Scrabble Adventures

We held another "Scrabble® Saturday" – this time we played at my place because Sam Hollington wasn’t able to host.  The players were:  Craig Rowland, Mark Hamilton, Sam Hollington, Yvonne Lobo, Ben Lam, Priya Fernando, Steve Ozorio, and me (links to cross-tables.com profiles).  Summary results below.

ROUND ROBIN
Game #1 vs. Craig Rowland
FINAL SCORE:  517 – 269 (LOSS – ouch!)
BINGOS:  ME – TAVERNs; Craig – ETOILEs, AUGITES

Game #2 vs. Yvonne Lobo
FINAL SCORE:  371 – 368 (LOSS)
BINGOS:  ME – TOAsTER; Yvonne – GRAVIED*, MoBSTER

Game # 3 vs. Priya Fernando
FINAL SCORE:  404 – 291 (WIN)
BINGOS:  ME – UN(P)ITTED, M(I)NISHeD; Priya – FOXT(A)ILS

Game #4 vs. Mark Hamilton
FINAL SCORE:  407 – 385 (LOSS)
BINGOS:  ME – BRISTlE (that’s BRISTLE), (B)ERAtING; Mark – SNORTED

Game #5 vs. Ben Lam
FINAL SCORE:  409 – 394 (LOSS)
BINGOS:  ME – MORTALS, REtAILE(R), (L)ETTERED; Ben – nUTRIAS

Game #6 vs. Sam Hollington
FINAL SCORE:  398 – 378 (LOSS)
BINGOS:  ME – SNEAKeR, EsTRONE(S); Sam – none

Game #7 vs. Steve Ozorio
FINAL SCORE:  504 – 381 (WIN)
BINGOS:  ME – IDEA(T)ING, LOUN(G)ERS, (C)RAfTIER; Steve – uN(I)TIZER

MINI-TOURNAMENT
Game #1 vs. Yvonne Lobo
FINAL SCORE:  458 – 421 (LOSS)
BINGOS:  ME – PaRRIES, TrEASON; Yvonne – MANDRIL, EXPIATE

Game #2 vs. Sam Hollington
FINAL SCORE:  387 – 376 (WIN)
BINGOS:  ME – REFILES; Sam – T(I)nPLATE, (R)INSaBLE

Game #3 vs. Ben Lam
FINAL SCORE:  451 – 428 (LOSS)
BINGOS:  ME – ENTREES, TOILETS; Ben – LEAsiNG, DEVIATE

1st place:  Yvonne
2nd place:  Sam
3rd/4th place:  Hans/Ben

Overall, I had fun and learned quite a bit.  Here are some general observations from yesterday’s 10 games:

• CLOCK MANAGEMENT:  Noticed that I’m using up most, if not all, of my clock.  During a few games, I was running out of time.  I think this is because I’m looking for more plays and thinking through my options more.  Nevertheless, I think I may need to be a bit more decisive to save some time.
• HESITATION:  For some reason, I noticed myself being more hesitant and tentative in many games – maybe it’s because I’m realizing that my margin of error is so small, I’m playing a bit "scared".  Before when I knew I had no chance, I was playing loose because I had no expectation to win.
• PHONY DETECTOR:  I seem to be having some issue identifying phony plays.  Perfect example was that I mis-took ENEW* for ENOW.  Yvonne played it against me late in the game for 30+ points and took the lead.  She held on for a win by a small margin – the final margin was 30+ points, but was a result of me attempting a "hail Mary" desperation play that was challenged off.  Part of my problem is that as I learn more and more words, I begin to realize just how many words that I don’t know.  I’m very surprised at how many words that look absolutely ridiculous are actually acceptable.
• IMPROVED BOARD VISION:  I felt that I was able to see potential plays develop.  An example was in the second game against Sam Hollington.  At times, I started to see spots where Sam was likely to go (and he did play there quite frequently too).  Note that just because I see plays develop doesn’t mean I can do anything about them.
• BINGO-ing:  I’m going to write more about this topic in a future post, but I don’t feel as much pressure to bingo as I used to.  In 10 games, I had 18 bingos versus 14 for my opponents.  I’m feeling like I can stay in a game even if I don’t bingo as much as my opponent – that’s a good thing.
• PLAY TO YOUR STRENGTH: I need to play to my strengths instead of worrying about making big plays, making bingos, or tile distribution.  Compared with others, I don’t think my strength is bingoing or knowing obscure short words, but having a well-rounded game.  Actually, I think my strength is my ability to evaluate and improve – I can look at my game, evaluate it honestly, and make changes accordingly.  Compared to even a year ago, I can see changes and improvements in how I play.  I wonder what others think.

