On 7/9/07, David Fotland <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
Very unlikely. I'm a strong player (but not very strong - 3 dan amateur), and I've played perhaps a dozen 9x9 games with people who were just learning the rules. I played in a couple of 9x9 tournaments on the crazy go day at the go congress (along with 3-d go, hex go, etc). Most beginners only need a couple of games on 9x9 before they start paying 19x19. 9x9 go is not very interesting to strong players, since it's not really go. I might as well be playing checkers or 9 men's morris :)
I agree that 9x9 is not that interesting for very long, even for beginners, but I'd like to put in a good word here for 13x13. I'm at about 25 kyu on dragongo; nearly all my games are 13x13, and I think I would be having much less fun at 19x19. There seems to be quite a bit of room for strategy at this smaller board size (for example, room enough for joseki patterns, though their significance is probably different) but games are over much quicker, which is an important consideration if you want to have fast games on a non-real-time server. Games take long enough as it is, and quicker feedback is useful for learning. It seems like 13x13 would be a good intermediate step for computer go. - Brian _______________________________________________ computer-go mailing list computer-go@computer-go.org http://www.computer-go.org/mailman/listinfo/computer-go/
