Wordle

I'm thinking of doing something like Smarty Pants 6, but based on past Wordle answers. The idea would be the player puts in a past date and then plays against the Wordle word for that day. A reason for this might be somebody is on vacation and unable to play certain days.

There are lots of sites with historic lists, but many of them seem to be wrong. I think this is because when the NYT bought the game, they eliminated some of the future answers. Answers used to be predestined and easily available. I'm not sure if that is the case any longer.

Here is a list of previous answers only.

My tentative idea of a name is Wordle Wayback Machine. The NYT attorneys would probably feel I'm abusing their trademark, but I doubt the hosting site (WoO) would be a big enough threat for them to care about.

Comments?

3 tonight June 23

Quote: avianrandy

3 tonight June 23

Show Spoiler

link to original post

Quote: avianrandy

3 tonight June 23

Show Spoiler

link to original post

Lol that’s not a 3.

Quote: unJon

Quote: avianrandy

3 tonight June 23

Show Spoiler

link to original post

Lol that’s not a 3.
link to original post

whoops was so sure that was it..running late lol

Make that a 4 lol...first mistake all day haha 3 shades of red right now

Quote: unJon

Quote: avianrandy

3 tonight June 23

Show Spoiler

link to original post

Lol that’s not a 3.
link to original post

thanks for waking me up :-)

Quote: Wizard

I'm thinking of doing something like Smarty Pants 6, but based on past Wordle answers. The idea would be the player puts in a past date and then plays against the Wordle word for that day. A reason for this might be somebody is on vacation and unable to play certain days.

There are lots of sites with historic lists, but many of them seem to be wrong. I think this is because when the NYT bought the game, they eliminated some of the future answers. Answers used to be predestined and easily available. I'm not sure if that is the case any longer.

Here is a list of previous answers only.

My tentative idea of a name is Wordle Wayback Machine. The NYT attorneys would probably feel I'm abusing their trademark, but I doubt the hosting site (WoO) would be a big enough threat for them to care about.

Comments?
link to original post

There was a guy who had a "Wordle Archive" similar to what you are describing. You could specify whichever game you wanted. This was good for me since I was late to the Wordle party, and gave me a chance to get up to speed, starting from puzzle #1.

Unfortunately, the NYT shut him down a few months ago. This page used to have the game, but now just has an explanation of why it's gone.

Wordle #370 June 24, 2022: 3/6


Dog Hand

Quote: Joeman

There was a guy who had a "Wordle Archive" similar to what you are describing. You could specify whichever game you wanted. This was good for me since I was late to the Wordle party, and gave me a chance to get up to speed, starting from puzzle #1.

Unfortunately, the NYT shut him down a few months ago. This page used to have the game, but now just has an explanation of why it's gone.

Wordle 6/24

Lucky on try #2, unlucky on try #3. I always seem to guess wrong when it's down to 2 or 3 possibilities.

link to original post

Thank you. That wasn't what I wanted to hear, but better than not hearing it at all.

Wordle 370 3/6

🟩🟨⬜⬜🟩
🟩⬜⬜🟩🟩
🟩🟩🟩🟩🟩

Wordle 370 5/6

⬜⬜🟩⬜🟨
⬜🟨⬜⬜🟨
🟩⬜🟩🟩🟩
🟩⬜🟩🟩🟩
🟩🟩🟩🟩🟩

Wordle 371 3/6

⬜⬜⬜⬜⬜
🟨🟩🟩⬜⬜
🟩🟩🟩🟩🟩



(I changed the time zone on my phone to Moscow time so I could do tomorrow’s Wordle tonight)

3 tonight June 24

Wordle #371 June 25, 2022: 4/6


Dog Hand

Wordle 371 5/6

⬜⬜🟩⬜🟨
⬜🟩🟩⬜⬜
⬜🟩🟩⬜🟩
⬜🟩🟩⬜🟩
🟩🟩🟩🟩🟩

Today's was a tough one for me. Ugh.

