Scratch, a word path puzzle
Scratch is the one game in the box with no clues. You are given a starting word, an ending word and the number of steps between them, and the job is to find words that get from one to the other.
How it plays
Each step must be an anagram of the word before it with a letter added or removed. Steps that only add or drop a letter don't count.
More than one route works, and the counter shows how many are still open. Every word you put in narrows the routes that remain, and a word that leaves none open is one to take back out.
A Scratch takes four to six steps. It also accepts words that are not in the word list, from a wider dictionary.
A worked example
This Scratch was made up for this page and comes from no day's puzzle. It asks you to get from FALSE to PLATE in four steps.
- StartFALSEthe first answer
- SEALthe
Fgoes - LEASTa T arrives
- TALEthe
Sgoes - EndPLATEa P arrives
FALSE drops its F and rearranges into SEAL. SEAL gains a T to make LEAST, LEAST loses its S to make TALE, and TALE gains a P to make PLATE. There are other routes as well, through different words at the second and third steps.
Tips
- Compare the two ends first. Letters in the start that are not in the end have to go somewhere along the way, and letters in the end have to arrive.
- Count. The lengths of the two ends and the number of steps tell you how many steps add a letter and how many take one away. FALSE to PLATE in four steps keeps the length, so two steps add and two take away.
- Work from both ends towards the middle. The last step is often easier to see backwards from the end word.
- A hint shows a letter of a word that fits the box you are on, and asking again shows another letter of the same word.
Scratch in the day's four
Omeletter sets four puzzles a day, chosen from its nine games, and every game comes round at least once in any three days. New puzzles appear at 05:00 UTC, which is mid-afternoon in Sydney and early morning in London.
You start with fifty hints in the app and five on the website, and you earn another for every puzzle you solve. On this website you can play today and the two days before it. The app keeps every day you open while it is free.
On the App Store and Google Play.
The other games
All nine are explained side by side on How to play, and every answer comes from the word list.