Scrabble Adventures

I missed attending club earlier this week because of a hectic schedule.  Fortunately, I was invited to attend a small get-together for some games at Vera Bigall’s place.  She was hoping to play a few games as preparation for an upcoming tournament in Montreal.

The attendees included:  Shaun Goatcher, Tim Anglin, Anna Miransky, me, Peter Manzolillo, Heather McCall, and of course, Vera.  I had never met Pete or Heather before, so it was cool meeting some new Scrabble-folk and playing against/with them.

Game #1 vs. Pete (view full game)
I had some good tiles while Pete didn’t.  Nevertheless, I made some good plays to score good points.  On turn #2, I completely missed the double-double opportunity (ATHEISM 92 pts) as I got locked in on the 8 letter word "THEMATIC".  Later in the game on turn #8, I missed another bingo.  I played GRIPE and kept E? for 42 points.  There were two bingo plays (12C PERIGEE 74pts and 4A REPEATING 74 pts) available that I completely missed.  According to Quackle’s "ask a championship player" option, GRIPE was still a better play – I’m assuming because of the balance between points scored and keeping the E?.  The play of EXERT for 62 points at turn 9 and a late bingo sealed this game.
FINAL SCORE:  447 – 304 (WIN)
BINGOS:  ME – HEMATIc, (V)ARIaTES;  Pete – ANEU(R)INS

Game #2 vs. Anna (view full game)
A weird game in which the top half of the board got closed down.  I’m kicking myself for completely missing a hi-prob bingo – EASTERN/NEAREST/EARNEST early in the game.  In all fairness, Vera missed this bingo too (she was kibbitzing   I let Anna’s play of LOS* stay on the board – bad on me.  Fortunately, Anna got very frustrated with the board and started to open things up – and allowed me to play a final play bingo for the win.
FINAL SCORE:  454 – 387 (WIN)
BINGOS:  ME – P(R)INTERS, GENTIlE (that’s GENTILE); Anna – sALTERN, ROADIES

Game #3 Hans & Heather vs. Vera (view full game)
We decided to play a ‘team’ game and it was quite fun.  Heather is a very good player and it was interesting to see how another player approaches the game.  She and I seemed like a good fit because we shared a similar approach to the game.

This game was a fun game as we had some good plays.  Having some very good tiles always helps.  Nevetheless, Heather and I seemed to find plays that the other didn’t see.  OVERGAIN* was a 50/50 proposition for me, but Heather convinced me.  A few turns later, I convinced Heather that APOSTATE was good (I thought so).  Unfortunately, Vera didn’t think so and challenged.  From there we sort of steam-rolled the rest of the game with fortunate timing that led to high scoring plays.
FINAL SCORE:  498 – 278 (WIN)
BINGOS:  ME/Heather – O(V)ERGAIN*, APOSTA(T)e; Vera – iNULASE

Game #4 Hans & Heather vs. Vera (rematch) (view full game)
A game of small plays with very few (apparent) opportunities to score big.  Heather and I struggled with having very few vowels for much of the game.  Me missing DOCENTS early or chickening out on TROPINS didn’t help.  Vera played a smart game and didn’t give us many free opportunities.  Having a few glasses of wine probably didn’t help the brain think
FINAL SCORE:  367 – 316 (LOSS)
BINGOS:  ME/Heather – none; Vera – ReDDENS

Game #5 vs. Pete (rematch) (view full game)
Unlike the first game, this one was very close.  I pretty much lost the game on turn #9 when I played UNALTER(S)*, completely missing NEUTRAL(S).  For some reason, I have difficulty seeing the EU combination.
FINAL SCORE:  350 – 331 (LOSS)
BINGOS:  ME – rEALIZE(S);  Pete – DIReCTS

Overall, I had fun playing as I hadn’t even thought about Scrabble in over a week.  In the two ‘team’ games I played, I was intrigued by how everyone seems to have different word knowledge.  For example, Heather (a >1500 level player) didn’t know many of the words that I suggested – some examples included ARVO, ENGRAM/ENGRAMME (I wasn’t sure about the second one), APOSTATE, CUTEY (I chickened out and wasn’t able to convince her it was good), and TROPINS.  Granted, she could say the same for me as I had never seen DOCENTS before and a few others.  What impressed me most was how she was able to see (and evaluate) different scoring options that developed on the board.  The only other time I played a team game was in Buffalo 2007 during the evening with Joe Bihlmeyer.  He was in charge for most of the game, but I had my moments like insisting that INCENTS was good.

