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Retro Dino

Lets talk Doom 2!

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As the title says I wanna talk about Doom 2. No i'm not talking about a NEW doom 2, which i'm hoping Bethesda is gonna announce TOMORROW! (HYPE!?!) I'm talking about the original Doom 2. For some reason I never took the time to actually play through the full game and beat it, until now. I just wanted to do a quick review of the game and talk about a few problems I had and I wanna see if anyone else had a few of the other same problems. The game was a solid 8/10 BUT:
1.The levels could be cryptic at times, and sometimes it felt like there was way to much backtracking. (This is one reason I HATE the metroid series.) 
2. The levels where to big. I mean come on, downtown was WAY to open and WAY to big, it took me forever to figure out where to go and like my first complaint, I just felt lost.
3. Enemy "traps", oh look a health pack, boom the wall opens up and theres like 20 imps. Okay fine that's fine everynow and then but it seems like every switch you hit, every health pack you pick up, or every corner you turn has one. It just started to getting annoying at times.
4. Monster spam. Like my 3rd complaint says, 20 imps!? Damn. I know the "super shotgun" can take care of most of them FAST but I mean come on. There where times where it felt like I was playing a game of dogeball trying to avoid all of the fireballs thrown at me. That was fun for awhile, but it got old fast.
5. Barons of hell. Remember beating episod 1 in Doom? The final level had those 2 barons of hell that kicked your ass no matter what you did, yeah that was great. But doom 2 comes along and just throws barons of hell around EVERYWHERE.
6. Some of the levels felt like really shitty wads. I mean come on. Rooms covered with the same decorations, arrows telling you where to go (even though it's obvious) and so on.

Those are 6 of the major complaints I had. Besides that the game was great, I loved it! Killing hordes of enemies was fun and it did add more of a challenge. This is a thread though so I wanna know if you guys agree with me or not. Also anyone else hyped for a POSSIBLE doom 2 (2?) Go back and play Doom 2 and keep these things in mind, you might understand where i'm coming from a bit more!

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Always fun to hear people's perspectives on the IWADs for the first time!

 

I think many of us here have played through Doom 2's levels so many times over so many years it's hard to really evaluate it properly when it's all just second nature now. It's hard to be holistic about something when you know every individual linedef like the back of your hand. 

 

Entryway for example stopped being a level years ago. It exists solely now as a place to tweak settings or test gameplay mods. 

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6 minutes ago, Bauul said:

Always fun to hear people's perspectives on the IWADs for the first time!

 

I think many of us here have played through Doom 2's levels so many times over so many years it's hard to really evaluate it properly when it's all just second nature now. It's hard to be holistic about something when you know every individual linedef like the back of your hand. 

 

Entryway for example stopped being a level years ago. It exists solely now as a place to tweak settings or test gameplay mods. 

True! I've been playing Doom 1 and every other doom forever now, and i even made wads with just the original doom textures. It was just recently that I decided to get Doom 2!

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Thy Flesh Consumed uses barons much more heavily than Doom 2 does. Doom 2 introduced the Hell Knight to use at times because taking down Barons take a lot of time and ammo unless you have the BFG. If you ever play Doom 64, that game absolutely loves the hell knights and barons. They're the most used monsters in those two games (excluding the gunners and imps) 

 

 

I made a long post some time ago comparing Doom 1 and Doom 2 breaking down the differences between the two. Doom 1 looks better because much of the level design is focused around neat buildings and giving off the vibe that you're really exploring some military base in E1 and then a morphing, rotting hellish military base in E2 all the way to being actually in hell in E3. Doom 2's level design is more focused around combat scenarios that are more memorable than the levels themselves, and that's why a lot of players find the Doom 2 maps to look ugly. You can definitely see the influence of Doom 2's style on Plutonia where it focused exclusively on combat scenarios and challenge. 

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Doom2  = Super Shot Gun.. I'd say this was the main reason Doom2 would be used more for Deathmatch and custom maps as the primary choice.

And of course having an extra weapon to add to the map you created is a plus.

