[NeoLemmix] Save-'em-up Contest #1 (Lemmings Redux)

[mantha16]

Remember to pace yourself by doing up to an hour's maximum per playing session, and not spend three hours in one go like I did.

and even changed skillsets.

wait a minute we are allowed to change the skills we picked

[WillLem]

Remember to pace yourself by doing up to an hour's maximum per playing session, and not spend three hours in one go like I did.

and even changed skillsets.

wait a minute we are allowed to change the skills we picked

Ah, no - I started before the playing phase officially began

[namida]

Just a reminder that there's about a week left until the playing phase closes.

[namida]

The playing phase will close in just over 48 hours. If you haven't submitted results yet, or wish to resubmit, please do so soon.

[namida]

At this stage I have received entries from all participants. There's less than 72 hours left to the deadline anyway, so it still applies as normal - midday on the 26th (UTC). That's just under 14 hours from the time of this post.

[namida]

Entries are closed (as of about 6 hours ago). I'll verify and post results over the weekend.

If any cases are found where a contestant has gone very slightly over the skill limit, and it appears to be accidental, I will allow a short time for them to resolve this. This will not apply in very blatant cases where it would appear the limit was ignored deliberately or through sheer negligence. (Or in other words - if you've used 26 of one skill, I'll point it out and allow some time to correct it. If you've used 40 of every skill, I'll just dismiss your entry as invalid.) To be clear: I'm not saying I've found any such cases; I haven't even looked at anyone else's results yet.

[namida]

Just confirming that I haven't forgotten about this, just haven't been in the right mindset to verify and total up the results yet. To be very clear, I have received everyone's results.

Some things I think I'll change if this runs again:
- Keeping the list of nominations secret until the playing phase actually begins. At least one user took advantage of the final set being predictable and so experimented with various skillsets before entering their selection. This was not a violation of the letter of the rules, but I feel it was a very blatant violation of the spirit of the rules which was that you're meant to select the skillset without full knowledge of what the levels would be - of course, with exactly 20 selected, you'd always know what they'd be but I still feel actually going in and trying a few different sets is pushing it.
- Relying on users to report their own results, on an honesty system. Then, the host only has to determine who's result is best, not what each person's result is.
- The rules around selecting a skillset need revising. I think having some rules here is good, it prevents people just going straight for lots of powerful skills, but I don't know if these ones were optimal.
- On the other hand, I am very happy with the lemming / skill quantities and think that I hit a really good balance on that one.

[WillLem]

Just confirming that I haven't forgotten about this, just haven't been in the right mindset to verify and total up the results yet

Happy to help if you need it; I have a bit of time over the next few days.

Keeping the list of nominations secret until the playing phase actually begins. At least one user took advantage of the final set being predictable and so experimented with various skillsets before entering their selection. This was not a violation of the letter of the rules, but I feel it was a very blatant violation of the spirit of the rules which was that you're meant to select the skillset without full knowledge of what the levels would be

The best way to address this is simply to have everyone submit their skillsets before choosing the levels.

On the other hand, I am very happy with the lemming / skill quantities and think that I hit a really good balance on that one.

Agreed

[Pooty]

Just confirming that I haven't forgotten about this, just haven't been in the right mindset to verify and total up the results yet

Happy to help if you need it; I have a bit of time over the next few days.

I can help out too, namida, if you like.

[namida]

Okay, so an idea came to me just now: Instead of tallying it up, modify NeoLemmix's source code to make a custom version of NeoLemmix to do so.

I've attached that version to this post. Install over an existing copy of 12.10.3 (note that it is based off this rather than 12.11.0, as 12.10.3 was the latest stable version when the playing phase started and thus is also the authoritative version for this contest). It has three key differences to allow it to work for this: It doesn't enforce skill limits (or even their presence / absence in the skillset); when doing mass replay checks it saves info on total lemming and skill counts (in the output text file - it isn't displayed on screen); and it matches levels to replays by title rather than ID.



With regards to results - there is indeed a case where one entrant went over the 25-of-each-skill cap by exactly one skill. There is an additional entrant who completely blew the 25 limit on one skill, as well as using exactly 26 of another.

Had this latter case been the only one, I would have simply disqualified them, but as I did say I would allow a chance to correct entries that were slightly over, I am going to allow an extra one week to get final results in. During this time, all entrants - even if their existing entries meet the requirements - are free to submit improved entries. I have already sent PMs to the users whose entries exceeded the limits; if you have not received one, your entry is fine (but you may still submit a new one just to improve your result, if you want).

The new deadline will be 00:01 UTC on March 13th.

[Proxima]

Just in case it wasn't clear: delete (or move elsewhere) all replays except the one you want to keep for each level (probably the most recent one) before running the mass replay check. Also, if you solved a level but decided that you would prefer not to save any on that level so as to save skills for other levels, you would delete all replays for that level.

[WillLem]

My skillset was:

Spoiler

Jumper - 25
Climber - 14
Stoner - 22
Builder - 25
Basher - 24
Miner - 25
Digger - 25
Cloner - 15

[Pooty]

Namida said on Discord that it is okay to share our skillsets now, if we want to. The number of lemmings we've saved will remain secret for now. I don't mind sharing the skillset I picked, so here it is:

My skill set

Jumper
Stoner
Climber
Builder
Miner
Platformer
Cloner
Basher

[namida]

Namida said on Discord that it is okay to share our skillsets now, if we want to. The number of lemmings we've saved will remain secret for now.

Confirming this is true.

Mine was Jumper, Climber, Glider, Stoner, Builder, Basher, Miner, Cloner.

[Minim]

Shame that the results aren't coming out until the 13th March, considering that the deadline was originally 12th Feb.

Anyway, this is my skillset.

Spoiler

1) Jumper
2) Climber
3) Stoner
4) Builder
5) Fencer
6) Platformer
7) Cloner
8) Digger