Multiplayer gameplay styles rabble topic yay!

[ccexplore]

Not quite in-topic, but when watching MP replays in Lix, is there a good way to find out within the game which color corresponds to which player?  So that you can easily and surely figure out who's the winner and therefore who to watch for educational value?  The thing is, when the replay finishes and it displays the scores, it does so in terms of player names only, not indicating who's what color.

I imagine all the information is probably stored in the replay text file so there's probably a way to find out by manually looking at the text file, but at some point it'd be good not to have to do that.

[okmot]

but I think for me, I can really only work well when given mostly straight-edge terrain pieces, like what you're seeing in Simon's screenshots.

In each of the themed graphics sets in clones there is a folder named "Tiles" which contains mostly square/rectangular terrain.  I tend to like straight edge design also, for gameplay reasons, but the curvy land chunks can look more natural.  It depends what kind of level you want to make.

[okmot]

Some Lix maps can't be won without clustering the main group while making the path. We found that these maps tend to be good. Some maps build up huge mental tension about when to free the accumulated crowd and how: Sending the crowd will lose to the enemy sending a few to the same place.

How do you enforce clustering?  Is it by making the path to the exit hazardous, with large open gaps?  It is fun to plan when to release a clustered bunch, but you are right that it doesn't happen often in clones.  Clustering was a good strategy early on in development, but it seemed like there was always a way to get one sabotage clone into the cluster and so it became a losing tactic.  Perhaps maps created without the Spin morph and distant start points would encourage more clustering.  I've actually just finished a simple MP map in which the start points dump out the clones quickly resulting in an instant bunch to manage for both groups.

[Simon]

Not quite in-topic, but when watching MP replays in Lix, is there a good way to find out within the game which color corresponds to which player?

When watching a replay, the player name of the currently selected color is displayed to the right of the skillset. That name field is actually a button that toggles through the active players, to view different people's skillsets.

How do you enforce clustering?

Have a higher spawn rate than what a route in progress can take.

Stepping Stones (screenshot in my first post above) is a prime example of deliberate bunkering despite having only a moderate release rate. All routes require many builders or floaters before being usable for the crowd, and time.

Downward Reduction has a high release rate, and the whole level is about crowd control with miners. There's no way not to cluster the lems, but unlike the longer strategical maps, one cannot bunker anywhere on this map. They usually cluster in the hole that has the most favorable position relative to the tunnels leading down to the work area.

-- Simon

[Clam]

If you minimize route building (forcing the player to make a path to their exit) and sabotage (paths relatively close to each other, or crossing) then what are you left with?

All right, when I said 'route building and sabotage', what I really meant was sabotage and repair, i.e. the repetitive routine of digging and building in one spot. I think geoo's definition of 'route building' is the better one (constructing a route to get to your exit in the first place). I should edit my earlier post to clarify this.

I've noticed that on levels in which the start point is in the middle and exits on either end (so that paths don't cross) tend to make it very difficult to make a comeback because once a player has the lead they can strictly focus on path repair and effective sabotage becomes virtually impossible forcing a nuke instead of a certain slow death.  So the tendency is to let weaker players lose by their own poor route building (losing a clone or two) and then just waiting for the map to end without ever making a move against the weaker player.

This comes down to map design. This problem can be avoided by delaying access to the exits, so that no lems are safe until the path is complete (see "Ghetto wars" and "Tower defense (Part 3)"), or requiring a dangerous path that can be very difficult to repair if sabotaged (see "Jenga"). In both cases, sabotage can be very effective until late on in the game. Besides that, geoo and Simon aren't weak players (far from it), and they need to entertain themselves .

At some point in every map you will have a completed path to your exit, and your next step (although better to do it in parallel) is to sabotage regardless of whether the paths cross.  It seems like this is just a matter of degree and delay we are talking about.

I won't deny that. But, on maps where there is a delay before sabotage, players have a chance to gain an advantage (by speed and accuracy in route-building, or by better choice of routes) before the sabotage begins. On 'true' type 1 maps, there isn't such an opportunity, and the whole game is about sabotage. On top of that, there's the clustering factor, and all the tactical decisions associated with that.

Even with well designed levels that supposedly increase predictability of the location of sabotage i would think that crafty players would overcome that to sabotage in unexpected places.

On some maps (type 3, and early in type 2), typically your opponent can only reasonably get one or two lems into your base. You can only attack where you have lemmings, and you always can see where your opponent's lemmings are, so in these cases you can easily see where you could be attacked at any given time. When there are crossing streams, there are many possible points of attack, and many potential attackers, and then it becomes difficult to predict the point of attack (and nigh-on impossible if the path extends beyond the size of the screen).