Wordle 371 5/6*

⬜⬜⬜⬜⬜
⬜⬜⬜⬜🟨
⬜🟨🟨🟨⬜
⬜🟩🟩🟩🟩
🟩🟩🟩🟩🟩

Mind of a different word. 3 tonight June 25

*kind even. Stupid autocorrect

Wordle #372 June 26, 2022: 3/6


Dog Hand

Wordle 372 3/6

⬜⬜⬜⬜🟨
🟨⬜⬜🟨🟨
🟩🟩🟩🟩🟩

Wordle 372 3/6

🟨🟨⬜🟨⬜
🟨🟨🟨🟨⬜
🟩🟩🟩🟩🟩

Fibble #87 6/9 5/5🏴
⬛⬛⬛🟩🟨
🟩⬛🟨⬛⬛
⬛🟩🟨🟩⬛
🟩🟩🟩🟩🟩
⬛🟩🟩🟨🟩
🟩🟩🟩🟩🟩
https://fibble.xyz/

3 tonight June 26

I did some analysis today, and like one of the other members here I found that the best two word opening combination is TRICE and SALON.

Here's my top 5 pairs:

TRICE and SALON
STOLE and CAIRN
TRAIN and CLOSE
LINER and COAST
STAIR and CLONE

Note that this is the lowest average remaining possible answers after both words are guessed, regardless of what clues you get from the first word. The clues you get from the first word may inform your second guess better than the pair above, though your best second guess will often be the matching pair above.

Tips for guesses

- The first guess may occasionally give you enough information to make a final guess in the second row. If at any time the clues you have received so far are enough to narrow down the result to only 1 or 2 possible answers, you switch to final guesses rather than strategic guesses.
- The strategic second guess should avoid using any of the same letters as your first guess. Even if the clue for a letter was yellow or green and you are trying it in a different position, it's still better as an overall strategy to guess a letter you haven't tried before as long as it's not a rare letter like Z or J (which you won't need to use in a second guess).
- No guesses should contain a repeated letter eg HEDGE (unless you're making final guesses and it's one of few possible remaining answers)
- Interestingly the letter H doesn't factor very often into my best first two guesses despite how common it is in English text. Before doing this analysis I'd been using H in my opening word.

Note that playing in "Hard Mode" severely limits your ability to guess strategically, and the above assumes you are not playing in hard mode. Hard mode means that if you get a clue indicating a letter is required (eg green or yellow) you MUST use that letter in subsequent guesses. As I discuss above, the best strategy is not to guess the same letter you have already guessed - unless you have high enough confidence to switch to final guesses, so hard mode limits your ability to try new letters strategically. I could do separate calculations based on hard mode rules one day perhaps.

Why do I emphasize opening word pairs rather than single words? Because more often than not, you will not get enough info in the clues from your first guess to significantly narrow down the possible answers, so you'll need to eliminate more letters in your second guess, so it's more likely that a good performing pair of opening words is needed than a good performing first word. That said, the first word in each of the above pairs is still one of the good choices for opening word on its own.

Other people have come out with what they think are good first guesses:

CRANE - yep it's good. If the clues don't help suggest a second word you can follow it up with PILOT.
CRATE - also good, indeed my results show it's better than CRANE, both on its own and as part of a pair, when followed up with SOLID.
RAISE - very good if only looking at the first word's performance - by some measures the best opening word. Can be followed up with CLOUT.
SOARE, ROATE, etc - these are good first guesses but not included in my analysis because I include only words that could be a possible Wordle answer as well (it would be lovely to get 1/6 or 2/6 every now and again). But I did find that the anagram of SOARE, AROSE is also a decent opening word and you could follow up AROSE (or SOARE) with GLINT.
TEARS - this isn't a very good opening word. Wordle doesn't contain any plurals so while guessing an S in the first word is good, TEARS won't ever be a wordle answer and few wordle words would have an S at the end (there are some, like FETUS and TORUS). I don't think any of the anagrams of TEARS came up in any of my analysis
LATER - pretty good, though I'm not sure the reasoning anyone had for rating this at the top. When paired with SONIC it makes a pretty good opening pair.

