Lemmings Forums
NeoLemmix => Bugs & Suggestions => Closed => Topic started by: ccexplore on March 16, 2020, 07:12:35 PM
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Split off from "Final new skill" topic after reply #28. Please keep all discussion of how the Slider might work in this topic rather than the other one.
This topic is more a "rough throw-around-ideas topic", a more streamlined topic to discuss specifics, akin to the current Jumper topic, will come if / when the decision is made to go with Slider for the 20th skill.
Slider interaction spreadsheet: https://1drv.ms/x/s!Am6NTdy4vnPXhINGmY0v7N79mUDDkA
similarly if multiple very strong candidates come up (they might even interact or complement each other in some way) then adding more than 1 is preferable.
I get that, but I don't think namida has the time or inclination at this point to implement more than 1, all that talk about an impending "final version" makes that clear. ;)
I will say though, it may be worth considering forgoing a 20th skill if it means instead adding some other new non-skill element to the game.
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in conjunction with the shimmier it can climb on the underside of platforms
:lem-shocked: I had completely forgotten about that! *mind-blown*
I only considered the case of sliding through a gap, that gap being closed above the Slider's head by a Platformer or Builder, and then turning that lemming into a Shimmier. Which seemed like a total corner case (pun intended, because any lemming transitioning from Climber / Slider to Shimmier goes around a corner :P ).
But transitioning from a Slider to a Shimmier at the bottom of a vertical drop, i.e. at the last possible frame before the Slider lets go of the wall and turns back into a Faller, this will be extremely useful!
So far you always have to do a workaround with such terrain shapes, sending one lemming ahead, turning him into a Stoner, then having a second lemming follow. Then you face the additional challenge of turning that second lemming around on the Stoner, then he needs to build / platform a little to get under the ceiling, and only then can he start shimmying.
As much as I like the Laser Blaster, I think I'm completely on the side of the Slider now! :thumbsup:
All three "destroy terrain at distance" skills, actually (Laser Blaster, Bazooker, and Mortar) really seem more like a nice gimmick to have, whereas the Slider would in fact create some more unexplored puzzle opportunities. Or, more accurately even, it would transfer established puzzle opportunities that have already been tried and approved of in custom L2 packs to NeoLemmix!
I'd also be happy to have the Slider as yet another permanent skill, so that it can create these interesting "how-often-does-he-turn-around" conundrums. That's the way anyone who has played a good deal of L2 (original and/or custom) is used to, anyway - and it would allow for more puzzles along the line of ONML's "Take care, sweetie", or Nepster's "Introducing: Climbers", where it all comes down to when exactly you assign this permanent skill - otherwise it will ruin your entire plan... :evil:
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One question we should probably discuss:
What happens if a lemming is simultaneously a Climber and a Slider and jumps towards a wall? Does he climb up or slide down? ;)
If the Slider is not a permanent skill, i.e. other than in L2, it should probably override the Climber for the duration of its assignment. Meaning, if you assign a Slider to a Climber stuck to a wall, that lemming will stop climbing and slide down instead.
However, if the Slider remains a permanent skill, it isn't clear in which direction the lemming should move when hitting a wall neither at the bottom nor the top, but somewhere in the middle. ???
One could argue that the Climber moves "forwards" and the Slider "backwards", therefore the default assumption after jumping at the wall would be climbing. If it were possible to assign Walkers and Cloners to Climbers, those could then create Sliders in the opposite direction. However, so far you can't assign either of those two skills to Climbers, and introducing this together with the Slider might result in post-hoc backroutes.
It would of course be possible to say "Assigning Walkers / Cloners to Climbers on walls is only possible if that Climber is also a Slider".
Also, there's the issue that a Climber-Slider can trap himself on a wall that touches the ground: Once the Slider reaches the bottom, he will look towards the wall, i.e. immediately start climbing again, and slide down again when reaching the top (unless you make him a Shimmier there). And since you can't assign a Walker to a Climber, there's no way to get him out of that loop at the bottom. Thus, there would have to be at least one frame of the lemming being a Walker standing on the ground (so that he can be turned around with a Walker / Builder etc.) between him being a Slider and a Climber.
Does anyone know how this is handled in Lemmings 2?
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What happens if a lemming is simultaneously a Climber and a Slider and jumps towards a wall? Does he climb up or slide down? ;)
As far as L2 goes, if I remember correctly, the transition to sliding only happens at the point the lemming walked past the edge. Basically instead of transitioning from walking to falling, it would transition to sliding. Jumping a slider against the wall will not allow it to start sliding.
That being said, for NeoLemmix we could consider allowing a jumper->slider transition. Climbing will be prioritized over sliding if the lemming has both, because I think the climbing case is more applicable in most situations--though perhaps you could decide the opposite if you want the lemming to be intentionally handicapped when it has both skills.
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Aside from "slider is non-permanent", there is also the option of Slider and Climber being mutually exclusive. This would also keep the limit for one single lemming at 4 permanent skills, despite 6 existing. (Currently limited to 4 because, although 5 exist, Floater and Glider are mutually exclusive. You can have them in the same level, but you can't assign both to the same lemming.)
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I would definitely argue against Climber and Slider being mutually exclusive, simply because of the interesting paths both can create in conjunction: A lemming can climb up a wall on the right, turn into a Shimmier to go to the left, slide down a wall on the left, and then at the bottom of that slide go back around the corner by transitioning back into a Shimmier. Combine this with the 2-way Jumper-Climber interactions and you can easily create paths that "skilled" lemmings can follow but the crowd can't.
And that is basically the point of a lot of levels. While I still get the feeling that "pioneer" is somewhat of a negative term here (because it has the connotation of the entire complexity of a level being reduced down to the actions of a single lemming while everyone else is contained safely), even a lot of the more challenging levels still require 2-4 "worker" lemmings, often in conjunction. And the fact that these workers can often take completely different paths than the crowd is what makes these levels significantly more interesting; because another thing that tends to make "pioneer" levels boring is if they're just carving out the exact same path the crowd will take later on.
One-way arrows, Swimmers, Gliders, Floaters, Shimmiers, all of these are common ways to allow worker lemmings to approach an obstacle from the opposite side, in order to create a path that the crowd couldn't create by themselves, even with enough distance between the lemmings - because the terrain simply isn't shaped in a regular lemming's favour.
Climbers and Sliders would provide many further such interesting interactions with each other, and those would only get extended even further by the combination with Jumpers and Shimmiers.
