Might and Magic VIII: Day of the Destroyer

Edit history:

SDAVerification: 2017-05-30 01:25:17 pm

2017-05-16 10:32:54 am

Game Page: http://speeddemosarchive.com/MightAndMagic8.html

Might and Magic VIII: Day of the Destroyer (pc) (pc) [Any %] [Segmented]

Decision: Reject

Reason: There are two cases of discontinuities in the segmentation. The run also used the "greyface" patch, which is unofficial. While the impact of this patch hasn't been fully clarified in the discussion, there is at least one case where it has had a noticeable impact on the game play.

https://queue.speeddemosarchive.com/verificationfiles/2054/

This run will be available for a month. After that these link(s) will no longer work.

Thread title:

SDAVerification

2017-05-16 10:32:54 am

Run Information

Might and Magic VIII: Day of the Destroyer (pc) (pc) [Any %] [Segmented]

Verification Files

http://v.speeddemosarchive.com/MightAndMagic8-20170508/MM8%20speedrun.mp4

Please refer to the Verification Guidelines before posting.

Please post your opinions about the run and be certain to conclude your post with a verdict (Accept/Reject). If you wish to remain anonymous, you can also send a pm with your reply to 'sdaverification' (please state clearly in that case which run you have verified). This is not a contest where the majority wins - Each verification will be judged on its content.

gammadragon

Edit history:

gammadragon: 2017-05-20 07:59:03 pm

2017-05-20 07:57:11 pm

Might be magic...

Full disclosure: I'm the runner with the current best time for this game on SDA so please take all of my comments below with that in mind (i.e. I may be biased).

As noted in the category listing, this is a segmented run. It's not obvious where the segments start or end, or how many have been used, as the final video has the joins edited out for seamless viewing. However, I don't believe this is a problem for SDA (staff, please correct me if I'm wrong). There are no run notes, so I've used some guesswork to complete the review below.

There are a few eyebrow-raising parts in this speedrun:

1) 0:40 - Shopping for scrolls. There are several things to note here:
a) Shop inventories are randomly generated the first time you enter
b) Scrolls with that icon contain a spell from a large pool of possibilities (total of 21 I believe, excluding Light and Dark magic as I don't think they can be sold at those shops)
c) The chance that both the two desired scrolls "Stone to Flesh" and "Invisibility" are in stock at the two stores is quite low, requiring many repeats of the shopping segment (probably hundreds). This in itself is not a problem as my run did the same thing, but combined with the above two points is a bit of an issue

Despite this, the runner seems to know that the spells are both in stock and exactly where to click to purchase them both, without even checking that they were the correct scrolls until 1:30 when the "Stone to Flesh" scroll is used. Given all the above, it would be impractical to do this in a real speedrun. I suspect that there was another segment that was not added to the final recording to "pre-load" the shop inventories with the desired scrolls.

2) 3:06 - Shopping for spells. The spellbooks are bought without checking what spells they contain. There are three possible spells for each of the three spellbook types that are purchased, making it a 1/9 chance that all the correct spells were bought. The actual spells are not all used or checked until much later. This leads me to the same conclusion as number 1 - I think that there was another segment to "pre-load" the shop inventory that is not in the final video.

3) 5:18 - More of a strange quirk than anything, but the runner jumps down an indoor elevator shaft and takes damage. However, falling large distances inside usually wouldn't cause damage (only falling outdoors causes injury). Possibly some sort of unofficial patch which adds indoor fall damage was used to record this speedrun?

4) 9:59 - Quicksave is used, confirming that an unofficial patch is used to run the game (probably Greyface's). SDA bans unofficial or fan patches for official SDA runs, I believe.

Apart from the above, the run is pretty good and the walk through doors trick improves the time quite a bit. I couldn't get that trick working on my machine but other people have reported that they could. If the runner has some good explanations for the questionable parts and an unofficial patch was not used, then I could accept this. However, right now I am forced to:

Reject

[b]Full disclosure:[/b] I'm the runner with the current best time for this game on SDA so please take all of my comments below with that in mind (i.e. I may be biased).

