A real tricky one with two sets of orthographic neighbor words.

Target Word: GROVE
Typical Wordle Word Construct: 2 Vowels and one compound consonant (2 letters or 3 letters; seen with >50% frequency)
Today’s Wordle Word Construct: Typical; 2 vowels (E, O); 1 compound consonant (GR)
# Of Guesses: 4.4 WordleBot average per Marc McLaren*; 4 for WordleGuru

Seed Word: SOARE
Seed Word Revelations: 2 vowels (E & O), 1 in exact position; 1 consonant (R) but not its position
# Of Possible Solutions after the Seed Word: 18 possibilities including 2 sets of orthographic neighbor words [PRONE, KRONE, DRONE, CRONE], [DROVE, GROVE, PROVE, TROVE]

Second Word: PRINT
Since most Wordle words have two and we already know 2 vowels from the seed word, there is no need to search for additional vowels.  This gives us an opportunity to deploy the EnotE (Eliminate-not-Enumerate) Strategy.

I could not come up with a word that would eliminate 17 of the 18 possibilities. So, I had to look for the second-best option. After a lot of noodling and thinking, I narrowed the choice to PRINT. Please notice that I used “I” as a vowel with two sets of compound consonants. Even though “I” is not expected in the target word, PRINT gave me the best option as an elimination word.

Revelations from the 2^nd word:1 consonant (R), in the 2nd position; equally important if not more important finding is that the target word doesn’t have the letters P, I, N or T.

# Of Possible Solutions after the Second Word: 5, including one set of orthographic neighbor words [DROVE, GROVE], BROKE, ERODE, and FROZE.

I didn’t think FROZE is likely to be the answer, so I overlooked it in coming up with the second elimination word. I had a hunch that the answer is likely to be from the orthographic neighbor set, i.e., either DROVE or GROVE.  I chose DROVE since it had the potential to eliminate 4 of the 5 leaving me with the answer.

I always prefer one of the possible answers as the elimination word since it gives me an opportunity to solve the puzzle at this very step.

Third Word: DROVE; it eliminated all with the exception of GROVE.

Revelations from the 3^rd word: The letters R, O, V and E in positions 2-5.
# Of Possible Solutions after the third Word:1 – the target word GROVE

EnotE (Eliminate-not-Enumerate) Strategy deployment: This Wordle is a good example of the power of the EnotE strategy, even though we had to apply it twice.

Gutfeel: The target word will be one of the orthographic neighbor words.

Final thoughts: Wordle outcome has a lot to do with luck, not just skill. It’s clear that LadyLuck was partially on my side today. On the other hand, WordleGod was up to his old tricks with 2 sets of orthographic neighbor words.

© 2022 Ashok Gupta All rights reserved.
Wordle and WordleBot are trademarks owned by the New York Times.

*The WordleBot score I refer to comes from Tom’s Guide by Marc McLaren.  Marc writes his post at around 7 AM U.K. time.
https:  //www.tomsguide.com/news/what-is-todays-wordle-answer#section-previous-wordle-answers

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My other work you may find interesting

I write Rhyming Prose (Prose that rhymes). My work in this area can be found on my website, Rhyming Prose — … when a poem won’t do it!

I have also started writing free-verse poems. My work in this area can be found on my website, Budding Poets Corner – Poet Laureates of Tomorrow