Hope everyone enjoyed watching this as much as I enjoyed making it. You've probably all seen Will Anderson's breakdown of the same story, but if you haven't, there's not too much overlap so check it out: th-cam.com/video/6RvNxkQ6Bgs/w-d-xo.html Check out these resources if you're new to Scrabble and want to give it a try: - Discord sever that is the best place to start as a newcomer (I'm on there as @Dings, Will Anderson is @wanderer15): discord.gg/GqkUqA7ENm - You can play online (both against other players and bots of various levels) at woogles.io/ - a site made by Scrabble players for Scrabble players, it's ad-free and based on donations. The official Scrabble dictionaries in English, German, Spanish, French etc. are all implemented there. Even Nigel has a profile there (although he doesn't use it much)! - The analysis engine used in the video is Macondo, created by César del Solar who is also a co-founder of Woogles: domino14.github.io/macondo/ This engine can even solve endgames perfectly - so unlike when I made the first video, we now do have a publicly available engine that can do this. It's even open source! - I compiled other resources for beginners, such as study tools, here: www.reddit.com/r/scrabble/comments/ypklis/an_overview_on_scrabble_resources/ - Finally, world-class player Mack Meller has some highly instructive content: www.youtube.com/@mackmeller
Thanks for your Scrabble videos about Nigel. Very interesting stuff. One question: What were the Challenge rules at the Spanish championship ? Was it double challenge or some point penalty for challenging a legal word ?
@zevkaufman5416 Amazingly, it was free challenge! It wasn't necessarily visible during the broadcast if a player was challenging. Nigel reportedly challenged two 4s though because he had been learning the short words more than a year ago...
@@rakino4418crazy that it's "just a game" but the dude spent maybe a whole year studying a dictionary he couldn't read and then spent money to travel to another country just to stomp on the locals
It's STILL so insane to me that Nigel is considered so close to perfect (if not perfect) that when he DOES make a "mistake" it becomes a game as to how it probably isn't one or is otherwise a play that requires 200+iq regardless. That is how sure people are of his ability... though with stats like his, who wouldn't be???
Reminds me of Steph Curry, while warming up in the NBA he is dribbling on the court and suddenly loses the ball. He proceeds to investigate the court and finds a blind spot, where the ball doesn't bounce right.
That clip is so good. Like,if a normal person did that we would just think we missed the dribble. Steph instantly knew that there was an issue @@ekrotte8714
If Nigel is too shy or uncomfortable with interviews, I do think it would be great if he could write a book about Scrabble, or even just about himself, before he dies. It would be a shame not to have some kind of deeper insight into how his mind works. If he's not good at writing he could get someone to help him, although maybe this would just be another annoyance to him.
My impression is that it doesn't have to do with interviews being outside of his comfort zone. He just doesn't see the point, and I have a hard time imagining he'd see the point of writing a book, as much as I'd like to read that 😅
I.mean, what's he going to say? Be able to memorize everything and have perfect recall? People with these unique abilities generally don't have much useful to say to average people about it.
Nigel is like Tom Bombadil in the Lord of the Rings. He's untouchable and envied for his powers, meanwhile he doesn't care for fortune and just enjoys himself :)
I wonder how easy it is for Nigel to keep the languages apart from each other. Not only does he need to remember a word he has seen before, but also the information which Scrabble dictionary it belongs to. Anyway, I absolutely love this video. I am sure I will end up watching it frequently like the previous one. Shame on the algorithm for suggesting it five days late. :P
Thank you. I can kind of explain that part since I play in two languages as well, German and English, and was surprised to find that the part about keeping the languages apart is surprisingly easy. To me it feels like there are two clearly separated boxes in my head, and I'm not usually confused about what box a word is in. I can't speak for having *four* different boxes in your head though (Spanish, French, international English *and* North American English, which is a separate list!)...
@@AlexDings I am not a Scrabble player, but I speak German, French, Italian and English. I never have a problem with mixing words up, it's more that I might not know a word in one language and then just go by what is the most likely word according to a similar language (eg italian - french). This mostly happens with Italian, my weakest language, or ironically german, my first language, when I don't know what a word is called in german because I only use it in English (normally for finance / economics expressions or parts of a bike, i mean what is a headset in german, or a derailer? ;))
Aw, I love the little tidbits you included at the end of Nigel's video interview, and his haiku submission. He just seems like a sweet guy. I do hope he challenges Germany next! I'd love to see you go head to head with the GOAT, Alex
I don't remember how I found the original video you did but it captured me to the full extent and I even come back and rewatch it every few months. I know nothing about scrabble and it's never really interested me but I love your style of video and love the tale you weave of Nigel and how you show it's not just a top-level memory bank skill. Thank you for putting out another amazing wrapup of his showing in a new language.
