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#character-encoding UTF-8
#player1 Niel_Gan Niel Gan
#player2 Adam_Logan Adam Logan
>Niel_Gan: ADIMORU 8D DOUMA +20 20
#note R14 of Montreal tourney, 5/26/24. This game was also streamed with commentary, so I'll focus my notes on what I was thinking during my plays and how I can do better in the future. I was running on almost no sleep that day for reasons out of my control, so energy conservation played a role in lots of my decisions.
>Adam_Logan: EFNRSTV -FV +0 0
>Niel_Gan: AAACIRV 9H AVA +12 32
#note Should look harder for options like VAC(U)A or AIRVAC after such an exchange. That said, this still sims best by a couple % vs racks like EIRST because I bingo back the most often after playing this AVA. I'm inclined to mostly trust sim because the board is unlikely to become drastically less open after Adam's next play.
>Adam_Logan: ENPRSTU K3 PUNTERS +75 75
>Niel_Gan: ACIIORR 5E CARRIO. +18 50
#note COIR clearly better. CARRIO(N) is anti-thematic because it screws up all my lanes - it sims equal to COIR if I gave Adam EIRST on this turn instead of the actual random rack. I had the vague thought of going for a blank but that's not worth it given the available alternatives.
>Adam_Logan: AEEILPR D6 PE.ALIER +72 147
>Niel_Gan: ?EILNRS 14B RESILiN +78 128
#note Took too long here. This was probably in the top 5% of outcomes after my previous plays. By this point in the game I was noticing that I was taking twice as long to generate half as many plays as I usually do, so I adjusted my time allocation during the rest of the game to try to deal with that.
>Adam_Logan: DDEEENS 15H ENDED +33 180
>Niel_Gan: ?CKNOSW 14K WOCK +34 162
#note I didn't even look for bingos here, given how long it was taking me to generate plays. This didn't seem like it would be a game-losing miss, and with one S unseen seemed like a reasonable gamble. In actuality WOCK sims 6% back from the best bingo, but I think taking 5+ minutes to find e.g. W(I)nNOCKS (+2%) would be worse than playing this quickly.
>Adam_Logan: EHILSUW O12 WISH +56 236
#note NG: Probably in the worst few % of outcomes here - I'm still fine with WOCK. That said, made a thought process mistake of failing to "look both ways" and notice all side effects of this scoring play: I saw the clear N column lane this gives back but did not look for S(WISH), and I continued not seeing SWISH until the last few moments of the game. This becomes even more important because I now hold two tiles that function as case letters.
>Niel_Gan: ?EIMNSZ L1 ZEINS +66 228
#note Here I would haved considered ZEIN more strongly if I'd seen S(WISH). Might also have seen MIZzENS if I'd seen the hook. ZEINS and MIZzENS sim very close to joint top. In practice I slightly prefer not bingoing here because Adam is a much better player than I am and I need to pretend I'm further down than I am on this turn. Having me on the blank also changes his play style, in some cases increasing the chance that we get to an endgame I can win without bingoing.
>Adam_Logan: DEFGHLU H1 HUGE. +30 266
>Niel_Gan: ?BEFGJM -BFGJM +0 228
#note The only candidate plays I considered here were J(i)B and this exchange. Clearly missing C9 JaMBE(E) 78 is terrible for my chances, but I hadn't seen anything during Adam's turn so I didn't think I should continue to burn too time looking. Not considering (Z)iMB to use the Z spot is a thought process error.
>Adam_Logan: DFILQRV 2G Q.ID +18 284
>Niel_Gan: ?AEINOO 1L .OON +39 267
#note I play (Z)OEA here if I see S(WISH). I thought AEI? went better with the N and B column lanes, and that Adam almost always blocks the I in PEDALIER given I expect him to be consonant-heavy and aiming for defense. I also thought that if he did a blocking consonant dump through the I, it would sometimes give back a lane for a bingo starting with a vowel, which I would more often hit with AEI?. But that is all irrelevant if I see my S hook.
>Adam_Logan: FGJLRTV 11B GR.FT +18 302
>Niel_Gan: ?ABEEIU C3 BEAU +16 283
#note Missed (Q)UA(R)E and (R)UBAI. C3 BEAU gives back more than it helps in most cases but I was tunnel visioning.
>Adam_Logan: GIJLLTV D1 GLIT +22 324
>Niel_Gan: ?ABEIMX 8K .EMIX +45 328
#note Did not see/know the bing. Didn't love this play but didn't want to spend too much more time. XI again less appealing when not seeing SWISH.
>Adam_Logan: JLOOOVY B2 JOY +37 361
#note NG: Adam mentioned after the game that he was considering 13J JOY.
>Niel_Gan: ?ABFITY 2N FY +31 359
>Adam_Logan: ALNOOTV 13I OVAL +18 379
>Niel_Gan: ?ABEEIT F1 BEE +24 383
#note Missing the S hook for the millionth time. I make an almost unbelievable class of error here, which is forgetting that I'm playing an endgame midway through considering my candidate plays. This means that not only did I not see plays like T(R)OAT, I also didn't even look for any of Adam's plays or my follow-up plays. This is also why I made my play with 3 minutes remaining on the clock. Basically means that I'm still a noob and need to practice endgames until it's automatic, rather than having a manual "endgame switch" I can forget to flip.
>Adam_Logan: ANOTT 13C T.OAT +22 401
>Niel_Gan: ?AIT 11L AITs +13 396
#note Finally notice it because I have to.
>Niel_Gan: (N) +2 398
#note Threw this one away several times over, but learned a lot about my problems in the process. Some things to work on include "look both ways" errors, score estimation for 2xL squares, basic endgames (!), and in the long term, better assessment of a given position in its totality. I consistently make worse decisions as the decision space expands, which is natural and will take a LOT of practice to manage through better play finding, play assessment, and board/situational schemas.
Also worthwhile to always take ~30s to look for the highest scoring play even if I don't think I'll end up playing it.
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