Playing games is fun, but I think I need to study more.  Missing hi-prob words and bingos is not fun, especially if it leads to losses.  In any case, it was a good break from a hectic week.  I know what I need to review to get ready for the 2008 Nationals.

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Here’s a quick recap of the games played on Saturday at Yvonne’s place.  In the morning, it was Shaun Goatcher, Sam Hollington, Yvonne Lobo and me.  In the afternoon, it was Steve Ozorio, Sam Hollington, Yvonne Lobo and me.  Needless to say, I was not expecting to win too many games -  I was hoping for 2 or 3 wins.

Game #1 vs. Yvonne
I was surprised that this game was even close considering that Yvonne had three bingos while I had none.  The game turned when I chickened out on challenging her last bingo and I couldn’t recover.  To make matters worse, the final bingo was a phony.  The bingo put her up by only 30, so I made a hedge bet and thought that I could try and play it out.  Guess it didn’t work out.  That’s fatal mistake #1.  I just reviewed this game on Quackle and it was painful – I can’t believe how poorly I played, leaving so many points on the board!
FINAL SCORE:  386 – 378 (LOSS)
BINGOS:  ME – none; Yvonne – L(I)TERATI, eNDRINS, SOFTEES*

Game #2 vs. Sam
Not sure how to summarize this game.  I gave myself a chance to comeback and win with a final rack of AENORST – can’t ask for much more than that.  Unfortunately, I had no home for it.  There was a point when I had a choice between blocking a TWS bingo lane ending with an S that Sam just played or blocking another TWS spot with a potential word ending in Z for 60+ points.  I decided to block the bingo lane, but Sam happened to have the Z and scored 66 points.  Quackle simulates blocking the latter, but I had a feeling that Sam had some very good tiles and wanted to make things a bit harder for him to get a bingo.  He just happened to have the Z and both blanks, so he could have potentially scored a huge bingo – granted, he was able to extract two turns of bingo points so I guess it is a moot point.
FINAL SCORE:  396 – 306 (LOSS)
BINGOS:  ME – (P)ETERING; Sam – RE(L)AXANt

Game #3 vs. Shaun
Another interesting game where I gave myself a chance to win at the end – granted, I think Shaun would have played the end differently were we playing in a tournament.  I think he was trying to bingo at the end rather than taking the conservative approach and banking points.  At one point, I had EEIMSSX and a choice of MIX (39) or MIXES (42).  I wasn’t sure what to play, and ended up playing MIX.  Looking back, maybe MIXES might be better because a) scores 3 more points, b) opens up the board more, and c) gives me a good ES leave vs. EESS (although EESS isn’t bad at all).  After a few thousand plies on Quackle, MIX wins out over MIXES by only a few points.

The game turned when I forgot if ET takes an S (it doesn’t) and tried to play ETS*/FORTiES.  As mentioned, because this was a friendly game, Shaun was trying to bingo instead of shutting the board down/taking points (granted he had a final rack of ENTAILS so I can’t really blame him).  I found TESTIeR for 84 points to close the gap.  I ended up losing the game.  The sad thing is that I just finished reviewing this game and there was a scoring error (by me!).  218 + 34 = 252 not 242.  Since we were just playing for fun, I didn’t ask for a recount.
FINAL SCORE:  374 – 371 (LOSS)
BINGOS:  ME – TESTIeR; Shaun – PATINAe

Game #4 vs. Yvonne
Not much to say about this game except that Yvonne drew the bag and crushed me.  Sure, I had a few Ses and a blank, but I had a few choice racks of OOOSUUY, EEEERRS and CENQVWY that sure didn’t help me.  Granted, Yvonne was drawing AMAZING tiles all morning against all of us, so I’m glad it wasn’t just me.
FINAL SCORE:  482 – 296 (LOSS)
BINGOS:  ME – SKIDdERS, ORALISE*; Yvonne – DEALeRS, LADRONE, GO(E)THITE(S) – this was an excellent find

Break for lunch.  Other than the second game against Yvonne, I couldn’t complain about my tiles and managed to stay close in the games.  After lunch, we played more of a "tournament" with a point spread to make things more interesting while vying for bragging rights.  I got 40 points from Sam and Steve and 30 points from Yvonne. 