Thank you Alex, as we say in french "it stinks work." We are so lucky as a community to have people like you and Will Anderson doing a so amazing job. In a way, Nigel performed an extra performance : he unified our communities, abolishing the borders of our respective languages
17:21 8 words I can really understand in that board and I am a native Spanish speaker from Argentina who has read at least 300 books for a span of time of 20 years until now.
Great video, as always and I am honoured to be featured as a possible victim for Nigel :) The huge fun of seeing Nigel playing in German would be seeing him playing 9+ letter words including all kind of extensions. These are (at least in theory) much likelier in German than in English.
43:54 I had to look at the board probably a solid 30 seconds to confirm this in fact has some resemblance to German :) would love to know the ratio of unusual words in German.
I was so waiting for this and your soothing german accent after Nigel won in spanish. I am also german, and usually have "Fremdschämen" with many germans doing it, but you are nowhere close to that level of Ze Germans(as you said in your "my best game" video in english). Gonna probably rewatch this a couple of times when i go to sleep. Keep doing what you are doing, i almost get lured into learnign german alphagrams :D
woah! the sequel! I’ve been out of the loop lately and I can’t believe I haven’t heard of this happening yet, glad I have something to go along with my dinner now :)
TH-cam keeps recommending me scrabble content for some reason, and as an outsider it seems like you all just have a huge crush on this Nigel guy lmao, I've never seen a scrabble thumbnail or title that wasn't about him - it's endearing
Well, you see those thumbnails because those videos gain the most traction! There's other content out there, but Nigel is sooo much more interesting to the general public
i find it quite impressive too that this extreme level of skill isnt diminishing with age, obviously hes not like grandpa status but he is getting older and often some younger talent tends to eventuallly dominate in competitive kinda stuff like this hope he lives on for many many years :)
I don't play Scrabble and I don't really ever intend to get into Scrabble, but I loved this video series. I do play (euro style) board games and I like competitions/esports. And so finding out about this level of talent and gamesmanship is really cool. Thank you for making these and I hope we see a sequel with you playing against Nigel in German Scrabble!
32:00 I suspect that Nigel's laid back attitude really helps on managing the pressure of these situations. If you aren't that worried about winning or losing, just in playing the game the same as in practice, the pressure simply isn't relevant.
Nice video. Only just seeing this now some three weeks later, but I was apprised of Nigel's wizardry in Granada and had even tried watching the stream a little bit, though it did seem clunky at times. Let me just say though having met Nigel, having spoken to Nigel, and even having a picture taken with Nigel, you just about nailed it with his general mannerisms. I'd add though that he's actually more talkative than one might imagine, and he might even embody the old XTC son "Making Plans For Nigel" where they sang _Nigel is not outspoken but he likes to speak and loves to be spoken to_... Nigel *is* happy in his world.... I think his brain simply works differently than most other people's brains. I was around him and another player in Buffalo in 2014 where she was telling both of us about a tremendous play she had just made in her previous game. With a rack of AEEIRST and places the play the bingos AERIEST and SERIATE, she found the beautiful play of E(LUV)IATE, a non-bingo triple triple for 114 points, banking the R and S and scoring well more than any of her bingo options would have. Nigel responded instantaneously with "but how could that be when it's only 108?" I don't know how many other players out there besides a select few have the natural mathematical ability not to mention board vision in ones own head to imagine where this would play, and total up the score as quickly as he did. I certainly don't have it. The first E from ELUVIATE hooked an R on the board which was right next to the triple word score, which accounts for the 6 extra points, which Nigel immediately understood when she explained. This to me encapsulates the brilliance that he possesses though, and the mastery and skillfulness that he has over the game. He's the GOAT for a reason...
