Crane's resignation

[Crane]

It is a sad day that I have to announce this, but I don't think I can design levels any longer.  My theme has always been to use the traditional 8 tools and the original tilesets.  But recently I was introduced to a trick that I never knew existed, but when I brought it up, it turned out that many players knew about it and had decided it wasn't a glitch and was even required to solve some of the levels (which is why I had not solved them).

The problem is, this trick (a Blocker can change the direction of a Digger when a lemming is made a Blocker while inside the Digger's tunnel, even though the Blocker is released a split second later) completely breaks a number of my levels and for one reason or another is impossible to patch (either because a Builder breaks the level in some other way or I can't use a Stoner to turn lemmings around elsewhere because it's not one of the traditional tools), but this was decided to not be a glitch a long time ago, and I can't argue with the logic of how it all works - setting it up so a Digger is not turned would be argued to be an arbitrary exception and will break levels that rely on the trick that was already decided to not be a glitch.

The thing is, I've now revealed that this trick breaks my levels and so will be instantly used to break my Contest 18 submission.  I am completely broken and I simply cannot live with this revelation.  Call it childish if you like, but there's no way I can go on now that I know that this trick exists and I'm also deeply ashamed that it never crossed my mind to try it.  It's too late now.

I'm sorry everyone.  Goodbye.

[Strato Incendus]

Well, sorry to hear that this revelation broke your levels - but how many of them actually depended on diggers and blockers expectedly behaving differently?

I think that I for one may have designed just about half a dozen levels where this specific interaction is relevant.

Especially in the higher ranks of any pack, there are enough levels that don't provide you any blockers at all - even in original Lemmings. In fact, you might remember that is one of the main sources of the increasing challenge from Tricky through Mayhem: the absence of blockers.

If you can't think of a way around running into this interaction, maybe just try to design some levels without any blockers for a while?

[Crane]

When you go by a "Subset" rule and combinations of other tools break the level in more conventional ways, no, I can't get around it. At least two levels were instantly broken upon this revelation and it's unfixable. I spent the whole of last night trying to fix my Contest 18 submission, and this simple trick spits in my face. So accuse me of being childish or not being creative. I don't give a damn. I'm done.

Also the fact that I didn't even think of this trick and its evidently common knowledge means I'm stupid and pathetic and not of this community and I should just kill myself and save everyone the misery.

[Strato Incendus]

Okay, calm down for a minute . I obviously don't know what else might be going on in your life at the moment that broken levels get to you like this, but I'm not here to judge. Let me just dispel one misconception you seem to have:

and its evidently common knowledge

I don't think there's such a thing as common knowledge here on the forums. In fact, at the moment the community seems to be splitting into the experienced players, i.e. those that do possess knowledge of all the obscure tricks, and those who don't. That is precisely one of the problems we're currently discussing with regards to New Formats and only high-difficulty packs being available.

I for one can tell you that I myself got stumped by a level from Nessy due to not knowing of this trick. I won't spoil anything, but it was a certain snow level from Lemmings Migration.

Second, from where do you take the assumption that a certain level of skill, be it at playing or level design, were a requirement to be accepted as a member of this community?

If that were the case, I'd most certainly be standing on the sidelines...

People can enjoy your levels and your packs even if they're easier. In fact, there seems to be growing audience for that, who don't want to constantly frustrate themselves by banging their heads against hardcore puzzles only.

Heck, there are even people who enjoy playing broken and backroute-able levels (nod to Arty? ).

Level design is a playground. Don't feel any pressure to "perform".

[namida]

To add to what Strato is saying - subset is an extremely restrictive rule. In normal conditions, where you're just making a level with no further limitations, backroutes are usually addressed via terrain changes - either something becomes steel or one-way, or some terrain is added / removed altogether. Or perhaps by adding traps or other objects that interfere. None of these options are available when working under the conditions of the "subset" rule, so backroutes will always be exponentially harder - if not downright impossible - to fix under such a rule. The only options you really have are time limit or skillset reductions, which are often last-resort tactics for dealing with backroutes and generally won't solve most of them. It may be best to look at some kind of more-general challenge you can present (eg: "solve this level without the bashers or diggers") than a specific exact solution, while under such requirements.

[Crane]

None of those are options. The blocker trick completes the level faster than the intended solution, and builders break the level in other ways. I also am dumb and stupid because of these common knowledge tricks that mean I can't complete Rhapsody in Blue even after 5 years. I cannot compete with you. I cannot hope to be a good designer, ever.

Also, I hate the new skills. All of them. I'm a traditionalist that makes me the sworn enemy of everyone who isn't over 60. True, you don't know what else is going on in my life, but I'm not going to be selfish and moan about details. Everyone has problems, so suck it up, get over it and earn yourself a life and don't be a parasite. Of which I am.

It's true, I cannot live with myself. So I am gone.

[Proxima]

We had a long discussion of this in discord, so I just want to quickly make a couple of points that weren't made there.

