I don't feel like ending the year talking about cancer, so instead I thought I'd explain the rules of Superscrabble, the game that Jerry and I keep trying to spread like a new religion.
We actually didn't make it up. If you haven't lost the little booklet that came with your game, under Variation--Rule 5 it says:
A player, at the start of any turn and before adding any letter to the board, may replace any single letter already on the board with one from his own hand which will form an acceptable new word or words. Any number of such substitutions may be made in a turn but only one letter at a time and only when correct words result from each individual change. No score is counted for the exchanges but letters thus acquired are scored in the usual way when added to the board at the conclusion of the turn or in a subsequent turn. This method of play tends to increase scores by permitting repeated use of high scoring letters or by making possible the formation of longer words.
In other words, if you have the Q but no U, and the word BUT is on the board, you can substitute an A, E, or I for the U and you're on your way to putting QUILL or QUEEN or QUITE, hopefully on a triple word space. It means that you can't do any long-term chess-like strategies, because by the time it's your turn again the board may have changed completely.
Russ has suggested a further variation of this, which we sometimes use: you get penalized two points for every trade that you make from the board, for the benefit of people who aren't used to playing Superscrabble. Of course, he also suggests that Jerry's penalty should be five points. Unfortunately, this usually doesn't help.
Happy New Year, everyone.
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7 comments:
I loves me some Superscrabble.
that sounds like fun. we might have to try this tonight. happy new year to you guys!
Uh...Lucie, I believe you won the last game that we played even after trailing, going out with a 7 letter word and beating Jerry too. Hmmmm........ We need to charge both you and Jerry about 15-20 points for each trade. That sounds fair to me! Happy New Year!
When our kids were little we let them use proper nouns, which makes it a lot easier for children.
I have heard of a game called noncompetitive scrabble where there are 4 or more players and the players and bystanders can vote on whether or not an innovative entry "should" be a word, even if it currently isn't used.
My wife and I play that you get a double or triple on the entire word even if you only added an "s" to it.
I also think that slang words should be allowed, but people don't always agree with this idea. Once I played a game where I put down "zoot" and it was disallowed, and I think that was very unfair, as everyone knows that a zoot suit is an actual phrase, so how can zoot not be a word?
People get so competitive about scrabble. I think of it more as entertainment.
Wow---I think Blue Sporuce has really had the last word here. But I must say that Jerry is very modest and quiet while playing, (perhaps stealth is the better word?) And as he adds up his score, he counts softly and states his total quite matter-of-factly. In short, he is a graceful competitor.
I am certainly not an expert scrabble player; my sister is the aficionado with the computer version, dictionaries, etc. She plays me when all else fails. But now, she insists on playing chinese checkers with me at my mom's, expecting to win. HA! I've won 4 out of the last five sessions, with the last one, my losing by one measly point!
We had us a good game of Superscrabble at Lorraines house on the 28th. I think my dad won, although the highlight was when Lorraine put down "Fart" and my mom remarked "why didn't you put down raft? To which the answer is obvious, FART is just cooler! Oh and you can also replace the F with a T or C or D or M or P and the little known Zart. That last word is maybe not so accurate.
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