As noted in the category listing, this is a segmented run. It's not obvious where the segments start or end, or how many have been used, as the final video has the joins edited out for seamless viewing. However, I don't believe this is a problem for SDA (staff, please correct me if I'm wrong). There are no run notes, so I've used some guesswork to complete the review below.

There are a few eyebrow-raising parts in this speedrun:

1) 0:40 - Shopping for scrolls. There are several things to note here:
  a) Shop inventories are randomly generated the first time you enter
  b) Scrolls with that icon contain a spell from a large pool of possibilities (total of 21 I believe, excluding Light and Dark magic as I don't think they can be sold at those shops)
  c) The chance that both the two desired scrolls "Stone to Flesh" and "Invisibility" are in stock at the two stores is quite low, requiring many repeats of the shopping segment (probably hundreds). This in itself is not a problem as my run did the same thing, but combined with the above two points is a bit of an issue

Despite this, the runner seems to know that the spells are both in stock and exactly where to click to purchase them both, without even checking that they were the correct scrolls until 1:30 when the "Stone to Flesh" scroll is used. Given all the above, it would be impractical to do this in a real speedrun. I suspect that there was another segment that was not added to the final recording to "pre-load" the shop inventories with the desired scrolls.

2) 3:06 - Shopping for spells. The spellbooks are bought without checking what spells they contain. There are three possible spells for each of the three spellbook types that are purchased, making it a 1/9 chance that all the correct spells were bought. The actual spells are not all used or checked until much later. This leads me to the same conclusion as number 1 - I think that there was another segment to "pre-load" the shop inventory that is not in the final video.

3) 5:18 - More of a strange quirk than anything, but the runner jumps down an indoor elevator shaft and takes damage. However, falling large distances inside usually wouldn't cause damage (only falling outdoors causes injury). Possibly some sort of unofficial patch which adds indoor fall damage was used to record this speedrun?

4) 9:59 - Quicksave is used, confirming that an unofficial patch is used to run the game (probably Greyface's). SDA bans unofficial or fan patches for official SDA runs, I believe.

Apart from the above, the run is pretty good and the walk through doors trick improves the time quite a bit. I couldn't get that trick working on my machine but other people have reported that they could. If the runner has some good explanations for the questionable parts and an unofficial patch was not used, then I could accept this. However, right now I am forced to:

[b]Reject[/b]

Snabel

2017-05-21 10:17:39 am

1)
I kept taking the ship from dagger wound to ravenshore. When entering ravenshore i checked the shops to see if the scrolls were there. When both scrolls were available for purchase i made a segment outside the shop door. In the video i record going from dagger wound to ravenshore and then load up my segment infront of the shop door, since i already checked if the scrolls were there, i knew exactly where they were in the shop.

2)
This is the same principle as in 1). I kept taking the horse from ravenshore to alvar until i got the books i needed. Then made a segment outside the shop door. In the video i travel to alvar using the horse, then load up the segment.

3)
This I found weird aswell, I have never taken fall damage when being inside but as you say it is probably because of the Grey face patch. (which i have installed for the convenience of quicksave)

4) I did not know this, and it seems harsh to reject my run only because i make use of quicksave for convencience

ktwo

2017-05-21 02:24:07 pm

Quote:

1)
I kept taking the ship from dagger wound to ravenshore. When entering ravenshore i checked the shops to see if the scrolls were there. When both scrolls were available for purchase i made a segment outside the shop door. In the video i record going from dagger wound to ravenshore and then load up my segment infront of the shop door, since i already checked if the scrolls were there, i knew exactly where they were in the shop.

The spirit behind a segmented run is that you finish a segment with a save and then you start the next segment by loading that precise save. The way I read your reply, you have loaded the shop segment from a different save with different seeds.

