Round 13 - Playoffs 5 of 2016 US Tak Open

This past week saw a number more exciting games. SultanPepper and Unsweet have successfully locked themselves into the top 3 for this playoff.  Trailing behind them are other playtak veterans: Simon, Abyss, NohatCoder, Turing, Ally, and Simmon. Personally, I'm particularly interested in watching the upcoming match between Turing and Simmon.

As a bit of a prelude to this, the game I'm focusing on this week is the second in the match between Turing and Tayacan. This week, I wrote a brief, high-level annotation of the game that can be found at https://goo.gl/1co2QM or in the viewer below:

Round 12 - Playoffs 4 of 2016 US Tak Open

Having reached the end of round four, we begin the last 8 matches of the season. As a result, tensions are rising and any mistake can spell the last and make or break players.

In following this week's hubbub, I found myself particularly intrigued by the first game between ira212 and Abyss:

In particular, I spent a decent bit of time considering the position of the board after the white's 11th move:

[11. c4]

There's quite a lot I would have personally preferred to play for the opening lines, but this play creates an interesting setup for the board. A quick glance shows that black is slightly ahead - at least in terms of flat count and tempo. On the other hand, white has better control over the center, a stronger capstone, and more opportunities to develop road threats. The question for me, then, is which is more valuable - black's tempo or white's position?

If black chose to press tempo with f5' then white is forced to respond to the tak threat. There are four major lines here to consider: f6, e5-, d1>, and f1<, as shown in the corresponding image below:

{f6 / e5- / d1>  / f1< }

Of these, the best option is easily f6. For one - it maintains the flat differential. Secondly - it prevents breaking up the current structures. Finally - even if black were to follow up with e6', then white can respond with f6-, stopping any real immediate tak threat in its tracks:

[{12. f6 e6' 13. f6-}] 

At the end of this, it doesn't seem like black has gained much. Black no longer has tempo, his pieces are disconnected, and doesn't even have any real good control over white's area. That being said, with black at the helm, he can now interfere with whites center control. In the original game, Abyss played c5 to contest white's control. My initial reaction was to play b4, expecting white to respond with c5':

[{13. ... b3 14. c6'}]

Note how despite black's ability to hinder white's progress, white is definitely in control here. Black's earlier procedure leaving a flat on e6 doesn't even help his position. In contrast, White has a lot more flexibility.  Regardless of black's response, white has a lot of good options: d5- --> b3; b4>c3+ --> d4<; c6 --> b6'.

This in stark contrast to the types of maneuvers seen in the 5x5 games. In those games, these sorts of tak and tempo would have easily been able to turn the tide, putting white on the defensive. Instead, with the extended time on the 6x6, the positional advantage wins out.

Note, though, that the power of white's last move - c6' isn't simply the tak threat. That's some of the pressure. More so, white is strongly increasing position across the board and vying for control over the northwest corner. The tak threat only really limits black's responses and prevents black from gaining more ground. 

For the sake of 'completion', I also played this out with 13. ... c5 - closer to Abyss's original play. Following this line, I would actually play 14. b5 as white. In the original playthrough, (14. b4), black is able to close white off from reaching ranks 5 or 6. By extending now, and connecting diagonally to a current stone, white is able to extend control onto rank 5 - aiming to a north-south road potential. (and still having some good west-east potential)

[{13. ... c5 14. b5}]

Here too, white has a much better position and more flexibility to build towards future tak threats. Overall, these lines reinforce the importance of position in the 6x6 game - especially the value of the central squares.

Let me know what you think. Does white's position put him in the lead? How would you play this position out from either side?

Round 10 - Playoffs 2 of 2016 US Tak Open

With the second round over, the first set of 8 people has been eliminated, bringing us down to the top 24 players.  Interestingly 3 of the 16 games ended in a tie-breaker. While this may not seem like a lot, it really shows how closely matched some of these players are and will be important to look at as part of the post-tournament analysis.

