Autotravel, Known terrain features, and Leaked Info
Posted: Sunday, 25th September 2022, 14:20Hey everyone.
TLDR: Autotravel is a pillar of the game. Some minor cases where it could be better integrated.
Long ago the 3 pairs of staircases used to not show that they were "known" stairs at the other end. This caused the optimal tedious behaviour to go them up/down to manually check and note those. This was obviously annoying so got changed to the current system. There are a number of cases similar to this that still employ the annoying old behaviour. Some simple changes could empower autotravel slightly, for elegance and design goal compliance, by converting to the "known on sight" system.
Case 1: Teleporters in most teleportvaults break autotravel until manually used. Its most often 2 TPs, no hidden info. This concerns a new temple design too, with 4 TPs: need to manually travel to your chosen gods altar, autotravel doesn't work.
Gauntlet layout: TPs there are also linear Almost everyone fully explores Gauntlet anyway.
Solution: Make those "known" TPs on seeing them.
Case 2: Magic Mapping: A timed portal message followed by MM. No matter how many portals there are on the map, I can't "X >" (map, go downstairs) those. This is supposed to avoid information leakage; empty shops/arches/ and abyss/hell/pan portals can confound this, but if there's only 1 portal I want to be able to travel there.
This also applies to eg. MM -> temple. MM on D:4-D7 reveals the golden downstairs ">" (console); but will not autotravel there, claiming to not know where it is.
Solution: This can be solved by changing the default: it should be possible to autotravel to all arches by going "X >". This still avoids info leakage while allowing rapid autotravel.
Case 3, more complex, debatable:
Escape hatches: autotravel catches these only after using them. So just for orb escape you should use all upwards hatches.
Strategic teleporters in levels: we've seen a number of teleporters in ordinary dungeon levels, not in closed vaults, to make strategic use of. Autoexplore doesn't use or catch those; and I think it should in some way?
Solution: nothing as easy as the other two and not Maybe on Orb pickup: "The dungeons secrets reveal themselves, you know the fastest way now" - and make hatches/TPs known after that.
TLDR: Autotravel is a pillar of the game. Some minor cases where it could be better integrated.
Long ago the 3 pairs of staircases used to not show that they were "known" stairs at the other end. This caused the optimal tedious behaviour to go them up/down to manually check and note those. This was obviously annoying so got changed to the current system. There are a number of cases similar to this that still employ the annoying old behaviour. Some simple changes could empower autotravel slightly, for elegance and design goal compliance, by converting to the "known on sight" system.
Case 1: Teleporters in most teleportvaults break autotravel until manually used. Its most often 2 TPs, no hidden info. This concerns a new temple design too, with 4 TPs: need to manually travel to your chosen gods altar, autotravel doesn't work.
Gauntlet layout: TPs there are also linear Almost everyone fully explores Gauntlet anyway.
Solution: Make those "known" TPs on seeing them.
Case 2: Magic Mapping: A timed portal message followed by MM. No matter how many portals there are on the map, I can't "X >" (map, go downstairs) those. This is supposed to avoid information leakage; empty shops/arches/ and abyss/hell/pan portals can confound this, but if there's only 1 portal I want to be able to travel there.
This also applies to eg. MM -> temple. MM on D:4-D7 reveals the golden downstairs ">" (console); but will not autotravel there, claiming to not know where it is.
Solution: This can be solved by changing the default: it should be possible to autotravel to all arches by going "X >". This still avoids info leakage while allowing rapid autotravel.
Case 3, more complex, debatable:
Escape hatches: autotravel catches these only after using them. So just for orb escape you should use all upwards hatches.
Strategic teleporters in levels: we've seen a number of teleporters in ordinary dungeon levels, not in closed vaults, to make strategic use of. Autoexplore doesn't use or catch those; and I think it should in some way?
Solution: nothing as easy as the other two and not Maybe on Orb pickup: "The dungeons secrets reveal themselves, you know the fastest way now" - and make hatches/TPs known after that.