Quote:

3)
This I found weird aswell, I have never taken fall damage when being inside but as you say it is probably because of the Grey face patch. (which i have installed for the convenience of quicksave)

4) I did not know this, and it seems harsh to reject my run only because i make use of quicksave for convencience

Unofficial patches are kind of a gray area when it comes to SDA. If it's for reasons such as compatibility or, in some cases, convenience, it can be acceptable. It shouldn't allow for any game play advantages though. Since the latter can be hard to say for sure, it's not really recommended to use an unofficial patch unless there is a strong precedence (like chocolate doom). The damage taken in #3 isn't a good sign. It directly shows that the patch impacts the game play in a noticeable way. Even though it might not be to any advantage, who knows what else of the game play might have changed?

I'll give you the chance to address these issues, should you have anything to add, but right now this run is about to be rejected for not adhering to the site rules.

[quote]1)
I kept taking the ship from dagger wound to ravenshore. When entering ravenshore i checked the shops to see if the scrolls were there. When both scrolls were available for purchase i made a segment outside the shop door. In the video i record going from dagger wound to ravenshore and then load up my segment infront of the shop door, since i already checked if the scrolls were there, i knew exactly where they were in the shop.[/quote]
The spirit behind a segmented run is that you finish a segment with a save and then you start the next segment by loading that precise save. The way I read your reply, you have loaded the shop segment from a different save with different seeds.

[quote]
3)
This I found weird aswell, I have never taken fall damage when being inside but as you say it is probably because of the Grey face patch. (which i have installed for the convenience of quicksave)

4) I did not know this, and it seems harsh to reject my run only because i make use of quicksave for convencience[/quote]
Unofficial patches are kind of a gray area when it comes to SDA. If it's for reasons such as compatibility or, in some cases, convenience, it can be acceptable. It shouldn't allow for any game play advantages though. Since the latter can be hard to say for sure, it's not really recommended to use an unofficial patch unless there is a strong precedence (like chocolate doom). The damage taken in #3 isn't a good sign. It directly shows that the patch impacts the game play in a noticeable way. Even though it might not be to any advantage, who knows what else of the game play might have changed?

I'll give you the chance to address these issues, should you have anything to add, but right now this run is about to be rejected for not adhering to the site rules.

Snabel

2017-05-21 04:50:06 pm

To your first comment ktwo, what difference does it make that i load up that exact save 100 of times to get a lucky seed or that i load up a save i know has the lucky seed? either way all of the "bad loadups" will be cut out of the video thus making no difference.

The gray face patch will not grant any advantages to this run. You can check what it does yourself if you're curious. I think it seems pretty obvious from my video that there are no places in the run i get an advantage from having the patch installed. As mentioned i only installed it for the convencience of quicksave.

ktwo

2017-05-22 10:09:32 am

Quote:

To your first comment ktwo, what difference does it make that i load up that exact save 100 of times to get a lucky seed or that i load up a save i know has the lucky seed? either way all of the "bad loadups" will be cut out of the video thus making no difference.

The difference is that there is a discontinuity in your speedrun. From what I understand, there is pretty simple workaround though. If you check gammadragon's run on the site, you can just add a segment outside the shop. In case you're interested, this is what we have in the rules about this case:

Quote from https://kb.speeddemosarchive.com/Rules:

There obviously needs to be continuity between segments in terms of inventory, experience points or whatever is applicable for the individual game. Note however that it's allowed for an SDA-submission to have discrepancies between two segments as long as none of it is to your advantage. This gives you the possibility to later redo segments that are in the middle of the run even in games where it's virtually impossible to end a segment with the exact same stats as before. Be aware that additional caution needs to be taken in games where the RNG seeds carry over between segments. It will in practice often be difficult to determine if this results in an advantage for the player or not. Re-doing segments where the RNG seeds impact future segments in a noticeable way is therefore not allowed on SDA.

Quote:

The gray face patch will not grant any advantages to this run. You can check what it does yourself if you're curious. I think it seems pretty obvious from my video that there are no places in the run i get an advantage from having the patch installed. As mentioned i only installed it for the convencience of quicksave.

Without knowing the game, I can't say what impact the patch would have just by watching your run and looking at the list of changes. It does look like some of the changes in the list impact the game play though. There also appears to be evidence pointing towards the indoor fall damage is a result of the patch. Can you identify which of the changes triggered that? Not evident to me at least.