As far as L2 goes, if I remember correctly, the transition to sliding only happens at the point the lemming walked past the edge. Basically instead of transitioning from walking to falling, it would transition to sliding. Jumping a slider against the wall will not allow it to start sliding.
Ah, okay, thanks a lot for the information! ;)
In other words: It's the "wall-jumping" part that's creating the problem, or, more accurately: The ambition to have Sliders interact with Jumpers as well, not just Climbers. For Climbers, it's pretty much a given at this point that they are going to interact with Jumpers both ways.
Personally, I quite like the idea of having to e.g. jump across a gap in order to reach a wall a lemming can hold on to that allows him to slide down an otherwise lethal drop safely.
That said, if we had to "ban" one interaction and I had to choose between Jumper-Slider and Slider-Climber (the latter by making both of these permanent skills mutually exclusive), I would probably rather stick to the L2 behaviour and sacrifice the Jumper-Slider interaction:
a) For consistency with L2 (for players switching from Kieran et al.'s custom L2 content to NeoLemmix, this can indeed be relevant!), but more importantly
b) because the Slider-Shimmier interaction is more important and revolutionary to me. Since the other main skill that interacts with Shimmiers is the Climber, I don't want to be forced to choose whether I can have only Climber-Shimmier- or Slider-Shimmier interactions with a given lemming.
But I think the case of the Slider being a temporary "movement" skill, like the Jumper and Shimmier as well (and the Walker, technically, counts too), can also be made, and actually only becomes stronger by going through these examples.
Much like the Jumper assigned to a Climber doesn't stop the lemming from being a Climber, but merely tells him "stop doing what your new default state tells you to do, and do this now instead!",
a Slider would tell him "stop climbing for now and slide down instead, but once you reach the next wall, you'll climb up as usual / once you reach the next straight drop, you fall looking forward, like a regular Faller".
In other words, the Slider would become the logical extension to the Jumper, in that both of these skills would be the only non-lethal skills you could assign to a climbing Climber.
As it currently stands, the Jumper is the only non-lethal skill that can be assigned to a Climber. But with that skill already being a precedent, there is nothing stopping other "movement skills" from behaving the same way.
If the Slider became such a non-permanent "movement skill", just like with Shimmiers, I think it should still be possible to have pre-placed Sliders in a level, as well.
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I would definitely argue against Climber and Slider being mutually exclusive, simply because of the interesting paths both can create in conjunction
That could still work if they were mutually exclusive, if we have the suggested "remove permanent skills" object 8-)
In other words: It's the "wall-jumping" part that's creating the problem, or, more accurately: The ambition to have Sliders interact with Jumpers as well, not just Climbers. For Climbers, it's pretty much a given at this point that they are going to interact with Jumpers both ways.
Personally, I quite like the idea of having to e.g. jump across a gap in order to reach a wall a lemming can hold on to that allows him to slide down an otherwise lethal drop safely.
I agree; Jumper -> Slider makes sense and would be an interesting interaction. I don't think we need to "ban" one or the other just because of the Jumper -> Climber or Slider? problem; we just need a consistent rule for whether the Climber or Slider takes priority. Right now I don't have a strong feeling on this; I'll think about it some more when it's not late in the evening.
But I think the case of the Slider being a temporary "movement" skill, like the Jumper and Shimmier as well (and the Walker, technically, counts too), can also be made, and actually only becomes stronger by going through these examples.
If it comes down to a vote on whether the Slider should be permanent or not, that would be an extremely hard decision for me; both have distinct advantages that would be lost with the other option, but we can only have one.
Much like the Jumper assigned to a Climber doesn't stop the lemming from being a Climber ... a Slider would tell him "stop climbing for now and slide down instead, but once you reach the next wall, you'll climb up as usual / once you reach the next straight drop, you fall looking forward, like a regular Faller".
In other words, the Slider would become the logical extension to the Jumper, in that both of these skills would be the only non-lethal skills you could assign to a climbing Climber.
I am, however, quite sure I would vote against assigning (non-permanent) Slider to a Climber to make him stop sliding immediately. For whatever reason, it just doesn't sit right with me. Partly because you can't assign walker there; partly because I'm used to the L2 idea that the Slider is primarily for sliding from the top of a wall, even if we accept Jumper -> Slider transitions.
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Someone needs to explain to me how a non-permanent slider would work especially in the basic use case, where a walking lemming reaches the edge of a fall and transitions instead to sliding down the ledge, facing opposite direction from before.
Normally a non-permanent skill would make the lemming immediately start doing stuff when assigned. I'd hope that for a non-permanent slider, it wouldn't require the lemming to be pixel-exact at the very edge for assignment to take effect. But if not, then what does the transition look like starting from assignment (where lemming is still at least a few pixels away from the ledge) to actually sliding down? What are the rules during that transition?
One can also imagine perhaps a hybrid handling, where you can assign the skill at any time and then the effect only starts kicking in when the lemming actually reaches the edge of a fall (so basically just like a normal permanent skill), but upon the completion of the slide down, the lemming also loses the ability to slide again until you assign the skill again. This could work but would behave nothing like any of the other skills in the game, and thus feels unnecessarily confusing to me.
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I imagine it would be like the NL platformer: when it begins the skill is (often) pixel-precise, but since NL allows skills to be "queued" (if a skill assignation is impossible, it will be remembered for half a second and carried out if it becomes possible) then the player has some leeway as to when they need to click on the lemming.
(Note: NL platformers are not always pixel-precise, since the criterion is that the lemming should have terrain under his feet, but none under his feet and just ahead. This will be at a precise moment if walking on flat terrain and about to reach a gap, but assignment is possible at any time when walking down a slope.)
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Ah okay, forgot that NL has assignment queueing implemented. Then I guess the same does work pretty well for a non-permanent slider just as it does for the platformer.
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After reading the above comments, it seems the best option would be to have the Slider as a non-permanent movement skill that can be assigned to a Climber (in the same way that a Jumper can).
As I imagine it, the effect would be to turn the lemming around slightly so they're facing half-away from the wall, but instead of falling, they slide. Upon landing, the lemming would walk away from the wall.
You get the best of all worlds that way:
Possibility to have the same lemming climb, shimmy, then slide (or any combination of those)...
Possibility to assign a Slider for one lemming for one drop, but then require other splat-prevention skills for any other drops in the level (or to put it another way, we'd now have a non-permanent way to get a single lemming down from a height)...
Possibility to turn a Climber around that's going up a wall you don't want them to go up...
No need to lose the Jumper>Slider interaction...
Less new rules to learn...
