The last two were unlikely to be the word, but I try to finish in only a few minutes and those popped to my head before foyer. But I could have guessed BOXER or DOPER or some other words I’m sure. When I’ve lost it’s usually because I have 3 letters and guessing only 2 new letters at a time doesn’t let you eliminate the other options fast enough.
Our wordle slack group lots of people lost on foyer.
I had started with some random word with lots of consonants (all black result), so when I got to having just o e and r, I only had two clear possibilities I could see left with three guesses.
There are two reasons that you always win within 6 guesses:
1. It has been shown [1] that in hard mode you can always solve wordle in 6 guesses (but not always in 5) if you assume that the hidden word is "reasonable", i.e., taken from the 2k-word list. However, if you know 12k 5-letter English words and if you don't assume that the hidden word is "reasonable", then you will sometimes need 7 guesses.
2. Even then, the average number of guesses that you need is much lower, at 3.5 guesses (or 4.5 using all 12k words). So if you play optimally or close to it, it is only in very rare cases (the worst case) that you will need the full 6 or 7 guesses.
So, surprisingly, the game is easier if you are not a "savant", or to be more precise, if you are not a computer :-).
[1] http://sonorouschocolate.com/notes/index.php?title=The_best_...