39:00 I think "sticking an opponent with a letter" is the best sounding of the bunch. I believe the issue here isn't with the choice of preposition but with the voice of the phrase. Nigel may be a good player, but he didn't really have any agency in setting up a board state so that L was impossible to play. Nigel didn't stick his opponent with a letter, Nigel's opponent was stuck with a letter. Turning the phrase into one using passive voice makes it sound better in my opinion. Nigel of course recognizes that his opponent is stuck and executes upon that opportunity, but it wasn't due to his intentions that they were stuck with L.
Gibsonización is absolutely fantastic. Unrelated to Nigel, though, I'm curious as to whether words with the digraph letter like TE[RR]OR would be valid as separate letters (TERROR as a 6)? Obviously hideously less useful but still.
I wonder what Nigel would have done if he played a blank and the letter he designated it as wasn't one that was already on the board. Fantastic video BTW.
For some reason, they don't have the "blanks need to be designated in writing" rule in Spanish. There was one situation when I was watching there broadcast where it did happen that Nigel played the blank as a letter that wasn't on the board yet, and he and his opponent appeared to have trouble communicating about it... I don't know why Nigel wouldn't just write the letter down anyway and show his opponent.
I know he doesn't live in Christchurch anymore (where I live) but he must come back here from time to time, so if I ever see him around I shall direct him to this video and tell him, Alex said he could smash you in English or German 😂
Great video, as always! Do you have any idea why there are so much fewer people playing spanish scrabble compared to french scrabble even though there are more spanish speakers worldwide?
The mystery in that comparison to me is why the French community is so big - 20,000 players is astonishing. Never really found a conclusive answer to that. For some reason tournament Scrabble started really early there, earlier than the first English-language World Championships!
I've seen the video about french scrabble and it blew my mind. Now this. This is beyond me. He absorbs this specific knowledge so readily that I feel like if he really wanted to he could become the best in all languages he tries. The only thing that might stop him is his limited lifetime and motivation. This doesn't feel real. When you are so unbelievably good that your mistake is confusing people thinking it might be a strategy they didn't think of...
These letter values are averages, they change depending on the board position and also in terms of how well different letters go together. If we adjusted the point values to make the distribution as balanced as possible, no letters would be better than others in general, but these skills of evaluating them im context would become more important than they already are now. Also, average scores would go way up because in order to average out a letter like the S, you can't really lower its point value since it's already a 1-point tile, so you would have to increase other letters instead
He has Hyperlexia. Words are different for us. The visual word that is. It is not photographic, that term is also not really used anymore in the context of functional individuals. And is nowadays more likely reserved for non-functional, borderline functional savant types. Nowadays eidetic memory is used and it has different forms. With me, I actually do have context, sometimes too much. Overwhelming at times. Socially awkward extremely often. Photographic doesn't apply, you seldom have all the details down to the strands of hair of a person being placed somehow (for me that usually boils down to mental fuzz of that picture in regards to that specific detail, it's hard to describe and it frustrates me not being able to recall that detail to complete it), but you have extremely accurate, for most neurotypical people uncanny, recollection of some specifics in most cases. For me it is texts I read and the context of that text. I can point you to specific news articles and the context of that article from decades ago. Not just on a single topic, but basically on all I read.
One possibility for him when he manages to win in every other language, he could try to play with a set of randomly generated word list, yes just random letter dataset, why not, I am sure he will memorize it all. The main problem I see with it is that no one else could play against him.
44:36 I agree, it would be interesting, since I, as a native Polish speaker, can only think "what the actual fuck is this" when I'm looking at that board
It's a random comment amidst all the other positive commentary on this video but I can't help but laugh that you used the Spanish upside down exclamation point in the thumbnail (¡)
Nigel is like Tom Bombadil in the Lord of the Rings. He's untouchable and envied for his powers, meanwhile he doesn't care for fortune and just enjoys himself :)
44:18 isn’t the board too small for German? Streichholzschachtelfachpapierfabrik … I’m German, strongly dyslexic, will never play scrabble… just stumbled into this video before bed. And now.. nightmares 😱
Off topic: As an American currently struggling mightily to learn a bit of German for an upcoming trip, it’s always frustrating (in a fun way) when somebody (usually a German/Swiss/Dane/etc) apologizes for their poor English while speaking better English than 50% of Americans despite it being their third or fourth language.
