Go: from 9×9 to 19×19, with handicaps and byo-yomi
khorost
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3 min read·👁 1
19×19, 13×13 and 9×9 boards, Japanese and Chinese rules, handicaps and byo-yomi, counting with dead stones marked automatically, six KataGo bots from 20 kyu to very strong, a study room and tournaments.
There is a new game in the club — Go. A board, black and white stones, and a move is one stone on an intersection of the lines. Surrounded stones are taken off the board, and whoever fences off more territory wins. The rules fit on a single page, yet the depth lasts a lifetime: Go has been played for more than two and a half thousand years and is still one of the deepest board games there is.
Three boards
- 19×19 — the classic board, used in tournaments and by professionals;
- 13×13 — a shorter game with all the ideas of the big board;
- 9×9 — quick games and the best place to start.
Each board has its own rating. In a challenge you can choose Japanese rules (komi 6.5) or Chinese rules (komi 7.5), a handicap — up to nine stones on the big board — and the time control: byo-yomi with several periods, or Fischer with an increment per move.
Counting without arguments
The hardest thing in Go for a beginner is knowing when the game is over and whose stones are dead. The table helps here: once both players have passed, dead stones are marked automatically, the territory is counted, and the players only need to agree with the result or adjust the marks.
KataGo bots
In the rooms with bots you'll face opponents powered by KataGo, from beginner to very strong: Sato_Bot (around 20 kyu), Mina_Bot (10 kyu), Kenta_Bot (5 kyu) and Yuki_Bot (1 dan). On the big board there are also Sensei_Bot and Ryo_Bot — worth playing even with a handicap. The bots play in the style of human players of their level, so it's easy to find an opponent of your strength.
Study room and tournaments
In the study room you can start not from an empty board but from a ready position — for example, four stones on the star points — to work through openings and practise the positions you need. There are tournaments on 13×13.
Archive
Finished games are kept in the archive: you can step through a game move by move and download it as SGF to study in any Go program. The latest games are shown by the "Telescope" on the home page.
Go is browser-only — on a computer or a phone, with nothing to install. Head over to the Go page — see you at the board!