High score Scrabble is a
variant of the board game
Scrabble
''Scrabble'' is a word game in which two to four players score points by placing tiles, each bearing a single letter, onto a game board divided into a 15×15 grid of squares. The tiles must form words that, in crossword fashion, read left t ...
that was popular among tournament players in the
United Kingdom
The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland, commonly known as the United Kingdom (UK) or Britain, is a country in Europe, off the north-western coast of the European mainland, continental mainland. It comprises England, Scotlan ...
in the 1970s and 1980s. The first National Scrabble Championship of the UK was played by high score rules in 1971, and was won by Steven Haskell.
Rules
In modern "match play Scrabble" tournaments, players dispute a fixed number of games. In most major tournaments, for example the
World Scrabble Championship
The World Scrabble Championship (WSC) is the most-prestigious title in competitive English-language Scrabble. It was held in every odd year from 1991 to 2013. From the 2013 edition, it became an annual event. It has been an open event since 2014 ...
and the
National Scrabble Championship
The Scrabble Players Championship (formerly the North American SCRABBLE® Championship, and earlier the National SCRABBLE Championship) is the largest ''Scrabble'' competition in North America. The event is currently held every year, and from 2004 ...
the players are sorted by number of games won and to break ties between players with the same number of wins, the total of the player's scores minus the total of his opponent's score (known as the spread) is calculated. For example a game won 500 – 350 would give a spread of +150.
In high score Scrabble, wins are not counted. Instead only the total number of points is important. Whether the player wins or loses the game, or what his opponent's score is are not a factor. Thus a player could lose all of his games, could still finish in the top half of a tournament with above average scores.
Phil Appleby scored 1049 in a British high score Scrabble game in 1989. However the official
Association of British Scrabble Players
The Association of British Scrabble Players oversees competitive Scrabble in the UK. It was formed in 1987 by agreement with J W Spear & Sons, the game's trademark owner, who were subsequently bought out by Mattel in 1993. It currently has around ...
website does not list this score as the highest ever, rather 712 by David Webb in 2008, long after high score Scrabble had been replaced by match play Scrabble in the UK.
[{{Cite web, url=http://www.absp.org.uk/features/records.html, title=Association of British Scrabble Players – Records, website=www.absp.org.uk]
References
Scrabble variants