A big thanks to Will for the great recaps! I've reviewed the games on my own as well and can share some of my perspectives: Game 1 - Round 24 I5 WOP with AEGOPRW: While Will very kindly gives me credit for trying to play some defense, this was a complete misread and overreaction to his last play. I thought he had really good stuff, possibly an S. My thinking was that I would force his bingo to open lots of floaters that I could counter bingo with my leave of AEGR. In reality, he's making this play with a lot of different racks since it scores 30 points, including keeping a bunch of consonants which is was actually happened. Even if he does have a strong leave, I don't think the defensive value of this warrants the equity sacrifice. The equity play of 15A PEW or D4 GAW is fine here. 9G A(V)A with AAAEGIR: Again, this is another move that's perhaps a bit too panicky. Sacrificing 6 points to play this over 13C AA doesn't seem justified in hindsight since a simulation indicated that it doesn't significantly reduce his bingo percentage. I think I definitely got a bit lucky that it happened to block J9 UNRESTS later in the game. H1 WO(R)M with HMOTUWY: This was a pretty bad miss of C3 MOUTHY. I knew YCLEPT but just didn't see it. I was a bit disappointed in myself when Will used the hook later and I realized I missed it. L1 YO(U)TH with AEHOTUY: I played too fast and tunneled a bit too much on trying to block the U and E in GARRIGUE to maybe force his potential bingos to give me some good counterplay. There are some better, more standard plays like K3 (G)OETY and 12H (C)OUTHY (I wasn't 100% sure of COUTHY, I thought it may have just been the COUTHIE spelling that was valid) that seem fine here. A6 AJI with ADEIJRT: I was very fortunate to have drawn into a high scoring J play that is able to outrun all of the potential bingos. Only A6 AJI and D1 JAI win everytime according to Quackle, and if I don't have one of those or if AF* is a word (allowing stuff like 12H (C)AITIFfS), my decision becomes a lot harder. Game 2 - Round 25 3C BR(A)ZE with BEPRRXZ: This is just a straight up terrible miss of BRAZER, which I wasn't sure of. The raw equity between keeping and playing the R on the end is very close, but leaving the DNRS hooks open is really bad for me and I really paid for it later. My sixes still need serious work. I was lucky to come away with a win after what happened. H12 (E)XPO with BIJOPRX: Again, missing the BRAZER hook. 13A AJIVA(S) with AABIJRV: I had a few options that were better equity such as 11I RAJA, 11I RAJ, and K8 AJIV(A), but I just got bad "vibes" about the resulting position. I thought that after 11I RAJA or 11I RAJ, Will would play on row 13 and it didn't seem like I would have much counterplay. Similarly, K8 AJIV(A) puts the A on K8 which gives Will the opportunity to hit the triple or play on the L column for a good score. After these plays, the floaters in TREENAIL would be gone and the board didn't seem to have many great scoring opportunities. I thought that if I played 13A AJIVA(S), there would at least be two somewhat decent places to score on Will's turn (column A and row 11) and that I would get one of them. That being said, that evaluation is seems like an overreaction in hindsight. I'm not down by that much and there's still opportunities to draw one of the blanks to come back. I think I leaned a bit too heavily on how I felt this turn instead of playing objectively. Any of the equity plays including something like 11K JA is probably better than what I played. I got lucky that Will couldn't really do much about the A in the triple lane. 14H (P)EW with EEIIUW?: This was a very tough play. Maybe with more tiles in the bag, D1 WI(R)E would be okay, but with three in the bag the endgame timing is terrible and it also does nothing to block his potential bingoes. I decided I needed to do two things: 1) Block the O since the pool is a bit consonant heavy and it seemed like he might need the O more than the T or D for bingos. Also, since I have too many vowels, the O doesn't really help my chances of bingoing, so blocking it made sense. 2) Play fewer than 3 tiles to give me a chance to counter bingo in the (hopefully) open spot if Will bingos from the T or D. I'm honestly not sure what the best play is. 14H (P)EW seems fine to me, but there could definitely be something better.
Fair play to Josh, the double blank can be a bit of a mixed blessing at times. When you have only one bingo with a double blank, it can be really hard to find.
play to your outs! if there's something you can't know that dictates whether it's possible for you to win, it's correct to play as if you know it's your favour. it's obvious when you put it that way but this is a really nice demonstration of it: you don't know what's in the bag, but you can win if it's a blank, so you play like it's a blank "play to your outs" is a phrase i picked up from mtg but it's applicable in a lot of other games and it's a helpful way to think about endgames in basically all of them. you can't be worrying about making your position better in the case where you can't win
This comprehensive turn by turn game analysis gives a more representing overview of a typical tournament game than the usual style of video that mostly focuses on highlights, you love to see it. I suppose that's why I hear everyone calling you the Daniel Day-Lewis of chess
18:29 would it not have scored more to play FIL, making FE, IN and hitting the triple for 25 points? It’s probably a worse leave, but it would be better than blocking bingos from the T, or i would’ve thought it is, but idk
I don’t understand why you made the text at the bottom a scrolling marquee. Not only does that mean that half of the definitions don’t show, it is also completely distracting and makes it impossible to focus on the static Scrabble board when you explain your thought process. Please change it to a static line of text. Even in the rare case where the full definition won’t fit and runs off the edge of the screen, it’s still worlds better than this.
