Flings for noobs called WishLine

I'm looking at ways of making my future Line Riding better, so was wondering if anybody knew of a good tutorial to give me an insight on basic flings for me to build on...?

Thanks,
Wish

Alright, I'm going to give you a crash course on fling mechanics. Here are units 1 through 3:

Spoiler:

1) The parts of Bosh (left) you see aren't really there, they're just a sprite programmed to move around depending on what his real self does. He is really made up of several contact points (middle, arrows on left, and he has 2 feet and 2 legs), as well as the connections between those contact points that determine how they interact with each other (for example, whether a well will rotate him, and whether he stays on the sled). In regular riding, these are used to see whether he contacts the line, and if they do, the line affects that contact point so that he doesn't just fall through it. You can make a gwell using any of those contact points.

2) When one contact point is moved, the directions and such average out in the next frame so that he goes back to normal (otherwise he'd just stay weirdly mangled all the time). Notice that the well that was pulled moves more than the ones that aren't, although it seems like some wells are more powerful than others, so it's not quite a straight average. It's helpful to think of it that way at first, though, until you get the hang of it.
I like to call the effect on the contact point that's going down in the right illustration because of going up in the middle illustration the "recoil effect", but you don't have to do that. I will, though, just for the sake of simplifying explanations.

3) While the line itself is infinitely thin, it can have an effect on a contact point down to a certain depth. If this weren't so, he'd just fall through the line whenever you tried to put him down on one. However, as you probably know, he is only affected by a line if he's going down relative to it, so he goes through the bottom. What you might not know, however, is that each contact point does this calculation independently (so it's very possible that only one contact point can be affected by it while the rest of them go through).
Also, the engine actually checks for this 6 times per frame, hence non-contact wells (we'll get into that later), but you won't have to worry about that for now. Really, people just think about it as 1 check per frame, although the engine would probably be very, very different if it did that. As I said, though, you don't have to worry about that.

Any questions before we move on to how flings take advantage of those 3 factors?

EDIT: Also, right click -> view image in new tab. Or something like that. F'ing thing cuts it off.

Hedge, your technical understanding of Line Rider is absolutely second to none. I'll peruse this when I have a more alert brain and time, okay?

I'm going to learn something from you.

Thanks a lot for help, present and future
Wish

There's a version of LR that makes the wireframe/contact points visible. I practiced quirky tricks with that a few months ago, and it really helped.

Well, I'll answer your questions tomorrow, but here's the next one anyway (plus a recap of #3):

Spoiler:

4) The top x represents one contact point, and the bottom x represents the effect of the rest of them put together (I know it's simplistic, and if I could accurately draw Bosh a several times to illustrate one point without going completely mad, I would, but bear with me here). There is one line facing directly up, which pulls that one contact point up toward it. In the next frame, the averaging effect makes that one point recoil and the rest go up. Now, in the next frame, because that other contact point went down, you can make another well going straight up, even though the rest of the contact points are already going up! Note that this is the origin of the whole every-other-frame thing. Sometimes recoils can last longer and you can do it every third (or even fourth) frame fine, or something really bizarre happens which lets you do it every frame, but, basically... yeah. Every other frame is the general rule.
This can generally be repeated with the exact same gwell slope a few times without the overall effect being too powerful for it to repeat itself (that is, the recoil not being strong enough to actually make the contact point actually go down relative to the line in the next frame, see #5's explanation), which is basically what makes modern XY possible.

5) Now, obviously it can't be repeated forever with just x lines, because eventually you get enough speed that the recoil doesn't make the well actually go downwards relative to the line. The fling solves this by giving each new line a little bit of an increase in slope, but not enough that it doesn't need the recoil effect to work. I included all the forces in there if you assume Bosh is a regular polygon with no biased contact points. Trust me, it gets way better when you introduce irregularity.
I also included a way of telling whether your fling should theoretically be speeding him up (and, by my logic, actually a fling, rather than a regular ol' gwell chain), again assuming that he's a regular polygon and such. Generally the method works for spidey, nose, hand, foot, and tail (first peg). If the intersection goes into the line itself, think about which side of the actual part of the line where the contact took place he's on (that is, imagine the line is just big enough that it'd affect him, cutting off all the excess lineyparts). But, yeah, intersection means he's probably speeding up, or at least gaining kinetic+potential energy, if you're using any of those contact points.

