bomber50
Level: Smitemaster
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I don't see how I can save the Stalwart from death.

stigant
Level: Smitemaster

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Are you going to the north? I spent several tries going that way and gave up. When I returned, I went south (doing exactly the same thing I did before, only to the south instead of the north) and it worked out.

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Dolan42
Level: Master Delver

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The Stalwart can handle either the top half or the bottom half of tar babies. Your job is to make sure he doesn't have any babies from the other side attacking him.

edit: or maybe not the bottom half. I don't remember which way I went.

____________________________
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"To understand recursion you must first understand recursion."

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[Last edited by Dolan42 at 04-23-2007 09:21 PM]

zex20913
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Unless I'm totally missing some obscure move sequence, the Stalwart can't handle the bottom half.

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mrimer
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zex20913 wrote:
Unless I'm totally missing some obscure move sequence, the Stalwart can't handle the bottom half.

I usually play the top half, so I know the stalwart can handle the bottom half. Don't know what the catch is offhand, though.

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Pinnacle
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I cleared the bottom-left blob first, then the bottom-right, then the top-right, then the top-left.


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Briareos
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mrimer wrote:

zex20913 wrote:
Unless I'm totally missing some obscure move sequence, the Stalwart can't handle the bottom half.

I usually play the top half, so I know the stalwart can handle the bottom half. Don't know what the catch is offhand, though.

Well, I just had a quick look on the top 25 demos for this room and not a single one of them does the top half first...

So either you have a special version of TCB where Stalwarts have twice the number of brain cells (read: two) that they have in the public version, or it's very, very inefficient to do the top half first.

And I can't say I ever managed to keep the Stalwart alive when I attempted doing the top half first, though, as he always managed to get himself killed when approaching two tar babies instead of swiping at them - would you mind posting a demo of how you did it? (If you did it... why do I have to think of OJ here? )

np: Richie Hawtin - Welcome(in) (DE9 - Transitions)

____________________________
"I'm not anti-anything, I'm anti-everything, it fits better." - Sole
R.I.P. Robert Feldhoff (1962-2009)

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[Last edited by Briareos at 04-23-2007 10:23 PM]

TripleM
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I found it was impossible to do the top half too. So I'd be very interested in what mrimer is talking about

stigant
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I think there's some movement priority issue that makes the tar babies come in to the stalwart's area in a slightly different formation from the top than from the bottom. The result is that the stalwart can't handle the babies from the south, but CAN handle the babies from the north. I was pretty furious when I finally tried from the south (so that the stalwart handles the north babies) since I had tried the EXACT SAME TACTIC several times from the north and it didn't work. To me, this is an egregious problem with stalwarts.

It may be possible, since the tar babies are not brained to stay to the east of the entrance to the stalwarts area, thus not allowing any babies at all to attack the stalwart. Oh, wait, you'll also need to stay reasonably far south so that you draw their agro as well. In the end, its probably at least a little less efficient since you'll have to clean up the babies that the stalwart didn't get to, and its probably more difficult since you have to watch your step quite a bit more so as not to let/draw many tar babies through the defenses.

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[Last edited by stigant at 04-23-2007 10:53 PM]

kzc
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stigant wrote:
I think there's some movement priority issue that makes the tar babies come in to the stalwart's area in a slightly different formation from the top than from the bottom. The result is that the stalwart can't handle the babies from the south, but CAN handle the babies from the north.

The stalwart can definitely handle babies from the south, since that's how I did it. My demo looks like a mirror image of Dolan42's 1st place demo (minus any attempts at efficiency).

Briareos wrote:
Well, I just had a quick look on the top 25 demos for this room and not a single one of them does the top half first...

My demo is 25 moves outside of the top 25 as of now.

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[Last edited by kzc at 04-24-2007 02:12 AM]

TripleM
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File: TCB Frozen Depths 2N3W.demo (6.3 KB)
Downloaded 82 times.
License: Public Domain

Can you upload your demo? Heres precisely what happens when I try to do the top half in a mirror image to Dolan's. (I hope you don't mind Dolan; its only the first 40 moves, and it obviously doesn't get anywhere ).
The point is, the movement order of the bottom babies is different to the top babies. Very early on, that causes a gap between two babies, which causes the stalwart to die. I really don't see what Beethro could possibly do up the top which changes that.

