[SUG][PLAYER] Fix misleading traps!

[namida]

All looks good to me. A related thought that came up on Discord is whether the falling rock trap should retain the few pixels at the bottom. Between the secondary animation, clear physics mode, and (editor-side) ability to view trigger areas, it seems unnecessary now - I suspect it was originally there to assist level designers with placing the trap.

While this is a purely visual change so not as big a deal to get finalized ASAP, it would be nicer to include it in the same set of changes instead of a separate change later.

Regarding how far to move the rope trap, I'll need to examine it in-game a bit and see how I feel.

[IchoTolot]

I now think that only two trigger areas need changing: the "ghostbuster" trap in the crystal style (which should be moved down 1 pixel), and the rope trap in the pillar style (which should be moved down 2, or maybe 1 -- and maybe also shrunk a bit).

I would agree moving the rope trap by 1 pixel, but not shrink it. For the 2 pixel difference variant I would move it by 1 and extend by another 1. As 6-7 pixels I would still call reasonable.

For the ghostbuster trap I would still tend to extend by 1 rather than to move by 1.

[Simon]

plate for the marble squasher trap is 3 pixels tall;
[plate] for the 10-ton weight is 4 tall.
if the entire plate is above ground, it looks as if the lemmings are walking past it and it should be safe.
Simon and others supported my original proposal, I wonder what they think about these traps in particular.

I'm fine with Proxima's adjustment. I have no strong opinion on trigger areas of plate traps.

Reason: The plate is peaceful by itself. Only when the deadly part of the trap sits on the ground, it should be deadly. But all plate traps have the deadly part hovering in the air.

Instead, in our world where a trap is entirely nonsolid, I consider the thick plate a design problem, and no trigger area would be unarguably good for them. The 10-ton weight in L1 in (Watch Out, There's Traps About) is foreground with hidden terrain behind. The trap looks good like that, but it can't be reasonable to always require hidden terrain with such traps.

In another world, the plate would be earth or steel, not part of the nonsolid trap, but plate and trap together are still a single tile. Such half-terrain-half-trap tiles are impossible in NL, and they would only be useful for these plate traps. Merely an interesting idea for the backburner.

-- Simon

[Simon]

Proxima's image of the 10-ton weight in reply #29 is inconsistent with Proxima's quote from reply #29:

these traps should be left as they are, which means that if the top 2 pixels of the plate are above ground, the lemming will step on it. As I said earlier, that's consistent with the height of the middle part of the "ghostbuster" trap (and also the bottom platform of the wheel).

I recommend that the quote be correct, and that the 10-ton weight/plate may (be raised by 1 pixel and be deadly), but may not (be raised by 2 pixels and still be deadly).



The fire pit (top right in Proxima's image in reply #29), does it come with its own floor? When that own floor is visible by 2 pixels of its thickness (instead of buried in the ground as it is in that image), will the fire pit be peaceful?

-- Simon

[Proxima]

Proxima's image of the 10-ton weight in reply #29 is inconsistent with Proxima's quote from reply #29:

That's because this object's placeholder secondary animation has the plate bobbing up and down, and I happened to screenshot on a frame when it was in between. I don't know if this animation will be kept in the long run.

The fire pit (top right in Proxima's image in reply #29), does it come with its own floor? When that own floor is visible by 2 pixels of its thickness (instead of buried in the ground as it is in that image), will the fire pit be peaceful?

Yes, the fire pit has a 2-thick supporting bar at the bottom as well as at the sides. On the original levels (e.g. Fun 18) this bar is always buried. I'm not entirely sure how I feel about this one.

[mobius]

this isn't about traps but it's a related issue;

I've always disliked the way the button trigger area is located. You can see in this picture what my issue is:

the button must be almost totally buried in order for it to work because the trigger area is high. I get it theory that the lemming has to press the top of the button but then why have the lower part of the button at all? Because if you put buttons on a piece of thin terrain then it'll look weird because most of it is sticking out underneath. I say either move the trigger area or make the whole button graphic smaller.

[namida]

Yes, let's give consideration to all objects in official styles (ie: "orig_*****", "ohno_*****", "default" and "xmas").

[IchoTolot]

I would agree with mobius on the botton there and would propose extending the buttons trigger by ~2 in the downwards direction.

[namida]

Okay so - I didn't look over the topic again, but the changes I've got so far are:
- orig_crystal:trap_03
- orig_pillar:rope_trap

In both of these cases, I've moved the trigger area downwards by 1 pixel. I have not yet fully tested what impact this has on existing content.

