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#player1 kacattac kacattac
#player2 ouistiti ouistiti
>kacattac: DDENNRV H5 VEND +16 16
#note I thought 16 pts was just enough to warrant playing through. Turns out that Exch DNV sims close enough behind this to be a very defensible choice. Keeping 1/3 here makes me squeamish though, so there's a good chance that I would have chosen a "worse" exchange, prolly DDNV, which sims surprisingly poorly.
>ouistiti: CIINNOS 6B CONIIN.S +68 68
#note Darn.
>kacattac: BDDLNOR C3 BLO.D +20 36
#note Sims best. I forgot/didn't see DOBL(O)N. It turns over an extra tile, stretches higher, and doesn't backhook. These things actually make it better, no? Of course there's absolutely no reason to play the hyperdefensive E4 BL(I)ND instead...
>ouistiti: ?AEPRTV E4 PR.VATEs +98 166
#note FMFL
>kacattac: ?ADENRS 8H .AuNDERS +83 119
#note This outsims (D)ARNDESt, which I didn't see. I suppose it's a question of creating volatility to fuel a comeback vs. creating an easy opening for opp to drop an early dagger.
>ouistiti: AEEMNOY 8A MAY +36 202
#note An amazing bevy of strong options are available here with this mediocre post-bingo rack. Can you find the three plays which score 40 or more? Playing short in column D also sims well here, favoring leave over score with an eye toward the many excellent floaters now on the board.
>kacattac: EIIRUXY F10 XI +51 170
>ouistiti: EEIJLNO L3 JOINE. +28 230
#note JOE at F2 or D1
>kacattac: EEEIRUY 3L .EU +20 190
#note Tough spot after being forced into XI last play. This is actually sort of obvious but I took forever to find it. It sims 5 clear of the nearest competitor.
>ouistiti: EFGHIKL M7 F.H +26 256
#note Q found three flashy non-bingo plays here which play through two tiles on the board. Failing that, K4 GHI sims best.
>kacattac: EEIIORY D3 OI +18 208
#note YO in the same spot scores 9 more and sims out to a half point worse valuation and a tiny advantage in win%. Good luck untangling that puzzle. I liked OI because it undoubles the IIs and creates a marginal M(OI) or P(OI) bingo lane for later. N2 O(U)RIE sims almost as well as these but seems uninspired and uninspiring. B8 (A)IYEE and Exch EIIOY sim rather far behind. It must be meaningful, I think, that the exchange sims as badly as it does despite the far superior chances of a bingo next turn (16% versus 3-4% for OI and YO). Perhaps at this particular point in the game it is most important to prevent the deficit from getting out of hand.
>ouistiti: EGIKLOU K5 KI +26 282
#note Sim is a logjam. This is fine but probably not the very best. 9G KUE seems a good candidate. I never saw the VEND(U) hook and could have used it later on.
>kacattac: EEIRSWY F2 WYE +23 231
#note Just admit it, you reeeally want to play (R)EWIRES here. But WYE indeed sims better and its not particularly close despite the massive score sacrifice.
>ouistiti: DEEGLOU N8 .OUGED +15 297
#note There is a seven which reaches the dws and scores 31.
>kacattac: EEILRST 12H STEELI.R +70 301
#note Why can I see DAUNDERS but not STERILE?
>ouistiti: AELOPST H12 .LOP +18 315
#note I never saw the (PRIVATEs)T hook. Robin sees it next turn. Sim prefers cashing in now with PLEATS or PALETS.
>kacattac: ABEGITU O12 .AGI +18 319
#note 12A BEAUT or BEGAT, or 9G BUG. This seems to be the stage of the game where my play deteriorates, even without time pressure. I think I know why: early-game play can be dealt with as a problem of "disorganized complexity" while late-game and pre-endgame play must be dealt with as instances of "organized complexity." There is a brilliant discussion of these principles in the final chapter of Jane Jacobs' "The Death and Life of Great American Cities." She quotes from a paper by Dr. Warren Weaver:
"The classical dynamics of the nineteenth century was well suited for analyzing and predicting the motion of a single ivory ball as it moves about on a billiard table . . . One can, but with a surprising increase in difficulty, analyze the motion of two or even three balls . . . But as soon as one tries to analyze the motion of ten or fifteen balls on the table at once, as in pool, the problem becomes unmanageable, not because there is any theoretical difficulty, but just because the actual labor of dealing in specific detail with so many variables turns out to be impractical.
