Back to Saturn X difficulty

I've been playing btsx for the past few days on Hurt Me Plenty difficulty and this wad is brutal af. It's mainly due to the massive ambushes from enemies who come in via teleporters or swarm in through walls that open up all around me. What's worse at times are the enemies that are mixed in with these mobs such as five or six revenants or, worse, multiple archviles. I am constantly having to savescum just to get through this wad. Maybe I need to git gud, but I don't see me gitting that gud any time soon.

Does the difficulty setting affect the loadout of enemies in certain areas? If I choose a lower difficulty, will the ambushes be less ridiculous?

EDIT: What is this?

Quote

You have reached the maximum number of posts you can make per day.

I guess I can no longer reply to people until tomorrow. That's great.

Yes changing the difficulty setting will change enemy composition and often, item placement as well

5 minutes ago, wad of doom said:

Does the difficulty setting affect the loadout of enemies in certain areas? If I choose a lower difficulty, will the ambushes be less ridiculous?

Yes, the wad has difficulty settings implemented.

11 minutes ago, wad of doom said:

I've been playing btsx for the past few days on Hurt Me Plenty difficulty and this wad is brutal af. It's mainly due to the massive ambushes from enemies who come in via teleporters or swarm in through walls that open up all around me. What's worse at times are the enemies that are mixed in with these mobs such as five or six revenants or, worse, multiple archviles. I am constantly having to savescum just to get through this wad. Maybe I need to git gud, but I don't see me gitting that gud any time soon.

 

Does the difficulty setting affect the loadout of enemies in certain areas? If I choose a lower difficulty, will the ambushes be less ridiculous?

In my experience, Back to Saturn X is far from being the most difficult non-joke mapset out there; Dark Tartarus definitely takes the cake in that regard.

And  there is no shame in "savescumming", really. While I can handle Back to Saturn X on Ultra Violence, I do save at the beginning of each map.

19 minutes ago, Egg Boy said:

Yes changing the difficulty setting will change enemy composition and often, item placement as well

19 minutes ago, Andromeda said:

Yes, the wad has difficulty settings implemented

This is too bad because I like the challenge of taking extra damage, but not the insane ambush mobs. I wish the two were decoupled so that I could keep one, but not the other.

15 minutes ago, Rudolph said:

While I can handle Back to Saturn X on Ultra Violence

Then you have my respect. I am struggling hard at my current difficulty. I don't mind the ambush mobs, but rather the enemies that are mixed in with them. Actually looking into modding away the OP'ness of some of the monsters such as archvile which does not need 700 health and a 10 painchance.

2 minutes ago, wad of doom said:

This is too bad because I like the challenge of taking extra damage, but not the insane ambush mobs. I wish the two were decoupled so that I could keep one, but not the other.

You can do that in GZDoom, by modding custom skill settings. You could make something that gives "easy" spawn filter but let the enemies deal ten times more damage, for example. Or take "hard" spawn settings but replace arch-viles with imps.

Yeah, the Archvile is by far the Doom II addition I am the least fond of. Out of curiosity, how far can you make it into Back to Saturn X without dying?

Just now, Gez said:

You can do that in GZDoom, by modding custom skill settings. You could make something that gives "easy" spawn filter but let the enemies deal ten times more damage, for example. Or take "hard" spawn settings but replace arch-viles with imps.

Wait, really? How do you do that?

13 minutes ago, wad of doom said:

This is too bad because I like the challenge of taking extra damage, but not the insane ambush mobs. I wish the two were decoupled so that I could keep one, but not the other.

Maybe i understand this sentece wrong, or maybe you don't know properly how difficult settings work.

For that reason, let me clarify it:

Difficult setting on Doom work in a especial way.

-I'm Too Young To Die: Doubles the Ammo and Halves the damage taken, monster count is the same as Hey, not Too Rough.

-Hey, Not Too Rough!: The monster count per map is the lowest.

-Hurt Me Plenty: The monster count is supossely a average challenge for everyone.

-Ultra-Violence: The monster count is very high in comparison to the other difficulties.

