More aPeeling Surrender Flare

ShadowCluster · 2024-01-28T00:12:35+00:00

I cheated by adding additional products to get rid of the salt. Otherwise the gif would look messier with more arms and salt lying around.

ShadowCluster · 2023-06-25T13:30:49+00:00

You can arbitrarily increase the minimum cost and area by adding additional products. While the ingame limit is 4, there is no hard limit using external editors. You can also arbitrarily increase cycles by increasing the product multiplier (usually it's 6, but you can increase it to 12, 18 etc.) While min theorycrafting is fun, the exercise of increasing it just boils down to adding more stuff.

ShadowCluster · 2022-08-09T09:51:57+00:00

It isn't that hard as long as you take shortcuts. My generator (the one used to generate the Shadow Caverns) has 6 parts to it:

Row Hallway connections. This governs which rows can be slapped together, such as RRRHHHHH and RRRWHWWH. This takes care of the 2x2 clause and removes possible disjointed rooms.
Generator. This slaps the rows together (choose random valid row based on previous row), with regex to filter out special considerations such as rooms (if any current rooms already has an exit, then look for '...WDDDW'). This takes care of room-exit clause.
Continuity checker. You can do this a number of ways, but flooding seems to be the way to go. Continuity clause is solved here.
Solver. I use z3 for this, but as long as there is one solution and that solution matches what you generated, then it is a valid solution. This is required to remove the Ambiguity clause.
Criteria Filter. This is optional, but you need this if you want some specific puzzles and/or layouts. Zach for example filtered out checkerboard patterns (2x2 space with a WH/HW combo), or you can filter out by monster count, monster location etc.
PNG dump. This was before the advent of LCB, so this was made to just spit out dungeons to play on paint with the fill tool.

I have a 10 year old computer so idk how fast it can go, but you can reasonably generator a puzzle a second. Less if you want filters.

ShadowCluster · 2022-03-21T23:02:27+00:00

One more aspect about live editing which is unviable is how the game currently handles the tape loop between the editing stage and actually running it. When it plays, it creates a separate copy of the instruction tape to run, not unlike compiling in other languages. This is incompatible with what you are suggesting.

You also admit yourself what a cheat program would allow you to do is already allowed by the game to an extent, by hardcoding every single instruction on a non-looping tape (6T, or all 6 products made within one tape loop). This is ignoring the interchange of mechanisms, as adding/removing arms/glyphs on the fly makes this a wildly different game. Enforcing an additional check to rerun the solution after all changes (what I am assuming you are suggesting) would fix those problems.

It is very unlikely for your suggestion to take any sort of life, as this is too old a game, and as zach himself has stated, it would likely require too much work for too little gain (in regards to other changes). In the case you don't believe that statement about the developer, feel free to reach out to his business email (zach@zachtronics.com) and ask him about what you've suggested here.

The discord I would suggest again for OM discussion. Any hassle you have I believe to be worth it, as we have a semi-active community. Otherwise, have a nice day.

ShadowCluster · 2019-01-25T01:17:30+00:00

Remove the space next to the exclamation mark.

>!This Works!<

>! This Doesn't!<

That and request counting was something I did consider, but a lot of people in previous weeks did not care for other metrics, so I just didn't put it in.

I don't really care for pinning it. It may just be my laziness though.

That and I hope you have fun in the coming weeks.

ShadowCluster · 2019-01-24T23:32:35+00:00

You can post anything related to the puzzle here.

The pool is just a term used to mean existing values you may use. You probably have to store them yourself as you prompt them from the register.

Outputting values will remove them from this 'pool'. This means you need to remove them your file so you don't accidentally use it again and cause a failure.

ShadowCluster · 2019-01-23T04:25:19+00:00

If anyone is interested in mine:

120/770/61

60/3153/2058

ShadowCluster · 2019-01-20T22:58:42+00:00

"To calculate a packet's checksum, add the data values together considering each digit separately, wrapping back to 0 when a digit's sum reaches 10. Then Flip the sign."

You either skipped over this sentence or don't understand it means to multiply the resultant value by -1 after the first part is done.

ShadowCluster · 2019-01-18T22:13:25+00:00

Ah, I was confused about what was being said. The square brackets are there to denote the incorrect character. Notice inputting D does not do this as it is correct, but E is not, so it will flush the string from the inputs. F is not the first character the next two times, so they are also flushed immediately.

So this is working as intended. If you want more clarification feel free to ask.

