Lost connection Odin City (possible bug)

[UpperKEES]

I'm not sure if it's a bug, but I've noticed on several maps that when I fly with Odin City to a different location (but stay connected to the network, indicated by the white lines), I lose 'power' for a brief moment. This causes totems to lose their charge and the storage to lose it's energy (never had the time to watch what happens with packets on their way somewhere). As far as I can see this happens when Odin City gets just out of reach of the last collector, but is still in reach of an other structure (like a relay). Within a fraction of a second the power goes up again, but the damage is already done by then.

Edit: tried it again and I did even have a connection with a collector!

[Karsten75]

Can you make a map that shows the issue?

[UpperKEES]

I've never made a map before, so that won't be the easiest way I guess, but I'll upload a screenshot.

[UpperKEES]

3 screenshots attached:

1. Odin City flying with power
2. Power drop down while clearly connected to the network
3. Power restored while still flying

[Karsten75]

OK, that's interesting. Perhaps an issue with switching between a relay and a connector. Look at this video and you will see that at no time does that happen.  http://alwego.elock.com.pl/cw/special_ops/dd_gump.avi

[UpperKEES]

Yeah, I know that video. I requested it. ;) I've finished Gump on Double Down the same way and didn't encounter this problem. You might think it's because of the wall, but I had the same issue during 'Flying Fortress' (by Apocalypstic) and 'Over high places' (by Alwego) today. In those maps you fly all the time and it happened only once or twice per map, while I was sure there was still a connection. First I thought it was my own mistake, but when I paused and paid attention, I found out the city was connected to the network all the time (at least graphically displayed).

In the second screenshot above ('NoPower.jpg') you can see clearly the white line going from the top left collector to Odin City. The collector that seems to touch the city is connected as well and underneath Odin City is also a (finished) relay. Three connections should be enough you would think. ;)

By the way: the map on the screenshots is called 'Aleville' (by Apocalypstic) and the bug can easily be reproduced. Most of the structures you see are part of the map, so it would cost less than 2 minutes for someone else to test it. You only need to build one collector and one relay.

Edit: added hyperlinks

[Siccles]

Ive had this bug too and as far as I can tell it occurs when flying over walls.

[knucracker]

Bi - zarre....
Very interesting indeed.  I'll take a look at this over the weekend.

[UpperKEES]

That would be great, thanks! :)

A fix would make it possible to finish some maps even quicker.

[knucracker]

Ha.... well there is a line of code in my LOS(Line of sight) function that returns false if the source cell has a wall.  This means that whenever the city if over a wall segment, you'll lose power.  I have no idea why I put that line there.  :)

It might be a left over from when I was going to have all walls act like crazonium walls do currently (block transmission lines).  I obviously decided to not do this in the final game, but this line might have been left over and not caught during QA because of the rare circumstances to observe it.  Of course now that I know about it, I can create a map that amplifies the problem (create a giant block of walls that the city flies over).

I have corrected this, so in the next drop the fix will be in place.  Note that I plan to do another drop that hopefully has support for custom map score posting, so this will be in that drop.  In the mean time, avoid flying the city over walls if you care about dropping power momentarily.

[UpperKEES]

Wow, thanks for your quick solution! I think we can only be happy with a game developer who listens so well to his customers and brings out so many new updates/improvements, so I don't mind waiting for the new release.

Just out of curiosity: why would you call the LOS-function anyway in this situation? Doesn't it only apply to shooting blasters?

[knucracker]

That's a good question and related to why I didn't see this bug before.  I used to not call LOS for connections between structures.  I only started this when I added crazonium walls (since these walls can block connections).  That was when the bug got introduced.

[Aurzel]

i noticed it has the same effect in the custom map when this was brought up, with preplaced buildings, if you put a building on the wall and one on normal ground, they wont be connected, at least now we know why it happens lol

[SPIFFEN]

In the map Stepwise ( http://knucklecracker.com/creeperworld/mapcomments.php?id=509&page= ) ,
the Blasters kill the flow from emitters that is on an lower lvl thru the Crazonium walls .
I placed Blasters on top of the emitters in the start ,
and they did damage the emitters on the other side of the wall ,
when the emitters i caped spawned .
Heres an pic :

[knucracker]

If I follow what you are saying, they aren't shooting through the walls, they are just destroying creeper underneath themselves and when they do this they also damage some creeper nearby (which happens to be on the other side of a crazonium wall).

If so, they yeah... I'm not surprised.  Creeper damage is done against the target cell and then against surrounding cells out to a maximum radius.  This is really an artifact of the way damage is done 'efficiently'.  If I had to check the LOS for each cell that was damaged for each blaster fire, a core i7 overclocked to 4ghz wouldn't even get the job done (at least not in AIR). :)  So this is a case where a necessary performance optimization can produce this effect.

Mythology wise, I could imagine that the Creeper is connected to itself through subspace... so when part of it is damaged nearby creeper is also damaged regardless of physical barriers.  Most of the time it is difficult to see or take advantage of this effect, but in this map you can use it to your advantage.