Being a language lover doesn’t necessarily make you a good Scrabble player. To improve, study common racks, understand hooks, memorize two and three-letter words, and learn the nature of tiles like J, Q, Z, and blank spaces. Look for common word endings and consider how your words affect opponents. Some players prefer open tables, while others focus on memorizing possible combinations. Forget the meanings of words and focus on producing the best-scoring words.
Language lovers (or lexophiles) might not be the best Scrabble® players. Even if you’re a good speller and have a huge vocabulary, your Scrabble® scores might not be particularly good. People who love the game often find themselves stuck scoring in the low 300s and can be beaten by other players, some of them quite young, who look like real geniuses in the game. If you’re a Scrabble® addict who keeps getting annoyed by low scores, don’t lose heart. There are ways to become a better Scrabble® player that have little to do with spelling skills or a love of vocabulary.
One way to improve your Scrabble® game is to study common racks that can produce numerous different words, giving you a much better chance of finding a place for a bingo, a seven-letter word that uses all of your tiles and results in a bonus 50 points. The ultimate rack for the scrabble player are TISANE tiles, which can be combined with all but a few letters to form a word. SATIRE and RETINA also produce more words and combine well with other letters.
Part of learning to become a better Scrabble® player is understanding the concept of hooks. Hooks are tiles on the board that you can add to create stronger, higher-scoring words. Many players can find bingos, but then cannot find anywhere to put them. Memorizing hooks for words can help you find seemingly impossible places to play bingo or just high scoring words. For example, the board may be locked and the word loin is open in front. You can use the hooked letter E to form eloin. Too many times, players may not recognize hooks at the beginning of words.
Another essential element of improving at Scrabble® is memorizing all two-letter words. It is often possible to play one word directly on top of another. Many players only think of playing something on a letter, but many words can yield huge points when placed directly on top of something else, which is possible in many circumstances. Most Scrabble® experts insist that memorizing three-letter words is also essential.
It is especially important to understand the nature of tiles such as J, Q, Z and empty space. All three letters each have two-letter words, which can be reproduced to great effect when needed, JO, QI, and ZA, respectively. You should also memorize the short list of Q words that don’t require a U, especially the words QAT, QI, and QAID, if you want to become a better Scrabble® player. The empty tiles, two for each game, are very special, as they can transform the normal word into a bingo. Most players recommend accumulating bingo blanks or using them to make words that will score at least 50 points.
Other experienced players suggest that if you want to become a better Scrabble® player, you should look for common word endings, such as ING, TION, IER, IEST, and IES. These can still help you find longer words, and you may want to save these tiles until bingos come to mind. It’s also a good idea to think about how your words affect other players. In many cases, you want to avoid giving your opponents the opportunity to score high because you placed high-scoring letters next to double and triple word scores.
This strategy is not always used and some of the best players prefer very open tables with many opportunities to play bingo. Some players recommend that you always play your own game, regardless of other opponents. Always get the best score possible and don’t worry about other people’s scores or speaking opportunities. This game theory works well if you are good at forming bingos. It may not be the best strategy if you are still memorizing.
Finally, it is very easy for lexophiles to become obsessed with knowing the definitions of words. Some of the best players don’t know them. Memorizing bingo racks and all their possible combinations is more mathematical than language oriented. Players might argue that to become a better Scrabble® player, you have to forget what the words mean and simply memorize as many of them as possible, using all possible strategies to always produce the best-scoring words. Again this theory tends to work very well in practice and has drawn many young players into the competitive world of Scrabble® tournaments, simply because they are very good at memorizing, seeing hooks and bingo.
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