I'll happily join in, too!

On a related note: In the Amiga emulated version, pressing escape to restart the level doesn't seem to work. Or does anybody know how to accomplish this in the Amiga version with some other key? Because always having to nuke whenever one tiny bit goes wrong is pretty annoying, especially in a game with as much execution difficulty as Lemmings 2...

Well, my "Great level of indifference" from World Tour that had a save requirement of 0 in Old Formats already no longer works this way in New Formats. So I wasn't even aware that SuperLemmix would allow for this again.

Since you mentioned Zombies, though, I do wonder whether there might be some levels where "kill all zombies" is the only objective, even if all regular lemmings die, too? On such levels, a save requirement of zero would actually make sense - as long as you can enforce killing the zombies somehow before letting the player advance / marking the level as solved. A talisman is generally just a "nice-to-have" reward on top, not a solving requirement...

The Dangler, much like the Shrugger, is supposed to give you a window of opportunity to assign a follow-up skill. In a game without rewinding features, such as Lemmings 2, this is pretty vital. In NeoLemmix, you can assign a Shimmier to a lemming a couple of frames in advance, and it will still be applied once the lemming reaches the appropriate spot. Still, that window of opportunity is pretty small, compared to having a dedicated Dangler state.

The Dangler should also affect Climbers and Rock Climbers in Lemmings 2, if I remember correctly. Importantly, while I always thought a lemming had to be a Rock Climber in order to transition from shimmying back to climbing, that is not actually the case: Even regular Climbers turn the upward corner, transitioning back from Shimmier to Climber.

The main weakness of the L2 Shimmier, compared to the NeoLemmix / SuperLemmix Shimmier, is that he can't shimmy up inverted 45° slopes (1:1 length-height ratio), but only flatter ones (2:1 ratio). For the 1:1-ratio slopes, you need the Rock Climber in L2 - which obviously has the side effect of the lemming looking in the other direction, compared to shimmying up a sloped ceiling.

I haven't tried what happens in Lemmings 2 when a Shimmier who is also a Rock Climber reaches an inverted 45° slope. Will he transition back into a Rock Climber, just like he would do if reaching a 90° corner? Or will he fall down?
EDIT: I've tried it out now. Indeed, a Shimmier who is also a Rock Climber will transition to a Rock Climber when reaching an inverted 45° slope. This isn't necessary in NeoLemmix / SuperLemmix, because Shimmiers can already handle such slopes on their own. It would however be required for 90° turns.

This would mean that only slopes steeper than 90° (those with a 1:2 length-height ratio) could still stop Shimmiers, because regular Climbers can't overcome those (and we don't have Rock Climbers in NeoLemmix or SuperLemmix). The only way a Climber could overcome such an obstacle, though, would be by always transitioning into a Shimmier for one horizontal pixel, after which he would automatically transition back to a Climber for the two pixels in height gain. Meaning, this would require the player to keep spamming Shimmiers on a regular Climber.

The thing about this new behaviour is: If Shimmiers can turn upward corners, how can you still stop a Shimmier? Gaps in the ceiling no longer work as easily. Unless of course you create a height of two pixels per 1 in length (1:2 ratio) - which right now makes the Shimmier stop, and would make him climb with the new behaviour - followed by another horizontal piece of ceiling.
This would require another Shimmier assignment if the lemming is supposed to continue. If no such assignment occurs, the only minor difference would be that, rather than falling down immediately as soon as the Shimmier reaches the 2-pixel-high terrain, he would climb up those two pixels, then dangle from the ceiling above them, and then fall down (for lack of another Shimmier assignment).



In short: One of the potential obstacles Turrican could add to his levels, in order to continue to enforce the Shimmier-Freezer-Cloner-Jumper combo, would be short sloped overhangs with a 1:2 ratio. This can be done either by extending the vertical overhang into a slope, or by cutting such a steep slope into it (=by erasing terrain).
Either way: Just make sure not to provide so many Shimmiers on such a level that the player could overcome this obstacle by Shimmier-spamming, as explained above, instead of using the much more elegent four-skills combo.

No, the lemmings won’t continue circling forever, since you’d always have to assign new Shimmiers again whenever they reach the bottom.
Of course, that’s an interesting way of containing a crowd, but due to the constant new assignment of Shimmiers, it would keep the player busy while they’re trying to accomplish something else with the worker lemming(s).

The “circling” effect is mainly a property of the Slider. For example, you can contain a crowd of (pre-assigned) Sliders by placing two Builders to their left and right, which will keep them circling back and forth between those two staircases until one of the staircases is cut through (or you have a lemming jump off a staircase to isolate him from the crowd).

