How to play Words With Friends on Facebook games

This is just a simple look at the basics of playing Words With Friends on Facebook. When you first look at the game board, it is a little confusing about how to play. After hearing many people ask about how to begin, I decided that some simple directions would be in order.

So, you accepted someone's invitation to play Words With Friends on Facebook games. Now what? You look at that game board, and wonder where to start. I know that I did! It is really so easy to play. Look at the bottom of the board and you will see some letters; these are like your little wooden tray of letters in the board game, Scrabble, which is basically what it is. You may need to scroll down a little farther to see the letters, as one of my friends found out!

Much more simple than it looks

You will be making a word with these letters, and it must cover that center star that you see. The letters are placed by dragging them from the bottom to the spots that you wish to place them. If you get them in the wrong spot, you can move them. If you want to bring them all back to the bottom and start over, click on "recall."

Or TL, DW, or TW

What are all those little DL, TL, etc... that you see on the playing board? These indicate a bonus score for you if you play a tile on that spot. The number on the letter tile is the points that you get for using that tile or letter, but DL doubles the letter value. TL will triple that value. DW and TW will do the same with the entire word value! Here is where your score is really turbo boosted!

If you play a letter tile in a spot that puts it next to another letter, it has to be a word! The words that the game accepts may surprise you, but it does have to work both ways. Also, you can only place tiles in one line on one turn. You cannot complete one word one way and add additional tiles to make the other word. You can only play one line at a time, and any accidental words in the process will count for your score, too.

Those other buttons at the bottom are nothing difficult to understand, and you probably won't use all of them, anyway, too often. The Play button is most important! It will submit your play, and if it is acceptable, it will ask you if you want to send your play to your opponent. You click yes, and you have played your turn!

If your word is not acceptable, for any reason, it will tell you. You can hit "recall" to get the tiles back where they came from to try again. You can hit "shuffle" to move them around for a fresh look at what you have to work with. You can hit "swap" to get some different tiles, but remember it will take your turn. You can "Pass" your turn, if you want to. "Resign" is pretty well self-explanatory! "More" is an opportunity to change your theme by purchasing a new look for your board. By the way, don't be concerned if you don't see all these buttons on your board. They don't all appear until you have started the game.

Most fun you can have on your Android tablet

I personally love to relax on the couch or even in bed and play Words With Friends on my Craig Touchscreen Tablet. You can download the Words With Friends App from Amazon. (The link is on this page) It is a very easy screen to use, and it is my very favorite activity on my tablet. If you are unfamiliar with the Craig Touchscreen Tablet from CVS, be sure and check out my site about it. It is under $100 and so much fun. Click on the photo below to see my site.

First try at Facebook Games

Facebook games are a big part of most people's Facebook experience. As a person who works online, I have not really had the time or interest in an activity that requires even more clicking and carpel tunnel pain! Having recently begun to play a game called, "Words with Friends," I will share a few observations about Facebook games in general. I invite any of you Facebook game veterans to contribute any thoughts you may have in the comment section.

Green Acres

Farmville is probably the most-played game in the Tri-Cities area, if the posts on the Facebook Newsfeed are any indication. I did try Farmville one time, but after about two minutes of hoeing a line of crops by just clicking with my laptop mouse, I turned in my John Deere and quit. I uninstalled Farmville, and I have been wondering ever since what possibly could be the fascination with any Facebook games.

Low maintenance games

Then one day I was intrigued by a conversation about a Scrabble game between friends. People who play various word games take turns, playing a game over a long period of time, one move at a time. People may have several games going at one time with different friends on Facebook. I decided I might like to play occasionally with a very good friend who loves words as much as I do, so we settled on "Words with Friends," a game which appears to be relatively new. I downloaded the free app to my Craig Tablet with the intention of only playing with that one friend, but I have a few games going with other friends, too.

What are the rules?

Like everyone else, I have always gotten those odd requests for a brick or a stable, along with invitations to water worlds or castles or whatever. They have piled up in a list that I see occasionally and always wonder what is the right thing to do with those? I have seen some people post an awkward announcement that they don't play games. It always comes across as , "Don't send me any more stuff!" I do not mind to receive invitations to anything, and I guess the real concern should be when you don't receive invitations to anything! I just don't want to offend someone; Are you supposed to RSVP and say, "No, Thanks," or something?

Hide the horses and hay wagons

People often complain about having to look at all of the posts about what someone is doing in a Facebook game: how many eggs they have found, barns they have built or whatever. All that needs be done is to click on the arrow beside someone's posting from a game, and scroll down to click, "Hide all by (the game name)"

If you want to stop posts from appearing on the Facebook Newsfeed reporting your game activity, you need to go to your privacy settings and make adjustments in your Apps and Games section in the left side of the screen. I have been tinkering with these settings, and, frankly, I have not yet been able to get it right. Facebook privacy settings have stumped more technically savvy users than me. And, just when you think you have mastered the system, they change it!

If you restrict too much access to your account, the game will not function correctly, which is what happened to me. My Words With Friends data became Zynga numbers. I had to reinstate the access that the app had in order to get it to function. I do have "only me" chosen on who can see things posted to the wall. I'm still working on this one.

If you can't stand the heat...

If you long for social connection, then games could easily provide that for you, however, be prepared for a potential onslaught of social activity. You can be overcome by friends needing this or that or wanting to engage you in a game, depending on the nature of the Facebook game you are playing. You could easily become overwhelmed with social interaction through the games, and your leisure time may be suddenly gobbled up with fulfilling requests. Be aware of that possibility.

The Verdict about Facebook games

I am enjoying the casual pace of a few ongoing word games with friends, but it is easy to see how it could quickly become very intrusive on a regular basis. This is especially so if you are involved in an online endeavor which uses Facebook for promotion and are on and off the site throughout the day and night.

I will throw this in for free

As a last word, I will say that I have encountered Facebook users whose Facebook accounts actually were compromised through playing games from third party applications. Usually the worst case scenario was that their account posted some pornographic video on their friends' walls. The funny part of this has been that it is always the least-likely person who would NEVER post a video like that!

Whoever has the most points when there are no more moves to be made wins.

The Enable Wordlist

Words with Friends uses a word list referred to as "Enable" as its final dictionary authority. You can access this public domain word list and quickly improve your enjoyment and mastery of the game. The link to the word list is below in the big arrow. You can download the word list in a Notepad format.

Would you be interested in a Words With Friends Tournament?