beautiful, this is the sort of tactical battle I would love to see at some point between professional players that have a lot at stake. But we're still so far from that. Little bits of brilliance like this, however, make it all worth it :)
3:00 in German Scrabble, we challenge the words individually, meaning we would know for certain which word of a play that made multiple is the invalid one. If a player wants to challenge, they have to say which words they want to challenge, and each word is checked independently. I had a case in a tournament where I played a legal word (QUeLLS), but the hook S(PÖTTEN) was phony. My opponent only challenged the legal word and lost 10 points for that; had he challenged both words, we would have first checked the legal one, seen that this is fine, and then checked the phony hook and thus would both know which word was illegal.
This was an awesome game! I'd need an engine to confirm this, but I suspect that this decision comes down to making the correct inference. After a play like L(A)B, it is highly likely that opponent has the blank and is 1 point consonant heavy. Further, I would also infer that opponent certainly does not have 2 or more Rs and may not even have 1 because of how multiple Rs damage the chances of the bingo he is fishing for. That makes it more likely that the Rs are in the bag for Mike to draw. If I run a sim inferring NST?, TOP(E) wins easily. Great play by Mike to recognize that over the board!
ADIEU over AUDIO avoids X-bombs and other high-scoring plays on either TL. Also only exposes one of the H-column TWs rather than two. And that lower one is only exposed to N/M given the U. Looks justifiable to me.
Besides ERN, could passing in place have worked for Stan? Myriapods allows Stan to go out with RETURNS and double the 7 tiles on Mike's rack. If Mike passes instead, Stan passes again. ERN risks drawing a non playable bingo. Passing doesn't incur that risk.
That's a cool idea, but the problem is Mike isn't necessarily going to hit his fish (remember, Stan doesn't even know what Mike is fishing for with TOPE). And if Mike misses, Mike can play off one or two tiles at a time for the next few turns, and if Stan keeps passing then Mike will climb into the lead given how close the score is. At that point Stan can't pass anymore. So sooner or later Stan will probably have to play something like ERN anyway, and as such he might as well now to minimize the number of times Mike can fish and accumulate more points -- frankly, ERST? is so good anyway with that pool that it's hard to imagine Stan not drawing a bingo.
You cover all the risky cool plays a lot but only the ones that work out to plan. I think it might be cool if we see some where the person doesn’t get the correct draw and has to pivot their strategy or something of that nature.
That's crazy! I wonder if after a bingo down the A column if Mike could have drawn anything other than an R or the blank to win. Was (MY)RIAPODS his only potential outbingo?
Good question! ADIPOS(I)S hits with an S draw through the I in GYRI, that may be enough to win (as it turns out, it would've been if Stan bingoed with all 1-pointers down the A column as he did here). If Stan scores even a bit more with his bingo, though, ADIPOSIS probably falls short as it scores 34 fewer than MYRIAPODS.
Insane... with a blank still alive (and your opponent basically telegraphing that he has it) that kind of move would have never crossed my mind. But then again, at that score, and the opponent having the only remaining blank, I guess he considered his position as "likely to lose" and so needed the myriapods gamble (which is still < 50% in terms of drawing a bingo at the end of the day).
Arguably not that much less than 50%. The opponent fished two consonants, neither of which was an R, so he probably doesn't hold more than one R. He might have drawn an R (or two) after his play, but most likely the pool contains 3 or 4 Rs. Add to that the chance of drawing an S for ADIPOS(I)S, and a small chance that the opponent doesn't have the blank.
Macondo's sim doesn't differ much from Quackle's - it'll assume that top equity moves are played in the simulation. With inference it might prefer (TOP)E, but it'll sadly never take into account possible responses such as (E)RN.
Btw, Mike should have challenged both words regardless if he knew whether ADIEUS was good or not. That's what the top players do; you're giving away extra information if you only challenge one. Also, I did NOT see MYRIAPODS coming at all. I thought he had just made a terrible play and that was going to be the point of the video, lol. Great job, Mike!
actually, just challenging ANYONES# would have been correct had Mike known ADIEUS was invalid, since it maximizes the chance of Stan trying ADIEUS again, and maximizes the chances that Mike could use ADIEUS himself despite it being phony
@@asdfasdf4924 use your imagination. Let's say the word was BEEDI instead, and an S was hooked onto it. You created a sweeping generalization about what top players do which was untrue and misleading.
Taking the points into account I still think I'd challenge both in this case as there's a chance Stan would convince himself adieus is bad and play anyones*/sha next go, and still may try adieus later whatever, but appreciate there would be more chance of this if it wasn't challenged the first time.
![I.N "HALLUCINATION" | [Stray Kids : SKZ-PLAYER]](http://i.ytimg.com/vi/n5B5q1Hwt_U/mqdefault.jpg)
beautiful, this is the sort of tactical battle I would love to see at some point between professional players that have a lot at stake. But we're still so far from that. Little bits of brilliance like this, however, make it all worth it :)
It's like in Chess: We know the Evans gambit is the strongest move, yet we'll never see it in a WCC.
Creative plays like this is my absolute favourite part about Scrabble
Same here!
3:00 in German Scrabble, we challenge the words individually, meaning we would know for certain which word of a play that made multiple is the invalid one. If a player wants to challenge, they have to say which words they want to challenge, and each word is checked independently.
