Jump to content
Search In
  • More options...
Find results that contain...
Find results in...
Captain Ventris

Maelstrom's Heretic Element Storm and Fulgurite Edition

Recommended Posts

Once a gameplay mod for Skulltag only ever released to private testers, I got the original creators' (Maelstrom and Starscream) blessings to update the last version that was released to testers, as well as to make a version updated according to my whims! Obviously it's for Heretic. It replaces both monsters and weapons.

Here's the original trailer made for the project:

 

 

To be COMPLETELY frank I'm not sure I'm going to get around to altering the remaining types of monsters. I've got a lot going one, but there was no need to have this sit around on my hard drive. There are some miscolored particle effects I was too lazy to change. Yeah, I know. Regardless it's quite fun as-is and definitely puts a new spin on the game!

Breakdown:
The mod is based around 10 elements. Gargoyles, Golems, Undead Knights, Disciples of D'Sparil, and Iron Liches (only in Water and Fire) spawn in one of these elements. In the Fulgurite Editition each level will have a primary and secondary element that are most common. Accordingly, the player can obtain weapons of each element. Now of the 10 standard elements, each one counters the next in order, and is resistant to whatever element it counters. SO:
Water : Blue
Fire : Red
Earth : Brown
Air : Gold (Cyan in Fulgurite Edition)
Acid: Green
Steel (Metal in Fulgurite Edition): Grey
Glass (Crystal in Fulgurite Edition): White/Light Grey (Purple in Fulgurite Edition)
Energy/Power: Purple (Yellow in Fulgurite Edition)

There are two other elements that spawn rarely but are more powerful. They are resistant to all normal elements, but counter each other.
Light (Sacred in Fulgurite Edition) : White
Dark (Profane in Fulgurite Edition): Black


Downloads:
Here is the original version, changed only to work on the current version of GZDoom.


The Fulgurite Edition makes all of the following changes and is available Here.

 

Version 0.1

 


Additions:
-Incorporated the maps made for Element Storm: Competitive. That would be Deathmatch maps ESM01-ESM05. This said, the Wad is not balanced for proper DM play. ALSO I found no credits for those maps, so if they weren't made by Maelstrom and Starscream, I hope someone can tell me who made 'em!

Bug Fixes:
-All calls for A_FireCustomMissile (and weapon calls erroneously using A_CustomMissile) have been updated to A_FireProjectile.

-Undead Knights lacked melee attacks!


Quality of Life Changes:
-Fixed typistry errors in the text. Grammar, capitalization, etc. across the board.
-Altered almost all obituaries to be more consistent in form.
-Added an Element wheel in the upper corner of the fullscreen HUD so you can see what color element counters which (just follow the colors clockwise).

-Steel is now called Metal. Changed for thematic reasons.
-Energy is now called Lightning. Makes more sense as an element and allows Crystal to be a purple color for reasons mentioned below.
-Glass is now called Crystal. Allows a color easier to differentiate from others. Before, Steel and Glass were very easy to mistake!
-Light and Dark are now called Sacred and Profane to highlight their existence outside the elemental wheel.


Visual:
-Adjusted the Neutral weapon's effect so it looked better.

-Made the Tidal Staff's visual effect less blinding.

-Lightning is now yellow because duh.
-Crystal is now a purple color. Pretty!
-Water is now a richer blue (it was grey-toned before and could look like Metal at a distance/during a chaotic fight).
-Air is now cyan because that makes vastly more sense then orange.
-Sacred enemies are now actually white instead of being sort of beigey.

-For the sake of visual feedback, there is now debris when the Tremor Staff boulder bounces against an actor, and the breaking of 
the projectile makes more debris.

-Fire Golem's fireballs have been scaled down to look less dire.
-Fire and Lightning Monsters are now Fullbright.
-Profane enemies are no longer translucent, and are ESPECIALLY not invisible because sheesh.
-There are no more Ghost monsters; instead only Crystal monsters are translucent. Hurrah, visual clarity!


Balance:
-There is now Spawn-weighting. Each level has a primary and secondary element, so you will tend to see monsters of those 
elements more often in that level. The weapons and ammo that counter those elements are weighted similarly. Example: The Level rolls
Fire for Prime element, and Water for secondary element. This means you will see lots of Fire monsters, a healthy amount of Water monsters,
and a smattering of other elements. You are more most likely to see the Tidal Staff and Lightning Gauntlets as a result.