Game #5 vs. Sam
I started off well with VOLCAnO, but fell victim to vowel-itis at the end.  Sam played a great game.  I had a few bingo racks, but Sam seemed to have a second sense and blocked my spots.  There were a few bingos that I "missed", but I don’t know those words so I don’t feel too bad.  At the end of the game, I was winning by 23 points and had AAEILST and played off an A, hoping to draw something from ACDEILMT.  Of course, I pick-up another A and wasn’t able to bingo.  Sam made some nice plays of MO(JO) for 28 and CEDI for 21 that blocked up my bingo lanes.  I just couldn’t score enough to pull out a win.
FINAL SCORE:  401 – 397 (LOSS)
BINGOS:  ME – VOLCAnO; Sam – TAPPERS, VITRINE

Game #6 vs. Yvonne
This game turned when Yvonne played UNA(V)OWed for 167 (a triple-triple), as she went from losing by 100 to winning by 60.  After that, I did my best to catch up, but I just couldn’t keep up as she picked up the last Ses, X, and Z.  I picked up 5 Ts in the final 5 turns.  Actually, I think I played all of the Ts in this game.  Great find for Yvonne on the triple-triple.
FINAL SCORE:  474 – 396 (LOSS)
BINGOS:  ME – LESI(O)NED, TRAVELS; Yvonne – ABRA(D)ING, UNA(V)OWed (a trip-trip)

Game #7 vs. Steve
A close game that I gave away at the end. as the board got clogged up in the middle with few places to make plays.  At first I had a bad feeling because Steve had an opening bingo of TREASOn.  After that, Steve was able to slowly pull away by outscoring me every turn by about 5-10 points.  At the end of the game I still had a chance if I could find a bingo.  I had AEILNP? with two possible bingo lanes:  1) through a W and 2) front hooking EL, YE and ED (all on top of each other).  Steve pointed out that I missed PIN(W)ALEs – I don’t know this word.  The thing that kills me is that I completely missed a word that I know that fit into spot #2 – LEAPINg.  I ended up playing dEPLAIN* in one final act of desperation because I didn’t see the real word.  That would have given me enough for a win.
FINAL SCORE:  372 – 291 (LOSS)
BINGOS:  ME – none; Steve – TREASOn,

Game #8 vs. Steve
I tried an opening play bingo that was challenged off and it sort of went down hill from there as Steve drew the bag on me.  Even though he had better tiles, he sure made some excellent plays – I’m not taking anything away from him.  It’s just that I didn’t have much to fight back with as I had to trade a few times with tiles like:  ELLNUUU, EINOOOO, and AELLNUU (I can’t believe that I picked up the multiple Us and Ls twice this game).  My opening play was HOMLIER* thinking that it was the comparative form of HOMLY* (apparently it’s spelled HOMELY and the thinking was correct – my spelling of the word wasn’t).  Because of all the losing, I think I chickened out on challenging words as I let PAWAR*, NESTLOR* and NESTLORS*/POSY stay on the board.
FINAL SCORE:  502 – 368 (LOSS)
BINGOS:  ME – R(E)INVENt; Steve – NESTLOR*, ETIO(L)ATE

Game #9 vs. Yvonne
Another game when I had vowels galore.  Because of all the vowels, I wasn’t able to use my blank that I picked up on the first turn until turn #11.  In a span of 3 turns, I played off 6 Es and still had vowels remaining.  Fortunately for me, Yvonne was fishing and didn’t score too much and allowed me to stay within 30 points of her for most of the game.  I thought that I had lost the game when I challenged WANTERS, but Yvonne didn’t really track quite right and I was able to end the game with a bingo.
FINAL SCORE:  420 – 342 (WIN – finally!)
BINGOS:  ME – SNEaKER, InCITED; Yvonne – RADIANS, WANTERS

Some final observations about these games:

