Go as primary resolution mechanic?

[Thomas Tamblyn]

My big concern with a Go mechanic (and even a blackjack based mechanic for that matter) is the time involved.  The depth of strategy involved means that players and Gms will spend a lot of time thinking.

More importantly, with a system that has this much handling time (I think thats the right term) while one player is resolving a conlfict with the GM, the other players are doing nothing and can do nothing until the go game is finished.

UNLESS you make the go game the scene's resolution, and have players declaring actions, where each action results in them getting X stones to place on the board (gm gets set number per turn based on opposition).  The problem here though is that you can't have more than 2 sides in any scene and people can't switch sides mid-scene.

[Shreyas Sampat]

I just thought I'd poke my head in and say that I have a game that uses a Go board as a mechanic, but not as a resolution mechanic.  It's used instead as a communal scene-framing mechanic and carrot mechanic: something like a reward mechanic, but player-driven.  It's for my GMless wuxia game.

I think the concerns about handling time are very relevant here: a Go game is a lengthy thing, even played by the very skilled.  I think I can see a solution for one of Thomas' caveats, that of switching sides mid-conflict, but the results would be strictly binary at the end, regardless.  A player could very simply choose the colour of each stone he sets down, and each colour represents and outcome rather than an entity.