Posts made by Hernanduer

This doesn't seem like something that should be allowed.

I don't think that makes much sense. Efficiency is one of the main reasons to upgrade those skills.

I do agree with the REGEN_MINERAL though, it shouldn't be inactive while the mineral is on cooldown.

It appears that if another player's power creep is "visible" to your game instance, it's being added to Game.powerCreeps. The sporadic nature is coming from my observers passively scanning the map...

I don't think other's power creeps should be in my Game.powerCreeps list.

I added a check to set .memory if it wasn't set and I get this interesting error as a result:

Power Creep Processing error Could not set other player's creep memory Error: Could not set other player's creep memory
at Object.set (:40507:23)
at Object.processPowerCreeps (main:12431:18) <-- only part of this that is my code
at Object.module.exports.loop (main:12935:8) <-- only part of this that is my code
at __module (__mainLoop:1:52)
at __mainLoop:2:3
at Object.exports.evalCode (:15990:76)
at Object.exports.run (:30481:24)
at global._init.global._start (:29710:22)

Randomly, some of my power creeps will lose access to their .memory shortcut point to Memory.powerCreeps[name] and I'll receive errors saying "powercreep.memory is undefined." This is not every tick and when it happens it does not affect every power creep.

Not sure when this happened exactly, I think it was with the new UI release. For some reason the forward and back buttons on my mouse (typically buttons 4 and 5) are bound to left click functionality and there's no easy way to quickly navigate through rooms. This is especially annoying when trying to go back and forth between two rooms.

They work fine if I hover the cursor over the URL portion of the browser window, but in the tab itself all I get is dragging on the map view.

Note: this seems to affect Chrome and not Firefox.

@artch said in PTR Changelog 2019-02-01: Power Creeps:

@hernanduer

Definitely still need power creep LOOK and FIND constants, or roll them under the CREEP constants.

FIND_*_POWER_CREEPS should work on the PTR currently, have you checked?

Okay, so that does exist, but it isn't in https://screeps.com/ptr/constants.js which makes it super hard to tell what constants exist. I thought that was the actual file the server used and it always had to contain what is used in game.

Operate_extensions should alleviate this some, but the really low amount of energy moved + the really long cooldown (you can get 5 50 part creeps out of 3 spawns in the time it takes for 1 fill cooldown) makes the skill practically useless and the synergy between the two skills is non-existent.

OPERATE_EXTENSIONS just seems a bit underpowered. I think a better solution is to increase its effect rather than change the mechanics. What do you think is an appropriate value?

One idea is to change its effect to a percentage of all extensions in the room: 20/40/60/80/100% of all extensions in the room are filled rather than some energy amount is sent.

That'll definitely make it stronger, but how will that factor into energy required by the power creep?

Definitely still need power creep LOOK and FIND constants, or roll them under the CREEP constants.

The disparity between operate_extensions and operate_spawn has me worried. I don't ever see a circumstance where calling operate_spawn at level 5 would be useful. The speed up is excellent, but the energy required stays the same and often that is already the primary constraint on how quickly creeps can spawn (3 healers can take quite a while to refill extensions...) Operate_extensions should alleviate this some, but the really low amount of energy moved + the really long cooldown (you can get 5 50 part creeps out of 3 spawns in the time it takes for 1 fill cooldown) makes the skill practically useless and the synergy between the two skills is non-existent.

I have a couple of proposals to alleviate this issue:

1. Change operate_spawn to also reduce energy cost by a similar percentage, but also reduce the percentages. 10/20/30/40/50% reduction in energy cost and build time would make this skill much more useful.
2. Change operate_extensions to instead treat the cargo hold of the power creep as a very large extension. This could be a buff the creep applies to itself (or maybe another creep could be possible too?) where its carry is now accessible to the spawns. The cooldown/duration could be something like 200/100, so you can't always use this, but it's good for a quick boost (also high ops cost? 25-50?) This change would move this skill from practically useless due to its cooldown and extremely subpar performance, to one that would become very useful in the right situations. And better yet, those situations work synergistically with operate_spawn.

Either of these changes would be good and make these skills much more useful. Right now I don't see myself ever using either, even in situations where spawning fast would be desired simply because it won't be possible to keep up with energy demands.

@artch said in PTR Changelog 2019-02-01: Power Creeps:

Update

New feature deployed: experimentation periods. An experimentation period can be activated for 24 hours, during which power creeps are deleted without cost and without delay. Each player has 30 experimentation periods initially, and we will replenish them from time to time when major balance changes occur.

In the current state you have there, this is actually a nice solution for my problem. I understand the need for penalizing re-creation of power creeps too often, and I still disagree with losing power levels, but this seems like a generous solution that still works against anyone trying to abuse the system.