[quote]To your first comment ktwo, what difference does it make that i load up that exact save 100 of times to get a lucky seed or that i load up a save i know has the lucky seed? either way all of the "bad loadups" will be cut out of the video thus making no difference.[/quote]
The difference is that there is a discontinuity in your speedrun. From what I understand, there is pretty simple workaround though. If you check gammadragon's run on the site, you can just add a segment outside the shop. In case you're interested, this is what we have in the rules about this case:
[quote="https://kb.speeddemosarchive.com/Rules"]There obviously needs to be continuity between segments in terms of inventory, experience points or whatever is applicable for the individual game. Note however that it's allowed for an SDA-submission to have discrepancies between two segments as long as none of it is to your advantage. This gives you the possibility to later redo segments that are in the middle of the run even in games where it's virtually impossible to end a segment with the exact same stats as before. Be aware that additional caution needs to be taken in games where the RNG seeds carry over between segments. It will in practice often be difficult to determine if this results in an advantage for the player or not. Re-doing segments where the RNG seeds impact future segments in a noticeable way is therefore not allowed on SDA. [/quote]

[quote]The gray face patch will not grant any advantages to this run. You can check what it does yourself if you're curious. I think it seems pretty obvious from my video that there are no places in the run i get an advantage from having the patch installed. As mentioned i only installed it for the convencience of quicksave.[/quote]
Without knowing the game, I can't say what impact the patch would have just by watching your run and looking at the list of changes. It does look like some of the changes in the list impact the game play though. There also appears to be evidence pointing towards the indoor fall damage is a result of the patch. Can you identify which of the changes triggered that? Not evident to me at least.

Snabel

2017-05-23 01:03:07 pm

From the first quote, it seems to me that I do nothing illegal. There most definitely is a continuity between the 2 segments in that part of the run. My inventory, experience or whatever, does not change in any way. I simply do not understand what the problem is with me knowing where the scrolls are inside the shop?

I do not know exactly where it is, but the fall damage is definitely a result of the Gray Face Patch, and I understand that this can give a minor advantage in my run, since it enables me to die earlier when I pick up the heartstone in the elemental of fire. I could however make a new segment in that part to remove the impact the fall damage might have on my time (which by the way would be max 1 or 2 seconds)

ktwo

2017-05-23 02:28:41 pm

Quote from Snabel:

From the first quote, it seems to me that I do nothing illegal. There most definitely is a continuity between the 2 segments in that part of the run. My inventory, experience or whatever, does not change in any way. I simply do not understand what the problem is with me knowing where the scrolls are inside the shop?

The discontinuity we're talking about is regarding the saves, not where you are in the game. You complete one segment and save at the end. Then you load the next segment from a different save. The quote from the rules talks about how this can sometimes be acceptable, but also how it should be used with great caution. Your discontinuity is a schoolbook example of how you're breaking this rule to gain an advantage (the part with the RNG seeds).

Quote from Snabel:

I do not know exactly where it is, but the fall damage is definitely a result of the Gray Face Patch, and I understand that this can give a minor advantage in my run, since it enables me to die earlier when I pick up the heartstone in the elemental of fire. I could however make a new segment in that part to remove the impact the fall damage might have on my time (which by the way would be max 1 or 2 seconds)

Take a step back and read your own writing from someone else's point of view. We all agree now that the grayface patch impacts the gameplay in one case we can't explain. But how do we know that it doesn't also impact luck, AI behavior or other less visible aspects of the game? Unless someone digs very deep in the game code, there will always be a doubt surrounding speedruns done with the grayface patch. I have a feeling that you're trying to achieve the exact opposite. You want to validate your speedrun. I know this sounds harsh, but if you want your speedrun to be validated, I think you should move over to one of the official patches. I know you have received a bit of feedback in the forum and on your youtube videos, so I'm sure you can get input if you need any support with this.

For information, I'm going away for a couple of days, so I'm not going to reply more this week.

