This is a recurring post to discuss programming or other technical projects that we've been working on. Tell us about one of your recent projects, either at work or personal projects. What's interesting about it? Are you having trouble with anything?

Hello, as the title implies, I am looking for a temp controlled teapot.

I own an ember mug and have to say, it is one of my favorite purchases/splurges. For those that do not want to click on the link, this is a temperature controlled mug that holds a hot temp for liquids in a mug wirelessly. It does this with quite good precision IMO, have not whipped out a thermometer to check accuracy.

I have been looking for some time for a teapot that could do the same. The requirements I have are that no plastic or otherwise health adverse heat volatile materials come into contact with the heated water, and I would like it to be a teapot, because I like the ritual of pouring the tea out of the pot. I want to be able to steep and pour the tea from the same temp controlled vessel(I don't mind heating water and then pouring it into the temp controlled teapot), so I'm not looking for a temp controlled kettle, necessarily.

I think last time I looked I ended up on pages showing things like this set up, which I'm open to, but would like some guidance or reviews, if possible.

Thank you!

Bonus, what are your favorite mint teas or other teas that have a sensory experience outside of temp?

EDIT: On the same website I linked, I forgot to direct people here. Has anyone ever used a teapot warmer like the ones on that website?

Have you watched any movies recently you want to discuss? Any films you want to recommend or are hyped about? Feel free to discuss anything here.

Please just try to provide fair warning of spoilers if you can.

I think about this from time to time. Good directors often switch gears. They abandon beloved themes, franchises, or entire genres. Sometimes they become producers for the series they initiated and the quality takes a dip. In any event, for whatever reason, talented movie directors sometimes decide to dedicate their careers to something we are not as fond of. Perhaps you read a book that would be perfect for them! This post is an opportunity to put them on the right track! (in our imaginations at least...)

My son loves reading time before bed, but he’s only 3.5 so the books have mostly been picture books until now. Lately though he’s been getting more into stories with plots and an extended narrative, but entirely in the form of movies. There aren’t a lot of kid’s books to go around with the sorts of dramatic stories he likes, they’re more like “caterpillar eats food” and “train engine climbs a hill with grit and determination” type stuff. And whenever I’ve tried to have him just lay down and listen to me read a story without any pictures to stare at he has absolutely no interest. He really likes having pretty visuals to look at.

I know when I was a small child these sorts of board/picture books weren’t really a thing in India. The pre-sleep ritual was usually “storytime” instead, where my parents would tell us stories. I’m a little bit concerned that my kid has been so accustomed to always having visual cues presented to him that it’s stunting his imagination a bit, like failing to exercise his capacity to visualize ideas and concepts for himself without being anchored by some artist’s depiction.

So I’m curious to hear from other parents or caregivers/educators (@kfwyre?). Did you find there was a natural transition point between going from picture books to telling/reading stories? Was there any sort of work you had to do to enable it? Are there “exercises” I can work on to help my son exercise his imagination? I have been working with him to have him tell me stories about his day, which he does pretty well. But his stories are always quite grounded and he’s usually telling me what he’s actually done and seen. When my nephews and nieces were his age they tended to spin out a lot of random stories that pretty obviously did not happen, and I assume this is because they had more experience being told stories themselves rather than just factual reporting about the happenings around them.

I graduated in the spring and spent the last few months at home with family. I'm hoping to find an apartment/job in a major US city working as a legal assistant or paralegal.

I've never rented before, so I have questions, but due to circumstances related to the ones pushing me away from staying at home any longer, I don't have any parents or older siblings to ask for help, so I'm hoping to crowdsource wisdom here. I have specific questions, but also happy to hear any general advice for someone renting an apartment for the first time.

Some relevant context:

• Studio apartment is nonnegotiable. I don't know anyone I trust enough to be my roommate. If that weren't enough, I'm one of the only people still wearing a mask and trying not to get COVID, so it's gotta be a studio for me to be able to relax.
• I'm looking for a walkable neighborhood and good public transit in addition to affordability, so really looking at Chicago and Philly right now.
• I love to cook, but I know studios often have really lackluster kitchens. Hoping to find one with a usable amount of counterspace.

