Week of June 16th: Teaching All the Players

[Shvegait]

For anyone who was brainstorming for last week and didn't make anything, your efforts will not go to waste. Implement it for this week! This contest is in some ways an extension of the first.

Design a small level that teaches all four players how a certain puzzle element works.

Due Date: June 22th, 5pm CDT (6pm EDT, 10pm GMT)
Mail Entry To: clantdg@gmail.com

Requirements:
- Design a new reusable puzzle element and create a small level demonstrating it.*
- The level must require 4 delvers to pass.
- In order for the level to be beaten, all players must understand how the element works.

*If you wish, you may use an existing puzzle element as the one you are teaching the players, instead of creating a new one.

Other puzzle elements can of course be used. Only the element being showcased needs to be fully understood by all players.

Bonus points for involving all players in a creative way. Try to follow the models used in the base map to ease merging. Good luck!

Attached is the latest version of the base map.

[Sabertooth_X]

Awesome, Shve. Started brainstorming already.

[Antistone]

A philosophical issue has occurred to me.

The way the map's currently implemented, technically, spirits return to the living world by dying. The only way to "die" in the spirit world in any of the existing levels is to walk up to a necromancer and "beg for life," but the only reason you can't put a broadsword into a shifter and let spirits start using it to return to life is that none of the existing levels happens to give anyone access to a broadsword and a shifter at the same time (the second demo level appears to do this, but the shifter in question is actually owned by neutral passive instead of allies-of-the-light, so it's not usable).

So, do we want to preserve the illusion that the spirit world is "death" and avoid letting anything in that looks like it kills a spirit (e.g. no deadly monsters in the spirit world), or do we want to embrace the concept that dying twice equals living again and decide that spirits throwing themselves on swords to return to life is OK?

[Sabertooth_X]

A trigger that detects suicide items and keeps them out of the spirit world can probably be implemented towards the end or something. Or just make the tooltip for the item say "This only works in the corporeal world" or something, and when it's used nothing happens.

EDIT: Oh, i never finished haha.
Yea I guess it's up to YOU (the mapmaker) to decide on a philosophical issue like that. I mean from my point of view I don't care.

[Shvegait]

I don't think dying in the spirit world causing you to live again makes any sense. I think it's fine to have other ways of returning to the living world besides the Necromancer, but not a broadsword...

[Antistone]

In that case, I guess map-makers have to be careful of that issue.

It might be possible to use unit classifications and "targets allowed" to make certain items (like the broadsword) unusable by spirits, even if they get them. Perhaps something involving the "suicidal" classification...

[thelosthero]

In that case, I guess map-makers have to be careful of that issue.

It might be possible to use unit classifications and "targets allowed" to make certain items (like the broadsword) unusable by spirits, even if they get them. Perhaps something involving the "suicidal" classification...

I like that idea.

Dying in the spirit world can allow some elements of joining the material world in a specific location, but a broadsword makes no sense for killing a spirit, it would make more sense if it were a "spirit dagger" or something.

[CHUNK]

Dying in the spirit world can allow some elements of joining the material world in a specific location, but a broadsword makes no sense for killing a spirit, it would make more sense if it were a "spirit dagger" or something.

Dying at all makes no sense - you are already dead (ergo "spirit world"). No dagger, broadsword, or any other weapon of any sort makes much sense to me, for this purpose (some other item might make sense, though). However, I would agree that changing the broadsword item that is currently used to get you to the spirit world into a dagger makes more conceptual sense (ie. a broadsword would probably be an awkward instrument with which you might attempt to kill yourself).

[Antistone]

The original map contained two suicide items: a broadsword, which is reusable, and a broken dagger, which is not. I can't tell you precisely what the reasoning was, though it may have something to do with the quotes in the item tooltips (from Shakespeare, I think).

However, the reason the broken dagger is not reusable is simply that the "drops on death" flag is set to false, which is kind of dangerous...if you give the players two broken daggers at once, one player could grab both and kill himself, and they'd both be gone. It should probably be set to have one charge instead.

[Rising_Dusk]

When you beg for life, why doesn't the necromancer ever say no?

[NoWorries]

When you beg for life, why doesn't the necromancer ever say no?

He likes to keep to himself. And when people show up, he gets uneasy. So, naturally, he does whatever he can to get rid of them.

[Antistone]

So, obviously it's a bit late to release a new base map for this week, but going forward, does anyone have a reason that we shouldn't give Delvers the "suicidal" classification and change the "targets allowed" for things like the broadsword to require "suicidal" and for things like "beg for life" to require "non-suicidal?"

Some quick testing indicates that this will still allow the items to be used by the wrong people, but they'll have no effect (which is probably good, since I think the alternative would've been that a Delver begging for life would leave a "beg for life" item on the floor that someone else could pick up).

If I don't hear anything to the contrary, I'm building my submission for this week with the assumption that this is the plan.

[TheZizz]

Sounds good to me.

[Antistone]

Well, my entry's done. The relevant level is currently #4, entitled "The Matrix," and the new element being showcased is called the Word of Shadow. Some parts may be unnecessarily difficult if you haven't yet learned about the elements I made last week.

Please tell me that someone else is also entering this week...

[Shvegait]

Antistone was the only one to enter -- AGAIN. It's a bit of a shame, because his level and Word of Shadow puzzle element are excellent, so you should definitely check it out.

I'm going to think a bit on how to proceed from here. Clearly hardly anyone really cares about this year's Mapathon, or if they are, they're not doing a good job showing it.

I'm thinking we'll do one more week, and then switch gears (if 2+ people participate) or cancel it altogether (otherwise).