ScooT9's E1M1

Um... here it is, i guess? The map that nobody asked for, and it also is the "My first attempt at making a doom map."

So, this is "ScooT9's E1M1" if you didn't notice.
Yeah, and the map itself isn't filled with STARTAN, trust me.

Here's the link: http://www.mediafire.com/file/d6j477iwjbor5sq/st9e1m1.rar

heres ONE screenshot to not spoil too much:
http://imgur.com/qqF30Pu

I made a update for this wad. Just scroll down to find it.

Tested with: Chocolate Doom v2.3.0

I can never resist a small first level. Here's a complevel 3 FDA:

https://www.dropbox.com/s/esygbsnz7ds1z1j/st9e1m1_fda_benjogami.lmp?dl=1

I found all but one secret (you'll see me bumble around while looking at the automap for a large portion of the demo). A decent first effort. Always nice to see a first map that is appropriately vanilla-compatible.

Here's a bit of unsolicited feedback, if I may!

Buggy type stuff:

- This door here:



while merely having a unique alignment in PrBoom, has some artifacts in chocolate doom.

- The first sludge floor that the player encounters doesn't do damage.

- The secret closet with your signature in it has 2 secret sectors.

Gameplay balance stuff:

I found that the secrets were too generous (2 blue armors, backpack, max shells on map 1?!). For me, secrets that offer additional paths, perspectives, entries into encounters are more rewarding than a whole bunch of loot that I can't use. Take for example the secret that lets you outdoors in E1M1: the only reward is a green armor, but you get to stroll around outside, shoot through windows, find some additional guys to kill, and then sneak into the back of a room. Secrets like that are cool.

Also, for that one trap: the shotgun guys are just kinda piled up in the middle of the room in front of you, and you have a comfortable amount of cover to mow them down from, and the ability to retreat. I think trapping the player in that small room would improve it (there's still plenty of cover so it's not too mean), and then maybe have a couple of guys upfront that when shot at are joined by some more that come out from nearby cover (sort of like the pistol guys that stroll out at the end, but they're a bit too slow to the scene).

I also played your map and found it quite good for what it is. It felt like a nice map in the style of classic E1.

Benjogami said:

I found that the secrets were too generous (2 blue armors, backpack, max shells on map 1?!). For me, secrets that offer additional paths, perspectives, entries into encounters are more rewarding than a whole bunch of loot that I can't use. Take for example the secret that lets you outdoors in E1M1: the only reward is a green armor, but you get to stroll around outside, shoot through windows, find some additional guys to kill, and then sneak into the back of a room. Secrets like that are cool.

I agree that the secrets are probably too generous / unbalanced but I for one always felt the same way about the original Doom E1. It's actually a blue armor outside in E1M1 and that map also has a total of 8 (shotgun) + 8 (2 shells) + 60 (3 boxes) = 76 shotgun shells on the map plus 16 x 4 = 64 extra from the shotgun guys on UV and that with an opposition of 29 weak enemies.
So if that was your intention to replicate that in your map, it's not that far off. Nonetheless I'd still probably at least cut the backpack, one blue armor and maybe the soul sphere as well. They're not needed for your map and if you would like to build a whole episode with it, it would be bad for progression if the player can just exit with close to 200/200 health/armor and 100 shells. Especially compared to pistol starting the next map that would be pretty unbalanced. Maybe instead you could add a rad suit in one of your secrets for the nukage?

Nate River said:

I agree that the secrets are probably too generous / unbalanced but I for one always felt the same way about the original Doom E1. It's actually a blue armor outside in E1M1 [...]

Hey it is blue. Whoops. There's also a box of ammo and a medkit in there. Nevermind me! I guess E1M1 is too generous as well. ;)

Alright. So should i make a fixed version of this map?

That's totally up to you if you want to change your map according to the feedback you got.
But I would say it depends if you want to use this map again in an episode / megawad release because then the players could carry over health/armor and ammo in continuous play.
Otherwise if you just wanted to test some things to make a decent first map, your time is probably better invested in just making new maps and trying new things and using what you learned from previous attempts there.

Nate River said:

That's totally up to you if you want to change your map according to the feedback you got.
But I would say it depends if you want to use this map again in an episode / megawad release because then the players could carry over health/armor and ammo in continuous play.
Otherwise if you just wanted to test some things to make a decent first map, your time is probably better invested in just making new maps and trying new things and using what you learned from previous attempts there.

I'm fixing it now, so i removed the blue armor, the backpack and the soulsphere and i also fixed the first nukage pool on the start, so now it deals damage.

Alright. The ScooT9's E1M1 Update is done. I fixed several things such as:
Removed soulsphere from the map and removed the backpack from the map. I also added 4 dm spawns, in case someone wanted to play dm on this map.

Here's the link: https://www.mediafire.com/?kwbcr5z53xnyc8z