Those questions I had:

1. If you offer to pay a landlord the cost of the lease in full, is it typical for the landlord to waive the requirement that you provide proof of employment, or if you asked them to waive that, would they be likely to say yes? I would really like to take some time off, and coming home was intended to be that, but toxic family means I've just been stressed the whole time, so being able to get a place without needing a job right off the bat would be a fantastic setup to make sure this new start goes well. (If I save up part-time earnings for the next 2-3 months, I'll have enough to pay a lease on a $1200 studio in full, furnish it with the necessities, and feed myself.)

2. Recently I realized that when apartments are listed as unfurnished, that means no bed or mattress either. (I kind of see now why futons are a thing.) How do people usually address this issue? Do you buy a mattress and bed frame with the expectation that you'll take it with you whenever you move out to the next apartment?

3. Since I don't live in the city I'll be moving to, I most likely won't be able to see the apartment in person before committing. Any particular ideas on how I could handle this or what I should be wary of? I've heard of services where you can pay someone to show up to a tour and video call you so you can follow along (https://www.gandertour.com/). $50 doesn't seem too steep, but I don't know if that specific service is trustworthy, or if there's a cheaper or simpler way to deal with this.

Those are my questions, and like I said above, any advice not 100% related to these questions is welcome too!

Background:

I've been using a 9-year-old 13.3 inch Dell Latitude 7370 laptop running MX Linux to stream games via Moonlight from a beefier desktop machine. It is SO good and works flawlessly. My only complaint is the smaller screen size.

I would like to upgrade to a larger computer, and given that the computer will literally only be used for streaming games, it doesn't need to have great stats. I'm looking at used/refurbished models -- both for price and because buying something new feels like complete overkill for my needs.

My only requirements are:

• 17 inch screen
• USB-C charging

That's it! I'm assuming that literally anything I can get with that will work for what I need given that my small, decade-old laptop is already doing the same job perfectly. USB-C charging is a must-have for me. I already have USB-C power cords in all the places I plan on using it, and I don't want to have to use a separate charger for it.

My Situation:

Because I'm searching for used/refurbished models, I'm limited to what's available rather than going for any specific model of computer. I can easily find listings for computers with 17 inch screens. What I can't find easily is whether or not they support USB-C charging. Most sites don't have a filter for that, and a lot of the listings don't specify the type of charger used and just list "AC adapter" (or don't mention it at all). Many sites don't have pictures of the ports, or the pictures they do have are stock photos that aren't of the exact model.

Is there some easy way to find these that I'm missing? Some keyword, or a site that does have a filter for that, or brand knowledge that can point me in the right direction?

Also, if anyone has any recommended sites for used/refurbished laptops, let me know. I have had success with Backmarket for used tech before, but I'm open to recommendations.

Do you devour dessert first?

Do you eat your pizza with a fork and knife?

Do you put ketchup on your steak, or eat it well-done?

This is a place to confess your food crimes -- the worst, oddest, or most atypical ways/things/combinations that you eat.

In addition to confession, you may also take a moment to preach. Win over some converts. Convince others of your ways. It could be that, after hearing your defense, the jury here will actually find you not guilty...

My partner and I like to have a drink while we cook/ after work, and we've usually switch between some wine or more recently nice cocktails. I'd like to up my cocktail game when I'm hosting though.

What simple cocktails would you guys suggest?

So far my favourite cocktails are Negroni, White Russian, Old fashioned, and for after dinner a friend of mine made that Im not too sure about that's a 50 50 mix of whisky and amaretto with a cherry that's surprisingly good.

User and book club ping recipient Maevens said that it would help them if the book and questions were posted to Storygraph, so I created a basic book club template, but I haven't done anything with it yet.

What do you all think? Options include simply posting the book title each month, posting the book title and the discussion questions each month or posting and including a link to the Tildes book club discussion. I'm going to do something minimal regardless, to honor Maevens' request but I want to know what you all think and whether there are things you specifically don't want me to do.

Bottom line, the two book clubs could run in parallel with crossover and links, or they could be essentially separate. Please advise.

My fiancee and I are considering adopting a dog, most likely in the age range of 6 months to 2 years. I've read before that pet insurance is only worth it if you get the dog as a puppy, but I'm wondering what real people think, particularly for a dog that's 2-3 years old. Does anyone else have a pet insurance policy? Who is it with? How's it working out for you? Would you do it again?

