The Idea of Go
The idea of Go is almost like a war. All throughout the game, you want territory. This means capturing stones and gaining control over your enemy. This page will go through the basics on game.
How To Play
You play Go by putting "stones", or the black and white pieces used to play the game, on the intersections of lines on the board. Once you put a stone down, you cannot move it unless it is captured (which will be explained later) and even then, it is only moved to be removed from the board. One player uses white stones and the other uses black. Remember that once you put a stone down, it cannot be moved.
At the start of the game, black goes first. Weaker players can get a handicap, where they are allowed to put however many stones they would like down, but only on Star Points. On the picture below, a black stone is placed on each star point on the board (though usually these points are marked, anyway)
Atari and Capturing
Atari is a word that reffers to when you are one move away from capturing a stone/stones in Go. You will have to capture stones often to control territory. Since the point of the game is to have the most territory, hence the most pieces on the board and control of situations, you need to capture stones every now and then throughout the game. Below is an average Atari situation.
In this situation, the Black player only needs to put a stone below the white one to capture it, like this:
Once the stone is captured, as it is in the picture above, it is to be removed from the board immediately, so as not to cause confusion, as in the picture below.
Remember that you can gain Atari as long as stones do not have lines leaving to open intersections. Below is a situation that is more of Atari than it is capturing. The white pieces cannot be removed in this situation because there is an insersection among them.
However, adding a stone, like in the picture below, to fill that intersection, will make the stones captured, and they are to be immediately removed from the board.
End
After all of these general rules are understood, you will be able to play a game.