[quote="Snabel"]From the first quote, it seems to me that I do nothing illegal. There most definitely is a continuity between the 2 segments in that part of the run. My inventory, experience or whatever, does not change in any way. I simply do not understand what the problem is with me knowing where the scrolls are inside the shop?[/quote]
The discontinuity we're talking about is regarding the saves, not where you are in the game. You complete one segment and save at the end. Then you load the next segment from a different save. The quote from the rules talks about how this can sometimes be acceptable, but also how it should be used with great caution. Your discontinuity is a schoolbook example of how you're breaking this rule to gain an advantage (the part with the RNG seeds).

[quote="Snabel"]I do not know exactly where it is, but the fall damage is definitely a result of the Gray Face Patch, and I understand that this can give a minor advantage in my run, since it enables me to die earlier when I pick up the heartstone in the elemental of fire. I could however make a new segment in that part to remove the impact the fall damage might have on my time (which by the way would be max 1 or 2 seconds)[/quote]
Take a step back and read your own writing from someone else's point of view. We all agree now that the grayface patch impacts the gameplay in one case we can't explain. But how do we know that it doesn't also impact luck, AI behavior or other less visible aspects of the game? Unless someone digs very deep in the game code, there will always be a doubt surrounding speedruns done with the grayface patch. I have a feeling that you're trying to achieve the exact opposite. You want to validate your speedrun. I know this sounds harsh, but if you want your speedrun to be validated, I think you should move over to one of the official patches. I know you have received a bit of feedback in the forum and on your youtube videos, so I'm sure you can get input if you need any support with this.

For information, I'm going away for a couple of days, so I'm not going to reply more this week.

Snabel

2017-05-23 02:35:27 pm

I do not gain any advantage doing it my way. I have a save file that I know has the scrolls (i reloaded hundreds of times to get that seed) and i simply take the boat from dagger wound to ravenshore, and finish my segment when entering the shop

The way you want me to do it is that I save before i enter the shop and then load up that exact savefile and then keep reloading 100 of times from that save to get the exact scrolls i need. In the end this gives the same outcome and therefore i really do not see any problems doing it my way

And you stated yourself that you do not know much about this exact game. Maybe someone who knows the gray face patch can assure you that it does not affect luck or AI behaviour

IsraeliRD

Edit history:

IsraeliRD: 2017-05-23 09:17:51 pm

2017-05-23 09:10:47 pm

Dragon Power Supreme

In terms of the discontinuity:
Any normal walkthrough (casual or speedrun) will enter the shop and take a few seconds to look at the scrolls to see whether the ones needed exist (the current speedrun hosted will do so as well). What you're effectively doing is loading a dfferent save file that skips that whole thing by simply go in, click without looking, and go out. You gain a few seconds advantage. You remove the whole RNG, you remove any comparison between you and others by doing this.

The rule ktwo said above says you can't load a segment from a different file like that that effectively skips the RNG and gain time compared to anyone else. What it also says is that for example if you redid a segment to get something done faster but unintentionally gotten boosted stats/health/stuff but the next segment has the discrepancy where you have lowered stats/health/stuff and you explain that, we're okay. In this case, you gain RNG and timing advantage compared to others, which is not okay.

So yes, it will be hundreds of attempts to be the same result but it will show the gameplay that will happen when others would play this game.

In terms of the discontinuity: 
Any normal walkthrough (casual or speedrun) will enter the shop and take a few seconds to look at the scrolls to see whether the ones needed exist (the current speedrun hosted will do so as well). What you're effectively doing is loading a dfferent save file that skips that whole thing by simply go in, click without looking, and go out. You gain a few seconds advantage. You remove the whole RNG, you remove any comparison between you and others by doing this.

The rule ktwo said above says you can't load a segment from a different file like that that effectively skips the RNG and gain time compared to anyone else. What it also says is that for example if you redid a segment to get something done faster but unintentionally gotten boosted stats/health/stuff but the next segment has the discrepancy where you have lowered stats/health/stuff and you explain that, we're okay. In this case, you gain RNG and timing advantage compared to others, which is not okay.