Not to mention Doom editing being one of the biggest things Doom has and always will have going for it. 

Doom2 had (a looong time ago) basically became the default IWAD to use because of this, and continues to be.

 

Oh yeah! 

I'm excited to hear what Bethesda is gonna announce!

I hope it's a new well.. "Hell on Earth" version, that would be shweet!

 

Edited by Mr.Rocket

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@Retro DinoI love DOOM II for everything what did you write.

 

Lots of Imps? Hell yeah!

Dodging few fireballs at once? Sure!

Big level? No way, they are normal, sometimes even smaller than you think.

Barons? Why not, great big and nasty demon which teaches all respect.

Enemy traps? Classic Doom!

 

 

Today we got games made in a different way like first cods, new cods, corridors games. So if someone plays Doom for the first time it's for sure not special think cause he has in mind new games which he has been played.

Only DOOM I and II are still in my soul. Ok, and Quake series.

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I'm a little biased, but..

 

10 out of 10 material for me. I f'ing love DOOM II from start to finish.

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To address some of the first points:

 

The only level I think that's too cryptic is map 27, Monster Condo. Seriously, I keep forgetting where all of the trigger lines are due to how weirdly they're placed. Sure there's a decoration to hint it but since i don't smash my face into every other decoration in DooM 1 and 2, I usually wont bother for map 27.

 

I never thought doom 2's maps were too big. Map 13 being the closest exception.

 

If you think DooM 2's traps are too bloody obvious, look at plutonia. ;)

 

Monster spamming only becomes a problem when you first meet the revenant... or the chaingunner. Both are annoying to deal with in spam-form.

 

Wait barons of hell are a problem? GG. Plasma rifles, well timed rockets and the SSG clean out barons much faster than you think.

 

And for your final point: Yeah I wont lie DooM 2 does have some VERY ugly map layouts, even rivaling DooM 1 which came out earlier.

 

 

A few extra points I wish to add;

 

[+] DooM II introduces my favourite song for the DooM series, Into Sandy's City

[-] Archviles

[+] MAP 23 since everyone but me seems to either ignore it or hate it... (weird if you ask me)

[-] MAP 27/Monster Condo... Not a fan

[+] Super Shot Gun. Dayum is that thing fun to fire ^_^

[-] Literally only 1 gun... GG ID... GG

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Doom II holds a special spot in my poor excuse for a heart because it was the IWAD I started with, so it's on a bit of a pedestal the others can't reach.

 

I liked the level designs, frankly. They were boring looking, but I found them to be a blast to play through. I don't mind some backtracking (I tend to do that anyway playing a map for the first time or going back looking for things), so that's not a strike.

 

Downtown was one of my favorite levels because it was so large and open. There was a whole city to explore and you could do so in pretty much any order you wanted. I like wide open maps that encourage exploration like that, so I really liked many of Doom II's levels.

 

Traps? Love them. 'Nuff said.

 

Monster spam? No. Doesn't happen. I've seen monster spam and Doom II doesn't have it. The closest it gets to are relatively large groups in rather large areas, but never anything spammy.

 

Actually, I'm getting really tired of hearing "monster spam" thrown at the IWAD's (particularly Plutonia, but that's not the subject matter). The map with the most monsters in it in Doom 2 is Refueling Base, and it only has 238 monsters on UV. Play Unloved to the end, or Chillax, then tell me the IWAD's are spammy. And this actually leads into the next thing.

 

On the topic of barons: Doom II does not throw them everywhere. If you were to evenly divide them all out across the levels, each level except one would have one baron in it. That is, on UV, there are only 31 of them. Ultimate Doom has 82, almost as many as Plutonia has (90), and 44 of them are in Episode 4. Compare that against the knight, which, on UV, there are 75 of.

 

Obviously, the best part of Doom II is the SSG, but the game as a whole is a blast to play through, even if now it's a little easy.

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I love the aesthetic of doom 2, it just looks so much better than the first game. As for the level design, I think it's fine for someone who hasn't played a pwad before.

