If you're using `res`, then you aren't going to scope it to the `if` statement. That is maybe another problem, sometimes you have to do this:

    res, err := actuallyImportantBits(...)
    if err != nil { 
        return nil, fmt.Errorf("actually important bits: %w", err)
    }

And other times you have to do this:

   if err := actuallyImportantBits(...); err != nil {
       return nil, fmt.Errorf("actually important bits: %w", err)
   }

The problem here is that you really don't want "err" to leak to the outer scope, so the second case is preferable from an absolute reliability and least-surprise perspective... but you can only do that in certain arbitrary cases. I think it's a bit of a wart.

You can certainly handle "res" in an else block, or even write "err == nil" and handle it there, but that is surprsing. I would say it's simply not done, ever, but the Go codebase itself does it (src/go/parser/interface.go.ParseDir was the first example I found; but my search returned many screenfuls of candidates so there are probably more cases lurking in there).

The fact that you have a choice is not ideal, basically.

But, having actually important bits in if err := ...; err != nil {} blocks is not detrimental to readability. You will know how to read that after 5 minutes of reading any Go program.