Why I prefer Ultimate Doom WADs

Maes said:

I always thought that UD was much more "Doom 2" in style than E1-E3 (all those rust/metal textures....). However in Doom 2 it's unusual to see all this wood + metal + rust combination, even if it's technically possible. Plus, UD still has access to all Doom textures, some of which Doom 2 doesn't have... so essentially UD = Doom plus some Doom 2 textures, minus the Doom 2 monsters and weapon. In turn, Doom 2 = Doom + new monsters + new weapon + MANY new textures -some textures and flat.

I'd say that you witness the "Ultimate Doom" style mostly on DM maps, which are usually laden with ripped resources but run in Doom 2 mode (SSG ;-)

You are comparing the official levels of UD with the official levels of Doom2, which I clearly stated in my first post this thread was NOT about. I'm comparing the game play styles of custom Doom2 WADs vs. custom UD WADs. Doom2 WAD makers have followed the trend of having slaughter fests against upper-tiered monsters, while UD WAD makers have followed the trend of having lower-tiered monsters with weaker weapons at your disposal. I prefer the latter, while others do not.

And I really don't care about DM. Never played much DM in Doom, nor do I want to. I have a feeling you are posting in this discussion without having played many custom WADs for UD at all - except maybe DM WADs.

By the way, I thought I would clarify something that I said earlier about "ducking and covering" from Revenents. The scenario I pictured when I said "ducking and covering" is a narrow hallway joined by another hallway, as pictured below. The big red dot is the Revenent, and the small dot is the player:



This is a situation found VERY commonly in Doom2 WADs (Revenents in narrow hallways). There are two ways that most Doomers would handle this situation. The cautious way to defeat this Revenent - and the method that most Doomers would probably use in a normal playthrough (not a speed run)- is to take cover in the joining hallway when the Revenent fires. Here is a video I recorded showing what I mean:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zGdS-uHUSU4

Now, the fancy way of killing this Revenent is not finding cover at all, which most Doomers would only risk if they were forced to, or if they had a lot of health at their disposal and were playing carelessly (I do sometimes if I'm bored). It is rare that mappers force you to fight Revenents in a tight hallway with no place to hide. But anyway, this is how I would kill a Revenent if I couldn't "duck and cover":

http://youtu.be/kM59ISmfks8

Lightning Hunter said:

while UD WAD makers have followed the trend of having lower-tiered monsters with weaker weapons at your disposal. I prefer the latter, while others do not

And for good reason: when was the last time you saw a good slaughter map with just Doom monsters and weaponry? It simply doesn't work: no mid-tier monsters, less species of monsters which can infight, and lack of the SSG. Battling a horde of barons with the shotty and RL? Oh please. Make it a cyberdemon fest? Swamp the player with a 100 cacodemons or fill pits with Lost Souls? Massed shotgunners? Hell no, even with the lack of Archviles. It would literally feel like "Doom: Half", rather than "Doom One".

So of course someone mapping for Doom (not just UD) will stick to more sober themes and focus elsewhere when mapping. And if somebody went the extra mile and really-really-really wants to map not for "just" Doom but for "Ultimate" Doom, he will make an effort to stick to the theme, so that his mod can be worth of an E4Mx slot.

Lightning Hunter said:

And I really don't care about DM. Never played much DM in Doom, nor do I want to.

That's your choice and opinion, but you ought to recognize that this way you cut yourself out of an entire "world" of PWADs using a particular style.

Lightning Hunter said:

I have a feeling you are posting in this discussion without having played many custom WADs for UD at all - except maybe DM WADs.

I admit I don't, but then, they are statistically few and far between -if I pick a random map from idgames right now, chances are that it will be for Doom II, then for Doom, and then UD/E4 (Final Doom anyone?). How many are there anyway? Less than 100 (counting episode replacement or even 4-episode megawads and TCs)? Unless one is dead-set on hunting down the very last of them, it's unlikely ANYONE will gather enough experience with them to match yours (?).

Maes said:

And for good reason: when was the last time you saw a good slaughter map with just Doom monsters and weaponry?