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As far as I recall, I was initially pleased that the game engine was as unchanged as it was (I felt it would be akin to sacrilege to change "Perfection" and maybe ruin the art assets that I loved so dearly from the first game).

The I got the game for myself and played it religiously for a while and it was glorious (more Doom, more enemies, the SSG, new music), but then gradually some kind of fatigue set in and I couldn't put my finger on what it was.

 

I believe, I was less fond of the overly weird texture choices. Where Ultimate Doom's episodes 1, 2 and 3 had textures that seemed more cohesive and gave a better illusion of location (tech base with vague Hell influences in E1, badly Hellified Techbases in E2 and finally, Hell with vague techbase influences "reality bleed"), Doom 2's seemed more all-over-the-place and it kinda hurt immersion and eventually interest in the game world. The music I also generally liked a lot less. Music has a way of influencing how well I like a game. Surprisingly so.

 

The SSG though, that was my favorite Doom weapon for a couple of years until I got sick of it due to custom mappers tending to design a lot of their maps with an over-reliance on it and Doom 2 itself has this flaw as well, as it gives you the SSG far too early (already in Map02). I'd prefer getting the SSG a little before halfway through the game so it can serve as a badass "upgrade" to the regular shotgun (which can still be used as an accessory for finishing off individual Imps or taking down enemies at range).

 

I did like the Icon of Sin a lot though, despite it largely being a texture (but I thought that was a rather clever way of working with the engine's limitations to give you an impressive Boss that made previous Doom Bosses seem like veritable insects). Eventually, I got annoyed with it too (I blame Final Doom and a slew of custom megawads that all have the IoS as Final Boss).

 

Oh yes, I've always thought that the whole "Hell invasion spilling over to Earth to be a literal End of Days scenario" was perfect for a Doom game, still do, it's just that it's a lot more cliché nowadays and has lost a lot of its original charm over time.

 

Also, I've always been kinda disappointed with how low-tech Earth feels in Doom 2. Probably affected my enjoyment of the game back then as well. The plasma-based weaponry, teleportation tech and the techbase textures in Ultimate Doom, not to mention the presence of off-world colonies, always suggested that an Earth City in this universe would and should be a lot more stylized than just regular ol' brick n' mortar buildings. Bring on the crazy Blade Runner/Fifth Element sci-fi stuff already!

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13 minutes ago, dsm said:

Also, I've always been kinda disappointed with how low-tech Earth feels in Doom 2. Probably affected my enjoyment of the game back then as well. The plasma-based weaponry, teleportation tech and the techbase textures in Ultimate Doom, not to mention the presence of off-world colonies, always suggested that an Earth City in this universe would and should be a lot more stylized than just regular ol' brick n' mortar buildings. Bring on the crazy Blade Runner/Fifth Element sci-fi stuff already!

I like that idea. It's a thought that's struck me a few times, but I never really did much about it, but now I have the capacity to.

Since HURedux has four episodes (Phobos, Deimos, Hell, and Earth) I can give Earth a more "Crystal Spires and Togas" look to it in E4.

That seems to be a theme we see distressingly often in sci-fi games, is the apparent modern-day Earth of an allegedly super-advanced one, when surely construction has surpassed what we can do today.

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49 minutes ago, dsm said:

The SSG though, that was my favorite Doom weapon for a couple of years until I got sick of it due to custom mappers tending to design a lot of their maps with an over-reliance on it and Doom 2 itself has this flaw as well, as it gives you the SSG far too early (already in Map02). I'd prefer getting the SSG a little before halfway through the game so it can serve as a badass "upgrade" to the regular shotgun (which can still be used as an accessory for finishing off individual Imps or taking down enemies at range).

 

I think that's a problem with Doom 2 wads at times, getting the SSG handed to you in the first or second map. Requiem did it right by making you wait to get it. 

 

Totally agree on using the regular shotgun to take out enemies in range. It's easy for players to say the SSG is overpowered due to close range, but you can't hit much from a long distance. Sometimes I truly believe the SSG was put into the game to deal with revenants quickly. It only looks overpowered when it's used to mow down a whole row of gunners and imps. 

