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Caravel Forum : DROD Boards : Architecture : Immolation (Flaming Fegundos! No, really!)
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Xindaris
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One-level hold introducing an interconnected trio of elements: Flame (a stationary one-tile deathtrap), Oil Barrel (a pushable that makes Flame when destroyed), and Flaming Fegundo (the result of putting a Fegundo onto a Flame). Contains puzzles using the elements in various ways.

For the most part this hold goes with the textless "sink or swim" method of introducing things, so I'd like some feedback on how clear the room introducing each element and/or concept actually is. The level only has green doors to enforce "now you understand what this is/does, right?" in a few relatively simple rooms and is otherwise open. It has a script that lets you warp to the entrance/exit room at will once the level is clear, since the room design would make walking all the way back a bit of a pain.

Please let me know what you think!

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[Last edited by Xindaris at 02-22-2019 09:59 PM]
11-04-2018 at 12:06 AM
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Someone Else
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icon Re: Immolation (+2)  
I love this. So much. I only have a few specific comments, though.

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Also checkpoints.
11-05-2018 at 03:17 AM
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Xindaris
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Thank you, Someone Else; I'm glad you liked the hold. I personally found jiggling the fegundos around in 3N2W a little tough as-is, though I may just be bad at it.

UPDATE:
-CHECKPOINTS.
(Would like feedback on their placements of course.)
-2N3W altered "for now at least" to require the player to only use the flame twice instead of thrice. Would like opinions one way or the other about if I should allow 3 and make 2 a challenge, though.

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[Last edited by Xindaris at 11-05-2018 03:35 AM]
11-05-2018 at 03:34 AM
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Someone Else
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Checkpoints are great! Yeah, I don't really think that forcing the player to bring them out as flaming fegundoes would really add anything to the room. I was just disappointed when I realized that I was working so hard on a solution that's way harder than the intended one. :P
11-05-2018 at 12:59 PM
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KituU
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icon Re: Immolation (+1)  
Hi, I also liked it very much. It is original, creative and fun to play. I wanted to keep on playing more!!

(If you right click on the fire, it does not come up in description.)


11-06-2018 at 03:14 AM
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Xindaris
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Glad you liked it.

The Flame entity is displayed using Imperative Ghost Display. That is the only way to make a custom object that monsters and/or the player can walk on top of, which is necessary for the Flame to work...and it makes right-clicking not show the entity's name. The same problem exists for custom tokens, potions, etc. But it should be pretty obvious where the Flame actually is regardless.

...I wonder how difficult it would be to implement some kind of "Behavior/Imperative Right Clickable" thing, though.

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[Last edited by Xindaris at 11-06-2018 03:19 AM]
11-06-2018 at 03:17 AM
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Xindaris
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UPDATE:
Added proper instructions into 3N. Seems my guess for how many scrolls I was going to need was spot on. It's about as clear as I think I can make it, but feedback would be appreciated.

Also, are there any feelings on 3N being a secret room? Like, does anyone feel strongly that it should not be?

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[Last edited by Xindaris at 11-06-2018 03:32 PM]
11-06-2018 at 03:31 PM
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Insoluble
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File: Immolation.demo (22.2 KB)
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icon Re: Immolation (+2)  
Just played through this. Demos are attached. It was a lot of fun. I enjoyed most rooms, the only exceptions being the few in which I had to guess some special property of the scripted element. I suppose I could have gone into the editor to check the scripting, but a scroll or two mentioning the properties of these elements would be very welcome. I had to use F3 for most of the hold since it's somewhat hard to trace diagonal paths over pits. There's not much that can be done about that though, and it was only a minor inconvenience. The aesthetics and text were fun and fit together nicely. I liked the way a lot of the rooms looked like they were crumbling due to explosions wrecking the room previously (2N2E) being a good example. Also, as a general note, it's good to remember that fegundos can set off checkpoints (well, regular ones at least), so you may want to consider putting some checkpoints around spots where fegundos would achieve an important room benchmark in some cases. I'm always rotten at checkpoint placement, but thought I'd mention it.

The Entrance: Pretty straightforward. So far the fire behaves mostly like a fire trap so it's easy to understand.

1W: I feel like this room is supposed to be a tutorial of sorts, but doesn't actually explain anything and instead just plops a ton of interactions on the screen in such a way that it's easy for the player to come away missing one or two of them. I ended up having to figure out some of the things that I think I was supposed to figure out here much later on.

