Hi Spectragate,
To be clear, in the introductory tutorial, that move - me placing the 3 earlier than the tutorial prompt about a loop - got me three things scored (I think it was sequence, same, and loop), all in one turn. If you try it, you'll see that only the sequence points add to your total. (The game shows a nice "wow 90 points total this turn!" or something, but it doesn't actually gain you those points.) So instead of getting 20 + 30 + 40, you get just 20 points.
It's easy to see with any closed/sequence or closed/same ... only the first of the two things mentioned that turn grants you points, the second doesn't.