I'm sure there's more. :lemcat:
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Jumping a slider against the wall will not allow it to start sliding.
I finally got around to testing this on DOS Lemmings 2 (using the Egyptian practice level). Turns out I remembered wrong, jumping a slider against the wall does allow it to slide down the wall.
In the case that both climber and slider are assigned to the lemming, and lemming gets into a situation where both skills can be used, looks like climber takes priority in Lemmings 2--in the wall jumping case above, the lemming would climb up. But note that it doesn't mean if you have a non-climber slider lemming who is currently in the middle of sliding down a wall, and you assign it climber then, it doesn't stop the sliding and make it climb back up again, it will continue sliding down.
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As I imagine it, the effect would be to turn the lemming around slightly so they're facing half-away from the wall, but instead of falling, they slide. Upon landing, the lemming would walk away from the wall.
geoo specifically mentioned the turning around at a floating bottom of a cliff (ie. facing at the wall that the lemming slid down, rather than away from it) as crucial to the skill's puzzle potential, and you certainly need that if you want to let the lemming shimmy along the bottom of the wall after sliding down to it.
In Lemmings 2, it is clearly depicted that during the starting transition at the top from walking to sliding, that the lemming turns to face the wall as he starts sliding down. I suppose you could delay that turning around until he reached the bottom and has opportunity to shimmy, but I don't really see a compelling reason to do it like that rather than like in Lemmings 2. In Lemmings 2, if the bottom of the wall connects to ground (so the lemming can actually land), the lemming will turn around again to face away from the wall as he lands and transitions to walker.
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After reading the above comments, it seems the best option would be to have the Slider as a non-permanent movement skill that can be assigned to a Climber (in the same way that a Jumper can). You get the best of all worlds that way.
Strongly disagree here. Most of the value of the slider in QFK to me came from the fact that it would always slide (and in particular turn around at the bottom of the slide unless it is a corner), requiring you to carefully plan around this, and allowing to separate a single lemming from a crowd multiple times. Similarly, like for climber puzzles, it can require you to force one and the same lemming to go to multiple places to do a slider-only action.
Also while a lot of the discussion seems to be focusing on surviving long falls, during play that seemed to be a minor aspect to me, while turning around or getting to the underside of blocks to shimmy along was much more important.
Possibility to have the same lemming climb, shimmy, then slide (or any combination of those)...
I don't see how a permanent version wouldn't allow for this?
If a shimmying (or climbing) slider reaches a corner with a wall facing down (like in the sketch below), the slider can just slide down that wall. If I recall correctly that's also the behaviour in L2.
XXXX
XXXX
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Btw just curious, in NeoLemmix, if a shimmying climber reaches the end of a platform (i.e. a corner with a wall facing up like below), does it climb up the wall? I assume not?
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Possibility to assign a Slider for one lemming for one drop, but then require other splat-prevention skills for any other drops in the level (or to put it another way, we'd now have a non-permanent way to get a single lemming down from a height)...
That sounds more like a disadvantage to me? If you wanted a lemming to come down a splat fall twice, just assign the floater from the beginning, and the slider is useless unless you want to exploit on of its other features?
No need to lose the Jumper>Slider interaction...
To me this seems to be the only challenge with a permanent slider. And it can be resolved by choosing which to prioritize when a slider/climber jumps into a wall. (My suggestion would be the climber? If a wall the lemming jumps to tops out in a ceiling, it will still slide down afterwards. The reverse wouldn't work.)
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Most of the value of the slider in QFK to me came from the fact that it would always slide... requiring you to carefully plan around this, and allowing to separate a single lemming from a crowd multiple times. Similarly, like for climber puzzles, it can require you to force one and the same lemming to go to multiple places to do a slider-only action.
Seems, then, that the Slider being non-permanent would also remove the need to concentrate on a single worker lemming, thus opening up even more puzzle potential and avoiding one-worker levels.
Also while a lot of the discussion seems to be focusing on surviving long falls, during play that seemed to be a minor aspect to me, while turning around or getting to the underside of blocks to shimmy along was much more important.
Good point, but I see no reason that non-permanent Sliders couldn't also do this.
If you wanted a lemming to come down a splat fall twice, just assign the floater from the beginning, and the slider is useless unless you want to exploit on of its other features?
Absolutely, but there may be situations where you don't want the lemming to be a permanent Floater (they may need to be a Glider later on, or vice versa): so, you can have them be a Slider for just the one drop. It opens up more choice for both level designer and player.
...which to prioritize when a slider/climber jumps into a wall. (My suggestion would be the climber? If a wall the lemming jumps to tops out in a ceiling, it will still slide down afterwards. The reverse wouldn't work.)
I agree with this, definitely, and just generally with the idea that a Climber overrides a Slider if both are permanent. However, I think that it would be preferable to be able to use the Slider to override the Climber action. So, in effect:
Climber lemming jumps towards a wall, grabs onto it, starts climbing. You assign a Slider and the lemming slides back down the wall at the point the skill is assigned: they would then have to land before they can climb again. If the climb tops out at a ceiling and the climber hits their head, you'd have to assign the Slider for the lem to safely slide back down (similar to the Climber>Shimmier transition), but the effect is the same.
More movement possibility, more potential, opens up the game in new ways. This would only work if the Slider were a non-permanent skill that could be used to temporarily "cancel" the Climber skill.
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Btw just curious, in NeoLemmix, if a shimmying climber reaches the end of a platform (i.e. a corner with a wall facing up like below), does it climb up the wall? I assume not?
Just to quickly clarify this: No, it does not. The Shimmier stops as soon as it detects an altitude increase of 2 pixels or more over just 1 pixels in width. It also doesn't turn around.
The shape of terrain you describe, though very common, can't even be handled by a Rock Climber in Lemmings 2. A Rock Climber could only handle a 45 ° slope followed by a straight wall (something the Shimmier can't do, since it can only do the reverse option, i.e. first a wall, then a slope or ceiling).
The only L2 skill that would be able to go from a ceiling around a corner and up a wall (rather than down like a Slider) would be the Magno Booter. But namida has already ruled out that one for complexity of coding.
If a wall the lemming jumps to tops out in a ceiling, it will still slide down afterwards. The reverse wouldn't work.)
Since all level edges are deadly in New Formats, we would have to assume a solid ceiling of terrain at the top of that climb, therefore also solid ground at the bottom for this comparison.
And in that case, once the Slider touches solid ground, he will look towards the wall, i.e. immediately start climbing up again. So the reverse would indeed work, wouldn't it? ;)
This is precisely what I meant about a permanent Climber-Slider trapping himself in a loop where he repeatedly goes up and down the same wall without ever turning around.
