Gnugo nosekis

    Keywords: Software

There are some situations where Gnugo just screws up EVERY time. If You know them, Youll improve Your performance against Gnugo considerably. Dont let this fool You into thinking You got stronger: Gnugo just never learns (unless its a version update). By adapting my playstile to Gnugo, I can improve my results in games against Gnugo by about 100 Points, compared to normal playstyle.


ihgo: The best reaction on such gnugo mistakes is to send an enhancement request to gnugo@gnu.org, the gnugo guys are very friendly (even better would be to code for the gnugo project...).

AndreasTeckentrup: Unfortunately, I am not a programmer, but I think that correcting single pattern mistakes wont help overall performance much. The aim of this page is not to deride or improve Gnugo, but to give some examples for the problems of computer go in general. I like the idea of Gnugo, and the program is one of the best available, so please dont think that I meant any disrespect to Gnugo with this page.


[Diagram]

Gnugo enters the corner

3-5 Noseki (Gnugo is white)
W8 is a totally inhumane move

[Diagram]

Gnugo dies unconditionally

3-5 Noseki (continuation)


[Diagram]

B7 Tenuki

Gnugo Tenuki Joseki (Gnugo is black)

normally, W6 at a would be Joseki, if You play like in the diagram, Gnugo doesnt know how to continue and plays tenuki


[Diagram]

Gnugo enters corner

3-3 Invasion when black has played 4-6 (Gnugo is white). There is a Joseki with W3 at A which lives(see 4464 enclosure 3-3 invasion), but Gnugo obviously doesnt know it. W dies unconditionally.


[Diagram]

Gnugo mis-handles the 3-4 Contact Play under a hoshi stone

MrTenuki: The following sequence is seen in a 4-stone handicap game. Gnugo is black. The initial score estimate says "Black is ahead by 39.1 points." The first move seems reasonable, but the follow-up is... let's say submissive.

[Diagram]

Gnugo mis-handles the 3-4 Contact Play under a hoshi stone

White seems to be confined to the corner, but...

[Diagram]

3-4 contact play, continued

W1 and W3 are peeps; W5 is an atari against the marked stone; B6 puts W1 into atari, and W7 captures the marked stone.

[Diagram]

3-4 contact play, continued

W5 is normally an overplay, but Gnugo decides to play submissively, and white gets to connect at W7. B8 makes life, and W9 connects. Thanks to B10, white ends in sente and has both influence and territory. Now the score estimate becomes "Black is ahead by 26.4 points." Please note that you can't repeat this in another corner, because black will tenuki to take big points.


I will add more when I have time. Feel free to add Your own nosekis if Gnugo regularly plays them.

Author: AndreasTeckentrup

Imagist: I think that in general the problem with GnuGo is that it plays too submissively. Also, I don't think it understands the proverb "urgent points before big points". This is speaking as someone only two ranks stronger than GnuGo on KGS, though, so I may not know what I'm talking about. :)


This is a copy of the living page "Gnugo nosekis" at Sensei's Library.
(OC) 2007 the Authors, published under the OpenContent License V1.0.
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