Hi [insert tiles demonym here]!

I have an LTT backpack, and the zipper is wearing out. The other zipper already broke, which LTT paid to repair under warranty. This ended up being quite a headache, because the repair shop couldn’t find an equivalent zipper anywhere in the EU for shipping (located in France). I eventually found a company in the UK that did custom orders, but the taxes and shipping to France was expensive. The warranty paid for it, but I won’t be using the warranty for the other zipper repair (it’s already an extremely generous warranty, and the damage should absolutely have been classified as normal wear and tear, so I don’t want to take advantage of it again.

Anyway, the zipper for the laptop pouch is showing the exact same signs of wear. I asked the shop if they could repair this one too, and they said no, because the pouch is too narrow to get their sewing machine into. So I can source a zipper, but I would have to hand sew it into the backpack. I feel like I am capable of this, I just don’t really want to do it. I think their might be a way to reinforce it without replacing the entire zipper. I haven’t been able to find any info online about my theory, so I wanted to see if you all had any insight.

The important part of the post:

This zipper is a plastic coil zipper from YKK. They have a continuous coil that is sewn into the tape with thread. The top surface of this thread is ruined by the slider when you zip. This thread is starting to abrade. The other zipper abraded fully in a spot, and the coil separated from the tape.

Here is my theory. If I get a very strong and relatively thin thread, I can hand sew through the coil to replace / reinforce the factory thread.

Has anyone done anything like this before? Any tips, or things to watch out for? Will this change or ruin the smoothness of the slider when zipping?

What have you been doing lately for your own fitness? Try out any new programs or exercises? Have any questions for others about your training? Want to vent about poor behavior in the gym? Started a new diet or have a new recipe you want to share? Anything else health and wellness related?

Lately there's been a rash of people ripping apart AC units on small business' so they can sell them for parts (mostly the copper). Tends to take days to months to discover, and by that time they're long gone and the police are rarely interested in it (in my experience even when you figure out who's actually buying stolen copper, or car parts....but i digress).

I was asked as a friend to help with this for a couple of small business locations that otherwise don't need normal security. To start it's just one large, 60x300', roof with a couple of units on it. They're willing to spend money, but also don't want to get scammed, so I've been looking into it for them.

They're getting a quote from one of the big security companies like ADT, but didn't feel they were getting it right since they just wanted a camera pointing at the access ladder, when it sure looks like the first time this happened it was someone who brought their own, so they really do need some good coverage and not just one camera pointed at a ladder while they pay for some 24/7 person to stare at the feed.

The rough requirements are:

1. Some decent weatherproofing, as this will be on a roof all day. We can put an enclosure around it but trying to keep this simple.

2. Easy remote access to footage, ideally with notifications that can be setup for things like human motion, or lost connection.

3. Ideally fewer cameras. Not exactly because of cost, but because of the difficulty of getting the power/network up there. Be a lot easier to do one drop in the middle of the roof than say a drop at every corner.

4. Probably not wifi cameras. I figure we need to run power up there anyways, so it might as well be POE if at all possible. Added bonus being that you don't need to worry as much about wifi signal and the rare enterprising criminal with a jammer/scrambler/whatever?

and the tricky one
5. No on site storage. Likely they'll want cloud.

My first thoughts:
I have ubiquiti at home, and this seemed fine for it as a nice in-between since they probably need 2-4 POE cameras max (was going to see if i could get away with 2 in the middle of the roof, one looking each way). Was going to mess around and see what level of alerts they give and make them a couple of accounts (basically one alert to the person who'd call the cops and one to the person who'd look at it if the feed went down).

The no on site storage thing however, complicates stuff....i think?

The short version is there's no way to do even a basic NVR there (i've been over this thoroughly, and it's more a drama thing than a business thing). I figured that wouldn't be an issue, they'd just have to pay extra for some cloud storage and host it there, and it would probably scale well for them if they liked the solution and rolled it out anywhere else. Rather than having a bunch of NVR's they could just have one cloud based one, neat.

buuuuut it seems ubiquiti doesn't really do that. The people i'm helping are somewhat technical but i'd like to keep this turnkey as possible. I don't think there's any clean/easy way to accomplish this with ubiquiti, or at least that I can find?