Great breakdown as always! The best of 5 between Josh and Waseem is being unofficially streamed by Heidi from the annotation station on Twitch under her username, HeroineToBirds!
@ That would be awesome. Your channel has gotten me into scrabble and i’m loving it. Enjoy watching the ones where you break down your own play. Keep it up!
Wait, is 4th place in Collins "Winter" the phenom from high school? I think she lives in Texas or something like that? If so, very impressive for someone so young!
For now, we only have the staffing/tech to showcase one game at a time, which is a shame, as so many amazing games get played each round. Something for us to aspire to!
Video idea: The new musical, The Connector just came out on TH-cam (th-cam.com/video/P0-MBMGfvdI/w-d-xo.htmlsi=XEzv0ApBLNzOZYAi). It has a song called “Success” that’s Scrabble themed sung by a Scrabble master character. Would love to get feedback on the accuracy- The video had the board, too!
A big thanks to Will for the great recaps! I've reviewed the games on my own as well and can share some of my perspectives:
Game 1 - Round 24
I5 WOP with AEGOPRW: While Will very kindly gives me credit for trying to play some defense, this was a complete misread and overreaction to his last play. I thought he had really good stuff, possibly an S. My thinking was that I would force his bingo to open lots of floaters that I could counter bingo with my leave of AEGR. In reality, he's making this play with a lot of different racks since it scores 30 points, including keeping a bunch of consonants which is was actually happened. Even if he does have a strong leave, I don't think the defensive value of this warrants the equity sacrifice. The equity play of 15A PEW or D4 GAW is fine here.
9G A(V)A with AAAEGIR: Again, this is another move that's perhaps a bit too panicky. Sacrificing 6 points to play this over 13C AA doesn't seem justified in hindsight since a simulation indicated that it doesn't significantly reduce his bingo percentage. I think I definitely got a bit lucky that it happened to block J9 UNRESTS later in the game.
H1 WO(R)M with HMOTUWY: This was a pretty bad miss of C3 MOUTHY. I knew YCLEPT but just didn't see it. I was a bit disappointed in myself when Will used the hook later and I realized I missed it.
L1 YO(U)TH with AEHOTUY: I played too fast and tunneled a bit too much on trying to block the U and E in GARRIGUE to maybe force his potential bingos to give me some good counterplay. There are some better, more standard plays like K3 (G)OETY and 12H (C)OUTHY (I wasn't 100% sure of COUTHY, I thought it may have just been the COUTHIE spelling that was valid) that seem fine here.
A6 AJI with ADEIJRT: I was very fortunate to have drawn into a high scoring J play that is able to outrun all of the potential bingos. Only A6 AJI and D1 JAI win everytime according to Quackle, and if I don't have one of those or if AF* is a word (allowing stuff like 12H (C)AITIFfS), my decision becomes a lot harder.
Game 2 - Round 25
3C BR(A)ZE with BEPRRXZ: This is just a straight up terrible miss of BRAZER, which I wasn't sure of. The raw equity between keeping and playing the R on the end is very close, but leaving the DNRS hooks open is really bad for me and I really paid for it later. My sixes still need serious work. I was lucky to come away with a win after what happened.
H12 (E)XPO with BIJOPRX: Again, missing the BRAZER hook.
13A AJIVA(S) with AABIJRV: I had a few options that were better equity such as 11I RAJA, 11I RAJ, and K8 AJIV(A), but I just got bad "vibes" about the resulting position. I thought that after 11I RAJA or 11I RAJ, Will would play on row 13 and it didn't seem like I would have much counterplay. Similarly, K8 AJIV(A) puts the A on K8 which gives Will the opportunity to hit the triple or play on the L column for a good score. After these plays, the floaters in TREENAIL would be gone and the board didn't seem to have many great scoring opportunities. I thought that if I played 13A AJIVA(S), there would at least be two somewhat decent places to score on Will's turn (column A and row 11) and that I would get one of them. That being said, that evaluation is seems like an overreaction in hindsight. I'm not down by that much and there's still opportunities to draw one of the blanks to come back. I think I leaned a bit too heavily on how I felt this turn instead of playing objectively. Any of the equity plays including something like 11K JA is probably better than what I played. I got lucky that Will couldn't really do much about the A in the triple lane.
14H (P)EW with EEIIUW?: This was a very tough play. Maybe with more tiles in the bag, D1 WI(R)E would be okay, but with three in the bag the endgame timing is terrible and it also does nothing to block his potential bingoes. I decided I needed to do two things: 1) Block the O since the pool is a bit consonant heavy and it seemed like he might need the O more than the T or D for bingos. Also, since I have too many vowels, the O doesn't really help my chances of bingoing, so blocking it made sense. 2) Play fewer than 3 tiles to give me a chance to counter bingo in the (hopefully) open spot if Will bingos from the T or D. I'm honestly not sure what the best play is. 14H (P)EW seems fine to me, but there could definitely be something better.