A regular Slider would of course turn around on the wall he slid down immediately after completing his slide, but a Climber-Slider wouldn't.
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And in that case, once the Slider touches solid ground, he will look towards the wall, i.e. immediately start climbing up again. So the reverse would indeed work, wouldn't it? ;)
This is precisely what I meant about a permanent Climber-Slider trapping himself in a loop where he repeatedly goes up and down the same wall without ever turning around.
No. In L2, the slider always turns around upon a no-fall landing and transitioning to walker, this is part of the transition and does not rely on the wall to turn the walker afterwards. As a result there is no loop even if lemming is also climber.
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Thanks for the information! ;) I took this as an opportunity to try out some stuff by myself, using the good old practice mode in Lemmings 2. (Basically the only thing from the game I used to play as a kid.) Note that I used the Amiga emulator with a .bat file for Lemmings 2, not the standard DOS version (since that version has Kieran's custom levels in it).
Here are my observations:
- First of all, i severely underestimated the regular Climber in Lemmings 2! Jumping towards walls and holding on to them as well as climbing around outer corners is something that both the Climber and the Rock Climber can do!
- It almost seems like the abilty to climb around the outside of a corner (i.e. transitioning back from a Shimmier to a Climber / Rock Climber) is a property of the Shimmier, not of either of the Climbers. Which begs the question: Why did we decide against the NeoLemmix Shimmier behaving in this way? ???
- Hence, my earlier claim in this thread was wrong: I thought such outer corners could only be handled by Magno Booters. You can see that this war clearly an error I fell for up until this day! So I hope it wasn't me who suggested that the Shimmier should not be able to climb around outside corners (i.e. that no Shimmier --> Climber transitions should be possible). It's probably too late to add this behaviour to the Shimmier now, since it would invite a bunch of backroutes, after the Shimmier has already been implemented in a stable manner for over a year. :'(
- The Slider indeed turns around on a wall that touches the bottom, even if he is a Climber or Rock Climber. If he drops from a wall, instead he will continue to look in the same direction he looked in when he was sliding.
I was about to write my comments about Jumper-Slider interactions when I discovered that ccexplore had already tested this in the meantime :thumbsup: .
I finally got around to testing this on DOS Lemmings 2 (using the Egyptian practice level). Turns out I remembered wrong, jumping a slider against the wall does allow it to slide down the wall.
In the case that both climber and slider are assigned to the lemming, and lemming gets into a situation where both skills can be used, looks like climber takes priority in Lemmings 2--in the wall jumping case above, the lemming would climb up. But note that it doesn't mean if you have a non-climber slider lemming who is currently in the middle of sliding down a wall, and you assign it climber then, it doesn't stop the sliding and make it climb back up again, it will continue sliding down.
The last part - "assigning while on the wall as a Slider / Climber" - is one thing I actually didn't try. I just noticed that the Climber takes precedent over the Slider when both are assigned as permanent skills.
Given that this was also what seems to have been preferred by most people in this thread anyway, at least this matter would probably be settled by that?
- If a lemming is a Climber and a Slider when jumping towards a wall, the Climber will take precedent, i.e. the lemming will climb up.
- If you assign a Slider to a Climber or a Climber to a Slider while on the wall, the lemming will continue whatever he is currently doing until he reaches the end of that wall. So the rule here is "finish what you've started". ;)
But now a remaining question is this:
Btw just curious, in NeoLemmix, if a shimmying climber reaches the end of a platform (i.e. a corner with a wall facing up like below), does it climb up the wall? I assume not?
Turns out this is indeed standard Shimmier behaviour in L2 for both the Climber and the Rock Climber. And it's extremely useful.
Whenever I want to accomplish something remotely comparable in NeoLemmix, I have to fiddle around a lot, by doing the following:
- send TWO Shimmiers rather than one
- the first one drops at the end of the platform and becomes a Stoner
- the second Shimmier lands on top of the Stoner
- now that second Shimmier needs to turn around somehow (Walker?)
- build a stack to close the gap between Stoner and ceiling / wall
- climb up the stack and then the wall
So in current NeoLemmix, this same outcome requires two Shimmiers, one Stoner, one Walker, one Stacker, and at least one Climber. That's FIVE out of ten possible skill types just to pull of this basic maneuvre!
The L2 Shimmier just transitions back into a Climber naturally, you don't even have to assign anything at the corner.
In contrast, though, the L2 Shimmier has a much harder time with sloped ceilings than I remembered. That's pretty much exclusively the Rock Climber's territory. And even the Rock Climber can only go UP these slopes; when it comes to going down sloped ceilings, you can't transition back into a Rock Climber, and the Shimmier immediately starts the "dangling from the ceiling" animation as soon as he reaches the slope, and falls down shortly afterwards.
So going around corners is no problem for the Shimmier, but going down sloped ceilings apparently is.
Of course, I'm not saying the NeoLemmix Shimmier shouldn't be able to go down sloped ceilings - in fact, I find this extremely useful as well. So aside from the fact that it would break countless levels to change this, I would never even want that to be the case. It was quite a nasty surprise that no skill in L2, neither the Rock Climber nor the Shimmier, were capable of handling downward-sloped ceilings. You can pretty much only resort to the Magno Booter there, but that thing is so overpowered that it can handle just every type of ceiling or wall.
But it would indeed be nice to have the Shimmier be able to go around outside corners IF he is a Climber (and only then), just like the opposite Climber-Shimmier transition is possible. This would not even require the "dangling" animation, it's a direct transition in L2.
This would also make sense in light of the upcoming introduction of the Jumper, since Jumper-Climber and Climber-Jumper transitions are also both possible.
I don't know if it's too late to consider changing this about the Shimmier... and how many existing levels would even be affected by it...
But I would like to remind everyone that even regular Faller behaviour was also changed after quite some time, in terms of no longer being able to exit mid-air.
So maybe... maybe... maybe it's possible? :D
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- It almost seems like the abilty to climb around the outside of a corner (i.e. transitioning back from a Shimmier to a Climber / Rock Climber) is a property of the Shimmier, not of either of the Climbers. Which raises the question: Why did we decide against the NeoLemmix Shimmier behaving in this way? ???
- Hence, my earlier claim in this thread was wrong: I thought such outer corners could only be handled by Magno Booters. You can see that this war clearly an error I fell for up until this day! So I hope it wasn't me who suggested that the Shimmier should not be able to climb around outside corners (i.e. that no Shimmier --> Climber transitions should be possible).
