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qoncept
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I understand that speedruns involve a lot of practice, optimization and seeing levels with your eyes closed, but in general I think people play Doom much faster than I do. I'm playing with a buddy who is about as good as me and after a good 4-5 hours, we just finished level 12 of Momento Mori 2.

I can see a couple things that could speed us up. We don't go out of our way to get 100% kills, but we do kill everything we see (except maybe a few monsters in the last room if one of us is low on health). And we're not playing Survival anymore, but we do our best to not die and take it a bit slow sometimes. But even considering that, it feels like we're REALLY slow. The biggest issue is getting stuck every once in a while and hunting for whatever switch we're missing. I think part of it is I don't have a good enough sense of direction to know where I am or even the layout of a level without looking at the map.

What do people do? Am I just switch-find-retarded? How do you know which monsters you can run by without running in to them again later?
Old Post 04-17-12 15:23 #
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purist
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Likely, the demos you're watching and comparing yourself to have been made by people you have played the level repeatedly to the point of knowing where everything is and the quickest route to get to it.

Maybe the first time they played Memento Mori 2 they got lost and played cautiously too.

That said, I'm not necessarily the best person to comment. I always get lost and spend ages getting through maps.
Old Post 04-17-12 16:03 #
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Memfis
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Let's see...

set "always run" to "on"
use straferunning as much as possible
during the battles, don't hide behind walls, just dodge everything (unless you're fighting hitscanners)
when using SG/SSG, hold "fire" constantly (reloading time should be enough to place your next shot)
be more aggressive
provoke infightings
try to line up monsters to deal more damage

But really, I don't think that 12 maps in 4-5 hours is slow. It took me approximately the same time to beat the first 10 maps of Plutonia Revisited.
Old Post 04-17-12 16:22 #
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Pavera
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Most of us doom community members have been playing a fuck ton of doom for the better parts of the last 18 years. When it becomes one of the only games you ever play anymore, you tend to get p.d. good at it. :P
Old Post 04-17-12 16:25 #
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Fluffles
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Most great speedrunners know everything about how to play the game perfectly whilst being able to do everything perfectly. It's like it with multiplayer aswell but when you get to such a perfectionist level you then start to have to use your intelligence to figure opponents out.

Partly why Doom is such a great game is when you get really good at it you have a great feeling that you can just defeat anything.
Old Post 04-17-12 16:57 #
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qoncept
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Memfis said:
Let's see...

set "always run" to "on"
use straferunning as much as possible
during the battles, don't hide behind walls, just dodge everything (unless you're fighting hitscanners)
when using SG/SSG, hold "fire" constantly (reloading time should be enough to place your next shot)
be more aggressive
provoke infightings
try to line up monsters to deal more damage

But really, I don't think that 12 maps in 4-5 hours is slow. It took me approximately the same time to beat the first 10 maps of Plutonia Revisited.

I think the only one I don't really do is using infighting as much as I could. I try to every once in a while but I usually get too impatient. Plus, we kind of have a half-assed kills competition going on each level and I always want to get as many as possible. I think saving the ammo would speed me up later, though.

Just for the hell of it I'm going to list a few of the things I've started doing/started doing better. I have been playing Doom since it came out, quite a bit for a couple years after it came out and then quite a bit for a few months at a time maybe 10 times since then.

- Using SSG efficiently (lining up enemies, getting close for each shot)
- Strafe running, especially through nukage
- Realizing that when there is a lot of nukage you need to run through, there's usually a suit somewhere nearby
- Lining up enemies not really so much to cause infighting but to at least let them hit each other a few times
- Killing hitscan enemies first and then worrying about the guys with projectiles I can dodge
- Finding secrets
- Using rocket launcher any time I have a worthwhile opportunity instead of saving it. I used to use it pretty rarely.
- Choosing the right weapon for the situation. I'll still shooting what I've got a lot of the time, but I do rethink and change to something more appropriate at least sometimes now

And the biggest thing is just not playing scared. When I was young (pretty much the time whole I played Vanilla Doom) I would always cheat. It seemed so overwhelming that I didn't think I could ever beat anything after the first few levels and so I never even tried.
Old Post 04-17-12 17:12 #
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dew
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Memfis said:
when using SG/SSG, hold "fire" constantly (reloading time should be enough to place your next shot)

i'm trying to kick this habit, because i think it's hurtful. sooner or later you will miss horribly just because you didn't wait half a second more to align monsters properly and you'll end up firing inbetween them instead, killing none. tapping fire should be a trained custom for all weapons except perhaps plasma and RL.
Old Post 04-17-12 17:24 #
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DuckReconMajor
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Plus it's also not as fun. It's more satisfying to have it shoot when you click the mouse as opposed to just automatically doing it. I realize this is about speed though.
Old Post 04-17-12 18:25 #
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qoncept
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dew said:

i'm trying to kick this habit, because i think it's hurtful. sooner or later you will miss horribly just because you didn't wait half a second more to align monsters properly and you'll end up firing inbetween them instead, killing none. tapping fire should be a trained custom for all weapons except perhaps plasma and RL.

