The iwad maps on nightmare difficulty.

What are your favorite and least favorite iwad maps to play on skill 5? Which maps are the hardest on skill 5 in each iwad?

map02

E2M2, because no hitscanners. Other maps with no hitscanners would qualify too.

not sure I've actually beaten E1M5 on Nightmare

doom is hard

The abundance of shotgun guys makes most of E1 pretty fun due to the infinite shotgun shells.

Sandbox themed maps from Doom 2 are pretty great too, especially Factory, Downtown, Suburbs and Courtyard.

this isn't actually much fun lol

edit: ok, I beat it at last. funny how I still look like a scrub doing it three quarters of the time. got into the swing of it at the end :D but I must say this level of difficulty is far too stressful and normally not what i want, might be a different story for deathmatch vets and such.

Map 24 ^-^
edit: but Map 23 is better on NM

i cant beat e1m1 on nightmare
im a noob the only difficulty thats easy for me is ITYTD
best = e2m1
worst = e3m8

i suck at this game :(

Can't say I 'enjoy' any map on Nightmare! difficulty. I might play one every now and then out of idiotic curiosity, but most of the time they just feel like too much work to actually be fun.

All that being said, and even though it's not an IWAD map as such (unless we're going to allow exclusive maps from console ports recreated/converted to a PC map format), this was actually a pretty good one to blast through on the absurd skill:

Can't say I 'enjoy' any map on Nightmare! difficulty. I might play one every now and then out of idiotic curiosity, but most of the time they just feel like too much work to actually be fun.

Yep. I can get into a punishingly long slaughter map going for hours, even a resource strict level where you have to punch a bunch of demons with non-zerk fist or somesuch. When things are too hard, there's the option to go slower. NM turns everything on its head. That pressure to move at a lightning fast pace is draining rather than relaxing.

E1M3 is the map that just stops me right in my tracks because fuck infinitely respawning shotgunners and demons

E1M3: because the backtracking makes it very challenging. Probably better to play with the stock you collected in E1M2.

E1M5: really nice to use the rockets and the supercharger at your advantage in the tower room.

E1M6: pretty awesome how the sergeants outside the complex can unlock the supercharger for you (and if you wait, get to you). Also the multi-tiered combat near the exit really has to be tactically handled with quick rocket damage.

E1M7: this plays like E1M3 and is similarly challenging. Again, rewarding use of powerups.

E2M1: great gameplay, I like how the demons have to be patiently killed while you stand on your telepad.

E2M2: pretty much a classic, albeit not hard.

E2M3: the shortcuts are really useful here.

E2M4: use the shortcuts

E4M1: what can I say, this map is just too evil. Besides all those monsters warping in, you also have reviving ones. You can hardly tell which is which!

Phml said:

Yep. I can get into a punishingly long slaughter map going for hours, even a resource strict level where you have to punch a bunch of demons with non-zerk fist or somesuch. When things are too hard, there's the option to go slower. NM turns everything on its head. That pressure to move at a lightning fast pace is draining rather than relaxing.

Yeah, there's no method to NM. You can't rely on your honed skills or whatever, you just need to stick to your route and hope for the best. Recoveries after something went wrong are frustrating and most likely screw you up further down the road anyways. Improvisation almost inevitably leads to death.

Well, unless you're rampaging through something as trivial as E1.

That's my main problem with the nightmare difficulty. It turns into a simple problem-solving game, that you have to follow exactly. After a few trials and errors you learn the solution and can apply it safely (or with some hitscan luck involved) and move on to the next level. It can feel like doing math homework. Lots of situations are solved by not getting involved (not triggering monsters). It can be mentally satisfying though, to figure out exploits that you didn't know about in the normal game. Sometimes I'm thinking about trying to play all new Doom levels in nightmare, but I'm not sure how well they scale. Most of my experience is from levels like Knee-Deep, and I'm not sure it's feasible to face too many revenants and mancubi this way.

Best: MAP31, Wolfenstein
Worst: E1M7, The Computer Station

Can't speak to the IWAD maps much since I haven't played many of them on Nightmare, but I've done a bunch of NM runs for PWADs and I think it's a lot of fun. There's definitely maps where it turns into a ridiculous game of trial and error, but the craziness of it can be quite enjoyable. The fact that you can't go too slowly due to respawns and the fact that no attempt is going to be exactly the same (meaning you have to deal with situations you've never seen before) make the challenge interesting for me.

Well, I never TRIED to beat the IWAD maps on nightmare. This game mode with all its changes just does not appeal to me.

I suggest Plutonia MAP11.