RoboBob3000
Level: Smitemaster

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At the moment, as far as I'm aware, the only way to edit turn order in the editor is to place an element on the top of the stack by editing it in some way.

I propose that the editor offer a turn order management feature. I'm picturing a window that you can open that lists each moving element in the room by name and location in the current turn order.

You can alter the turn order by selecting a single element or multiple elements and clicking on up/down arrows in the UI, shifting them one space at a time. Alternatively, there is an editable text field in the turn order manager that displays the turn order of the currently selected element - simply type in the new order number to update.

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Penwielder
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I really like this idea. I would get a lot out of it, personally.

I think the easiest way to implement it would be as a knock-off of the scripting window. Monsters would just be listed in order with their movement order number, character type, and coordinates, and could be dragged around at will just like script commands. A few other restraints would have to be put in place for consistency, of course--no putting mimics after monsters and so on.

This topic also just reminded me of an incident in the construction of Archipelago in which I was trying to put monster A before monster B, B before C, C before D, and D before A, and it took me embarrassingly long to realize why it wasn't working.

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asmussen
Level: Master Delver
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I'm sure that it's much to late to unscramble this particular egg, but I always thought it would have been better if the turn order was based off of something static like starting at the top left most monster and working down to the bottom right. That way, if you really wanted to put forth the effort, you could always work out exactly what the turn order would be from just what you could see on your screen while actually playing the game. I imagine that such a drastic change in behavior would break way too much existing stuff to consider doing it now, though.

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Trickster
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This gets increasingly complex when enemies are generated or regenerated. When I was helping test Dischorran's recent hold we noticed how tricky it is to manipulate the order of fegundo movement (this is needed for the challenge version of the five-fegundo room). Fegundoes get renumbered each time they reappear, so getting them in a particular order is quite hellacious.

As for how ties are settled, or how roaches map, I'd have to ask someone like TFMurphy or mxvladi. I would guess some simplistic rasterized order is used, but maybe the queen that generates them contributes something to the order in the case of roaches, or the previous fegundo order could be used to break ties...there are many ways it could have been implemented, in other words.

(I'm finding a similar difficulty in Triple Town (a SpryFox game). I can't quite pin down bear movement. There is randomness, but there are also moves a line of bears will never take, and not enough people playing it to find accurate documentation on the G+ version. Highly vexing, even though I rock at the game...it would really help my scores if I could figure it out more.)

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Jatopian
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Maybe this feature should be buried in the documentation, though. We don't want puzzles that rely heavily on turn order, as a general rule.

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Jatopian
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Yeah but you can't rely on noobs to realize what's considered polite. They're going to think turn order is a respected and expected puzzle vector if we have a nice obvious button for it and everything.

[Post Deleted] Trickster wrote:
Penwielder's hoof-drawn

Pen Wielder indeed. Special talent: fancy pen-wielding.

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[Last edited by Jatopian at 03-23-2012 02:51 AM]

Trickster
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Jatopian wrote:
Yeah but you can't rely on noobs to realize what's considered polite. They're going to think turn order is a respected and expected puzzle vector if we have a nice obvious button for it and everything.

Agreed, but if "how n00bs build holds" guided what we allow the architect to use, we wouldn't have tarstuff or snakes or trap doors or any of the bajillion other things you can do horrible stuff with if you are an imbecile.

Few architects can make a room that only works properly if the move order of monsters is respected, anyway--it takes some small amount of skill and grasp of monster movement issues in order to do it. I trust those that can do so, to use it properly. If they don't, then people will down-rate their holds, or tell them during development (HA's will probably tell them too during review).

In fact...I don't think I've ever seen a monster movement order puzzle where the turn order mattered in some way that wasn't either obvious or expressly told to the player*, but I've played dozens where it mattered, and it was a very clever element.

(* Just remembered a third case: in certain "kill mass monsters" rooms, including a couple I've made, monster move order matters...but not in a way that T&E won't lead you to the correct approach even if you don't understand the concept. So while changing the move order would ruin the puzzle in those cases, you don't have to discover it by any means or think about what move order implies in order to solve the room. I suspect there are more than a few war rooms with this trait.)

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[Last edited by Trickster at 03-23-2012 03:02 AM]