In theory I think there might be some clever network way to host the NVR at some other physical/central location (with less drama) and then route all the traffic there, but that's beyond my current ability, and i'm skeptical that even if I learn how, i can keep it simple enough that i'd feel comfortable suggesting it.

The followup research:
So there's huge professional companies like verkanda/axis. I did some basic pricing research and it looks like $2kish, minimum, a year for these things. That might be within their budget (i'm told the damage done was easily into the 5 figure territory), but it also feels like extreme overkill for something that should be easier to solve?

Another one i've come across before is Reolink, but I have 0 experience with it and haven't found much in either direction that makes me think it'd be a good solution or a terrible one.

I'm pretty against ring/nest just due to a mixture of "fuck em" and also feeling like you don't get what you pay for.

Overall-

Anyone have any experience or guidance with this sort of thing? I really feel like my own home network/camera setup has me right on the edge of being able to say "ah yeah here's what you need...." and yet i've fallen at the finish line. Is there some easy way to make ubiquiti work (seems to meet all the needs except the cloud storage)? Or some system you're familiar with that does have that feature?

I feel like i bump into these kinds of problems more and more where the options are "make it a second hobby/job" or "pay through the nose" when it feels like there should be a reasonable inbetween.

Have you watched any movies recently you want to discuss? Any films you want to recommend or are hyped about? Feel free to discuss anything here.

Please just try to provide fair warning of spoilers if you can.

Anxieties, fears, bad habits, childcare, etc.

What keeps you up? This is a place where you can get those thoughts out of your head and into words instead.

For those reading the responses here, please practice empathetic listening — especially for those sharing difficult thoughts or feelings. It is much more important that someone feel heard and understood than it is to try to solve their situation.

I loved the notes app post (h/t @kwfyre) and that led me to think about the motivational or inspiring quotes that mean something to you whether they're well known or more obscure, whether said IRL or in fiction!

Have you watched any TV shows recently you want to discuss? Any shows you want to recommend or are hyped about? Feel free to discuss anything here.

Please just try to provide fair warning of spoilers if you can.

What have you been listening to this week? You don't need to do a 6000 word review if you don't want to, but please write something! If you've just picked up some music, please update on that as well, we'd love to see your hauls :)

Feel free to give recs or discuss anything about each others' listening habits.

You can make a chart if you use last.fm:

http://www.tapmusic.net/lastfm/

Remember that linking directly to your image will update with your future listening, make sure to reupload to somewhere like imgur if you'd like it to remain what you have at the time of posting.

Tildes is a very serious site, where we discuss very serious matters like yemen, brave and septic tanks. Tags culled from the highest voted topics from the last seven days, if anyone was documenting.

But one of my favourite tags happens to be offbeat! Taking its original inspiration from Sir Nils Olav III, this thread is looking for any far-fetched offbeat stories lurking in the newspapers. It may not deserve its own post, but it deserves a wider audience!

Oldest doesn't have to mean absolute age and can be relative to that tech's particular "lane" (e.g. your "old" cell phone might be newer than one of your game consoles, but it still "feels" old when compared to cell phones exclusively).

And "tech" can be, well, anything you think counts as "tech!"

Find yourself watching tons of great videos on [insert chosen video sharing platform], but also find yourself reluctant to flood the Tildes front page with them? Then this thread is for you.

It could be one quirky video that you feel deserves some eyeballs on it, or perhaps you've got a curated list of videos that you'd love to talk us through...

Share some of the best video content you've watched this past week/fortnight with us!

Command and Conquer Generals Zero Hour:
It has a very active community and there are lots of tournaments. Matches are very intense and fun.
Europa Universalis IV:
At this point of my life, I can say I am almost super pro at this game with thousands of hours 🥲

I also want to get into Red Alert and Star Craft series but I find them super complicated for some reason lol. Maybe I lost my game learning skills at the age of 29…

I was going to get screenshots to backup what I am talking about but apparently they aren't kicking around in the system forever so most of the evidence is gone but I often see mycketforvirrad editing the title of a post I make to exactly what it already was while they are editing tags as they see fit.

What's up with that?

As part of a weekly series, these topics are a place for users to casually discuss the things they did — or didn't do — during their week. Did you accomplish any goals? Suffer a failure? Do nothing at all? Tell us about it!

