Level Solving Contest #4

[Crane]

Welcome to the 4th instalment of this contest.  This is the first contest that I've hosted, so go easy on me.

This one is unfortunately NeoLemmix only, and uses an existing level.  I just had to wait until the end of the Level of the Year contest or at least until the level was eliminated, so as to not influence the vote.  The level in question is "It's Lemmings, Doofus!", and the challenge, should you choose to accept, is to solve it using as few different types of skill as possible - e.g. solving it with 5 Bashers counts as 1 type, but solving it with 2 Bashers and 1 Miner counts as 2 types, so scores lower.  If there's a tie, the secondary category is highest number of Lemmings saved, and if that is also tied, then the tertiary category is the lowest number of skills used overall.  Winner gets to host the next contest, or nominate another to run it.

Submit replays via PM.  Deadline for solutions is 8th June 2019, 11:59pm.  In case Colorful Arty releases a new version of the level, find attached the version that will be used for this contest.

So to reiterate, judgment is based on categories in the following order:

• Primary: Fewest types of skill used
• Secondary: Most Lemmings saved
• Tertiary: Fewest skills used overall

Good luck, have fun!

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Submissions so far:

• Forestidia / Simon (joint effort)
• Minim

[Minim]

Well, I just played it and solved it today but not optimised my solution of course. Here are my first thoughts on the level.

Wow, you picked a really long and hard level here! Considering the length it's making me wonder if we should add another criterion for those players who've tried but can't quite make it. I call it the "distance from entrance" and I will talk this through on a separate topic.

Edit: Great job spicing up the competition by adding a new criterion to the contest and setting that as primary. It's about time we had a new challenge.

[Crane]

You're welcome. I figured I needed something new and much harder to optimise. With most Lemmings saved, I was able to get 99% with every attempt at getting 100% failing, and I figured most people would get this score, while with fewest skills used, the minimum target is too loose for it to be practical.

[Minim]

I might also mention this: I found out on the editor that this level is accompanied by the music track "dos mashup 1", which I can't find the download for. Does anyone know where that is? Looking forward to hearing that instead of "Doggie in the window".

[SQron188]

I might also mention this: I found out on the editor that this level is accompanied by the music track "dos mashup 1", which I can't find the download for. Does anyone know where that is? Looking forward to hearing that instead of "Doggie in the window".

in here

[Crane]

Only 3 days left.  Get those replays in!

[Simon]

Hi Crane, how are the results?

If you're super busy, I'll offer that you PM me the replays, and I'll evaluate for you.

-- Simon

[Crane]

I got the results collated on my laptop. Will post them later today.

[Crane]

Only two entries, which is a bit disappointing, but here are the final results:

Name	Types of Tool Used	| Lemmings Saved |	Total Tools Used
Simon / Forestida (joint effort)	5	95	37
Minim	5	95	40

It was pretty close, but Simon / Forestida edge out on doing it with 3 fewer tools!

I found a solution that uses 5 types of tools but saves 96 lemmings, but since I ran the competition and saw all the replays, it would be a bit unfair to include my own entry - I'll attach the replay though.  A 4-type solution proved elusive though and is probably impossible.

Thank you every for participating.  Simon / Forestida, you can run the next competition!

[ccexplore]

Sorry to see so few submissions , I guess everyone's too busy/distracted over past 2 months?  Maybe it's a sign to pause this for a little bit until we receive signals of renewed interest.  Either that or we need to stick to shorter levels or something.

[Minim]

Well, good game, Simon. I've been on 94 lemmings for a long while but when I got to 95, I was so pleased I stopped.

I enjoyed everyone else's replays. Crane's one pretty much combines the best bits between Simon's solution and mine.

With a game that's not so popular these days, I'm not surprised that we saw only two entries. I agree that we should pause this, or try a different approach: PM other people for a private duel contest?

[Simon]

Thanks for the contest! We had a good back and forth of ideas.

Minim's holding pit at the hatch was expensive. Compared to me, Crane replaced an exploder with a miner and thus saved an extra lem.

After the beginning, the solutions are conceptually near-identical. Every player mines over the gallow traps and needs no builders here. In the middle, all players choose the lower route, I'm not even sure whether the top route works, at least it shouldn't work when we constrain ourselves to 5 skill types.

The map seems designed to be nontrivial even with all 8 skill types. Thus, when we artificially restrict this to 5 skill types, the map lacks scope for wiggling and smart skill saving in the second half.

-- Simon

[Crane]

It's hard to realise this when one first sets the challenge.  Even designing a level specially for such a competition can be difficult if the level designer has an idea behind how they want the level to be completed.  It does make for an interesting experiment though.

[Simon]

It's hard to realise this when one first sets the challenge.

No problem, the optimization was a good grind nonetheless.

I won't host a contest anytime soon. Minim, feel free to host one! Or call open floor.

-- Simon

[Minim]

No problem, Simon. I'm calling for the open floor here. However, if I do happen to think of something I'll let everyone know. Attention seems to be turning to 3D Lemmings at the moment.