As for the swap trap question, ccx provided a good response.  It's the only trap that is specific to MP and is twice as deadly as a trap that just kills a clone so if you can lead your opponents clones into it there is a high reward.  to truly alter gameplay you need to need to alter objective; what defines a win.

Ok, that's reasonable enough. But in adding more features and objectives, you risk losing the essential simplicity that makes the game fun to play. For the top players, this isn't so important, but a lot of people (especially new players, and their importance shouldn't be underestimated) just want to have fun, without being bogged down with rules.


I'll add that, regardless of what's been said so far about map types and their strategic value, what I like most when playing is variety. I've noticed that geoo and Simon like to stick to their dozen or so favourite maps, and immediately launch into a new game on the same map when they finish. My preference is to play as many different maps as possible, even mediocre ones, just to keep things fresh. Plus, as mentioned alrady, type 2 maps especially are quite demanding on the players, so it's nice to break from those after a while.

[Simon]

I've noticed that geoo and Simon like to stick to their dozen or so favourite maps, and immediately launch into a new game on the same map when they finish.

Yeah, when playing 1v1, we often play the same map 5 to 10 times in a row. We call this behavior smack-smack, that is the sound of hitting the space bar twice with a few fingers of the non-mouse hand. The first hit dismisses the result box, the second marks the local player as ready for the next match.

There's usually been something during play that even the winner has screwed up, so both immediately want to have another go and get it right that time. I believe this is also the best way to become better.

geoo and me suck at 2vX as a team though. :>

-- Simon

[ccexplore]

After 2 Lix MP sessions, I don't think I can keep throwing around "I haven't learn my hotkeys" as an excuse.  not that it'll me help much suck-wise, but at least hopefully a little less of idiotic I-pick-the-wrong-skill mistakes

On the other hand, I think Lix actually has even more types of skills than Clones, so I don't think it makes sense for me to reinvent the wheel--geoo/Simon, what key mapping are you guys using right now?

[Simon]

My layout, blocker and cuber share the same key:



geoo's layout, key 105 is the semicolon. He holds the mouse in his left hand despite being right handed:



-- Simon

[Clam]

The hotkey layout is an interesting topic in itself. I still use Lemmix often, so I'm well used to the F3-F10 keys. These aren't easy to get to in the heat of a game though, so to avoid tying myself in knots too badly (both in Lix, and when I go back to Lemmix) I've remapped the original skills to numbers 3->0, with the other skills plus directional select clustered to the left. (This is for standard handedness and QWERTY layout, unlike the above ). This turns out to be convenient for maps where individual lems are micromanaged heavily (including race maps), as it puts walker, jumper, runner, climber and floater all close together. Also, I like to associate the keys with skills in memorable ways.


My current layout in full:

Original 8 skills: 3->0
jumper: Q ('Queue jumper')
Walker: W
platformEr: E
bAtter: A
runner: S (Sprinter)
cuber: D (as in '3D')
left/right directional select: z/x
Nuke stays on F12, I can't yet find any compelling reason to change it.

[okmot]

I'll add that, regardless of what's been said so far about map types and their strategic value, what I like most when playing is variety. I've noticed that geoo and Simon like to stick to their dozen or so favourite maps, and immediately launch into a new game on the same map when they finish. My preference is to play as many different maps as possible, even mediocre ones, just to keep things fresh. Plus, as mentioned alrady, type 2 maps especially are quite demanding on the players, so it's nice to break from those after a while.

I tend to favour playing the same map multiple times as well, in an attempt to find a different and hopefully better strategy.  But map jumping is also fun especially if it's a 2 vs. 2 setup, and nobody has played the new maps yet.  I've recently posted a Clones map pack, you can read a synopsis here with links to screenshots.

Optimal hotkey layout is important for keyboard health.  Having a keyboard for feet would be nice, i'm sure i could hit at least 2 distinct keys per foot with big toe heel pivot.  Hooking up a drum kit as a gaming input device is how we will "play" games in the future.

[Simon]

It doesn't matter how easy to learn a key layout is. Eventually, one wants to use the hotkeys without thinking anyway. All that matters is how nicely it feels when it's ingrained in muscle memory. I believe mine isn't optimal either -- the skill additions of the past months were simply pasted onto an existing layout.



geoo has made these two lopsided 1v1 maps, suitable for beginners to play against experienced players. The first one is Uphill Battle, it's completely biased against the lower position. To play this, you want to abort and restart when the strong player spawns at the top.



The second one, Ivory Tower, gives the attacker 30 free points, and he has to stir up the defender's cluster of 90 in a limited amount of time. This is less lopsided than the first map, but between two good players, the defender will always win. The attacker will try to climb the tower, make an exploder hole near the top, and use builders to get on top. The best defense is probably to use knockback exploders in regular intervals against the attacking climbers and builders, and also to make a second exploder hole further towards the bottom of the ascent.

geoo has also updated Stepping Stones (link to image), he'll probably include that image in the page here and write something about it soon.

