STK items

Current STK weights-list issues.

1)The weight-list is not fine-grained enough for moderate to high number of karts (say >=11, but it's more acute the higher the number).

There are 5 position categories with each its own weight. 2 are first and last, so there are 3 classes for all the other karts.

One core goal of the items is to help to catch up. That means that being a few places behind should give better items. With 14 karts, you can be 3 karts behind and get the same items ; with 20 karts you can be 5 karts behind and get the same items.

That also mean that if there are important differences between what each category give, one place of difference in a 15/20 kart race may have a strong influence on the outcome.

Proposed fix : creating a new position category. Each new position category requires additionnal code in powerup.xml ; so there shouldn't be too much. Still, before implementing, it's probably worth to discuss if one more or two more is better.

2)The dynamics of the game vary depending of the total of karts.

In a 4-karts race, destroying an opponent is very useful, in a 20-karts race you'll destroy him and get destroyed by the next, globally hindering all the karts in the pack, and you'll prefer more personal bonuses.

In a 20-karts race, the "pack" is stretched on a way longer length once the chaos of the start has settled down. The bonus which allows to gain 1 second will be less useful here than in a 4-karts race.

One does not need to take such extreme example however to have a noticable difference - 8-karts and 12-karts races already differ noticably.

Some items have a different impact depending of the number of karts : parachute, basket ball and until the "pack" is stretched, the cake and swatter, and the bubble-gum in defense value.

It's clear that while the game remains playable, a "one weight-list to fit them all" approach is limited and doesn't offer the best experience.

Proposed fix : creating a few categories, each covering a range of kart number. A 5-kart race and a 7-kart race ; and a 17-kart race and a 20-kart race ; are close enough so that a common weight works for both.

An alternate solution would be to use a formula outputing weights depending of the total number of kart. That would allow to smooth differences between categories, but keeping it tweekable/straightforward seems difficult.

3)The weights in powerup.xml are confusing. They are added to make a total, and then the share of the total they make is evaluated. But you can't at the first glance get a sense of what is going on, because the totals vary for the different weights and these totals aren't even multiple of 100. The global item modifiers adds more confusion.

Proposed fix : make all the items weights sum up to 100 for easy maintenance and custom changes. If 2 is fixed adding categories of weight for kart numbers ; the global_item modifier may be removed (or adapted).

4)Follow the leader shares the same weight-list as normal races. It could benefit from a custom one. Are basket balls truly desired ? Shouldn't the leader get some zipper to make it harder to follow him ? Shouldn't the leader have no offensive weapon and be "neutral" ?

Proposed fix : custom weight-list for FTL. The number of karts decrease during a FTL race ; tying item weights to the starting number wouldn't make much sense.

5)Current weights are not balanced to make the items help to catch-up ; this being more important for each kart added - it's decent at 6, bad at 12 and very bad at 20.

Reducing offensive weapons and increasing zipper would be useful, though other small rebalancing may also help.

Proposed fix : Fixing 2 would mean creating new weights-lists. Taking this issue into account while doing so, fixing 2 would fix 5.