At present, my go strength is 5-kyu. Recently I’ve been having strange experiences. Games that I’m convinced I’ve won while I’m playing turn out to be losses and games that I feel are hopeless and so resign turn out to have been wins for me. At what strength are players able to carry out positional assessments? Consultation One : From Mr. Yoshida ‘I’ve captured a group.’ = I’ve won. ‘I’ve lost a group. My territory has been destroyed.’ = I’ve lost. It’s easy to think like this, but it’s surprising how often losing stones doesn’t particularly matter. The go board is so broad that success or failure in one area can be reversed in another area. There are turn-arounds of 10 or 20 points in the endgame, as well. That’s why go is so interesting. As for your question about what level positional assessment becomes possible at, I think that at 5-kyu you would have a general feeling about the positional balance just by surveying the whole board, without necessarily counting. If you don’t know which side is ahead, the odds are that it’s an even contest. Up until about 1-dan, you can use positional judgement just as a rough guide, that is, ‘I’m a little ahead’ or ‘I’m a little behind.’ Rather than trying to carry out a detailed assessment, I think you’ll get better results by focussing on finding the best move for the next move. If you think you’re ahead, it’s easy to start playing slackly. I hope that you keep doing your best while taking care about the above points.