It's not exactly accurate to say this trick was decided not to be a glitch (and yes, I know that I was the one who used that word). We don't have any kind of ruling body that decides what's a glitch and what isn't. In the case of the digger-blocker trick, it was first discovered by ccexplore and referred to as the "Wild 15 glitch" -- this was a period of the forum's history when glitches were kept secret, often because their finders wanted to make levels requiring the glitch to stump people with. Then, when it became known that "Wild 15 glitch" referred to the digger-blocker trick, there was a little discussion, and those involved came to the conclusion that it shouldn't be classed as a glitch -- but again, "those involved" were a tiny subset of the forum. And at the time, the glitch/non-glitch distinction was only relevant for whether a solution got the "glitch" tag in challenge topics. The main level creation tool was Lemmix, which aimed to mimic the behaviour of DOS Lemmings precisely, glitches and all -- and it was considered perfectly acceptable for levels to rely on glitches in their solutions. (After all, we didn't know then that anyone would ever go to the effort of making a glitch-free Lemmings clone.)

Nowadays, things are very different, with both NeoLemmix and Lix aiming to be glitch-free. So it is intended behaviour that the digger-blocker trick works in both programs. However, there has never (to my knowledge) been a real debate over whether this mechanic should be kept or not; it's just there because it's always been there and it's never really been questioned.

* * *

While I wouldn't say I hate the new skills, I am firmly in the traditionalist camp, as you can see from my pack-in-progress GemLems, which uses only the 8 original skills, no new object types, predominantly the original tilesets, and even eschews vertical-scrolling levels. You are not alone

* * *

Rhapsody in Blue was designed way back when I had far less experience (well, the mere fact that it's a Cheapo level serves to date it), and so the original lose-3 version was hopelessly backroute-ridden. Once I discovered the digger-blocker trick, I realised that incorporating it into the intended solution would make it lose-2, which would fix all the "Compression Method" type backroutes at a stroke. I preferred a backroute-free version using an obscure trick over a backroute-ridden version without the trick. That's an aesthetic preference and I accept that you might feel differently. But note that the version with the trick is, of necessity, much harder, which is why it's in the last rank of the Lix community pack (the Cheapo version was never in a pack, so its difficulty was never ranked against other levels). The Hopeless rank -- and even the penultimate rank, Vicious -- includes many other levels that use similarly obscure tricks as deeply hidden parts of the solution. That's why this rank is only for experts, and in five years I still haven't completed half the levels. So you are definitely not "dumb" because you didn't solve it for yourself. (Also, it took me roughly ten years to solve Insane Steve's "Attack of the Subconscious".)

Also in the Hopeless rank are "Behind Bars", which was a layout I found in a set of levels I made on paper when I was 9, that happened to have the potential for a decent puzzle; "Path of Wickedness", which is just one of Insane Steve's levels where I found a solution with 2 or 3 of each skill so I trimmed the skillset to alternating 2s and 3s; "Labyrinth of Despair", which is similarly taken from a namida level and has 3 of each; "You only get one bash at it", which came about from the discussion of a one-way widget in one of mobius's levels; and "The Continuum Hypothesis", which shamelessly rips off "I am A.T."

In other words, all my difficult levels have come about by chance or through borrowing from other designers. I can never compete with people like Nepster and namida who seem to effortlessly produce really high-quality difficult levels, or Nessy, who makes levels that look absolutely gorgeous.

I'm not going to give up, though. I keep telling myself that maybe one day I'll get there.

[namida]

Nowadays, things are very different, with both NeoLemmix and Lix aiming to be glitch-free. So it is intended behaviour that the digger-blocker trick works in both programs. However, there has never (to my knowledge) been a real debate over whether this mechanic should be kept or not; it's just there because it's always been there and it's never really been questioned.

To add to this, I mentioned this in Discord but - the logic, at least for me in the case of NeoLemmix, was that this behaviour is what results from the digger and blocker simply following their completely expected behaviours, just in a somewhat unusual setup. Should something different happen, this would then be a deviation from the normal rules - either a special case of "a blocker cannot be assigned near a digger", or a special case of "diggers are not affected by blockers". Now, sometimes this is justified - and there are cases in NeoLemmix that have special rules (the most obvious would be how some states turn to an ohnoer when the bomber is assigned, while others go straight to an explosion) - but in this case, I didn't see one as being justified.

[Simon]

-- Simon

[grams88]

I like that one Simon

Sorry to hear that one Crane, you might be feeling at a lost but give it a bit of time, I think it can be hard to come up with a certain solution and it does feel bad sometimes when that solution gets backrouted in a way that you don't expect maybe it was because of a trick.

I think I might be a traditionalist eight skill person myself, my level pack is the eight skills, I have not really deviated much from that at the moment myself

I don't like seeing people getting upset about things. I think sometimes it might be best if we do take a break from things as sometimes we can feel overwhelmed and even when it comes to lemmings thinking of level ideas can be quite difficult at times.

