Custom Map #3873: Mighty Plant. By: MxGoldo

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This topic is for discussion of map #3873: Mighty Plant


Author: MxGoldo
Size: 128x84

Desc:
Fight against a single Emitter that corrupts a peaceful heavily scripted lifeform. #CRPL #CustomEnemy #Beams (many) #NoDigitalis #NoRunners

[KingGladiator88]

I cannot come up with any way to beat this map.

If you ignore the enemy creeper and try to terp the mountain range the flowers spread and you are overwhelmed.

If you rush the flowers with beams as soon as possible you still will get some flowers that spead into the middle of the pool out of range of the beams.

Once a flower starts to spread it is impossible to stop it because each one is a 15 emitter. It makes too large a creeper pool to get every seed with beams.

I tried 7 times to beat this map and every time i end up with a bunch of flowers in the top right of the map I cant reach so they spread exponentially.

In 6 minutes give or take I am getting a few hundred creeper pumped out a second. I don't have the energy to put up a defense that quickly.

I also tried getting a bertha up to try to get the creeper pool down but I am overwhelmed before it can even finish building.

With this much creeper spread You're forced to put your beams as close to the creeper as possible to get as many seeds to prevent them from spreading.

I'm having a hard time keeping them alive since they have so little HP they are dead within a couple seconds when the creeper hits it, and the -1AC flowers cant keep a defensive line to fight against the +15 flowers. And losing a beam with full ammo is a lot of energy invested on a map that by design absolutely requires perfect energy management.

Trying to use the forge to increase range doesn't help much since you can only increase range once and the 1 totem doesn't put out enough aether to keep upgrading.



Basically, we need more energy on the map, or the creeper flowers need to spread more slowly, or we need more aether to get forge upgrades, or beams need MUCH more HP.


EDIT:

The fact that you can't build over friendly flowers makes trying to reinforce an area impossible as well after a certain amount of time has passed since I can only put 1-2 beams in range of enemy flowers.

Also, uneven terrain makes it harder to place defenses. Terps are too expensive and too slow to terraform so you lose a lot of time/energy trying to make an area you can build cannons and mortars on.

[GoodMorning]

A very nice map. The first I will put a rating on.

That said, allowing building under friendly flowers would be nice (if you reuse this script).

One way to win, KingGladiator88:

Spoiler

Build power, pre-build two Beams and a few weapons. Get a Forge for build speed, and possibly energy production. For an even easier time, get the two AoO (Conversion).
Nullify Emitter. Move the weapons a little, add a Beam to the PZ. Nullify the one, perhaps two, seeds which land. By the time the seeds have landed, you should have an almost-finished Nullifier placed for the first flower, which will have wilted.
Converting as required, done by 5min. (Creeper flowers can be killed with AC. Hello, AoO.)

Note: Flowers may appear earlier or later. Nullify the Emitter quickly enough, and you may not have to face the flowers at all.

[close]

Nicely written scripts, too.
(Note: The mutation function will cause an evolutionary process toward faster growth.)
It looks like you have the same reusability mindset for scripting that I do.
The scripts read like a lecturer teaching Python to undergraduates (very clear, much refined).
However, it's a bit of a shock, seeing warp notation, frequent and explicit comments, and non-minimalist variable names.
A pleasant surprise, largely, but a surprise nonetheless.

A side thought:
On seeing reverse Polish for the first time, warp notation is invaluable, making it read more like function(param) in other languages.
After working in unwarped RP for a while, seeing warp notation (especially in conditionals) makes the code more difficult to read.

Another side thought:
I wonder how many people start CRPL with a script for Emitters which build Emitters? It seems to be more than random chance would dictate.

[MxGoldo]

A very nice map. The first I will put a rating on.

That said, allowing building under friendly flowers would be nice (if you reuse this script).

Thanks for the kind words.

I thaught, it wouldn't be necessary to allow building on friendly flowers because they die after a short while. Instead of just allow building on friendly flowers I think of killing the friendly flower if there center is under another building.

Balancing was rather difficult. Perhaps it ended up a bit too hard.

A fast way:

Spoiler

Place CN close to the AoO (Conversion) on the lower right. Get it with collectors. Build more collectors to get close to the emitter. Build a Mortar and a Cannon. Once built use the AoO on the Emitter. Build one more collector to move the mortar in range of the emitter.  Build a nullifier and protect it with the Cannon

[close]

One possible long way:

Spoiler

First build power, Collectors and later Reactors. collect the AoO.
Build the Forge for Weapon range and energy efficiency
There is a Aether Resource Pack hidden in the white on the Mountain
Start building Beams and a few Mortars along the Mountain. To protect the entrance from the river a Cannon or two in addition to Mortars and many Beams are enought. At this stage the Beams are mainly to prevent creeper flower seeds from entering your base.

Build Terps to flatten the top of the mountain.
The flower seeds only target Terrain levels 2 - 7. It helps if you Terp the Mountain broader at a Terrain level of 8.
You can use Sprayers to collect AC inside your base.

Now slowly expand by building new weapons. Nullifie the Emitter and build a Beam on the PZ.
The AoO (Conversion) helps to clean the rest of the world faster. Keep in mind that every friendly Flower that dies by creeper has a chance of about 30% to convert into a creeper flower.

[close]

[chwooly]

Not an easy map but interesting none the less. I would like to see more of these however, balance needs to be played with, If you don't get a win quick it seems you can't win at all.

[RrR]

If you don't get a win quick it seems you can't win at all.

I went for, and got, the slow win. You need a lot of energy to power all those beams. Eventually, the creeper flowers have a reproduction rate < 1 and you can start to advance. I should have made more use of the AoO and I just allowed AC to accumulate in my base, which probably wasn't the most productive.

[toolforger]

An even easier (quicker) way to win:

Spoiler

• Build enough energy to power the next steps. Filling the plateau with collectors will do.
• Reach the Conversion artifacts with relay. Start this early, after the first few collectors.
• Set up cannons to prevent the buildup of large minimally-creeped areas. This is essential to prevent the creeper from corrupting trees. Maybe also some mortars (I used them), but that's actually counterproductive when using the converters.
• Nullify once you're confident you can build the nullifier before the emitter overflows it.

[close]

It's Game Over if a single seed gets corrupted, but it will give you one of those 2-minute scores.

[toolforger]

@MxGoldo: Exponential growth cannot be balanced. I see from comments that it's indeed more like a saturation curve, so kudos for that, but if there's nothing that shows the player that it is, they will see the exponentialness and despair, and probably not even try.