About room #209
- Ladder
- DEER → WARP
- Word length
- 4
- Par (fewest steps)
- 6
- Letters that differ
- 4
Room #209 climbs from DEER to WARP. Of their 4 letters, 4 differ (positions 1, 2, 3, 4); each of those needs a rung of its own, so the shortest imaginable ladder has 4 rungs — par here is 6.
So 2 rungs are sidesteps: somewhere a correct letter gets spoiled for a moment, or a letter from neither word is borrowed.
If a step leads to a word that can only change back, undo it and try another position.
Four-letter words, but five or six steps.
Stuck? Open a hint
Hint: the first step
Change letter 4 to D: DEED.
Show one shortest ladder
DEER → DEED → HEED → HERD → HARD → WARD → WARP
Rules of Word Ladder · One letter at a time: planning ladders and guesses