I had a case in a tournament where I played a legal word (QUeLLS), but the hook S(PÖTTEN) was phony. My opponent only challenged the legal word and lost 10 points for that; had he challenged both words, we would have first checked the legal one, seen that this is fine, and then checked the phony hook and thus would both know which word was illegal.
This was an awesome game! I'd need an engine to confirm this, but I suspect that this decision comes down to making the correct inference. After a play like L(A)B, it is highly likely that opponent has the blank and is 1 point consonant heavy. Further, I would also infer that opponent certainly does not have 2 or more Rs and may not even have 1 because of how multiple Rs damage the chances of the bingo he is fishing for. That makes it more likely that the Rs are in the bag for Mike to draw. If I run a sim inferring NST?, TOP(E) wins easily. Great play by Mike to recognize that over the board!
Great points, thanks Billy!
20:00 Another important thingks that Mike cannot pass his turn, as then Sten would simply pass too -- he would 100% come on top after a 6-pass.
For sure, good point
4:33 lol Stan also had anyones on his rack 😂
He was the one who played "anyones" the first time when it got challenged off.
ADIEU over AUDIO avoids X-bombs and other high-scoring plays on either TL. Also only exposes one of the H-column TWs rather than two. And that lower one is only exposed to N/M given the U. Looks justifiable to me.
a swap of x5 feels justifiable 2 😉
Besides ERN, could passing in place have worked for Stan? Myriapods allows Stan to go out with RETURNS and double the 7 tiles on Mike's rack. If Mike passes instead, Stan passes again. ERN risks drawing a non playable bingo. Passing doesn't incur that risk.
That's a cool idea, but the problem is Mike isn't necessarily going to hit his fish (remember, Stan doesn't even know what Mike is fishing for with TOPE). And if Mike misses, Mike can play off one or two tiles at a time for the next few turns, and if Stan keeps passing then Mike will climb into the lead given how close the score is. At that point Stan can't pass anymore. So sooner or later Stan will probably have to play something like ERN anyway, and as such he might as well now to minimize the number of times Mike can fish and accumulate more points -- frankly, ERST? is so good anyway with that pool that it's hard to imagine Stan not drawing a bingo.
You cover all the risky cool plays a lot but only the ones that work out to plan. I think it might be cool if we see some where the person doesn’t get the correct draw and has to pivot their strategy or something of that nature.
That's crazy! I wonder if after a bingo down the A column if Mike could have drawn anything other than an R or the blank to win. Was (MY)RIAPODS his only potential outbingo?
Good question! ADIPOS(I)S hits with an S draw through the I in GYRI, that may be enough to win (as it turns out, it would've been if Stan bingoed with all 1-pointers down the A column as he did here). If Stan scores even a bit more with his bingo, though, ADIPOSIS probably falls short as it scores 34 fewer than MYRIAPODS.
Insane... with a blank still alive (and your opponent basically telegraphing that he has it) that kind of move would have never crossed my mind. But then again, at that score, and the opponent having the only remaining blank, I guess he considered his position as "likely to lose" and so needed the myriapods gamble (which is still < 50% in terms of drawing a bingo at the end of the day).
Arguably not that much less than 50%. The opponent fished two consonants, neither of which was an R, so he probably doesn't hold more than one R. He might have drawn an R (or two) after his play, but most likely the pool contains 3 or 4 Rs. Add to that the chance of drawing an S for ADIPOS(I)S, and a small chance that the opponent doesn't have the blank.
the commentary regarding the choice of the second adieu sounded a lot like the commentary mack gave in his lowest-scoring scrabble challenges
What if Mike did not draw an R at the end?
An S draw would give ADIPOS(I)S for 65, which is also enough to win. Other draws don't give a playable bingo.
What a banger!!! Amazing game. Thanks for the fab vid.
Thanks!
I wouldn't even be mad if I fell into a trap as beautiful as this one. In fact I would be celebrating that I would be featured in a Mack Meller video.
Hahaha
IT’S A MYRIACLE!!!
Does the engine play TOPE? Is 1/3 chance to win the game enough equity given Mike´s position?
INSANE
Macondo's sim doesn't differ much from Quackle's - it'll assume that top equity moves are played in the simulation. With inference it might prefer (TOP)E, but it'll sadly never take into account possible responses such as (E)RN.
Btw, Mike should have challenged both words regardless if he knew whether ADIEUS was good or not. That's what the top players do; you're giving away extra information if you only challenge one. Also, I did NOT see MYRIAPODS coming at all. I thought he had just made a terrible play and that was going to be the point of the video, lol. Great job, Mike!
actually, just challenging ANYONES# would have been correct had Mike known ADIEUS was invalid, since it maximizes the chance of Stan trying ADIEUS again, and maximizes the chances that Mike could use ADIEUS himself despite it being phony
@@axcertypo adieus is valid tho..
@@asdfasdf4924 use your imagination. Let's say the word was BEEDI instead, and an S was hooked onto it. You created a sweeping generalization about what top players do which was untrue and misleading.
I see where you're coming from. I hadn't accounted for that scenario
Taking the points into account I still think I'd challenge both in this case as there's a chance Stan would convince himself adieus is bad and play anyones*/sha next go, and still may try adieus later whatever, but appreciate there would be more chance of this if it wasn't challenged the first time.