Spike1007, folkslinger and other APPW competitors

[lalatan]

On September 22, 2023 I sent this e-mail to admin: "The last few months those who compete in the avg pts/word category have a problem. A little background for you: a few years ago those of us who competed in APPW agreed to have a minimum of 1 word/game. However, some players now are not honoring that agreement, either willfully or they don't know about it.

In this month's competition, there is a 4x4 player currently in the silver trophy position who has only .515 words played per game. Even more ludicrous is the 5x5 player [Ywebite] who is currently in the gold trophy position with an avg of .010 words/game. He has already won 2 trophies for such a few words in hundreds of games. One month he played a total of 11 words in over a thousand games played.

So, what I am asking you to do is change the required parameters for that competition from only 51 games played to 51 or more games played with an avg words/game of at least 1.0.

I think it would add legitimacy to those of us who have done so and would disallow players who find a few high pt value words and blank all the rest of their games to increase their avg pts/word.

If that would be too difficult for you to do, I understand. I would then announce my withdrawal from any such competition and state the reason why. It really does cheapen our accomplishments.

Thank you for this website and the numerous improvements you have made over the years."

After no reply from Stephen, which was unusual, on Oct. 3 I asked if he had received the first e-mail. That time he replied he was on vacation but would be back soon. Since then I have heard nothing further. I resolved to ask him nothing more about the issue. No point in nagging him.

Last month I decided to play the 4x4 APPW competition since nobody seems to want it and the current leader was at 15 pts. It was something different to do; I can get it done in <2 hours. On the 6th of that month I noticed Shock had played a word worth 34 pts. On Nov 30 he blanked 52 games and won the gold trophy, as illustrated in the attachment below. Of course, that pissed me off since he did it to me once before in 5x5. But I thought I'd say nothing about it since that's what trolls delight in. (Shock, don't bother replying since I still have you on my ignore list.) I hadn't invested much time to get 51 games. I have plenty of trophies so don't need any more.

SHOCK NOV 23.jpg

I checked his scorecard this morning and this is what it showed.
SHOCK DEC 23-12-02.jpg

So, he is poised to do it again and not only in 4x4. I know you guys in 5x5 filter through a ton of games to get your final APPW values. So this is a warning to you not to waste your time unless you don't mind your work being blotted out like that. Ywebite has been scoring some trophies with very few words played in the month. I see that "the cryptogram keeper" won the 5x5 silver last month so he possibly pulled the same stunt. So, if you guys want the competition to be meaningful, I suggest you add your voices to mine in e-mails to admin. I'm personally done with issue.

[admin]

My apologies - your email fell through the cracks. No excuse, but both my wife and I were sick for several weeks following our return from vacation and I will admit that once I'd recovered I didn't do a proper job of catching up through the old inbox.

I may be able to implement something similar to what you're suggesting, though I'm not sure if it would help this particular issue setting a requirement of 1 word avg per game. Someone could easily "goose" their average to above 1 just by playing one or two normal games and getting 100+ words, then go back to exactly what they were doing before. I'm also not sure I understand the fundamental difference between someone having 0.515 avg words/game vs having 1.188 avg words/game, as you currently do. Honestly asking because I just don't fully understand: why should that be considered against the spirit of the game?

My original concept with Average Points per Word was that people would play "normally" (i.e. getting as many words as they could per game) and it would just be another fun way of comparing people's performances. Cherry picking only one or two long words from each game wasn't something I'd intended to incentivize, though obviously that's what's happened. So now that it has, and since there does seem to be interest in playing this way, I just want to better understand what (and why) the community feels is "fair play" here vs. play that's against the spirit of the site.

[bwt1213]

My personal opinion is that games in which no words are played should not count in anyone's averages or totals. If you played 100 games and in 90 of them played zero words, then you really played only 10 games. I don't personally think that average words per game should matter; it would be easy to fiddle with that, as Stephen has noted.

[lalatan]

My apologies - your email fell through the cracks. No excuse, but both my wife and I were sick for several weeks following our return from vacation and I will admit that once I'd recovered I didn't do a proper job of catching up through the old inbox.

Wow, I'm sorry you 2 had such a rough time since vacation. I'd say that's a good enough excuse.

I may be able to implement something similar to what you're suggesting, though I'm not sure if it would help this particular issue setting a requirement of 1 word avg per game. Someone could easily "goose" their average to above 1 just by playing one or two normal games and getting 100+ words, then go back to exactly what they were doing before. I'm also not sure I understand the fundamental difference between someone having 0.515 avg words/game vs having 1.188 avg words/game, as you currently do. Honestly asking because I just don't fully understand: why should that be considered against the spirit of the game?

I'm not actually competing this month, just finding long words, as is my habit. If a player were to boost their avg words/game by playing a normal game of 100+ words, the avg pts/word would drop unless each word was => their current avg pts/word.
Re: having a 1 word/game minimum we felt why should a player be rewarded for finding a word in half or less games. It's like running at the Olympic games in the 800m race and being awarded gold because you ran the best 200 or 400m. With a minimum of 1 word/game, the "race" would be completed, so to speak. I can't speak for all long word players.

