Direction of Play
The direction of play is a higher level concept in the opening, relating to the efficiency of stones played on the board. This involves the important trade-off between overconcentration (korigatachi) and vagueness - between playing a move that accomplishes too little and a move that tries to accomplish too much. Additionally, the stones already played are taken into consideration. The players aim not only at making efficient new moves, but also at playing moves that heighten the value of their previous moves, and at achieving maximum harmony in a global sense. One must strive to make each stone played important and valuable, that is, utilize its aji to the fullest extent possible. Thus, choosing the correct direction of play requires not only a deep understanding of the value of thickness, but also demands a good sense of positional judgment from the players.
Read more about this topic: Go Strategy And Tactics
Famous quotes containing the words direction of, direction and/or play:
“Not I, not I, but the wind that blows through me!
A fine wind is blowing the new direction of Time.”
—D.H. (David Herbert)
“Exaggeration is in the course of things. Nature sends no creature, no man into the world, without adding a small excess of his proper quality. Given the planet, it is still necessary to add the impulse; so, to every creature nature added a little violence of direction in its proper path, a shove to put it on its way; in every instance, a slight generosity, a drop too much.”
—Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803–1882)
“They can play a bugle call like you never heard before,
So natural that you want to go to war.”
—Irving Berlin (1888–1989)