Scrabble Challenge #8: Is the Highest Scoring Move the Same in Words with Friends?

As much as I love Scrabble, the iPhone and Android versions of the game are just not as much fun or as fast paced as Words with Friends. I play both, but I'm most active on Zynga's version of the mobile word game because it's quicker to make moves, doesn't take as long to update, and gives more immediate competition, due to the fact that it's not as intimidating as Scrabble is to a lot of my friends. It's laid back... which means I have a bunch of games going, and I like that.

But sometimes it gets confusing, going back and forth between Scrabble and Words with Friends, because the board layout is different, as well as some of the point values for letters. Which means playing a bingo in one game might not be as worthwhile in the other.

Here's the main differences between the two games:

• Letter tiles
  
  Scrabble has 100 letter tiles.
  
  Words with Friends has 104.
• Premium squares
  
  Scrabble has 8 TWS, 24 DLS, 12 TLS, and 17 DWS (counting the center square).
  
  Words with Friends has 8 TWS, 24 DLS, 16 TLS, and 12 DWS (center square is not one).
  
  See the image above for actual placement in each game.
• Point values
  
  Some of the letter point values are the same, but some aren't.
  
  B, C, G, H, J, L, M, N, P, U, V, and Y are all different values.
  
  See the image below. Words with Friends are the letters on the left, Scrabble's on the right.

• Letter distribution
  
  The letter distribution is also different, but not by much. Both have 2 blanks.

Now, all of this matters is terms of word placement. One word could be worth over 200 points in Scrabble, but in Word with Friends only 70. That's why it's important to explore all your options. If you have a bingo (seven-letter word) in Scrabble, it's probably a good throw down, since you'll get an additional 50 points added to your score. But in Words with Friends, you only get an extra 35 points, so throwing a two-letter word like QI down in the right spot could do far more damage.

The Challenge

For this challenge, find the highest scoring move on both the Scrabble board and Words with Friends board below. Your letters are QFDLATS. All the letter have the same value, except the L. Will the highest scoring play be the same word? Or not?

Puzzles were made using Scrabulizer, a great tool for playing around (but NOT for cheating!).

** Click here for the answer to the above puzzle.

Last Week's Solution

And here's the answer for last week's Scrabble Challenge #7:

Q: With the letters MABGANS on your rack, try finding the bingo word on the board using a parallel play to spells six additional words, totaling 153 points.

A: The word was MBAQANGA, which was previously featured in a Scrabble Bingo of the Day. When placed on the board horizontally below UTENSILS and above JOEY, you'd also be able to spell MO, MICROBE, AY, NOTA, PENGO and CONGE.

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