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I've gotta agree with you on a lot of the points here. I beat doom 1 for the first time a few years ago, loved it, and I come back and replay it regularly. I played all the way through doom 2 for the first time a few months ago, and I was more frustrated than having fun most of the time. Maybe that's partly my fault for playing on ultra-violence the first time through, but I never had too much of an issue with doom 1 on UV (or UV -fast), it felt like a fair and fun challenge. It would kick your ass if you screwed up, but would reward you for being observant, skillful, and for exploring the levels. That's not how doom 2 feels.

 

Compared to doom 1, doom 2 just feels like a very poorly designed game in terms of the levels. Monster spam is a problem throughout much of the game, especially in levels like "suburbs," where I had to retry it 30 or so times on pistol start before I was able to finish it. Ridiculous amounts of enemies, and not nearly enough ammo to make a dent in their numbers. Now, you might say that a lot of this comes from not knowing the map, and you'd be totally right about that. But to me, it never felt rewarding or fulfilling to memorize the maps, and to get through them successfully. It was more like, "oh great, I'm going to have to do that again in the next map." I had no drive to really get familiar with the level layout, I only did it because I had to for a lot of these maps.

 

And there are some parts of the game that are just straight up bullshit, made to waste your time. Best example is the exit of tricks and traps. Ha ha, really funny guys, I can't get back up and I have to do the whole level from pistol start again. I mean, it lives up to the title of the level, but that's not a good thing. That's why I used save files a whole lot more in doom 2 than doom 1. Also, the final boss felt a lot like it was just wasting your damn time too. I'd never seen footage of someone beating it, so going in I had no clue what to do. Ok, I'm shooting it, is this doing anything? Does killing his little spawned monsters hurt him? I spent about 20 minutes in one life just hammering the god damn wall textures with bfg shots and chaingun bullets. When I figured out you can raise the platform, I kept trying to shoot the bfg in its head, of course that did nothing, but how am I supposed to know that you can only shoot the rocket launcher in there? There's the rockets on the platform, but that's your only hint, and I still didn't figure it out after an hour of trying. I had to look up a walkthrough to tell me to switch to the rocket launcher.

 

On the size of the levels, I disagree with you actually. They never felt too big, even the open ones like downtown. But one thing I can say is that, in my opinion, the levels are ugly. I like what they tried to do with downtown a lot, and it feels a little bit like you're in an urban setting, but god damn it looks like shit. The factory is a real sore thumb too. Most levels aren't too bad, some of them even look quite good, but the ugly ones are really, really ugly.

 

There are some really standout levels that I enjoyed a lot (MAP13, MAP06, and MAP22 come to mind), but overall I don't think I'd say that I like doom 2. To me, doom 1 feels like a much more solid and enjoyable experience. Only thing it's missing is the super shotgun!

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15 minutes ago, billymaize said:

but how am I supposed to know that you can only shoot the rocket launcher in there?

 

You're not, and that's a part of what makes it challenging to new players. Anyway, you'll get used to it. Be glad it's not the Icon of Sin fight at the end of Hell Revealed.

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It's been over 2 decades since I first played Doom 2, but I don't remember thinking that the levels were cryptic or required you to double back or retrace your steps too much. Personally, I liked the open concept of the Metroid series, so perhaps I just viewed backtracking in Doom differently. That being said, any backtracking in Doom is miniscule compared to Metroid.

 

The levels always struck me as a good size. I don't think the original designers ever set out to make sprawling Eternal Doom-esque levels. I think that Petersen, Romero, McGee, and Green were actually going for maps that could be played (with minimal deficiencies) on any machine at the time and would provide good Deathmatch experiences.

 

Linguica did an analysis of the number of enemies on screen at any one time in Doom and Doom 2.

From that analysis, you can see that are certainly times when there are higher monster counts, but they're relatively rare. There are definitely not hordes of monsters being spammed at you around every corner. The iwads weren't Chillax or an Okpulok level or even a Hell Revealed. Nor were they meant to be.