[/b]

I don't enjoy a "good" slaughter map at all. Like I already said, slaughter maps and BFG Spam-fests are boring to me, and Doom2 WADs have plenty of them. Naturally, that would make me a fan of UD maps, since they don't have slaughter fests. You obviously enjoy slaughter maps, so you prefer Doom2.

So of course someone mapping for Doom (not just UD) will stick to more sober themes and focus elsewhere when mapping. And if somebody went the extra mile and really-really-really wants to map not for "just" Doom but for "Ultimate" Doom, he will make an effort to stick to the theme, so that his mod can be worth of an E4Mx slot.

Thank you for finally understanding the point of the topic! The point is that UD mappers have different themes and styles of game play than Doom2 maps, and I just happen to enjoy the UD style. UD WADs are quite a bit different than Doom2 WADs. Both of us simply like different styles of game play.

That's your choice and opinion, but you ought to recognize that this way you cut yourself out of an entire "world" of PWADs using a particular style.

I haven't cut myself from them. It's possible I have played more Doom2 Single Player Megawads than you have. I simply don't enjoy them as much as UD WADs anymore. Perhaps my taste of WADs after having played Doom for 18 years has changed. Or perhaps I don't like the direction that WADs for Doom2 are taking now. Either way, they are not as enjoyable anymore to me. My own project that I started about 12 years ago is for Doom2, but it is just about abandoned now. I don't think I'll ever finish it. If I had started the project today, I would definitely make it for UD.

I admit I don't, but then, they are statistically few and far between -if I pick a random map from idgames right now, chances are that it will be for Doom II, then for Doom, and then UD/E4 (Final Doom anyone?). How many are there anyway? Less than 100 (counting episode replacement or even 4-episode megawads and TCs)? Unless one is dead-set on hunting down the very last of them, it's unlikely ANYONE will gather enough experience with them to match yours (?).

There are hundreds of new Episodes for Ultimate Doom, and thousands of single maps. I have made my own compilations of my favorite UD episodes, in fact. Yes, there are more levels for Doom2, but there are also thousands of UD levels. I always find myself replaying UD WADs more often then Doom2 WADs.

Lightning Hunter said:

There are hundreds of new Episodes for Ultimate Doom, and thousands of single maps.

This may sound just a matter of semantics -but what do you mean that a WAD is "for Ultimate Doom"? You also include "plain Doom" WADs in that definition? Because the idgames archive has about 33K entries of today, of which half are text files and that leaves about 16.5K files, of which some are combos, utilities, source-port exclusives etc.

So I can't imagine that literally thousands of them are Ultimate Doom exclusives (aka they include at least one E4 map slot, and thus would not play on "normal" Doom). Do you agree with this definition of something being "for Ultimate Doom"?
Did you include "plain Doom" maps and episodes in the numbers you quoted?

As for episodes, there was a thread long ago by some guy who wanted "full episode replacements" for Doom. Turned out those were surprisingly few and far between (perhaps not even over a hundred, literally), and of course if you filtered them by "Ultimate"-ness, you'd get even fewer hits. It didn't help that his definition of "episode replacement" was something that replaced ALL maps in an episode, and ALL episodes at the same time, which proved even more restrictive.

Speaking of which, it would be interesting to see just exactly how many single maps and episode replacements/TCs target ULTIMATE Doom specifically, and WON'T play on "plain Doom", at all. I can't imagine them being more than a few hundred in the entire idgames archive.

Edit: a VERY unscientific search (searching for "Ultimate" in the whole textfile in idgames) gives 1641 hits, with a lot of bogus. Searching for E4M gives a probably more realistic 220 hits, though it might miss a few. Either way, I don't see "thousands of exclusive Ultimate Doom levels".

When I say Ultimate Doom, I don't mean UD-only WADs. I basically mean anything that will work in UD, which includes, but is not limited to Doom1 WADs.

