Here's my code. It still has SEVERAL hours to run... 
#!/usr/bin/perl

use strict;
use warnings;

my @text;

while (<DATA>) {
  my ($q, $w) = split;
  push @{ $text[$q-1] }, $w;
}

my @best = calc(\@text);
print "{@best}\n";

sub calc {
  my ($t) = @_;
  my @best = (0);

  iter($t, [(0) x 26], \@best, 0);

  return @best;
}


sub iter {
  my ($t, $tmp, $best, $i) = @_;

  if ($i == @$t) {
    my $s = 0;
    $s += $_ * ($_+1) / 2 for @$tmp[0..25];
    @$best = ($s, @$tmp[26..$#$tmp]) if $s > $best->[0];
    return;
  }

  for (@{ $t->[$i] }) {
    $tmp->[ord($_) - ord('a')]++ for split //;
    push @$tmp, $_;
    iter($t, $tmp, $best, $i+1);
    pop @$tmp;                  
    $tmp->[ord($_) - ord('a')]-- for split //;
  }               
}

[download]
I'm using your larger data set, of course.
Jeff japhy Pinyan, P.L., P.M., P.O.D, X.S.: Perl, regex, and perl hacker
How can we ever be the sold short or the cheated, we who for every service have long ago been overpaid? ~~ Meister Eckhart

In reply to Re: Challenge: Letter Power by japhy
in thread Challenge: Letter Power by Tanktalus

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