How good IS Megaword?

[Naboka]

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Congratulations to Megaword.

Just saw that he'd beaten 1500 (1511) points on 4x4 with 280 words.

1511 points!

280 words !

Wow.!

Really.

My wrists feel inflamed just thinking about it.

Was curious who was wiping out my scores so rapidly this morning. Guess that's answered.

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[MegaWord]

Haha! Thanks Naboka. I was truly shocked when I saw 1,511 pts, then when the results came up I saw 280 words and was even more surprised! All you gotta do is keep at it and good things will happen!

Here's the vid: https://youtu.be/uqwhKyQtMx8

Thought it was cool when I was trying to type MAISTERS and found MAISTRES. Didn't even know it was a word but went with it, haha.

[MegaWord]

My previous message says "unapproved". I'm guessing you guys can't see it. Maybe this message will be acceptable. Thank you Naboka for your recognition. I am very proud of my new 4x4 record status for points and words. And here is a link to the video.

[4x4] 1,511 pts 280 wds :

[Naboka]

My previous message says "unapproved". I'm guessing you guys can't see it. Maybe this message will be acceptable. Thank you Naboka for your recognition. I am very proud of my new 4x4 record status for points and words. And here is a link to the video.

[4x4] 1,511 pts 280 wds :

hoped you had done a video.

suspected that was the cause of the blank post.

Haven't watched any of your vidos/games in about a year. Spent many a work week studying them earlier. They helped a lot.

Paused this one when the board appeared and estimated what I would do, then let her rip to see how you approached it. Was somewhat surprised that I can follow along now while you're playing without having to pause to wonder what just happened.

It was kind of fun seeing anticipated words scroll by.

Again, congratulations. These new boards...

I like them.

[lalatan]

My previous message says "unapproved". I'm guessing you guys can't see it. Maybe this message will be acceptable. Thank you Naboka for your recognition. I am very proud of my new 4x4 record status for points and words. And here is a link to the video.

[4x4] 1,511 pts 280 wds :

I read the forum once a week now but when I saw your username on a post I knew it would be significant. I wanted to respond before your accomplishment was snowed under by other posts on the forum feed.

Wow, congratulations on yet one more EPIC game and milestone!! Your avg words entered/sec was a fantastic and astounding 2.333... You should definitely be proud.

[BoggleOtaku]

Congratulations, MegaWord!

Similar to how you set an upper limit to number of points per word (54 in 5x5), I wonder what is a practical upper limit that can be achieved for total words and points.

Here's my estimate. I would like to encourage improvements to this estimate.

Max typing speeds are ~250wpm for 5 characters/word, over short times. Since average word lengths are probably around 5 and 6 characters for 4x4 and 5x5, respectively, and there is the extra enter key to hit, I would correct this to 250(5)/6 ~200 wpm for 4x4 and 250(5)/7 ~ 180 wpm for 5x5. So this would be 400 words max for 4x4 (2 min limit) and 540 words for 5x5 (3min limit).

MegaWord is achieving numbers like 1511 points over 280 words, or ~5.4 points per word for 4x4 and 2107 points over 338 words, or 6.2 points per word for 5x5. If this could be achieved at world record typing speeds, we would have 5.4 ppw (400w) ~ 2200 points 4x4 and 6.2(540) = 3348 points 5x5.


Naboka is achieving numbers like ~800 points over ~100 words for 4x4, which is ~8 points per word for 4x4. MegaWord's points per word in 5x5 is 1 higher than in 4x4, so I'll guess that a comparable score in 5x5 for rare words only would be ~9 points per word.

If unlimited rare words were available and Naboka's ppw would be achieved at record typing speeds, this would be 8*400 = 3200 points 4x4 max and 9*540 = 4860 points 5x5 max.
Rare words on 5x5 could probably only make up say half the total because they are rare--hard to find a puzzle with 400 rare words in it. So I'll take the average of MegaWord's and Naboka's ppw, to get a practical upper limit.