1N: Mostly better than 1W since there were fewer things going on. I can see from this that stabbing a red barrel makes a fire. Strangely enough a keg exploding a red barrel won't make a fire until the turn after. Turn order shenanigans I suppose. At least I'll probably remember that exploding a barrel will also make a fire.

1N1W: Didn't really have a clue how these things work. This was the room that I had to spend a bunch of time in just guessing at what the scripting was. It would probably have been a fun room if not for that fact. I remember seeing a scroll much later on that explained some of the things I had to figure out here, maybe move it to this room? Also, possible challenge: don't use all the fegundos.

1N2W: Somehow forgot about this one until the end. appropriately easy for one of the first few rooms. I guess by the time I got to this one I already had figured out how most of the mechanics work.

2N1W: Didn't use the power token here. Not sure if it is supposed to be a red herring. Still was a fun room. By this point I had mostly worked out what was going on with the new elements.

2N2W: Strangely seemed much simpler than the rooms that proceeded it. I guess the hold is in an open format at this point though so I should expect a bit of variation in difficulty.

2N3W: Fun room. finding an ideal way to set up the fegundo each time wasn't too difficult, but was still enjoyable. Here's the scroll I was thinking of. It would be nice to see more like this early on so that all the varied mechanics are easier to conceptualize and remember.

3N2W: Seems like it's only possible to use the fire for the the first fegundo. It was somewhat tricky to offset the remaining three, but not too bad.

3N1W: Nice little room. I had fun with this one. Much easier to handle 2 fegundos at a time than 3. Not sure if you care or not, but the power tokens are different distances from the respective entries so anyone planning to optimize the room will always come in from the west entrance. Might be nice to even it out.

2N: This felt fairly trivial compared to a lot of the other rooms around it.

2N1E: This one was pretty tricky mostly because I hadn't seen much of the red barrels and didn't remember everything about how they work. I guess maybe 2N was a bit of a reminder. It was a neat room though. I liked it. Looks like the mimic has to either go on (12,7) or (9,7) but both are functionally equivalent.

1N1E: I always enjoy rooms like this that ask you to design a structure ahead of time. Tried to see if this could be done with two barrels but wasn't able to do it.

1E: This one was tricky. Had no idea what I was supposed to do for the longest time, then accidentally stumbled onto the fact that fire don't fall into pits for whatever reason. I kind of wish this was mentioned somewhere, would have made the room a much more satisfying experience.

2E: This one also felt somewhat easier than the average room. Still was quite fun.

1N2E: Nice. A snake timing room. The snake timing isn't too tricky, but feels about right for the general difficulty level you seem to be going for.

2N2E: Very nice minimalist room. One of my favorites. It's exactly what it needs to be to get the puzzle across without any extra details or "gochas". Very nice room.

3N1E: This one took me a while to get through, but was a pretty fun room on the whole. One thing that felt a little tedious was the fact that the shape of the bridge at (11,9) or so makes the tar blob want to form tar babies that make it impossible to get out of the tunnel unless you wait a few extra spawn cycles. The spawn per turn is pretty low, so waiting a few more cycles feels a bit more like busy work than a real challenge in any way. It might be nice to either narrow that bridge to 2 wide for the whole duration, or extend it to 3 wide. Doesn't really functionally change the room but makes it feel like I have to wait around for less.

3N: Super cool that you included all these explanations.

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11-10-2018 at 06:29 AM
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Xindaris
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Thanks very much for your feedback, Insoluble!

As far as text explanation goes, I was trying to be very minimal with it and let the player figure things out almost entirely via experimentation. The one scroll in 2N3W is because I felt that was the only part of the "mechanics" that was arcane enough to really demand explanation. Every other room in the hold can be done without using that fact, too. This is why, for example, 2N1W has a power token. The only thing you need to know in 1N1W is that flames can set off fegundos even if you just push them into it, and that's what the room is intended to show off. Maybe it would help to retool 1W to involve a two-step process: First show the player that a flaming fegundo lights fuses/bombs/etc., then ask the player to use that fact.

Other responses:

2N is a pure tutorial room to inform the player that flames light fuses they sit on top of, which hadn't been shown before. That's why it's so easy/has a green door. It also serves as the gateway to the east side, which is more strongly based on barrels, while the west side is more strongly based on fegundos.

