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Rheb
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icon Another Giant bug (+1)  
I'm not sure, but brained giant seem to act a little weird sometimes.
If Beethro stands beside the front part of a brained giant, facing the same way as the giant, and move backwards, the giant doesn't move diogonaly killing Beethro, like a unbrained giant would have done. It doesn't matter which way Beethro and the giant are facing, or on which side of the giant Beethro's standing.

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[Last edited by Rheb at 01-31-2008 09:27 PM]
01-31-2008 at 09:25 PM
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TFMurphy
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icon Re: Another Giant bug (+3)  
It's not *really* a bug - it's quite consistent with how giants work. Though if we wanted to change it... well, one moment first.

We're back down to brained movement preferences here. After Beethro moves, we need to see which part of the Rock Giant will be controlling the move. This is always the closest corner of the giant. In your example hold, this would be the SE corner after Beethro moves E.

The *obvious* move is S. However, Beethro's sword blocks that move. That means that the SE part of the giant can't move directly into the square that's 0 distance away from Beethro.

That leaves tiles that are 1 distance away from Beethro. The available squares in that case would be W, SW, SE and E. SW is blocked by Beethro's sword, W is blocked on the first turn by the wall, and E and SE are open.

Brain movement preferences prefer E to SE if they're the same distance from Beethro. The giant doesn't understand that one of its *other* parts would kill Beethro if it moved SE. (In fact, it never understands this - the only reason an unbrained Rock Giant does this is due to Flanking movement preferences). So it moves E.

As you continue moving E, the brain movement preferences will next prefer a W movement to E, pulling the giant one more move back before it follows the rest to the E. All this is standard brain movement... just mapped to the Rock Giant's unique shape.

===

If we wanted this changed, we'd likely want to add a killing move detector for both unbrained and brained Rock Giants, similar to how other monsters already prioritise killing moves. But otherwise, it's pretty consistent with normal brain preferences, just with a different shape.

EDIT: By the way, such a change *would* mean something to unbrained giants as well. Consider this example:

....
.GG.    G = Rock Giant
.GG.    B = Beethro on NE-facing arrow
..B.
....


In the example, the Rock Giant cannot move S to directly kill Beethro. Flanking kicks in, so the Rock Giant must now choose between SW and SE. Both are actually open, but the Rock Giant prefers SW movements and will pick this one, even though a SE movement would actually kill Beethro.

If you placed Beethro's sword to the W, the SW movement would also be blocked and force the Giant to the SE, killing Beethro. If a Rock Giant checked for killing movements first, this would not be necessary. So it's up to debate whether such a change should be implemented.



[Last edited by TFMurphy at 02-01-2008 05:31 AM]
02-01-2008 at 04:59 AM
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Remlin
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icon Re: Another Giant bug (0)  
What's to debate? It's a general drod principle that aggressive monsters always take a kill when it's available, and rock giants should be fixed when they don't.

Is there really an opposing viewpoint here? Saying "it's not actually a bug because it's just following its programming" is sort of arguing in circles, no?

Thanks for the explanation of the mechanics, by the way, interesting stuff.
02-01-2008 at 08:13 AM
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TFMurphy
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icon Re: Another Giant bug (+1)  
Hmmm... it's not *that* simple. Different monsters have different quirks (especially when brained).

We have Guards and Stalwarts that don't understand oremites at close quarters. We have roaches that ignore Stalwart kills when brained, but goblins that don't if they happen to pass by (both will not head for Stalwarts when brained though). Aumtlich need to be facing your direction, and Wraithwings need a partner or something else causing them to flee or you can go up right next to them and not be hurt. We have *Slayers* that would rather turn than take a kill if you happened to use a tunnel on the same turn.

So here, we have Rock Giants that, under certain circumstances, are unable to understand that they can take a kill. That's not really that big a quirk. You could even try to explain it as a consequence of the Rock Giant's unique structure (the fact that it's basically four stupid Rock Golems working together as one entity). That's why I said it's debatable.

I'm not saying it shouldn't be changed... just that it's not as clear cut as some bugs.
02-01-2008 at 10:38 AM
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Briareos
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icon Re: Another Giant bug (+1)  
TFMurphy wrote:
You could even try to explain it as a consequence of the Rock Giant's unique structure (the fact that it's basically four stupid Rock Golems working together as one entity).
I think this would explain it even better... :D

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02-01-2008 at 01:45 PM
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