Any questions before I move on to special cases like counterclock limit and noncontact flings?

From your explanation of what makes a fling in number 5, how do you account for lines that do not intersect, such as a downwards 2nd tail 'fling' ? example: 1:08 in https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AkZt_9fhIOQ

^ As I said, it's assuming he's a regular polygon with no biased points. Shoulder, 2nd peg, and butt are special cases, the "counterclock limit" flings, which describes their behavior when you try to 360-degree-loop them counterclockwise.

(Also, the least you could've done would've been to use CF as the example )

haha yes, the giant shoulder flings are clear examples of this. Although it might also be worth mentioning to new players that not all flings will overcome the downward force of the gravity, resulting in a net loss of speed, although it is still a fling. (think going upwards with a very weak fling) Likewise, downward chains will still result in Bosh speeding up due to the effects of downward gravity, but it is still a chain.

So the terms "Chains" and "Flings" should explain speeding up and slowing down in respect to the natural effects of gravity. Although that's probably too indepth for a newcomer to conceptualize, and might be better off going unsaid haha.

Yeah, I actually did specify "kinetic+potential energy" somewhere in there, but it was probably lost to everyone when I kept euphemizing it as "speeding up".
(However, most flings, when done well, are strong enough that gravity is pretty negligible)

Hedgehogs4Me wrote:Yeah, I actually did specify "kinetic+potential energy" somewhere in there, but it was probably lost to everyone when I kept euphemizing it as "speeding up".
(However, most flings, when done well, are strong enough that gravity is pretty negligible)

coughcoldfusioncough

rabid squirrel wrote:

Hedgehogs4Me wrote:Yeah, I actually did specify "kinetic+potential energy" somewhere in there, but it was probably lost to everyone when I kept euphemizing it as "speeding up".
(However, most flings, when done well, are strong enough that gravity is pretty negligible)

coughcoldfusioncough

Hedgehogs4Me wrote:^ As I said, it's assuming he's a regular polygon with no biased points. Shoulder, 2nd peg, and butt are special cases, the "counterclock limit" flings, which describes their behavior when you try to 360-degree-loop them counterclockwise.

(Also, the least you could've done would've been to use CF as the example )

Come on, rabid, seriously?
Anyway, working on units 6 through 8 now.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_Y1kC9p35p4

Definitely.

Short answer: Just do it mayng.
Long answer: Hedge

Chui Ninji wrote:Short answer: Just do it mayng.
Long answer: Hedge

Hedge. Final answer. We all win

Okay, I now have a limited understanding of the physics behind how any form of fling really works, and how it interacts with Bosh's essential make-up. Cheers, Hedge

What I don't yet understand is how to I apply this newfound knowledge to placing a first line of a fling, and knowing where to place subsequent lines. This is something I didn't get from your excellent diagrams, so I'm probably being dim . Help me out?

I only really got flings once I tried them at a speed of about a sled length per frame, so try that. You're going to want to make sure that each well only effects one contact point to start with (later on you can do more complex flings), and then find the position that contact point is at 2 frames down the road from where you are. Then, place your second well there, remembering, of course, to slant it so that it propels him a bit forward as well as up. Repeat.
I recommend you start with a contact point that's easy and you can see, like hand or spidey. Then, once you can do that, try a contact point that's easy and you can't see, like nose (and perhaps tail, if you're used to it). Then you can move on to slightly more difficult flings, like the counterclock limit flings and noncontact flings (will be covered in 6-8).

Of course, there's a little more to it than that, but you'll learn it as you go. Good luck!

Follow up - I'm playing around more with gravity and flings and a few fledgling newbish flings are coming into play in my track

We need some sort of line rider conjectures and theories thread for stuff like hedge's diagrams

So hedge pretty much makes the best fling tutorial/description ever when someone asks "how do i fling?"

i love it