| Player 1 |
|
#player1 Jennifer_Lee Jennifer Lee
#player2 Adam_Logan Adam Logan
>Jennifer_Lee: CEEEIRV H7 RECEIVE +82 82
#note JENNIFER: This game includes comments and some discussion back and forth between me and Adam. Where I ask a question and there is no response from Adam, he concurred that my reasoning was correct. My thanks to Adam for kindly sharing his racks and thoughts on this game.
>Adam_Logan: ALPSTTX 13H .XPATS +46 46
>Jennifer_Lee: ABIILOU K7 ABOULI. +18 100
#note JENNIFER: BAILOU(T) favored at L7 for a couple extra points. I guess it is also less dangerous to put the A at 8L to hit the 3WS than the B in 8K? I am happy that I remembered how to spell ABOULIA.
>Adam_Logan: AGLMMTU L4 GUMMA +31 77
>Jennifer_Lee: BHIJKNN 5K J.NK +30 130
#note JENNIFER: I considerd J(U)NK at J10 for 1 more point, but it seemed crazy dangerous with both Y hooks out. ...................... ADAM: on the other hand, a five ending in S hurts a lot more after the actual play. The possibility of an S-ending bingo at N4-10 is unimportant, because such words play at 14B anyway. The 10J placement simulates 6 points better. GUMMA would not have been played keeping a Y, but this doesn't matter much one way or the other. If my rack were random I would have about 2*7/70 = 20% chance of having a Y, whereas actually I just drew 5 from a 68-tile bag containing two Y's, so the chance is about 2*5/68 = 15%. However, the difference in the benefit to having a Y is small enough that 5% of it is negligible.
>Adam_Logan: ELNQTWY O1 NEWLY +55 132
#note JENNIFER: And yup, he had the Y. ..................... ADAM: Simulates equal to WETLY. If Jennifer had played JUNK at 10J, I would have replied with WETLY at N6, but it would have scored 1 point less than this. ..................... JENNIFER: Why would you have played WETLY instead of NEWLY if I had played JUNK at the 10J spot? Is the QN leave better than QT? I don't understand what about the positioning of JUNK would have made you play WETLY versus NEWLY. ..................ADAM: after JUNK at 10J, WETLY scores 6 more than NEWLY.
>Jennifer_Lee: BDHILNV 10J V.LN +15 145
#note JENNIFER: Gah, I saw B(U)NDH at 10J, but I wasn't sure if it was good. Could also have done (BA)NDH at 8K, which Quackle favors, perhaps because it takes out the 3WS and scores 8 more points than B(U)NDH?
>Adam_Logan: ADIQRST 14F QADI +57 189
#note JENNIFER: This was a beautifully placed play. ............................. ADAM: If I had played WETLY on the last turn, I would now have QINDARS at 14B
>Jennifer_Lee: BDFGHIO 15E FIB +23 168
#note JENNIFER: I did not know BODGI(E), at 2J. I considered BIF(I)D at 11F, but started to doubt myself on it being a word. You will see a theme here of me finding plays and then doubting whether I was correctly remembering whether something was a word or not. I think this is because I add new words to my cardboxes every day, but don't review the words already in my box enough to solidify my knowledge of those words. So I have seen a lot of words (for me), but I am not solid on many of them.
>Adam_Logan: ??DRSST 15I STRiDeS +78 267
>Jennifer_Lee: DEGHNOR N1 OH +22 190
#note JENNIFER: Not sure why I did not think to play HO at N2 for 3 more points, which is what Quackle prefers. The (BA)NDH play at 8K that I missed earlier is still possible, for 33 points. That play scores 8 more than Quackle's preferred play of HO at N2. I guess Quackle still prefers HO because I am trailing and need to bingo and DEGNR is a better leave than EGOR? Is it a better leave? I think if I had been sure that BANDH was good, I would have taken the points. I missed EDH at I7, which scores a nice 29 points, but I would not have played it anyway because I want to leave those letters open for bingos to the R and E (and maybe to the C). ....................... ADAM: I agree that EDH doesn't make much sense. As for DEGNR vs. EGOR, of course you can get in trouble with DEGNR by picking two consonants. However, if this doesn't happen it's a strong bingo leave. EGOR is an unfortunate in-between leave that isn't very good either for scoring points or for bingoing: without an N, the G is a bad tile. Cross-tables leave evaluator has DEGNR at 11.1, EGOR at 0.9--a larger difference than I would have expected.
>Adam_Logan: EHIINOR M5 .OIR +20 287
#note ADAM: I wasn't really sure what to do here. I did think of HI, but I'm ahead so I don't want a volatile leave like EINOR. MOI looks reasonable. ........................ JENNIFER: What do you mean by EINOR being a volatile leave? It seems like a strong bingo leave, but I'm guessing that's not what you mean by volatile. .......................ADAM: not quite the same, but related. EINOR leads to a lot of bingos and a lot of low-scoring turns when I pick two one-point tiles and don’t have a bingo--rather like your DEGNR. Keeping the H makes those less likely. On the other hand, HI does block the easy bingo line at O8-O15. ......................JENNIFER: I was not familiar with the use of the word volatility in this context. I understand it to mean that the range of possible scores that Adam will have on his next turn varies a lot because he could hit a playable bingo (big score), or miss it and draw all low point tiles, which will make it hard to score (low score). In contrast, by holding back the H, he is a little less likely to bingo, but he is more likely to score at least a medium score. In other words, his range of possible scores on his next turn is narrower than with the EINOR leave.