Some personal observations about my opponents:

• PRIYA – Solid player.  I’ve only played her twice so I don’t have much to report in terms of a "scouting report".  I was a bit suprised that her rating wasn’t higher.  Could be that she doesn’t know as many exotic words as other experts.
• CRAIG – Plays a very fundamentally sound game.  He thinks plays through and has excellent board vision.  In my game against him, I made one bad move and the game just unravelled.  I wasn’t sure if SCOW was good and so I didn’t play my bingo (SATIRES) and it went downhill from there.
• STEVE – Steve seems to know many words, but I think he makes too many risky plays.  From what I’ve seen, I think he will try phony plays if you are rated below him.
• MARK – Not sure what to make of Mark.  He plays well, but I think he doesn’t know very many words except those he’s seen played against him.  Granted, he doesn’t seem shy about challenging words that he’s never seen.  Might be an opportunity to goad him into a challenge if you play a less common anagram.
• BEN – Not sure why Ben thinks otherwise, but I really was impressed with Ben.  I think he’s an outstanding player.  I sat next to him a few times and was amazed at his ability to find plays even when his tiles were just ugly.  He was able to stay in the game when I would have just been absolutely frustrated.  He’s currently about 1350, but I think might be higher than that.  Definitely better than me.
• SAM – I’m really impressed with Sam’s play.  He just plays the tiles he gets and keeps scoring to put pressure on his opponent(s).  If we played 20 games straight up, I’d only expect to win one or two.  I don’t understand how Sam can play at such a high level without tracking tiles.  I wonder if tracking would help him win more games.
• YVONNE – Yvonne definitely knows how to bingo.  But, from a strategy stand-point, I think I’d have to agree with some observations made by others, in that she makes very risky and questionable plays at time.  She does seem to fish quite a bit, but it seems to work for her, so who am I to argue with her strategy.  Given a better word knowledge, I can see many of her plays get challenged off.  I think she’s been able to get words by me because I don’t know as many words.  On another note, I got irked at her because she has very poor game etiquette.  She’s experienced enough to know better – I can see why other people get annoyed by her.

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Had an interesting night at the club.  Even though I went winless (again), I didn’t feel too discouraged about the losses (I hope I’m not getting used to losing).  Since I learned a few things, the losses weren’t too disheartening.

Game #1 vs. Shaun Goatcher
I was able to keep up with Shaun, and even take a small lead, until Shaun played a bingo on turn #11.  Shaun played ASPECTS leaving an A at square B1.  My tiles were ADEIUX? and I tried to find some plays, but missed the obvious E(A)UX (57 points).  Looking over these racks, I missed some bingos at the end that could have won me the game.  Since I didn’t see them, I had to try and keep my bingo lanes open.  Unfortunately, that strategy allowed Shaun to finish with another bingo (TRAINER) and thus the big spread.  The game was actually much closer than the score indicated.
FINAL SCORE:  494 – 337 (LOSS)
BINGOS:  ME – FROSTED; Shaun – EpINAOS, ASPECTS, TRAINER

Game #2 vs. Yvonne Lobo
Not sure how to characterize this game.  I mostly had single point tiles all game – only 8 tiles >1 point.  At first that sounds good, but that doesn’t leave one much opportunity to score.  I was able to take a 100 point lead by challenging off a phoney (CLOTTIER*) and then playing a bingo.  But then Yvonne played two bingos in a row to tie me.  After that, she got 41 for QI, 35 for JOGS, 43 for HEX, 29 for FEN, and 33 for VET.  I just couldn’t keep up.  Not having either of the blanks didn’t help either.

