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Nerdle = Like Wordle but with Equations

344 points| dzink | 4 years ago |nerdlegame.com | reply

141 comments

order
[+] tibbar|4 years ago|reply
I made a solver for this and did some comparison with Wordle: https://jacobbrazeal.wordpress.com/2022/02/07/solving-nerdle.... TL;DR even though there's an order of magnitude more possible words, you can solve it in fewer average guesses than Wordle pretty consistently.
[+] pierrebai|4 years ago|reply
That's because there are fewer letters. In wordle, ignoring the fact that the word need to exists, you could make 5 guesses with 5 new letters each time and still not quite exhausting the letter space. With the math one, in two guesses you can figure out the digits.

Also, I play wordle in the hardest mode, which forces you to always reuse known letters, which makes it a lot harder. (I also playu in a clone with an extended vocabulary here: https://www.arachnoid.com/wordgame/index.html)

[+] nneonneo|4 years ago|reply
You note that the interface accepts a lot more words than are in the dictionary, much like the normal Wordle game. I wonder if you can exploit the full set of acceptable words to narrow down the possibility space even further? I would not be surprised if there's an equation in the full set that performs better than the equation you initially selected.
[+] pierrebai|4 years ago|reply
I get the same feeling as everyone. There is no point in the game because even a single digit wrong is no clue at all. In my 1st and only attempt, I entered 1 + 2+ 8 = 11 and both pluses, the 2 the 1 and the 8 were right, with only the 2 in the wrong position. And yet that gave zero clue to what the other number was... and it turned out to be another 8, which made finding the solution really luck-based.
[+] quietbritishjim|4 years ago|reply
As others have said, you can (and often should) make guesses that don't satisfy all the clues you've found so far. That way you can find / eliminate symbols much more quickly.

It's funny there are so many people saying how much they hate it. All power to you. But personally I like it way more than Wordle.

I basically like the solving part of Wordle but hate the thinking up words aspect. Nerdle fixes that, but the equation bit keeps it more interesting than a meaningless string of symbols.

Similar to how I prefer the numbers round on Countdown [1] to the main letters game.

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Countdown_(game_show)

[+] elcomet|4 years ago|reply
Why would you put three ones?

Maybe you should have tried the other numbers

[+] hackeraccount|4 years ago|reply
that is so odd - I think I had the same situation as well. I'm not particularly numeric so I was briefly excited (I tried an available number and realized it fit!) but then figured out that there were multiple solution.

And finally lost because I too didn't realize that I could re-use an 8. I'd feel bad but it could have been any of the choices I did take so ... maybe not so fun.

[+] de_keyboard|4 years ago|reply
This... doesn't work well. There are too many possible solutions given the clues, making it just luck.

Consider:

   2 + _ + 8 = 1 _
Now _ could be 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 0
[+] lalaland1125|4 years ago|reply
The trick is to rule out as many digits as possible using guesses that you know are wrong.

9 + 4 + 7 = 20 for example is a more efficient guess than naively trying to guess each pair.

And there are even better guesses if you just use digits.

[+] stared|4 years ago|reply
It is the same thing as with Wordle, when there is only one letter missing and you have to iterate over the possibilities. In words, however, typically there are only 2-3 correct choices.
[+] evanb|4 years ago|reply
nerdlegame 20 3/6

gkmkkgkg

ggkgkggg (emojis didn't render right in HN)

gggggggg

Knowing the answer I then opened a new tab to try something [that I won't detail to minimize spoilers for today's puzzle] and got linked to

> >Number ordering and 'commutativity'

>

> We get it. 1+2 and 2+1 are effectively the same in maths because of a principle called ‘commutativity’. In the same way, 34 = 43.

>

> However in Nerdle, the only perfectly correct answer is the one we're looking for, in the order we have it. So if our answer contains 1+2, we won’t accept 2+1.

>

> We've spent hours playing with alternative commutative-friendly rules that would allow both 1+2 and 2+1. But so far, every variant we’ve tried is simply not as fun to play.

>

> If you feel the commutativity challenge costs you an extra attempt at a Nerdle challenge unfairly, you can always delete one line from your game emojis before you share them. We won’t tell anyone, promise.

The same issue afflicts mathle http://mathlegame.com/ and I think poses a fundamental issue with this game. In spelling there is a definite order. With commutative mathematical operations, not so. WRODLE!=WORDLE but 1+2+3==2+3+1. They might LOOK like different sentences, but they are not. They are the same. Sure, the glyphs are in different orders, but no aspect of the Platonic sum can distinguish them. They are one.

[+] jameshart|4 years ago|reply
RAISE and ARISE both mean 'the lift up', but they're different words, and you're not going to win a wordle for 'ARISE' with 'RAISE'.

I'm not sure how you would want to win for getting the right number in the wrong place in a game which provides clues to find the right places by telling you when you have the right numbers in the wrong places.