In addition, next week will feature more exciting matches. I personally am looking forward to the match between NohatCoder and SultanPepper. Whoever you may be rooting for, the tension is palatable.

One of the games I particularly enjoyed this past week was the first game between Gray_Mouser and SuperJujuAwesome:

Round 9 - Playoffs 1 of 2016 US Tak Open

With the first round of the playoffs, there has also been quite a bit of additional media surrounding the tournament games. Both BenWo and Baweaver have streamed some of the matches to their respective channels. For myself, I found it particularly helpful and interesting to watch through parts of a game, try to figure out what I would move in certain situations and what responses I expected. Playing these out - either physically, digitally, or mentally, I believe can help a lot to familiarize with various patterns and trades.

Perhaps one of the most pernicious and difficult patterns for players - even at this level - is Tinuë. By the time one notices the tinuë, it's usually too late. And the Road to Tinuë is often not so straightforward. There's a really interesting example of this in this week's match-up between Kakaburra and Doodles:

Round 8 of 2016 US Tak Open

With the Swiss stage complete, we have our line-up for the next stage of the tournament - the final double elimination. I want to offer a sincere congratulation for all of you who participated, regardless of whether you moved on or not. If you have managed to make it to the next stage, well done! I'm excited to see this play out. For the everyone else, I have seen a lot of improvement in play from everyone and some great matches. I want to compliment all of you for raising the bar and level of play and providing a challenge and I hope to see you continue to play the game, give feedback on the current tournament, and participate in future tournaments.

This week, I decided to explore the game between Ally and Turing. These are fairly experienced players, who are exploring the meta and tend to be quite intentional about what plays they make. So, in reviewing their game, I was hoping to find what moves lead to Turing's eventual loss. In my high-level overview, I've noted a few places where I play slightly differently, or I would explore a different line than the ones Turing and Ally chose. You can follow this commentary, as usual, at the following link and in the viewer below (https://goo.gl/Cu1bTa):

Round 7 of 2016 US Tak Open

As we close in on the last match of the Swiss stage, tensions are rising. The last match could make or break a lot of player's inclusion in the next round of the tournament. Regardless of whether you've made it or not, I wish to congratulate all of you who have stuck with the tournament thus far and played through all the rounds. As of the time of writing this, over 360 matches have been finished as a part of the tournament.

This week, I wanted to look a bit deeper into the first game between nebel and r_so9. I've covered neither of these aplayers games but .Based on their current rankings and the game played, though, they seem to represent of mid-tier players. As with my last post, I've included brief, high-level comments on the full game (https://goo.gl/61mf60):

Round 5 of 2016 US Tak Open

Now that we're past the halfway mark, our final line-up is really starting to take shape. Quite a few of the high rankers are notable participants from previous informal tournaments, such as Turing, Fwwwwibib, maron, Simmon, applemonkeyman, and kakaburra, amongst others. Watching and following these games can really help demonstrate the level of play possible.

In particular, this week, I decided to delve into the first game of the match between Fwwwwibib and NohatCoder. Both of these players are quite strong, so parsing through their moves can be quite educational. Like last time, I notated a brief, high-level full game comments, using ptn ninja (https://goo.gl/NZaH8h):

Round 3 of 2016 US Tak Open

With the 2016 US Tak Open tournament's 3rd round behind us, participants are entering the halfway mark of the swiss stage. Now, more than ever, match wins are important. Even a single win could push some players into the coveted top 32.

In reviewing some of the games, I've noticed that some of the reporting hasn't been the most consistent. Please remember to include links to the PTNs when submitting! In addition, when scores are tied please remember to reference the tie-breaker rules (Appendix A) to determine the match winner. At the end of the tournament, I have plans to do a meta-analysis of the games played, and having accurate and complete information will really help in this (in addition to making sure that all players are at an even ground).