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[Last edited by TripleM at 04-24-2007 01:31 AM]

kzc
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File: TCB Frozen Depths 2N3W Victory.demo (7.7 KB)
Downloaded 280 times.
License: Public Domain

TripleM wrote:
Can you upload your demo?

Glad to. In case it wasn't clear, I didn't mean a literal mirror image, of course - just a mirror of the general idea. The key seems to be staying easterly longer.

Dolan42
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TripleM wrote:
Can you upload your demo? Heres precisely what happens when I try to do the top half in a mirror image to Dolan's. (I hope you don't mind Dolan; its only the first 40 moves moves, and it obviously doesn't get anywhere ).

Of course not, I don't think I did any tricks in the first 40, those came much later In fact this thread prompted me to go back and try the room again and I cut 18 moves off my demo

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"To understand recursion you must first understand recursion."

TripleM
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Ah, of course. So you don't move west far enough for the babies to attack the stalwart at all, which I think stigant was suggesting.

A stalwart's behaviour is still a bit too monster-movement-dependent for me, though. Not to say I don't like the idea.

stigant
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Well, when I went back to play this room last night, I couldn't stay East enough to keep the stalwart out of trouble (more power to those of you who can... I'm impressed!). What I don't understand is why the stalwart AI has it charging into situations that put it adjacent to monsters. The problem I ran into was this:

Babies from the South:
S
|
BB

Babies from the North:
 B
B
|
S

In both cases, the stalwart charges the baby he can kill, but in the case from the south, he ends up next to a baby who then kills him. Even your 10 year old sister wouldn't play DROD that way, right?

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zex20913
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Wrong actually. I'm teaching some DROD to my students (I'm a student teacher) and the moves we take to be trivial are not coming across well to them at all. Including "Q,W" when facing a roach. Or even just "Direction to stab the roach".

They are improving, though. Their death count is decreasing.

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stigant
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Well, the point I was trying to make is that with a reasonable amount of experience fighting things/DRODing/playing chess, one should develop at least ONE move of lookahead. (Hmmm, if I take the bishop with my queen, I get the bishop, but then his knight can take my queen! doh). The stalwarts clearly have _some_ lookahead as evidenced by the fact that he starts turning towards the roaches when they are still 5 or 6 squares away, but he hasn't developed enough lookahead to realize that stepping next to a baby is going mean death. This seems contradictory to me. Especially in light of the fact that they are supposed to be mighty warriors (whereas your students are ... still warriors in training). The upshot of this inconsistancy is that this room is much harder from the north than from the south even though its pretty much symetrical. I guess one way to think of it is this: If one of your students could survive the stalwart's situation with you doing the south side, then it would be reasonable to assume that the same student could survive as the stalwart while you do the north side first. This isn't the case with the stalwart AI.

Incidently, I did manage to do it from the north finally. It was much harder.

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[Last edited by stigant at 04-25-2007 05:19 PM]

Sillyman
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That ain't lookahead... it's just him turning his sword toward the nearest opponent.

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Briareos
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Sillyman wrote:
That ain't lookahead... it's just him turning his sword toward the nearest opponent.

Yeah, well - I wouldn't want the Stalwart AI to start doing a deep recursive search ahead for the best solution, but checking if you end up right next to a monster after stepping somewhere doesn't even need recursion...

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AnneAardvark
Level: Goblin
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Thats a dirty trick,
I play Drod because its a logic puzzle.
When a seemingly symetrical room plays differently from two directions then thats not logical and then makes this room just pure luck which I hate in a logic game. I, as most people would, start from the top and work down which is why I'm here looking for a solution.

To keep the logic in the game then I think a scroll is in order to give a hint that the room does not behave as symetrical as it looks.

hartleyhair
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Well, the Stalwarts do have concrete rules governing their behaviour - so once you've worked them out, it is logical.

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[Last edited by hartleyhair at 01-13-2008 04:27 PM]

Jatopian
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hartleyhair wrote:
Well, the Stalwarts do have concrete rules governing their behaviour - so once you've worked them out, it is logical.

Uh, yeah, good luck with that.