 

Traps are an essential part of the Doom experience. I don't recall them happening every time you hit a switch or picked up a key or weapon. You're right, though, if every time you do something, you expect there to a trap, and there is a trap, then it gets repetitive and isn't fun. Traps work when they're unexpected.

 

Not that it was one of your complaints, but, traps also work when you can get out of them, either through ingenuity or firepower. Inescapable death traps typically aren't viewed as fun, and the iwads were made while inescapable death traps were still a thing that you could do without having everyone universally pan your level.

 

With regard to Barons of Hell, check out the Doom wiki: https://doomwiki.org/wiki/Baron_of_Hell

 

There are only 31 barons through the entirety of Doom 2 on UV. That hardly seems to be everywhere. There are 36 Barons on the same skill level in E2 and E3 combined. By extension, that would imply that Barons were everywhere in the Shores of Hell and Inferno. Which they're not.

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^^ That thread you linked got me thinking, could the same be done with counting the number of active monsters at the time, and not just the number of monsters drawn?

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On 6/10/2018 at 4:44 AM, DynamiteKaitorn said:

 

[-] Literally only 1 gun... GG ID... GG

Sorry, didn't get this. You mean SSG is OP?

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1 minute ago, GarrettChan said:

Sorry, didn't get this. You mean SSG is OP?

Super shotty is great but the I said "Literally only 1 gun... GG ID... GG" Was because they only added 1 new gun yet added multiple new enemies.

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I really like it. The thing I don't like about Doom 2 is the weird wooden library aesthetic at some parts. That might just be me, I don't know.

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14 hours ago, DynamiteKaitorn said:

Super shotty is great but the I said "Literally only 1 gun... GG ID... GG" Was because they only added 1 new gun yet added multiple new enemies.

 

They didn't need to add any more guns outside of the SSG. Along with the SSG, the new enemies play extremely well to the strengths of the existing weapons and they give those weapons greater purpose (particularly the rocket launcher, plasma gun and BFG).

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23 hours ago, NaZa said:

^^ That thread you linked got me thinking, could the same be done with counting the number of active monsters at the time, and not just the number of monsters drawn?

It's an interesting idea. Do you mean active within the map (i.e., moving around anywhere within the map) or do you mean active in your vicinity (i.e., in a position to attack you)?

 

For instance, there's a big difference between the following:

  • In Room X, when I look in any particular direction, I see no more than 10 monsters at a time.
    • Therefore, the monster horde size recorded in Room X is only 10.
  • In Room X, when I teleport into Room X, there are 10 monsters in front of me. However, there are also two ledges beside me that both have 5 monsters on them. Two monster closets also just opened behind me and they both have 5 monsters in them. Thus, there are another 20 monsters that I can't see, but that can still attack me.
    • Therefore, the monster horde size recorded in Room X is 30.
  • In Room X, there are 10 monsters in front, and 5 monsters in each of the ledges and monster closets behind me. Plus, there are three doorways that lead to adjacent sound-connected rooms, and each of those rooms contains 10 monsters, all of which will become active.
    • Therefore, the monster horde size recorded in the immediate vicinity of Room X is 60.

This sort of logic, to a degree, could factor into @Retro Dino's original statement.

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6 minutes ago, Pegleg said:

It's an interesting idea. Do you mean active within the map (i.e., moving around anywhere within the map) or do you mean active in your vicinity (i.e., in a position to attack you)?

I was thinking the former. moving around anywhere in the map, as that's probably easy to find out through a demo and exe, but caged imps and such would be very difficult to factor now that I think about it. Your idea about the immediate vicinity works much better (especially after I read the explanation), but I am not sure how that could be calculated.

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I find it interesting how certain situations (Gotchya, Tricks and Traps) encourage you to rely on infighting to get through it. Sure, you COULD fight all those Barons and a Cyberdemon but it's easier to just stand there and let the Cyberdemon thin out the Barons while suffering intense damage in the process. Typically, he dies and the Baron horde is thinned out enough to become more managable. Then Gotchya, the Spider typically dies and the Cyberdemon's weakened enough to be pretty easy.

