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#player1 Jim_Burlant Jim Burlant
#player2 Stephen_Sneed Stephen Sneed
>Jim_Burlant: EHIOOOQ -IOOOQ +0 0
#note The duck says QI 8G is the sim winner. Hmmm.. I felt that the problem with that was that, if he had something hooking or extending the Q, EHOOO could easily be so useless I'd have to exchange. With unique vowels I might have considered the Q play but I just couldn't convince myself to keep EHOOO. Why not take care of it now? The duck docks me not quite 4 points for this choice.
>Stephen_Sneed: LMU 8G LUM +10 10
>Jim_Burlant: ACEEHIU I4 HEAU.E +13 13
#note Neither Quackle nor I liked this play. So why did I choose it? I didn't like 7I HUE either - being vowel overloaded for a 3rd straight turn - a real possibility drawing to ACEI - wasn't an appealing thought. J7 EAU wins the sim. I don't know about that one - while X is a low-prob draw, can it really be right to give him a juicy spot for the X if he's got it? I saw the risks with my choice and felt that, easy H1 play or not, the best thing I could do was turn as much of the rack as possible and hope to draw into something better.
>Stephen_Sneed: EIKP H1 PIKE +39 49
>Jim_Burlant: CDIIOOX 5I .XODOI +28 41
#note Didn't see OXIDE and was too fixated on clearing out both O's. While this choice sims second, it (justifiably) loses by 10 points because it gives up too much on the scoreboard.
>Stephen_Sneed: ANY 4K NAY +25 74
>Jim_Burlant: ?CEIINY G5 ICI.Y +15 56
#note Never occurred to me that there was a bingo in this rack; the 17000-probability mYE(L)INIC would have played at G5 for 64. This play is one of the 3 best non-bingo choices, the others being J5 XI and G4 YIN. I'd much rather get rid of the YI combo.
>Stephen_Sneed: DOP F8 POD +23 97
>Jim_Burlant: ?AAEGNS 2B AGeNES.A +70 126
#note I initially put down LASAGNE (blank L) at 11E, but didn't like the easy S hook at K11, so I pulled it back up. With the duplicated A's it took me a couple of minuites just to find this. Best is 1H PAGEANtS 83, which I didn't see. I'm at 55% winning chances here. Incorrectly scored as 72.
>Stephen_Sneed: UV C2 .UV +14 111
>Jim_Burlant: ?ABEIOO E9 BOO +21 147
#note Best, at 78%...but some consonants (R, N, and T, anyone?) would be nice for a change.
>Stephen_Sneed: CEELNTT N5 .NTELECT +64 175
>Stephen_Sneed: CEELNTT -- -64 111
>Jim_Burlant: ?AAEIOS 4B A.O +12 159
#note Since I picked up a free turn I figured I could make a cheap play to hopefully clean up this rack. NAOI is a little better in terms of rack cleaning, but given that I've been drawing nothing but vowels this whole game (or so it felt like, anyway) I thought I might be overdue for some consonsants, so I was reluctant to play off 3 tiles. This choice and OVA in the same spot win the sim. I don't have an N in my rack and I didn't think it would be wise to give him an easy N hook down the A column. Though I lead by only 38 pts at the beginning of this turn, the duck says I'm at 88% winning chances with this choice.
>Stephen_Sneed: CENT 12C CENT +18 129
>Jim_Burlant: ?AEGIIS 6E AE.I. +9 168
#note Given what I was drawing relative to the tile pool, I was starting to brain lock on several of these racks. It just didn't compute that I was somehow not finding any of those R's and T's, yet I just kept drawing vowels from a rapidly dwindling supply of vowels. Stephen told me during our extensive post-mortem that he realized at this point I was really drowining in vowels. Sim winner is J5 XI 15. I wanted to turn more tiles to finally draw something like RT, RN, or TN.
>Stephen_Sneed: DOR 6K ROD +18 147
>Jim_Burlant: ?EGIJSU C9 JUI.E +44 212
#note Ok, nothing bingo prone but I sure ain't complainin'. This is clearly best, and I'm now at 92% winning chances.
>Stephen_Sneed: LT 13B T.L +5 152
>Jim_Burlant: ?AFGIRS E5 F.G +14 226
#note Ok, how many of you out there not rated 1800 would find the 14000-probability GARFISh? Not knowing that bingo led to my making the biggest blunder I made this entire tournament. I saw ARF 14B (clearly the best non-bingo option), put it down...and pulled it up. Though it would have put my lead up increased my lead to 97 points, I got inexplicably paranoid that he would come back with ZA A14 49, even though I'd still be up 48 after that and in possession of the blank. I looked at the pool and gambled that with all those good letters still out I'd draw into an easy bingo and seal the game on the next turn. I was in effect hoping he'd have to do something on row 14 that would give me something back on row 15. Punishment for this blunder was swift.
>Stephen_Sneed: AEGLRST 14D LARGEST +65 217
>Jim_Burlant: ?AIMORS 15H MOA +31 257
#note The bane of the blank racks, where you only see bingos that don't play and can't find or don't know the ones that do, strikes again. All I saw were 8's like MORALIST, AMBROSIA, ORALISM...but couldn't find/didn't know 1H PASTROMI, PAROSMIA and 10H ISOgRAM. Post-mortem I saw 1G APHORISM but would have passed had I seen it, given that there was the S still unseen. I spent several minutes on this rack looking for the bingo I couldn't find before settling on this. I'm still in good shape, right? On a valuation basis this is not a bad play, as it only gives up 5 points (roughly) to the 1H bingos. This is still a favorable pool with EEEENNNTTT unseen, so hopefully I'll have something next turn.
>Stephen_Sneed: BEHR J7 HERB +31 248
>Jim_Burlant: ?IIRSTT 10J .ITT +6 263
#note Weak play - I thought I should open a line and hope; I was still fixated on the bingo to win the game and was definitely thrown off by the I TT draw with all the unseen E's. K10 It wins the sim...but it probably wouldn't have mattered given my next rack.
>Stephen_Sneed: ILRSW N10 SWIRL +29 277
>Jim_Burlant: ?INRSTW 15L WIST +42 305
#note This time I draw a bingo I know...but it doesn't play. And I spent another couple of minutes looking for the bingo I couldn't find. Running the sim, Quackle suggests TWIN or WRIT 12L, presumably to let me draw into a Z play at 15L. Hmmm. I felt I should take the points and hit him hard, and force him to have to score.
>Stephen_Sneed: DZ B4 .DZ +33 310
>Jim_Burlant: ?FNNNRV 12L Ve.N +14 319
#note Under ideal circumstances this is my game to win. Stephen has to ditch his Q and will have to plan his end game around unloading it. Unfortunately, this isn't an ideal set of circumstances. Because of all the difficult racks and all the time I had to burn trying to find the bingos I couldn't find, I was down to 50 seconds on my clock at the start of this turn. Assuming he unloads his Q with QAT L8, VeNIN 12K followed by F(E)RN F1 wins 338 - 332 (which would be corrected to 336 - 332 after the inevitable recount). It took me almost all of those 50 seconds I had left just to find VeIN...which didn't cut it due to the triplicated N's. And due to time pressure I completely flubbed the end game, gifting Stephen the win.
>Stephen_Sneed: AQ L8 QA. +22 332
>Jim_Burlant: FNNR K10 .F +10 329
>Stephen_Sneed: EEER 7A REE +18 350
>Jim_Burlant: NNR F2 .RN +3 332
>Stephen_Sneed: E 11N .E +7 357
>Stephen_Sneed: (N) +2 359
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