With that aside, I want to delve into the game I'll be looking into today: the first game in the matchup between nelhage and abyss:

Round 2 of 2016 US Tak Open

With the second round of the Swiss stage complete, the participants are really beginning to distinguish themselves. While still pretty flexible, the top 32 is starting to shape out. Quite a number of the names at the top here are Playtak and tournament veterans, including Simmon, Kakaburra, Turing, SkippyThePenguin, Ally, and others. In addition, there are quite a few names that I'm not as familiar with. It will be exciting to see how these individuals continue to perform over the next round.

Round 1 of 2016 US Tak Open

This past week featured the first round of the 2016 US Tak Open. As this is only the first week, players are only just beginning to distinguish themselves.  The top 37 players are currently undefeated. This puts the pressure on them even more to keep their scores up to ensure a place in the top 32 by the end of the Swiss-style stage. The middle 74 won one game, but not the other putting, meaning their match win or loss was determined by the individual game scores and tie-breaker rules. Both these individuals and the bottom 37 will have to up their game if they want a chance at the coveted top 32.

2016 US Tak Open

With the 2016 US Tak Open Tournament imminent, there is a lot to be excited about. Perhaps most notably, this is the first official major online Tak tournament, fully supported by the US Tak Association. As a result, there are actual prizes in store for first and second place. More so, there is actual prestige and status on the line. In addition, there are 149 registered participants, making it the largest Tak tournament to date. Of these participants, 81% are from the US, while the rest are from 11 other countries, making this an international event!

Analysis: Tak Open Finals R1: applemonkeyman vs SultanPepper (1/2)

Note: The analysis and positions described are for the 6x6 game. Extend the principles and ideas to the 5x5 and the 8x8 at your own risk...

The next match in the Tak Open finals that I'll be looking at is the first game between applemonkeyman (white) and SultanPepper (black):

Analysis: Tak Open Finals R1: Gerrek v Simmon (2/2)

Note: The analysis and positions described are for the 6x6 game. Extend the principles and ideas to the 5x5 and the 8x8 at your own risk...

The next game in this series is the second in the match between Simmon and Gerrek, this time with Gerrek as white and Simmon as black:

Analysis: Tak Open Finals R1: Simmon vs Gerrek (1/2)

Note: The analysis and positions described are for the 6x6 game. Extend the principles and ideas to the 5x5 and the 8x8 at your own risk...

The number of games in the tournament is quite massive, so with the current state of the tournament, I am shifting focus to comment the Finals matches. Granted, this still will wind up with 14 matches (for 28 games) to comment, which is still quite a bit. As such, if anyone wants to pitch in their own comments, feel free to get in contact with me and I'll set you up with a game not currently being processed.

To kick this off, I will be looking at the first game between Simmon (white) and Gerrek (black):

Analysis: Open Tournament A: Simmon v. Maron

Note: The analysis and positions described are for the 6x6 game. Extend the principles and ideas to the 5x5 and the 8x8 at your own risk...

To continue my series of analysis of games from the Open Tournament, I want to move onto the second game between Simmon and maron, with Simmon as white and maron as black. (Note: While it is important to consider the context of the game in the match, I am analyzing this and other second games in of their own merit and play).

Analysis: Open Tournament A: ts52 vs. Simmon

Note: The analysis and positions described are for the 6x6 game. Extend the principles and ideas to the 5x5 and the 8x8 at your own risk...

In this post, I am continuing my analysis of varied games from the Open Tournament. As there are a lot of games to look at and each one may take a fair bit of time to analyze, I will continue to update as I can, but it may be a while before I get into any particular game. I may also collaborate with others to help with this task. 

One final note: In the course of (all) my analysis, I am using a tool I designed to help delve into particular lines and variations: https://github.com/nqeron/TakAnalysis. For the moment, the functionality to attempt to annotate moves is a bit weird, so I'm primarily using it to ask TakticianBot for its move recommendations. For more details on how either of these work, feel free to send me an e-mail.