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i ABSOLUTELY liked Doom more than Doom: Hell On Earth more so because the level design was more claustrophobic which i honestly really liked.  Doom: Hell on Earth has some maps, like Tricks and Traps, that are just boring beyond belief, at least in my opinion.

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4 hours ago, MetroidJunkie said:

I find it interesting how certain situations (Gotchya, Tricks and Traps) encourage you to rely on infighting to get through it. Sure, you COULD fight all those Barons and a Cyberdemon but it's easier to just stand there and let the Cyberdemon thin out the Barons while suffering intense damage in the process. Typically, he dies and the Baron horde is thinned out enough to become more managable. Then Gotchya, the Spider typically dies and the Cyberdemon's weakened enough to be pretty easy.

I remember reading in a magazine about strategy for Gotcha being let the Cyberdemon and SMM fight it out and you clean up whoever survives. I remember telling a friend of mine about this and his response was, "Yeah, I don't give them the chance to fight. I just kill them both myself."

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I remember tackling Gotcha and the cyberdemon always winning the fight in vanilla, but then I switch to ZDoom and suddenly the Mastermind opens up a can of whoop ass I never knew it had on anything that pisses it off. Looking back, I figure that's most likely because hit detection is done differently in ZDoom.

As it happens, that map never really was one of my favorites. A lot of the later levels seemed so much weaker to me than the earlier ones, which is incredibly ironic, because my favorite IWAD map is The Living End.

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In my experience, the Cyberdemon 99% of the time wins. I'll provoke them, then leave to the secret down below, and, as I'm climbing up that tower of elevators, I'll hear the Spider's death sound. Then again, I always make the Spider be the one to inflict friendly fire on the Cyberdemon because it's easier to dodge rockets than chaingun fire.

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On 6/13/2018 at 7:31 AM, Pegleg said:

Linguica did an analysis of the number of enemies on screen at any one time in Doom and Doom 2.

Ah, thanks very much to repost this into the thread because I haven't read anything like this, and this is a very good material to think about the size of enemy hordes or stuff. To be honest, some people like to say "something is everywhere" when that thing is not actually everywhere for some reason. This makes me think whether they just make up an excuse to hate something, not sure.

 

2 minutes ago, Aquila Chrysaetos said:

I remember tackling Gotcha and the cyberdemon always winning the fight in vanilla, but then I switch to ZDoom and suddenly the Mastermind opens up a can of whoop ass I never knew it had on anything that pisses it off.

Wait... this didn't happen to me in ZDoom though. Still the Cyberdemon wins most of the time. As I play more, I realize at the distance in Map20, Cyberdemon usually wins. If they are closer, Spider Mastermind could win more. In long distance fights, Cyberdemon wins most of the time.

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7 hours ago, Pegleg said:

It's an interesting idea. Do you mean active within the map (i.e., moving around anywhere within the map) or do you mean active in your vicinity (i.e., in a position to attack you)?

 

For instance, there's a big difference between the following:

  • In Room X, when I look in any particular direction, I see no more than 10 monsters at a time.
    • Therefore, the monster horde size recorded in Room X is only 10.
  • In Room X, when I teleport into Room X, there are 10 monsters in front of me. However, there are also two ledges beside me that both have 5 monsters on them. Two monster closets also just opened behind me and they both have 5 monsters in them. Thus, there are another 20 monsters that I can't see, but that can still attack me.
    • Therefore, the monster horde size recorded in Room X is 30.
  • In Room X, there are 10 monsters in front, and 5 monsters in each of the ledges and monster closets behind me. Plus, there are three doorways that lead to adjacent sound-connected rooms, and each of those rooms contains 10 monsters, all of which will become active.
    • Therefore, the monster horde size recorded in the immediate vicinity of Room X is 60.

 

7 hours ago, NaZa said:

I was thinking the former. moving around anywhere in the map, as that's probably easy to find out through a demo and exe, but caged imps and such would be very difficult to factor now that I think about it. Your idea about the immediate vicinity works much better (especially after I read the explanation), but I am not sure how that could be calculated.

@Linguica

Any thoughts on this, since your work was the impetus for the discussion?

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