Gamehouse Mahjong Quest Serial Number
Sibyl Piccuillo
Go is an abstract strategy board game for two players in which the aim is to capture more territory than the opponent by fencing off empty space. The game was invented in China more than 2,500 years ago and is believed to be the oldest board game continuously played to the present day.[1][2][3][4][5] A 2016 survey by the International Go Federation's 75 member nations found that there are over 46 million people worldwide who know how to play Go, and over 20 million current players, the majority of whom live in East Asia.[6]
The playing pieces are called stones. One player uses the white stones and the other black. The players take turns placing their stones on the vacant intersections (points) on the board. Once placed, stones may not be moved, but captured stones are immediately removed from the board. A single stone (or connected group of stones) is captured when surrounded by the opponent's stones on all orthogonally adjacent points.[7] The game proceeds until neither player wishes to make another move.
When a game concludes, the winner is determined by counting each player's surrounded territory along with captured stones and komi (points added to the score of the player with the white stones as compensation for playing second).[8] Games may also end by resignation.[9]
The standard Go board has a 1919 grid of lines, containing 361 points. Beginners often play on smaller 99 and 1313 boards,[10] and archaeological evidence shows that the game was played in earlier centuries on a board with a 1717 grid. Boards with a 1919 grid had become standard, however, by the time the game reached Korea in the 5th century CE and Japan in the 7th century CE.[11]
Despite its relatively simple rules, Go is extremely complex. Compared to chess, Go has both a larger board with more scope for play and longer games and, on average, many more alternatives to consider per move. The number of legal board positions in Go has been calculated to be approximately 2.110170,[15][a] which is far greater than the number of atoms in the observable universe, which is estimated to be on the order of 1080.[17]
Go is an adversarial game between two players with the objective of capturing territory. That is, occupying and surrounding a larger total empty area of the board with one's stones than the opponent.[21] As the game progresses, the players place stones on the board creating stone "formations" and enclosing spaces. Stones are never moved on the board, but when "captured" are removed from the board. Stones are linked together into a formation by being adjacent along the black lines, not on diagonals (of which there are none). Contests between opposing formations are often extremely complex and may result in the expansion, reduction, or wholesale capture and loss of formations and their enclosed empty spaces (called "eyes"). Another essential component of the game is control of the sente (that is, controlling the offense, so that one's opponent is forced into defensive moves); this usually changes several times during play.
Initially the board is bare, and players alternate turns to place one stone per turn. As the game proceeds, players try to link their stones together into "living" formations (meaning that they are permanently safe from capture), as well as threaten their opponent's stones and formations. Stones have both offensive and defensive characteristics, depending on the situation.
An essential tactic is that a formation of stones must incorporate at least two open points (known as eyes) to preserve itself from elimination on the board. Two or more eyes incorporated into a group (called a liberty) and a group with two or more eyes cannot be captured, even if it's surrounded on the outside. [23] Such groups are said to be unconditionally alive.[24]
The general strategy is to place stones to fence-off territory, attack the opponent's weak groups (trying to kill them so they will be removed), and always stay mindful of the life status of one's own groups.[25][26] The liberties of groups are countable. Situations where mutually opposing groups must capture each other or die are called capturing races, or semeai.[27] In a capturing race, the group with more liberties will ultimately be able to capture the opponent's stones.[27][28][b] Capturing races and the elements of life or death are the primary challenges of Go.
In the end game players may pass rather than place a stone if they think there are no further opportunities for profitable play.[29] The game ends when both players pass[30] or when one player resigns. In general, to score the game, each player counts the number of unoccupied points surrounded by their stones and then subtracts the number of stones that were captured by the opponent. The player with the greater score (after adjusting for handicapping called komi) wins the game.
In the opening stages of the game, players typically establish groups of stones (or bases) near the corners and around the sides of the board, usually starting on the third or fourth line in from the board edge rather than at the very edge of the board. The edges and corners make it easier to develop groups which have better options for life (self-viability for a group of stones that prevents capture) and establish formations for potential territory.[31] Players usually start near the corners because establishing territory is easier with the aid of two edges of the board.[32] Established corner opening sequences are called joseki and are often studied independently.[33] However, in the mid-game, stone groups must also reach in towards the large central area of the board to capture more territory.
Dame are points that lie in between the boundary walls of black and white, and as such are considered to be of no value to either side. Seki are mutually alive pairs of white and black groups where neither has two eyes.
Ko (Chinese and Japanese: 劫) is a potentially indefinitely repeated stone-capture position. The rules do not allow a board position to be repeated. Therefore, any move which would restore the previous board position would not be allowed, and the next player would be forced to play somewhere else. If the play requires a strategic response by the first player, further changing the board, then the second player could "retake the ko," and the first player would be in the same situation of needing to change the board before trying to take the ko back. And so on. [34] Some of these ko fights may be important and decide the life of a large group, while others may be worth just one or two points. Some ko fights are referred to as picnic kos when only one side has a lot to lose.[35] The Japanese call it a hanami (flower-viewing) ko.[36]
The strategy involved can become very abstract and complex. High-level players spend years improving their understanding of strategy, and a novice may play many hundreds of games against opponents before being able to win regularly.
Strategy deals with global influence, the interaction between distant stones, keeping the whole board in mind during local fights, and other issues that involve the overall game. It is therefore possible to allow a tactical loss when it confers a strategic advantage.
Novices often start by randomly placing stones on the board, as if it were a game of chance. An understanding of how stones connect for greater power develops, and then a few basic common opening sequences may be understood. Learning the ways of life and death helps in a fundamental way to develop one's strategic understanding of weak groups.[c] A player who both plays aggressively and can handle adversity is said to display kiai, or fighting spirit, in the game.
In the opening, players often play established sequences called joseki, which are locally balanced exchanges;[44] however, the joseki chosen should also produce a satisfactory result on a global scale. It is generally advisable to keep a balance between territory and influence. Which of these gets precedence is often a matter of individual taste.
The middle phase of the game is the most combative, and usually lasts for more than 100 moves. During the middlegame, the players invade each other's territories, and attack formations that lack the necessary two eyes for viability. Such groups may be saved or sacrificed for something more significant on the board.[45] It is possible that one player may succeed in capturing a large weak group of the opponent's, which often proves decisive and ends the game by a resignation. However, matters may be more complex yet, with major trade-offs, apparently dead groups reviving, and skillful play to attack in such a way as to construct territories rather than kill.[46]
The end of the middlegame and transition to the endgame is marked by a few features. Near the end of a game, play becomes divided into localized fights that do not affect each other,[47] with the exception of ko fights, where before the central area of the board related to all parts of it. No large weak groups are still in serious danger. Moves can reasonably be attributed some definite value, such as 20 points or fewer, rather than simply being necessary to compete. Both players set limited objectives in their plans, in making or destroying territory, capturing or saving stones. These changing aspects of the game usually occur at much the same time, for strong players. In brief, the middlegame switches into the endgame when the concepts of strategy and influence need reassessment in terms of concrete final results on the board.
Almost all other information about how the game is played is heuristic, meaning it is learned information about how the patterns of the stones on the board function, rather than a rule. Other rules are specialized, as they come about through different rulesets, but the above two rules cover almost all of any played game.
Although there are some minor differences between rulesets used in different countries,[48] most notably in Chinese and Japanese scoring rules,[49] these differences do not greatly affect the tactics and strategy of the game.
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