I tried to keep the board relatively closed, but I just didn’t have the tiles to shut the board down.  Early in the game, the board was fairly closed and Yvonne seemed to be a bit frustrated.  She even challenged HOOEY.  I think this strategy is the way to go in the future.  With Yvonne, it seems like it’s "bingo or broke".
FINAL SCORE:  433 – 361 (LOSS)
BINGOS:  ME – MANNERE(D); Yvonne – IRRITA(T)E, DUnGIER

Game #3 vs. Priya Fernando
This game was similar (but not as bad) to the last game in terms of tiles except that I had a blank this time.  Priya opened with a bingo (UPRIVEr) and I was a bit worried at first.  I had AAINORT and was able to find A(E)RATION.  Two turns later, I had AEELIR? but couldn’t find a double-double through a D.  I played REALIsE(D).  Two turns later, I have AEHINSS.  After shuffling, I realized that if I get a B, I can play a bingo (I missed the other with V).  There are 15 other words with that blank, but I don’t know most of them.  Fortunately for me, Priya plays (s)WOBS, giving me the B that I need.  The rest of the game was a challenge for both of us as we exchanged 20-30 point plays.  Priya was able to pull ahead with JEEP (48) and XI (44).  Even still, I was able to stay within 10 points of her.

I started running out of time, but I realized that both the Q and Z were still in the bag, with fewer spots to play them.  I picked up the last S and then started playing single tiles while scoring ~10 points each time.  My strategy was to stick Priya with the Q and Z – which I did.  Unfortunately, she was able to play the Z for 35 points.  I mis-tracked the tiles and was worried that she could play off the Q, but wasn’t able to think everything through because my clock was running down.  As such, one of my plays allowed her to play CORA(L) for 29 points.  That essentially sealed the game.  Apparently, AERATION takes an S and I missed that play for 39 points (AERATIONS/EELS).  As I mentioned earlier, because of the low time situation, I didn’t even think to try that play once I was sure that Priya was stuck with the Q.  Just goes to show that clock management is important.
FINAL SCORE:  421 – 414 (LOSS)
BINGOS:  ME – A(E)RATION, REALIsE(D), (B)ANISHED; Priya – UPRIVEr

Man, I seem to be in a bit of a slump.  I think I’ve only won one game out of my last 20.  Granted, I seem to be playing higher rated players, but still – losing sucks.  Tonight’s games were lost on one or two poor plays by me.  Given my inferior word knowledge when playing expert-level players, my margin for error is very, very small.  The only positive for the night is that I was able to keep up with relatively even tiles.  Other than the game against Yvonne, I can’t complain about the tiles.  These were all on me.

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Not much to say about yesterday’s games at the club – I got spanked and it wasn’t very fun.  Sometimes there’s just not much you can do.

Game #1 vs. Geoffrey Newman
I got clobbered in this game as Geoffrey drew some amazing tiles.  Given that he’s better than me, this game was over pretty quickly.  I think other than the Q, I didn’t see a power tile.  I ended up challenging a word, SANSEIS, as I had never seen it before and thought it wasn’t good.  I was behind by so much by the 6th turn that I almost had to challenge the play.  I should know better because Geoffrey doesn’t need to phony against me to win.  Can’t expect to win when you’re scoring in the teens vs. 30+ for your opponent.  This game went downhill very quickly.  Nevertheless, Geoffrey played a very good game with the tiles he had and should get credit for some good finds.
FINAL SCORE:  474 – 246 (LOSS)
BINGOS:  ME – none; Geoffrey – SANSEiS, ELUANTs, TENTERS

Game #2 vs. Fraser Simpson
We started off with two consecutive exchanges each, but Fraser pulled ahead with QUOtE (46) and then MIS(QUOTE) for another 54.  Not much I could do there as was getting stuck with As and Is.  By the time I started getting some better tiles, I was behind by quite a bit and couldn’t catch-up.  Losing track of the remaining tiles didn’t help, but I had burned up so much time earlier in the game trying to extract as many points out of some tough tiles that I couldn’t spend as much time on the end game as I had hoped.  In this game, I can’t really complain about the tile distribution as we got about equally good tiles.  It’s just that I got my "good" tiles toward the middle/end when I couldn’t really score with them.  Still haven’t seen a blank.
FINAL SCORE:  349 – 345 (LOSS)
BINGOS:  none in this game