[Crane]

Me taking a break won't change anything. The fact is that the trick breaks many of my levels, including two of my subset levels, the fact I accidentally revealed that the trick breaks my contest 18 submission thereby permanently tainting it, and the fact that the trick was known for 15 years but I was too stupid to think of it myself, along with the discovery that it's common knowledge to the point that IchoTolot is happy to show it off to rub it in my face even though there's a steel floor beyond the digger and he has a spare bomber and a lemming he's allowed to lose.

And novice players like myself won't be able to solve my level, so will watch a video of it being solved, see the trick and downvote it in anger that I dare use such an obscure trick. I am stupid. Stupid.

[IchoTolot]

I go to sleep and to university and meanwhile everything burns

...along with the discovery that it's common knowledge to the point that IchoTolot is happy to show it off to rub it in my face even though there's a steel floor beyond the digger and he has a spare bomber and a lemming he's allowed to lose.

As a reference: Crane pm'd me a level to solve which he was originally thinking about submitting. I solved the level using said digger+blocker trick and had a skill and a lem to spare as a result, so I pm'd him my solution with the description that before I give any feedback I want to know if this is intended.
Text inside my pm :

Well, first I need to know if this is intended.

Regarding the resignation topic as this is not the first time I hear this shoutout in despair from forum members, here is my viewpoint in general:

People need to not take things as backroutes, criticism and the inability to solve certain levels quickly personally or purely negative. This will otherwise inevitably lead into despair and resignation. This sounds hard, but letting the things get to your mind results in sadness.

Don't let anger clutter your mind!

Regarding backroutes:

Crane, your levels have backroutes because of a trick you just discovered. You've got 2 options as a result:

    - Let it be and don't concern yourself with the backroute.

    - Fix the backroute and this leaves you again with 2 options:

        - Change the level so the backroute trick is not possible anymore. As I suspect that the digger+blocker trick in this case is more efficient than your solution this will probably be impossible.

        - Adapt the intended solution so that it can incorporate the backroute fully or to a certain degree. I have made use of this option a lot and the recent 7.4 United update is a testament to that.

If your level results in being "too easy" as a result from incorperating the backroute, maybe redfine it as a trick introduction level and make a different level as your contest entry.

Don't despair! Relax and try to think clearly, then come up with a suitable solution.

Regarding criticism:

Take it or leave it. Yes, you have the option to not adapt according to it. Still the negative feedback is very valuable for optimising your content in general, but in the end if you have another viewpoint nobody can force you to deviate from that, even if their point is supported by strong arguments.

Regarding not being able to solve levels or discovering tricks:

This doesn't make you stupid in any way! Intelligence is not measured in the ability to solve or create Lemming levels. It might take you way longer to solve certain levels than other people, but who cares?

Play what you can solve and if you hit a roadblock you can still keep on trying while moving on.

[Crane]

As you've probably already seen though, the backroute is near impossible to fix in my submission, given I've submitted 3 versions already, and now this trick is revealed to me that just blows the level to kingdom come.

I cannot introduce this trick because I would have never in a million years thought of it, which makes me stupid compared to you, and yes, there are levels that incorporate the trick, like Rhapsody In Blue, which I was never able to solve, which makes me stupid again.

So no, I can't take criticism, nor live with myself with this revelation and the fact that my resignation is seen as a joke because you've seen others react this way, hence I'm just to be dismissed, ignored or laughed at.

I am stupid for not thinking of this trick myself, and not knowing about for FIFTEEN years. And I don't know what you class as intelligence, but my skills outside of Lemmings are ridiculed because I'm deemed to be an insufferable nerd while my skills are of no value in the workplace because they're outdated and scare other programmers. I'm also unemployable anyway.

And I can't self-terminate no matter how much I want to, because I'm a coward.

And who cares? I care, my parents care, and every support worker and doctor who believes (correctly) that I won't amount to anything, and every employer who will pass me up for someone more reliable and less abnormal.

[Crane]

The thing is, I can't in good conscience endorse this trick because the leap in logic is beyond me even as part of an introductory level (I would have not worked it out even in level with just a Digger, Blocker and Basher), but the trick exists and is known by the community save myself, and the trick destroys far too many of my levels that use the traditional skills. But it's been proven before that what I think is irrelevant and also what I think is abnormal and perverted, so my opinion is worthless. So there is nothing else for me to do. I'm excluded from this community because I don't know a well-known trick and I'm even criticised for not using custom music because I stick with tradition.

[Crane]

But me saying "I can't endorse this trick" will just lead you to say "well we do, live with it" and just paint me as a temper-tantrum-throwing child that deserves even more ridicule that I'm sure you'll happily pay a penny to laugh at when I'm finally thrown into an asylum and artificially kept alive because I provide a source of income. At least I'll be finally useful to the world.