>> No, humans are much weaker on 9x9 than on 19x19.
> With all due respect, that's absurd. If that were true, then all
> we would have to do is move to smaller boards if 19x19 were not
> challenging enough.
You've almost gotten it right. In fact, 9x9 go is used to teach people
the rules of the game, and to help get them acquainted with fighting,
since it's basically a big fight from start to finish with too small of a
board to think about much else. 13x13 is used to get those same
students accustomed to thinking about the rest of the board, and
19x19 is the real game. 9x9 and 13x13 are cute, and it's quite
impressive that UCT-based programs are getting very good at playing
at the smaller size, but it's unrelated, in an important way, to the larger
size board. they're different games entirely.
I think that I've played 15 games on a 9x9 board, and several
hundred on a 19x19 board. I have no idea what it would mean to
be "the world's best 9x9 player", because nobody keeps track of
these things and I can't easily go get a book about 9x9 theory.
It's an unimportant game from the point of view of the typical 19x19
player, but it is a separate and distinct game -- if you study and play
19x19 go for most of your life, you will no longer be spending much time
playing the 9x9 version, and probably won't be all that interested in
'mastering' it. similarly, if you play 9x9 go for too long, it will take you
far
too long to understand why everything is so much harder on a 19x19 board.
So yes, humans become weaker at a game that they don't study,
write books about, spend thousands of years trying to master, etc.
It doesn't mean that 9x9 is harder *as a game*, it just means that
it holds no real interest *as a serious game*.
To belabor this even further, if you were to take everyone playing 19x19
go right now and convince them that no such thing ever existed and that
only 9x9 go exists, in a short amount of time they would all be very much
stronger 9x9 players (relative to the game itself), because 9x9 is a less deep
game. something like "the best" opening move might be found, for instance,
whereas nobody knows this same fact on a 19x19 board.
s.
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