• According to the online ratings calculator, I was only expected to win 0.838 games based on everyone’s current NSA ratings.  So my lone victory is about what is expected based on the statistics.  To win a few more games would have been nice.
• Yvonne likes to bingo and fishes quite often.  I’m not sure if she only fishes against lower rated players like me.  She also tends to get fixated on bingoing, so it’s possible to get her completely frazzled if you can challenge a play off.  It seems like it’s "feast or famine" for her.  I wonder if shutting the board down against Yvonne is a good strategy.  She seems to get flustered when she can’t bingo, especially if she has bingo tiles but no home for them.  It’s something to think about for the future.  If I ever play another friendly game against her, I’m going to try an experiment of trying to shut the board down completely and see what she does.
• Steve seems to play a few phony plays per game, although I don’t think he does it on purpose.  I think I need to be on guard for this in the future.
• For some reason, I was a bit gun-shy about challenging words as the day progressed.  Part of this was because I was playing against players rated higher than me (300+ points) and I think I was a bit hesitant to challenge because of the perceived (and actual) difference in word knowledge.
• As I’ve been trying to convince myself, given relatively equal tiles, I think I can hang with players in the 1500-1700 range.  Of course, I’ll take my share of beatings and losses, but in terms of strategy and board vision, I think I’m doing okay.  I was able to see "hot spots" and scoring plays before my opponent played (i.e., predict/guess where the opponent would play – not necessarily the exact play).
• Sam is a solid player.  Not much else to say about him.  The only way I can compete with him is if I have better tiles.  He doesn’t get flustered and he keeps on scoring with the tiles he has.  He also bingos if it’s available to him.  Not sure if he makes phony plays on purpose, but he’s gotten a few past me.  My fault for not catching them.
• Shaun is another solid player.  He knows so many words, but for some reason I seem to be able to stay relatively close with him in terms of games.  For whatever reason, I just feel very comfortable playing against him – maybe it’s a style thing.  Unlike against other people, I don’t feel as if I need to change how I play when I play Shaun.
• One thing I’ve started to notice is that games (at least the games I’ve played) are decided far earlier than I would expect.  Everyone talks about playing a strong "end-game", but when I review my games in Quackle, the final 4-5 turns don’t seem to have any bearing on the outcome.  The pivotal, deciding move is often made in or around turns #7-10, which is more like the "mid-game" rather than the end game.  I tend to think of games lasting about 14 turns.  I think I need to pay more attention during the middle as that seems to be when I’m losing quite a few of these games.
• Gotta expand my vocabulary/word knowledge.  As I noted the past few posts, I think my limitd word knowledge is keeping me from truly competing agains the 1500+ players.  Today was a lesson in humility in that I can’t just coast on my past word knowledge.  I’m at the point where I need to put in some time studying words for me to be able to compete.  Guess I know what I’ll be doing for the next few years – word lists!  Yay!  Sure it’s not as fun as playing games, but it’s what I need if I want to win.  I’m no ashamed to admit that losing sucks.  Take today for example.  I played well enough to win about 4 or 5 of the games today, but I didn’t win.  I can take a "moral" victory in that I was competitive and had chances to win, but that’s not much consolation to a person who likes winning.

I hope we have another day like today before the US nationals.  I think it would be a good tune-up for everyone.  Maybe we can go to Sam’s place in St. Catharines so he isn’t always driving to Mississauga.  Maybe if the weather gets nicer, we can have a BBQ at his place and have 6-8 people over.   

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The past few weeks of play have been fun, but I think it’s time to get a bit more serious about my club play.  I have two tournaments upcoming and I want to perform well.

1) SARATOGA SPRINGS, NY (FEB. 22-24)
I decided to enter the Saratoga Springs Scrabble® tournament (Feb. 22-24) and will be playing up in a higher division for the main event.  I’ll most likely remain the lowest seed in the division.  While this represents a great opportunity to gain ratings points, winning games will be that much more difficult.  I’m planning on playing in the early bird, so hopefully I’ll get a great start to the tournament.  If I play well, I may not be the lowest seeded player.

2) WATERFORD, MI (MAR. 1-2)
This tournament (more info available here) is the week after the Saratoga tournament.  Ideally, I will fair well at Saratoga to allow me to play up again – maybe I’ll get a chance to play against Mr. Scrabblephreak in a tournament setting – and win   On a side note, Amanda Hubble, the tournament director, has done a very cool job with the tournament’s web page.  She did added some cool effects to player photos.