I don't mean it in a bad way but pretty much all Europeans are used to learning 1-2 languages besides their native one. English speakers often take it for granted that that particular language is popular nowadays and go their entire lives in blissfulness. As a European this is a wild idea to me, like, people nowadays living like Europeans 60+ years ago
Winning a tournament several rounds in advance is Gibsonization. 24:30 Showing a mind-blowing graphic like this is Jxmyhighrollerization. Or just highrollerization for short. If you watch his videos, you just know it will come. If you like basketball, watch his videos. And if you hate basketball... watch his videos too.
Well Nigel did the same for French Scrabble Memorize the ENTIRE spellings of French/Spanish words by memorizing the ENTIRE Spanish/French Dictionaries.
Heh if he ever took the Icelandic challenge, seems like he'd only need 1% of his power to crush the reigning champion. Solely because the competition is small
If there are no Q-without-U words in Spanish Scrabble, and it already has a mandatory Ch, Ll, and Rr tile, why on God’s Green Earth doesn’t it have a Qu tile instead of a Q tile?!
Hope everyone enjoyed watching this as much as I enjoyed making it. You've probably all seen Will Anderson's breakdown of the same story, but if you haven't, there's not too much overlap so check it out: th-cam.com/video/6RvNxkQ6Bgs/w-d-xo.html
Check out these resources if you're new to Scrabble and want to give it a try:
- Discord sever that is the best place to start as a newcomer (I'm on there as @Dings, Will Anderson is @wanderer15): discord.gg/GqkUqA7ENm
- You can play online (both against other players and bots of various levels) at woogles.io/ - a site made by Scrabble players for Scrabble players, it's ad-free and based on donations. The official Scrabble dictionaries in English, German, Spanish, French etc. are all implemented there. Even Nigel has a profile there (although he doesn't use it much)!
- The analysis engine used in the video is Macondo, created by César del Solar who is also a co-founder of Woogles: domino14.github.io/macondo/
This engine can even solve endgames perfectly - so unlike when I made the first video, we now do have a publicly available engine that can do this. It's even open source!
- I compiled other resources for beginners, such as study tools, here: www.reddit.com/r/scrabble/comments/ypklis/an_overview_on_scrabble_resources/
- Finally, world-class player Mack Meller has some highly instructive content: www.youtube.com/@mackmeller
Thanks for your Scrabble videos about Nigel. Very interesting stuff. One question: What were the Challenge rules at the Spanish championship ? Was it double challenge or some point penalty for challenging a legal word ?
@zevkaufman5416 Amazingly, it was free challenge! It wasn't necessarily visible during the broadcast if a player was challenging. Nigel reportedly challenged two 4s though because he had been learning the short words more than a year ago...
I think your English is pretty darn good
Hilarious that Nigel lost the Duplicate because he was too embarrassed to ask someone to move out of the way.
He's quoted as saying he didn't bother asking the guy to move because "its just a game"
It sounds like he did try to fix the problem, but the timer almost ran out for that turn by the time he succeeded
@@rakino4418crazy that it's "just a game" but the dude spent maybe a whole year studying a dictionary he couldn't read and then spent money to travel to another country just to stomp on the locals
How does that even work, how can you physically stand in the way of somone's letters and/or board?
@@TheMarkoSeke its duplicate - they are playing from common board projected on a screen at the front of the room
rolling laughing at the "my trip to the lake" one-liner. amazing work on this, so many great extra details.
43:25 had me rolling
It's STILL so insane to me that Nigel is considered so close to perfect (if not perfect) that when he DOES make a "mistake" it becomes a game as to how it probably isn't one or is otherwise a play that requires 200+iq regardless. That is how sure people are of his ability... though with stats like his, who wouldn't be???
Reminds me of Steph Curry, while warming up in the NBA he is dribbling on the court and suddenly loses the ball. He proceeds to investigate the court and finds a blind spot, where the ball doesn't bounce right.
That clip is so good.
Like,if a normal person did that we would just think we missed the dribble. Steph instantly knew that there was an issue @@ekrotte8714
If Nigel is too shy or uncomfortable with interviews, I do think it would be great if he could write a book about Scrabble, or even just about himself, before he dies. It would be a shame not to have some kind of deeper insight into how his mind works. If he's not good at writing he could get someone to help him, although maybe this would just be another annoyance to him.
