Neather2
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As multiple weapons with various features were introduced, a marvelous world of puzzle potential has risen. However, I can't fully comprehend the behaviour in this situation:

B = Beethro wielding a stick facing north
M = Mimic wielding a stick facing north

Since a stick can't kill monsters/living beings, you can place a mimic right behind you. If from the previous condition you move southeast once, you'll travel two tiles due to movement of the swords. However, if you have a usable object on that second tile, like a potion or horns, the player will perceive it as an obstacle and will only move once. If you otherwise have a pressure plate, a fuse, a trapdoor, or an empty tile, you'll move twice.
But why would a potion prevent you from moving further?

EDIT: I also just noticed that you'd drink the potion and move two tiles simultaneously if it is placed right on the first SE tile from your position.

B
M P > B moves twice and drinks P

B
M
-----P > B moves once and does not drink P


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[Last edited by mrimer at 02-19-2016 03:35 PM]

The spitemaster
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I believe that beethro is just treated like an object after his turn is done. Would it make sense to be able to place more than one mimic in a turn?

However, along the same thread, what is the intended behavior with tunnels + platforms? I can understand slightly being pushed off a platform instead of moving it. But the one that gets me is that you can be pushed through a tunnel without moving through it. On your turn you move onto the tunnel square. Then the mimic pushes you in the direction of travel of the tunnel and you come out the other side.

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Neather2
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And you can jump past active fire traps, which definitely makes no sense to me.

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coppro
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That's fine. The fire trap only fires on turn boundaries.

mrimer
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I'm not exactly clear on what we're saying is the bug here, or what the expected behavior is. Neather2, can you restate?

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I am Gandalf the White.
And I come back to you now at the turn of the tide.

Watcher
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The issue that Neather2 is pointing out is that when Beethro is pushed by a staff or other weapon, he cannot be pushed onto a square that a mimic could not walk onto. For instance, if a mimic tries to push Beethro onto a square containing a potion, he will stay in place instead. This is unintuitive, because Beethro is perfectly capable of walking onto this square.

The spitemaster points out a similar problem with tunnels: Beethro cannot be pushed onto a tunnel, despite being able to walk onto it. Also, if Beethro is standing on an east-facing tunnel and a mimic tries to push him eastwards, he will be moved one square east, not through the tunnel. This can actually get him into areas that are otherwise blocked by the tunnel entrance.

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mrimer
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Bump. TFMurphy, can you investigate?

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Gandalf the Grey. That was my name.
I am Gandalf the White.
And I come back to you now at the turn of the tide.

---

[Last edited by mrimer at 07-12-2014 08:08 PM]

skell
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Bump, I'll take care of it this evening

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Nuntar
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So we had a debate in chat that revealed several of us have differing opinions over how these two issues should be resolved. One thing about chat is there's much more pressure to express and defend your opinion before the chat moves on, and this leads to the debate feeling a lot more heated than it actually is. So I decided to post my views in the topic instead.

Issue 1: Pushing onto / over potions

It seems no-one likes the idea of it being possible to drink multiple double-placement potions per turn (and even "Teleport player" doesn't allow this), so the remaining options are:

(1) Current behaviour: Pushing onto potions is blocked.
(2) Beethro only drinks a potion if he is on one at the end of a turn. He can be pushed over potions without drinking them.
(3) Pushing Beethro over multiple potions makes him drink them all, but only the first one brings up the double-placement interface; other potions disappear without being used.

(2) is consistent with tokens; (3) is consistent with the 5.1 behaviour of "Teleport player".

Jutt said: "It would be nice though if pushes worked the same for all interactions, such as tunnels, potions, horns, tokens... either they all activate, or none of them do."

I agree, and I also find (2) much more intuitive than (3). I can accept "Teleport player" performing some sort of wizardry where potions vanish without having an effect; it's much harder to swallow a push chain doing this. Also, turns seem to happen so fast that it would be strange for Beethro to drink potions in the middle of a turn So, my order of preference is 2, 1, 3.

Issue 2: Pushing off tunnels

Again there are three possible ways this could be resolved:

(1) Current behaviour: Beethro can be pushed off a tunnel into the next tile.
(2) Pushing off tunnels is blocked and leaves Beethro on the tunnel.
(3) Pushing when Beethro is on a tunnel takes him to the tunnel's destination.

