[SUG] New skill - Runner [Shelved until further notice]

[WillLem]

From this topic:

The Runner: It already exists in Lix, and the only reason it doesn’t in NeoLemmix is that it tends to add execution difficulty where the NeoLemmix player wants none. For SuperLemmix, though? It seems tailor-made!
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should be comparatively easy to implement

Having one lemming run ahead to perform skills seems great. And having a runner perform a higher jump would replace
the vaulter for sure.

[WillLem]

I agree that this one's a no-brainer for SuperLemmix. The Runner would be a bit more of a challenge to code than you might think, though.

For one thing, even before delving into the code, we have the question of which skills ought to be affected by its speed, and how so? Jumpers are obvious, but what about Climbers? Swimmers? Even Gliders might be affected.

A Jump would likely become a "Super-Jump", like in Lix, with the lem balling up like Sonic The Hedgehog and covering a greater range (this state could also be employed for the Trampolene object as well).

Support for this idea? Thoughts? Suggestions?

[Strato Incendus]

Before we wonder what other skills should be affected by the Runner: Didn’t you already implement a Superlemming mode?
Sure, that speeds up the entire game, including the time counter, rather than accelerating an individual lemming relative to the speed of everything else. But Superlemming certainly has the property of affecting every skill execution. I’m not sure whether that should be the case for the Runner.

What would make sense to me are the following interactions:
- Runner + Jumper = wider jump
- Runner + Spearer = wider throw
- Runner + Grenader = wider throw

The latter two alone make the Runner a lot more valuable in SuperLemmix than it ever would have been in NeoLemmix!
Unless of course if NeoLemmix had retained the Spearer and Grenader, too.

With Shimmiers and Walkers, I’m already on the fence about whether these should be sped up by Runners.
Same for Swimmers, Climbers, Floaters, and Gliders.
The reason being that all of these motions cannot be carried out concurrently with running.
Nor can any of the destructive skills.

Perhaps there is potential in making a running Builder or Platformer lay his bricks faster.
However, since one version of New Formats NeoLemmix, the Platformer has been using a novel sprite (compared to the old one, which was identical to that of the Builder), for which he actively kneels down to lay the bricks. So the Platformer makes less sense as an interaction with the Runner. A running Builder could be more easily imagined dropping the bricks behind himself as he charges forward.

But from a game-mechanics perspective, if either the Builder or the Platformer are accelerated by the Runner, then both of them should be.
By extension, the same thing would apply to the Stacker, though — and this makes even less sense to me, flavour-wise, since the lemming has to come to a standstill to stack, and is therefore by definition not running at this point.

Hence, the Runner as a permanent skill would usually be a state lemmings transition back into, once they’re done performing other tasks.
At least that’s the way it works in Lemmings 2: The Tribes, if I remember correctly?



PS: One noteworthy idea: What happens when you assign a Laserer to a Runner? Will it still stop while shooting?
If not, the Runner could be used to blast away a wider tunnel with the laser beam than usual.

[Floyd Brannon]

I like the runner. I was trying to keep my faves down to 3, but this is at least top 4 for me.

[WillLem]

Superlemming certainly has the property of affecting every skill execution. I’m not sure whether that should be the case for the Runner.

Superlemming mode and the Runner skill would be two totally separate, different things which depend on different mechanics. The Runner wouldn't so much be a "sped up lem" as a singular action which has a greater range of movement over a shorter number of physics updates. By contrast, the physics updates themselves are made to happen at a faster rate (3x, to be exact) in Superlemming mode.

What this means is that every one of it's interactions with any other lemming state may (or may not) need to be individually modified, hence the need for some decisions around it.

With ... Walkers, I’m already on the fence about whether these should be sped up by Runners.

Maybe I've misunderstood here. The Walker state itself would be replaced by the Runner. I imagine that assigning a Walker to a Runner would cancel the running state.

Hence, the Runner as a permanent skill would usually be a state lemmings transition back into, once they’re done performing other tasks.
At least that’s the way it works in Lemmings 2: The Tribes, if I remember correctly?

I don't think Runner should be permanent. Perhaps semi-permanent, cancellable with a Walker, makes most sense?

But yes, L2 does indeed maintain the running state between other normal-speed actions. From very quick testing, the only state that appears to be directly affected by running is jumping!

If anyone plays more L2 than me and happens to have knowledge of exactly which other skills/states are affected by the Runner, this would help massively! Also, it would be interesting to know which states are affected in Lix.

Ultimately, we need a list of all interactions, whether we want each to be affected by the Runner, and if so then how.

[Proxima]

I don't think Runner should be permanent. Perhaps semi-permanent, cancellable with a Walker, makes most sense?