With that note, I'd like to delve into the next game:

Analysis: Open Tournament, A: nqeron v. Simmon

Note: The analysis and positions described are for the 6x6 game. Extend the principles and ideas to the 5x5 and the 8x8 at your own risk...

Last month held the first ever online Tak tournament, the Tak Strategy Summer Invitational Tournament. In the wake of this, a more recent tournament has arrived, dubbed the Open Tournament. In contrast to the previous tournament, the pool of participants was open to any participants (though restricted to 16 total). In addition, whereas the summer invitational was scheduled with a live stream following - along with commentary - this tournament is schedule-free and none of the games have been commented on - in any form. Due to this absence of commentary, so far, I thought I would offer some of my own insights into the games of the tournament.

Before starting, however, a few things should be clear. My analysis is not intended as an end-all and be-all of analysis. Rather, it is intended to be a jumping off point - my own subjective evaluation, subject to scrutiny, criticism, and input from other experienced players. In the same regard, it is not intended to be complete. There is a lot that could be said about specific games and the strategies or possible lines - too much to be covered in individual analysis pieces. For the sake of brevity, and to highlight the more interesting moves, I probably won't discuss every position or idea. Where there are interesting ideas that fall out of scope, I will attempt to delve into them in more in-depth posts.

Finally, note that all the games will be oriented to the a1 and lower right triangle, using the idea of collapsing board symmetries. (As a result, while the games will be identical, the PTNs used here and those listed in the archive may have different orientations).

Without further ado, let's delve into the first game that I'll be looking at:

Strategy: Negative Placement

Usually, in the game of Tak it is most beneficial to be laying flats. There are cases, however, when placing a piece can make a position worse. I encountered this recently in a game I was testing my mettle against a bot: ditaktic v. TakticianBot

Game Analysis: Novice and Experienced play on the corner

Note: The analysis and positions described are for the 5x5 game. Extend the principles and ideas to the 6x6 and the 8x8 at your own risk...

In the last few posts, I discussed some theory in regards to the Adjacent Corner Opening in response to the AB line. In this post, I want to take a look at an actual game that was played on this line. My hope is that by looking at player moves, it'll be easier to see some of the impact of the choices of certain moves and how they pan out to the later game.

The game I want to discuss in this post is between two humans, a novice (white) and an experienced player (black). I would recommend following through the game as I discuss the moves in the viewer below or at the following link:  Novice-Experienced Game.

Opening: Adjacent Corner AB-D staccato

Note: The analysis and positions described are for the 5x5 game. Extend the principles and ideas to the 6x6 and the 8x8 at your own risk...

Last post I started to discuss the AB Adjacent corner openings.  In this post I wanted to continue this discussion with a focus on the 'AB-D staccato':


[PTN: 1. a5 a1 2. b1 d2 3. d1 e1]

While it may not seem like much, white now has a number of options that can change the look and feel of the game. With black having cut off the imminent threat of the 1-row, white now has a few options. For one (I), white can put pressure on the lower d&e squares - continuing the original thread. Alternatively (II), white can aim for the center (c3) or some surrounding squares. Or (III), white can direct some attention up the b-file. There are certainly other possibilities, but these are certainly the major lines, each with a different feel and rhythm.

Adjacent Corner Openings: A-B variations

Note: The analysis and positions described are for the 5x5 game. Extend the principles and ideas to the 6x6 and the 8x8 at your own risk...

I want to start by examining what I term 'Adjacent corner openings': that is openings of the form 1. a5 a1, where the initial stones are placed in corners of a single file or row. While I haven't seen this played too much online, it is an opening set that I think has a wide range of applications to other openings and a fair amount of intricacy.

Due to the breadth of possibilities, this needs to be divided even further, starting with the 'a-b' variations: 2. b1.

At this point the board looks like this:


[PTN: 1. a5 a1 2. b1]