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#159592 05/08/06 05:08 PM
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I'm 45 years old. I have been playing scrabble for some while, having been taught by my grandmother when I was about 5. Today, for the first time, I got to use a variant of my favorite word in a game of scrabble. I played 'obviated' as my first move (second of the game) for about 60 some-odd points. I played two bingos in this 6-6 minute game, but won on time.

#159593 05/09/06 01:21 AM
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Oh, isn't it so SATISFYING, when you finally get to do something you've been waiting for?? 'Fraid the closest I can come was saving letters for a big long play in Bookworm, and I can't even remember now what it was. So--what did you mean by bingos?

P.S.--I hate keeping score in Scrabble. My goal always is simply that all the letters be used, me helping my opponent if necessary.

#159594 05/09/06 10:38 AM
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Nemmine bingos. What's a 6-6 minute game?

#159595 05/09/06 12:10 PM
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Maybe bingo is a general term for bonus squares like double word score, triple word score, double letter score, double martini* etc.



*Playboy edition of Scrabble(TM) 1978

#159596 05/09/06 01:30 PM
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A bingo is using all your letters. I actually scored 216 or something like that (by bingoing across two triple word scores). It wasn't that long ago - maybe a month or so, but I can't recall what the word was. up till that time, when I read of people getting 200 (and 300!) point scores on a single word, I thought they were either exaggerating or were playing in cahoots somehow with their opponents or were simply misremembering (I do it all the time).

6-6 was meant to imply that each player has 6 minutes on his clock. I wasn't sure of the proper nomeclature to express the concept.

Last edited by TheFallibleFiend; 05/09/06 01:33 PM.
#159597 05/09/06 11:50 PM
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For the hungry - seven-letter-placements (aka Bingos) are easier if you recycle the blanks, i.e. replace them on the board with a tile of the same letter from your rack, and then make your play. I partook once in a game in which the first five entries were bingos, and seven of the first nine, using that rule. Final score was roughly 595 to 398.

Regarding clocks: they're like chess clocks - two clocks actually, interconnected so that one starts when the other stops. Your clock runs while it's your turn, and then you push a button stopping yours and starting your opponent's. Not everyone uses them, especially in casual games.

#159598 05/10/06 01:37 AM
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You can take blank tiles off the board and replace them with the letter??? Since when? Wow--that could make some subsequent plays so easy it seems almost like cheating.

#159599 05/10/06 03:04 AM
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Quote:

You can take blank tiles off the board and replace them with the letter??? Since when? Wow--that could make some subsequent plays so easy it seems almost like cheating.




I think that's a Rummicubes rule that someone decided would be *neat in Scrabble!

#159600 05/10/06 01:50 PM
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"P.S.--I hate keeping score in Scrabble. My goal always is simply that all the letters be used, me helping my opponent if necessary. "

Keeping score is easy when you play online. I play at www.isc.ro. There are other sites with scrabble and scrabble-like games, though.

When I was younger, I never played to win - I played to get the coolest word. Of course grandma trashed me. I don't recall ever having beaten her. Perhaps I did, but I don't recall. I played an interesting foursome once. My wife is not a native English speaker. She got her BS in math from Berea college. Her sponsor in the US was the president of Berea College in KY. (In fact, this same man had been her father's teacher at Yale in China HS.) It was me, my wife, the president, and his wife. My wife and I were severely thrashed, but it was a pretty fun game, all the same.

I play to win now, and not to get the coolest word - though sometimes I just can't help myself. Mostly I just play for fun. I can't get into the nastiness. You beat someone - by luck or skill, it doesn't matter - and the first thing do is start cursing because you "cheated" or "used a program" or what have you. I've though perhaps I ought to adopt that philosophy - surely, NOBODY could possibly be THAT MUCH smarter than me, and ANYONE who beats me THAT badly, MUST BE CHEATING!

I figure there's a lot more crazy people walking the streets than there are in all the asylums in the world - and eventually they figure out a way to get on the net.

#159601 05/11/06 01:18 AM
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You fight find interesting: Word Freak, by Stefan Fatsis. Not great literature, but entertaining, and provides some insight into the world of high-level Scrabble®.

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