Original discussion of shimmier -> climber (https://www.lemmingsforums.net/index.php?topic=3430.msg66293#msg66293), with Nepster's reply (https://www.lemmingsforums.net/index.php?topic=3430.msg66340#msg66340).
But I would like to remind everyone that even regular Faller behaviour was also changed after quite some time, in terms of no longer being able to exit mid-air.
That's not quite accurate; before the decision was made to disallow direct drop, it was an option that could be enabled or disabled by the pack author.
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Thanks a lot for the link, Proxima! :thumbsup:
In fact, I just realised that just today, I created a level that would be totally broken - or at least significantly simplified - if Shimmiers could actually go around corners in NeoLemmix. I attached it (together with a replay) for demonstration purposes; basically, the core trick at the end is only necessary precisely because Shimmiers can't go around corners.
I also envisioned some more landscapes in my head which could be covered by repeated Shimmier-Climber-Shimmier-Climber transitions, and I agree that this could quickly go unchecked.
BUT: I think there is a way to actually make this possible in a controlled (=not overpowered) manner WITHOUT having to modify the Shimmier's behaviour at all! :thumbsup: More so, it could happen in the context of this new 20th skill, if that skill ends up being the Slider indeed!
Basically, while Climbers don't "dangle" in NeoLemmix as they do in L2, the Slider would pretty much have to do so. Because otherwise, at the very last frame of him being a regular Slider, he would still probably not be low enough beneath the ceiling to seamlessly transition into a Shimmier.
Thus, if dangling is a specific property of a Slider, a lemming could only do it if he is a Slider.
Since Sliders can transition into Shimmiers, the opposite transition should also be possible.
Meaning
a) a Shimmier reaches a wall and slides down ("inside" corner)
b) a Shimmier reaches the end of a ceiling, turns around and dangles from it (Slider), and from that position he could then climb up ("outside" corner) ;)
The common and intuitive rule here would be "a Slider always turns in such a way that he faces the wall". If he approaches a wall from the inside, then after shimmying, he would dangle from the ceiling shortly and then slide down the wall. If however he approaches a wall from below / the outside, he would have to turn around to hold on to that wall above him - and then it would be possible for him to climb from there.
In other words, Shimmier-Climber transitions still wouldn't be possible (no breaking levels / overpowered Shimmiers), but Shimmier--> Slider --> Climber transitions would be. ;)
This would reduce the required skill count in the example I cited above from five different types to at least just three (Shimmier, Slider, Climber).
Of course, the issue here is: How do you tell the Slider to start climbing up again? This behaviour can't generalise too much, because otherwise, every Slider reaching the bottom end of a wall would climb up that wall again immediately if he's also a Climber.
But just like we need to prevent a Slider from immediately climbing up a wall again after having touched the ground (which is a special case), one could surely also make this behaviour specific to the situation when a Slider dangles after shimmying, rather than dangling after a regular slide.
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I am very much against that idea. It would be a weird edge case that would be hard for new players to discover, and it has no connection at all with the Slider's usual function.
Possibly, a Shimmier reaching the end of a ceiling would have one frame where they can be assigned Jumper before they fall. That would allow him to transition to climber with only four skill types (shimmier, jumper, stoner, climber -- and the stoner wouldn't be needed if there happened already to be terrain for the jumper-climber to latch on to). I'm normally not a fan of transitions that give you a one-frame window for making the assignment, but NL's skill-queuing does alleviate it somewhat.
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I am very much against that idea. It would be a weird edge case that would be hard for new players to discover, and it has no connection at all with the Slider's usual function.
Possibly, a Shimmier reaching the end of a ceiling would have one frame where they can be assigned Jumper before they fall. That would allow him to transition to climber with only four skill types (shimmier, jumper, stoner, climber -- and the stoner wouldn't be needed if there happened already to be terrain for the jumper-climber to latch on to). I'm normally not a fan of transitions that give you a one-frame window for making the assignment, but NL's skill-queuing does alleviate it somewhat.
Honestly I have to agree with Proxima, I don't want the slider either, I don't like the idea of it being the 20th and final skill, but as a skill in general, it's just rather situational and I don't want something that a floater or glider could do better. In terms of skills like these, I think im happy enough with just the Jumper.
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Honestly I have to agree with Proxima, I don't want the slider either
...except that isn't what I said at all ???
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@GigaLem: Proxima only argued against the specific idea of using the Slider to help a Shimmier flip upward around a corner and transition into a Climber. ;) But as I understand his second-to-latest post, he isn't against Shimmier-Climber transitions in general; he only argues that the Jumper should be used instead, rather than the Slider, to enable this transition.
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I have mentioned opposition to the slider previously, but I no longer feel this way, given the interpretation of the slider as a permanent skill.
The potential to have a slider that transitions to shimmier would be a powerful difference to the floater/glider, which I could definitely see myself using a lot (as I like using shimmiers). I'd realistically probably end up using this more than the other proposed skills.
Overall, I would expect it to have similar skill synergies to the climber - thus, it would share the climber's ability to wall-jump as well as to jump into a wall to begin sliding. This would require some sort of rule regarding when a lemming has a choice between sliding or climbing. My opinion is that either the climber should take precedence (though whatever choice is made needs to be consistent throughout, so either climbers or sliders should take precedence in all situations where there's a choice to be made). You could make them mutually exclusive to assign like the Floater/Glider, but I'm not sure I like that approach, as the Climber/Slider makes more sense as a combination than Floater/Glider, though, because while there would exist situations where a lemming could either slide or climb, there's also situations where the choice is unambiguous, unlike the Floater/Glider, where the skills are fully mutually exclusive, because a lemming that has the option to begin gliding will always also have the option to begin floating and vice versa.
As there were some discussions about the slider/shimmier interactions, here is a quick summary of my thoughts on the matter:
I'll begin by noting how the climber functions now:
Climber -> Shimmier: Yes
Shimmiers normally jump to reach the ceiling, but they have the option of climbing as well to get there.
Shimmier -> Climber: No
I think it makes sense for the Shimmier -> Climber transition to be disallowed: the Shimmier can't handle a change in height of more than 2 pixels; thus it can't hoist itself to the wall to begin climbing it. There's another setup that can happen where the Shimmier comes into contact with a wall, but in this setup there wouldn't be anywhere for it to go up, since it would hit the ceiling, thus the transition is irrelevant.