[+] jstx1|4 years ago|reply
This is very frustrating. It's like Wordle but without any of the nice or enjoyable elements.
[+] capitainenemo|4 years ago|reply
What frustrated me was the guessing. By equation 3 I had everything narrowed down except the 1s place in the answer which was same as number in the equation. So, I spent the next 3 guesses trying the remaining digits, and eventually losing with 2 more digits left to try.
[+] sxv|4 years ago|reply
I enjoyed it fwiw.
[+] tluyben2|4 years ago|reply
I liked it but I don’t like the 1+2 != 2+1 ; I understand why it is but that is just annoying throwing away one go that you cannot really know. Which is different from Wordle, game play wise.
[+] jonny_eh|4 years ago|reply
You just described nearly every clone.
[+] culi|4 years ago|reply
EDIT: game's over. It's already been done: https://rwmpelstilzchen.gitlab.io/wordles/

Is anyone keeping track? So now we have:

*wordlists*:

- [wordle](https://www.powerlanguage.co.uk/wordle/): wordlist picked by creators partner

- [byrdle](https://rbrignall.github.io/byrdle/): wordlist has to do with choral music

- [lewdle](https://www.lewdlegame.com): lewd words

- [sweardle](https://sweardle.com/): 4 letter "sweary" words

- [plantle](https://plantle.netlify.app/): herbs/fruit/flora/shrooms/etc

- [digitaltolkein](https://digitaltolkien.github.io/vue-wordle/): lotr words

- [taylordle](https://www.taylordle.com/): words from taylor swift lyrics

*math*:

- [primel](https://converged.yt/primel/): 5-digit primes

- [nerdle](https://nerdlegame.com/): math equations

- [mathler](https://www.mathler.com): math equations

- [mathle](https://mathlegame.com/): math equations

- [hexle](https://jamesl.me/hexle/): guess the hexadecimal number

- [byrtle](https://jamesl.me/bytle/): guess in base-10, but answers/guesses are converted to binary

*other*:

- [squirdle](https://squirdle.fireblend.com/): pokemon, tells you if you got the right gen, type, weight, etc

- [absurdle](https://qntm.org/files/absurdle/absurdle.html): adversarial wordle

- [dordle](https://zaratustra.itch.io/dordle): 2 words at once

- [quordle](https://www.quordle.com/): 4 words at once

- [wordle](https://worldle.teuteuf.fr/): countries, correctness based on distance

- [letterle](https://edjefferson.com/letterle/): one letter

- [squareword](https://squareword.org/): 2 dimensions!

languages:

- [言葉で遊ぼう](https://taximanli.github.io/kotobade-asobou/): kana (Japanese)

- [wordle (es)](https://wordle.danielfrg.com/): spanish

not wordle:

- [three magic words](https://www.threemagicwords.app/)

---

Edit: added suggestions, categorized them, and added descriptions

I guess I'm the one keeping track

[+] lapetitejort|4 years ago|reply
What's next: choosing political parties to form a coalition government.
[+] duck|4 years ago|reply
I didn't think this would work... but then I solved it and now I think it could be fun. Looking forward to tomorrow's game!
[+] kawfey|4 years ago|reply
I played it for a while but found myself constantly opening my calculator or counting on my fingers. I failed at 4th grade times tables lol. I could solve it every time, between 4 and 6 tries, but it was just annoying to have to deal with stuff like that, and that it requires specific numbers in spaces...not expressions with the same numbers that evaluate the same e.g. 48/8+3=9 != 3+48/8=9.

This game type works so much better with word, at least with my brain.

[+] pimlottc|4 years ago|reply
This is fun but the different colors (or rather, lack of color) are way too subtle for me. It takes me conscious effort to distinguish "correct-character-wrong-position" from "correct-character-correct-position".

It probably also doesn't help that I'm seeing also seeing tons of phantom dots from the grid illusion [0]...

0: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Grid_illusion

[+] lapetitejort|4 years ago|reply
I solved it in six using only three unique digits and one unique operator (excluding the required equals of course). I expected it to be more varied and grew more despondent as all of the digits and operators dropped away. Even with the restricted character set I'd expect the operators could produce some varied gameplay, but from the one puzzle I got I'm not too hopeful. Are these hand-designed, or random for each person?
[+] drivers99|4 years ago|reply
If it's like wordle, then everyone gets the same puzzle on a given day. Your description matches what I played today (and is a partial spoiler; one great thing about wordle is that people have been good about not spoiling it). Tomorrow's may be quite different.
[+] bhelkey|4 years ago|reply
I prefer to open with: 2*3+8=14 or 84/7-5=7.

I find it tremendous important to find which place the equals sign is in while eliminating operators and digits.

[+] Kinrany|4 years ago|reply
3*4+-7=5 and 10=8/2+6 cover everything but 9.
[+] nextstep|4 years ago|reply
Cool idea.

But here’s the first game I played: https://pasteboard.co/NYP4YfnNj0kk.jpg

Perfect example of why this doesn’t really work. I didn’t have enough information to narrow down the possible values that could solve the missing parts of the equation I stumbled on in the remaining tries.

[+] GlitchMr|4 years ago|reply
You don't have to play hard mode. No need to guess what you deduced already, you can make a guess that doesn't use your previous deductions.
[+] compsciphd|4 years ago|reply
I found its 2 easy. my first attempt is always 23+45=68. at that point i covered most of the possible symbols.
[+] cu3ba11|4 years ago|reply
I somehow managed to get the right-hand side of the equation correct on the first try, which made finding the left-hand side fairly easy. I guess I'll have to wait until tomorrow to try the game out for real.
[+] alistairSH|4 years ago|reply
Is the UI really slow to react for anybody else? Button clicks have a noticeable lag for me on Safari on iOS. I get the same thing on some other Wordle clones and archives, but not the main Wordle site.
[+] kleene_op|4 years ago|reply
Wew. That was surprisingly fun!

I managed to do it in three guesses, but man was I slow.

[+] 42jd|4 years ago|reply
Seems the strategy is to eliminate as many numbers/operators before you attempt to guess. Was able to get it in 4 as by the second row I had the set of values to work with.
[+] izzydata|4 years ago|reply
It looks like they updated it because I used to be able to do 1+-/*23= and it would accept it because it couldn't compute it as incorrect.