Oh yeah, about 3 weeks ago, I started posting games online, one a day. Check it out. What to do about this main page? Working on it, but who knows.
So I was putzing around in Excel several days ago and came up with a design for a scoresheet that I'm pleased with. There's enough room in each row to record a rack and play. Letters are listed alphabetically for the most part (except the power tiles are moved to the center of the field). And there's a place for notes (endgame calculations, retracking, etc). The biggest goal, I think, was to provide a scoresheet that made it easiest to tell whether a letter was crossed out or not. The "official" scoresheet doesn't do this. Letters are way too small, and it's way too easy to overlook something. Try it out. If you like it, tell me, tell a friend!
The brain goes through an algorithm, however scatterbrained, for finding a good play which is the best play in any given set of circumstances. One particular rack in a recent game reminded me of such a situation where finding the good play isn't enough and finding the star play isn't easy.
Imagine a Y open at the end of a 2x2 lane. Also, an E is open in the middle of the board. Your rack is AHLMST?. The algorithm, ideally, should be:
Most people probably do some form of this in their minds already. I'm merely typing it out for my own benefit, as missing some steps in this process often leads to lower-scoring plays.
The next step in this algorithm is when you realize there probably isn't a bingo (or one that you can't find), and you have to move on to balancing your rack and scoring enough points). This is even more delicate a process.
"Best game ever" is hyperbole, but this live game at a local club tournament was pretty solid. Only one bingo, but only somewhere between -4.8 or -7.7 equity lost. Not that I think equity is any indication of how well you played. You could make the best play every time and still score 250. But this is something to strive for, I think. I differed with Quackle in a few places. I like the turnover of BLITZ, but BIZ was fine too, and a little safer. Not my style though. LUVS wastes the S. CURD or CRUD scores better and leaves that area free to bingo on the next turn, which I did. A lot of the turns played theirselves (shirtsleeve), though, but there are a couple of particular note: (E)Y(E)BAR, and QADI for 55, forming HA/AWED/MOMI. OURIE for 32 was sound and pleasing. I wasn't sure about VANNER, but chose to play FAVE up top holding out for the last S for OES/HEME/QADIS for 45. No luck, he bingoed with the S on the next turn. OES for him was the second best play, but since he was down, he might have considered trying to catch me by playing OES, keeping ENORT. Replay the game here.