My impression is that it doesn't have to do with interviews being outside of his comfort zone. He just doesn't see the point, and I have a hard time imagining he'd see the point of writing a book, as much as I'd like to read that 😅
I.mean, what's he going to say? Be able to memorize everything and have perfect recall? People with these unique abilities generally don't have much useful to say to average people about it.
@@dash4800 Nigel's play goes beyond perfect knowledge. His strategic play is out of reach for other players too.
Nigel is like Tom Bombadil in the Lord of the Rings. He's untouchable and envied for his powers, meanwhile he doesn't care for fortune and just enjoys himself :)
@@dash4800 Buuut his perfect word knowledge is the "least" impressive part of his game. And that's saying a lottttttttttt.
I wonder how easy it is for Nigel to keep the languages apart from each other. Not only does he need to remember a word he has seen before, but also the information which Scrabble dictionary it belongs to. Anyway, I absolutely love this video. I am sure I will end up watching it frequently like the previous one. Shame on the algorithm for suggesting it five days late. :P
Thank you. I can kind of explain that part since I play in two languages as well, German and English, and was surprised to find that the part about keeping the languages apart is surprisingly easy. To me it feels like there are two clearly separated boxes in my head, and I'm not usually confused about what box a word is in. I can't speak for having *four* different boxes in your head though (Spanish, French, international English *and* North American English, which is a separate list!)...
@@AlexDings I am not a Scrabble player, but I speak German, French, Italian and English. I never have a problem with mixing words up, it's more that I might not know a word in one language and then just go by what is the most likely word according to a similar language (eg italian - french). This mostly happens with Italian, my weakest language, or ironically german, my first language, when I don't know what a word is called in german because I only use it in English (normally for finance / economics expressions or parts of a bike, i mean what is a headset in german, or a derailer? ;))
@@ReaperCH90Steuersatz und Schaltwerk. Beide nicht zulässig im deutschen Scrabble 😂
Das ist jetzt sehr pedantisch von mir, aber die Wörter sind beide gültig scrabble-info.de/wortlisten/superdic-checker/
So weiß ich in Zukunft zumindest, welches der korrekte Wortchecker ist 😀
I have been smiling stupidly for the last 45 or so minutes
Thanks again, Alex. Lieblich, wie immer.
Aw, I love the little tidbits you included at the end of Nigel's video interview, and his haiku submission. He just seems like a sweet guy. I do hope he challenges Germany next! I'd love to see you go head to head with the GOAT, Alex
Definitely a life goal to play a tournament game against Nigel at some point - preferably in German but I'd take English as well
"The reason it's called Duplicate is because the computer duplicates my moves" 😂😂😂
41:58
He showed up, won the world-championship, refused to elaborate and left before the ceremony.
I don't remember how I found the original video you did but it captured me to the full extent and I even come back and rewatch it every few months. I know nothing about scrabble and it's never really interested me but I love your style of video and love the tale you weave of Nigel and how you show it's not just a top-level memory bank skill. Thank you for putting out another amazing wrapup of his showing in a new language.
I'd say you know quite a bit about Scrabble now :-)
Thank you Alex, as we say in french "it stinks work." We are so lucky as a community to have people like you and Will Anderson doing a so amazing job. In a way, Nigel performed an extra performance : he unified our communities, abolishing the borders of our respective languages
I was continuously entertained by the Richard Nigel memes. Great video.
if they have double letters in one tile, maybe they should make QU into a single tile as well.
Apparently it's a popular house rule to just have the Q tile count as QU by default. Would definitely fix the imbalance.
17:21 8 words I can really understand in that board and I am a native Spanish speaker from Argentina who has read at least 300 books for a span of time of 20 years until now.
Great video, as always and I am honoured to be featured as a possible victim for Nigel :) The huge fun of seeing Nigel playing in German would be seeing him playing 9+ letter words including all kind of extensions. These are (at least in theory) much likelier in German than in English.
17:10 I just comment to confirm that, as a native Spanish speaker that has never played scrabble, this seems like 50% common and 50% obscure words.
43:54 I had to look at the board probably a solid 30 seconds to confirm this in fact has some resemblance to German :) would love to know the ratio of unusual words in German.
