h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

What a terrific new use for a set of scrabble tiles. I love it and can't wait to try it.
Do you have any way of deciding who says a word first if both people claim it or is there a physical grab of the letters (in a sort of snap fashion)?

Bluemooner - it is *only* a bit over a year since you created this entry.

Vestboy this query came up in the PR thread F122614?thread=271821
I'd suggest in the absence of an impartial arbitrator that physical grabbing could prove somewhat chaotic (as the game progresses and words build up in front of each player and unused letters in the middle).
Perhaps a less violent method would be to use a 'bean of decision' set between the players, and the first to grab the bean gets to *immediately* state their proposed word (no selfishly grabbing without a word in mind), and then return the bean (enabling the other player a chance to grab it and declare another word) before grabbing the letters of their word.

This would allow both players chances to grab words and have a common place to grab 'control'

Pimms

Hmmm. Perhaps there could be an entry on how to adjudicate in games like this. Arm wrestling, unarmed combat, toss of a coin, ip-dip-sky-blue-who's-it-not-you type rhymes...

If players can't agree they should set a house rule so that the turner of the new tile gets first pick or opts to pass, and then 'grabs' go in turn until all players have 'passed', and then the next player turns a tile.

This would avoid arguments, but possibly make the game a little less exciting. Some short time limit for a player to grab before grab-rights automatically pass to the next player might add a bit of tension.

How about a 'Jump Tile' kinda like basketball? Toss a tile in the air and whoever grabs it first gets the go.


Or a speed round between tied players. Normal play pauses while tiles are shown in fairly rapid fashion, say one tile every two seconds, to the two players, the first to call a word gets the go.

Or, hey, .. the easiest would be to flip a tile... Letters I go, blanks you go.