>Jennifer_Lee: ADEFGNR G3 FANGED +22 212
#note JENNIFER: Ooh, (K)ERF at N5 for 35 points is cool. (K)RANG in the same spot for 31 is also cool. I did not see those possiblities. Quackler recmmends I fish off the F with F(e) at N14 for 8 points. I didn't feel like I should sacrifice that many points. In hindsight, I really regretted my play. I felt like I needed to start scoring more to put myself behind by only one bingo instead of a bingo plus. I didn't love playing long to score because I knew I was not going to pick up a blank and this play blocked the R and E lanes that I intentionally left unperturbed in my last play. On the other hand, I thought playing vertically up as long as I could would offer some letters to play through, though the F is not easy to play through in the middle and the A is maybe a little less ideally positioned to play through. Also did not like that this slotted the A next to the 2WL, making for easy plays by Adam to score down from the 3WS. If I was going to play FANGED, though, I think I should have played it at I3 so I could have played 8s that ended in A or N. ....................... ADAM: KERF would have given me a difficult problem, though if nothing else I could kill the right side with HOIDENS.
>Adam_Logan: DEHIINO H1 HIED +40 327
#note JENNIFER: And I give Adam the easy points I feared.
>Jennifer_Lee: EEOPRRT 5D POR. +12 224
#note JENNIFER: That K spot I missed earlier remains open with plays like (K)ORE and (K)REEP from N5. At this point, it is not looking good and I am falling further behind. POR(N) is kind of a desperation semi-fish to try to open more lanes and bingo as soon as possible. There are almost certainly better ways to do that, though, right? I feel like I have to open the left side of the board more, rather than do something like ROPE from I3 on RO(W) at 3M.
>Adam_Logan: ACILNOZ I3 ZONA +52 379
#note JENNIFER: Ouch.
>Jennifer_Lee: EERTTTY N5 .Y +33 257
#note JENNIFER: (K)YE is more points. At least I finally saw the scoring potential of this K spot.
>Adam_Logan: ACEEIIL 8K ...IC +27 406
#note JENNIFER: Adam mentioned that he played ZONA instead of ZOIC to hold the IC for this play. ...... ADAM: Though perhaps this is overthinking. In truth, I should probably have played CALIPEE or APIECE instead of this. ....... JENNIFER: On the other hand, CALIPEE and APIECE create an easy vertical lane down column C for me to hook a bingo, instead of forcing me to play through the P in PORN. Is that a valid consideration? ...... ADAM: it is. You need two bingos to win here, and even then it isn't guaranteed. With BARIC I force both bingos to be on the left, whereas after the other plays you can bingo on the left first and maybe have both sides of the board open. On the other hand, BARIC keeps a leave that I might not be able to score with, if you do get the bingos. It's tough to judge this sort of position because I am a very strong favourite after all three plays.
>Jennifer_Lee: EERTTTU 6A TRUE +10 267
#note JENNIFER: My truly desperate attempt to hit a high scoring bingo. With three T's. ............................. UPDATE FROM JENNIFER: Another player pointed out that I'm unlikely to succeed with a play like this against a player at Adam's level. It's not like he is not going to notice that I am desperately trying to open a 3WS bingo or a triple-triple. He will do something to block it. I've done this in other games and succeeded when the board had another decent bingo lane already open (I guess Row 1 does have bingos to the H). In those cases, a play like this can force my opponent to make a point-sacrificing play down column A or a parallel play to make it harder for me to bingo. But here this doesn't really create a distraction because there isn't another huge bingo spot that is already open for me to hit if Adam blocks. [Note: I did not share this updated comment with Adam, so he may not necessarily agree with my thoughts on this comment.]
>Adam_Logan: AEEILTU A6 .ITULE +18 424
#note JENNIFER: Adam could have shifted this up to play it at A4 for 3 more points. Not sure if he had a reason for playing it here. Maybe to make it harder for me to bingo because I would need to have more overlaps? ............................. ADAM: yes, exactly.
>Jennifer_Lee: AEINSTT B9 SATINET +76 343
#note JENNIFER: Finally hit my bingo and am lucky I can still play it notwithstanding Adam forcing me to play a bingo with more overlaps.
>Adam_Logan: AEEEGOR B2 EAGE. +12 436
#note ADAM: not one of my better endgames. This does keep lots of out-plays, but it doesn't block Jennifer's. ......... JENNIFER: None of the Quackle choices blocks my outplays either. What are some considerations I should keep in mind when choosing whether to block an opponent's only outplay versus guaranteeing that I go out in two moves or score best? ........ ADAM: usually blocking is right, but there are positions where you score so much by ignoring an out-play that that is the right thing to do, or where you can't go out in two and your opponent has two good plays. Championship Player says GHEE is best for me, keeping AERO at 4A and 14L.
>Jennifer_Lee: AOOW 4D OW +25 368
#note JENNIFER: Did not see my outplay of WA(H)OO at 1F.
>Adam_Logan: EOR A13 ORE +19 455
#note JENNIFER: And Adam wins, yay!
>Adam_Logan: (AO) +4 459
|
