How about EXTRA? An E at the beginning, and an A at the end - neithet are very common - not to mention the X. A QU sequence is also usually hard to guess.
Thought of another tough but fair wordle. I do not look forward to this one coming up in the live game, as it almost certainly will.
I challenge you to a Wardle 
ETA: Actually, this word may be harder on paper than in practice.
Well, you got me. My last three guesses were SAGGY, SAPPY and SAVVY, so I was on the right track, more or less… guessing a second S would be critical.
Oh, snap, I didn’t even realize it was another trap word. I was mainly just focused on a triple consonant. Yeah, turns out it was tougher than my edit gave it credit.
After posting I thought of better ones: MOMMY and DADDY, particularly the latter. M is a pretty common guess letter, while D could be but for some reason just isn’t. (Pairs poorly with the other letters you’d want to guess, is my theory.)
ETA: ‘Trap’ is a term I made up to describe those SHA_E situations where you have 3 or 4 greens but many choices for the last letter(s).
I don’t get folks saying that words with Q or W are difficult. It narrows down the pool quite a bit, which is helpful to me.
For some reason, my guesses are always blind to Y and -H. I just don’t expect them, and when I get them it’s hard to place them. So for me, it would be very hard to guess less-used words like BRINY or PHONY.
I had TRACE (my normal starting word) NOMAD, BASIL, WASPY (wasn’t sure if that was a word or not). Then I was running out of letters for _AS_Y. Looking at the unused letters I couldn’t see any that worked. Then saw _ASSY. I probably would have done a different _ASSY word, but knowing it was a trick word I figured it was SASSY
Nice! Excellent, love hearing the process.
Yeah, it’s unfortunate that any wordles in this thread start with the premise that you know it’s a tough word.
ETA: NOMAD is an excellent research word. I need to remember that one.
EDIT2: Just thought of another hard one similar to above: LILLY. Also POPPY. Oh shit, PEPPY/POPPY/PUPPY and possibly PAPPY. I should have gone with PUPPY instead of SASSY.
Would you think QUBIT is hard? It has no repeated letters, but…
XYLEM could be difficult.
My usual guesses are
FRIED 0
GHOST 0
BLACK 0
JUMPY
The only letters now left are N Q V W X Z
I’m pretty sure I’d get it on guess 5
I didn’t realize what “hard mode” meant, but now realize I always play that way. Isn’t everyone trying to get the word in the fewest tries? Not sure why anyone would waste a word by not using the previous clues. The most satisfying part of the game for me is when I get it in 2.
In the long run seeking out more of the unknown letters rather than always going for the long-shot guess may improve your average score. You would normally only use the Hail Mary play in the dying seconds, not 5 minutes into the first quarter.
That’s interesting, but I don’t consider it a Hail Mary. Very rarely do I ever need more than 4 guesses, so I consider 3 my average and 2 a win. The “easy” way makes 2 almost impossible.
Today I ready this thread and wondered what I would do with PUPPY. Long story, but I think I would get it in 4 based on things I had already thought of.
Then I went and played a couple of puzzles. The second one had:
TRACE, LIONS, DUMPY, PUPPY. PUPPY was the answer.
That’s a good starting word I like the obscure ones. I only know it because I have a property on a Xylem Lane in Ocqueoc. I like plants I it should be familiar otoh.
How about pbbth for a Wordle 
I think easy mode makes it more likely to solve puzzles with more possible solutions than available guesses. Hard mode means every guess is a possible solution but it doesn’t always provide as much additional information as an easy mode guess. If you play on hard and have - O U L D, you are relying on luck to get the final letter. An easy mode guess can narrow down the options.
I suspect optimal strategy would be a mix of the two, which is effectively saying that easy mode is optimal because it doesn’t preclude you from choosing hard mode guesses but hard mode does preclude you from easy mode guesses.
George Costanza might get VULVA quickly but I think it would stump me
I try to straddle the dual goals of not losing and using the lowest number of guesses. If your only goal is to win then I agree that not doing hard mode is pointless because a win is so easy. When the answer is something like *IGHT with more than 2 possible answers, I try to make a word using all the possible letters so it will lower my average score. But I usually don’t waste my 2nd and 3rd guesses on eliminated answers just to maximize my letter coverage.
I always try to start with a word associated with the day. Like if I’m going to be playing D&D that day, I use Dragon. Not the cleverest plan, admittedly.
Especially since the words are all 5 letters. 