Game 3 vs. Kaveria Raviraj
What a frustrating final game of the night.  I had exactly one bingo rack available to me.  Of course I didn’t even get a chance to play it (PICANTE).  I looked over my tiles, and here are the only non one point tiles I picked-up:  DDGKPCQWFFM.  This game got out of hand very quickly and because I was behind by so much, I had to play very "risky" to give myself some chance at trying to make a comeback.  But then, Kaveri makes plays like:  RITZ (38), RITZY/YEW (44), HOST (30), and COX (35) and the game is pretty much over.  The frustrating thing is that toward the end, she played STIRIng* (there are 40+ 7 letter bingos with that set of tiles).  I was a bit shocked that she tried that – I was thinking "are you kidding me?!!".  Honestly though, I gave a moment’s thought to just accepting the play to end the misery before challenging it.
FINAL SCORE:  418 – 308 (LOSS)
BINGOS:  Me – none; Kaveri – DENTALS

Wow.  What a crappy night.  In two of the games, I really didn’t have much of a chance.  If you don’t get tiles, it’s tough to win.  I didn’t see a blank all night.  In the game against Fraser, I had a chance, but trying to mount a comeback after getting behind early on is very difficult, especially if your opponent starts shutting down the board to prevent you from scoring.  The only positive that I can take from this night is that I gave myself a chance to win a game even though I didn’t bingo and was behind.  Actually, going over these specific games irks me.  I had so many racks of tripled (or more) letters:  HLOTTTW, ADDNNNO, DEGIIII, EEEEGRW, AJLNNNR, AIITTTV, EEEEGNT, and DEENNNT are some examples.  Hopefully this is just "one of those days".  I had hopes of winning some games and moving up to 1500 so I can join Group A, but at this rate, I’m falling back to the pack of Group B.

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Had a … challenging evening at the club last night – partly of my own making.

Game #1 vs. Sophia
I’ve had some difficulty playing against Sophia before.  She tends to make these great little filds of 3-5 letter plays that score in the 25-40 point range.  To me, it’s quite infuriating, but it’s a good strategy.  Early on, Sophia made a couple of plays that seemed to shut down the entire left side of the board.  The game turned into a "death by a thousand cuts" type game as we both struggled to find openings to make plays.  I was able to outscore her on a few turns and build up a decent 40 point lead.  Given the state of the board, I didn’t make any attempts to open up the board.  She didn’t try to open things up, so I just traded points for the win.
FINAL SCORE:  348 – 279 (WIN)
BINGOS:  ME – STRINGs; Sophia – none

Game #2 vs. Kaveri
This game turned on one play.  I had a small 15 point lead and the board was fairly closed with one bingo lane available in the top right quadrant of the board.  I was getting mostly consonants and I decided to play off the K.  As I was putting down the tiles (KAT), my "spidey sense" was tingling, warning me about the danger of my play.  After hesitating for a moment, I decided to make the play anyway.  Bam!  Kaveri plays her bingo InVITED.  My play provided the only spot for her bingo.  With so few tiles left in the bag, I didn’t have enough material to mount a comeback.

FYI – Kaveri likes to shut the board down because she says it’s "more strategic".  If you get a lead against her, she doesn’t seem to know how to come back because of her playing style.  On a more positive note, even though I was struggling a bit with my tiles all throughout the game, I managed to play off 4-5 tiles at a time instead of trading.  For example, I played 1) OILIE(R) and kept ES, 2) (B)RRR and kept ELNS, and 3) played COO(E)D and kept OHS.  In the past, I probably would have either traded or burned some of my bingo-prone tiles off.  The bad thing is that I didn’t listen to my "spidey sense" and it cost me the game.
FINAL SCORE:  358 – 305 (LOSS)
BINGOS:  ME – none; Kaveri – InVITED

Game #3 vs. Fraser
I’d like to say that I was the victim of some poor tiles, but that wouldn’t be fair.  Sure, Fraser did get a better share of the tiles, but he made some very smart plays.  I only managed to pick up the Q, S and one blank.  I challenged TWAINS and things sort of went downhill from there.  After that, Fraser pulled ahead and then kept scoring and shutting down bingo lanes.  I was doing my best to open things up, but couldn’t come-up with any high scoring plays.  I was so far behind that I had to resort to making very risky plays and try to open up lanes everywhere.  In the end, I just didn’t get the right tiles (in this game) to overcome that one challenge.  I’m pretty sure that the general strategy was correct – I’m not sure that I made the best plays possible.
FINAL SCORE:  410 – 228 (LOSS)
BINGOS:  ME – none; Fraser – ALIASEs

Unlike last week when I couldn’t seem to do anything wrong, this week as more of a challenge.  Sure the losing sucks, but I learned a few things, so it’s not all bad.