It would still be a "permanent skill" in the Lemmings sense: gives the lemming the ability to perform an action rather than the skill and action being the same thing; the lemming retains that ability even when not currently performing the action; a lemming can have multiple permanent skills but only one non-permanent skill at a time.

Or when you say "I don't think Runner should be permanent", do you mean something other than making it cancellable? This is not clear.

[Floyd Brannon]

I recommend to have the runner only replace the walker skill. Then extend that to jumper only.
Keep it permanent until the lemming enters the exit. I wouldn't recommend doing anything else faster. His name only implies that he runs, not that he lays bricks and can hurl a spear to the moon.

I think the runner is usable enough if it can run ahead and maybe jump farther.

[WillLem]

when you say "I don't think Runner should be permanent", do you mean something other than making it cancellable?

You understood right, I mainly mean in the sense that the skill is cancellable. It feels right that assigning a Walker to a Runner ought to cancel the running ability.

Having said that, we then don't have a way to turn a Runner around... hmm. Maybe it should be a permanent skill, then, like in Lix. @Lix users - does this generally work well as a game mechanic? The Lix Walker seems to be explicitly a "turning" skill, then. Maybe it makes more sense to refer to the Walker skill as the "Turner" - and, from that point of view, it definitely should also turn Swimmers, possibly even Builders, and maybe even midair Gliders...

I wouldn't recommend doing anything else faster. His name only implies that he runs, not that he lays bricks and can hurl a spear to the moon. I think the runner is usable enough if it can run ahead and maybe jump farther.

Yes, agreed. Simplicity is also a goal here, so maybe walking and jumping ought to be the only actions affected by the Runner skill (if implemented).

[Strato Incendus]

Having said that, we then don't have a way to turn a Runner around... hmm. Maybe it should be a permanent skill, then, like in Lix. @Lix users - does this generally work well as a game mechanic? The Lix Walker seems to be explicitly a "turning" skill, then. Maybe it makes more sense to refer to the Walker skill as the "Turner" - and, from that point of view, it definitely should also turn Swimmers, possibly even Builders, and maybe even midair Gliders...

I’m always gonna call a loud “stop!” whenever propositions come up to fundamentally change the behaviour of any long-established skill.

The Walker also can’t turn Shimmiers around — it cancels them. If you want to turn the lemming around again afterwards, assign another Walker.
Your “non-permanent” version of the Runner would essentially be closest to the Shimmier, as far as I can tell: A movement skill that can be performed for one iteration, until the requirement is no longer fulfilled, and/or the lemming is assigned another skill. This distinguishes the Shimmier and Runner from the Swimmer, which, much like Climber or Floater, is a permanent skill that the lemming reassumes whenever the requirement is met (a vertical wall / falling / being in water).

Aside from assigning two Walkers to a Runner to turn him around, obviously you could turn around a Runner by having him run into a Blocker.

But generally speaking, the question of how to turn a lemming around just one more time is one of the primary ways that difficult puzzles use to make themselves more challenging. :PWhich is why you typically won’t see a lot of Walkers in the level packs with higher difficulty, since the turning-around function is often more powerful than the cancelling function. Builders, Bashers etc. can all cancel other skills in various ways, but they can’t just turn around a lemming anywhere in the level: Bashers need to hit steel, Builders need to build into terrain. The Walker can turn lemmings without any external requirements.

Hence, I don’t think the Walker should be powered up in that regard even further.

Especially when it comes to the idea of renaming the Walker into a “Turner”: The Turner is already a skill in L3D. And it functions more like a Blocker. So guess what the primary way of turning other lemmings around has always been? A Blocker.

And as someone who notoriously struggles finding the solution when lots of Blockers are involved (in non-conventional ways), I’d say they provide the far more interesting challenge, in terms of how to turn lemmings around, than to just provide the player with some overpowered Walkers.



PS: You’re right that I wasn’t thinking properly when talking about the Runner “speeding up Walkers” .
PPS: I finally feel compelled to dredge this excerpt from a post of mine in the “joke skills” thread, now that we’re seriously discussing the potential introduction of the Runner:

The Skateboarder.

This one is inspired by Speedy Eggbert (the game which Jaimie's Techno and House tileset are taken from): The lemming gets on top of a skateboard, putting him at a slightly higher position than regular Walkers, as well as moving slightly faster. He can thus get over trigger areas of traps (or buttons you don't want to push yet, teleporters or splitters you want to avoid, etc.) that regular Walkers would walk into. In contrast to the Shimmier, he doesn't require a ceiling above his head to do this, plus he can be assigned more skills (Shimmiers can only be assigned the same skills as Fallers or Swimmers). For example, he could start bashing or fencing while still standing on his skateboard, creating a tunnel only he can reach (if the skateboard places him higher than 6 pixels above the ground; otherwise, he could get over traps and still create a tunnel accessible to regular Walkers). Admittedly, this might be difficult, because the assignment of the Basher or Fencer would stop him from being a Skateborder, therefore falling down.