My original concept with Average Points per Word was that people would play "normally" (i.e. getting as many words as they could per game) and it would just be another fun way of comparing people's performances. Cherry picking only one or two long words from each game wasn't something I'd intended to incentivize, though obviously that's what's happened. So now that it has, and since there does seem to be interest in playing this way, I just want to better understand what (and why) the community feels is "fair play" here vs. play that's against the spirit of the site.

Yes, we who are prone to carpal tunnel, arthritis, wrist/hand/finger problems or even slow typists still enjoy playing Boggle but can't play the normal game. We did shanghai the orthodox playing of the game; it's a version that allows us to play more games, while, I think, other long word players just prefer it.

I hope others will chime in and give you more info. As I mentioned, I'm now retiring from the competition. If I earn a trophy so be it but I'm not trying for it.

[John13verse34]

I agree that games with no words played shouldn't count toward competition results. I'm one of those people with wrist/hand/finger problems who can't always type well enough to make a lot of words, so I've enjoyed having a category where I can actually compete. It's discouraging when players with just a few good scores are able to win a trophy by padding our their required minimum with zero-word games.

[admin]

That seems fair. I've added code now that will not update a player's monthly scorecard unless at least one word is found in a game.

[folkslinger]

I want to thank the administrator for resolving this issue. I would say it not only seems fair to me, but also validates the hard work that I and others have done in earning a trophy and preserves the value of those accomplishments.

Lalatan, thank you for bringing this up again. I believe it was the weight of your voice that was needed to resolve this.

Thanks to everybody who contributed to this.

[63chev]

I agree with j John and the others here in this post, that the games that have no words shouldn't count for! anything, although I'm not really trying to do anything but get the highest score with the fewest amount of words; it does seem unfair for the modicum of those who honestly just go for long words and appw and really strive to find at least 50 or 60 of them in the month that a person could beat them out with just one; even in baseball a hitter had to have a certain amount of at bats, or a pitcher a certain amount of innings pitched to receive awards; these people who only find one good Word in a month are already recognized with a record in the game and in the high scoring and long words category....

[the cryptogram keeper]

Thanks, admin, for the new code.

No "stunts" here. I just clicked thousands of times to pick "juicy" boards and tried to play only those boards. When I got a good board, I only looked for the best word - couldn't always find it, so there were a few games with zero words. It's not a very fun way to play, but I like finding long words and have practiced and gotten better over time - plus, I have a bit of a competitive streak and enjoy watching my avg climb.

Your trophies are safe for December, but maybe I'll see you in January -_-

[Spike1007]

Stephen, thanks for the fix, and lalatan, thanks for the push! That's always been an cheap way to score a trophy, usually when someone new would find that loophole.

[bwt1213]

Just a note for those with typing problems: speech to text. This came from my wife, originally; of her ten fingers (no polydactyly) anywhere from four to six are usually numb and she can't feel to type with any speed any more. So I bought a microphone for her laptop. Windows comes with speech recognition built-in (windows-H) and you can get a list of all the commands it recognizes on line (just look up "voice commands for Windows speech to text"). Can this be used to play this game? Certainly. For common words, you can just say the word and then say "new line" for the enter key. You'd be surprised how many uncommon words are recognized. For uncommon words, you can spell the word out, one letter at a time, and then say "new line". You don't have to type at all. Is this a threat to the top players? Nope; I doubt you can speak 300 words per minute, and saying the word and then "new line" would get you 100 words per minute, net. But if you have a disability like my wife's, then you can play this game. If you read the commands recognized by the speech-to-text software, you can do a lot more than that -- you can run your whole computer. But someone who really can't type more than even one keystroke or perhaps not even that, the speech-to-text software opens a whole world. And if you want to play the "highest average point per word" game, you certainly can spell out the letters one at a time for your arcane word and your fingers can take a vacation.

Maybe everyone already knew this stuff. But if you didn't, now you do. I had no idea it was this good. If you have a microphone on your computer, it's worth a try. If you want to buy one, my wife's cost $30 at WalMart. It transcribed text perfectly when I spoke in a normal voice 20 feet away.

I hope this helps at least someone. And happy holidays to all!

[lalatan]

Stephen, thanks very much for your solution to the problem and for crafting the most entertaining Boggle game on the internet.

folkslinger and Spike, you are welcome.

No "stunts" here. I just clicked thousands of times to pick "juicy" boards and tried to play only those boards. When I got a good board, I only looked for the best word - couldn't always find it, so there were a few games with zero words. It's not a very fun way to play, but I like finding long words and have practiced and gotten better over time - plus, I have a bit of a competitive streak and enjoy watching my avg climb.

Ok, good to know. I didn't check your stats so it was a possibility you had blanked games. There was a lot of that going on. Congrats on your achievement!

Poor Shock, now he's going to have to come up with different way to rankle people to get his kicks. Now it looks like he's building a high APPW in 4X4 just to prove he's a legit player, something he could've done years ago. Even though I'm no longer affected I'm glad trolls like him can no longer do what he has done twice.