In this case my preference is strongly for (1). It makes intuitive sense -- to me; clearly others disagree -- that pushing into an empty space is allowed. Beethro cannot step or be pushed onto a closed door, but can step or be pushed off one, so it has felt, all the way since AE, that the destination matters and not the tile Beethro is currently on.

Pushing imparts momentum to the pushed object, which is why it moves in the direction of the push. It seems wholly arcane for, for example, an east push to send Beethro through a tunnel under the ground.

Also, (1) opens up some excellent puzzle potential, as Watcher mentioned: it can allow Beethro to access areas that are otherwise inaccessible.

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Insoluble
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Issue 1: Pushing onto / over potions

Technically there is also a 4th option: Pushing Beethro over multiple potions makes him drink them all, but only the first one brings up the double-placement interface; other remain and Beethro passes over them. Sorry that was badly worded. The fourth option is for pushed Beethro to drink all invisibility and speed potions, but only drink the first Beethro double potion. All other double potions would remain. This is kind of a weird option and i don't like it at all, but in the interest of thoroughness I wanted to throw it out there.

I don't think anyone was arguing for this one though. I also personally prefer option 2 due to the consistency with tokens. Tokens are much more common that teleportation, so if we're going to chose to make this be consistent with something, it might as well be the more commonly encountered "something".

Issue 2: Pushing off tunnels

Option 2 seems the most intuitive for this one. Nuntar makes the point that it is often the case that the destination tile being an open floor tile is all that matters in pushing. In other words, it matters more where you are moving to than what you are standing on (Please correct me if I am misinterpreting). Schik replied in chat by suggesting, "Or perhaps the established rule is that you can be pushed to the same places that you can walk. You can walk off a door, you can be pushed off a door. You can't walk off a tunnel in one direction, you... can? be pushed off in that direction." This was possibly more to play devils advocate than anything else, but I would point out that a player can't be pushed onto an open floor space from a force arrow or orthosquare if being pushed the wrong way.

That being said, the argument that being able to push a player over a tunnel would lead to some interesting puzzle mechanics is intriguing. I still think it is intuitive behavior since the one side of a tunnel has always behaved like a barrier before, but feel less strongly about this one than I do about the previous case.

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[Last edited by Insoluble at 02-19-2016 03:55 PM]

mrimer
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Insoluble wrote:
Pushing Beethro over multiple potions makes him drink them all, but only the first one brings up the double-placement interface; other remain and Beethro passes over them.

I don't understand this description. How can Beethro drink them all if only the first one is used and the others remain?

Maybe you meant to say Beethro only drinks the first one?


Edit: I would not expect pushing Beethro onto a potion to be blocked. That seems a code oversight.

____________________________
Gandalf? Yes... That's what they used to call me.
Gandalf the Grey. That was my name.
I am Gandalf the White.
And I come back to you now at the turn of the tide.

---

[Last edited by mrimer at 02-19-2016 03:39 PM]

mrimer
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Regarding pushing off tunnels: I agree that in "real life", pushing Beethro off of a tunnel might not cause him to actually travel through the tunnel. Also agree pushing off of a tunnel without teleporting through it could allow the player to get to places where he can't otherwise go.

However, this being a puzzle game, as a player I would expect element interaction to be consistent. So, Beethro's movement when pushed from a tunnel in its direction of entrance would be consistent with taking a step in that direction normally. Having interesting emergent behaviors via element combinations is good, but I don't want a bunch of fiddly rules I need to remember in obscure cases. DROD has enough of those already, and I don't want to keep introducing more whenever an oversight in the game logic is encountered.

I say that if Beethro is on a tunnel and pushed toward the tunnel entrance, that he transports through the tunnel. That's exactly what I would expect that movement to do because that's what always happens in this situation otherwise.

____________________________
Gandalf? Yes... That's what they used to call me.
Gandalf the Grey. That was my name.
I am Gandalf the White.
And I come back to you now at the turn of the tide.

---

[Last edited by mrimer at 02-19-2016 03:34 PM]

Insoluble
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mrimer wrote:
I don't understand this description. How can Beethro drink them all if only the first one is used and the others remain?

Sorry! I was typing too fast. The fourth option is that Beethro would drink all potions until reaching the first double placement one. Then only the first double placement potion would get placed. All other double placement potions would remain. But invisibility potions and speed potions could still get taken by multi pushing. I don't particularly like this option, but wanted to throw it out there as another possibility.

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mrimer
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Ah, got it. Thanks for the clarification.