-- Simon

[Clam]

[08:35:43]   <Clam> the rabble topic is on page 3, this is a travesty

Multiplayer is hot again, and we've seen some novel creations since the last post here

Here I'll go over two game styles have been tried with some success, but will need modified game-modes to work to their full potential. I'll explain the concepts, attempts to date, and proposed game rules here. This has all been suggested elsewhere, but not in an organised place.

NOTE: This is not the Great Lix Wishlist! These maps work just fine as-is, with basic house-rules. In the worst case, you might need to see the replay to find out who won.

I've split this into two posts so I can get the first part out sooner.
(Spoiler alert: part 2 is on combat maps!)


RACE

This is all about speed - get your lix to the goal first. In general terms, it's "first to x points wins".

Attempts so far
Race maps to date have had 1-2 lix per team, and usually a race to 1. To begin with it was just an isolated section per player, but it's grown into batter fights, builder wars and even a batting race.

Why doesn't it work in the standard rules?
Overtime triggers a nuke, so other players get at least 5 seconds to catch up and tie. Nuking damages the terrain and can make it impossible for players to finish. Losing lix creates an unwinnable situation, leaving the player as a spectator for the rest of the game.

Proposed rules

• Nuke uses the Burner "skill" to avoid damaging the map. When a player reaches the target, he Burner-nukes automatically, without a countdown, to avoid interfering with the remaining players.
• When the winner finishes, overtime triggers as usual, during which other players can fight for placings.
• Your score is the time taken to finish. If you don't finish, you get no score and place equal-last.
• Lix respawn when they die (unless nuked) OR reach a goal, subject to the usual spawn interval. If killed, they retain any permanent skills they had. This means you're never out of the game, although you'll likely be some way behind if you lost a bunch

Ideas for future levels

• Probably the most important thing is to make sure that the path can't be irreparably destroyed. This might mean giving infinite building skills, no terrain-destruction skills, or a path of steel.
• The most obvious change is to have more lix per player. This runs the risk of feeling like an ordinary streamy game with standard rules, but we've found ways around that before
• No race map yet uses 'death' skills (bombers or cubers). The respawning mechanic could make this interesting.
• With respawning, it's possible to set the target higher than the Lix count - but I expect this would make for a repetitive game.

Sample levels

The First to Finish! No interaction, a straight optimisation and execution challenge. A quick death awaits any mistake.


Marble Run. Athlete race with multiple paths, trading off between speed and difficulty. Mistakes are costly, as is running into the bat of an opponent!


Build Wars. You have two lix, one builds and one fights (interchangeably). You have to build all the way up around the map, and your goal is halfway around horizontally from your start. Intense with lots of players - every player-count version is crammed into a single screen! (This one is 4P) Team mode makes for a very different but equally intense experience.

[Clam]

COMBAT

Fight to the death! Win by being the last player with live lix on the map.

Attempts so far
Just two maps to date. Both amount to a fencing match, where each player's last lix has to avoid the opponent's bat. See below (or above, where one of the maps has been posted already).

Why doesn't it work in the standard rules?
Because you have to reach the goal to score points! The current workaround is to have a delayed path to the goal, with the disincentive of getting batted into an unwinnable position if you go before you "win". It's also limited to one (or very few) lix per team, because with more lix you can defend your path-builder. The waiting time at the end is frustrating, and the bigger the map, the longer this has to be.

Proposed rules

• No goals.
• Your score is the time elapsed when you lost your last lix. If everyone but you loses all their lix, you win!
• In case of a stalemate: If no one uses a skill for some length of time (set this as the Overtime), the game is scored on number of Lix remaining. If you're behind, you have to do something about it!

Ideas for future levels

• Anything that's not a fencing match! A map with a large amount of walker, jumper and batter skills will probably reduce to the same fencing match in the end.
• More lix per team, on bigger arena-style maps full of deadly traps!
• Limit fine control tools (walker, jumper, blocker), so players stand more chance of taking out many lix at once. Hide away your lix (and hunt down the opponent!) with the slow-moving L1 skills!
• Destruction skills should be more plentiful than construction skills, so the entire map doesn't end up as a safe holding pen!
• Sturdy paths around the map are important, so no one can hide in an unreachable spot, at least until lategame when skills run low.
• You can of course have a 1- or few-lix-per-team fencing match on a more interesting map.

Sample levels

Last Man Standing

Last Man Standing. A mindless batter fest at first, it can be played skillfully with micromanagement when both players have only a few lixes left. You have just one builder, and if you try to use it while the opponent still has lixes, they just bat your builder so you cannot win.

FIGHT! Extension of Last Man Standing to any number of players.