> From: Heikki Levanto <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>

> On Wed, Dec 10, 2008 at 12:39:55PM -0800, terry mcintyre wrote:
> > I once heard a simple rule which seems to cover just about everything
> > interesting: "consider only moves which are on the 3rd and 4th lines,
> > and/or within a manhattan distance of n, for some small n, of some other
> > stone already on the board." If memory serves, David Fotland mentioned this
> > at the Portland Congress. Some players favor opening moves on the fifth
> > line, however.
> 
> And the occasional funny guy playing the center point...

That may be the most interesting opening! On a 9x9 board, it may be a winning 
strategy by Black, and it is playable on 19x19 as well; see 
http://senseis.xmp.net/?TengenFuseki

Quote follows:


Tengen has been researched by professional players in the past, and
the results weren't negative. Aside of occasional historical
experimentation, Kubomatsu Katsukiyo was the first to thoroughly research 
tengen opening, playing it in all of his spring 1934 Oteai games (when he held 
black). Tengen was also an important part of the shin fuseki movement that 
started at about that time as well. Go Seigen vs Kitani Minoru mirror go game 
is particularly famous. 


The reason why tengen opening is not played very often in practice
is best summed up in the following quote Kubomatsu Katsukiyo's article 
Researches on Tengen:
"I cannot say definitely that tengen is bad. However, the reason tengen
is hardly ever seen today in pro games is not that tengen is
disadvantageous, but that, as that venerable old man Taisaku? said, its 
variations are limitless. And since one cannot analyse it as
thoroughly as the four corners, everyone plays safe and does not even
contemplate playing tengen." (from John Fairbairn's MindZine article describing 
tengen research by Kubomatsu Katsukiyo:  
http://www.msoworld.com/mindzine/news/orient/go/history/kubomatsu.html). 


      
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