Fair play to Josh, the double blank can be a bit of a mixed blessing at times. When you have only one bingo with a double blank, it can be really hard to find.
Yeah, there is like 300 something two letter combinations, so that it is a lot of pages to flip through in your head.
MUDIRIEH was a championship-level find for sure.
MUDIR, MUDIRIA, MUDIRIEH are a nice triplet of words to learn
Thanks. Added that to my vocabulary
play to your outs! if there's something you can't know that dictates whether it's possible for you to win, it's correct to play as if you know it's your favour. it's obvious when you put it that way but this is a really nice demonstration of it: you don't know what's in the bag, but you can win if it's a blank, so you play like it's a blank
"play to your outs" is a phrase i picked up from mtg but it's applicable in a lot of other games and it's a helpful way to think about endgames in basically all of them. you can't be worrying about making your position better in the case where you can't win
This comprehensive turn by turn game analysis gives a more representing overview of a typical tournament game than the usual style of video that mostly focuses on highlights, you love to see it. I suppose that's why I hear everyone calling you the Daniel Day-Lewis of chess
Hummus (the food) is spelled with 2 m’s. The word you played, humus, is a different word meaning “decomposed organic matter”.
I ate a lot of humus last night
Great games and awesome videos. Thank you!
excellent analysis very instructive
Thank you for the recap!
Watching you live on Wirtuals stream. Was surprised to see you on a different twitch channel! :)
was the sound a bit low or was it me?
that's because he's using his earbuds mic, instead of a standalone mic (since he's traveling)
4:15 It *does* set up the SWOP hook, but it's easier to end than to start with an S.
Here I go making commentary right before the video does...
FIE is a crazy find, PIE in the same spot is tempting as it sets up FACeS as well as C(R)AFtS with a blank draw, but Josh can block both and win.
18:29 would it not have scored more to play FIL, making FE, IN and hitting the triple for 25 points? It’s probably a worse leave, but it would be better than blocking bingos from the T, or i would’ve thought it is, but idk
Oh no way, you’re a Lawrenceville native? Spent a summer there doing non profit work, lot of love for Lawrenceville ❤️
these were great!
These are so good. Do you have more analysis coming?
I don’t understand why you made the text at the bottom a scrolling marquee. Not only does that mean that half of the definitions don’t show, it is also completely distracting and makes it impossible to focus on the static Scrabble board when you explain your thought process. Please change it to a static line of text. Even in the rare case where the full definition won’t fit and runs off the edge of the screen, it’s still worlds better than this.
Good call, will fix that in the future
I agree, those scrolling definitions are quite entertaining 👀
Bro I had a Scrable competition and I had lost from school jem tentera
@@wanderer15you are way better than Nigel richard
ktane guy :o
Great breakdown as always! The best of 5 between Josh and Waseem is being unofficially streamed by Heidi from the annotation station on Twitch under her username, HeroineToBirds!
I'm surprised you commented on ouens looking weird but not on yclept lol
There are so many Y- past tense forms that one gets desensitized
under 5 mins hello will Anderson you helped me in Scrabble alot especially the hooks
@15:52 The rack shown has 7 consonants.
Wow, VIBED is NWL only. Or is it in CSW24 as well?
@mouykaing7456 there are lots available if you look hard enough, but the release date for CSW24 is Aug 15
Will you ever stream yourself playing scrabble?
I used to, but it's hard to find the time! Hope to get back to it someday.
@ That would be awesome. Your channel has gotten me into scrabble and i’m loving it. Enjoy watching the ones where you break down your own play. Keep it up!
I wonder how ZIN (32) compares to ZEDA; you had just talked about wanting to keep bingo tiles. ZIN seems better.
Scrabble good
Mudirieh 😮
Wait, is 4th place in Collins "Winter" the phenom from high school? I think she lives in Texas or something like that? If so, very impressive for someone so young!
Nope! Winter is a middle aged dude lol
Why aren't these games being broadcast live?
For now, we only have the staffing/tech to showcase one game at a time, which is a shame, as so many amazing games get played each round. Something for us to aspire to!
Hello
GL
YOOOOOOOOOO IM A JAFA
Wow noice
BUHLS 😍
Damn people named Ian can be pronouned E-yahn, I-yahn, and yahn now apparently
jjjjj
BUT BROTHER, WHAT ARE YOU GONNA DOoo, WHENN THE HULKAMANIACS COME AFTER YOUUu!!
Video idea: The new musical, The Connector just came out on TH-cam (th-cam.com/video/P0-MBMGfvdI/w-d-xo.htmlsi=XEzv0ApBLNzOZYAi). It has a song called “Success” that’s Scrabble themed sung by a Scrabble master character. Would love to get feedback on the accuracy- The video had the board, too!
Starts at 17:53!
How cool, I'll check it out!