So yes, it will be hundreds of attempts to be the same result but it will show the gameplay that will happen when others would play this game.

gammadragon

2017-05-24 02:33:04 am

Might be magic...

I'm a bit torn on the Greyface patch issue. The patch does help quite a bit with OS compatibility. Snabel is generally right that in the video he doesn't take advantage of any of the patch features that would give an advantage in the run - possible exception with the indoor fall damage, but that is so minor as to be easily ignored. Quicksave is really no advantage, as the menu time is excluded from the final run time anyway. There are some patch features that affect combat, but the run requires virtually zero combat so those changes are basically irrelevant for this run.

However, there are some features of the patch that could give a huge advantage if used. For example, "F2 toggles Double Speed mode" - if Greyface's patch is allowed then is double speed mode allowed? Also, as mentioned before, who really knows which of the other changes have had a difficult-to-detect effect on the game, which could add up to a significant total time difference? How about if someone created their own fan patch which allowed skipping some boring bits of the game, would it be allowed? Obviously not, but it's easy to see how the grey area could quickly be abused. It's also pretty impractical to ask SDA to pronounce judgement over every fan-made patch for every game.

I'm not going to post any further opinion on the patch, but I can see how the rules would be very complex to enforce in cases like this. With one simple change, it would be easy to open the floodgates to a whole new set of possibilities.

Also, I hope that the discussion so far is not taken as a personal attack. It really is a good run and I think everyone would encourage you to complete one more attempt to fix the stated issues and resubmit. Part of SDA's role is to make sure that speedrunning a specific game is done on a level playing field, which is why the rules are sometimes complex or intricate. If you have any doubts about them then it's worth asking first on the forums at the beginning and most people would be happy to help out.

I'm a bit torn on the Greyface patch issue. The patch does help quite a bit with OS compatibility. Snabel is generally right that in the video he doesn't take advantage of any of the patch features that would give an advantage in the run - possible exception with the indoor fall damage, but that is so minor as to be easily ignored. Quicksave is really no advantage, as the menu time is excluded from the final run time anyway. There are some patch features that affect combat, but the run requires virtually zero combat so those changes are basically irrelevant for this run.

However, there are some features of the patch that could give a huge advantage if used. For example, "F2 toggles Double Speed mode" - if Greyface's patch is allowed then is double speed mode allowed? Also, as mentioned before, who really knows which of the other changes have had a difficult-to-detect effect on the game, which could add up to a significant total time difference? How about if someone created their own fan patch which allowed skipping some boring bits of the game, would it be allowed? Obviously not, but it's easy to see how the grey area could quickly be abused. It's also pretty impractical to ask SDA to pronounce judgement over every fan-made patch for every game.

I'm not going to post any further opinion on the patch, but I can see how the rules would be very complex to enforce in cases like this. With one simple change, it would be easy to open the floodgates to a whole new set of possibilities.

Also, I hope that the discussion so far is not taken as a personal attack. It really is a good run and I think everyone would encourage you to complete one more attempt to fix the stated issues and resubmit. Part of SDA's role is to make sure that speedrunning a specific game is done on a level playing field, which is why the rules are sometimes complex or intricate. If you have any doubts about them then it's worth asking first on the forums at the beginning and most people would be happy to help out.

Snabel

2017-05-24 03:27:25 am

Is it possible that a few seconds can just be added as a punishment for my "mistakes" i.e. the fall damage and me knowing where the scrolls are. I think it would be fair to add 5 seconds to compensate for this

I might also just correct the flaws and reupload, at this point it seems to be the only real option

gammadragon

2017-05-26 12:26:12 am

Might be magic...

I'd also use the 1.0 version of the game to avoid any contention over using an unofficial patch. Based on the current run, I would definitely accept if you made all those changes.

Snabel

2017-05-26 08:16:36 am

Sounds good, I will try to see if I can make it possible then

SDAVerification

2017-05-30 01:25:18 pm

Decision posted.