Editing Go (game) (section)

=== Scoring rules ===
[[File:Gofin.png|thumb|A simplified game at its end. Black's territory (A) + (C) and prisoners (D) is counted and compared to White's territory (B) only (no prisoners). In this example, both Black and White attempted to invade and live (C and D groups) to reduce the other's total territory. Only Black's invading group (C) was successful in living, as White's group (D) was killed with a black stone at (E). The points in the middle (F) are ''dame'', meaning they belong to neither player.]]

Two general types of scoring procedures are used, and players determine which to use before play. Both procedures almost always give the same winner.

* '''Area scoring procedure (including Chinese):''' counts the number of points a player's stones occupy and surround. It is associated with contemporary Chinese play and was probably established there during the [[Ming dynasty]] in the 15th or 16th century.<ref>{{cite web|work=New in Go|title=The rules debate as seen from Ancient China|last=Fairbairn|first=John|date=June 2006|publisher=Games of Go on Disc (GoGoD)|url=http://www.gogod.co.uk/NewInGo/C&IP.htm|access-date=2007-11-27|url-status=dead|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20130112213532/http://www.gogod.co.uk/NewInGo/C%26IP.htm|archive-date=2013-01-12}}</ref> Beginner-friendly, but takes longer to count. A player's score is the number of stones that the player has on the board, plus the number of empty intersections surrounded by that player's stones. If there is disagreement about which stones are dead, then under area scoring rules, the players simply resume play to resolve the matter. The score is computed using the position after the next time the players pass consecutively.
* '''Territory scoring procedure (including Japanese and Korean):''' counts the number of empty points a player's stones surround, together with the number of stones the player captured. In the course of the game, each player retains the stones they capture, termed ''prisoners''. Any dead stones removed at the end of the game become prisoners. The score is the number of empty points enclosed by a player's stones, plus the number of prisoners captured by that player.{{efn|1=Exceptionally, in Japanese and Korean rules, empty points, even those surrounded by stones of a single color, may count as neutral territory if some of them are alive by seki. See the section below on [[#Seki (mutual life)|seki]].}} Under territory scoring there can be an extra penalty for playing inside ones' territory, so if there is a disagreement extra play to resolve it would, in tournament settings, happen on a separate board, where the player claiming a group is dead would play first, and would demonstrate how to capture those stones. For further information, see [[Rules of Go]].

Both procedures are counted after both players have passed consecutively, the stones that are still on the board but unable to avoid capture, called ''dead'' stones, are removed. Given that the number of stones a player has on the board is directly related to the number of prisoners their opponent has taken, the resulting net score, that is, the difference between Black's and White's scores is identical under both rulesets (unless the players have passed different numbers of times during the course of the game). Thus, the net result given by the two scoring systems rarely differs by more than a point.<ref>{{Citation | url = https://www.cs.cmu.edu/~wjh/go/rules/AGA.commentary.html | title = Demonstration of the Relationship of Area and Territory Scoring | first = Fred | last = Hansen | publisher = American Go Association | access-date = 2008-06-16}}</ref>