Regarding this behaviour itself:
Yes, this is something that’s possible in L2: The Tribes, and something I’ve always missed in NeoLemmix.
If it can be added to SuperLemmix, I’m definitely in support of it.

As with many such changes, it might open up backroutes in whatever of my existing NeoLemmix content I convert to SuperLemmix. But in contrast to the previous idea of Shimmiers naturally turning around when hitting walls (unless they’re Sliders), this behaviour seems worth it to me.

The reason I’m glad Shimmiers don’t naturally turn around on walls is that I have levels where part of the challenge is precisely the setup of the Shimmier turning around. Meaning, you either have to place a Blocker in their path, and/or rely on areas in the level that have one-way fields in order to turn the Shimmier around. If the Shimmier could simply turn around on any standard wall, these interesting challenges would have been eliminated.

Likewise, for the behaviour discussed here — Shimmiers transitioning back to Climbers — some levels that already exist right now require Jumpers to solve this. However, since Shimmiers can’t transition to Jumpers, you always need additional setup — e.g., a Stoner / Freezer under the ceiling, on which the next Shimmier can then land, jump off from it (without bumping his head at the ceiling) to a nearby wall, and from that wall he can then jump back to the upwards wall. That’s two extra skill types (Jumpers and Stoners / Freezers) required to get a Shimmier up a wall.

So yes, if the Climber-Shimmier can turn the upward corner immediately, this would simplify the setup a lot!

What do you mean by “ranged Batter”? What we’re currently discussing the Bazooker could look like? Or something entirely different?

If the range works in a perfectly horizontal trajectory, the only upside to a non-ranged Batter (who also hits his target from a horizontal angle) would be that it works over a longer distance on flat terrain. Meaning, if the current platform is particularly long, you could launch a Bazooka from one end of the platform to bat a lemming from the other end of the platform across a gap.

Conversely, if the terrain the Batter is standing on is an upwards slope, there basically wouldn’t be a difference to the non-ranged Batter, because the projectile couldn’t fly far to begin with. And if you’re launching the Bazooka on a downward slope, it might fly right over the to-be-batted lemming’s head.

These are the limitations of a horizontal projectile arc.

If, in turn, the Bazooka follows the same trajectory as the Spearer and Grenader, then there would be no difference between the Bazooka and Grenader, aside from the Bazooka flinging lemmings around. In other words, as said before, the Bazooka is to the Grenader what the Knockback Bomber is to the Bomber / Exploder.

If we instead decide that the flinger skill should not destroy terrain (for the reasons WillLem has explained), then the Bazooka would not destroy terrain, which would feel pretty weird to me.

With the Batter, meanwhile, it’s more obvious why it wouldn’t destroy terrain (well, unless somebody confuses the Batter for the L2 Club Basher. Which, coincidentally, could be used as the sprite for the Batter on the skill panel?).

I strongly advocate against any changes to the Grenader.

As WillLem said, strictly horizontal arcs aren't that great. If another skill is added, while the Grenader stays the same, then it's a different story. But if the Grenader's arc is flattened, it becomes much weaker, in my opinion.

Similarly, adding knockback to the Grenader would also make it worse, in my view, simply because you could no longer throw a grenade into a crowd (say, for example, to free the Blocker holding them back at the end): Now you'd always have to worry about the grenade flinging random lemmings from the crowd elsewhere, possibly to their deaths.

In fact, this is precisely what often happens in L2: The Tribes, with skills like the Knockback Bomber, Bazooker, Mortar etc., and is part of what, in my view, makes L2: The Tribes such a frustrating experience.

So, once again, I stand by my principle: I'd rather see no flinger skill added to SuperLemmix at all than to see changes to the existing skill of the Grenader, merely in an attempt to somehow fit the Batter's function into an already existing skill.

As you can see, this time my argument isn't even "existing content", but much more generally, "overall annoyance caused by knockbacks".

Knockbacks should never be a byproduct of a skill that you would often rather use for something else. If we do decide we want any kind of flinger skill, that should be the skill's main purpose.
This is a completely new mechanic, as far as NeoLemmix / SuperLemmix is concerned. Which is another reason why it shouldn't be tagged on to something that already exists in the engine.

The beauty of the Batter - or a dedicated Knockback Bomber, or the Bazooker we're currently contemplating - is that they would only or at least mainly be used to fling lemmings around. Rather than wanting the skill for something else, with the knockback often backfiring in the player's face.