(Suggestion) LMS time limit

[Xhatahx]

LMS fights can last a bit too long at the end, especially with bots. I suggest that when the boss music starts, a timer begins. When that timer hits 0, everyone left dies and the game will be tied.
I thought about simply draining health away, but then the player with more health can just stall the game until the other one dies.
Good idea?

[Russel]

Timelimit exists in Zandronum that automatically wins the person with the highest health value in LMS.

Additionally, a hard coded solution of this style could potentially make rounds feel arbitrary. If there is no victor, what was the point of the round? Nothing was accomplished.
Just forcing a round to a close isn't a good way to approach this situation, I feel. Such an approach feels arbitrary and meaningless.

I'll leave this where it is for now to keep a tab on discussion but I don't think this is going in.

[Orange juice :l]

I would definitely prefer a softer approach that encourages if not forces players to fight each other. A passing idea I had was a "floor is lava" type thing wherein a safe-zone is randomly selected and as time goes on the areas farthest from it would inflict damage over time. This wouldn't kick in for quite a while, scaling with the number of players. Of course, this is something I'd rather see as a toggle/pwad. Could thematically fit in as if roboenza is seeping into the map or somesuch?

[CutmanMike]

This has been a problem in LMS since the days of GVH (and probably before that) and I still haven't seen a suggestion that seems feasible enough to work on every map without involving one player randomly winning. OJ's suggestion is on the right track though, something that forces players to find and kill each other should be the way to go. Implementation of that idea is the problem. However even then I don't know if we would necessarily want it in core as the default option.

[MusashiAA]

How about making health and ammo pickups never respawn again after being collected, once there are only two players left?

I think OJ's idea of "roboenza seeping into the map", damaging players that are inside areas filled with "roboenza", and forcing players into a "central area", is on the right track. The problem lies in redesigning maps to fit such notion, and to create the LMS-only scripts necessary for it, if even possible.

[CutmanMike]

Perhaps it could pick a random DM start, then a damanging circle slowly starts closing in around it (starting at a massive range to compensate for big maps).

[TheDoc]

I don't understand why the current timelimit counter wouldn't suffice.

[Dittoman]

I don't understand why the current timelimit counter wouldn't suffice.

It's because the time counter doesn't work in (Team) Last Man Standing. I learned this the hard way; I've had to restart several fights over because bots got stuck after I died and the match never ended.

[Orange juice :l]

My idea is partially drawn from other games that have used a similar technique so I'm going to mention some of the pros and cons. Often this will reward people not only for being able to kill the opponent once they actually know where they are, but also for being able to hold their ground. Optimally you won't know where the roboenza safe-zone is until either a solid amount of time has passed or you receive more map knowledge- either exploring the bounds or getting teammate callouts. Once you know the sweet spot, you can "dig in" and fend off everyone else. Tactics become much more important and playing around the roboenza leak could be a legitimate strategy.

On the other hand, it's important to know when to stop. If the roboenza safe zone is something like 3 megamans wide, then whoever has the close range weapon wins. Make it too small and I'd much rather just tank the health drain than get in close. So what do we do then, increase the damage so you can't just no-sell the major mechanic? This creates a sketchy balance arms race and it's much safer to make it as least-intrusive as you can while still accomplishing its original goal of time-limiting LMS matches. If one guy has full hp, maybe he deserves to shoot the 1HP fish in that tiny barrel from outside.

Unrelated, but when it comes to LMS changes, I also recall an idea Muzaru came up with once that would reward players with Points for dealing damage/kills in an FFA/3+team LMS game. Points could be spent on upgrades, stat restores, etc.. This rewards players for being proactive and killing rather than hanging back and waiting for the mexican standoff to end.

[Xhatahx]

Maybe the best option is the one I rejected at the start: The players have their health drained.
But instead of just having it while the boss music is playing, how about having it drain all the time, at the rate of 1 health every (1.15 to the power of the amount of players in game) seconds?
It's simple(somewhat), the one with more skill(hopefully) wins most of the time, and it works even if more than 2 players are stalling.

[CutmanMike]

http://cutstuff.net/forum/index.php?topic=10599.new#new Check this out

[Hilman170499]

Actually, making it a mod is a good idea, because like it or not, not everyone would enjoy a new LMS system that forces them to potentially change play styles(read: some like to play as ambushers).

[Xhatahx]

...which makes my suggestion sound better when I think about it.

Code: [Select]

script 115 OPEN
{
if(ACS_ExecuteWithResult(975,0)!=2){terminate;} //Is this LMS? If not, abandon ship
if(PlayerCount()<9)
{
Delay(34);
    for (int a=1000; a<1033; a++)
    {
Thing_Damage(a,1); //Take 1 HP away from everyone, may be adjusted
}
}
if(PlayerCount()==1){terminate;} //Is the game done? If so, abandon ship
delay(1);
restart; //Lather, rinse, repeat
}
Also, exponents are bullshit, so my old suggestion falls flat.
How will it deal with stalling? You don't know if the other player has higher HP than you, so it's not certain whether you'll win against them. That's really the best I have.

[Ru5tK1ng]

It's because the time counter doesn't work in (Team) Last Man Standing. I learned this the hard way; I've had to restart several fights over because bots got stuck after I died and the match never ended.

Unfortunately, that's a root cause of a lot of problems with TLMS game modes. I don't know how long it's been broken for, but I know at least since Zan 1.3. Mods like GvH and ZDoomWars drag on forever when played in Teams as a result.

There is a tracker ticket about it here: http://zandronum.com/tracker/view.php?id=2048

However due to the lack of discussion, it seems only a handful of people mind that the timer is broken.

[CutmanMike]

Moving to rejected since this is something to do with Zandronum itself, and I've made an external option to tackle this.