How To Win at Scrabble

Winning Tip for Scrabble

The secret to learning how to win at Scrabble depends on the skill level of your opponent, of course. Since you’re reading an article on winning at Scrabble, I’m assuming you’re a beginning or basic level Scrabble player, so my advice will be targeted at those who have just learned Scrabble and want to improve quickly.

There are certain tricks to playing Scrabble that, if you learn them, you’ll become much better quickly. You don’t have to necessarily use the old-fashioned method of reading avidly or studying the dictionary like a scholar, though neither of those would hurt.

1. Learn 2 and 3 Letter Words

Probably the simplest way to improve your score in Scrabble is to learn the two and three letter words that you might not normally use every day. Once you learn this relatively short list of Scrabble words, you’ll be able to control a number of situations in a Scrabble game.

One, learning two and three letter words makes it a lot more likely that you can build two words beside one another. This means you can score two or three different separate word scores on a play, even if they are smaller totals (not always the case).

Two, this lets you get rid of difficult letters in the endgame scenario, when you’re trying to find places to play your last remaining letters in an increasingly crowded board. In competitive games, whoever goes out first is often the winner. Don’t get stuck with tiles you don’t know what to do with.

2. Learn Vowel Rich Words

When learning new words for Scrabble, focus on vowel-rich words – words that use 3 or more vowels in them. Certain games will see you collecting a lot of vowels, which make it hard to play. The best thing is to get rid of the excess vowels in your hand and collect a rack of letters that are balanced and easier to use.

When you learn the English words with a lot of vowels in them, this will help you get out of some tight spots.

3. Learn Consonant Rich Words

Conversely, if you have too many consonants on your rack, it’s going to be next to impossible for starting players to find good words to use. You’re looking for a balance of vowels and consonants in your Scrabble letters. So if you are going to study words to build your vocabulary, study a few consonant-heavy words to help you get out of situations where you simply have no vowel to use.

4. Learn the Q Words

There are sixteen legal “q” words you can learn in Scrabble that don’t require the “u” to play. Most beginning Scrabble players are thwarted by the “Q” tile, if they also don’t get a “U” tile to play. That’s because, if you end the game with the “Q” in your hand, you lose 10 points, while the person who went out gets 10 points. On the other hand, if you can play the Q, you get 10 points. That 30 point swing can be the difference in winning and losing.

Unfortunately, many of these are Arabic words, so it’s uncertain whether they will appear in the dictionary you use as your official word list. There are only 16 words on the official word list that don’t include the “QU”, so study for your particular house rules.

Keep in mind there are a few words that have the “q” in the middle of the word, which might not need a “u”.

Q Words Without U’s

Here’s one list of official Scrabble q-words without u’s. You should be pretty safe using these q-words in most Scrabble games you play.

The point being, learn a handful of q words that don’t use the u and you’ll probably never get stuck with a q in your hand at the end of the game again.

5. Study the Tiles Already Played

Study the letters already played on the board and see if you see a trend. For instance, if you see a bunch of “e”‘s on the Scrabble board, then the “e” or “e’s” you’re holding might be precious. But if you don’t see many “e’s” on the board and it’s getting into the latter stages of the game, then you might want to get your e-tiles out of your hand.

Like we talked about when we discussed “vowel rich words”, if you get too many vowels in your hand at once, your ability to score goes down considerably. So read the board and avoid these situations when you can.

6. Play Defensively

Avoid playing in places that give your opponent easy access to double and triple word scores – especially the 3x word scores. Even if you have a great word that is going to give you points, you might be better off playing a word that doesn’t net as many points somewhere else, if it means avoiding a word placement that sets up your opponent to build onto a triple word space.

The same can be said for other multipliers on the board, though you may not be able to avoid this always. Remember that winning isn’t about only scoring, but keeping your opponent from scoring. Playing defense works in Scrabble, the same as it works in football, baseball or basketball.

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This entry was posted on Monday, January 11th, 2010 at 5:11 pmand is filed under Scrabble. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.

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