Then, my rough estimate for a maximum of what is humanly possible is 2700 points, 400 words for 4x4 and 4100 points, 540 words for 5x5.

Maybe a way of increasing points further for 5x5 is to take puzzles with many similar high scoring rare words and then practice the similar letter combinations, such as ZZLE, ZZLERS, ZZING, ZZLING. A method pianists use to practice fast passages is isolate the tough parts and then break them down into 2- or 3- or 4- note groupings, starting at different notes, and then play these groupings as fast and clear as possible with a longer pause between the groupings. Maybe methods such as these could be adopted.

[MegaWord]

I read the forum once a week now but when I saw your username on a post I knew it would be significant. I wanted to respond before your accomplishment was snowed under by other posts on the forum feed.

Wow, congratulations on yet one more EPIC game and milestone!! Your avg words entered/sec was a fantastic and astounding 2.333... You should definitely be proud.

Thank you Lalatan! It feels at this point like going higher isn't even necessary, like I've surpassed what I even fathomed possible and hoped for.

To BoggleOtaku:

My typing skill started in middle school taking a typing class. I remember striving to get 100 wpm just typing short words with the home row keys. Playing this game has really been my main typing practice. The game itself has developed my typing skill. Which may be good (for skill in this game) since it is a bit different, pressing the enter key with the right pinkie finger after every word and no space bar. When I started playing this game my fingers just would not move fast enough, like they were slow and it was frustrating. But over time they've just gotten faster and better able to keep up with my mind, which makes it so much more enjoyable. I still have weaknesses (obviously) typing certain words over other words. The words in the game that I got my new record on were easy for me to type quickly. For instance Q words I don't type nearly as fast, maybe simply because of less practice since they don't occur as much in the boards. For me it's been a gradual growth in ability.

As far as upper limits, I realize that it is really unknowable. It depends on the person's effort to keep pushing higher. I'm certainly not the fastest typist in the world and I'm surprised to be the fastest on this game. The potential though on some of those 5x5 boards with lots of Q and Z words is really good. I just can't type them fast enough at this point. There is much potential for higher scores, just depends on the individuals dedication. Though, I'm sure the world record typist could quickly beat my scores if they practiced this game a fraction as much as myself. It's been fun though, growing in both word knowledge and typing speed since together they harmonize in this game.

[BoggleOtaku]

MegaWord,

Thank you for your comments. Something I didn't put in my estimate estimate is the ability to see the words. I'm basically assuming that typing the words is the bottleneck, not seeing the words. In my case, however, my bottleneck is not seeing the words fast enough. So I am really impressed that you can see them even faster than you are typing, which is already at a substantial fraction compared to a world class typist.

I have no idea at this point of what could limit how fast one sees them. Some people even memorize the board and see in their mind's eye (I think I saw a post long ago where someone mentioned this.) Fast typists wouldn't necessarily have the skill of seeing the words in the puzzle, although they probably can take in the next dozen words to type at a glance.

In my case, I often see the middle or end letter groupings and then search for the related words, whereas I've seen in your videos that you find all words you can starting with a given letter (position), which seems a great systematic approach, kind of like how Google started doing search by dedicating a computer for each letter starting the search phrase. Maybe I'll try that approach for awhile and see if my "sight" improves.

[MegaWord]

I increased my 5x5 record to 2,345 pts with 294 wds on 12/24/2023. The Q words I got at the end really boosted my score. My post with the link to the video was unapproved again. Maybe this message will be acceptable.

Happy Holidays and Wordtwisting everyone!

[bwt1213]

Congratulations! And thank you for your kind wishes. I have an idle thought -- given the same board and unlimited time to type, how long would it take for me to match or surpass your three-minute record? From sheer typing speed, something more than seven minutes might do. But I suspect I don't know as many scoring words as you, so that would probably not suffice.