I was so waiting for this and your soothing german accent after Nigel won in spanish. I am also german, and usually have "Fremdschämen" with many germans doing it, but you are nowhere close to that level of Ze Germans(as you said in your "my best game" video in english). Gonna probably rewatch this a couple of times when i go to sleep. Keep doing what you are doing, i almost get lured into learnign german alphagrams :D
woah! the sequel! I’ve been out of the loop lately and I can’t believe I haven’t heard of this happening yet, glad I have something to go along with my dinner now :)
YY is an onomatopeia for confusion in Polish, so you nailed it Alex :)
TH-cam keeps recommending me scrabble content for some reason, and as an outsider it seems like you all just have a huge crush on this Nigel guy lmao, I've never seen a scrabble thumbnail or title that wasn't about him - it's endearing
Well, you see those thumbnails because those videos gain the most traction! There's other content out there, but Nigel is sooo much more interesting to the general public
@AlexDings haha yeah I get that!
This was such a great video, and the analytical insights you provided were fantastic!
Gosh I love these updates, memes, and footnotes. Thank you!
What an amazing video, and thank you for the abundant usage and praise of Woogles!
This video was a total joy from beginning to end. So many Easter eggs and pause-worthy details. Danke schoen!
This was wonderful, thank you for the deep dive
Danke Alex! Du bist eine Legende dafür dass du so tolle Videos machst.
Viel Liebe zum Detail und guter Humor, traumhaft!
i find it quite impressive too that this extreme level of skill isnt diminishing with age, obviously hes not like grandpa status but he is getting older and often some younger talent tends to eventuallly dominate in competitive kinda stuff like this
hope he lives on for many many years :)
Training your brain keeps neurons from degeneration
Sehr gut gemachtes Video, gerne mehr solcher Content gerne auch über Nicht-Scrabble Themen!
I have never watch a scrabble game in my life, but this was really fun to watch. So thanks
I like how you used the same photos of him.
Like he truly doesn't get in front of a camera
Nigel Richards is not the Magnus Carlsen of Scrabble, he is the Stockfish of Scrabble
I don't play Scrabble and I don't really ever intend to get into Scrabble, but I loved this video series. I do play (euro style) board games and I like competitions/esports. And so finding out about this level of talent and gamesmanship is really cool. Thank you for making these and I hope we see a sequel with you playing against Nigel in German Scrabble!
What a great video! I would have never thought scrabble could be so interesting, but this is some crazy stuff
32:44 love his reaction here, just "cool, what did I miss?"
32:00 I suspect that Nigel's laid back attitude really helps on managing the pressure of these situations. If you aren't that worried about winning or losing, just in playing the game the same as in practice, the pressure simply isn't relevant.
Thank you for a great video! Really good content
Nice video. Only just seeing this now some three weeks later, but I was apprised of Nigel's wizardry in Granada and had even tried watching the stream a little bit, though it did seem clunky at times.
Let me just say though having met Nigel, having spoken to Nigel, and even having a picture taken with Nigel, you just about nailed it with his general mannerisms. I'd add though that he's actually more talkative than one might imagine, and he might even embody the old XTC son "Making Plans For Nigel" where they sang _Nigel is not outspoken but he likes to speak and loves to be spoken to_... Nigel *is* happy in his world....
I think his brain simply works differently than most other people's brains. I was around him and another player in Buffalo in 2014 where she was telling both of us about a tremendous play she had just made in her previous game. With a rack of AEEIRST and places the play the bingos AERIEST and SERIATE, she found the beautiful play of E(LUV)IATE, a non-bingo triple triple for 114 points, banking the R and S and scoring well more than any of her bingo options would have. Nigel responded instantaneously with "but how could that be when it's only 108?" I don't know how many other players out there besides a select few have the natural mathematical ability not to mention board vision in ones own head to imagine where this would play, and total up the score as quickly as he did. I certainly don't have it. The first E from ELUVIATE hooked an R on the board which was right next to the triple word score, which accounts for the 6 extra points, which Nigel immediately understood when she explained. This to me encapsulates the brilliance that he possesses though, and the mastery and skillfulness that he has over the game.
He's the GOAT for a reason...
Once again and amazing video on this living legend of a player!
Was hoping you’d do a part two!
I was about to say Alex, watch him come for your language next. Haha
Great and loved the comedy too. (You rang, Alex?). Thank you.