This is a recurring post to discuss programming or other technical projects that we've been working on. Tell us about one of your recent projects, either at work or personal projects. What's interesting about it? Are you having trouble with anything?

What have you been watching and reading this week? You don't need to give us a whole essay if you don't want to, but please write something! Feel free to talk about something you saw that was cool, something that was bad, ask for recommendations, or anything else you can think of.

If you want to, feel free to find the thing you're talking about and link to its pages on Anilist, MAL, or any other database you use!

I’ve casually discussed with several of other printers on here, but would love to casually chat about the hobby

What you print with, materials, settings, slicer, etc.

Me personally, I use a heavily modified Ender 3V2 that runs klipper with a dual z axis and direct drive extruder hotend (orbiter 2.0 on a V6)

I print a variety of PLA, PETG, and just recently got into ABS and ASA

I’m currently working on wiring up a stealth burner setup for the X axis though (in preparation for my Voron build 👀)

And I just recently finished printing the Input Labs Alpakka controller! (which is super duper cool)

But yeah I’m down to answer any questions or talk about anything 3D Printer related

Post something from your notes app that you think might be a good conversation starter.

Including but not limited to:

• An idea you jotted down to remember for later
• A meaningful quote that resonated with you
• A reminder
• A to-do list
• Those books you’ve been wanting to read
• A message you saved
• Those questions for your doctor
• That creative writing you were working on
• etc.

You can post the quote just on its own, or you can post it and add some context/questions to it as well. Anything you think might spark some good discussion or thought in others.

I've tried DDG for some time, but I keep finding myself using !g to find better results. I read a comment on Reddit that you just need to get used to searching things differently, but I'm starting to think that DDG just isn't very good. Kagi works well and I use the free version a bit for academic stuff, but I don't see myself paying for a search engine. Anyone have long-term reviews of search engines like Brave, Qwant, etc.?

So this may be weird, I just got a new set of pixel buds pro 2 and they work great, except if I'm not playing audio on my phone they frequently disconnect and reconnect from my bluetooth - I can tell because I can hear the tones. But if I'm playing a podcast or YouTube video, no issue. Phone is a Pixel 7a and it doesn't do this with my old A buds, my car, etc. haven't tried pairing the buds to anything else yet.

I've updated firmware, restarted everything, checked settings, turned off the adaptive sound, with no change. Help?

Hey Tildoes, my partner and I have been navigating a broad, government level health challenge and I was hoping to pick the hivemind for help on navigating it.

As some of you may have seen in articles posted here, there was a massive fire at the lithium ion battery plant in Moss Landing a few months ago. It ended up spewing a slough of nasty chemicals into the air, which inevitably landed in the surround agricultural fields and waterways. My partner was in Australia when the fire occured, thank god, but was still freaking out about downstream effects. There have been studies from a 3rd party group from UC Davis and San Jose State - that found elevated levels of heavy metals - however those have been downplayed by local agencies claiming there are not major impacts and that distribution was surface level. With everything we know about state and federal agencies oversight, sometimes they are less than transparent about reporting toxic impact factors - like what happened in Hinkley and was popularized by the movie Erin Brockovich. However today the California Certified Organic Farmers put out their own update and press release. They summarized what has happened and seem to be endorsing the safety of the farms they have certified in the area.

So here is the rub: Federal, state, county, and local agencies have determined there is not significant contamination, the CCOF has agreed with these agencies, and my partner is still uncomfortable eating local produce. It feels a bit like we're back in covid times, and she is looking for cherry picked studies to justify strict behavioral and consumption restrictions within our household. We have always agreed to "shift our risk tolerance according to data" and now - with the Trump administration and a general distrust of our fed/state agencies - she's advocating we continue to avoid these foods until there is "definitive proof" that the food is safe.

I'm kind of at a loss of what do to. On one hand, it's a minor thing to change where we get our food. Food systems are complex and we can kind of get it from anywhere. On the other hand, I love my time at our farmers markets, experimenting with new foods, and supporting our local community. I also think the more obscure the process from farm to shelf, the more possibility for health/employee/environmental shenanigans by the producers. To me buying broadly "American" or "Mexican" kale doesn't mean we aren't going to have similar or worse impacts to our food.