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hartleyhair
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Mod-down? I was merely objecting to AnneAardvark's statement that this room involves 'pure luck' - which DROD never involves.

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I'm currently working on Jerrik's Dungeon, an oldschool Hold for TCB.

AnneAardvark
Level: Goblin
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the 'luck' element is which half do you do first.

"..Stalwarts do have concrete rules governing their behaviour..."

Really?
Who would have guessed their behaviour is different from any other character with a sword.

Now that I am aware of such tactics then I know to look for such behaviour quirks in other characters later on.

Thats what this thread is for, "..stuck stuck stuck..".

BTW I am enjoying the game immensly, despite my hatred of seemingly random quirks, the question is, how long would it have taken me to solve the room without this hints board? Or would I have given up, nah!

Chimerix
Level: Delver

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File: TCB Frozen Depths 2N3W Death.demo (6.7 KB)
Downloaded 65 times.
License: Public Domain

I'm having a problem not related to the N/S debate. I plunge in and clear out the south half of the room. When I finish, I rush up to help the Stalwart.

By this time, the tar mother has expanded to where there are 2 spaces between her and the black wall. The Stalwart is beside the black wall, fending off northerly roaches. I walk up beside him, with my sword facing SE, cutting the mother as I arrive.

I end up with a scenario where the Stalwart has cleared both arrows to his north, there's a tar baby immediately to my east, and one SSE, while my sword is facing SE.

If that doesn't make sense, let me say it another way... there is NO roach adjacent to the Stalwart.

Any move I make, the Stalwart dies. I swing at the roach beside me, he dies. I step SW to avoid death, he dies. I step S to kill the other roach (dying myself in the process), he dies.

WTF? Reiterating for the 3rd time, no roaches are adjacent to him!

I've attached a demo to prove I'm not on crack.

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CuriousShyRabbit
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Chimerix, you're definitely not on crack, but there's also nothing wrong with what happens in your demo. It can be explained using movement order.

1. First Beethro moves. He swings counterclockwise to kill the baby east of him.
2. Then the Stalwart moves. He steps SE trying to kill that same baby (the closest one to him; he can't swing his sword, or he'd kill Beethro).
3. Then the tar babies move. The tar baby SE of the Stalwart kills him.
4. Then the picture on your computer screen is updated.

Chimerix
Level: Delver

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Well, when you explain it like that, it makes sense!

No wonder the Stalwarts suffered such an ignominious defeat at the hands of the Empire!

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JLE
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Well. Same is happening as described above. Whenever I try to complete this room from the north first (as the Challenge stipulates), the Stalwart dies on the 10th turn after the first spawn. This is because he is faced with the following configuration:

S
|
BB

No baby is within his reach, so he moves forwards to stab one baby and is immediately killed by the other.

What sequence of moves, GIVEN BEETHRO ON THE NORTH SIDE (i.e. no answers saying "just go from the south side instead" will be considered adequate), is needed to make this not happen?

In any case, the combination of arrows, green doors and black doors would seem to present another problem:

The two tar babies in the west, behind the western black door, require ALL the outside tar to be cleared to get to them.

While they are alive, the green door east of the tar mother remains closed. (As do the green doors holding the western babies in, so the only way in to them is through the black door.)

The force arrows will let somebody into the tar mother area, but not out. So once you're in there, if there are any tar blobs left outside on either north or south, there is no way out.

So you have to destroy all four tar blobs, the two on the north AND the two on the south (and hit both orbs to open the yellow doors.)

I have, however, been unable to do this without the tar mother expanding to fill all the available space, except for the one square occupied by the Stalwart.

Which means that when you cut the tar to get in to the tar mother, one of the tar babies is behind him, and kills him before he can move.

How do you get around this dilemma as well? I do not believe it is possible to clear ALL of the external tar on both sides, and still have room to get into the tar mother's area before she grows to fill the whole room.

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[Last edited by JLE at 01-10-2020 08:53 PM]

Rabscuttle
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For the challenge:

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[Last edited by Rabscuttle at 01-10-2020 11:02 PM]

Rabscuttle
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For entering the central chamber:

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[Last edited by Rabscuttle at 01-10-2020 10:55 PM]