On a side note, I’ve decided to participate in this year’s US National Scrabble® Championship in Orlando, FL and will be playing in division 4 (1100-1299).  I’ve also decided to go on a tournament moratorium to prepare for the National Championship.  Hopefully the extra studying will pay off with a strong performance.  I’m going to get some additional practice in this weekend at Yvonne Lobo’s home – she’s hosting a few of us for some friendly games, but we’re all using it as practice for tournaments.  I’ll be playing against Shaun Goatcher (he’s practicing for the upcoming Canadian Nationals), Yvonne Lobo, and Sam Hollington.  I’ll probably get whupped, but that’s okay as I’ll get accustomed to playing against 1500+ players.

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Now that my two recent tournaments are over, it’s back to club games.  Even though I didn’t do as well at the Saratoga Springs and Waterford tournaments as I had hoped, I feel pretty good about my game.  With some additional study, I think I can be a dangerous player.  Okay, onto the games…

Game #1 vs. Paul Wigley
This was an interesting game as I had a very interesting situation during the mid-game.  I plan on simulating this situation and posting it here in a day or two for everyone to view (and comment), as I’d love to get some thoughts and opinions from others.  Even though I didn’t bingo in this game, I had a string of eight turns where I didn’t score less than 25, with several plays in the high 30s and one in the high 40s, scoring about 260 points.  While I didn’t have outstanding tiles, I took the points that seemed available to me.
FINAL SCORE:  364 – 339 (WIN)
BINGOS:  ME – none; Paul – OVErSEE

Game #2 vs. Allan Brown
After a slow start, this game just got out of hand for Allan.  I had an set of tiles that didn’t seem very promising to me:  DIIIOS?  I was thinking OIDIOID, but even that didn’t seem to work.  I ended-up trading and apparently missed a bingo:  SImIOID.  Seeing the word now, I know it’s good, but I can say that I would not have found that play (besides, it didn’t play).  There was one bingo available:  IDIOcI(E)S, but trying to find that is a stretch for me.  Maybe I need to study my 3I words.

Anyway, I got some fortunate tiles and was able to extract some big points and bingos.  Allan seemed to be fishing for a bingo as he often does.  While he was scoring 5-15 points, I was hitting him for 30+.  By the time he got his first bingo, the score was 207 – 133 (for me) and I was still scoring, as I had 6 turns when I scored 340 points.  Can’t expect to win when you’re not scoring.  Craig’s been saying that I shouldn’t fish, but it sort of hit home during the Saratoga tournament when Sam Hollington also mentioned that the expert players don’t do that.
FINAL SCORE:  525 – 276 (WIN)
BINGOS:  ME – TOONIeS, TABULA(T)E, (M)ISDEALS; Allan – R(E)FRAINs

Game #3 vs. Mark Hamilton
I was lucky in this game as I made two critical erros.  I had an opening rack of EEEEEKW with absolutely no play because Mark opened with QI.  Fortunately, I picked-up ERUDITE that I played incorrectly as UREDITE* – I wasn’t sure of the spelling, but I knew that one of those two were good.  Mark missed another phoney word on that play – MIT*.  That was error number one.  My second mistake was playing KNOT M12.  Right after I played it, I knew it was a mistake as I realized that I had opened up the TWS lane at the bottom of the board and also a juicy bingo lane for a word ending in S to make S(KI).  Mark played ZINGS for 64 – sure it wasn’t a bingo, but it scored like one.  The only saving grace I had was that I had built up a 100 point lead, which was whittled away.  I have to be on the look-out for potentially calamitous moves.  Now that I’m playing higher up at tournaments, a mistake or two will surely lead to a loss.
FINAL SCORE:  390 – 362 (WIN)
BINGOS:  ME – UREDITE*, R(E)ACTING; Mark – IRONIeS

On a side note, Sam Hollington visited the club.  I think he had a fun time playing against some expert players (and beating the too).  Hopefully we’ll see him out more often – I know it’s a bit of a trek for him to come, but it’s nice to see some different faces at the club.

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