I once went through the entire archive of /IDGAMES and downloaded anything that was over 500k, then sorted through all of those downloads to find which ones were complete episodes. I ended up with about a few hundred episodes, but of course most of them were not worth keeping (similar to most Doom2 WADs). So, I went through the hundreds of episodes and deleted the one's that were junk. In the end, my "Ultimate" Collection of Doom WADs is the follows:

-About 31 Episodes worthy of keeping
-8 MegaWADs that consist of 3-4 episodes each, also worthy of keeping
-Too many Single Maps to count, many of which I haven't tested yet.

It would take years (at least with my schedule) to play through all this content. Here is a list of Single Episodes I kept, in case it helps anyone looking for content to play:

Par.wad - PHOBOS: ANOMALY REBORN
End1.wad - The Beginning of the End (two episodes)
End2.wad - The Beginning Of The End Part II
Parallel.wad - Parallel Dimension
Phobos-v.wad - Phobos Revisited
Sudtic.wad - Slaughter Until Death
Teutic.wad - The Evil Unleashed
Bak2Hell.wad - Back To Hell
Nukemine.wad - Nuke Mine
phell.wad - Planet Hell
Inferno.wad - Inferno
Epi-hell.wad - Episode Hell
pe1_phob.wad - Simply Phobos
pe4m_all.wad - Death Tormention 1
pe4_dt2.wad - Death Tormention 2
pe4_dt3.wad - Death Tormention 3
Debut.wad - Debut
RetroEps.wad - Retro Episode
Class_Ep.wad - The Classic Episode
ddvu.wad - Deimos Deja Vu
dbimpact.wad - Double Impact
kdu.wad - Knee Deep in the UnDead
b2b.wad - Back To Basics
nhfl.wad - No Hope For Life Epsiode 1: Back To the Fight
invotdam.wad - Invasion of the Damned
Infinity.wad - Infinity
Eternity.wad - Eternity
Serenity.wad - Serenity
Crusades.wad - Crusades
Rage20.wad - Rage Doom
Phobos.wad - The Far Side of Phobos


Megawads:
nmdu.wad - Needs More Detail (3 episodes)
2002ad10.wad - 2002 A Doom Odyssey - 10th Anniversary (4 episodes)
bgcomp.wad - Base Ganymede: Complete (3 episodes)
concern.wad - Concerned (3 Episodes)
dtwid.wad - Doom The Way ID Did (3 episodes)
extremal.wad - Extremal (3 episodes)
njdoom.wad - NJ Doom (3 episodes)
Vengnce.wad - Vengeance (4 episodes)

Either way, I don't see "thousands of exclusive Ultimate Doom levels".

You are taking me out of context. I said there were thousands of single maps for download, which there are:
http://www.doomworld.com/idgames/index.php?dir=levels/doom/

And yes, I meant levels that work in Ultimate Doom. The only big difference between UD and Doom1 is an additional Episode. Why are so many people in this thread picking apart each of my statements? Do I need to spell out each of my statements in legal terms using thousands of pages compiled by a lawyer in order for people stop interrogating each of my sentences?

Lightning Hunter said:

Also, the 4-episode format of UD is a huge advantage over the 32 consecutive level format of Doom2, as mentioned earlier in this thread. It forces the player to lose all their weapons at the start of each episode, like a fresh start.

My favorite WADs for UD have a much different style than the fan-favorite WADs for Doom2. Death Tormention 3, 2002ado, Inferno, and Phobos Anomaly Reborn for UD have VERY different game play styles than Alien Vendetta, Hell Revealed, Schythe 2, Speed of Doom, and countless others.

Scythe 2 and Speed of Doom force losing weapons. In fact, Scythe 2 forces this much more often than any stupid old boring crap UDoom wad out there ever. You're making stupid shit up and cherry pick whatever you think fits you. Lutz's Inferno is actually not at all like you describe it. It often depends heavily on chaingun, RL and plasma spam and it's far from rare for it to ambush you with large crowds or a cyberdemon. The last map has an undefeatable army of cyberdemons that makes most of Doom2 PWADS look easy. You know, some of us have played the mapsets you keep mentioning. Your riposte?

EDIT: I would also like you to explain dbimpact e1m8 to me. How is that UD at all?!