So, from here on, I will be approaching each game I play as a "tournament" game.  My aim is to focus on the process, and not worry about the winning.  Specifically, I want to stop making some of the silly errors I’ve made the past few weeks, focus on finding the "best possible play", and continuing to give myself chances to win.  I’m sure that if I do that, the winning will take care of itself.

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I’m currently studying the following:

• top 400 7 letter words by probability
• 2-6 letter words with J, Q, Z, X – for some reason, I’m stuck on the Zs
• 6 vowel 8s (done)
• 5 vowel 7s

I think I have a capacity to learn about 100-150 new words a week. Hopefully with a bit of study, I’ll be able to reach my goal of 1200/1300. With two possible tournaments coming up, I want to play well. I’m confirmed for the Waterford, MI tournament and am considering playing at the Saratoga Springs, NY tournament. At the Saratoga tournament, I would most likely play up a division (1200-1599).

For those reading this post, you may be interested in a study strategy recommended by my club director.

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I’ve been trying to compile a list of “important/notable” Scrabble® tournaments for a while.  Instead of only playing in local tournaments, I want to start playing in some of the larger and/or more “important” tournaments held in North America and then try and play in them over time.  Jason Ubeika was nice enough to provide a great deal of information regarding tournaments.

The “Major” Tournaments

According to Keith Smith’s Total Scrabble, the majors are defined as (page 55):

• National Scrabble® Championship (US)
• World Championship
• Superstars Showdown (inactive)
• All*Stars (inactive)

As far as I know, only the US Championship and World Championship are still active.

The “Semi-Major” Tournaments
These tournaments are probably the closest thing we have to “major” tournaments in North America.

• Arden Cup (Chicago)
• Boston Area Tournament
• Dallas Open
• Pigeon Forge, Tennessee
• Reno, NV – July

Other “Notable” Tournaments
These are notable for any number of reasons like # of entrants, # of games, prize money, concentration of expert players, tournament history/longevity, extent of out-of-town players, and, of course, important-sounding name.

• Albany, NY – New Year’s
• Albany, NY – 4^th of July
• Atlantic City
• Baltimore
• Charlotte Shodown
• Lake George, NY
• Michigan Madness
• Oregon Tile
• Phoenix
• Reno, NV – January

I’ve heard great things about tournaments organized by Ira Freehof in New York City.

Notable Canadian Tournaments

• Canadian National Scrabble Championship (top 50 qualifiers only)
• Michael Wise Memorial Tournament (Toronto in September)
• Montreal (May)
• Toronto Open/Human-Computer showdown (if held again)
• Vancouver (March)
• Western Canadian Scrabble Championship (Alberta)

If you think I’ve missed any tournaments, please contact me (or post a comment) so that I can update this list.

After a successful 2007, I’m looking forward to 2008.  Here are my Scrabble® goals for the next 12 months:

• Reach 1300 rating (NSA/tournament):  I’d like to put together a string of successful tournaments and break the 1300 barrier.  1200 might be a more reasonable goal as I don’t expect to play in as many tournaments this coming year.
• “win” a tournament:  Last year, I had two “wins”/first place finishes at tournaments.  I’d like to have at least one “win” this year.
• Reach 1500/Division A at the Club:  I’d like to finish strong this season and be able to play against the experts at my club.  To do that, I’ll need to reach 1500 (club rating).  I’m currently sitting around 1300 so I have some work to do.  The season ends in August 2008, so I still have a few months to go.
• Break 500 points in a game:  I’ve only scored over 500 points in one game (Buffalo Scrabble Tournament – May 2007) and I’d like to do so again this coming year.  Ideally, I will break 500 more frequently.
• Win more consistently:  I’d like to win 65% (2/3) of all my games this year.  I know that’s a pretty high number, especially if I start playing against higher rated players, but it’s something that will allow me to continue to increase my NSA and club ratings.
• Finish stronger at tournaments:  I’d like to finish stronger at tournaments, especially at multi-day tournaments.  I noticed that my second day performances haven’t been so great and I’d like to change that.

I’ve also been thinking about a study strategy and plan to post it in a few days.