@davaned said in PTR Changelog 2019-02-01: Power Creeps:

Random thought: If you want to start working on goal oriented progress and more onboarding to the game, you could reward all players who reach(ed) 5 GCL with 5 free power levels. That would give players a way of messing around with power creeps and not feeling super locked out. Plays into the "hero" idea where they can get one hero creep, and understand that if they work for it they'll be able to level them up. It's harder to see the value if they don't have a taste of it, and concrete goals are great for player retention.

It's a shift from just a "raw world" type progression, but it's a thought.

Power will be buyable from NPCs on the market and the first few levels are meaningless in amount, so that doesn't really seem like a very useful thing to give for free and break all other "rules" the game has in place.

PowerCreeps aren't showing up under Room.find FIND_CREEPS or the more specific versions.

The PTR API Reference is out of date too, in particular with some constants usage and stating power creeps have indefinite lifespans.

@faff said in PTR Changelog 2019-02-01: Power Creeps:

I reckon the level drop penalty is a very elegant solution. It's functionally similar to proposals for hard timer lockouts but leaves player interaction as part of the system while scaling the penalty with the player's ability to mitigate it.

It's not a level drop, it's a malus to your real level. That means the scale of loss gets greater the more creeps you delete and there is nothing you can ever do to fix it. It's bad design and antithesis to fun or strategy.

@artch said in PTR Changelog 2019-02-01: Power Creeps:

Honestly, I actually think you will be. Not at the start, but your pursuit of perfect optimization will inevitably lead you to the point when your every single PC has slightly modified skills tree and thus slightly modified aspects of behavior, thus effectively becoming unique "characters", unlike regular creeps which all have identical bodies. Otherwise you won't be able to achieve the desired level of optimization, identical builds of PCs won't work as good as highly optimized for given circumstances (rooms, defense/offense balance, neighbors, world location, new secret trade mechanic that will be announced soon).

Can't get to that point if deleting them costs me a usable level. I will absolutely never delete a single one and thus won't ever develop such optimizations.

Permanent loss in a game like this is ridiculous.

Well, you permanently lose almost everything when you respawn.

I have a question for you: have you ever played a persistent world online game with skills/tech trees where you are allowed to reset without cost (i.e. without some permanent loss of resources like gold, credits, skills points, etc)?

I remember the fact you keep your GCL and code being a big deal. You never lose everything when you restart, and levels are supposed to be one of those things.

Sure, some RPGs have costs for reskilling. NEVER are they the levels you're trying to reskill, and they're typically pretty cheap, in the realm of some credits or a special item you can find.

@artch

@artch said in PTR Changelog 2019-02-01: Power Creeps:

@hernanduer Power Creeps are intended to be an RPG element in Screeps. They are not just units, they are heroes. And we'd like to make PCs feel like characters in RPG or heroes in a strategy game, where you don't recreate your character all the time, but develop it towards some build that you planned in advance. Experimenting and optimizing should be done in the planner, not on a real creep. We want players to invest in their PCs, make them valuable static asset rather than dynamically assignable resource.

Why? I have 422 levels right now, I'm not going to be writing individual code for 40+ power creeps; they're going to fit into roles just like normal creeps. I'm not saying the levels should be immediately available again, you could even lock out all the levels someone used (level 25 creep - 25 levels locked) for a few days if they delete a power creep, that prevents someone from immediately switching. Permanent loss in a game like this is ridiculous.

And as in any RPG, you can reset to fix some mistakes, but at a cost. The cost is not super high actually, it's only a day or two of power farming, and it can also be paid with credits, since power will be sold by NPC terminals starting from this release. It feels natural that higher level players should pay more, because their power processing rate is supposedly higher too.

The point is, that's game effort that is gone forever, and the more deletions made, the more expensive they get because power levels are exponential. It's not a fun or strategically valuable mechanic, it's unfair penalization for people who like to optimize.

This doesn't even account for guaranteed post-release balancing of powers. Grace periods won't work, what if someone has to be afk for some period of time? You also won't be able to immediately reset everyone's power creeps using the changed powers, that could break who knows what. Free resets or something?

This stupid permanent loss system just adds so much needless complication while giving absolutely NOTHING in terms of value to play, and in fact takes away from things players feel they have earned.

You should absolutely not permanently lose a power level for deleting a power creep. It should be a temporary level debuff that lasts a week or something, but there is no feasible way in the current system for that to ever work. A little bit of leeway for the first month works for everyone playing now, but what about any new players? Beyond that, since it doesn't reduce your actual power accumulated, recovering that "lost" level will take an exponential amount of time depending on how many levels you already have. It's just not a fair nor reasonable thing in this game, where re-engineering and optimizing is supposed to be prized.

There's a bug on PTR where the memory database was updated yesterday night but the power creep I created before that happened no longer works. I call .spawn and get a 0 response but the creep fails to spawn.

Since power creeps now have timed lives (lame), when will they ever be locked out from spawning?