What have I ever done to deserve this uncivil treatment? Is my opinion not respected? Rather than discuss this politely, all of you seem to prefer to "win" a debate, when this was never intended to be a debate. I wanted opinions, not arguments. I am through with this flamewar that was meant to be a pleasant discussion about whether people enjoy UD WADs or Doom2 WADs. Maybe only a 3rd of the people on this thread gave their opinion, while the rest of them bashed my opinion.

Thanks goes out to the people who kindly responded...

EDIT: I would also like you to explain dbimpact e1m8 to me. How is that UD at all?!

That list I compiled was merely a list of episodes people might want to play. I was being nice by compiling a list of episodes that you Doom2 fans might want to try, and you have spit that kindness back in my face. dbimpact was not one of those episodoes that fits my agenda of great UD episodes. I just said it was worthy of playing. What are all of you, lawyers?

I do enjoy a good UD wad. I just don't enjoy your pushy way of declaring them superior to D2 wads when there are so many proofs to the contrary. I've played many good UD wads, of which some are on your list, and I've played dbimpact more thoroughly than you or anyone else in this discussion. What I dislike the most is that you describe the variety and richness of UD wads, but you're quick to dismiss EVERYTHING D2-related as samey spammy unrefined shit. That's so arrogant and blind that I can only applaud the fact that you already checked out of the discussion and won't bother us anymore.

dew said:

I do enjoy a good UD wad. I just don't enjoy your pushy way of declaring them superior to D2 wads when there are so many proofs to the contrary. I've played many good UD wads, of which some are on your list, and I've played dbimpact more thoroughly than you or anyone else in this discussion. What I dislike the most is that you describe the variety and richness of UD wads, but you're quick to dismiss EVERYTHING D2-related as samey spammy unrefined shit. That's so arrogant and blind that I can only applaud the fact that you already checked out of the discussion and won't bother us anymore.

I love you too.

So I agree with the OP, but for my own reasons. That is, I have more UDoom favorite PWADS than DOOMII PWADs. This is not the same thing as thinking UDoom is better than DOOMII. As many have pointed out, there is little that can be done in UDoom that cannot be done in DOOMII, and nothing of true significance. I also prefer DOOM2.WAD over doom.wad any day of the week, and have played it far more often. However, I do find that I enjoy playing custom levels for UDoom more than DOOMII.

First, let me address the one of the biggest differences between UDoom and DOOMII; the SSG. I do not agree with the notion that it completely replaces the original shotgun. The original shotgun is still my weapon of choice between the two for zombies. It is more effective at a distance than the SSG. Trying to kill a chaingunner who is a ways away with the SSG is just a recipe for pain, as maybe one or two shots will actually hit him, triggering his pain state and retaliation. The regular shotgun as a much more concentrated area of effect, and it reloads quicker. Even if one shot with the normal shotgun does not kill, it will certainly do more damage and the player is much more likely to get the next, killing shot off before taking much if any damage himself.

Beyond this situation however, the regular shotgun does lose most of its usefulness. The only other time I will use it is if there are monsters above me on a ledge, as the horizontal spread of the SSG often will be highly inefficient in these situations, with shots hitting the ledge below and flying over the intended target.

But I think the SSG is the way to go, if not a bit overpowered, in most all other situations. It all comes down to level design, but the fact of the matter is that the SSG is a very powerful weapon with a very slow reload time. It is the primary weapon of the game 9 times out of 10. A huge chunk of my time playing DOOM2 PWADs is spent either circle-strafing while reloading or abusing corners, always with the SSG in hand.

Now, the next big difference between the two Dooms. The beastiary. I say that DOOMII's beastiary makes DOOMII's gameplay slower and weaker than UDoom. Due to the SSG's power it is frequently used against monsters above zombies. It is slow. Compare this to UDoom, where the primary weapon is the shotgun. It is not as slow. This difference in primary weapon speed makes DOOMII slower and chunkier. Add to this chunkiness the beefed up hit points of most of DOOMII's monsters... revenants, mancubi, arachnotrons. Arch Viles. All take 2-4 slow shots with the SSG. This makes fighting these monsters repetitive, as you must perform the same maneuver 2 or 3 times. zzzzzzzzz. In UDoom, the standard-issue monsters are zombies, imps, demons. These can all be taken out in 1-3 shots usually. Zombies can go down 2 or 3 at a time with a single shotgun blast. Less shots to kill things, faster shots. This speed is simply compounded with rockets and plasma of course. While many DOOMII monsters take 3 or 4 rockets to take out, 3 or 4 rockets will clear out 90% of a room in UDoom. I plow through enemies to a much more satisfying extent while playing UDoom PWADS.

