(For Each Integer) VS (Player Group)

[jonhysone]

Hi guys.

So this is a question about efficiency.
Everyone knows that Player Groups (Force Groups) leak, I am using some trigger that picks players from some filtered Player Group (Not all players ofc), and I can't really destroy that group. The question is :

Which of these two is most efficient ?! Knowing that I use this PERIODICALLY.

============ THIS IS THE EVENT ============

• Events
  • Time - Every 0.05 seconds of game time

====================== Rivalry Actions =====================

• For each (Integer i) from 1 to 12, do (Actions)
  • Loop - Actions
    • If (All Conditions are True) then do (Then Actions) else do (Else Actions)
      • If - Conditions
        • ((Player(i)) slot status) Equal to Is playing
      • Then - Actions
      • Else - Actions

======================= OR ========================

• Player Group - Pick every player in FilteredForce and do (Actions)
  • Loop - Actions

Thank you very much.

 

[IcemanBo]

The more players the player group has the less efficient it is against a custom loop.
But in your you also use a "unfiltered" integer bounds for loop. So you might have 11 not needed checks in theory.
Then the player group would be cooler.

Basicly it doesn't matter too much. Do what looks cleaner, easier to work with, and what you personaly prefer.

 

[Wietlol]

and I can't really destroy that group.

Noob
You can destroy the group, you just dont want to.


As IcemanBo said, it doesnt really matter at this point.
Player groups only contain up to 16 players and looping through that doesnt really have any efficiency problems by far.

The only differences you should be considering is wether you want to adress the players by integer or by handle, wether or not you want to be able to use "Skip Remaining Actions" (aka return), what approach is easier to understand and/or maintain, etc.

(Also FilteredForce isnt really a descriptive name imo... I would call it PlayingPlayers... which can be used by many scripts for localplayer stuff, cinematics, dialogs, etc.)

 

[BPower]

Like mentioned before it depends on the size of the force ( player group ).

Also using the player group outperforms the loop, because you
don't need to check for the player status. Just add only those players to the
player group, which are actually playing.

For good cleanup you can detect the player leave game event and eventually
remove a player from the player group.

Just for the sake completeness:
Even faster is a linked list you loop over and the fastest is a stack.
Linked lists require a lot of special knowledge for GUIers, a stack
would be how we normally code MUI spells.

 

[Zwiebelchen]

Use the integer loop. It's cleaner and faster, as a ForForce enumeration will open a new thread for every player. The extra condition in the integer loop will most likely not offset the performance hit of ForForce.

 

[BloodDrunk]

I myself use For Loop always when checking anything about players. Works just ok.

 

[jonhysone]

Thanks guys, it seems I am about to use ForEachInteger after all.
+rep for everyone.

Noob
You can destroy the group, you just dont want to.

That's not the case xD I am just using the player group from the beginning of the game 'til the end, so destroying it is nonsense.

 

[Dr Super Good]

The loop approach is inefficient as it has to constantly filter players. An integer approach using an integer list would be as efficient as the player group, in such a case both are viable implementation strategies.

For GUI I would personally recommend the player group approach since it is more readable and easier to understand.

 

[jonhysone]

The loop approach is inefficient as it has to constantly filter players. An integer approach using an integer list would be as efficient as the player group, in such a case both are viable implementation strategies.

For GUI I would personally recommend the player group approach since it is more readable and easier to understand.

I heard that I can't use waits under the "loop actions" of a Player Group.
I am more into Indexing and stuff so it's easy for me to switch between both methods.
I have even changed every "Group" action (Units, Destructibles, Players) with an indexed Integer loop.

Seems like everything is going fine by now.

Thanks.

 

[Wietlol]

Well... you should consider what you are actually doing when adding a wait in a loop... in any loop... just when you are adding a wait in any place in your script.

 

[Dr Super Good]

I heard that I can't use waits under the "loop actions" of a Player Group.

That is correct. How using TriggerSleepAction could possibly be useful in such a loop I do not know.

 

[Bribe]

I heard that I can't use waits under the "loop actions" of a Player Group.

That's right. Enums and boolexprs create a different kind of execution thread than triggeractions and ExecuteFunc. In the latter, you can use waits. World Editor GUI used to only allow one action per enum and to date its GUI does not let you insert actions into conditions. Its original designers had tried to prevent users from getting caught up in bugs like this.

 

[Wrda]

Use the integer loop. It's cleaner and faster, as a ForForce enumeration will open a new thread for every player. The extra condition in the integer loop will most likely not offset the performance hit of ForForce.

Such a speedfreak...
But yes, integer loop is personally easier to use because it is more readable and faster to use.
By the way, you can add waits "indirectly" in loops of player group or unit groups:

Hidden

• Untitled Trigger 001
  • Events
    • Map initialization
  • Conditions
  • Actions
    • Player Group - Pick every player in (All players) and do (Actions)
      • Loop - Actions
        • -------- Some Stuff --------
        • Trigger - Run Untitled Trigger 002 <gen> (ignoring conditions)

• Untitled Trigger 002
  • Events
  • Conditions
  • Actions
    • Wait 1.00 seconds
    • Unit Group - Pick every unit in (Units owned by (Picked player)) and do (Actions)
      • Loop - Actions
        • Unit - Kill (Picked unit)

This kills all units after 1 second, not 1 by 1.

 

[Wietlol]

But will it kill all units of player 1, then one second later all units of player 2, then one second later all units of player 3, etc?

I think not.

 

[Wrda]

Now when i tested it with player 1 and 2 units, just the player's red units got killed...weird. Maybe because Picked Player got nulled somehow.

 

[Bribe]

You have to use local variables in the ancillary function and to get the wait the way you want just increment a real variable by 1.00 each iteration of the loop and specify the nested wait to that variable.

 

[Ceday]

Edit:nvm

 

[Zwiebelchen]

Such a speedfreak...

Wait, you say that to me of all people? I'm constantly preaching that readability trumphs speed in most cases and even use struct extends struct despite it spamming trigger evaluations just because it looks neat.

I just answered the TO's question. Looping an integer has many advantages over a ForForce loop, especially as it allows using local variables inside the loop and doesn't block out Waits like a ForForce call does.