Download Vertical Mapper 3.7.1
Kathleen Denson
I have fed a series of numbers into a graphmapper (without using Range) and I am trying to understand the correlation between the input and the output.
Since I am not using Range as the input (Hence no vertical division marks on the graph), I am wondering how the Graphmapper remaps the input to arrive at the resulting outputs.
Basically it is f(x) = y, where x is the input (X-axis) and y is the output (Y-axis). To manually edit a function f, you need to work in a domain of x (from x0 to x1), you can put any value there, but normally you put a value inside that working domain (normally from 0 to 1) because that way you get an expected value, visible in the graph drawing. On the other hand you also need an output working domain (from y0 to y1) to map the result of the function y to a domain you are interested in. Normally this is also from 0 to 1, and when this is the case, if the graph cuts in the middle of the height, for that input/x will give a value of 0.5.
The vertical lines correspond to the input value. If your function works between x0 and x1, then your input values should be between x0 and x1. However, these lines do not appear when there are too many input values, to avoid too many red lines.
The common use of the Range component is mainly for convenience, as by default it returns a list of numbers between 0 and 1, which is the default domain of the GraphMapper at X. If you use the Series component instead, you either have to remap these values between 0 and 1 or change the X domain of the Graph mapper to the domain of your numbers.
The Monuments in the Survey Monument Mapper are permanently placed survey markers, brass disks set in concrete with a known position and/or elevation, which provide the horizontal and vertical control for land surveying. With this application you will be able to do the following:
Is it because of the programming restriction? Like the skybox and fall-to-death area have some vertical limitation? Or the enemy AI and pathfinding is too stupid that all of them will fall to their death? I mean it would be fun to have some large vertical cave-like structure and platform for you to parkour and bullet jump around, right?
A few different types of reasons, some I understand a bit better than others, leaning on the more artistic side than technical. Of the latter I am sure there are many. For example, more of our vertical maps are from later on in the series, some of the older maps (some that are defunct) existed from a period where our movement and mobility options and powers were different.
Artistically, well, you want to be creative when designing levels, but also practical. You do want levels to sort of be intuitively navigable as well as interesting/creative. There is this balance, conflict and competition of ideas. You can make levels, areas a bit more unorthodox and challenging, so a player has to think more, and can feel rewarded when they figure out how to progress (classic Tomb Raider games for example were often just about figuring out the puzzle and challenge of large rooms, exploration and moving forward), but you also don't want players to feel "stupid" or "slow" even if thats merely an internal judgement, if they can't figure it out, go slow etc Especially if the game overall is implying they should be going at a faster pace. Especially if there are other factors, like being multi player.
There are also all sorts of tricks around lighting, texture, colour design that are utilised to help players navigate consciously or subconsciously. These can differ though, and again depend on context. Jupiter Gas City tileset was a bit overwhelming for me at first, but now I like it a whole lot. I know a lot of players that dislike it still though, because to them its confusing, which, to be fair, it can be, if you are new to it and you have high level players with far more familiarity and practice with Warframes, going way way faster.
I didn't really actually appreciate and get good at navigating Gas City until I did a lot of solo missions there, and familiarise myself with the map. Then I start to recognise design cues that lead the player (and a lot of the secrets it has). Warframe often can be way too fast paced for that amount of level introspection/investigation though. Think about how polarising Angels of Zariman was as well, some players just really dislike searching through environments, where as some really enjoy it. Some like to go fast, some like to go fast... but also, like to go fast everywhere, into every corner and crook, solo, so they can look at level details. Which then later in MP, make them see even faster, as they know maps really well (I go slow in solo, but often in MP I am usually the fastest player without even trying, just because I know maps so well, I usually have to consciously slow down, to stay with the group).
Plus then you have various AI issues too. There is that one Corpus Defence map that is pretty unpopular because it can take much longer (perception or otherwise). Depending on how you move too, enemy AI can get stuck in loops, weird patterns.
If you like vertical levels though, the good news is that generally, vertical elements in games try to be explored more with time, as it can be one of the more interesting, creative ways to introduce and implement into games. It just requires more thought and solutions for issues I mentioned. I think a lot of the more recent maps/tilesets are pretty good as far as implementing vertical designs (Gas City and Zariman).
I think part of it is due to the game's procedural nature. While you could make rooms with intense verticality, too many variations in height will probably make it harder to detect collisions and generate viable maps, especially for tilesets that mix indoor and outdoor environments.
There's not just a lack of verticality but a lack of adjusting dead zones, both pits and the skyboxes, being far too restrictive on where we're allowed to go. Hek there's still some tiles that'll zone you out for bullet jumping straight up.
And it's definitely not some engine limitation as we do have tiles with verticality, even some really old ones in the Orokin Tower tileset. And as enemies already navigate vertical sections with predefined points they can jump to/from they can just as well have enemies navigate them just fine. Though pathfinding though such rooms would likely worsen the issue of enemies being slow in endless missions but nothing is stopping players from fighting enemies in said rooms if that was an issue. Also defense mission concerns like some are mentioning don't matter if they just don't make more vertical defense maps.
They could solve that by just making them take the place of elevator tiles. And open air maps already sort of have this with the Europa ship graveyard and Corpus outposts which already combine indoor, outdoor, and elevator tiles.
Some maps with verticality were removed for unknown reasons, one that comes to mind is the grinner asteroid one with 2 elevators, i'm guessing it was mainly because when 2 players use the elevators, the remaining squad had to call the elevators to go back up, making them fall behind.
Another one also on grineer asteroid was the one with a spiral staircase and this one was removed due to waypoint issues, causing problems with navigation because you never knew which way was out just by using the waypoint, was it up or down? no idea, the waypoint points to the center of the room. If you fell it would take ages to go up, sure advanced players just skipped the staircase, but this tile was present early on and was just fustrating when finding something in that room due to several overlaps and constant waypoint changes in minimap.
Also having enemies climb such a tall room in survival could cause issues
The old corpus capture target room was also removed eventually as the target was in a dead end next to a glass wall, making him an easy target. We now have corpus ship tileset rework but it makes no sense right now with all the range we have in abilities. I admit there wasn't all that much verticality in this room asside from some stairs.
We used to have some rooms with serious verticality back in the day, mainly in the asteroid tiles. I remember that there was a huge room with like 5 or 6 levels, some stairs scattereda round, and a few elevators that were used to get around this tile. The problems though came in 3 main forms:
-Waypoints commonly just broke in this room leaving you confused as to where to go as a player. This led to a ton of frustration and anger among players as they couldn't figure out how to go forwards without trying every single door on every single level.
-Enemy pathfinding in these tiles was utterly atrocious. As an example of this: When doing the Kahl mission in the murex, in the second room where you're rescuing the two targets, try to tell your companions to move from the top floor to the ground floor using the command menu, and watch them float and jump around between levels and take a very long time to just move down a short distance.
Now imagine what that would look like in a tile with 5 different floors and was much taller.
Further imagine what this would do to a survival mission if this tile happened to be included in the tileset?