My proposal for the slider:
Slider -> Shimmier: Yes
This seems analogous to the Climber -> Shimmier transition. The Slider is just being used as an alternative method to reach the ceiling to be shimmied across. Dangling wouldn't be necessary, but it would be an option - the main purpose it would serve would be giving the player time to assign the Shimmier, but the skill queuing behavior renders this unnecessary.
Shimmier -> Slider: Yes
This is analogous to the Shimmier -> Climber setup with the Shimmier comes into contact with a wall described above, so why would it be different here? In the Shimmier -> Climber set-up, there was nowhere for the climber to go once it reached the wall. But the Slider would be able to go down, since there wouldn't be any terrain in the way.
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My opinion is that either the climber should take precedence
This would be my suggestion as well, since it would be in line with Lemmings 2: The Tribes: When you have a Slider jump towards a wall, he will slide down. A (Rock) Climber will climb up. A lemming who is both a Slider and a (Rock) Climber will always climb up.
Making Climbers and Sliders mutually exclusive would be a totally unnecessary limitation of their great potential for interaction.
There's another setup that can happen where the Shimmier comes into contact with a wall, but in this setup there wouldn't be anywhere for it to go up, since it would hit the ceiling, thus the transition is irrelevant.
Such a transition could happen if there is a gap in the ceiling - however, it would require the Shimmier to jump across the gap, so it would be a Jumper-Climber transition. The important part here is that a Shimmier-Jumper transition isn't possible. I've just tried this out, Shimmiers can't jump in L2 either - probably because the Shimmier in L2 starts with a forward jump itself, so otherwise it would be possible to cancel a Shimmier by assigning a second Shimmier.
It also makes sense that it isn't possible, because the Shimmier has no ground to jump off from. I sometimes envisioned the Shimmier "swinging back and then forward" to get some acceleration that would then allow them to "jump" from the ceiling. But you'll have to resort to Gliders to do that (and Gliders can't hold on to walls then afterwards).
Shimmier -> Slider: Yes
This is analogous to the Shimmier -> Climber setup with the Shimmier comes into contact with a wall described above, so why would it be different here? In the Shimmier -> Climber set-up, there was nowhere for the climber to go once it reached the wall. But the Slider would be able to go down, since there wouldn't be any terrain in the way.
Yes, this absolutely should be possible, and it is indeed in Lemmings 2.
Slider -> Shimmier: Yes
This seems analogous to the Climber -> Shimmier transition. The Slider is just being used as an alternative method to reach the ceiling to be shimmied across. Dangling wouldn't be necessary, but it would be an option - the main purpose it would serve would be giving the player time to assign the Shimmier, but the skill queuing behavior renders this unnecessary.
Keep in mind there are two applications for this:
1) The main one is the Slider sliding down below a corner and transitioning into a Shimmier there (indeed this is the application I'm most curious about, and therefore also the one I would most likely make excessive use of! :thumbsup:).
2) But there is also the potential to have a Platformer or Builder create a ceiling above a Slider's head just after he has passed by. So if another lemming places a brick 1 pixel above a Slider's head, the Slider should also be able to transition to a Shimmier, just like a Climber would be in this situation.
The Slider is pretty much a downward Climber in every sense of the word. ;) I'll just stress this again for anyone else who likes to compare it to the Floater instead! :P
When it comes to getting around "outer" corners - i.e. application 1), transitioning into a Shimmier after having reached the bottom of a slide - I think the Slider would in fact need an analogy to the Climber's Hoister animation.
Since a lemming's position is measured at its feet, the Slider would have to let go of the wall once his feet trigger is no longer 1 pixel inside the wall (as this is how a Climber's position is measured).
We don't need a dangling animation, but we would kind of need the Slider to put his arms above his head for at least 1 frame when he reaches the end of a slide. The regular position of the Slider's arms is in front of his body, so it doesn't make sense to transition into a Shimmier from that.
I'd envision the Slider sliding normally first (arms in front of the body), then once there is no further terrain beneath him, his body continues to move downwards while his arms stay at the last pixel of terrain they can hold on to. This is where you have the opportunity to assign a Shimmier. If you don't, the Slider will let go with his arms as well, at which point he will just transition back into a regular Faller.
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Okay, just like IchoTolot did it for the Laser Blaster, I am going to compile the proposed behaviour for the NeoLemmix Slider:
General premise: The Slider is a downward Climber. His position marker is at his feet and 1 pixel inside the wall.
General behaviour:
- Whenever a Slider reaches the edge of a platform, he turns around and falls.
- As long as there is an uninterrupted straight wall, he will hold on to it, which will prevent him from splatting. Once he lets go of the wall (either because the skill is cancelled or because the wall is no longer straight), he transitions to a Faller, i.e. fall height is measured from there.
- After turning around, once the Slider completes his action, he will move 1 pixel further into the new direction he is now looking. This is the equivalent of a Climber hoisting himself onto a wall he has been climbing up before. It should be a natural result of the lemming's position trigger being buried 1 pixel inside the wall: Once the wall ends, this means the lemming has now been moved 1 pixel to the side. Technically though, this movement already appears as soon as a Climber / Slider "enters" the wall.
The second behaviour allows a Slider to land on the lower layer of two or more platforms with perfectly alligned edges. Meaning, the bottom platform does not need to be protruding compared to the upper one.
Much like a Climber still tries to perform the hoister animation when you remove the terrain while he is climbing (e.g. with a Basher), the Slider would still try to "dangle" on the ceiling, or whatever his respective counterpat to the Climber hoisting animation would be.
SKILL TYPE: permanent (=athletic).
A lot of the challenges relating to Sliders stem from the Slider retaining its turning behaviour. You can even easily envision levels where the fall-breaking properties of the Slider are completely irrelevant, but the turning behaviour is crucial. If you want to see examples of that, take a look at the Medieval Tribe from Quest from Kieran 2 (either in Lemmings 2 for DOS Box or on YouTube).
In NeoLemmix in particular, this would also allow for hatches with pre-assigned Sliders, which would force the player to work with this altered turning behaviour. :thumbsup:
OVERLAP WITH OTHER ATHLETIC SKILLS:
- Slider-Climber definitely needs to be possible. When a Climber-Slider reaches the bottom of a wall he has just slid down, the Slider part needs to include the action of turning around on said wall. (This is how it's done in Lemmings 2.) Otherwise, a Climber-Slider will trap himself in an infinite loop of climbing up and sliding down the same wall.
- Slider-Glider would be useful in my opinion: The Slider would turn the lemming around, and once he lets go of the wall, he continues gliding into the new direction.
