negative score artifacts, zero-cost artifacts, and their uses

[jepler]

I noticed (after upgrading my map editor from 0336 to 0439) that it's possible to assign a negative score to an artifact.

This would make sense in levels that present themselves as "trainers", and as a way to make the level score about more than obtaining a speed run (and possibly spending enough energy to dig out a hard-to-reach artifact for extra points): you get to choose between a higher base score or whatever resource (energy, ore, technytes) is encased in the artifact.  And presumably somebody will use the comms to announce that you're a wimp for needing those resources...

For instance, in a simple level I crafted with a slow-starting emitter and a -1000-point crystal, you have a choice of winning in 0:17 but with a score of 8,951 by taking the crystal so you can build a nullifier quickly, or with a time of 0:39 and a score of 9,892 if you don't touch the crystal and just wait for the nullifier to build from the LS's energy production.

It's worth noting that a 0-cost artifact can be claimed as long as it's not in ground, even if it's not in beacon range, not reachable through empty squares, or is covered by creeper.  This could be used in puzzle levels (you can't destroy that emitter yet, it needs to erode down to that artifact; or the same for an artifact to be dug out by a gate's activity) or possibly even trainer/tutorial-type levels ("looks like you're having some trouble; here's extra resources to help you" after failing to win for 5 minutes; but is it possible to trigger a message just because some terrain got dug out and the artifact became clickable?)

As an enhancement: it should be permitted to skip picking up a tech artifact with a negative score and/or with a zero cost; as it is, you can't employ this negative score scheme to penalize the score of a player who opts to use a certain unit type, because you're forced to pick it up to end the level.

Hm, does this apply to a 'collect all capsules' level?  no, you can leave tech artifacts uncollected there.  good to know! so you can use this trick now in collection missions, just not obliteration missions.

Apologies if these are old ideas that has been used in levels already; I haven't noticed it in any custom map I've played to date.

[Ebon Heart]

I like your point here, and one thing I've been wanting for a while is time based messages. I.E. at x frames/seconds/minutes, you get a message... or something like that. And if you're interested in a map that makes good use of these features, look at Kithros' map, buried alive.

[Kithros]

My map (Buried Alive, map 675) makes heavy use of the negative point gems - but it's not a good map for the casual player since even with the gems it seems like it turned out quite hard (I'm a terrible judge of difficulty :/). It can give a good idea of some of the uses of them aside from simply allowing people to get extra resources though, mostly by making use of the fact that you can't build an ore rig over a gem, so taking a gem can allow you to reach certain areas of the map that would otherwise be unreachable.



As far as allowing techs, it can potentially work, but only in some maps. The idea would be to have the tech reachable playing normally, but only after the map is basically already over (ie. under the highest intensity emitter usually), and then you would have another entrance blocked by an ore block, and you put a negative score crystal in front of the ore block. A bit awkward, and won't work on all maps depending on their layout, but it's better than nothing.