No, I'm not telling you to leave, dear readers, I'm talking about the tiles you 'leave' on your rack after you make a play!
Yes, so after skipping K as part of the ABC Wednesday series, I'm back on board with L.
So your 'leave' is very important because it's going to set you up for what's going to happen on your next turn. Take a shot at these three randomly generated racks, pretending you're going first, and see if you can find the best play:
1. EIIOOTT
2. AEFNSTU
3. EIIOQTU
1. So you may have been tempted to play TOO or TOOT or even TIE, but those all leave you with all or nearly all vowels! In this case, you're better off keeping the E or ET or even EIT and exchanging the rest. Besides, no one's even played so you can pretend you're not even losing a turn!
2. FUN, while it only scores 12 points, is actually the highest rated play. This is because AEST are great tiles to build a 7 or 8 letter word from, and because U is probably the least useful vowel. FAUN and TUFA are also rated highly (since they leave EST and ENS), but those are less common words.
3. This was a trick question, because QUOIT is actually a word! If you didn't know that word, hopefully you found QUOTE, QUITE or QUIET. QUOIT is best because it leaves you with EI- it's hard to explain, but certain vowel combinations are better than others. Just try and think of words that have an E and I in them versus two I's, or an O and an I, and hopefully that will explain how EI beats out OI or II. Regardless of this, though, playing QUOTE for 48 points (by placing the Q on the double letter score and getting the opening double word score) is a good example of when scoring points can cancel out the leave rule, assuming you didn't see a better play. If you score a lot on a turn, say 40 or more points, it's sometimes worth sacrificing the balance of tiles on your rack for a turn or two.
That's all for this week! Thanks for reading.
And hey, while I have your attention, you may want to check out a list of casual scrabble clubs here.
6 comments:
1. Good thought
2. I ALWAYS try to get rid of the U!
3. I saw QUIT, QUITE and QUIET, buit not QUOIT - ah, well
ROG, ABC Wednesday team
1. I thought those were L's,but now see they're capital I's. I had "tootle" which is obviously wrong.
2. I had "fasten" but I see where you're going with this.
3. I had "quote"
Good ones, all - enjoyed this!
Leslie
abcw team
Good points. Especially when going on a run of picking out lots of vowels.
1 Tootie - as in...oh, who knows!
2. Unfeast...as when you have just finnished Thanksgiving dinner and having eaten too much you wished you could "unfeast".
3. oh this is fun. I need to think about these and will be back.
This is a Lot of fun.
Thanks,
Meryl
http://departingthetext.blogspot.com
Good ideas - it really does matter. :) Thanks for the tips!
I play Scrabble like some people eat dinner - daily and with gusto. I didn't even try because it would depend on the Triple Word Scores, etc. Wasn't thinking "outside the (Scrabble) box"!!!
Amy
http://sharplittlepencil.wordpress.com/2011/04/06/loud-lecherous-legislators-abc-wednesday/
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