earliest cyb/spiderdemon placement in megawads?

I'm after some examples of megawads that place cyber/spiderdemons similarly to how the iwads did. Too many megawads seem to throw them at the player during the first few maps.

EDIT: Also after examples of where they've been placed very early in a megawad, provided it isn't a slaughterfest.

The Lost Episodes of Doom (aka Jpt_40) is from 94-96 era and has good examples of using Cyberdemons and Spidermasterminds.

edit: I think I have the filename wrong

congo on top

Cleimos 2 only has two Cyberdemons and one Spider Mastermind IF I recall correctly; on MAP15, 16 & 24 respectively.

As far as these monsters appearing early on: Heroes 2 MAP01 has plenty to work with.

DTWID obviously handle cybs and masterminds similary to Ultimate Doom and although I've not played it I expect DTWID: Lost Levels is similar.

From memory I think TVR places boss monsters relatively late on. From personal projects Hadephobia has it's first Spiderdemon on MAP11 and Cyb on MAP13 - although they become more frequent from there on.

I think AV has a Cybie starting @ map 6. Forgot about Spiders though.

purist said:
From memory I think TVR places boss monsters relatively late on.

Level 5 has a pair of Spider Masterminds on all difficulties. o:)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=siXUMIFwICg

Level one of Plutonia has a Spidermastermind and level one of TNT has a Cyberdemon -- that is if you're playing on co-op.

I recall MAP01 of Plutonia had an Arch-Vile on the tougher difficulties.

Scythe is a pretty good wad boss-wise: the first Spider Mastermind is on MAP18 and the first Cyberdemon on MAP20. Things get a bit hectic after MAP20 though, bear in mind. =D

Obsidian said:

I recall MAP01 of Plutonia had an Arch-Vile on the tougher difficulties.

I was talking about Single Player. :)

Cyberdreams has alot of cyberdemons. I think.

BloodyAcid said:

Cyberdreams has alot of cyberdemons. I think.

A much under-appreciated wad!!

Ah, Cyberdreams! Don't know how I missed it. That one's worth a playthrough.

In the episode I'm making, I've got a few Cyberdemons in the middle and towards the end. But I'm saving the spider demon for last.

Spider Masterminds are relatively rare in MegaWADs, especially compared to Cyberdemons. Why? Because they're excessively tricky beasts... to implement effectively.

Big, bulky targets that scream "HIT ME". Sure they can certainly tear you up, but they need a lot of space to move around and some sort of terrain-based defence (higher ground, etc.) while being within 'medium' range to serve any purpose other than soaking up a load of BFG tracers and exploding in the space of a second.

Memento Mori 2's use of boss monsters is pretty interesting. No bosses until map20 (except for map32), but from then on, cyberdemons regularly appear in basically each map.

MM2 had firm rules about when particular monsters and weapons were allowed to be used, phasing them in over the run of levels.

Of course, as the rules said "Cybers are OK from this map onwards", pretty much everyone mapping in that slot and later used a Cyber :)

yakfak said:

Level 5 has a pair of Spider Masterminds on all difficulties. o:)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=siXUMIFwICg

I didn't think spiderdemons could infight? (Or cyberdemons for that matter) - or am I thinking about monsters that can't be resurrected by an archvile?

invictius said:

I didn't think spiderdemons could infight?

All hitscan monsters can infight, because monsters are immune to their own projectiles, not to hitscans.

The spiderdemon is a hitscan monster, like the zombies.

On the other hand, the cyber and the spider are both immune to splash damage. So the cyberdemons cannot infight as they won't hurt each other, neither with the projectile impact nor with the splash damage.

Any wads that feature ONLY spiders or cybers in a level? As in more than the two you get in go 2 it.

invictius said:

Any wads that feature ONLY spiders or cybers in a level? As in more than the two you get in go 2 it.

I can't not mention this. :)

In "Time of Maps" there is a level with like 90 cyberdemons and nothing else.

Capellan said:

MM2 had firm rules about when particular monsters and weapons were allowed to be used, phasing them in over the run of levels.

Interesting. By chance do you have any of those rules still lying around anywhere? I'm sure Denis and Thomas won't care if you leak them now. ;)

Urban Space Cowboy said:

Interesting. By chance do you have any of those rules still lying around anywhere? I'm sure Denis and Thomas won't care if you leak them now. ;)

I don't have the specific rules any more. It has been 17 years, 4 houses and about 5 computers since then, after all :)

It was a pretty simple table, though, with columns for map number, weapons introduced, and monsters introduced. Once a weapon or monster was introduced, you were free to use it thereafter. That was all there was to it, except there were some things you could use on the secret levels "out of sequence".

Memfis said:

In "Time of Maps" there is a level with like 90 cyberdemons and nothing else.

Also 1337.wad map11 has 64 cybers. It's good for practising but try to avoid the crusher switches.

How about Slaughterfest series? All maps contains cyberdemons.