Wind

Wind is the only tool in Wall-X that steers the ball without touching it. You draw an arrow; along the strip it covers, the wind blows in the arrow's direction and pushes any ball passing through. You can change the ball's path even in mid-air.

How wind behaves

• The strip: wind blows along a band about 88 centimetres wide, centred on your arrow. The ball is pushed while it's inside the band and not at all once it leaves.
• Strength: inside the strip the ball accelerates at about 36 metres per second squared in the arrow's direction. That's more than three and a half times Earth's gravity, so an upward wind lifts the ball against gravity.
• Length: an arrow must be at least 60 centimetres and at most 2.4 metres long. Draw longer and it's cut at 2.4 metres; shorter and it isn't placed.
• Angle: arrows can point any way: up, down, left, right or diagonally.

How much ink it costs

For line tools, the ink you spend is the real length of the path you drew, so a wobbly ramp costs more than a straight one. For wind only the straight distance between the arrow's tail and tip counts. That makes wind a good way to cover a big area for relatively little ink.

How strongly the ball reacts

The speed wind adds depends on how long the ball stays in the strip. A slow ball is pushed a lot, a fast one only a little. So:

• Send the ball along the strip (in line with the arrow) and it stays inside for a long time and gets a strong push.
• Send it across the strip and it only spends 88 centimetres there, bending its path slightly.
• Wind placed at the top of the ball's arc, where it's slowest, has the biggest effect.

Patterns that work

The lift

Draw an upward arrow across the ball's path. The ball rises inside the strip and keeps climbing as it leaves. When the hole is high and there's no room for a ramp, this is the cleanest answer.

The brake

An arrow pointing against the ball's direction slows it down. Useful when the ball arrives too fast and bounces off the far wall.

The last-second fix

A short arrow pointing up or down just before the hole lets you correct the shot's height by a few centimetres at the very end.

More in this section

• RampThe easiest way to lift the ball. Balancing angle, length and power.
• SpringChanges direction by bouncing. The angle is everything.
• BoosterSpeeds the ball up in the direction you draw. Direction and length work together.