"Imagine, however, a large billiard table with millions of balls flying about on its surface . . . The great surprise is that the problem now becomes easier: the methods of statistical mechanics are now applicable. One cannot trace the detailed history of one special ball, to be sure; but there can be answered with useful precision such important questions as: On the average how many balls per second hit a given stretch of rail? On the average how far does a ball move before it is hit by some other ball? . . .
" . . . The word 'disorganized' [applies] to the large billiard table with the many balls . . . because the balls are distributed, in their positions and motions, in a helter-skelter way . . . but in spite of this helter-skelter or unknown behavior of all the individual variables, the system as a whole posesses certain orderly and analyzable average properties."
Now in terms of Scrabble Brand Crossword Game: a full bag and empty board "[posess] certain orderly and analyzable average properties." Put another way, "The great surprise is that the problem now becomes easier" when the bag is fuller and the board emptier. Conversely, "as soon as one tries to analyze the motion of ten or fifteen balls on the table [or tiles in the bag] at once...the problem becomes unmanageable, not because there is any theoretical difficulty, but just because the actual labor of dealing in specific detail with so many variables turns out to be impractical." In Scrabble, the "specific labor" of twenty-five tiles in relation to a partially exhausted board is more challenging for human brains than are the "analyzable average properties" of ninety tiles and an empty board. I think this is why the strength of my plays tends to plummet once the bag is between two-thirds and three-quarters empty. I need to get better at the "specific labor" of the proverbial 15-ball pool table. The main reason I'm not already better at this is that I don't enjoy it at all, "not because there is any theoretical difficulty, but just because the actual labor of dealing in specific detail with so many variables turns out to be impractical" for my particular brain and personality. Humph.
>ouistiti: AAEOSTT 12C OATS +31 346
#note Sim prefers shorter plays, sacrificing score now for better bingo chances next turn. Those better chances are, however, still barely 20%, so it seems fair to play the S now and take the points.
>kacattac: BEFNTUZ J7 F.TZ +35 354
#note B10 ZEBU! FML. 9G FUB is also great. Why can I see ZEBU and B(OATS) and not put them together? Anyway, there is a lot to think about on this play: OATS could be a set up; the Q is unseen; there is a juicy Q spot at N2, which I can block with FUTZ for 3 less; I hold a U of my own, which may be worth conserving to go with the Q later; I miss the (VEND)U hook; playing the U now increases the danger of a Q clog/stick; but scoring well and holding the Z has definite upside. I decide to hedge, leaving N2 open and taking a few extra points. The Q is menacing here psychologically, but if we're being mathy about things the chances of opp dropping it for big points next turn or of me drawing it here are both relatively small. FUTZ at N2 ultimately outsims my play by a point despite scoring 3 less, so evidently I should be more fearful of opp dropping the Q and less fearful of drawing it myself. Or I could just see the obvious best play.
>ouistiti: AAEGORT B10 TOGAE +22 368
#note Sims best. You can chase bingos here with G1 GOA or 9E (T)AO, but TOGAE keeps the pressure on and more or less eliminates the threat of a counterbingo.
>kacattac: BCEINQU 14F QU.IN +36 390
#note 9G is QUI(T)E a find. Otherwise this is ok.
>ouistiti: AAAEHMR A13 HAM +31 399
#note 13B (A)HA sims best. After that, sim prefers AMA or AHA to HAM. It's reeeally hard to sacrifice those points here. no? The issue, perhaps, is that HAM creates a juicy spot at C13. That would have been the decisive factor if I had played a proper endgame.
>kacattac: BCELRRW C11 R.W +32 422
#note This "wins" in scare quotes. There are two other "winners," one of which is 5 better than this, the other equivalent.
>ouistiti: AAERTU K8 .EAT.R +25 424
>kacattac: BCELR N2 C.RB +16 438
#note C(U)BER wins last turn or now. It flashes through my mind but I chicken out of it. I think I've played it before, but I'm rusty on fives right now. Also, there is a saxophonist named Ronnie Cuber, and when a word is also a name sometimes I second guess myself. FMFL. Kudos to Robin for playing a perfect endgame. Do you see her out play? I didn't.
>ouistiti: AU 9E .AU +15 439
>ouistiti: (EL) +4 443
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