I'll make a note to self to maybe move the tokens in 3N1W, thanks.

In 3N2W it's possible to use the fire to rearrange the remaining 3 fegundos after getting rid of the first one. Not entirely sure it's necessary to do so, however.

In 3N1E, letting the tar grow a few times so you don't get overwhelmed on the way out of the tunnel is supposed to be the trick. In my opinion it does change the room functionally because the player has to actually work that out; the rest of it seemed fairly trivial to me, but I suppose that could just be because I designed the elements/room.

The goal of 1E is entirely to teach the player that fire persists over pits, even though barrels do not. I suppose I could put a pre-existing fire over some pit in an out-of-the-way part of the room to suggest that to the player, but I really don't want to give away the trick of the room in a scroll.

Also: for anyone to answer, is making 3N a secret room OK or should it just be an optional one?



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[Last edited by Xindaris at 11-10-2018 04:22 PM]
11-10-2018 at 04:05 PM
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Xindaris
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UPDATE:
-1W altered to require slightly more work on the player's part
-3N1W: East side of player's path moved south a couple of tiles so that both tokens can be reached most efficiently in the same number of turns (10).
-1E now has a fire visibly present over pit (but not useful for destroying the kegs or brain) to hopefully hint at the room's solution a bit.


Also, reiterating question in previous post about 3N.

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[Last edited by Xindaris at 11-16-2018 03:13 AM]
11-16-2018 at 03:13 AM
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Xindaris
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UPDATE:
1W altered again to definitely require the player to understand the light-fuses behavior of a flaming fegundo, instead of just letting the player bonk fegundo against a wall to win.

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01-11-2019 at 06:35 PM
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Insoluble
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Xindaris wrote: Also: for anyone to answer, is making 3N a secret room OK or should it just be an optional one?

Sorry. Never replied to this and saw that you asked in chat. I think it's probably fine. The kinds of people who care about secret completion are mostly the kinds of people who would try to play through all the unrequited rooms too.

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02-20-2019 at 05:32 PM
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Xindaris
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UPDATE:
-2N3W built so that the player "normally" can light the Fegundo 3 times, but with a challenge for destroying all of the bombs in only 2.
-Floor in parts of some rooms (particularly 1N1W) changed to tile to make it easier to see the grid where it's helpful to see it; and for aesthetics in others.

I'd also like to announce my intent to send this to HA soon. If anyone has any complaints or can point out anything in desperate need of changing within the next day or two it would be greatly appreciated. I will take silence to mean "hold is fine, go ahead and promote it."

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[Last edited by Xindaris at 02-21-2019 07:43 PM]
02-21-2019 at 07:37 PM
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Nuntar
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File: Immolation Nuntar.demo (9.3 KB)
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icon Re: Immolation (+1)  
Got a few demos for you. Not solved yet: 2N3W, 3N1W, 2N1E.

Overall, these are fun rooms with an interesting custom element, and the way it worked was mostly clear. 1W doesn't really show that the flaming fegundo won't move if you turn, since there's no incentive to turn; it would help if the power token was on a pressure plate releasing a roach south of Beethro.

Checkpoint in 1N2E should be before pressure plate. 2N1E could do with one at 20,13.

As for 3N, since there are no other secrets and no master wall, and it's not a puzzle room, the only difference it makes to make it a secret is that players who complete the hold will have it tagged as "100%". Up to you really whether that's desirable or not.

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[Last edited by Nuntar at 02-22-2019 07:45 PM]
02-22-2019 at 07:41 PM
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Xindaris
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Thanks much, Nuntar; I'm glad you like it. Those suggested changes seem good to me, so I'll do them.

(Update: changes as suggested in above post)

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02-22-2019 at 10:00 PM
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File: Immolation Nuntar.demo (10 KB)
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icon Re: Immolation (+1)  
Challenge scripting in 2N3W seems to be bugged. The included demo for this room meets the condition but isn't awarded the challenge.

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02-24-2019 at 04:21 PM
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Xindaris
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The roach is on (12, 20) when the last of your bombs are destroyed in that demo, not south of it as the challenge scroll states. That's why it's not awarding the challenge. That said, I think I'll amend the challenge's statement+scripting because I think your demo is still a valid way to "do it in two flames".

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02-24-2019 at 05:46 PM
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