39:00 I think "sticking an opponent with a letter" is the best sounding of the bunch. I believe the issue here isn't with the choice of preposition but with the voice of the phrase. Nigel may be a good player, but he didn't really have any agency in setting up a board state so that L was impossible to play. Nigel didn't stick his opponent with a letter, Nigel's opponent was stuck with a letter. Turning the phrase into one using passive voice makes it sound better in my opinion.
Nigel of course recognizes that his opponent is stuck and executes upon that opportunity, but it wasn't due to his intentions that they were stuck with L.
Everyone else fighting for second place while my man is playing expansion packs.💀
"What'd I miss? TARTARIZE? Ha, your computer is busted but I keep track of it as a joke in my head anyway."
This video is amazing, great job
Gibsonización is absolutely fantastic. Unrelated to Nigel, though, I'm curious as to whether words with the digraph letter like TE[RR]OR would be valid as separate letters (TERROR as a 6)? Obviously hideously less useful but still.
no
Just rewatched the video about Nigel winning French scrabble yesterday and suddenly this gets uploaded.
The upside-down exclamation point in the thumbnail is hilarious 😂
I wonder what Nigel would have done if he played a blank and the letter he designated it as wasn't one that was already on the board.
Fantastic video BTW.
normally in a tournament, the letter of the blank has to be written (or circled) on paper. You do not need to pronounce the letter.
For some reason, they don't have the "blanks need to be designated in writing" rule in Spanish. There was one situation when I was watching there broadcast where it did happen that Nigel played the blank as a letter that wasn't on the board yet, and he and his opponent appeared to have trouble communicating about it... I don't know why Nigel wouldn't just write the letter down anyway and show his opponent.
The eagerly-awaited sequel is here
I know he doesn't live in Christchurch anymore (where I live) but he must come back here from time to time, so if I ever see him around I shall direct him to this video and tell him, Alex said he could smash you in English or German 😂
Great video, as always! Do you have any idea why there are so much fewer people playing spanish scrabble compared to french scrabble even though there are more spanish speakers worldwide?
The mystery in that comparison to me is why the French community is so big - 20,000 players is astonishing. Never really found a conclusive answer to that. For some reason tournament Scrabble started really early there, earlier than the first English-language World Championships!
@@AlexDings Thanks for the answer, that is actually astonishing!
I don’t think the two nickels joke is gonna be enough this time
Also have to mention how ROFL that Princess Bride reference really, truly applies to this. Amazing
I've seen the video about french scrabble and it blew my mind. Now this. This is beyond me. He absorbs this specific knowledge so readily that I feel like if he really wanted to he could become the best in all languages he tries. The only thing that might stop him is his limited lifetime and motivation. This doesn't feel real. When you are so unbelievably good that your mistake is confusing people thinking it might be a strategy they didn't think of...
I think part of how he can do it is that he's not really learning it like a language. It's almost more mathematical.
15:48 i wonder how would rebalanced (letter score) Scrabble that makes this graph to be a straight line would work
These letter values are averages, they change depending on the board position and also in terms of how well different letters go together. If we adjusted the point values to make the distribution as balanced as possible, no letters would be better than others in general, but these skills of evaluating them im context would become more important than they already are now. Also, average scores would go way up because in order to average out a letter like the S, you can't really lower its point value since it's already a 1-point tile, so you would have to increase other letters instead
@AlexDings so I guess it'll be good, no drawback? Except inertia ig
Si te toca una Q, ya puedes ir desesperadamente en busca de una U, ya sea en la bolsa ya sea en el tablero.
Thank you again for 45 Minutes of laughter :D
The Nigelated meme got a big laugh
Can the live coverage be watched anywhere? I'd love to hear commentators' reactions when Nigel's victory became a certainty...
Unfortunately there was no live commentary - the broadcasts are here though: www.youtube.com/@scrabblemesa1/videos
@AlexDings Thanks!
37:29 So what you’re saying is that Nigel made a correct move because the engine can’t or won’t disagree? Seem accurate.
He has Hyperlexia. Words are different for us. The visual word that is. It is not photographic, that term is also not really used anymore in the context of functional individuals. And is nowadays more likely reserved for non-functional, borderline functional savant types. Nowadays eidetic memory is used and it has different forms. With me, I actually do have context, sometimes too much. Overwhelming at times. Socially awkward extremely often. Photographic doesn't apply, you seldom have all the details down to the strands of hair of a person being placed somehow (for me that usually boils down to mental fuzz of that picture in regards to that specific detail, it's hard to describe and it frustrates me not being able to recall that detail to complete it), but you have extremely accurate, for most neurotypical people uncanny, recollection of some specifics in most cases. For me it is texts I read and the context of that text. I can point you to specific news articles and the context of that article from decades ago. Not just on a single topic, but basically on all I read.