The biggest reason perhaps why I prefer UDoom over DOOMII custom levels is how well the monsters blend together in UDoom. While it is true that alone barons or cacos or imps do not pose much of a threat, it is their beautiful mixing that forms a homogenous killing blob of suffering. UDoom's monsters blend much better than DOOMII's monsters. There is a lot more decision making that goes into taking out a mob of UDoom's monsters than that goes into DOOMII's mobs.

One huge difference between the UDoom and DOOMII's monsters is their physical size. Arachnotrons and Mancubi take up a lot of room. Thus, areas with mobs containing these monsters have to be rather big. This means that after a couple are taken out (often through excessive infighting), the player usually has enough room to run around boringly in circles until the rest of the monsters kill each other. As a side note, this is why I find painful floors so important in level design, as it limits the space for the player, but not the monsters.

The difference in the relative power of hitscanners also makes for better mob dynamics in UDoom. A nicely blended UDoom monster mash will have a decent percentage of sergeants. Sergeants can hold their own in a UDoom mob and their hitscanning punch reduces the effectiveness of circle-strafing. In DOOMII, hitscanners are relatively weak compared to hell knights, barons, mancubi, etc. Throw some hitscanners into a DOOMII mob and they will explode into guts very quickly due to infighting. Hitscanners die very quickly in DOOMII mobs. Very quickly it is just projectile monsters left to deal with.

The rest of the UDoom beastiary is equally well blended. Zombiemen are more obstacles and wastes of time/shots in a nice UDoom monster mash. Imps' attacks are easier to avoid but are beefier than zombies. Let them get too close and they'll claw and fireball you good. Demons are the same in this sense, and also a serious shell sponge. If they are getting too close you have to deal with them, giving sergeants time to damage you. Throw in a baron or two and you have some very dangerous enemies you need to concentrate on while still keeping the weaker monsters at bay. Cacos make great snipers from a distance. They take a lot of time to take down, so it is often better to ignore them if they are positioned at a distance. However in this situation their medium-speed plasma balls throwing in a bit of chaos into the mix. I do a lot more weapon switching in UDoom if the ammo is well balanced, pulling out rockets for a few shots when I see a baron, then switching back to the chaingun or shotgun for when the weaker monsters are drawing close.

Mobs of DOOMII beasts fall into chaos and leave the player with nothing to do but run in circles. As I mentioned, the size issue can quickly give the player room to breathe and circle-strafe. Hitscanners get toasted by buffed upper-tier DOOMII beasts very quickly. Those upper-tier beasts have powerful attacks. So powerful, in fact, that it gives the player less to do while playing. It is very often much more efficient ammo-wise to let the strong DOOMII monsters kill each other. Shooting into a DOOMII monster mob is unwise, as it will simply mean the monsters you hit will not infight for a while. I do not find it fun to rely on infighting. It makes me feel weak and unnecessary. It makes me wonder how these idiot monsters ever survived each other this long. I want to be the strongest guy in the room, mowing down monsters as I go. In UDoom, if a baron infights an imp or a zombie, the infighting will last about 2 seconds and the result will be one splatted imp and one relatively unaffected baron. Compare this to a mancubus and a baron fighting, which lasts much longer and leads to one dead monster and one severely weakened monster. DOOMII's power is much more heavily weighted at the top. The heavily lower-tiered nature of UDoom's monsters makes inducing infighting less effective an option. There are many equally strong lower-ranked monsters in UDoom, but they are so weak in general that wasting time trying to get them to infight is not as effective as simply killing them yourself. Waiting for UDoom monsters to infight will lead to some unnecessary shotgun blasts to the gut and face. It is better to take the fight to the monsters in UDoom and go hammer-down. I find this far more satisfying then watching the buffed monsters kill each other in DOOMII. This makes the DOOMII monsters seem far more stupid and nonthreatening than in UDoom. The hiscanners in DOOMII mobs are weak and die quick, leaving easily-dodged projectiles (even the homing ones) to deal with. A mob of projectile shooters is not much of a threat for the ultrafast marine and will generally implode in on itself.

