Staff Reporter
Word games can be extremely fun to play, especially if you enjoy stumbling upon new words and being challenged based on your vocabulary skills. If you’re a beginner to the world of Scrabble, you’ll realize that there are numerous tips, tricks and ways to get ahead in this entertaining game.
Here’s a beginner’s guide for playing scrabble to help you get high scores.
Objective
Understanding the objective of scrabble is essential as a beginner. The whole point is to try to make words that score the most points by making use of the tiles as well as the bonus squares on the board. Playing scrabble isn’t just a fun, exciting game, but also helps improve vocabulary and is a great tool for students, kids, adults, and families to sharpen their minds, focus on details, and learn new words.
How to play
The basics of the game are fairly simple. Each player receives 7 tiles at the beginning of the game to be used in turn to try and make a word on the board. Once the first player has started, it is essential for the next player to build words on to the already existing tiles on the board. This can be done by adding letters to make a longer word, adding words perpendicularly or overlapping words. As long as the tiles are touching at least one tile, then you’re doing it right.
Important tips for every beginner to know
Word finders
While the game is based on your vocabulary skills and training your mind to be able to quickly unscramble words and getting the most points, there are some other useful tips that every scrabble player should know. You’ll be surprised to know that many players use UnscrambleX.com to help them find words when they’re in a bit of a pickle. Not only will they be able to learn new words, but will be able to keep the game going even faster. All you have to do is insert the tiles you have and you’ll be given all the options you could play by the word finder.
S for scrabble
Another vital tip to know is how important the letter ‘s’ is in the scrabble world. It’s not just used to add to the end of the word and gain points, but can also be used to add another word perpendicularly, by joining these two words by the letter ‘s’ and getting the score for both words. If you’ve managed to do that on a double word score or triple word score, then you’ve just gained a whole lot more points.
Quick “fix”
When you feel you’re stuck and unable to make new words, always think of prefixes or suffixes to be added to existing words on the board such as -ed, -er, -ing, as well as re-, de-, un-, mis- and so on. You’d be surprised how many points you can get without having to put much effort.
Maximize your tiles
When it comes to the board, the bonus tiles are the key to increase the number of points you have, so always make sure that you either use them, or prevent your opponents from using them. Try to always place the high-ranking tiles on the triple letter score to get the most out of it and use the bonus tiles even if you’ll just end up getting a few points. That way you ensure that your opponents will not gather more points when it’s their turn.
By the book
There’s a scrabble rule that not everybody knows and it’s the bingo score. You can score 50 extra points if you manage to use all 7 tiles in one round, so always check on your word finder whether your tiles will be able to give you a word or not to keep you ahead of your opponents.
You also have the option to choose to either swap all your tiles or just a specific one when you feel you’re struggling to make words with the tiles you have. This can sometimes give you an advantage; however, you will not get the opportunity of playing that round if you decide to swap tiles.
Quick plays
Another way to advance in scrabble is to get familiar with all the possible 2 letter words and 3 letter words you can come across. While sometimes they don’t make sense, they come in very handy when you’re playing and help you out of a rut.
Games that are useful and help sharpen your mind are considered a great educational tool, which is also quite entertaining. So, if you’re looking to improve your language or vocabulary skills as well as train your brain to make connections, detangle letters and unscramble words in a fast-paced environment, then scrabble is the game for you! Just remember to use these tips and you’ll be scoring high on the ranking board.
