Scrabble is finished once all the players have used all their tiles, all the tiles in the bag have already been drawn, or there are no longer any words that can be played.
Give everyone a piece of paper and a pencil, too. That way, they can keep track of all their points. If your crew wants to be extra fancy, each player can bring their very own Scrabble score notebook.
Proper nouns—nouns that are always capitalized—like names and places. Abbreviations, like “CIA,” “FBI,” or “USA. ” Prefixes or suffixes by themselves, like “anti-” or “-ful. ” Hyphenated words, like “short-term” or “old-fashioned. ” Any other incomplete and unofficial English word, like “ridic” (for “ridiculous”).
Proper nouns—nouns that are always capitalized—like names and places. Abbreviations, like “CIA,” “FBI,” or “USA. ” Prefixes or suffixes by themselves, like “anti-” or “-ful. ” Hyphenated words, like “short-term” or “old-fashioned. ” Any other incomplete and unofficial English word, like “ridic” (for “ridiculous”).
After sorting out the order everyone will go in, put all the letter tiles back in the bag and shuffle them again.
Do not show your tiles to your fellow players. Part of the fun in playing Scrabble is all the fun surprises when you see what someone else spells out (or when you dazzle everyone with an epic word choice).
Keep track of the points for each play! More on that in the Scoring section. The star counts as a “Premium Square,” and it doubles the score of the player who places their first word. For example, if the total value of the first word played was 10, then the player actually doubles that and collects 20 points.
Pass the bag to the next player so they can draw new tiles at the end of their turn, too. Make sure that everyone has 7 tiles again by the end of their turn unless there aren’t enough tiles left in the bag to make this possible.
Make sure to consider all the connected tiles. If you add tiles to someone else’s word on the board, the tiles must create 1 new word. However, if your tiles touch other tiles somewhere else on the board, these connections need to also make valid words for your play to count. For example, build the word “noisy” by using the “n” in another player’s word, “pension,” to connect all of the words.
Just be careful—if the word is in the dictionary and the player has spelled it correctly, then the word stays and the player gets the points. As the challenger, you’ll lose your turn. If the word is not in the dictionary or the player has spelled it incorrectly, then the player must remove the word from the board. The player gains no points and loses that turn.
Just keep in mind that you can’t play a word in addition to drawing new tiles, so this move counts as your turn. There’s also a chance that you might draw some of the letter tiles you were trying to get rid of, especially if the number of tiles in the bag is running low.
Keep in mind that the game ends if all players choose to “pass” for two consecutive turns in a row.
0 Points: A blank tile. 1 Point: A, E, I, L, N, O, R, S, T and U. 2 Points: D and G. 3 Points: B, C, M and P. 4 Points: F, H, V, W and Y. 5 Points: K. 8 Points: J and X. 10 Points: Q and Z.
Double Letter Score: A letter placed on this square is double (x2) the number of points shown on the letter tile. Double Word Score: A word that is made up of a letter placed on this Premium Square receives double (x2) the number of points than it otherwise would. Triple Letter Score: A letter placed on this square is triple (x3) the number of points shown on the letter tile. Triple Word Score: A word that is made up of a letter placed on this Premium Score receives triple (x3) the number of points than it otherwise would. When tallying the bonuses for plays with multiple Premium Squares, use an order of operations—add the letter bonuses before the word bonuses. [15] X Research source Example: If you lay down 5 letter tiles to spell the word “aroma,” and “m” is on a Triple Letter Bonus, while the entire word is on a Double Word Bonus, first calculate the bonus for the letter (3x2=6), factor it in when getting the score for the total word (1+1+1+6+1=10), then use the Triple Word Score to trip that sum (10x3=30) to arrive at your final score (30) for that turn.
Example: If you lay down all 7 tiles to play the word “detainer," and both “e” and “n” are on Triple Letter Bonus Squares, factor in the bonuses for “e” (1x3=3) and “n” (1x3=3), total up the score whole word (1+3+1+1+1+3+1+1=12), then add your 50-point “Bingo” (12+50=62) to receive your final score for that turn (62).
If a player tallied up 100 points, but they have 2 tiles left in their rack which have a combined points total of 9, then they’ll end the game with 91 points (100-9=91). If a super fortunate player ends the game with 0 tiles in their rack, then they get the sum of all other players’ unplayed tiles added to their score. If there were 3 other players, and they each had 5 points left in their racks, then the player with 0 tiles gets to add 15 points (5+5+5) to their total score. If there’s a tie, then the player with the highest score before any deductions wins. If Player A and Player B are tied with points, but Player A had 119 points before deducting 1 point and Player B had 120 points before deducting 2 points, then Player B wins.
If there were 3 other players, and they each had 5 points left in their racks, then the player with 0 tiles gets to add 15 points (5+5+5) to their total score.
Play using the official Scrabble dictionary and enforce invalid words. Practice against Scrabble pros at the Internet Scrabble Club. Read the Official Tournament Handbook to learn championship etiquette. Join an official Scrabble association, like NASPA or WESPA. Study word lists religiously with a program like “Zyzzyva. " Memorize words that use high value letter tiles, like “quixotic” or “jazzy. " Tile-track by keeping in mind the exact tile distribution of all 100 tiles.
