WYPS Blog

WYPS in Japanese

2012-05-07T08:58:00.000-07:00

On LittleGolem is possible to play WYPS in Japanese. Game is played only with Hiragana without diacritics. There is my game example in Japanese played on Little Golem.

Short video with game example:

Review of WYPS

2012-03-29T00:42:00.000-07:00

Czech magazine deskovehry.com (Deskove Hry = Board Games) publish review of WYPS. Review is in Czech and English too.

WYPS in February 2012 - 11th Championship

2012-03-09T00:25:00.000-08:00

In February finished 9th French WYPS championship (winner Paul Gautherot) and 11th Italian championship (winner Super Chicken). But in february finished main 11th WYPS championship too.

Winner of 11th became Allan Mertner. It is his first win in WYPS championship - congratulation !!

There is final interesting position of game between Allan Mertner and beppi: hero game.org (finished 2nd). For last move Allan used all his stones, but there is no move for white player.

In this position white player (Clint) resigns his game against Allan Mertner. White player could continue in game with move FORLORN, but black has letter F and after his move FORLORN is game finished. By the way in this position has winner 11 stones less than loser ! It is interesting but in game #1388597 had winner 23 stones less than loser !

Longest word was played in this position. White (Nagy Fathy - winner of group 1 in second league) found word MOISTURIZERS. The same player found in another game word DYOTHELITIC. And I lost only game with labradors - when he found word COROLLARIES.

Position from game #1388517 from second league. Only three games in tournament finished with full board.

WYPS in January 2012

2012-02-05T05:47:00.000-08:00

In January 2012 was finished 8th championship of German WYPS. Final group won lehmans, who won all his games.

On 4th January started 10th championship in small WYPS. Tournament play 49 players in 6 group. link

WYPS in December 2011

2012-01-04T03:24:00.000-08:00

In December finished 8th Spanish championship (winner is RoByN) and 10th Italian championship (winner imperatore).

In December started a first tournaments in a new Number variant played on very small board. This variants looks as very interesting variant.

WYPS in November 2011

2011-12-01T05:41:00.000-08:00

WYPS - numeric version

In November was finished 6th championship in Numeric version. It was played according to a new rules. Tournament won Nevermind - won 10 games from 11. On Little Golem is a new number version too - played on small board. He lost only one - very short game with Luca Bruzzi (finished on 2nd place).

WYPS - English on small board

On November start 9th championship on small board. Final group was very quick and already is finished. Winner is Nevermind too !! There are some interesting Nevermind's positions from his games:

In all three positions white on move connect all three sides and fill all empty fields !

Some interesting facts:

Shortest game #1390168 has only 6 moves and whole board was filled !

Longest game #1390294 has 17 moves.

Longest word was MINISTERIAL and ANCHORETIC:

Most popular words were QAT and QI (3x).

WYPS and Siri

2011-11-28T23:50:00.000-08:00

Did you try Siri on iPhone ?

WYPS in October 2011

2011-11-01T10:19:00.000-07:00

10th championship in WYPS

In October was finished 10th championship in WYPS. It was first championship played according to new rules. Winner is Malaj from Hungary, winner of 9th championship too. Most important game was between Malaj and Paradoxx.

In this position Malaj found ingenious move: MAQUILA and won game in next move.

Interesting game was game #1348948 from final group. Game was played to last letter.

Several statistics:

Number of games: 261
Longest game: 50 moves.
First player won 46% of games.
Number of moves: 4443
Longest words 11 letters: MANTELSHELF (played in line !), FIELDSTONES, NEUTRALISER, PARASELENAE. All four players who found so long words lost these games !!
Most popular words: ZEE, QI, TEE, TRY, JET

8th WYPS championship on small board

In October finished 8th championship on small board too. Winner is imperatore.

There was found two 11 letters too: TEPEFACTION and ESTERIFYING. Both found Nagy Fathy and he will be play in final group in next championship.

