Thursday, May 5, 2011

Bummer...

Opponent opens with 8G ZEE. 

I play the only playable bingo with AACEIV?, which puts an E in the triple lane.

Opponent triple-triples thru E with DEOPSTU.

Adding insult to injury, there is now a U on the board and my rack is EKMNOSX! 

Pretty sure this is as close as I'll ever get to playing this 8 as a natural.

2 comments:

Roger Owen Green said...

I wonder - is it better, in general, to avoid building toward a triple word (let alone two!) , even if one passes on the bingo? I tend to play more defensively than you played this - but then again, I'm not nearly as good as you.

scrabblepodcast said...

Good point- hanging an E in the triple column is generally regarded as risky- especially if both blanks haven't been played.

I ran the position through a simulation program and it actually suggested playing VIA/ZA as a better play- but then that program knows every word and would be more likely to be able to play a bingo on the next turn than me!

So I usually just take the points even though there is risk. The only other time someone might pass up a bingo is when they can score 35/40 points or more on their turn, save a blank and have a very good chance of bingoing on the next turn or so.

But with my luck, every time I do something like that, I draw all vowels and end up holding the blank for the rest of the game.