Arch viles are hitscanners. Very slow, but powerful hitscanners. I used to love arch viles. Now I find them very gimmicky. Often a mob fight with archies will involve two rounds for me. First round, I will not know the arch vile is coming, I will explode, I will die. The second round I will know the arch vile is coming, I will kill it ASAP, and that will be that. Arch viles also make ammo balance difficult. If they manage to revive a bunch of buffed DOOMII monsters ammo balance can be thrown way off. I find Arch Viles to be too gimmicky and not particularly well designed. It is really tough to make interesting arch viles encounters these days.

So there ya go. Many of the reasons why I like UDoom PWADs over DOOMII PWADs. The OP, chunky, slow nature of the SSG. The slow, grindy beefiness of DOOMII monsters who take too many repetitive shots to take out. The better bottom-heavy balance of UDoom mobs and the tendency of powerful fireball-shooting DOOMII mobs to simply implode in on themselves and not be by any means a threat. I think I will always personally prefer UDoom mapping over DOOMII. Anyone familiar with my work (Awakening, end1&2, NEIS), will know I love creating mobs of weak monsters with a few medium and one or two strong monsters thrown in.

Oh, and I generally think the BFG is fine. It is true that I don't like how it generally replaces the plasma rifle. However, the BFG takes a lot of skill to use, and when trying to make shooting the slow, expensive BFG shot worth it I will often put myself in harm's way and take a solid chunk of damage. It's well enough balanced in my opinion, in both games. Certainly popular DOOMII PWADs involving hordes of a single type of monster or frequent use of archies can make it seem OP, but this is a matter of level design and not the weapon itself.

@NaturalTvventy: awesome post, but I found Awakening boring on HMP (= only UD monsters). What kept me playing it were the new monsters on UV only...

SSG is fun to use and makes dealing with stronger enemies more dynamic. This is the problem with UD: unless you can rock launcher/plasmagun all the time, you're stuck with shotgun/chaingun when dealing with stronger enemies, which is boring as hell. Killing a single Caco with a shotgun is slow, killing a Baron is downright tedious. Killing multiple Cacos/Barons with a shotgun/chaingun is super slow.

This leads to the second problem: all projectile enemies shoot in a straight line which makes dodging trivial and boring. D2 adds monsters that keep the pressure on the player in a way that's very hard to mimic in UD (and impossible in most cases). Revenant, Mancubus, Pain Elemental, Archvile - all those monsters offer threats that are either harder to predict or force the player to think about a lot more stuff than just moving left or right. All of this works in favour of dynamic, skill-based combat.

Finally, UD doesn't have any mid-tier monsters. There's a huge gap between Caco and Baron. There's nothing between Demon and Caco.

You can make small-quarter fights with few, low-tier monsters in D2... but you can't make bigger fights in UD unless you spam rockets/cells. They'd call for using just two types of enemies, Cacos and Barons, which alone would make them boring but would also require tedious shotgun/chaingun health-chipping with nothing to put a pressure on the player.

NaturalTvventy said:

A nicely blended UDoom monster mash will have a decent percentage of sergeants.

A nicely blended Doom 2 monster mash, on the other hand, will have a decent percentage of chaingunners. Carefully placed chaingunner won't explode into guts so easily.

NaturalTvventy said:

First round, I will not know the arch vile is coming, I will explode, I will die.

vdgg said:

@NaturalTvventy: awesome post, but I found Awakening boring on HMP (= only UD monsters). What kept me playing it were the new monsters on UV only...

Yea, I like them new monsters too! I watched your Awakening demo not long ago it just so happens. Nice job on that one!