I was taking a look at Wicked 15 for the min-skills for max-% thread, and I have to call into question the 7-builder result for that level in this thread.  The result is first mentioned in my post here, but I made a reference to Proxima's earlier work, which I can't seem to find anywhere.  I'm sure I took the 7-builder result from his original post, since I can't seem to replicate it myself.

Later on, Proxima posted this in a post that appears to have been deleted, but not before it was quoted by Clam:

Wicked 15 -- now that I'm actually playing this in Lemmix, it looks like my previous result may be incorrect. It seems that in the original game you have to place 6 bricks under the hatch to make the fall safe, and that can only be done using a clever trick seen in this video

This suggests that the 7-builder solution may have been incorrect.  I'm going to assume it is unless someone can provide evidence confirming that it's doable.  The fewest I was able to use, while still saving 48/50, is 9 builders.

Tricky 25 is almost certainly possible, but extremely hard.  I had a go at it, and I was able to take out the vast majority of each bridge while still saving more than enough to pass the level.  I didn't quite clear out everything due to some poor bomber/nuke timing, but I got enough to believe that it can be done.

A couple more improvements in Crazy:

Crazy 12: 6 skills - See this post from Clam
Crazy 19: 7 skills - This is the ceiling route, using the release rate and the long basher tunnel to create a large gap in the crowd, allowing the basher to finish the bridge over the OWW before anyone overtakes him.

Mayhem 8, I can't even reproduce Minim's result, let alone beat it. The best I can manage is 10 skills - three to contain + release the crowd, three builders to cross the gap. It seems you then need at least four to get past the wall without losing any lemmings (the easiest way being 2 climbers + 2 diggers).

I don't have time at the moment to try this out, but it seems to me that you should be able to get past the wall with just 1 climber + 2 diggers.  There should be plenty of time for the one climber to climb up, dig down, and repeat.

Improvements for both Taxing 2 and Mayhem 1 are confirmed in DOS.  Taxing 2 with 7 skills is actually pretty straightforward - first 3 lemmings dig, RR 99, then bash twice and build twice to the exit.  The crowd has enough walking space to render any sort of crowd control unnecessary.

Mayhem 1 with 27 skills just barely works, using 2 floaters, 24 builders, and 1 digger.  A screenshot of the left side of the level is attached.

Well done!

I saw MASTER-88's post and had similar skepticism -- I thought maybe the Genesis version had a slightly narrower wall, or a different size bomber crater, or slightly different physics that made 48/50 possible.  I didn't think the stuck climber trick was a possibility because I didn't see a way to get the climber into the wall in the first place.  But when I saw ccexplore mention the climber backing 2 pixels away from a wall after hitting a ceiling, I knew what had to be done.

I can now confirm the result in DOSBox.

Filling in the gaps from L3D:

L3D Level 35: 7 skills
L3D Level 50: 9 skills
L3D Level 68: 9 skills
L3D Level 75: 6 skills (the 1-basher solution)
L3D Level 78: 12 skills (a variation of the 7-builder solution)

Also, L3D Level 76 (Fun Fair) is down to 17 skills - the standard solution only requires 3 builders.

Apparently I didn't push my own method far enough.  Mayhem 25 is now down to 12 skills.


This solution will also work for Tricky 13.