AQ5, Go!
So, I have been making very little writing progress lately. *sigh* It's almost as if, as long as I am still editing AQATSA, I can't quite throw myself into something new.
I know... kind of... what the major events will be in AQ5. I just haven't worked out the unifying metaplot yet, and there are some really big.... gaps.
I haven't even settled on a title.
But, the ideas, they are rattling around, and my vague idea of how the story will continue is starting to gel. Actually, it would be more accurate to say that in the milky soup of proto-plot, a few clots are beginning to congeal.
See, I've even started jotting down notes:
No, I haven't actually started writing yet, and I still plan to finish my other project first (ETA: unknown).
Master of bumbling at go
I'm still having a little... trouble controlling my temper when I make a stupid move in go. I mean, if I lose because I'm just plain outplayed, I can handle it, but when I lose because the motherfucker invaded "safe" territory and I should have been able to kill him but I was too incompetent to do so, or because I have, through carelessness, allowed a great big group of my own stones to be cut off and killed, I just want to kick my own ass.
This is serious, yo. I mean, it actually puts me in a bad mood! Go is messing with me. I must master it.
I had a really interesting game the other day with a human player. I actually wound up in a triple ko situation, which is supposed to be pretty rare. And there was a huge group of stones and chunk of territory at stake.
The really embarrassing part is, I won that exchange, and still lost the game. Badly.
Equally embarrassingly, I was so irked at losing that I didn't save the game, which means I can't review it now. So I am still not sure if sacrificing a corner in order to win the ko fight was my undoing, or if I had already lost the game at that point.
Anyway, here's tonight's ranked game with MFOG. I have been hovering steadily at 13-14 kyu (my online rank is beginning to reach that point). So I still usually beat MFOG when it's playing at 15-kyu level, and I'm still all over the place when playing against it at the 12-kyu level. My losses are still usually thrashings, while my victories are pretty narrow.
Tonight, it played at the 12-kyu level, and I won by 9.5 points. I was black.
Not a really interesting game, but I wasn't entirely sure I'd won until the computer tallied the score. I should have been more confident, since I actually took three corners, and had done a pretty good job of squeezing white in the middle, but at the time, it felt like white was invading and threatening me on every front. And that group on the left, I actually let white play against the four-stone 'L' because I was pretty sure I'd read correctly that I'd still be able to kill, but I was terribly afraid I'd find out I'd guessed wrong and would be kicking myself as white took a bite out of my territory (which would certainly have tilted the game against me).
Those huge territories of white's in the upper left corner and the right side? I'm pretty sure if I were a dan-level player, I'd be able to invade and take some of that, but every time I try, I just end up throwing a bunch of stones away.