My thoughts on pushing on potions:

On the surface, option (2) above feels intuitive. Precedent: ever since version 1.x, Beethro waits for monsters to move before actually drinking the potion. (EX: If Beethro steps on a mimic potion, but then a roach eats him on the same turn, then he doesn't get to place the mimic, which could have killed the roach.)

____________________________
Gandalf? Yes... That's what they used to call me.
Gandalf the Grey. That was my name.
I am Gandalf the White.
And I come back to you now at the turn of the tide.

---

[Last edited by mrimer at 02-19-2016 04:26 PM]

skell
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Just to chime in, the way I implemented it with teleport is a bit different than what Nuntar said. When you multi-teleport the player in a single turn they'll drink all non-double potions and only the first double-potion. The rest of the double-potions will be left untouched.

At least that's how I intended it to be.

And before anyone asks I had my reasons to do it this way. The reason is that "DrinkPotion" is part of PostprocessPlayerMoveInteraction() command, which means drinking happens after player moves but before anything else happens in the room, so from this point of view it actually makes most sense.
If we were to make only the last potion drank we'd... We can't make it, because that would change the game's behavior, at least with non-double potions. If we only make the last double potion drank then it is inconsistent with non-double potion drinking, as they're drank as they come, but suddenly the double potion is drank only the last one.

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mrimer
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Pardon, I wasn't suggesting we have to make a change here. I'm fine with the current behavior remaining as-is unless we uncover there is a bug or clear oversight in the code.

____________________________
Gandalf? Yes... That's what they used to call me.
Gandalf the Grey. That was my name.
I am Gandalf the White.
And I come back to you now at the turn of the tide.

---

[Last edited by mrimer at 02-19-2016 07:03 PM]

Jutt
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The more I think about it, the more I'm starting to appreciate the current behaviour where you cannot be pushed onto potions/horns/tunnels:

– A push is pretty much an involuntary movement. If you step onto a potion yourself, the drinking the potion is part of the intention of that move. We could assume that standing on a potion without drinking it is not allowed*. If you're pushed, there is no intention to drink the potion, so you fail to move there entirely. The idea that stepping onto a potion/horn/tunnel requires some special skill is illustrated by monsters being unable to do that.

– Current behaviour is also most easily described with the single rule "nothing can be pushed onto potions/horns/tunnels". This kind of allows you to consider all pushable objects/entities as equivalent dead weight, all obeying the same obstacle rules. All other proposed rules are invariably more complicated.

– It avoids all issues with multiple potion consumption in a single turn, and is therefore by far the safest approach.

So I would approve if no changes are made based on these considerations.


* Of course there is also the option that being pushed onto a potion has you stand on it without drinking, kind of like how a mimic can step onto a potion and ignore it. To take the potion would require moving off the square, then step onto it again. Not a mechanic I would recommend though.

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mrimer
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Those are great points.

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Gandalf? Yes... That's what they used to call me.
Gandalf the Grey. That was my name.
I am Gandalf the White.
And I come back to you now at the turn of the tide.

skell
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Jutt wrote: <wall of text>

Sure, some good points . My question is then what do we do with multiple teleport commands in a single turn? We can't disallow teleporting onto potions because it hardly makes any sense and is very limiting for the architects. Do we keep the behavior that's in the game right now (the one I described, drink all no-double and the first double) or maybe something else?

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mrimer
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I'm fine with keeping things as-is.

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Gandalf? Yes... That's what they used to call me.
Gandalf the Grey. That was my name.
I am Gandalf the White.
And I come back to you now at the turn of the tide.

skell
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Alright, I am closing this as fixed, and to reiterate how things are going to work now:
- Pushing player off the tunnel in the tunnel's direction will make them go through the tunnel, always, without exception. (this has been changed in RC3, post-6468)
- It is impossible to push anything on a tunnel, including the player
- It is impossible to push anything on a potion, including the player

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[Last edited by skell at 02-20-2016 12:03 PM]

Dragon Fogel
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Confirmed. In 5.1.0.6478, it is impossible to push the player onto a tunnel, potion, or horn, and pushing a player on a tunnel in the direction it points pushes the player through the tunnel.

Likewise, a timeclone cannot be pushed onto a potion, horn, or tunnel.

However, as noted in another thread, pushing a timeclone off of a tunnel in the direction it points does not result in it going through the tunnel.

skell
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Since the temporal tokens are now in a separate thread I am closing this as verified.

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