Will: Hmm, I almost did BENJ and Quackle ever so slightly prefers it, but not for the reason I would expect (allowing fewer bingos) - it actually allows more bingos than JEW (24% to 19%), but almost equivalent average scores, which I think suggests that JEW is easier to overlap for solid scores on non-bingo turns. Even the leftmost placement of BENJ, which certainly looks like it would be hard to play sevens against, yields more bingos than JEW. BENJ then outperforms JEW on my own next turn by several points thanks to the more flexible leave. #tacticssmall
I think 7c ATT might be the play i was looking for. I didn't like that MATT gave back big overlaps, but ATT is better cause his overlaps score less and they will give back a lane on the A column. The pool isn't too dangerous for those overlaps either. I like it to keep ILKA open. I was kinda lost for options here, didn't see anything besides ilka plays that I liked. At this point I was also not so down about playing with ILKA because I figured I could get away with the S hook and challenge it off if he played it. #findingsmall
I missed a rare opportunity to play KAAS here, in the same spot. #findingsmall
I'm not too worried about the C hook here, since The C is usually a word-starter and he only has 6 squares to play a word starting in C.
Q likes FEW way more, really? I can see EEFW being not that good on this board, but it's still not awful. it's saying straight up that I average 2.5 more after FEW and also keep a better leave next turn... I feel like the 2 row after FEW is a more dangerous threat than the O and C after OUCH, although the sim has the immediate bingo % as identical (but mose of the 2 row bingoes will also play on row 7, but later on row 7 will get blocked). However, I think row 2 is easier to block than the marginal OC lanes. Not sure exactly how marginal they are tho, this may not even be a big enough threat to give any weight to. Seems like #tacticssmall but it still doesn't make sense to me that CEOU does so much better
L9 P(H)YLAR blocks L1 JAd(E)ITES, 14H TAJInES, and L8 JE(H)ADIST, but M9 P(E)ARLY only blocks the last two #endgamesad
Players agreed to a final score of 460-323
YOLO moment. LATRIUMS* still in play, but I didn't think this would matter much. Kyle won't play it, I probably won't, he could definitely challenge. 6J F(U)SE is best, missed it. #findingmedium
Although I'm in a great position after HAMATE (his bingoes will empty the bag, leaving me up a tempo in a close endgame, meaning a very likely win), I should still do AHEM N11 - I really loved what that did, but I was only 90% sure that AHEM didn't take an S, and if it takes an S that could be a game-losing mistake. I felt like the chance that AHEM took an S was higher than the chance that HAMATE would lose me the game when AHEM would win me the game. Either way this is just an estimation and a clear word knowledge error. #knowledgemedium
JUBE sims a little bit better. i guess quackle wants me to keep the R and S open for my own strong leave.. even though it's a little more volatile and i'm up. shrug. i do like starting to close down stuff early if possible. -1 #equity #strategysmall
I had a hunch that ARREArED* might be phony, and I saw bingos on 14F. So why didn't I just play DREAREr for only 7 fewer? Quackle strongly prefers fishing off two tiles with O10 EGGER.... #knowledgelarge
I almost played OPIATE/AVAUNT to go for the blank, and then I didn't because I was worried about the spot it created. So fucking stupid, because O11 is already a thing. Idiot. #strategylarge
LOL this is phony! jeez... i remember thinking it looked a little funny, but i was pretty dejected by my record, lol. but even now i thought it was fine. #knowledgelarge
1st key miss this game. I completely missed the SPAVIN hook, but I also had a 3x3 of A8 SUbO(C)EAN, which Mack immediately found after the game. If I'm going to miss the SPAVIN hook and the 3x3, at least spot N7 ApO(L)UNES. He dodged a bullet, didn't he? #findinglarge
quite a few plays with with blank draws, but it's highly unlikely I'll draw the blank after he played bemix. I didn't see any legit wins over the board so I went with AQUAS which put enough scoring pressure on to make his endgame fuckupable. I missed a win with the S though - QUANT wins with the S cause he can't play TiME cause I get STIME/BATS for the win! #endgamelarge
Didn't see SPREDD, which must be better just to shed so much clunk. The left side of the board isn't quite as dire as it looks thanks to ANANA. #findingsmall 16:44
I chose this over AY/YA plays because I hate F's and because AY/YA plays close bingo lanes. But ?AFIS > ?AISY, and 3M YA makes column O a bit harder to use. #strategymedium
The sims said 6A SNOWMEN wins ~82% but 2J WOM(A)NS wins ~85%, which is a bit unintuitive. I think the sim might be overestimating 2J WOM(A)NS slightly because sometimes the opponent will fish 1 with 2 in the bag, but it might still be best. #strategysad
I thought this would bring his bing % down significantly compared to better equity plays, but The Duck says no, only by 1-2 percentage points. #strategymedium
Quackle likes H6 MILE a lot. I don't see what's so great about it, but MIMEOED is probably a mistake anyway, as it blows up the rack. 7E MEG is the best equity play but Championship Player doesn't seem to consider it. D8 VIMEN is reasonable. #strategysmall
Joey: ESCARGOT
Josh: had I seen ESCARGOT during my thought process last turn or as a review of said thought process this turn, I would have challenged QUICKY* off the board and been ahead by 200. I should still challenge because how likely is he to block the D anyway? I don't need to worry pretty much at all about having a spot to bingo. Horrible #knowledgesaddest