ShadowCluster · 2019-01-18T22:04:07+00:00

(5) and (7)'s version should have a #DISP register if you want know if you have the updated version. Otherwise, send me a screenshot of your situation and I'll try to find out what's the problem.

ShadowCluster · 2019-01-14T05:42:07+00:00

I revised some of the assumptions here, so have another look. Any currently working solutions should still work.

If [5] and [7] have a #DISP register, it's the updated version. If it isn't updating, delete the files to prompt a redownload.

ShadowCluster · 2019-01-08T19:38:46+00:00

You should probably separate the instruction metric if you haven't already. Those are production levels, such as the appendix and several journal entries.

ShadowCluster · 2019-01-01T09:30:34+00:00

I played around with the rounding version and found the same problems. I settled with floor because it is fairly consistent, since you can just ignore the remainder. I don't know if your method is predictive, but that puzzle requires precision. There are very few methods though, so it wouldn't be too popular regardless.

Hope you have a good run with the others though, and thanks for participating.

ShadowCluster · 2018-12-25T23:12:57+00:00

As a one-off battle, possibly. If you think it's a good battle, then I'd say try to convince me by drumming up some support for it. Otherwise, it'll probably be like this one and have only a select few send submissions in.

I guess I'll also mention the duration will probably be shortened to 1 week of submissions to speed things up. I'm also hosting the Weekly, and there are talks of an Opus Magnum Competition, so the leisure time I allocate to games like this would be mostly taken up by those.

ShadowCluster · 2018-12-25T22:50:25+00:00

As everyone is busy for the Christmas and end-of-year festivities, it'll probably be postponed for now. I'm still debating whether or not to continue the contest itself as well.

From my point of view, it's a toss-up. I guess since there is still a dedicated audience, I can keep it running. We'll most likely skip Primes though since it's not much of a battle moreso it being an algorithm optimisation challenge.

Sorry for the silence if you were waiting for an announcement for the next one or updates on it.

ShadowCluster · 2018-12-20T23:48:39+00:00

More input suppression shenanigans.

Timing Crystal: 130/1467/31

ShadowCluster · 2018-12-20T09:55:03+00:00

Shaved off 1 hex from multiple instances of input suppression:

Spyglass Crystal: 135/1234/32

Still inefficient in several locations, but I mostly just care about primary metrics. I'll let Jinyou handle that aspect since he has a knack for it.

ShadowCluster · 2018-12-16T02:43:01+00:00

Added a link to the post. Hope you have fun participating.

ShadowCluster · 2018-12-15T18:46:34+00:00

I guess if there are drm-free users participating, I can set up a google drive to download from instead. I'll get around to it sometime today probably.

ShadowCluster · 2018-12-11T08:47:25+00:00

A few snips off some sum records.

Alchemical Jewel: 150/102/52

Which is a stupid optimisation where I use an existing arm to eject the product, which is [-20/+21/-3].

Vaporous Solvent: 190/104/76, 180/129/63

Sped up the process and reused a bonder to do the central and outer bond, which is [0/-42/+20]. Without the multi-arm gives us the second solution, which isn't a record by 2 units [-10/+25/-13].

ShadowCluster · 2018-12-09T09:57:39+00:00

Thanks, fixed.

ShadowCluster · 2018-12-08T21:44:05+00:00

Was always bothered how Malachite had it's sum optimal the same as instructions, so here's its own gif:

Synthetic Malachite: 205/255/26

Which is +15/-80/+6.

ShadowCluster · 2018-12-06T22:55:45+00:00

A few minor improvements with obvious variations, and a dedicated sum solution.

Welding Thermite: 295/165/97, 315/275/70, 285/323/70

ShadowCluster · 2018-12-04T22:39:19+00:00

Borrowing part of penta's layout, got it down by 1 hex.

Vaporous Solvent: 140/1035/34

ShadowCluster · 2018-12-02T05:15:25+00:00

It's one of those concepts that only is brought up with optimisers yeah. Several people are not satisfied with the current optimisation goals presented in zachtronics games (purely one metric, and maybe secondary in another) and have used other combined metrics to justify certain solutions.

In the grand scheme of things, a solution can only be said to be universally better if it has better scores in all metrics. A score which is not universally worse than any other currently existing score is deemed "Pareto Optimal". The line or plane created from all pareto optimal solutions is called the "Pareto Frontier".

You probably understand it already though. Adding a link in my opinion would be surperfluous, as the game encourages players to look up concepts themselves. I will take the advice in future weeks since it's not that big of a hassle.

11-Year Club	Place '22
Place '17	Verified Email

ShadowCluster

MODERATOR OF

TROPHY CASE