What would definitely work though would be assigning a Builder or Platformer to a Skateborder, since those skills don't actually require terrain beneath the lemming's feet. He could thus start building or platforming in what would be mid-air for all the other lemmings, which can be a great way to isolate him from the crowd!

Also, most prominently, you could assign a Jumper to a Skateboarder, who would consequently jump a little further than regular Jumpers.
In contrast to Speedy Eggbert, the Skateboarder would only bypass traps by not even hitting them in the first place; if Speedy Eggbert hits a (one-use) trap in his game, those get destroyed instead, while Eggbert remains on the skateboard and survives.
All in all, this skill would have all the properties of the Runner (increased moving speed + wider jumps), while still offering some additional applications.

So if anyone ever seriously contemplates adding the Runner to NeoLemmix, maybe consider the Skateboarder first...

[WillLem]

I’m always gonna call a loud “stop!” whenever propositions come up to fundamentally change the behaviour of any long-established skill.

Yes, rightly so. I've addressed this here. Also see the Upcoming Features topic for SuperLemmix, which comprises all proposed features and accepted suggestions.

With that stated clearly, we can surely get back to discussing things without concern that anything I randomly say during a theoretical discussion ought to be taken as a proposed change (unless I explicitly state that this is the case)!


From what you've said, I understand that you're more interested in the idea of having to figure out how to turn a lem, so we don't want the Walker to be a generic "Turner". I definitely agree there, but had to ask the question because it just seemed to be presenting itself via the current discussion re: the Runner.

To re-focus things, then, I need to be entirely clear on which people prefer here, out of these two options:

1) Assigning a Walker to a Runner cancels the running behaviour and returns the lem to a normal walking lem, without turning them around (semi-permanent Runner)
2) Assigning a Walker to a Runner turns the lem around, and the lem then continues with the running behaviour (permanent Runner)

The Skateboarder.
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at a slightly higher position than regular Walkers, as well as moving slightly faster. He can thus get over trigger areas

This obviously depends on how tall the trigger area is. A skateboard probably shouldn't be any higher than about 4px (3 for the wheels, 1 for the board). We can probably get away with setting the lem's foot position a bit higher whilst they're a skateboarder, but not too much so or it might start making things very wonky!

What would definitely work though would be assigning a Builder or Platformer to a Skateborder, since those skills don't actually require terrain beneath the lemming's feet. He could thus start building or platforming in what would be mid-air for all the other lemmings, which can be a great way to isolate him from the crowd!

Haha, this is a neat idea. He'd have to leave the skateboard behind, though, surely - maybe it could evaporate

[Simon]

Next fork in the design: L2 runners have forward momentum when they fall off ledges. Effectively, they jump. Kieran used that to create courses for runners that walkers couldn't traverse.

Lix runners don't have that forward momentum. Hard to say what's the better design. I believe I've grown a soft spot for the forward hop in the past years.

This design decision is orthogonal to the skill permanence (all 2x2 designs are possible).

-- Simon

[jkapp76]

Here my video of the Lemmings 2 runner.

His body is at a nice running angle.

[WillLem]

Next fork in the design: L2 runners have forward momentum when they fall off ledges. Effectively, they jump. Kieran used that to create courses for runners that walkers couldn't traverse

We could merge this idea with Strato's Skateboarder idea, and create The Hoverboarder.

This lem drifts along at twice the speed of a regular lem, and slightly higher so it can potentially traverse trap triggers. It could also traverse Water, removing the need for the proposed Surfer skill.

When reaching a wall, the Hoverboarder could either turn around and continue, or the board could become a terrain piece, and the lem is no longer a Hoverboarder. I probably prefer the former.

When reaching a cliff/edge, the Hoverboarder continues at the same speed and trajectory, but begins to descend - the arc is probably steeper than a Glider, so we get Simon's L2 "hop". If the lem is a Glider, then... well, I'm not sure tbh. Thoughts?

Maybe certain actions ought not to be possible whilst Hoverboarding, since it seems like quite an overpowered skill so far. Jumping, we take for granted, Shimmying could detach the lem from the board - it continues on its trajectory to become a terrain piece (if we like the "can also be terrain" idea, that is. I'm not sure if I do at the moment). Floating, Swimming, Disarming, Sliding and potentially Climbing are all bypassed.