[shock]

Thank you for the fix Admin!

[bwt1213]

Just a note for those with typing problems: speech to text. This came from my wife, originally; of her ten fingers (no polydactyly) anywhere from four to six are usually numb and she can't feel to type with any speed any more. So I bought a microphone for her laptop. Windows comes with speech recognition built-in (windows-H) and you can get a list of all the commands it recognizes on line (just look up "voice commands for Windows speech to text"). Can this be used to play this game? Certainly. For common words, you can just say the word and then say "new line" for the enter key. You'd be surprised how many uncommon words are recognized. For uncommon words, you can spell the word out, one letter at a time, and then say "new line". You don't have to type at all. Is this a threat to the top players? Nope; I doubt you can speak 300 words per minute, and saying the word and then "new line" would get you 100 words per minute, net. But if you have a disability like my wife's, then you can play this game. If you read the commands recognized by the speech-to-text software, you can do a lot more than that -- you can run your whole computer. But someone who really can't type more than even one keystroke or perhaps not even that, the speech-to-text software opens a whole world. And if you want to play the "highest average point per word" game, you certainly can spell out the letters one at a time for your arcane word and your fingers can take a vacation.

Maybe everyone already knew this stuff. But if you didn't, now you do. I had no idea it was this good. If you have a microphone on your computer, it's worth a try. If you want to buy one, my wife's cost $30 at WalMart. It transcribed text perfectly when I spoke in a normal voice 20 feet away.

I hope this helps at least someone. And happy holidays to all!

I used the speech to text software and it worked. And then it didn't. And then it sort-of worked. Here's the thing: the Microsoft stuff is so good at transcription because it uses context to decide what you said. If you're dictating unrelated words, or at least words that aren't part of a sentence, it's not so good. But you can still spell words out, a letter at a time. And that does work. But once you've entered that word, Microsoft thinks you were entering into a form that had one slot. So it's done, and you have to start it up again. Sigh.

I will be checking other dictation software and when I find one that is good for this game, I will let everyone know. But in the meantime, if you are going to write everyone a Christmas letter or append a few chapters to your newest book, the Microsoft software works great. Really. And if you have problems typing and want to send lengthy e-mails to everyone or write letters or even do reports or business-related work, get yourself a microphone.

[Naboka]

I used the speech to text software and it worked. And then it didn't. And then it sort-of worked. Here's the thing: the Microsoft stuff is so good at transcription because it uses context to decide what you said. If you're dictating unrelated words, or at least words that aren't part of a sentence, it's not so good. But you can still spell words out, a letter at a time. And that does work. But once you've entered that word, Microsoft thinks you were entering into a form that had one slot. So it's done, and you have to start it up again. Sigh.

I will be checking other dictation software and when I find one that is good for this game, I will let everyone know. But in the meantime, if you are going to write everyone a Christmas letter or append a few chapters to your newest book, the Microsoft software works great. Really. And if you have problems typing and want to send lengthy e-mails to everyone or write letters or even do reports or business-related work, get yourself a microphone.

Intriguing way to neurtralize the competitive advantage of the ungodly typists. Especially if you have arthritis or other impairments.

After all, the game is mostly about finding words and registering them using your own brain, rather than it being a typing contest.

Of course, "using your own brain" has sometimes meant "using your own brain to use software to make you look really smart and skilled." Seems that every couple of months some player comes along lighting up the boards with amazing scores that test credibility. (Then they leave when caught-- probably return with a new name.)

Oh well.

Most of the time when using diction on my Iphone, I want to toss it against the wall. You'd think Apple would have more sophisticated software, but it has a lot of trouble with unusual words.

And this game thrives on unusual words.

Just played a game where lalatan had gotten staminiferous. It's a botanical term meaning havine stamens. Stamens is spelled with an e, while staminiferous changes the e to i.

Most of us have lazy speech. Words that are near homonyms, like pen and pin, become indistinguishable when spoken--even though one has a short e and the other a short i sound.

Not to mention homonyms.

I know a lot of medical and scientific terms, but my spelling sucks. The schwa sound and lazy pronunciation sometimes leave me scrambling to find the right vowel. I'm curious how the diction software handles that.

Also, all the loan words. And truly ultra-ultra rare words.

Since I do this for the challenge rather than the competition, I'll stick to using my fingers.

Just think of the miraculous coordination between your eyes, brain, fingers that must occur for us to type anything at all. It's really magical.

As I get older, I find those neural connections more and more muddied. It seems that signals get sidetracked, take a vacation, lose their energy somewhere between thinking and doing. Playing this game is one of the ways I employ to maintain those pathways.

Though, cyclically, those pathways seem completely trashed and in need further maintenance. It's like periodic snowstorms that need replowing. During the blizzard, you just can't see much or move around efficiently. Then it lets up, and...

ps. just for fun, tried to say "homage" with my phone's diction using both pronuciations. Got homage and omar--even when trying really hard to pronounce the g with the pretentious pronunciation.