-You no longer start with an Elemental weapon, just the Neutral weapon.
-The Neutral element spell is now on Key 1. All elemental weapons are in a row from key 2-9 in the order of their elemental interactions.
    The Sacred and Profane weapons are together on key 0.
-You can now only possess 3 of each Element Sphere at once.

-Element-Neutral starter damage raised from 2 to 3, and Powered version from 3 to 5.
-The Element-Neutral starter spell now fires 4 tics faster and refires quickly.
-The Element-Neutral projectile's speed was raised from 20 to 30 (Powered from 20 to 40), and now travels in a tight corkscrew so it's easier to actually hit things.
-Ammo counts for weapons and pickups have been lowered across the board.
-The Meteor Staff's refire rate was sped up by 9 tics, and it now deals area damage in a 128 unit radius.
-Powered Meteor Staff's damage has been raised from 3 to 8 on a direct hit, and its speed was raised from 20 to 28.
-The Energy Gauntlets now fire both projectiles simultaneously, are 4 units closer together, and each deal 8 damage (up from 6).
-The Tremor Staff's damage was raised from 5 to 8, firing speed slowed by 18 tics, and impact force increased from 150 to 300.
-Powered Tremor Staff damage raised from 8 to 10.
-Tornado Claw damage raised from 2 to 3.
-Crystal wand damage increased from 4 to 5.
-The Acid Scourge's spread was reduced by 3, projectile speed increased by 6, and damage increased from 2 to 3.
-Acid Scourge poison should now effect monsters.
-The Tidal Staff's fire pattern was altered so it doesn't wander off to one side, and its damage was raised from 2 to 3.
-The Steel, Sacred, and Profane weapons will no longer be reflected.
-Steel Bolt's damage raised from 5 to 8 and its fire rate slowed by 8 tics.
-Profane now fires 17 tics faster.
-Unholy Bolt damage increased from 5 to 10.
-Sacred now fires 15 tics faster.
-Holy Bolt width increased from 15 to 20, and damage from 5 to 14.

-Edited all Gargoyles to correctly reflect the default Charging behavior.
-Monsters now take half damage (instead of no damage) from a weapon matching their element.
-Lightning no longer takes 2.5 times damage from itself, but half in accordance with the other elements.
-The various characteristics of Monsters in different elements have been altered. Stats are normal where unspecified.
    -Fire has a slight speed boost, and instead of becoming afraid, gets sped up attacks at half health.
    -Air has a substantial speed boost but slightly less health, and halved mass. Can also dodge about!
    -Earth is slightly slower but has a decent health boost and regenerates back up to their max health by walking around.
    -Acid now always deals poison damage at range at 1 damage per second. More hits means a longer time being poisoned.
    -Metal is slow, with a big health boost and a halved pain chance.
    -Crystal is delicate and of course still reflects projectiles, but also possesses higher then normal damage. Glass cannons!
    -Lightning is the fastest and no longer regenerates. Lightning has a chance to double in speed for a short period!
    -Sacred and Profane have boosted stats all around but aren't as insane as before. Sacred still Rezzes, while Profane passes 
        through others of its same species, has homing attacks, is fear-inducing to other monsters, and gains health attacking you.

 

Share this post


Link to post

The original version of this mod was under development in 2008, almost 10 years ago. The code must have definitely shown its old age, so great work cleaning it up. I remarkably could remember the colours of the original elements quite well, so having a few colours changed around messed me up a few times!

 

Nothing beyond Golems and Gargoyles were spawning for me, was that intentional? I was playing in the latest development build of GZDoom. Also the DM maps seemed to be inaccessible, but I'm pretty confident I'm the one who made them (eg. Starscream). I could never forget how awful they were for DM.

Share this post


Link to post

Oh I goofed up a couple numbers in spawning scripts. Redownload it and try it!

 

EDIT: Oh it actually turned out that all I had to do was import a couple Skulltag item definitions. Otherwise it was just core Decorate stuff! If you had gone with Acs I'm sure something would have exploded, but yeah.

Edited by Captain Ventris

Share this post


Link to post

Create an account or sign in to comment

You need to be a member in order to leave a comment

Create an account

Sign up for a new account in our community. It's easy!

Register a new account

Sign in

Already have an account? Sign in here.

Sign In Now
×