Lemforum backroute fixes, Lix 0.10.x

[mobius]

thanks Simon for the many comments and the stream that got me thinking about this again.
Simon commented on difficulty of some levels; I'm fine with moving any of my levels as you see fit. I'm not good at judging the difficulty of my own.

I found the following levels substantially harder then their surrounding levels:

-Can't Reach it don't need it
-Land of Rainbows and unicorns

I thought 3.1.1.1.1 was quite a bit easier than it's position.

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-Lixes in Motion: I'm surprised this is placed this late in the game. Seems easier than this.

I found others but most of them are pretty subjective and since I haven't solved a lot of other levels around there either it's not great to judge before solving them.

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-Conundrum: If you're okay with changing titles; I think "Get Behind me, Satan" is a more memorable one for this level.

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Replacing levels: I can't find the thread right now where Simon mentioned I offer my level "Oblique Strategy" to replace a level. In any case; changing my mind about that maybe since this one uses a trick that another level in here uses pretty obliquely, no pun intended.

These two levels by Pieuw; The Last Laugh and Erbalunga and "Division of Labor"; both of these were based on levels by Pieuw who I only was getting to know at the time and in hindsight I picked some of his least best levels to showcase here. He has *much* more impressive levels to choose from than these... I'll gladly make some replacements for these. Division of Labor is only loosely based on his level, I've altered it significantly, not sure I'm all that happy with it.

Babylon Fading:
Strongly in favor of replace this level, it has little to nothing unique about it or anything I'm very impressed with. It ended up being a filler level in my own pack.

EDIT: - this level too; 6 gaps, five builders-- isn't all that great imo, kind of obvious what needs to happen, even for a beginner level, I might see if I have a better replacement.

Soulful Bounding Leap:
same as above, but I don't feel as strongly. I'm pretty sure I can come up with something better than this.

Passing Engagement;

The Great Escape: another

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

builder trick

, maybe I can find something more outstanding. [this was by tseug that I remade]

I will look at my own levels and a few lying around or Pieuw's and others that we put in Revenge of the Lemmings for instance and if any of these can get removed I'll try to find a level of similar difficulty. There are a handful of levels I've played in the past couple of years that blew me away and I think really deserve to be showcased here.

[Simon]

Conundrum: Will rename to Get Behind Me, Satan (with this exact capitalization) for the next release. Will keep it at its place, Vicious 2. I'm well-used to the name Conundrum for it, but it was a generic name indeed.

Lixes in Motion: Hmm, I don't find this so easy, I think it's properly ranked in mid-Daunting. What do others think?

Happy to cut Last Laugh. We need a replacement level then. I'm happy to put in anything you supply, and we can reorder accordingly.

Soulful Bounding Leap: I like this, and it's surprisingly hard. I wasn't able to re-solve it. I'd keep it, it's a candidate for slight uprank even. Forestidia found it hard, too.

3.1.1.1 I haven't solved yet, can't give feedback yet. At least it looks reasonably easy, yes.

geoo's Derailed and BOGOF #2 need upranking.

-- Simon

[Forestidia86]

Regarding "The Last Laugh"... going into a spoiler tag since I don't know whether Simon has solved it:

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

I don't know what the original version of the level was like, but considering the Lix version on its own merits: the trick of using the jumper-climber to keep a lix busy is a nice linchpin that doesn't appear elsewhere, and is very well-hidden on this level, making it satisfying to solve. I would definitely argue for keeping it even if this solution is nothing like what was originally intended.

fair enough. If people really like this level that much, then leave it as is. I am a bit doubtful of this; Simon played the level on stream the other day

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

[and was on totally the wrong track, but seemed confident he could make it work; it was very fiddly, I don't like those kind of things in my levels.

but that may change when he solves it. IDK. I could make some alterations I suppose if that was appropriate but I don't feel like doing that in this case. Let's get some more input before making a final decision. I'll probably end up not doing anything with the level then.

I like The Last Laugh, too.

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

But the other exit is reachable, see attachment in this post

[mobius]

I'll think about fixing The Last Laugh

this is from that other thread;

I have solved: Oh No, Not Again.

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

My solution is very tight. I had the main idea relatively early but couldn't implement it until now. Could be a backroute though.

Edit Simon: I attached my solution too, this arose after massive counselling by Forestidia and is probably similar to hers.

Just thought I should point out that the original version (even with some modification to make it easier was the most hated level from feedback of ROTL. Several people gave the exact comment Foristidia does here and some even offered great disdain for the level. Obviously this version has differences but just putting that out there.

[Proxima]

You could fix The Last Laugh by moving the entire SE block, including the exit, 16 pixels right (all the way into the corner).

[mobius]

The Last Laugh; I made that fix. Also removed a basher.

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

Hopefully the other exit looks possible but not *too* possible.

I don't like the idea of people spending a ton of frustrating time getting very very close to a solution that's not right.

Also update for Cornerstone.

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

spoiler: the extra bashers can be used to stall and ease the timing. That could be intentional.

Some responses to Forestidia's replays:

Concerning "Stuff in the Way" (click to show/hide)

This is about managing the destructive as well as constructive skills and is in the end a timing issue. Saw the main problem rather fast, finding a solution for it lasted some time.

was that a yay or nay?

