As someone who definitely gets worked up when there’s a timer (still got all 18; top 1% really? Might be good to show a rough number of total players), I don’t really get it without a timer.
I am with the people asking for a scramble/ shuffle button. I have to do anagrams all the time in cryptic crosswords and sometimes it requires seeing things in a totally different order to unlock the answer.
According to my analytics only 32 people out of 12,145 got all 18 in todays puzzle so far!