@stevetrov said in Partial Boosts:

for most usecases its only slightly better than using recycle.

That in lies the problem I suppose. A lot of the functionality here overlaps with recycling.

@poma said in Partial Boosts:

Honestly it feels like increasing the game complexity for edge cases.

I'd argue it's not really adding complication to the end user's code. The (undefined) default would still boost the creep's parts for its entire lifespan. The new variable on boosted parts likely wouldn't affect anyone adversely, and I think it unlikely many even use the existing boost variables on the individual creep parts. This is just an idea to give us more flexibility for creativity, especially since the devs are actively trying to increase the costs of boosts. Perhaps when power creeps come out (hahahahahahha) then this idea will offer greater usability since they have the potential to legitimize many more niches for creeps.

Say you make a huge miner creep that has as much WORK as possible on it. To really cram that WORK in there, you sacrifice the MOVE necessary to move even once a tick on roads. Maybe as little as one move per 3 or 4 ticks. You don't want to boost this miner's move because once it's at the site it's not moving ever again, and that only takes a couple hundred ticks. It really seems like it'd be a waste. But! If we could instead boost a creep temporarily, rather than for the life of the creep, this gets to be a lot more efficient.

I propose changing boostCreep(creep, # of parts) to boostCreep(creep, # of parts, # of ticks)

This would also require adding a Creep.body[].boostRemaining variable to track this value.

boostCreep would now only use a fraction of the boost compound based on either the # of ticks or the creep's remaining life if the parameter is left empty. Energy usage would remain constant to incentivize going for longer boosts as compared to the shorter ones. The scale would work in steps of 50 with 1450-1500 ticks taking 30 compound and 0-50 taking 1 compound.

Well sonny, back in my day, we only had THIRTY parts.

@gankdalf Your calculations are wrong.

8000 energy/300 ticks = ~27 energy/tick 1600 carry/150 tick travel = ~11 energy/tick moving

You'd need about 2.5 carriers/haulers per single mine at a distance of 75 one way to handle that volume of energy. Take 100 parts off for the two miners at home (who need slightly larger carries to not waste ticks transferring to the link). That leaves you 1100 parts for remote mining. With the numbers above, you can mine 7 sources, assuming a miner with 25 work/1 carry/13 move and a carrier of 32/16.

I'm also not sure what you're doing with your power creep calculations. 1 PC should handle 3 mines with 100 distance between them. You need 23 levels to reach level 5 EXTEND_SOURCE. I have the highest power in the game at 329 levels and that's still only 14 operators capable of doing that. That gives me the potential to have 42 extended sources (assuming I do nothing else with these guys), giving me a whopping 210000 energy extra per cycle, or 1.05million per generation (roughly 800k/hour)

So I'll agree with you, I don't really see how this can compare with just getting more rooms.

I like it! Much better and more intuitive, though like others are saying, it took me a little bit to even see the super super tiny lock icon and it's not obvious when they unlock.

It's a little annoying we still have to waste levels taking a base management skill before being able to unlock disrupt terminal, though I do like that you require all 5 levels before cap to be used if you want to cap disrupt terminal. Basically says that's all that creep is going to be the best at, as it should be since that power is very strong. Wouldn't mind seeing one more offensive power though which, with this design, should be soooo much easier to draw up and include. That way we don't have to pick something to include on the offensive creeps that will likely never get proper use.

(Edit: I guess maybe you could give it generate ops? That'd be something for it to do while it's sitting around...)

Another helpful bit of info would be something to tell you what the potential max level for this creep is. And maybe make the current level (of the creep and the powers) a little bigger? They too are really tiny.

@muon said in Flag Bugs.:

However, you can create flags in a room you have vision and then move them to a new position where you lack vision, although this works very inconsistently as @likeafox has mentioned.

The problem is very straightforward. The server doesn't simulate rooms with no active objects. When flags were moved from being objects to serialized assets (some time ago...) they no longer forced the server to simulate that room. Creating a construction site, using an observer to observe the room, or using some other mechanism to make the server acknowledge the existence of that room will make the flags in it visible to your code. Until this is done, any actions done on the flag "object" (which is only generated when the server recognizes the room from real objects and deserializes the flag data) will not be processed because, like I just said, the object doesn't really exist.

This isn't to say that the [Flag NAME] object doesn't exist, just that any modifications done to it are not processed.

Agreed. If anything performance seems to be worse with the change from SVG graphics. Now when you zoom in inside a room the whole page stutters to a halt in chrome. I'm running an r9 280X and 3570k so those aren't the issue and this wasn't really a problem when SVG was in use.

The map view is also pretty bad with larger window sizes. Having the window set to 1440p, it takes about 5 seconds to load all the rooms in the map and just panning around is incredibly slow.

Strangely, firefox seems to have better performance at room level but worse at the map since it freezes the entire window until every room in view is loaded.