Your solution is close but misses one of the key elements of the solution. TBH; imo this level's solution is all about a tight time limit and precision and as such, not sure it really fits in the pack anymore. Don't know how to remove this backroute either.

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

[adding a trap at the spot where she goes doesn't fix it]

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reguarding: Five for Fighting... I'm debating altering this to enforce the solution to it's sister level, but that will make it harder(?) thus needing to be moved/upranked(?). RoundTheWheel liked this one a lot. (the harder version that is.)
<Forestidia commented on this level too but I lost the comment.>

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Theresa falls up the stairs: this level was plagued with backroutes.  @Simon have you solved it yet? Would you or anyone mind testing it sometime, I just have a feeling backroutes may remain. I have another level idea in mind which uses the same trick but looks quite a bit different, if the need be.

[Simon]

I haven't solved Theresa yet. Who else has?

Earmarked your Cornerstone and Last Laugh for Lix 0.10.2. Thanks!

-- Simon

[mobius]

Weeble solved Theresa intended. I guess I won't worry too much about it.

Some questions/suggestions regarding some random levels:
feel free to disagree, these are only minor adjustments based on feedback/watching replays and stuff.

-does "Hard to Port" feel tedious? 30 climbers is kind of a lot. I could try making everything a bit smaller and reduce lix count to cut back the tedium???

-I hadn't noticed the changes to "Path to Mahiman" until now, really nice!  It's much better puzzle now. Suggestion: change title to "The Lixyrinth" (Lemmyrinth was the original title, I don't know why I wanted to change that honestly. Another one of those dumb decisions I made...

-Regarding Gr8 Escape: Weeble had quite a time playing this level, maybe we should keep this one?
My thinking for removal was; Gr8 Escape is a challenging level no doubt. But I am bit surprised people have a real hard time with it nowawadays. Really

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

there's one baisc trick and once you see that/if you know it the levels not bad at all.

Where as I think Shvegait's level is of similar nature but less "trick" and more some logical pathing necessary.

-Narbacular Drop; added an unnecessary runner to ease timing, would this add a backroute? I doubt it; decoration embellished a bit. No change to the solution.

-tiny backroute fix for Tinker Tailor Soldier Lix, found by weeble I think

[Simon]

Earmarked Tinker Tailor and Narbacular Drop for 0.10.2. Thanks for re-covering the backroute fix!

Hard to Port: If we want to ease execution, my first hunch is to reduce lix and widen the spawn interval. But a second interesting idea might be to lengthen the starting platform: When only 3 lix fit on it, you'll have to return every 3 spawns to assign climbers, whereas when ~8 lix fit on it, you can assign 7 climbers while paused, then return to the main work for a longer while.

Path to Mahiman: Yes, wonderful puzzle. The renaming feels ad-hoc, let's sleep over it. If you'd still like to rename it in a few days, we can do it. Probably won't make it into 0.10.2 anymore then, but I'm open to do it afterwards.

-- Simon

[Simon]

mobius replied to my previous post with:

Hard to Port
Path to Mahiman

The more I think about it the less I feel like doing so I'll likely *not* go ahead on this and some of my other suggestions. I'll just try to cover the most glaring issues.

All right, sounds good with me.

Let's keep this topic for backroute fixes only. I've split the considerations for full level outtakes/replacements off into Lemforum outtakes/replacements, 0.10.x .

-- Simon

[mobius]

nice. I was actually going to suggest we make a new topic to keep it more organized.

And instead of just dumping levels in the topic I will actually try to find an appropriate replacement for whatever level I suggest for removal.

[mobius]

fix for Five for Fighting,
Forestidia's comment was this seemed easy for its position, maybe now it will feel right. This was, in fact, my original intention for the level but at the time it was backrouted and I didn't feel like or didn't see a way to fix it. As she pointed out I have since done so with my NeoLemmix version, see if this holds up.

I have more comments to go through at some point but I don't expect there to be many more requests or changes.

[Simon]

Thanks! geoo's Five for Fighting replay from 2017 fails for your fix. Please re-cover your fixed version with the intended route.

I'm getting 0.10.2 ready to publish. If I don't get your cover in time,

I've just published 0.10.2. Your backroute fix will simply go into 0.10.3 as soon as it's covered. Given all the busywork around lemforum, that won't be a long delay.

-- Simon

[mobius]

sorry for forgetting to upload the replay with it.

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

runners are not needed but there to make timing easier. Hopefully this doesn't allow backroutes.

some comments after watching Raymond's replay:

He solved Soulful Bounding Leap kind of weirdly but I don't mind this. I can't even remember exactly what the intended solution was but it's fine. I'm more concerned if it felt fiddly or annoying. And the fact that when he was trying to jump on top of the blocker; it looked like it should've worked several times when it didn't. Don't really understand that. [this isn't a problem with this level per say, but how jumpers or blockers work???]

regarding some other levels like Slipping which has come up a bunch lately; I'm okay with multiple solutions here; still looks good to me.

[Simon]

Thanks, yes, your replay solves it. I've earmarked Five for Fighting for 0.10.3.

Soulful Bounding Leap can lead to precision with jumping onto blockers. See the attached replay for a solution that uses only 1 out of the 4 jumpers. It feels like a backroute. The jumper/blocker physics of course are up for discussion, I have no good offer even for what should theoretically happen.

-- Simon