Nudges, in order of increasing blatancy:
1. There's a pretty big clue in the grid of a puzzle which asks you to find a five letter word. 52 A: "Puzzle that gets people obsessing about five letter words" which is, of course, WORDLE. If that's not enough, there's also 69 A: "What you might do if you fail to solve 52 across on the sixth try" which is CUSS.
2. Look for pairs of 5 letter words in the grid.
3. Remember the puzzle title: "Yellows And Greens".
4. The Ys and Gs in this puzzle are all on the right side of the puzzle. That is not a coincidence!
"Yellows And Greens" by benchen71
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benchen71
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Nudges, in order of increasing blatancy:
1.
2.
3.
4.
1.
2.
3.
4.
Check out "The MOAT MEOW Mashup Pack" here. US$10 for 14 metas that don't always abide by the "rules" of the game: asymmetry, 2-letter words, uncrossed letters, who knows. And this time there's a mega-meta! 
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Laura M
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Got it only after the 4th nudge. Wow! Very clever, and also I can't believe how dense I was :-)
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KayW
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Doh!!! My sentiments exactly. Nice one, Ben.
Contest Crosswords Combating Cancer (CCCC) is a bundle of 16 metapuzzles created to help raise money for cancer-related charities. It is available at CrosswordsForCancer.com.
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Dow Jones
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benchen71
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Lots more solvers!
Laura M
Carolyn
KayW
markhr
Dow Jones
LindaPRmaven
DIS
BobJas
Bbaack
bringing us up to 28. Answer reveal in less than 24 hours!
Laura M
Carolyn
KayW
markhr
Dow Jones
LindaPRmaven
DIS
BobJas
Bbaack
bringing us up to 28. Answer reveal in less than 24 hours!
Check out "The MOAT MEOW Mashup Pack" here. US$10 for 14 metas that don't always abide by the "rules" of the game: asymmetry, 2-letter words, uncrossed letters, who knows. And this time there's a mega-meta!
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benchen71
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A few more solvers coming through:
Spid4567
Account
Schmeel
for a grand total of 31. Answer reveal shortly...
Spid4567
Account
Schmeel
for a grand total of 31. Answer reveal shortly...
Check out "The MOAT MEOW Mashup Pack" here. US$10 for 14 metas that don't always abide by the "rules" of the game: asymmetry, 2-letter words, uncrossed letters, who knows. And this time there's a mega-meta!
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benchen71
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- Joined: Thu Jul 22, 2021 8:50 pm
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Here's the solution to "Yellows And Greens":
I constructed this puzzle in the week before Matt Gaffney made his announcement about failing to construct a Wordle meta, I swear! Then, when a couple of commenters suggested that @madhatter5 or myself could complete Matt's grid, I just had to bite my lip. That said, my mechanism is quite different, relying on the solver noting the 5 pairs of 5 letter words, and the unusual distribution of Ys and Gs (the puzzle title was supposed to push you in that direction!)
It was actually quite hard to come up with the Wordle entries. If I had too many letters in the correct place too soon, I would have an unmanageable number of Gs to deal with. Similarly, if I had too many correct letters in the wrong place then there would be too many Ys. I was also trying to simulate a likely Wordle progression. In this regard, the hypothetical player started with an unusual word (FLUID) and repeated two unused letters (D and E). But the most important constraint was that there had to only be one possible answer, given all that had come before. KOALA is indeed the only possible word, based on the Wordle dictionary.
I was aware of the two unrelated 5 letter words in the grid, and early on in the process I did want to get rid of them. But in the end I decided that since they weren't paired across the grid like the others, and given that neither of them included Ys or Gs, and given the clue of CUSS spoke of getting the answer on the 6th attempt, I figured it should be OK. Since no one commented about them, I guess it was OK!
I constructed this puzzle in the week before Matt Gaffney made his announcement about failing to construct a Wordle meta, I swear! Then, when a couple of commenters suggested that @madhatter5 or myself could complete Matt's grid, I just had to bite my lip. That said, my mechanism is quite different, relying on the solver noting the 5 pairs of 5 letter words, and the unusual distribution of Ys and Gs (the puzzle title was supposed to push you in that direction!)
It was actually quite hard to come up with the Wordle entries. If I had too many letters in the correct place too soon, I would have an unmanageable number of Gs to deal with. Similarly, if I had too many correct letters in the wrong place then there would be too many Ys. I was also trying to simulate a likely Wordle progression. In this regard, the hypothetical player started with an unusual word (FLUID) and repeated two unused letters (D and E). But the most important constraint was that there had to only be one possible answer, given all that had come before. KOALA is indeed the only possible word, based on the Wordle dictionary.
I was aware of the two unrelated 5 letter words in the grid, and early on in the process I did want to get rid of them. But in the end I decided that since they weren't paired across the grid like the others, and given that neither of them included Ys or Gs, and given the clue of CUSS spoke of getting the answer on the 6th attempt, I figured it should be OK. Since no one commented about them, I guess it was OK!
Check out "The MOAT MEOW Mashup Pack" here. US$10 for 14 metas that don't always abide by the "rules" of the game: asymmetry, 2-letter words, uncrossed letters, who knows. And this time there's a mega-meta!
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rjy
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I'm a stupidly late finisher on this, having avoided your solution posting above and requiring yours and other nudges to be dragged over the finish line. My brain could not make the connection of Y and G to the Wordle response colors (duh! but we all have those occasional meta-blockers) and I was thrown by the repeated I, D and E to think it was a Wordle progression (curse of playing it in Hard Mode)
That said - what a brilliant concept, and wonderfully executed. Wish I had pieced it together nudgelessly!
That said - what a brilliant concept, and wonderfully executed. Wish I had pieced it together nudgelessly!
Ray
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Darth
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Wordle fan here. The title clued me in on the theme even before starting. Well done, Ben!