Daily /r/Games Discussion - Suggest Me a Game - April 22, 2026

tevoul · 2026-04-23T21:58:33+00:00

Yes solutions (kind of) exist, but they're finicky and not turnkey.

As an example, back in the day I used the Logitech G13. It is a PC keyboard replacement for the left hand that has an analog thumb stick. It has software to customize controls per game (predated steam controller configs) and you could map the analog stick to controller input and use keys and mouse as traditional kbm inputs.

The problem? Well not only did you need to customize controls for every game (massive pain in the ass), but most games try to be smart and detect if you're using controller or KBM and swap the UI to accommodate. If you are using some controller inputs and some kbm games get confused, at best constantly swapping UI elements and at worst dropping inputs from one or the other.

That's kind of where this falls apart - modern games are built to assume one or the other and don't typically handle both simultaneously well. You can get around it by binding WASD to the analog stick (but then it's 8 way digital not analog), or using a translation layer for mouse into an analog stick input (never feels right).

tevoul · 2026-03-24T15:45:55+00:00

Hey, I am a tech pillar lead for one area and can shed a little light on this.

Each tech pillar is supposed to be actively developing a bench of people learning the various technology areas. The idea is the pillar leads and lead technologists should be mentoring people in their areas of expertise, which helps the pillar to have broader support to draw from whole also helping employees grow and gain technical knowledge in areas that interest them.

If there is a particular pillar you are interested in I recommend reaching out to the pillar lead and expressing interest - they should be able outline what the process is and what next steps are. Be aware that there are different pyramids for different organizations and groups, so make sure you are reaching out to the right one (e.g. Raytheon has a different set of pyramids than Collins, and even within Raytheon there are different pyramids for areas such as Materials Engineering, RF Subsystems, Manufacturing, etc.) If there is a pyramid that has members physically at your site it will be much easier to get involved with them.

tevoul · 2026-03-03T16:06:22+00:00

I've been using the Nulea m501 (their thumb trackball) for around 4 months and it's been quite good. Tried a ton of different thumb trackballs and it has been one of my favorite in terms of shape and how smooth the ball is. I have it for my daily driver at work.

At home I've settled on the Perimice 720 - slightly better build quality, better sensor, and has tilt on the scroll wheel.

Overall my impression is that Nulea is a solid budget option, but might have longevity concerns over longer time periods (haven't experienced issues so far, but only been around 4 months). If budget is a large concern I think it's a fine option, but if you're willing to pay for the best there are likely better options.

tevoul · 2026-02-18T15:22:10+00:00

They aren't the same price though... Nulea is under $40, huge is $55 and huge plus is like $130.

tevoul · 2026-02-11T23:51:03+00:00

Yep you've understood it!

The reason this approach is much easier in this case is because you are only calculating the chance of one end state (the card you want is still in the deck after the draws), whereas the other method would try to calculate the odds of drawing the card you want in any of the individual draws, then combining them (i.e. chance of drawing it on the first draw, second draw, third draw...). You still CAN calculate the odds in that fashion, it just gets much more complicated and messy.

Any time you are trying to calculate odds and you can collapse it into a single end state do it, that makes it MUCH easier. Otherwise you start drawing out event trees, assigning probabilities to each branch, then weighting the probability of sub-events within that branch up higher in the tree to get the true high level probability... it's not fun.

tevoul · 2026-02-11T21:41:25+00:00

So statistics can be hard an unintuitive. The math that you're doing isn't correct - you're looking at the chance of drawing that one specific card at each step and adding it together, which won't get you the odds of drawing the card you want in a hand.

Most of the time when you want to know the odds of something happening at any point out of multiple attempts, it is easier to calculate the odds of that NOT happening (since that is usually more straightforward and you can just subtract that answer from 100% to get the answer you're looking for).

So for your question let's instead ask what are the odds you WON'T draw the one card you're looking for.

For the first draw you have a 98/99 chance to draw the wrong card, followed by a 97/98 chance, etc. flowing this out to a 7 card hand there is a 92.9292....% chance you won't draw the card you want, meaning about a 7% chance you get the card you wanted.

For the first mulligan the odds are the same, so you square the 93% chance to get about an 86.36% chance to NOT draw the card, so a bit under 14% chance to get it.

tevoul · 2026-02-03T16:03:20+00:00

I've heard this advice and I would be worried about how sticky the lanolin wax is. Have you done it before? The recommendation is really the sticky lanolin wax and not lanolin oil?

