Theory on Desmonds animations
i just thought about this so this teory isn't quite developed yet.
in Stabbys video on stealing the digipen, Desmond is seen dancing on the table. at the very end he jumps down and he does the arm-flapping thing that Altair does when he jumps down.
now here's what i think. Desmond and Altair is virtually the same. they look basically the same except the clothes, so i think that they made one core character model for both and then made small alterations.
therefore i think that Desmond has most if not all Altairs animation incoded, they are just deactivated and could in theory be used by massive computer-hacking.
ofcourse i don't know anyone who can do that so there's really no way for me to confirm this, and i doubt Ubisoft would like to answer.
anyone with knowledge in programming want to share what you know?
I'm sure that's exactly how it is. All of the animations you are able to do with Desmond are 100% identical to Altair's.
It's time-consuming to create animations, so the less of them game developers need to make, the better. Desmond's sections of the game weren't in need of a unique set of animations, so they just used the canned animations they already had. Even a lot of the NPC animations are the same as Altair's.
I'm sure Penelope Garcia from Criminal Minds could get Desmond to shank Vidic in like 30 seconds! Ask her! 
I'm sure Penelope Garcia from Criminal Minds could get Desmond to shank Vidic in like 30 seconds! Ask her!
I don't follow your reference...