-Nightmare: same monster count as UV, but monsters are faster, also you receive double ammo.

So, you will never receive extra damage on any difficulty.

Only thing that changes on difficulty settings is the monster placement and total amount of them.

Just that.

Monster behaviour is the same on all difficulties except nightmare.

They are not more agressive or calmer.

The only thing that changes is the monster placement and monster count.

So there is no shame at all on going down on the difficulty setting.

Back to Saturn X is a highly regarde mapset that is still a great challenge on every difficult setting.

8 minutes ago, wad of doom said:

This is too bad because I like the challenge of taking extra damage, but not the insane ambush mobs. I wish the two were decoupled so that I could keep one, but not the other.

They are mostly decoupled. The only setting where you take less damage is I'm Too Young to Die. You could go down to Hey, Not Too Rough and still take the same amount of damage with fewer monsters.

3 minutes ago, Rudolph said:

Yeah, the Archvile is by far the Doom II addition I am the least fond of. Out of curiosity, how far can you make it into Back to Saturn X without dying?

I am pretty good at Doom in general when the gameplay and mechanics are fair. I have no problem with archviles, agitated skeletons, or cyberdemons. It's when they're mixed in with the massive mobs that ambush you that I constantly die and rage quit, so I can survive easily up until those points.

You did not answer my question, though: how far can you make it into Back to Saturn X without dying? Maybe I can give you some advices to get better.

I would say maybe E1 is a bit harder than Plutonia. Probably lower difficulty should be something like Plutonia UV? I don't know whether you have beaten Plutonia on UV.

7 minutes ago, P41R47 said:

-I'm Too Young To Die: Doubles the Ammo and Halves the damage taken

So I guess this is why I assumed that using higher difficulty modified the damage taken factor. Also, when I've tried to play Nightmare in the past, I would take a hell of a lot more damage, but I guess that's just because the enemies move (and shoot?) faster.

I am using GZDoom. Any way to change the difficulty midgame?

4 minutes ago, wad of doom said:

Also, when I've tried to play Nightmare in the past, I would take a hell of a lot more damage, but I guess that's just because the enemies move (and shoot?) faster.

Nightmare! has -fast and -respawn on and takes away the 8 tics before enemies' fires, so they will just stand there and keep attacking your instead of waiting a bit on UV, or even on -fast.

Don't know why people like to mention Dark Tartarus that much as that's not even vanilla or Boom, so it's difficult to compare when coming to gameplay styles. Though I'm not playing anything on ZDoom, what could I say, huh.

9 minutes ago, Rudolph said:

Wait, really? How do you do that?

Load a custom MAPINFO file that defines the new skills.

skill EliteMonsters
{
	Name = "Elite Monsters"
	SpawnFilter = easy
	DamageFactor = 10
}

skill NoArchViles
{
	Name = "No Arch-Viles"
	SpawnFilter = hard
	ReplaceActor = ArchVile, DoomImp
}

https://zdoom.org/wiki/MAPINFO/Skill_definition

If you record a video of yourself playing I can try to help.  NiH has a great post on how to improve.  https://www.doomworld.com/forum/post/2165502

Play it with that .deh file that lets arch-viles ressurect themselves and higher-ranking monsters >:D

4 minutes ago, Gez said:

Load a custom MAPINFO file that defines the new skills.

Holy shit, it is really that easy?!

Much obliged!

6 minutes ago, wad of doom said:

I am using GZDoom. Any way to change the difficulty midgame?

yes, open the console and write the following.

Skill level #

# = 1, is ITYTD, 2 is HNTR, 3 is HMP, 4 is UV, 5 is NM

hit enter after selecting what difficulty you want, and the console will say that the difficulty will be changed on the next game.

So, IDCLEVxx to the map you already are, and save again at the start to mantain the newer difficulty for the rest of the game.

9 minutes ago, wad of doom said:

I am pretty good at Doom in general when the gameplay and mechanics are fair. I have no problem with archviles, agitated skeletons, or cyberdemons. It's when they're mixed in with the massive mobs that ambush you that I constantly die and rage quit, so I can survive easily up until those points.

