r/baduk • u/TDGSlayer • 5d ago

Which pro players/games should I study

Hi everyone,

I'm around 7k on Fox and 10k on Pandanet. I'd like to start replaying pro games on a real board, guessing the pro's move before playing it, but I'm not sure where to start.

I am mostly interested in the fuseki up to middle game. My current level is 7k fox/10k pandanet.

Thanks !

7 Upvotes

83% Upvoted

12 comments sorted by

11

u/Typical-Jackfruit-51 2 kyu 5d ago

Here's what I do when studying pro games:

  • I also focus on fuseki & early middle game
  • I pick one player and think about their thought process, so guess which area of the board rather than which exact move
  • I like pre-AI games and value games by Japanese players (simpler/more "honte" moves)
  • A few pros I like studying: Iyama Yuuta (solid player), Lee Changho (one of my favorite pros & good at defense), Rui Naiwei (aggressive style), Lee Sedol & Shin Jinseo (top-level pros, but harder to follow)

8

u/OmnipotentEntity 2 kyu 5d ago

For others who are telling you not to study pro games, I don't agree. Do study pro games. Just accept that some of the moves will be difficult for you to understand. There are other moves that will be easy for you to understand. And there will also be still other moves that will be possible for you to understand with a little bit of work.

There are a lot of moves in any given pro player's game, and not all of them are "deep" and "mysterious." There are even some that are obvious to any 20 kyu player, such as connect against a peep, and so on.

9

u/tuerda 3 dan 5d ago

Whoever interests you and stimulates your imagination. It is possible to learn from pro games but the main reason to see them is for the pure entertainment value. For a go player to look at pro games is like for a basketball player to watch the NBA. You might learn something, but that isn't necessarily the point.

1

u/Puzzleheaded_Math706 5d ago

I think those are 2 completely different approaches and both just work fine

3

u/abbbaabbaa 1 kyu 5d ago

I like to watch BadukTV streams for pro games.

2

u/NewOakClimbing 11 kyu 4d ago

I'm around the same level. I have the Invincible book (games of Shusaku), and I'll also download pro games from players I just happen to like.

I usually read a bit about the history and context of the game first, then try to memorize the first 50 or so moves while replaying it on a real board.

It's honestly just something I find fun. I'm not really sure how much it's helping me improve, but I enjoy doing it.

1

u/Artistic_Mango_3756 5d ago edited 5d ago

I don't really recommend player in your level learn by pro games. Remembering the josekis is more important.

2

u/Typical-Jackfruit-51 2 kyu 5d ago

Why not?

5

u/Artistic_Mango_3756 5d ago

There is a huge gap between the way professional Go players think and that of ordinary enthusiasts. My Go teacher is fox 8d, and even he finds professional games very difficult to fathom.

0

u/newrandreddit2 5d ago

If you're interested in fuseki, then watch any pro matches you find interesting. It might be fun to follow a recent tournament for example.

If your goal is to improve efficiently, as others have said this is probably not a good approach. It would be better to focus on reading ability. But it's totally fine to have no interest in min/maxing learning efficiently, we should all do what's fun.

-1

u/earltyro 5d ago

Being 160cm and asking who to role model basketball from: Yao Ming, Lebron James or Steph Curry.

You can appreciate all of them, but are you going to improve much from watching their games? Probably not, it's better if you work on your fundamentals. The dribbles the 3 points the layups the footwork.

Can you pick up a few high level strategic things, yes. You can play like AlphaGo in the fisrt 30 moves and get a percentage of 95%. But when the stones touched each other, it is the joseki, it is the life and death that is going to drag you back to 0.5% playing people a couple ranks higher.

In reality, it is the games that you were sandbagged, that you learnt most. Because every single move, there was an obvious mistake, every single move that you could find a better way to play it. That's how you improve.

-1

u/alphapussycat 5d ago

Just watch some amateur dance games to get exposed to shapes.. Unfortunately go no longer has kibitzing, so it's not nearly as entertaining to watch.