- Slider-Floater therefore seems like it should also be possible: The Slider turns around and then can still survive a fall once he lets go of the wall. A Slider-Floater can survive any drop, but yet still exploit these drops for turning around. If you don't want the player to avoid using the Slider by only making the lemming a Floater, then you should probably simply not provide any Floaters on a given level.
- Overlaps with Swimmers and Disarmers don't seem problematic.
In short, I don't think there have to be any skills which are mutually exclusive with the Slider.
Thus, the only skills that would remain mutually exclusive with each other (not with the Slider) would be Floater-Glider.
INTERACTIONS WITH OBJECTS:
- one-way fields: A Slider moving through a one-way field (or Blocker, they behave the same way) that's exerting force into the opposite direction than the one the Slider is facing should turn around and let go of the wall, just like a Climber does.
- splat pad: A Slider landing on a splat pad does not splat because he never becomes a Faller; it's like a Climber performing the hoister animation within the trigger area of a splat pad and then continuing to walk.
- splitters. This is different from one way fields, I just found out: A Climber that climbs through a splitter which has its trigger buried in the wall he is climbing and is pointing into the opposite direction will briefly turn around and turn into a Faller. However, he can't get out of the wall, so he's briefly trapped on that pixel. Because that pixel is within the trigger area of the splitter, he will trigger the splitter again so that it now points into the same direction as he was facing before. At the next opportunity, he starts climbing up again. So I'd expect the Slider to act in a similar way and also continue sliding down.
- teleporter: A Slider sliding into a teleporter and coming out of a teleporter that's also touching a wall should continue sliding. This is what Climbers do as well.
- triggered traps: A Slider-Disarmer moving through the trigger of a trap should behave the same way as a Climber-Disarmer. Which to my knowledge is: The lemming dies. Even though his feet are technically 1 pixel inside the wall, i.e. he is standing, he isn't able to perform the Disarmer animation.
TRANSITIONS:
from another skill to a Slider
- Shimmier --> Slider: A Shimmier that's a Slider and shimmies against a wall should slide down this wall instead of just falling regularly. This never comes up with Climbers, because an uninterrupted ceiling would prevent the Shimmier from climbing, and an interrupted ceiling would cancel the Shimmier before he reaches the wall he wants to climb. With Shimmier-Slider transitions, however, both the ceiling and the wall are connected, therefore the skills should connect, too.
- Jumper --> Slider: A Slider that jumps against a wall starts sliding down, much like a Climber jumping against a wall starts climbing up. If a lemming is both a Climber and a Slider, the Climber always takes precedent: A Climber-Slider jumping against a wall will start climbing up, never slide down. This is consistent with Lemmings 2 behaviour.
- Glider --> Slider: Should not be possible. A Glider-Slider that bumps into a wall will still turn around, not hold on to it and slide down vertically - just like a Glider-Climber bumping into a wall doesn't start climbing.
- Swimmer --> Slider: A Swimmer falling out of a water area has no terrain to hold on to. Therefore, even if he is a Slider, he should turn into a regular Faller at this point, facing the same direction as before, instead of turning around like a Slider would. Of course, as said above, it is generally still possible to make a lemming both a Swimmer and a Slider; the former simply can't transition into the latter directly. In contrast, a Swimmer-Slider sliding into water can just start swimming.
- Faller --> Slider: You can of course assign the permanent skill property of being a Slider to a lemming while he is a Faller, but that will not result in the lemming suddenly holding on to a wall next to which he is currently falling down - just like you can't make a Faller hold on to a wall and climb up. In order for a lemming to start sliding, he already needs to be a Slider at the top of the drop, before he even starts falling. The standard transition is always Walker --> Slider, never Faller --> Slider.
- Builder/Platformer --> Slider: A Builder or Platformer that's also a Slider and is no longer being assigned new bricks will turn around when falling off his own staircase/bridge and continue to walk back where he came from (unless the bridge ends at an altitude where he can continue walking without ever falling before).
A corner case: A Slider falling from a Stoner is interesting, because there is a gap between the stoned lemming's shoulders and head that the Slider could potentially "drop" into. I'd argue though that, with the trigger being at the Slider's feet, once he drops himself off the Stoner, his own feet will be at about the same height as the Stoner's feet. So he should drop down from there (or shimmy along the underside of the Stoner) as normal, not pull himself back up into the Stoner's head-shoulder gap.
from a Slider to another skill
- Slider --> Walker: Just like a Climber, a Slider can't be cancelled by assigning a Walker to him. Of course, a Slider will automatically transition back into a water once he reaches the end of a slide and stands on solid ground (or transition to a Dangler, then Faller if there is no solid ground at the end of the slide.)
- Slider --> Cloner: Again, just like a Climber, a Slider can't be cloned while sliding. Of course, you can clone a regular walking lemming that happens to be an athlete with the property of being a Slider.
- Slider --> Bomber / Stoner: Since Sliders are 1 pixel inside the wall, they oh-no inside the wall, like Climbers.
- Slider --> Jumper: A Slider should be able to jump off the wall he is sliding down in the opposite direction, just like a Climber.
- Slider --> Shimmier: When the Slider reaches the bottom end of a straight vertical wall, but there is no terrain under his feet, before transitioning into a Faller, he should either
a) perform a "dangling" animation like in Lemmings 2, which would be the equivalent of the Climber's "hoister" animation, or
b) remain in the standard Slider animation, but at the last frame (and a couple frames before as well), it would be possible to assign a Shimmier to him, so that he then continues to shimmy along the underside of the wall he was just sliding down. This would be the equivalent of NeoLemmix Climber --> Shimmier transitions, which, in contrast to Lemmings 2, do not use the "dangling" animation for the Climber.
A corner case: If a Slider slides through a gap, and then a constructive skill closes that gap right above the Slider's head like a "Great Lemming Caper" in reverse, the Slider should be able to transition into a Shimmier and hold on to that bridge. I don't see this being particularly useful very often, because the Slider is facing towards the wall he is sliding down, so he would shimmy right against it and turn back into a Slider afterwards. One application though might be the following:
- Slider slides down wall
- Platformer / Builder / Stacker / Stoner closes gap above the Slider's head.
- Slide gets assigned a Shimmier.
- The Shimmier gets cloned.
- The original Slider shimmies against the wall he was just sliding down and transitions back into a Slider; the clone can go on to shimmy into the opposite direction.
Anyway, this would be the way I'd expect these skills to behave, based on their previously established characteristics.