Other championships

October was really rich for finished championship. Finished:

7th German championship
7th Spanish championship
8th French championship
9th Italian championship

WYPS in September 2011

2011-10-03T01:25:00.000-07:00

Numeric WYPS

In the last month finished 5th championship in the international version of WYPS. Winner is klaashaas from the Netherlands. Tournament was played according to old rules, where letter after flip became not flippable. New 6th championship is played according to new rules, similar to the standard version of WYPS.

French WYPS

Jean Herbert from Canada won 7th championship in WYPS - french version. He had the same number of points as Paul Gautherot - both lost one game. Jean Herbert probably won next French championship too, because he already won with Paul Gautherot.

Small WYPS

40 players are played in 8th championship in small WYPS. Tournament started on 5th September and probably will be finished in October.

WYPS in store

2011-09-18T08:21:00.000-07:00

Finally is possible again to buy WYPS. Price is until now 24.00€ and shipping 5.00€ and I hope it will be not higher. You could buy WYPS in store.

Handicaps in WYPS

2011-09-12T05:30:00.000-07:00

When I played WYPS with children it is not very interesting game because I am very strong. We invent a handicap version, where I have only a few stones in rack - for example three or four. Our rules for handicap WYPS:

Stronger player is black and has less stones in rack - 6,5,4,3 or 2.
Weaker player is white and starts games
There is no swap move.

In this video is example of handicaps where black player win with only two stones in rack.

Rules in PDF

2011-09-10T04:51:00.000-07:00

I create a PDF document with rules. It is suitable for printing. Document is here.

Finished tournaments in August

2011-09-02T09:09:00.000-07:00

In August were finished several championships.

On August 1st finished 8th Italian championship. Championship won beppi. He won 7th, 3rd and 2nd championship too.

On August 14th finished 7th English Small championship. Tournament won gpallis. About interesting game between 1st and 2nd player we wrote in previous blog.

On August 17th finished 6th Spanish championship. jose.ibiza won all his games.

Longest word in 7th English Small Championship

White player - maguire from Germany - played FLUTTERED.

WYPS - idea for universal version

2011-08-16T08:16:00.000-07:00

Spiel des Jahres 2011 became game QWIRKLE - http://boardgamegeek.com/boardgame/25669/qwirkle. Stones for Qwirkle and definition of word could be used in WYPS too. Rules for international version of WYPS - Q version:

Size board 8. It is 36 fields.
36 stones. There is 6 characters in 6 different colors.
Rack size is 5 stones.
Other rules are the same as in last version of WYPS.

Two interesting games

2011-08-10T11:50:00.000-07:00

There are two interesting games from ongoing tournaments on LitteGolem.

Full Board

This game was played in 10th WYPS championship between JeanHerbert and chianti. Game was played to last stone and last 13 moves were atari moves. There is final position:

The win with a few stones

Second game is played in 7th WYPS championship on small board. Game is played between gpallis and Michal Piszczalka. gpallis is a new champion on small board and this interesting games is his only lost. In this position:

gpallis plays excellent move REFILTER.

White is not only connected, but there is only one free field in corner, very distant from important letter R. But Michal Piszczalka found right solution.

In final position has black only 9 stones against 19 white's stones. But it is enough to be connected.

New videos on YouTube

2011-08-06T08:14:00.000-07:00

I create two new videos. There is a new special page with these videos too. Video with game on small board has every move commented - there are explained rules.

WYPS - new rules and new tournaments

2011-07-18T13:06:00.000-07:00

There are a new official rules for WYPS. In short:

Size of board - 13.
Every player has 7 stones in rack.
First move is choice.
ZigZag move is allowed and player could turn one opponent's stone.
If move is in line, player turns all opponent's stones.
Atari is move, when player connect all three sides of board.
Game is finished, when opponent is not able break off opponent's atari.

And changes on Little Golem:

Championship is played according to new rules: groups
Monthly cup is played according to quick variant - first atari won game
Championship on small board is played too according to new rules: groups.
New rules will be in variant with numbers too. Next championship will start probably in August.