Just came across this interesting people directory of Scrabble blogs.  No clue as to who runs it, but if you’re interested in reading about people’s Scrabble journeys, it’s a good place to start.

I had some time today and decided to play a few games on ISC since I haven’t played online in a while.  Now I remember why I stopped playing on ISC.  While playing games is fun, I can’t stand people accusing me of cheating.  I don’t care if my opponent cheats – it makes it more of a challenge to win and forces me to play better (better board vision, strategy, and words).  I just can’t stand when people accuse me of cheating.

In one game, I was playing a hi-rated player (1800+) to test myself out.  I’m currently rated around 1600 on ISC (handle:  hansmixer).  After winning the game, the person asked what I studied for my PhD – thought I was a liberal arts major.  Then the person acused me of cheating because on my profile I indicate that I’m a 1100 NSA rating/1350+ club rating.

I played two bingos that game – the words seemed pretty obvious to me.  Here are the two racks I had when I played the bingos:

• AILNRT? – multiple places to play and so I played RATLINe.  Come-on, I can see at least 5 anagrams to this one (TReNAIL, LATRINe, ReLIANT, ReTINAL, and RATLINe) – I’m sure there are more.  This one comes immediately to me as it’s a derivative of the TISANE, RETINA, or SATIRE stems.
• EIOPSTX – my first thought was EXPOSIT, but then the person played a bingo to block my original spot (RUINERS I believe).  But, then I remembered Paul Wigley telling me there was another anagram to that rack:  POXIEST.  Much to my surprise, it fit and I scored 132 (TWS with the X on the DLS square)

I don’t know about you, but the two above racks don’t seem too exotic.

Hey man, I’ve been going over my power tile 2–8 letter word – so far J, Q, and Z with X next.  I feel very confident playing those tiles.  In fact, I *want* those tiles now because I have confidence to score with them.  After finishing the power tile 2–8s, I plan to go over the 7 letter stems.  Looking over the past few weeks of games, I’ve noticed that I could bingo more often if I knew the 8s.  I’ll hold off on the 5s for a while, unlike Kevin who’s killing the 5s and who knows what else he’s been studying.

Looks like I won’t be playing on ISC again for a while.  I find playing against Quackle to be a better test – granted that program seems to get some amazing tiles.  When playing Quackle, I can only win one game out of 10.  Most of the time, I get totally crushed, but it’s practice so I don’t really care.

This weekend is the Oshawa Scrabble Tournament.  I’m hoping to have a successful weekend of playing Scrabble as I’ve been studying for the past few weeks.  I wasn’t able to attend the club tonight because of a snow storm (we had about 20cm of snow today) so I spent some time reviewing word lists.

At the time of this writing, I’m currently listed as seed #7 in division #5.  Cross-tables.com currently lists 18 players in my division, of which five are unrated.  I’ve got a pre-tournament 6.8 expected wins – meaning that I need to win most of my games to move up.

Anyway, here’s a short list of things I’ve been studying:

• Hi-probability 6 letter stems:  TISANE, SATIRE, SENIOR, and RETINA.  RETINA? I just learned this week, so I’m not 100% on it just yet.  After this weekend, I hope to add a few more stems:  ARSINE, INSERT, TONIES, ASTERN, STONER, and SEATER to start.
• U & I dumps:  I started learning a short list of U and I dumps because I seem to have trouble knowing what to do with these two letters.  I didn’t get around to learning more general vowel dumps but hope to do so for up-coming tournaments.
• 3 letter words:  I’ve been reviewing my 3 letter words as I think I’ve forgotten quite a few of them.  I can’t say that I have them all, but going over this list was useful.
• Miscellaneous “weird/rare” words:  I’ve been going over a list of words that are somewhat weird/rare.  I’m hoping to bust out a few this weekend and have people challenge me (VROUW, TUYER, JNANA, or ZEBEC are a few examples).

I hope to write a summary of my games and overall thoughts after the tournament is over.  Hopefully this will be a good one.  My goal for this tournament is to play as best as I can, ideally winning 10 games (or more).  I hope that I can raise my rating close to 900 or so as I’d like to break the 1000 barrier this year.  Hopefully a string of a few good tournaments will help me get there.