I, and it looks like puzzlegal, almost went for MOXIE before MOVIE, but I took a guess that MOXIE was an unlikely Wordle word. Since I looked yours up for you, I decided to check out if I was right in that assumption, and I was. It is an allowable play, but does not show up in the potential answers list. My intuition is not always correct, though. One puzzle during the transition between the original and the New York Times had two correct answers, depending on which version you played: AGORA and AROMA. The original had AGORA in its target list, and I would have never expected that word to be well-known enough for the average person. And neither did the New York Times, as they struck that word from the list and used AROMA instead for that day’s puzzle. (Feb 15, #241)
it took me a long time, too, although I wouldn’t call it too long since I had it narrowed down to only the right answer in the end, and it didn’t even look like a real word without the accent.
I strictly adhered to all of my rules – at this point they are legion – and was rewarded with only one possible word for the three. Perfect!
It helped that earlier today I was idly thinking of good vowel-heavy starter words, and I thought of both SAUCE and SAUTE, and wondered if SAUTE was in the answer list or only the guess list. Question answered.
I never did come up with a perfect vowel starter. My criteria are three vowels from the group AEIO – not U – plus two consonants from the group CLMNPRST. H and K would be acceptable but not ideal, and definitely not both. The best I came up with were the two mentioned above, and then switching the crappy U out for an even worse Y: MONEY and COPAY. (Also wondered if COPAY is in either list.)
I had been inspired by yesterday’s MOVIE, which is so close to awesome.
Oh, duh, two vowel-heavy starters that meet all my criteria are IRATE/ORATE. They even end in E, which is my preference for playing the first E. IDEAS is also pretty good but the D isn’t great and E in center position isn’t either. (A, O or even I in center position is the ideal for me. Which, again, _RATE does nicely.)
I got so much info from my first word that i decided not to use my usual second word, and then got lucky. Knowing the placement of five letters gave me only one legal word for guess three. I didn’t see it until i started trying each letter, though.
TRACE
WHIPS
BASTE
SAUTE
After the first word I saw it could easily be one of the _ASTE words. The second word was to find which one (with my false assumption)… It eliminated waste, haste and paste. This left baste as the only other aste word I could think of. Even though baste was wrong it gave me the right answer.
MOVIE → Good things to try for the second guess - another vowel, for sure, but A or U?
PASTE → Ok, well, S in front, only one word I can think of SAUTE
NOISE and PIANO are both solid picks for vowel starters. I think _RATE is the clear best, but both of your suggestions are fun alternatives. Nice work!
At least I thought of one on my own: IDEAS, but of course it’s contaminated by a dirty D. Heh.