5:56 Best of the memes xD
One possibility for him when he manages to win in every other language, he could try to play with a set of randomly generated word list, yes just random letter dataset, why not, I am sure he will memorize it all. The main problem I see with it is that no one else could play against him.
Nigel is such a dork i love him
I hope this dude wins an Italian scrabble championship next
12:51 oh so it's not like French where duplicate is more prestigious?
44:08 I didn't know Jürgen Klopp played Scrabble in his youth! :D
If Nigel ever goes for the German championship, I'll be hoping that you win
He can be the only contestant in the new category Multilingual Scrabble.
Don't forget my man Serge Emig! 😀
Would be fire to see him in Russian scrabble
That's another language where there surprisingly seems to be no tournament scene!
did they get the dog out of the oven in time? that's all I need to know
Fantastic video as always Alex!
9:02 con que ahí está Selene Delgado 💀💀💀
He can't keep getting away with this /lh
Si Richards fuera ciclista, se podría decir que ha ganado el Tour, el Giro y la Vuelta.
44:36 I agree, it would be interesting, since I, as a native Polish speaker, can only think "what the actual fuck is this" when I'm looking at that board
I'm sure in a few years nigel will become the german scrabble champion too
It's a random comment amidst all the other positive commentary on this video but I can't help but laugh that you used the Spanish upside down exclamation point in the thumbnail (¡)
Nigel is like Tom Bombadil in the Lord of the Rings. He's untouchable and envied for his powers, meanwhile he doesn't care for fortune and just enjoys himself :)
44:18 isn’t the board too small for German? Streichholzschachtelfachpapierfabrik … I’m German, strongly dyslexic, will never play scrabble… just stumbled into this video before bed. And now.. nightmares 😱
There's gonna be like 17 of "The _ Scrabble Champion who doesn't speak _" soon enough
30:40 nunca había visto un juego de scrabble profesional y solo conozco como 5 palabras de todo el tablero jaja
Off topic: As an American currently struggling mightily to learn a bit of German for an upcoming trip, it’s always frustrating (in a fun way) when somebody (usually a German/Swiss/Dane/etc) apologizes for their poor English while speaking better English than 50% of Americans despite it being their third or fourth language.
I don't mean it in a bad way but pretty much all Europeans are used to learning 1-2 languages besides their native one. English speakers often take it for granted that that particular language is popular nowadays and go their entire lives in blissfulness. As a European this is a wild idea to me, like, people nowadays living like Europeans 60+ years ago
When you're an absolute genius but all you can do with it is... play Scrabble xD
Winning a tournament several rounds in advance is Gibsonization.
24:30 Showing a mind-blowing graphic like this is Jxmyhighrollerization. Or just highrollerization for short. If you watch his videos, you just know it will come. If you like basketball, watch his videos. And if you hate basketball... watch his videos too.
I would like to see him visit a cassino.
Nigel would probably be the one player who would in an endgame that he is already winning regardless, not play has name, in favour of the best play.
I'm bad at Scrabble.
I'm pretty good at haikus.
Nigel so gets me.
👏🏻
What does yy mean in Polish?
According to the guy who posted that photo: "interjection when you don't know what to say" - seems appropriate to me 😅
Well Nigel did the same for French Scrabble Memorize the ENTIRE spellings of French/Spanish words by memorizing the ENTIRE Spanish/French Dictionaries.
Heh if he ever took the Icelandic challenge, seems like he'd only need 1% of his power to crush the reigning champion. Solely because the competition is small
8:43 thats an old reference
14:32 hilarious!!!
Ahh, I remember the first video
Iove the memes :)
up until the eighth round where nigel finally... no, jk nigel wins LMAO
If there are no Q-without-U words in Spanish Scrabble, and it already has a mandatory Ch, Ll, and Rr tile, why on God’s Green Earth doesn’t it have a Qu tile instead of a Q tile?!
His brain must be crazy 😂