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I've created a spreadsheet with my thoughts about how the Slider, including a "Dehoister" transition state used in some cases (eg Walker -> Dehoister -> Slider; as a reverse of Climber -> Hoister -> Walker), would interact with other possible lemming states (as well as the Walker and Cloner skills).
https://1drv.ms/x/s!Am6NTdy4vnPXhINGmY0v7N79mUDDkA
This is viewable in your browser, you do not need to download anything. Feel free to give input.
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Thanks for the overview! :thumbsup:
Regarding wall jumping and the note "what if lemming is also a Climber?", as said before, I'd keep this consistent with L2 behaviour, in that the Climber always takes precedent over the Slider when wall jumping. Meaning, a Climber-Slider jumping at a wall will start climbing up. He will only become a Slider when falling down from the top.
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The other obvious question that I can't believe hasn't come up yet (or maybe it has and I've forgotten): How fast should the slider move?
For obvious reasons, he shouldn't be faster than a faller. That's 3 pixels per second. The option is also there for 2 pixels per second (same speed as a faller in an updraft, or a floater not in an updraft) or 1 pixel per second (same speed as a floater in an updraft). I personally kind of like 2 pixels per second, but I could see 1 pixel working too.
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2 pixels per second, like a regular Floater, seems reasonable.
The question is then whether Sliders should also be slowed down by updrafts, i.e. to 1 pixel per second, like Floaters in updrafts as well.
Does anyone happen to know how fast the Slider moves in Lemmings 2?
It does definitely seem faster than a Climber, which makes logical / physical sense.
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The question is then whether Sliders should also be slowed down by updrafts, i.e. to 1 pixel per second, like Floaters in updrafts as well.
I'm leaning towards no on this one. Partly for simplicity, but also the difference from 2px to 1px is far too much for a lemming without a big-ass umbrella to catch the updraft air. :P 3px to 2px on the other hand might be okay, but yeah, I do think 3px per second is a bit fast as the starting point.
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Just a quick post to show some support for this skill, since others have been getting more discussion-time recently.
Go Slider! :thumbsup:
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Partly there's a lot less to discuss about Slider - most of the detail is already fleshed out and not particularly controversial. It will likely be the second to get the exp build (behind the Grenader / Spearer, which are basically only being held back by me not wanting to release any new-skill exps before 12.10 stable is out and otherwise would be ready for release - the reason for this is that I'd like them to be "nothing different, except the skill, from a stable version").
And to be clear, that in turn is to do with implementation difficulty (and in particular, later-adjustment difficulty) of the laser-blaster; not because of anything I have against it.
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Put up a poll regarding slider speed.
It's not critical to get this right the first time, this is one of those things that would be very easy to alter during the experimental phase. Obviously, it goes without saying that if / when Slider hits RC phase (let alone stable), the speed is no longer open to change; but yeah, we can try out other speeds during the experimental phase.
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Another question is what to call an athlete with 5 permanent skills.
Currently we have <skill name> for 1, "Athlete" for 2, "Triathlete" for 3, "X-Athlete" for 4. (We have five permanent skills, but as Floater and Glider are mutually exclusive, a single lemming can currently only have up to four.) Perhaps the best way about this is to keep it as is for 1 and 2, and beyond that something like "Athlete-III", "Athlete-IV" and "Athlete-V" (using roman numerals to clearly distinguish from the lemming quantity)?
This is obviously not an urgent matter and can be decided later, but it's something to give thought to at some point.
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More importantly, when holding down the Ctrl key and hovering over a lemming that has permanent skills, what letter abbreviation should be used for slider if it also happens to be a swimmer? S is already used to indicate the lemming is a swimmer, and slider also starts with an S, so here we have a problem. Maybe use two letters instead?
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Currently, I'm using "L" for Slider, though this is up for discussion. I do agree it should be a different letter from Swimmer, regardless of ordering.
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Here's a video showing an initial Slider implementation. It's pretty solid as far as the basic cases go (ie: Walker becoming Slider; Slider becoming either Walker or Faller depending on circumstance), though none of the fancier cases are supported yet.
https://youtu.be/BrDqpqIFYQA
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Here's a video
No, there is no video. :8():
-- Simon
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Here's a video
No, there is no video. :8():
-- Simon
What are you talking about? :8():
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Second video: https://youtu.be/Uail0mB8URk
This shows some more transitions to slider. Transitioning from slider is still limited to "walker if hit ground, faller if run out of wall in midair".
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Seeing these videos, I love this skill! :thumbsup: Feel free to use my Slider sprite for testing in the meantime if you wish. If this skill gets implemented, I'll likely increase the animation to several frames and have some hair movement.
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The placeholder sprites will remain in place for now. Final sprites can be discussed after "which skills make it?" has been decided.
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Another video!
https://youtu.be/0_1OXHVPCLw
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Great work, namida! :thumbsup: Especially the smooth transitioning to the Shimmier. And also, that the Climber overrides the Slider during wall jumping.
My only question would be about the Climber transitioning directly to a Slider when hitting a ceiling. Does this happen in Lemmings 2, as well, btw?
Anyway, this is certainly great for preventing Climbers from splatting. And I assume the Slider will turn around when reaching the bottom again (as a Slider sliding down a regular wall does in L2, even when it is a Climber)?
Because otherwise, it will be a constant back-and-forth transition between Climber and Slider, and the only way to get the lemming off the wall again would be by wall jumping.
You wall-jumped right away in this video, so I couldn't tell what was going to happen once the Climber-Slider reaches the bottom and lands on terrain right in front of the wall.
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My only question would be about the Climber transitioning directly to a Slider when hitting a ceiling. Does this happen in Lemmings 2, as well, btw?
Anyway, this is certainly great for preventing Climbers from splatting. And I assume the Slider will turn around when reaching the bottom again (as a Slider sliding down a regular wall does in L2, even when it is a Climber)?
No idea about what happens in L2. I went with what made sense to me.
Yes, the slider will turn around at the bottom. This happens any time a slider (climber or otherwise) reaches the bottom of a wall or reaches water, regardless of whether the situation arose by sliding down from a ledge, sliding down after hitting head while climbing, or walljump-sliding and being assigned climber after latching on.
The climber-splitter bug (https://www.lemmingsforums.net/index.php?topic=5183.0) also affected Sliders, so the Slider exp will be based on "12.10.X + the fix for that bug" rather than 12.10.X stable.
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This potential new skill looks really cool. :)
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A bug with the Slider has come to light where, if a Climber-Slider is assigned a Shimmier below an overhang, he ignores the overhang and slides down the wall instead. This will be fixed before the public exp release.