black wins by 5.5 points).

Imagine what this would look like without the and stones-- doesn't work so well unless is already there.