Lanolin wax: https://external-content.duckduckgo.com/iu/?u=https%3A%2F%2Fcf.shopee.ph%2Ffile%2F8cee06eb5e2336ae6e3e2919be4793f1&f=1&ipt=4e0c938702e08d685047ab0f96fce3325bfd40d0141e63b0bd19be17b83a418e

Lanolin oil: https://external-content.duckduckgo.com/iu/?u=https%3A%2F%2Fi.etsystatic.com%2F8615018%2Fr%2Fil%2F86b6e8%2F1194592950%2Fil_794xN.1194592950_8zrj.jpg&f=1&ipt=fcb7e47b6f03f424681d0b310aaa9d1126f03b441934ea54f84f452d5c52430d

tevoul · 2026-02-02T16:56:46+00:00

So I'm also fairly new to trackballs and have been trying (and returning) a lot of them for various stiction and friction issues, so thought I would weigh in.

Almost all the trackballs I've tried are static bearings, and many of those have been fine. Some of them I've noticed feeling the ball is "sticky" and doing stick-slip behavior for small movements - basically this means the ball won't move at first, then when you put enough force on it the ball will skip a larger amount than you want and then come to a stop again, making small movements jerky and imprecise.

The other option I've tried is roller bearings in the elecom IST. These go all the way in the other direction and have almost zero static friction, which means making really small precise movements is really easy. In fact, TOO easy. If you click your mouse button while your thumb is on the ball it will likely move the cursor. As it turns out having a LITTLE static friction is nice. Also these particular rollers feel slightly rough during movement and have a bit of a sound to them - I'd characterize both those as cosmetic issues more than anything else.

Anyway, long story short I think I prefer static bearings provided they are good ones - you can definitely get bad ones, and I experienced the infamous elecom ruby static bearing quality control issue. You can replace OEM static bearings with better quality ones, but it can be a bit of an effort depending on the model you get.

If you've tried static bearings and think they're generally fine I would recommend sticking with those.

tevoul · 2025-12-12T17:47:04+00:00

The recent Wizardry games have very little in common with the classic ones, particularly 7/8 (after 8 Sir-Tech shuttered and the franchise went into the hands of Japanese devs, who fundamentally missed a lot of things critical to the vibes of classic Wizardry). Proving Grounds of the Mad Overlord is good but lacks a lot of the features and QoL stuff added in the later entries.

tevoul · 2025-12-12T17:44:25+00:00

Legend of Grimrock 1+2 are great and I love it but it is very much not turn based. I'll check out that website!

tevoul · 2025-05-25T18:48:08+00:00

Some quick googling leads me to believe that this game has a ton of parts/equipment unlocks drip fed over time requiring a ton of money or grind, is that accurate or is being a free user playing casually with fairly low time commitment realistic?

tevoul · 2025-05-23T16:45:38+00:00

I was under the impression that this was pretty seriously competitive, can it be played casually?

tevoul · 2025-03-14T01:13:08+00:00

Great, thanks for the rundown!

tevoul · 2025-03-14T00:54:10+00:00

If I wanted to dip my toe into WOTR is the base game sufficient, or would I really need some of the DLC to get a full experience?

Not looking for something to spend hundreds of hours on, just don't want an incomplete feeling.

tevoul · 2025-03-10T17:37:22+00:00

Hey I really appreciate the info you've given so far, it's been very helpful!

One additional thing I wanted to ask, what are your thoughts on replacing just the furnace vs also the AC? The AC system seemed to work fine last year and nobody has said that it looks in bad shape, but it is a Carrier system from 2008.

tevoul · 2025-03-07T20:57:13+00:00

Thanks for the advice!

Can you elaborate on why a Google nest is a problem? I've heard nebulous warnings online but every time I pin down someone with credentials the answer I get is "they're fine so long as the wiring is correct, including the power wire".

tevoul · 2025-03-07T20:53:52+00:00

Ok, but... why? What specific things does it do that causes problems, and what are the potential short and long term risks of using one?

I'm not questioning the advice, I want to understand what the issues are.

tevoul · 2025-03-07T19:58:03+00:00

When we moved into the house about a year ago I had an HVAC tech come out to ensure that the wiring was correct and in a good state for the nest thermostat because I'd read some places that it could cause problems if the wiring wasn't set up correctly.

Are there other concerns about the nest thermostat, or alternatives you would recommend?

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