Help For Go

Introduction

Welcome to the network Go server. The rules of Go are below. The Go "challenge" command is described here. Other commands are the same for all pbmserv games.

At the time of this writing, go does not detect the end of the game or determine the winner. Players should count their own scores and the loser should resign to end the game.

go challenge [ -small | -medium | -large ] userid1 userid2

Start a game between userid1 and userid2.

The -small option will create a 9x9 board.
The -medium option will create a 13x13 board.
The -large option is the default. It creates a 19x19 board.

Rules of Go

Object of the Game

On a 19x19 (or 13x13 or 9x9) board, the two players of go try to surround as much territory as possible with groups of stones of their color.

Movement Rules

On your turn, you place a piece of your colour in any unoccupied position on the board.

          A B C D E F G H J K L M N O P Q R S T

      19  . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .  19
      18  . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .  18
      17  . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .  17
      16  . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .  16
      15  . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .  15
      14  . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .  14
      13  . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .  13
      12  . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .  12
      11  . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .  11
      10  . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .  10
       9  . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .   9
       8  . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .   8
       7  . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .   7
       6  . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .   6
       5  . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .   5
       4  . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .   4
       3  . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .   3
       2  . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .   2
       1  . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .   1

          A B C D E F G H J K L M N O P Q R S T

                Figure 1 -- Empty Go Board

However, the server doesn't ever know if a game is over, nor who won.

That is left as an exercise to the players. The losing player should resign.

 

Note from Richard   This is due to the difficulty of determining the live/dead status of groups of stones. In fact, recently, I was looking at a game and completely missed a seki. Someday, I hope to add an end-game phase where, after both players have passed, they begin a "nominate... accept/reject" phase where one player nominates a group of stones that he feels are dead. and the other player accepts or rejects that nomination. Lather... Rinse... Repeat... again... once both players have passed (meaning there are no more dead groups, only live groups and groups in seki), then (and only then) could the server determine the score. This is essentially how the IGS servers work (IIRC).