Athletes

[namida]

I'd like suggestions on how better to handle athletes; since unlike traditional Lemmings where there are only two permanent skills and thus you know that an athlete is Climber + Floater; under NeoLemmix there are a total of 5, of which any one lemming may have up to 4 at a time (a single lemming cannot be both a Floater and a Glider).

Since the addition of these new skills, the system has simply been to use fancier names when they have multiple skills - two gives "Athlete", three "Triathlete", and four "X-Athlete", no matter what those skills are. However, the problem is precisely that - it doesn't indicate what permanent skills they have, just how many. I would guess in a lot of cases this could be deduced from the available skillset, but in complex levels, or levels that have lemmings which spawn with permanent skills already assigned (in which case they don't nessecerially have to be skills that appear in the skillset), this may lead to uncertianty.

So, I'm wondering if there's any suggestions on how to better handle this, or if everyone thinks it's fine as-is.

One method I did briefly experiment with was appending a string to the normal skil name, or to Athlete, which would show a dash for any skill they don't have, and a single letter for those they do; for example, for a climber + glider + disarmer (mechanic), it'd show C-GD (with the dash being where an S would appear for Swimmer). Since Floater and Glider are mutually exclusive, I didn't see the need to have five spaces; the third one would change to either F or G as appropriate. The problems with this is that it looks a bit untidy, and also that it barely fits - the "1" (or whatever quantity number is correct) is literally right next to the O in "Out" (see attached screenshot). The problem is even worse if the normal name (rather than always using "Athlete") of their action is used, particularly if the lemming happened to be a Platformer at the time.

Of course, it could be argued that the font is probably larger than it needs to be, and that a smaller one should perhaps be used in order to put more information on the skill bar. In this case, a system like this one would be less problematic.

Anyway, what are your suggestions?

[Nepster]

I cannot think of any level, where this causes problems, so it is probably fine as-is.
Confusion is only possible if you have multiple lemmings with different multiple skills (but totalling to the same number) working in the same area of the level. But how often does this happen?

[namida]

Off the top of my head, the one level I can think of where this might be a problem is LPOmega Mental 16 "Skill Factory"*. That's not to say there aren't others, of course - and there's also the possibility someone might create such a level at a later date.

* For those who don't know this level, you start with no skills (but have lots of pickup skills in the level), and there are four pre-placed lemmings with different sets of permanent skills - Climber+Floater, Climber+Glider, Floater, Glider.

[Wafflem]

One method I did briefly experiment with was appending a string to the normal skil name, or to Athlete, which would show a dash for any skill they don't have, and a single letter for those they do; for example, for a climber + glider + disarmer (mechanic), it'd show C-GD (with the dash being where an S would appear for Swimmer). Since Floater and Glider are mutually exclusive, I didn't see the need to have five spaces; the third one would change to either F or G as appropriate. The problems with this is that it looks a bit untidy, and also that it barely fits - the "1" (or whatever quantity number is correct) is literally right next to the O in "Out" (see attached screenshot). The problem is even worse if the normal name (rather than always using "Athlete") of their action is used, particularly if the lemming happened to be a Platformer at the time.

Of course, it could be argued that the font is probably larger than it needs to be, and that a smaller one should perhaps be used in order to put more information on the skill bar. In this case, a system like this one would be less problematic.

I actually like this method, and of course there are ways to improve that.

Some ways:
-I don't see why you should put "Athlete" in front of "CS--". This would be very problematic if you put Triathlete because it would really not fit. Perhaps shorten Athlete/Triathlete/X-Athlete? e.g. , "ATH CS--". "TRIATH CS--", "XATH CS--" etc.).
-Or, perhaps hold a key like Shift, then click on the Athlete/Triathete/X-Athlete. This will then replace the word Athlete/Triathlete/X-Athlete with the string of letters.

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Another thing to note is that this issue also applies to Zombies - you don't know what permanent skills they have as it always says "Zombie" when hovering the cursor over them. Doomday Lemmings Outbreak 2 "Haunted Pier" is an example of this.

[namida]

While I was trialling that system, I dropped the "Triathlete" / "X-Athlete" thing, instead always just using "Athlete" together with the specified skills. I also implemented the same thing for zombies (if they had any permanent skills), though didn't test it with them.

I do like your idea of using a modifier key. Though I also was thinking that perhaps Shift should be used to ensure assignment to a lemming that hasn't been assigned any skills yet (primarily for the "one skill per lemming" talismans). Of course, since one is a selection issue and one is a display issue, they don't have to be on different keys.

[GigaLem]

I was thinking of Super-athlete

[namida]

That's of no help whatsoever. NeoLemmix already has names for 3-skill and 4-skill athletes (and a 5-skill athlete is not possible, since Floater and Glider are mutually exclusive and there's only 5 total permanent skills). The question here isn't what to call the multi-skill athletes; it's how to display which skills they have instead of just how many.

[namida]

Okay so, I've more or less used DynaLem's suggestion for the next update. If you hold Alt while putting the cursor on a lemming, instead of showing the name of its current action / state, it'll show a series of 5 characters.

1st character: C for a climber, otherwise a dash
2nd character: S for a swimmer, otherwise a dash
3rd character: F for a floater, G for a glider, otherwise a dash
4th character: D for a disarmer, otherwise a dash
5th character: Z for a zombie, otherwise a dash