Do You Play Better On A Real Board??

Have you ever felt that your real-life games of Go are better than your online ones? Are you plagued with messy, hasty online blitz games, and want to make better moves when playing online opponents? In my first episode of "Off The Grid", I try to answer that question, and give you real tips you can take with you in your own games!

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[PengyGoy]

"Playing with people you know" --- soooo true! I didn't think of it until you said it but absolutely. Having a rival is so helpful for getting stronger. Also I find losing against my friend-rivals is also much less painful (usually) and I have more fun overall.

[Cemo]

The lighting/colours of this are real warm and nice. The vid has just a relaxing vibe overall, nice work!

[hushvirginia]

I think a solid strategy for good online go playing is to limit distractions. Playing in person often means you are much more focused on the board and only the board. Playing online, you might also have other tabs open, you might be getting notifications on your phone, if you have family or kids at home they may be interrupting. All of those distractions makes a HUGE difference in quality of play.

[InSente]

EDIT: The subtitles for Tip 3 and 4 are both the same - but Tip 4 should read "Assign set # of moves to read beforehand". Apologies for the typo! Don't forget to check out my twitter, twitch, and patreon channels (links in description) to have your voice heard and learn some Go! How have YOU dealt with playing online games too quickly? Let me know in the comments!

[pandasrtasty]

I play on real board bc I'm in love with my yunzi stones. I find it rewarding to play with "hand talk" like when I subtly slide a stone in place that foils my opponent or pop the stone with a click as a defiant roar my a.d.d. loves the extra context and kinesthetic reward.

[kaida]

This is really helpful! I'm a long time HnG fan, but never really felt like I knew enough of go to play anyone until watching your Beginner series (& doing TsumegoPro puzzles like you suggested). I've still never played anyone (mostly AI) so this was helpful to know how to improve/ transition to one day playing someone on a real board!

[Churro_Douglas]

I’ve experimented with listening to different music while playing online. Rage against the Machine was what I listened to during my most embarrassing losses.

[icuddledyourimouto]

Cool video, I look forward to more of this new series.
Re. Online & In-person playing: I find that for abstract games like Go & Chess it works fine for me. In the beginning espescially. It takes little more than a minute to wait for another player so you can quickly get tons of games under your belt and build up familiarity. Most sites like OGS offer post-game analysis tools too so you can always go back and study games that happened even months ago.

In contrast: What I cannot work well with are board games. I tried playing Dune recently and it just isn't the same if you don't have those funky little game-pieces on your hand.

[BerthaMcFee]

Most of my online matches have been against players who were ranked higher than me.

I absolutely DO NOT look down my nose at online play. For the same reason, I don't take it as personally when I lose; I am generally surprised that I wasn't walloped harder. I think the time limits have a much bigger effect on how deeply I read.

[Oscaro]

Loved the video, I have fallen into the same trap of playing quickly against Smargo or an online game with a person.

BTW A couple of questions on your equipment.

What kind of wood is your board and how thick is it? And also how thick are your stones??

Thanks

[JamesThompson-zubq]

woah off the like the go grid... i just got that after watching the whole video

[TheSamuelCish]

I always download the SGF file from OGS and run it through KaTrain to analyze what my opponent and I could have done better. I'm a 12k and I was shocked to see how many of my games were just me and my opponent making mistakes that happened to work out for me. It helps to see what really works and you should definitely do again vs what happened to work and shouldn't be tried again.

[vidarvapor]

The subtitle for Tip 3 and Tip 4 are both "Copy moves on a real board."

[GOZES]

Maybe a question for another video but I'm wandering how to improve/practice reading. Also love all your videos. I still remember when you had less then 1k subs :)

[arghyachatterjee]

I started watching your videos from 4 yeas back starting with the "Beginner Go Series" to mark my first steps towards learning Go. I have a suggestion, or rather a request: Can you please mention the software / Go server that you use when you are making your videos? That will be helpful for noobs like me.

Wanted to post on a older video but many uploaders do not respond to old posts, so commented on the latest video uploaded in this channel.

[isimsizkopek]

im playing for over 1 year and i've never played on a real board. i don't have any friends who play go, and it kinda makes me frustrated tbh. it's not just about the moves you read, you read the body language, and the conversation. it just feels shallow the online games, nevertheless go is the greatest single game i've had the privilige to play.

[illowrenollow]

We in the Chess-Realm have digital Chessboards (like those from DGT most used in int. tournaments), it should be easy to use same technik, but honestly i hate this digital world, nothing better than moving the wooden knight on a wooden chessboard and say checkmate!

[Visurex]

i never played on a board :s bought one but no one to play against :'(

[jacksonfinnigan]

I thought using an iPad or something similar laid out flat on a table and using a stylus would work since it would be similar to a board setup. Just being able to play the game in a similar position, with a stylus for an easy way to play your moves I think would help. Might not work on something small like a phone though; because its so dissimilar to a board in size.

[alanhernandez]

Where i can buy a Goban like yours? great channel!