I didn't take any measures to exclude possible answers that have already been used. I had to decide whether to draw the line. In case you don't know, all the past and future answers and the day on which they'll be the answer are already published but I did not use the information about when an answer will be the answer.

Others have done a more comprehensive analysis where they have constructed a tree of every possible sequence of words guessed throughout the entire game. This may better inform strategy past the first two guesses and may even suggest some changes in rankings for the first two words given the next word coming.

Wordle 373 4/6

⬜🟨⬜⬜🟨
⬜🟩⬜🟩⬜
⬜🟩🟩🟩🟩
🟩🟩🟩🟩🟩

Wordle #373 June 27, 2022: 4/6


Dog Hand

Wordle 373 4/6

⬜🟨⬜🟩🟨
🟨⬜🟨🟩🟨
⬜🟩🟩🟩🟩
🟩🟩🟩🟩🟩

3 tonight June 27

Wordle #374 June 28, 2022: 4/6


Dog Hand

Got it in three

Wordle 373 3/6

⬜🟨🟨🟩⬜
🟨🟩⬜🟩⬜
🟩🟩🟩🟩🟩

Wordle 374 4/6

⬜🟨⬜⬜⬜
⬜⬜⬜🟨⬜
⬜⬜🟨⬜⬜
🟩🟩🟩🟩🟩

Wordle 374 5/6

⬜⬜⬜🟨⬜
⬜⬜🟩⬜🟨
⬜🟩🟩⬜⬜
🟩🟩🟩⬜⬜
🟩🟩🟩🟩🟩

Wordle 374

Wordle 374 4/6

⬜🟨🟨⬜⬜
🟩⬜🟩⬜⬜
🟩🟩🟩⬜⬜
🟩🟩🟩🟩🟩

3 tonight June 28

Surely, I will not be the only to have missed today's word. Yikes.

Wordle 375 5/6

⬜⬜⬜⬜⬜
🟨⬜🟨⬜⬜
⬜⬜⬜⬜⬜
⬜🟩🟩⬜🟩
🟩🟩🟩🟩🟩

Quote: rsactuary

Surely, I will not be the only to have missed today's word. Yikes.
link to original post

Pass the dunce cap, I blew it too. That has got to be the toughest word I've ever seen in this game. I don't think I have ever said or wrote that work in my life and didn't even think it was proper English.

Wordle #375 June 29, 2022: 4/6


I agree that today's word is unusual.

Dog Hand

Wordle 375 X/6 is trending on Twitter, so lots of people are having trouble with it.

Tough one today. Was happy to figure it out in 4.

Wordle 375 4/6

⬜⬜⬜⬜🟨
⬜⬜🟨🟩🟩
⬜🟩⬜🟩🟩
🟩🟩🟩🟩🟩

Wordle 375 4/6

⬜⬜⬜⬜⬜
⬜⬜⬜🟨⬜
⬜⬜⬜⬜🟩
🟩🟩🟩🟩🟩

3 tonight June 29 strange word

Wordle #376 June 30, 2022: 5/6


Dog Hand

Wordle 376 6/6

⬜⬜⬜⬜🟨
⬜⬜⬜⬜⬜
⬜🟩⬜🟩🟩
⬜🟩🟩🟩🟩
⬜🟩🟩🟩🟩
🟩🟩🟩🟩🟩

Wordle 376 5/6

⬜🟨⬜⬜⬜
🟨🟨⬜⬜⬜
⬜⬜🟩🟩🟩
⬜🟩🟩🟩🟩
🟩🟩🟩🟩🟩

Lucky 2 tonight June 30

I did tomorrow’s Wordle early.

I’m waiting to post my results I don’t accidentally spoil it for anyone.

Wordle 377 3/6

⬜⬜⬜🟨🟨
🟨🟩🟨⬜🟩
🟩🟩🟩🟩🟩

Glad to have one work quickly for me.. been a tough week!