F10 (Q)UOTA seems like a good idea here. I didn't like (Q)UAI despite it being more proactive than U(N)AI, since it could help Kevin a decent amount potentially. QUOTA is best by a lot #findingmedium
Tough move here. My hope was that reparalleling MIS with ISO would help me open more of the board on subsequent turns, but particularly blocky AMIS hooks like the one Vince played are bad news. Sim actually prefers LIS slightly over MIS on that basis, allowing many fewer points per turn to Vince by allowing fewer hooks and less lucrative plays down the L column. #strategysmall
considered QUAGS as well, since the G is a huge impediment here. Incredibly, my reasoning was off. The S doesn't improve Joey's chances at a bingo, since QUAGS is otherwise quite defensive. He also scores a whole lot more after QUATE because of the hooks, and my chances of a bingo next turn are only slightly better with GS, perhaps only because of how open of a play QUATE is compared to QUAGS. #strategysmall
js: this is not a word cd: yeah, i wanted to just play POUCH but i didn't like keeping ALL. i didn't think of HAUL I7, pretty straightforward. i spent a lot of time iterating subwords through P and R etc, gotta always get better at anagramming. -6.5 #findingmedium
So many lanes, so much potential! I spent more than 5 minutes looking for bingos and didn't see one. After the game, I gave the rack to Alec and he found the only bingo in about 30 seconds. Dude is *sharp*. Also, LENO 1A is better than any other play by far. I must have gotten flustered after wasting all my time failing to find the bingo that I didn't take more time to find the right non-bingo play. (-30) #visionlarge, #strategylarge, #timemanagementlarge
I liked this for defense, but XI bingos so much it looks like it's worth it. Especially for spread purposes it's probably the correct play, which would matter a lot later in the tournament. #strategymedium
saw 7H NO(G) but hated the leave. saw H2 KON(D)O but didnt stop to consider that, given that it scores as much as MONO, i should probably play it. silly billy mode activated, i say. can i call this a decision paralysis mistake? #tacticssad
spent forever trying to find a triple triple and ran out of time. i hope i would have found POSTBAg if the game depended on it. -14 #findinglarge
i absolutely knew i was going to have a bad tournament after this game. it really sucks to lose the opening game, and as much as i need to practice zen and whatever, you just know it's not your tournament after this. i was not feeling it. i do need to practice staying calm before nationals though, and i should have made more of an effort here.
I felt like a moron after this - I really, truly was weighing BOIL vs LOBI against Noel's leave of TIRES and somehow brain farted and played BOIL, which allows 20% more bingos than LOBI. I remember realizing I had made a big mistake even before Noel played his bingo. #strategylarge 18:52
Before this turn, I had maybe 9 minutes on my clock, but my tracking was off. I think I spent about 8 minutes retracking before realizing we were missing a tile. By the time we found it I had maybe a minute left. I panicked and played this. #TIMESADDEST
I did see E5 DEXTe(R)S, but the leave is not great. The X isn't worth keeping for long on this board, which is where the duck agrees with me. DGST? is not 6 points better than EGS? which would have happened after doing H5 D(I)X(I)T for 24. #findingmeh
So close to doing 8A THO despite the duplicated Is and lost my nerve. Another idea I didn't see: I13 IT to set up ETH plays. KITTEN blows up my rack far too much for not enough points. #strategymedium 13:23
Stopping miracle column A bingos and scary plays like 10B JAR. Something like 2I DINTING is mostly bulletproof as well, though I guess it would suck if Benjy had AGITABLE or EGLATERE. Quackle also likes 11H EMEND which I admit looks quite good to me, holding my lone vowel to dump the Q if I draw it and blocking the N and T of OUTPAINT. #strategysmall
Quackle assigns this the highest valuation, but M11 TOR and a few other plays have undetectably better win chances (99.99 > 99.99 apparently). I considered TOR but I did not realize that it forced bingos ending in S to play on column N instead of column M, thus giving me high-scoring responses. #tacticssmall
didn't know DOMATIA#, though this rack did scream of bingo. I missed DAIM(Y)O and OID(I)A which both significantly improve on this. I looked for something like DAIMYO, such a tough thing to spot. OIDIA should not be tough to spot, but I was intent on leaving the S hook open and totally distracted by what had just happened. Really bad. #findingSADDEST #knowledgeSADDEST
Tunneled on REZ almost immediately, and it's not a huge error; but OOZE and ZOO at least retain some bingo% and need to be considered. #findingsmall 16:51
#knowledgesad for challenge F12 PIU or F13 UP are nice here. I think my play leaves too many vowels. Even 13E (X)U is better (I bingo like 75% of the time after) #tacticssaddest
C13 AWN 10 points is way too many to give up. I saw AWE and discounted it because it's still possible to trip-trip through the E, but the N in that spot is a lot more defensive (opponent's avg score goes up by 7 compared to AWN). My play doesn't stop WR bingos #findingsadder #tacticssad
bingoes like B3 GYrAtED are not worth it here, but IDEAloGY is definitely the right play here. it's 83 points and i should be able to survive a bingo back on column B. i should have looked a bit harder. -16.5 #findinglarge #knowledgelarge
Saw ClAQUER for 125 hooking CANON before he played. Tilted after, and missed the A4 QUARE for 87 leaving C? and the clearly best A2 ACQUiRE for 146. #findingsaddest