I'm trying to find a reasonable middle ground or a bellwether indicator we can use as a go/no-go, but every time I think we've agreed on one it feels like the goal posts have been moved. Do any of you have similar issues or possible navigated differences in risk tolerance during Covid well? If so, how did you do so? I know this is a bit of a random thread, but I'd love to hear what you think!

What have you been doing lately for your own fitness? Try out any new programs or exercises? Have any questions for others about your training? Want to vent about poor behavior in the gym? Started a new diet or have a new recipe you want to share? Anything else health and wellness related?

2 Grand Prix races finished already. I'd forgotten what Shanghai International Circuit looked like; cool track.

Not as exciting as Melbourne, but that's probably because the rain really spiced up AusGP at the end. Some thoughts as I watched:

• Alonso retired due to break issues in Lap 5. Not a great start to the season
• Weird to see Max lose two spots at the start of the first lap and not immediately recover
• Poor Yuki with his broken frontwing. Broke out of nowhere, too. Man just can't catch a break...
• Great little fight between Charles and Max in Lap 53. Max did eventually recover to his starting P4
• Both Haas in the points? Nice! Ocon P7 and Bearman P10

Congrats to Piastri on his 3rd F1 win! I get the feeling we're going to be seeing this McLaren 1-2 frequently. Who's in which position, we'll see. Though with the Ferraris, Russell, and Max also mixing it up up top, this should be a good season.

Next race:

Japanese Grand Prix
Suzuka Circuit
Sunday, April 6, 2025

I am Brazilian and I have used software to assist me in writing both English and Portuguese since I the 1990s. That was a great boost to my learning process, as I could see the corrections made to my writing and incorporate them in my writing. I also enjoy concoting sentences that feel correct and proper.

However, writing this way has disavantages.

First, when I write correct English, readers will assume that I am a native English speakers, generally American. This comes with a lot of baggage and expectations for the interpretion of sophisticated context which I lack. When I fail to conform to those expectations I am met with hostility. At that point it is useless to disclose my nationality, since the bad vibes are already set.

Second, formal and properly written paragraphs give the impression that I think too highly of myself, that I wish to give more weight to my ideas than they really have (someone was aggressive to me because I used the word "ontological" once...). Much of the world prefers the informal mode of communication which I personally find unpleasant. But bad interactions are way more unpleasant. So perhaps I shoud change the way I write to be intentionally informal and a little improper. That way everyone will understand that I am not a native English speaker and also that I do not believe that my ideas are inherently superior to everyone else's. Also, a little bit of error prevents people from thinking I am an AI.

I did not proofread this post and I feel ashamed. Maybe it is for the best.

eBay is updating its privacy policy, effective next month (2025-04-27). The major change is a new section about AI processing, accompanied by a new user setting with an opt-out checkbox for having your personal data feed their models.

While that page specifically references European areas, the privacy selection appears to be active and remembered between visits for non-Europe customers. It may not do anything for us at all. On the other hand, it seems nearly impossible to find that page from within account settings, so I thought I'd post a direct link.

I'm well aware that I'm anomalous for having read this to begin with, much less diffed it against the previous version. But since I already know that I'm weird, and this wouldn't be much of a discussion post without questions:

• How do you stay up to date with contract changes that might affect you, outside of widespread Internet outrage (such as recent Firefox news)?
• What's your threshold -- if any -- for deciding whether to quit a company over contract changes? Alternatively, have you ever walked away from a purchase, service, or other acquisition over the terms of the contracts?

Have you watched any movies recently you want to discuss? Any films you want to recommend or are hyped about? Feel free to discuss anything here.

Please just try to provide fair warning of spoilers if you can.

So Assassins Creed Shadows released this week, and so far the discourse surrounding the game is really all over the place with lots of good and bad reviews across the spectrum. I was a big fan of the Assassins Creed games from 1-3, and then I skipped the PS4 console generation so I didnt play any of the more recent ones. But this new one is about ninjas, which is rad, so Ive been following news about the game.

One thing I noticed, which is the main thing I want to discuss, when seeing clips of the game online is the focus on sword combat, and more specifically open combat. I dont know if this is a thing that became more of a focus in earlier games like Valhala or if its more a response to the success of Ghost of Tsushima. Im wondering if anyone else has thoughts on how the role of combat has evolved as the series has advanced.

