You submit four colors and receive one black peg and one white. The first red looks promising, so you keep it and rearrange the others.
Did that black peg actually identify the red position?
Feedback describes the guess as a whole. It does not identify which individual positions earned the pegs.
A Reddit player asks about practical strategy where the secret cannot repeat colors but guesses can. That resembles our Mastermind 3D. Start by making the information checkable.
Write down the version's rules
The site uses seven colors. Standard mode has four positions; hard mode has five. Secret colors do not repeat, but guessed colors may. You have eight attempts.
Other versions permit repeating secrets or use different color counts. A fixed opening or “five-guess guarantee” from another ruleset is not a guarantee here.
On phones, tap colors below to fill positions or drag them. Submit when all positions are filled. Practice recording feedback in standard mode before increasing length.
Black and white describe the whole row
Black means correct color and position. White means a color exists in the secret but is misplaced. A secret peg already counted as black is not also counted as white.
In this synthetic exercise, the secret is red, blue, green, yellow. The guess is red, green, purple, brown. Red is exact; green is present but misplaced. Result: one black, one white.
We can identify the colors because the teaching example reveals the secret. During play, the same feedback does not tell you which two colors earned it. Fixing a particular position goes beyond the evidence.
Separate existence from position
Try another hypothetical guess: red, red, red, red. If the secret contains one red, it must match one of these positions, producing one black and zero white.
That confirms red exists without identifying its position. Every guessed position was red.
Repetition can test a question, but uses an attempt. Decide what you want to learn before filling a row with duplicates merely because you are unsure.
Give the next guess a question
A first guess with distinct colors can cover more possibilities. Then ask whether you are testing a color's presence or locating a color you suspect is present.
Changing every color and position at once can make comparison harder. Keeping one color still preserves a hypothesis, not necessarily a proven position.
Record the guess and aggregate feedback. Add one unresolved statement, such as “red may be second, but the first result also permits no red.” Remove a hypothesis that conflicts with any round.
Replay every earlier round against a candidate
When a possible secret occurs to you, treat it as the answer and score all previous guesses against it. A candidate explaining round three but not round one is invalid.
This is slower than choosing a row by feel but reduces contradiction. Keep multiple surviving candidates honestly. Fitting existing evidence does not establish uniqueness.
This is a manual elimination method, not proof of an optimal eight-attempt winning algorithm. Hard mode adds a position and makes records more important. One loss is not a judgment on your logical ability.
Before submitting, state what this guess is intended to rule out. The feedback can then answer a question rather than merely decorate another row.