101 Ways to Win at Scrabble: Top tips for Scrabble success. Barry Grossman
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Название: 101 Ways to Win at Scrabble: Top tips for Scrabble success

Автор: Barry Grossman

Издательство: HarperCollins

Жанр: Развлечения

Серия:

isbn: 9780008104344

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СКАЧАТЬ doubt over the correct spelling of HRYVNYA.

      At the same time, seven-letter words are crucial to scoring big in Scrabble because if you can play one then you get that most wonderful of things, a fifty-point bonus. In the early days of serious Scrabble, players obsessed about learning as many sevens as they could because of this. It probably wasn’t the best approach to take and must have led to a lot of frustration as they waited, endlessly, to play ZYZZYVA (an American weevil). The secret is to confine yourself to the most useful ones, e.g. the sevens that are most likely to come up in play. These are those that consist solely of the one-point tiles LNRST and AEIOU – the commonest letters in the Scrabble bag.

      Here are some of the high-probability seven-letter words to remember as you search for a bonus-score:

      NATURES

      NEROLIS oil used in making perfume

      NEUTRAL

      OILNUTS

      RETAINS

      RITUALS

      SALUTER

      TAILORS

      TRISULA trident symbol of Hindu god

      Nearly all of these have at least one anagram (one has ten – can you guess which?). If you can get into the habit of being able to look at your rack and say, “Ah yes, AILRSTU, that makes RITUALS”, you will soon automatically also see the anagram, TRISULA, and you can then play whichever one fits on the board, scores more, or is otherwise the better move.

      (The mighty ten-anagrammer is RETAINS, making eleven anagrams including RETAINS itself.)

      In the exact same way as it makes sense to concentrate on the sevens, which contain the commonest letters (AEIOU and LNRST), the eight-letter words with those same common letters are the ones that will pay the biggest dividends. Here are a few likely suspects:

      LATRINES

      LUNARIST one who believes the moon influences weather

      NEUTRALS

      NOTARIES

      ORIENTAL

      RETINOLS plural of retinol, a name for vitamin A

      TENURIAL pertaining to a tenure

      TONSILAR pertaining to a tonsil

      TURNSOLE a plant with flowers said to turn towards the sun

      Again, many of these have anagrams, and it’s a good idea to learn a few as it is often harder to place an eight-letter word on the board. For instance, ORIENTAL is an anagram of RELATION, but the third anagram TAILERON may be the only one that fits.

      Here are some fantastic fours to help you get rid of awkward consonants:

      JIAO Chinese unit of currency

      JEUX plural of JEU, a game

      EAUX plural of EUA, a river

      QUAI same as QUAY

      QUEP expression of derision

      QUOP to throb

      QAID Arabic chief

      QADI a Muslim judge

      FIQH Islamic jurisprudence

      WAQF Islamic charity

      DZHO another spelling of ZO, our old friend the yak-cow cross

      ZOOT as in zoot suit, a once fashionable man’s suit

      VIVA to give a candidate an oral exam

      VIVE long live

      VIVO with vigour

      VEXT same as VEXED

      VIZY to look

      WILI a spirit

      CWMS plural of CWM, a Welsh valley

      TSKS from TSK, to tut in irritation

      Good players can look at their rack at any given stage of the game and know what sort of move they should be trying to make. Most racks will fall into one of five categories; here’s what you should look to do for each type:

      Too many vowels: Use one of the multi-vowel words or change.

      Too many consonants: Use a multi-consonant word or change. There are lots of common five- and six-letter words which can help get rid of excess consonants: PRINT, TRUCK, CLAMP, FRONT, THRONG, etc.

      Bonus-friendly: Good balance of vowels and consonants, mainly one-point tiles, no double letters (or one at most). Have a good look for a bonus word, either a seven or a playable eight. If you can’t find it, play off the least appealing letters to increase your chance of a bonus on the next turn. Don’t neglect to still get a reasonable score now if you possibly can.

      High value: Two or more of the higher-scoring tiles (those scoring three or more) but with vowels to help you use them. Play the high-value tiles, making maximum use of premium squares. It helps if the high-value tiles go nicely with each other, like CHK, rather than being incompatible like GVW.

      Just rubbish: Racks full of incompatible letters like IJUY, or low-value tiles that don’t look like they’re close to a bonus, like GLLNOOU. With this sort of rack you probably just have to play off as many as you can for as much as you can, or change.

      The D is one of only two letters worth two points (the other is the G), and this indicates its status as not being quite as common as the one-point consonants.

      Its main use for bonuses is for forming past tenses and past participles of verbs – PLANTED, SPRAYED, INFLATED, REMAINED and thousands more. There are also lots of words with DE- at the beginning – DELOUSE, DEVELOP, DENATURE and so on. This does show the main weakness of the D which is that it needs an E to be most effective, although DIS- can also be a handy prefix, with words like DISPLAY, DISCORD, DISTRACT.

      There are eight two-letter words with D:

      AD an advertisement

      ED an editor

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