[ewanmcteagle]

I don't think it's that strange. Ultimately you have to play in order to read ahead in the game. People who think they can sit down and learn to read ahead will struggle. But if you start actually playing, a lot of the basic reading ahead will become second nature and then it's on to harder/deeper reading. The same is true of chess. Someone given the rules and a set can't hope to get it in any meaningful way though it is theoretically possible. For Go, if you can find people better than you to play against and keep it up for a year you'll look back and realize that even your initial worries were just a misunderstanding. DGS is not a good place to start. You need to play in volume. Bulk practice.

[btilly]

Go is worse in this respect than chess.

In chess, in principle, you can sit down and think through every possible combination in a simple position and figure out tactical traps. After doing this a few times you learn what sort of things to look for.

In go, even for simple problems, there are too many possibilities to think through all possibilities. Until you can start to recognize key points, nobody can even explain to you how to think about problems.

[dwc]

I'll take your advice regarding volume/bulk. It seems sound to me. I took up chess a bit more than a year ago, and tactics practice and non-stop playing have done more for my game than any reading.

[ewanmcteagle]

sorry, by 'read' I meant calculate. Calculation is the chess term, reading is the Go equivalent.