Ultimate WYPS tournament finished

2011-07-18T12:55:00.000-07:00

On March 16th I wrote about Ultimate variant of WYPS. It is variant where is no luck influence. On LittleGolem was played small tournament with this variant.

Winner of tournament become JeanHebert. He won all his games.

Tournament Table.

I am champion !!

2011-07-04T10:15:00.000-07:00

I won 6th championship on small board. I love playing on small board, because my English is not very good for searching long words on bigger board. I was successful in 1st championship too, where I was 3rd and lost only 4 games from 27 games.

In last championship I lost again 4 games (from 13). We were 4 players with the same result, but I was player with best Sonnenborn score.

Some positions from my lost games:

White (JeanHebert from Canada) won.

Black (beppi from Italy) found answer in this position.

This my result means, that rules of WYPS will be changed, because there are suitable for me, but not suitable for other players.

5th WYPS championship on small board

2011-05-30T09:54:00.000-07:00

Championship on small board was finished. Winner is Michal Piszczalka. There is picture from one his game.

link

In new championship is in main group 14 players including me. link

Final table of 5th WYPS championship on small board:

WYPS on 1000 fields

2011-05-09T01:39:00.000-07:00

How long is game when is played on 1000 fields ?

There is experiment with WYPS game played on board with size 45 fields per side. Board has 1035 fields. You need 12 WYPS set of stones for playing on such big board.

Game finished after 338 moves. There is final position:

8th WYPS championship is finished.

2011-05-03T00:53:00.000-07:00

8th WYPS championship was finished. Championship was played with old rules (shared pool of letter). Winner is labradors from Honduras. Congratulation !!

Labradors lost only one game with imperatore. Their game has 90 stones - final position:

In whole tournament was four games where was 90 stones used and only one games where was used all 91 stones. It was game from 3rd league: http://www.littlegolem.net/jsp/game/game.jsp?gid=1295712

Longest used word in tournament was REHEARSERS in game http://www.littlegolem.net/jsp/game/game.jsp?gid=1295520&nmove=3.

Most atari (23) was in games http://www.littlegolem.net/jsp/game/game.jsp?gid=1295620 and http://www.littlegolem.net/jsp/game/game.jsp?gid=1295745.

9th championship will start today with new rules - both players has own rack of letters.

New rules on LittleGolem

2011-04-04T14:05:00.000-07:00

In this post I mention possible change of rules. New rules are added to this web site and these rules are now on LittleGolem too.

On LittleGolem was added Ultimate WYPS too. First tournament will start on April 18th.

There is summary of all variants of WYPS.

Ultimate WYPS

2011-03-16T06:22:00.000-07:00

Ultimate WYPS is a variant of WYPS where is no influence of luck. WYPS is played according to standard rules with changes:

There is no rack or pool of letters. All 91 letters are taken from bag and players can use all these letters for move.

Length of word is limited. Limit is maximal length of used word in game increased by one. For first move is limit 3.

Some notices:

For first moves are often used very outlandish words. For example TWP (it is only 3 letters word without possibility to enlarge).

In middle of game are often used very long words.

Game example:

WYPS - small change in rules ?

2011-03-16T05:53:00.000-07:00

In last months I tested a new small change of WYPS rules. There are suggestions for change of WYPS rules:

Every player has own rack of seven letters.

There is no pool of letters.

With old rules, players often damage rack for opponent. For example deliberately use all vowels or they let the same letters in rack. The rack is often full of hardly used letters and game is not so fun and is slow. When everybody has own rack, is not possible to damage opponent's rack. Common pool had reason in original version of WYPS where every letter can change a whole game.

After several games I decide play without pool. Because player has minimal influence on opponent's rack, pool was not so needed for a game.

And there is possible add two new rules for better balance of game:

On start of game both rack must contain at least one vowel.

First player is choosing which rack is her. Second player will do first move.

Game example: