Words by Farber

Fair game with large dictionary

How to play «Words by Farber»

• How to start?
• Game rules
• Letters and values
• Frequently asked questions
• A word by the author
• Thanks

How to start?

There are no active games at the beginning.

Click the button «New game» or «+» to start a new game.

Each player has 24h for a move, so please be patient — or just start several new games at once.

Game rules

The goal is to build words at the game board, and achieve the highest total score.

The first word must cover the center square of the board.

Each player must play off of words already present on the board and place 1 to 7 new tiles in a vertical or horizontal line at the game board.

Playing all 7 letter tiles in a single turn brings the additional score bonus of 15 points.

Colored squares double or triple the letter («2L» and «3L») or word scores («2W» and «3W»). However they only multiply scores once, at the first use. First the letter multipliers are applied and then the word ones.

There are 2 blank tiles in the game, which can substitute any letter.

After each play, the player receives new letter tiles from the pile, so that there are 7 tiles at the hand again.

The game is over when a player has no more tiles at the hand. The leftover letter tiles at the hand of the other player are dismissed.

If the both players pass or swap each 2 times in a row, the game ends.

Letters and values

Frequently asked questions

Question #1 Why do players have so much time for each turn, why not reduce it to just few minutes?

Answer #1 The quite long time of up to 24 hours per move allows players to play the best words without any hurry. To avoid waiting for a single opponent it is recommended to start several games at once.

Question #2 Why are valid words sometimes not accepted?

Answer #2 Please ensure that the new letter tiles at the game board do touch the old ones and build a single line.

Question #3 How could the opponent submit an already played word again?

Answer #3 If a previously played word disappears from the game board, because it was extended by appending more letters to it — then the word can be played again.

Question #4 Why is the game over already? I still have some unplayed letters at the hand!

Answer #4 The game is over when (1) the pile is empty and one of the players has spent all of her letters (2) or when the players swapped letters or passed 4 times in a row.

Question #5 How is the player rating calculated?

Answer #5 The Elo rating for each player is calculated by the same method as in international chess: winning against a strong opponent scores higher than winning against a weaker one.

Question #6 How to find a recently met player?

Answer #6 In the list of all players at https://wordsbyfarber.com/en/top

Question #7 Can the game opponent be chosen, can you invite a certain player into a game?

Answer #7 Unfortunately, no.

Question #8 How to merge player profiles at Android and desktop?

Answer #8 Please visit at a desktop PC (not at the phone!) the web page https://wordsbyfarber.com/en/google

Question #9 How to change the player photo and name at Android phone?

Answer #9 To update the personal info, just login in your Google account page: https://myaccount.google.com/personal-info

Question #10 What is the purpose of game coins?

Answer #10 Game coins are earned through solving of «Daily puzzles» and winning against king players. The coins can be spent to buy solutions for «Daily puzzles». And to show the remaining letters in a game. For the latter click the «Pile» button.

Question #11 Why does the number of wins change? Why do the longest words disappear from statistics?

Answer #11 To make my life as game admin easier, every night games older than 1 year are deleted from the database. That is why player statistics fluctuate.

A word by the author

Greetings dear players!

My name is Alex, I am from Riga in Latvia – but live in Germany since 1990:

Besides coffee and candy (the churros photo captured me 2021 in Spain) I love literature and programming — and that is why I develop the «Words by Farber» game in my leisure time.

My goals are:

A large dictionary: with over 276000 English words.

Fair play: there is no pay to win in my game, i.e. it is not possible to buy blank tiles or hints. It is not possible to swap tiles and perform a move at the same time either.

Good luck!

P.S. Latvia experts will recognize immediately, where the favorite hamster of my daughter is sitting:

Thanks

• The game «Words by Farber» is using the following open source projects: Jetty, PostgreSQL and Pixi.js.