On levelling up and receiving upgrades to the passive mapping mutation, the game will take an extremely long time to respond, around 30-45 seconds.
On my core2 3.0gz, 2gigs of ram, vista computer.
Working as designed - gaining levels of passive mapping requires re-evaluating the maps for the entire dungeon, which takes time. Same issue as good god piety ranks, abandoning gods, and death. We have a general improvement planned, but it's not in the 0.6 agenda.
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I use a circa 2001 no-name computer with a single 2GHz P4; for me, the longest freeze is five seconds. Something else must be going on to explain this backwardness? -sorear
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I agree with jpeg here. Here, I am not talking about performance issues, only gameplay:
If mapping works retroactively, this encourages players to look through all levels already visited, checking for a mapping effect.
If mapping only works on current levels, players might feel encouraged to re-visit some levels. That is not ideal either, but altogether better, I find.
If we think that neither is desirable, we could also rule that mapping can only come into effect on new levels but that's a bit of a crutch.
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I only thought about gameplay. If passive mapping is not retroactive, then players are encouraged to farm explored levels to try and get more mutations faster. DD are hurt especially since they gain passive mapping at predictable levels - I want to get a better idea of what's on D:7, and I'm level 8 (50 to go), I'll just hold down 5 until something spawns.
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This seems harmless to me. The only grinding you should worry about is where the benefit is open-ended. In the case of a finite benefit like this, it's harmless.
Also, note there are many game situations where, if you are close to gaining a level, you might wait for a spawn on an explored level before continuing, like if there is a spell you will be able to memorize. Magic mapping doesn't create any special problem here as far as I can see.
Lemuel
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Also, couldn't we solve sorear's concern by making
(a) the Mapping start at XL 2, with radii increasing
(b) the results fully deterministic: ie. which squares on level X with XL Y will be revealed is calculated, not rolled?
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I like the current (sorear's) mechanic. It doesn't force you to get back and re-explore everything, and keeps players from micromanaging their xl vs dungeon level.
The current 1-2 sec pause when gaining the mutation can be easily removed by postponing remap (and god abandonment effects) until the next time a given level is loaded. Why that delay can be as bad as 30-45 seconds on a beefy machine when on an ancient 2.4Ghz Celery it's fast is probably a bug somewhere...
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Sorry, I was being unclear. When I said I don't like the effect to happen retroactively I meant what others have suggested: postponing remap until the level is revisited.
I would not want mapping having no effects on levels you'd seen previously; I just don't like the idea of someone fiddling through the X[] commands to check for mapping effects. If you are looking for something, say the entrance to a branch, you're going to revisit the levels anyway, and it makes total sense for the mapping to kick in once you enter the level, rather than as soon as you gain the mutation.
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Working as designed - gaining levels of passive mapping requires re-evaluating the maps for the entire dungeon, which takes time. Same issue as good god piety ranks, abandoning gods, and death. We have a general improvement planned, but it's not in the 0.6 agenda.
So THIS is what happened to me before. I thought the game had crashed, and was just about ready to kill it when it suddenly resumed again.
If it's working as designed then it's clearly not designed very well. No game should freeze for 30+ seconds, that's ridiculous.
I use a circa 2001 no-name computer with a single 2GHz P4; for me, the longest freeze is five seconds. Something else must be going on to explain this backwardness? -sorear
Maybe it depends on the numbers of level you've seen by this point? Also, tiles could take longer.
And I still disagree on the idea that you map levels retroactively.
jpeg
I agree with jpeg here. Here, I am not talking about performance issues, only gameplay:
If mapping works retroactively, this encourages players to look through all levels already visited, checking for a mapping effect.
If mapping only works on current levels, players might feel encouraged to re-visit some levels. That is not ideal either, but altogether better, I find.
If we think that neither is desirable, we could also rule that mapping can only come into effect on new levels but that's a bit of a crutch.
I only thought about gameplay. If passive mapping is not retroactive, then players are encouraged to farm explored levels to try and get more mutations faster. DD are hurt especially since they gain passive mapping at predictable levels - I want to get a better idea of what's on D:7, and I'm level 8 (50 to go), I'll just hold down 5 until something spawns.
sorear-
This seems harmless to me. The only grinding you should worry about is where the benefit is open-ended. In the case of a finite benefit like this, it's harmless.
Also, note there are many game situations where, if you are close to gaining a level, you might wait for a spawn on an explored level before continuing, like if there is a spell you will be able to memorize. Magic mapping doesn't create any special problem here as far as I can see.
Lemuel
Also, couldn't we solve sorear's concern by making
(a) the Mapping start at XL 2, with radii increasing
(b) the results fully deterministic: ie. which squares on level X with XL Y will be revealed is calculated, not rolled?
I like the current (sorear's) mechanic. It doesn't force you to get back and re-explore everything, and keeps players from micromanaging their xl vs dungeon level.
The current 1-2 sec pause when gaining the mutation can be easily removed by postponing remap (and god abandonment effects) until the next time a given level is loaded. Why that delay can be as bad as 30-45 seconds on a beefy machine when on an ancient 2.4Ghz Celery it's fast is probably a bug somewhere...
Sorry, I was being unclear. When I said I don't like the effect to happen retroactively I meant what others have suggested: postponing remap until the level is revisited.
I would not want mapping having no effects on levels you'd seen previously; I just don't like the idea of someone fiddling through the X[] commands to check for mapping effects. If you are looking for something, say the entrance to a branch, you're going to revisit the levels anyway, and it makes total sense for the mapping to kick in once you enter the level, rather than as soon as you gain the mutation.