In my personal view, a ninja assassin game should have minimal focus on direct combat. The ideal way an assassination should go is something like this:

1. Do some early missions to gather intel or do prep work

2. Take on "the approach" to your target, which will involve a combination of parkouring over rooftops and stealth kills to remove guards. Your efforts in step 1 will make this easier or harder.

3. Get into position and wait for the right moment when the target moves into the right place

4. Spring your trap, whether that be pouncing on them with a dagger or setting off an explosive or whatever

5. Drop a smoke bomb, disappear into the shadows, maybe jump off a rooftop into a haystack for good measure

When pulled off correctly, it should be like you were never there. Aside from the dead guy. If you are getting into a direct head on confrontation as a ninja, you have fucked up at ninja. To this end, I feel that in a stealth assassination game open combat should be more of a penalty for when you screw up and get caught, not part of the core strategy.

Looking back at the early games, this concept was applied in AC1. Getting into a fight with a Templar was pretty difficult and tedious. You didnt want to get stuck doing it, and if you did it was often better to just run. The times you were forced to fight head on it felt like you were trapped in a dire situation that was not to your advantage, so it was a good way to apply pressure to the player to make a scene seem tense.

In AC2 the combat was reworked and became significantly easier. I actually really like the way it was implemented. Technically you can get away with just hammering away at most weaker enemies until you break their guard, but the combat really shines when you fight defensively. If you focus in dodging and counter-kills, big fights become a thing of beauty. Ezio dodges and weaves effortlessly through the crowd, doing a slick spin slash every so often to slice a bad guys neck. Its all very stylistic and elegant and graceful in a way that makes Ezio look like a badass but is still very evocative of the idea of a master assassin.

And then AC3 is fine, I don't have a ton to say about that one.

Returning to Shadows, when I look at clips of people playing the game there is a lot of sword combat. The combat seems to often follow a pattern where the enemy will perform a fixed attack pattern with visual indications like a colored aura around their weapon, which the player must mitigate through precision by either dodge rolls or parrys, after which there will be a pause during which the player can whack at the enemy a few times and reduce their health bar. Repeat a couple times until they are killed. I think it is specifically the hacking away at an enemy like you are taking a machete to jungle foliage that I dont like about this. Whittling away at an enemy who just tanks it and soaks up damage feels decidedly un-assassiny to me.

Now, if open combat is intended to be a big part of the game then I can see why this is the case. You cant make every enemy a long drawn out chore like AC1 because if youre going to have to do this like a hundred times that will get old fast. And you cant do glorified quick time events like AC2 because itd be too quick and a major pillar of your gameplay will feel trivial. So I can see why this newer style of combat is being used, I just don't feel its a great fit for the genre.

What are your thoughts? Are you a fan of stealth-action games? Do you enjoy dodge-roll-centric combat? How would you want to see combat handled in an assassins creed type game?

I'm going to be in NYC with my daughter next week for a school conference. There are already some planned tourist things: the One World Center observatory, South Street Seaport, the Roosevelt Tram ride, and a Broadway show.

There is a pretty full schedule of scheduled activities. The primary degree of freedom is that almost every meal, breakfast lunch and dinner, is "on your own".

We're staying right in Times Square, so the expectation seems to be that everything you could want for food is within walking distance of the hotel. I plan to find a grocery store and get some fruit and snacks to keep in the hotel so we don't have to go out for every meal if she's exhausted.

Keep in mind also, it will be myself, my 4th grader, and whatever of her 4-6th grade friends we pick up, so we're not looking for bars or haute cuisine. If there's something "special" or uniquely new york, I can probably sell it as a new experience, but it needs to be in their overton window.

She's a pretty good eater but prefers familiar food. She's a fan of American staples like pizza, dogs, and burgers. She does well with Italian and Mexican, but rarely likes Thai, Indian, or Chinese.
Her best friend is vegetarian, so at least some vegetarian- friendly options would be good.

We won't have a ton of time for other touristy stuff, but I'm open to recommendations for something simple and short we could do in the evenings. In this thread people mentioned riding the ferry, so if that's a thing we can easily do from there, maybe grabbing some street hot dogs and sitting on the ferry would be a good option?

So, Tilderistas what Times Square recommendations (or anti recommendations) do you have?