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Fuseki

 

San-San with Facing Komoku
  Difficulty: Advanced   Keywords: Opening

For about a month I was in a bit of a funk, where I was losing just about every game I played. This of course tanked my rating. During this time I was also taking Black just about every game. Then I started playing white with this couter-opening and I've been scoring enormous success. I'm not sure what it is, but I've only lost a couple of games as white in the last couple of weeks on the internet, and none in person. Needless to say it broke my funk. Here it is. --BlueWyvern

[Diagram]
Diag.: White San-San and facing Komoku counter-fuseki

Here is the basic pattern. I've mainly just used this against influence based Fuseki patterns, such as SanRenSei and the ChineseOpening. The theory behind this opening is that it gives you two solid corners fast, and you can immediately commence destroying your opponents influence, without worrying too much about counter attacks. I've found that the majority of people seem to like attacking the komoku with a high approach at 5. When this happens, attaching underneath and pulling back works perfectly well. You gain good profit and sente, and Black is virtually forced to play low at 'a', an influential loss. If Black plays at 'b', White 'c' becomes a nice checking extension, threatening to invade and make massive profit along the side.

One possible continuation is to play the splitting move at 'd', the wear down the influence of the star stones to the point where you can invade at the three-three point. I've found that if I can get all four corners with this opening, the game is mine. Keep in mind if you follow this strategy, you will need to have a couple of big corners, and reduce the center a bit. Having all four corners is no guarentee to win, especially if your opponent controls the rest of the board. :-)

KarlKnechtel: I like the wariuchi here too - but if you're aiming to 'wear down influence', why not play for it yourself on that side of the board (i.e. d at e instead)?

splice: I've actually been using the same type of opening. I started off with san-san and non-facing komoku, but I think I prefer facing komoku. It was iffy at first, what with a totally new opening (I was previously using either nirensei or hoshi and komoku, mostly, with once or twice omokuhazushi). But I levelled off, won some 10-15 straight games, lost once or twice, and started winning again. It is a very interesting opening to me.

HolIgor: Having no understanding of the opening, I'd like to comment on this idea anyway. I've played quite a lot of san-san myself and was quite content with the results at the moment. But, it is not a universal solution or recipe of a win. As usual it works against the guys that don't know how to counter the plan. But with the stronger players you will be pressed down easily.


[Diagram]
Diag.: Black presses white down

Do you have a plan how to play in this situation? Since san-san is so territorial and robust the one thing that the opponent does not want to allow you is to make a moyo based on it. So, the first task for black would be to eliminate this possibility creating at the same time a huge framework of high stones. The fight in the middle will be favourable for black.

At the same time you have to remember that white's territory on the first diagram is too small yet to win.

Anyway, this is my understanding and experience. I am weak at fuseki though.

BlueWyvern: Actually, people do play this quite frequently, the problem is, pressing down straight away can be premature. The stones doing the pressing down are without any base or eyespace whatsoever and can turn out to be quite heavy. I on the other hand have a solid position underneath which I do not have to worry about that holds quite a bit of profit. Several times I have been able to successfully attack the pressing down group, building me enough strength in the center to combat the star stones influence in the process. In my experiance, almost no one at my level gets the timing of the press down right, and by the time people do, I also feel like I'll have improved.

Anyways, if you are aware of how Black has to play, you can take measures to counter it. Incidentally, I've always like an influence building strategy more, but I find that this is perhaps helping me understand influence a little better.

kungfu I may not be up to date with the modern lines, but I believe either 5 or 7 above is a space too far (7?)

SAS: Why do you believe this? They look like the usual moves to me.


DaveSigaty: The current GoGoD CD (May 2002) has 70 games that begin with the komoku plus san san combination. The first appearance was in 1948 when Go Seigen played it against Hashimoto Utaro. It was played frequently by Sakata Eio but Fujisawa Shuko, Kitani, Takagawa also used it in the 60's. It continued to appear in the 70's and 80's with more territory-oriented players like Ishida Yoshio, Rin, and Cho Chikun using it. It has appeared less frequently in the 90's.

[Diagram]
Diag.: Continuations


It has a better than average record with Black winning only 51% of the time. The most popular reply has always been the high approach move at "a" (appeared in 50 of 70 games). Remarkably, this is despite the fact that White has won more than 50% of the games with that continuation. The continued use of "a" by Black may be an indirect judgement of the quality of players that have used this line as White :-)

 Statistics:
 70 matches (70/0), B: 51.4%, W: 48.6%
 Ba: 50 (50), B46.0% - W54.0%
 Bb: 12 (12), B58.3% - W41.7%
 Bc:  8  (8), B75.0% - W25.0%

BlueWyvern's variation attaching underneath with B making the solid connection appears in six games. White won all six! Takagawa Kaku was the unlucky Black in four of the games.

[Diagram]
Diag.: Continuations


 Statistics:
 6 matches (6/0), B: 0.0%, W: 100.0%
 Ba: 4 (4), B0.0% - W100.0%
 Bb: 1 (1), B0.0% - W100.0%
 Bc: 1 (1), B0.0% - W100.0%
 Game list
 1960-05-13:  Fujisawa Hideyuki - Takagawa Kaku (W) 10a
 1961-07-05b: Fujisawa Hideyuki - Takagawa Kaku (W) 10a
 1961-10-15b: Sakata Eio - Takagawa Kaku (W) 10a
 1961-10-22:  Sakata Eio - Takagawa Kaku (W) 10a
 1983-06-30c: Kobayashi Satoru - Otake Hideo (W) 10b
 1984-03-25a: Honda Kunihisa - Takemiya Masaki (W) 10c

Kungfu The magic is not limited to nirensei, as Nie Weiping showed in his book. Here are some moves I remember:

[Diagram]
Diag.: Nie vs Iwata

black 11 at a, white 12 at b. I think I forget the true position of 7 and 8, but this is the basic picture as I remember it. 7 and 8 or around there are miai i think.
DaveSigaty - Nie Weiping vs Iwata Tatsuaki (black) 1976-04-17 in the Japan-China Go Exchange. I corrected 8 from the original position at "c".

[Diagram]
Diag.: Continuation


This is a copy of the living page "San-San with Facing Komoku" at Sensei's Library.
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