Tapping with the plasma rifle has gotten me killed more than once. I try not to waste any more ammo than I have to and end up leaving a chaingunner alive, and the delay before you can fire again seems to be inconsistent.

What controls are people using for changing weapons? I was a keyboard-only guy for a long time and used the numbers but switched to using the mouse recently. I've been using the scroll wheel to change weapons since then but it doesn't seem to work very well (in Skulltag, at least). If I'm using the SSG and want the plasma rifle, for example, but scroll through 4 to the BFG, you can't "scroll back" until the BFG is up and ready. I guess I'm used to Unreal Tournament where weapons are readied much more quickly.
Old Post 04-17-12 18:27 #
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dew
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i use WASD for movement and 12345 for the original weapons, then C for bfg and V for plasma. this has served me well even in multiplayer. i can never remember weapon order in the heat of the moment, so i only use mousewheel changes for fast pickups (running over a new weapon in the first half of the weapon switch, so the process gets overriden and i get the new weapon up faster).
Old Post 04-17-12 18:43 #
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Memfis
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dew: good point, this actually happens quite often to me. :)

qoncept: I use arrows for movement and numpad numbers for weapons (except BFG is "0" instead of "7")
Old Post 04-17-12 19:06 #
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40oz
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I play very fast but i also die a lot in maps that are intended to be difficult. In a lot of 1994 levels, especially ones for Doom 1, I can play very fast and recklessly because there are lots of shotgun shells and very few arch viles and chaingun guys.
Old Post 04-18-12 00:08 #
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Phml
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Likely, the demos you're watching and comparing yourself to have been made by people you have played the level repeatedly to the point of knowing where everything is and the quickest route to get to it.


Additionally, the ratio of discarded attempts to released demos is sometimes fairly big. While most people can probably play as fast in any random map on a first play as they do in their best demos, it's possible they'd die a lot doing so.
Old Post 04-18-12 08:49 #
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ClumsyDoomer
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First time I had same problems, but TAS learning gave me many Doom experience and success. Try to increase your skills using TAS first - for example, compare my 30no1633 and 14no513. The second one is over 1 minute faster, the first was made 1 year ago. So, I increase my skills with TAS, it really helps.
Just start with speed 20- it makes speedrunning very simple. After a week change it to 50, and keep training up to GS 100...
Old Post 04-20-12 18:39 #
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qoncept
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Just to be clear, I didn't mean to imply I wanted to do speedruns. I just got the feeling that I was slow as hell, but based on other comments it sounds like I'm not doing so bad. :) I think we've got about 10 hours in to MM2 now and we're ready to start level 29 (and didn't find the secret levels).
Old Post 04-27-12 15:48 #
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jongo
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This is actually quite fast. Also most people have just played popular wads much and they remember routes and strategies. And this knowledge releases your potential speed. To make yourself feel better, watch some timeofdeath's slaughterfest2011 demos, then watch some FDA of him and compare the speed ;)
Old Post 04-27-12 18:59 #
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TimeOfDeath
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lols yeah, my FDAs are actually FPAs (first playthrough attempt). I play slow and safe, try not to die, and try to kill all monsters/find all secrets, cuz that's how I play wads for the first time.

As was said, you can play a lot faster if you have the maps memorized.
Old Post 04-27-12 20:09 #
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Phml
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my FDAs are actually FPAs (first playthrough attempt).


All FDAs should be FPAs, otherwise they aren't FDAs.

Now that you mention it, FPA would have made more sense than FDA as an acronym.
Old Post 04-27-12 20:40 #
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TimeOfDeath
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You're right, sorry about my wording. I just meant that I do FDAs from a playthrough perspective instead of a speedrun perspective.
Old Post 04-27-12 23:03 #
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Phml
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Oh, I didn't mean to imply you were wrong at all. Actually, I think it's interesting to think about. In regular speedrunning categories you have these clear goals everyone share (i.e. UV speed means exiting the level as fast as you can, period). With FDAs, everyone kind of make their own objectives and there's a wide variety of playstyles.
Old Post 04-27-12 23:38 #
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jongo
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yeah, and goncept is essentially FPAing mm2 now as far is i understand. And given the complexity and size of maps in MM, there is really no surprise it would take long time to finish.
It took me 25+ hours in my first playthrough (with saves) to uv-max every map btw.
Old Post 04-28-12 06:27 #
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