I see another change is default:button, with the suggestion to increase the height of the trigger area by 2. Any objections to this?

Any other changes that need to be made?

[namida]

I've implemented the change to default:button. (This change, as well as the others in this topic, will come with V12.7.0, not with the next routine styles update.)

I'm not really looking through these much myself at the moment (I'm focusing on other things), so I'm relying on you guys to let me know if there's any others that need to be changed - so please, take the time to check, especially if this is particularly of interest to you.

[namida]

I've had a look over the remaining objects, and it mostly looks good to me.

The other objects maybe of concern are the splitters in the Brick and Bubble styles (should the trigger area cover more vertical area?) and the unlock button in the Bubble style (I think this one should be moved downwards a bit, maybe?).

Ideally, I'd like for discussions / etc on this to be wrapped up by the time V12.7.0 RC is released (sometime early-to-mid next month), and there will be no further physics changes to any existing objects in the official styles once V12.7.0 stable is released (except to fix mistakes, if any are made with the update) - so this is very much a "speak now or forever hold your peace" situation if you think anything needs further changes.

[Proxima]

I think the other thing that needs deciding is the question Simon raised about the fire pit object:



At the moment, the bottom supporting bar needs to be buried for the fire pit to be deadly. Does that make sense or should we change it?

I don't have a very strong opinion on this one. The bar looks so similar to terrain that if it's not buried, it looks like the object is raised above where the lemmings are walking. Then again, it makes sense to take damage from being that close to fire!

[namida]

If we look at the original game, in almost all use cases of this object, it's buried in terrain. Usually, this terrain goes far enough that it fills in the gaps between the bottom of the object and the flames, even.

The only exceptions I can find are:
- Mayhem 2. In this case, the flames are used in a similar manner to water along the bottom of the level, and have no terrain under them in the first place - though they are placed high enough that their trigger area does not reach to the bottom of the level.
- Sunsoft 22. This isn't a true exception as such, but rather, two fire objects are placed above the terrain, with extra terrain in turn placed along the bottom of the fire objects. There's a third fire object that's directly buried in normal terrain.

(This includes Budget Amiga and Genesis levels. It does not include the PSP levels, as these were fan-remade by hand, so are not useful information here.)

Basically, the official games always bury it - of the above exceptions, one isn't really an exception as much as a "this could look like an exception if you don't look closely" case, and the other is a very unusual use case. Now of course - that doesn't necesserially outright serve as a reason to keep things as-is (after all - maybe they're like this *because* of the trigger area, although I'd have to wonder - at least for DOS / Amiga - why they didn't change the trigger area instead of designing around it, unless this was intentional), it's just a point to consider.

[IchoTolot]

The fire pit only has a deadly flame while the pit edges are not deadly.

I think you can be tricked both ways here:

- Why did the non burning edges kill me? (if we change it)

- Why can I walk under the pit? (if we don't change it)

As both ways have the chance to be misleading, I would vote for no change as people are more likely to have encountered this already in NL or the original game and therefore the to be tricked part is a bit less.

Furthermore, in the case of under the pit walking, I would consider it to be more expected by players as it is common knowledge that lemmings can squeeze through 1 pixel horizontal lines inside the terrain, therefore squeezing under the pit becomes more likely.

At last, I think in terms of fire objects I think a smaller more forgiving trigger area is better. Why?
I would assume players get angrier if their lemmings die unexpected and less angry if they survive, especially if surviving leads to an unexpected solving of the level. Of course an unexpected way can also be irritating and hide a solution, but then this also implies that there was really bad level desgin at work here and the level creater should make things 100% clear anway.

[Proxima]

- Why can I walk under the pit? (if we don't change it)

Furthermore, in the case of under the pit walking, I would consider it to be more expected by players as it is common knowledge that lemmings can squeeze through 1 pixel horizontal lines inside the terrain, therefore squeezing under the pit becomes more likely.

I don't agree with this. If the fire object were raised so there's a 1-pixel gap between the supporting bar and the terrain, then yes, players who have observed lemmings squeezing through 1-pixel gaps might expect to get through. But that argument doesn't apply when there's no gap. I would consider it very bad design if a level used a fire object perched on terrain, like the lower-right object in my picture, and expected the player to guess that it's safe for lemmings.

In fact, because of your argument against changing this object, I'm now much more convinced that we should change it