azb
Level: Smiter
Rank Points: 460
Registered: 03-08-2014
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File: NPC Platform Bug.hold (1.9 KB)
Downloaded 38 times.
License: Public Domain

Hello everyone,

In the most recent patch of The Second Sky I have, 5.1.0.6512, the game glitches out with an endless flood of error messages even after you close the program, and sometimes even crashes due to the sheer flood, as soon as the hostile NPC moves the platform.

This is a huge deal breaker for a later boss fight level in my King Azb's Arena hold, who I want to be able to push mirrors, drop trapdoors and move platforms to make the combat more difficult, but am I simply using an outdated DROD version?

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Please feel free to test the ultimate arena: King Azb's Arena today!

hyperme
Level: Smitemaster

Rank Points: 1060
Registered: 06-23-2006
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This is present in 5.1.1 RCs so updating won't save you.

The bug is a problem with the Pathfinding Imperatives. Due to how the game checks for obstacles, it will try to test illegal platform moves when encountering pits or water if the NPC is standing on a platform type that can cross them. Due to some optimizations in platform code, this crashes the game.

The various beelining imperatives won't cause this to happen, as they do not attempt to construct a path, and so will never check the obstacleness of a non-adjacent tile.

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azb
Level: Smiter
Rank Points: 460
Registered: 03-08-2014
IP: Logged

That is very bizarre that the pathfinder code would crash it, cause I don't think it would be a big deal to script special algorithms to make it work seamlessly on platforms the way it works seamlessly on normal floors right now, cause I believe doing the math it probably will not be any more complicated than the normal pathfinding algorithm is, the only thing that would make it more tricky is accounting for when the platform won't fit through, but that probably just involves sorting through an array or some other method of checking each square on the platform before making the decision to calculate a specific path to move along.

____________________________
Please feel free to test the ultimate arena: King Azb's Arena today!