Stealth flats
In this article
In most flats, the puzzle is only to figure out the words; the overall idea of what to do (the puzzle type, enumeration, and tagging) is stated explicitly. A stealth flat is one in which this information is deliberately obscured within the constraints of the puzzle. For example:
THIRD-LETTER CHANGE (4)
That gal with the whip can’t be beaten, I reckoned.
I knew that that FIRST was the best with the SECOND.
=Bartok
This looks like a third-letter change with two parts, but it’s really a three-part last-letter change: FIRST = lass, SECOND = lash, THIRD = last.
The most common device for modifying a flat title is to use some kind of rebus:
ENIGMATIC REBADE (4, 4, 4, *4) (reading has abbrs.)
At FOUR last night (or morning?), at a party,
Her reason and her passion had a fight;
To choose between a heady and a hearty
Desire, the TWO contended through the night.
“I want,” her passion said, “that clever, cocky, ’n’
Cool guy in that cloak there. Don’t you think he
Looks, in that there ONE-like or Masochian?
I love men who write novels that are kinky!”
Her reason then replied, “I like that fellow
Who’s munching, eros, on a broccoli spear.
He’s nice (the same is true, of course, of Jell-O)
And makes about THREE megabucks a year.”
Which one? Well, neither did—’twas I who won her;
While id and superego got quite chattery,
I wrote a subtle rebus in her honor,
And won her ego over with my flattery.
=Ucaoimhu
As hinted in the penultimate line, this is a rebus, not a rebade. The solution is cape, very, nous, Sade [cap every no.; US’s ADE]. ONE is the cueword; the other numbers are just numbers, capitalized per the rubric.