The explosion-based skills are all as-is. Destructive skills probably shouldn't be possible, and neither should constructive skills. This is, of course, very debatable.

Walker feels like it should either cancel the Hoverboard state, turn them around, or do nothing (Walkers don't have to have a function - Swimmer, Climber, Slider, Floater and Glider currently don't respond, so why should the Hoverboarder?).

I've updated the title because I currently much prefer this idea to a standard "Runner", but of course it can change back at any time. This is one we probably need to discuss significantly, since there are a lot of potential complications when it comes to behaviour and skill interaction.

Feedback very welcome.

[Strato Incendus]

We could merge this idea with Strato's Skateboarder idea, and create The Hoverboarder.

This lem drifts along at twice the speed of a regular lem, and slightly higher so it can potentially traverse trap triggers. It could also traverse Water, removing the need for the proposed Surfer skill.

Believe it or not, these were exactly the thoughts going through my head recently, too!

The Hoverboarder originally came from the Spearer, whereas the Skateboarder came from the Runner, and the Surfer from the Swimmer.
But the similarities are obviously similar, just like with the various Pourer skills, where we also agreed we might at best need one of them that accomplishes all of these purposes.

The flipside of that, of course, is that it goes against the principle "a skill always does one thing" that we recently discussed with regards to the Walker?
Since the Walker does two things: cancelling skills and turning lemmings around, depending on context.



Now, of course, the speed of the Hoverboarder could be seen as a secondary trait - much like the Basher, Miner etc. also have different speeds at which they move, while their main purpose is something else. In the Hoverboarder's case, the main purpose would probably be the "lifting it slightly off the ground" part?

This would probably also eliminate the need for a "horizontal flier" skill, as we considered it for the Magic Carpet / Jet Pack / Hang Glider etc.

Maybe certain actions ought not to be possible whilst Hoverboarding, since it seems like quite an overpowered skill so far. Jumping, we take for granted, Shimmying could detach the lem from the board - it continues on its trajectory to become a terrain piece (if we like the "can also be terrain" idea, that is. I'm not sure if I do at the moment). Floating, Swimming, Disarming, Sliding and potentially Climbing are all bypassed.

In my quote about the Skateboarder, I proposed that it might be possible to build / platform / stack while standing on the board.
Builders and Platformers don't require terrain under their feet to begin with, which normally doesn't make sense flavour-wise.

With the hoverboard, however, it actually would make sense, since the lemming does have something to stand on.
So it would be weird if, in the one instance where the lemming does have a board under his feet while being in mid-air, that he would suddenly no longer be able to build / platform / stack. ^^

This would also be an interesting way of creating terrain in mid-air, without always having to resort to the Freezer.

[WillLem]

the speed of the Hoverboarder could be seen as a secondary trait - much like the Basher, Miner etc. also have different speeds at which they move, while their main purpose is something else. In the Hoverboarder's case, the main purpose would probably be the "lifting it slightly off the ground" part?

The "slightly off ground" feature definitely fixes this as a worthwhile skill, since it's completely unique in that regard. The idea that it can bypass triggers (we'll make sure of that in the code rather than relying on the actual sizes of the triggers themselves), cross water, and (probably) ascend a 7px wall make it a good way to get a worker around a level quickly.

We do need an answer to the "should the Hoverboard itself be terrain?" question. I'd probably rather not, so any "Hoverboard becomes Spearer" interactions can probably be ruled out in favour of the Hoverboard instead trying to ascend, and turning around if it fails. Movement seems the better way to go with this, particularly since it's being considered as a Runner alternative.

This would probably also eliminate the need for a "horizontal flier" skill, as we considered it for the Magic Carpet / Jet Pack / Hang Glider etc.

And the Surfer, which probably won't be happening anyway; I'd rather upgrade the Swimmer instead, and look to the Hoverboarder as a "can cross water" skill.

It becomes even more important then, whether this skill is permanent (always applies once assigned), semi-permanent (applies until cancelled by user input), non-permanent (applies until cancelled by a game mechanic beyond the user's control) or single-use (applies for a set duration/length).

I'm probably more in favour of semi-permanent or non-permanent for the Hoverboarder, and semi-permanent for the Runner (it definitely feels like a Walker should cancel a Runner, not turn them).

Builders and Platformers don't require terrain under their feet to begin with, which normally doesn't make sense flavour-wise.

With the hoverboard, however, it actually would make sense, since the lemming does have something to stand on

I agree for the most part, but if we allow construction skills then it feels wierd to disallow destruction skills, all of which would make much less sense with a Hoverboarder. What do others think about this?