There's no way this won't sound condescending, but if you're struggling with btsx on HMP you're probably not as good as you think you are. A crucial aspect to improving as a player is admitting your shortcomings and tearing down your assumptions of how the game is played so you can correct those. If you assume you're doing everything right but still struggling, it never gets fixed.

I can guarantee you every fight in btsx can be done with 100% consistency on UV, even for someone who hasn't meticulously studied the mapset.

It might not take you as long as you think to get good enough to beat it with minimal saving if you practice. If you know how the enemies and weapons work then the same basic principles still apply. I had a fairly similar experience playing popular PWADs for the first time.

17 minutes ago, wad of doom said:

I am pretty good at Doom in general when the gameplay and mechanics are fair. I have no problem with archviles, agitated skeletons, or cyberdemons. It's when they're mixed in with the massive mobs that ambush you that I constantly die and rage quit, so I can survive easily up until those points.

Adding to what Daerik said, which I agree with:

That right there is the kind of typical talk of someone who's relatively new to custom WADs, and goes into them with the expectation that their overall difficulty and design philosophy matches that of doom2... And you couldn't possibly be more mistaken if that is what you expected to get in a modern megaWAD...

One thing you need to understand, and more importantly accept, is that this community has been around for a very long time, which means that even your average forum visitor who still plays this game regularly will laugh at how easy doom2 is in contrast to content which people find moderately challenging, such as BTSX...

And if you think BTSX is hard or unfair, then god help you if you ever pick up something like abandon, ribbik's stardate series, or even dimensions by MrZzul, because that's where maps tend to get "actually difficult"...

If there's one thing that needs to be said, it would be that playing on HMP instead of running in with a "UV or bust" mentality puts you ahead of a great many people, who had their egos bruised by modern WADs. So kudos right there...

1 hour ago, wad of doom said:

This is too bad because I like the challenge of taking extra damage, but not the insane ambush mobs. I wish the two were decoupled so that I could keep one, but not the other.

 

 

Then you have my respect. I am struggling hard at my current difficulty. I don't mind the ambush mobs, but rather the enemies that are mixed in with them. Actually looking into modding away the OP'ness of some of the monsters such as archvile which does not need 700 health and a 10 painchance.

You don’t take extra damage in uv it’s the same as hey not too rough and hurt me plenty only difference is monster and item placement the only difficulties that change damage and such are nightmare and im too young to die 

Back To Saturn on HMP isn't really that difficult to tell you the truth. I think you should just grind through it and get better at DOOM.

I can relate to the OP. Back To Saturn X Episode 1 presented me with a very rude awakening on my original UV-Continuous playthrough back when I was new to PWADs, just out of boot camp after playing Plutonia and PRCP.

I still have PTSD from MAP05's insane finale of: "A gang of Revenants is chasing you, AND a turret Cyberdemon is firing into the arena, AND a swarm of Pinkies is gumming up your movement, AND let's throw in two Arch-Viles on top of everything else."

Things don't improve in MAP06; that teleport trap at the midpoint is comically lethal. If you haven't found the secret, you're going to be instantly smothered by monsters with no cover. Yes, the field of corpses has clearly warned you that you're in the presence of death, but it still didn't feel like there was anything I could do about it when one second it was quiet, and the next second it was "suddenly blinded by fire while being shot from every direction"

Admittedly, I'm rather shit at that kind of close-range rocket combat. I still think it's worth gritting your teeth and pushing through; the mapset chills the hell out after that early difficulty spike. MAP07 is where it finally gets fun again (partially due to the generous supplies provided to support the nonlinear format, and partially because they FINALLY hand you a Plasma Gun).

-

...Or, alternatively, you could play Episode 2 first. It may sound a little counterintuitive, but the sequel avoids these jagged, jarring peaks and valleys and presents a smoother, steadier difficulty curve. It also provides the complete (weapons 1-6) arsenal by the start of MAP04, which lets you avoid the "smothered with no close-range DPS" situations you can get yourself into in Episode 1's introductory chapter.

Oh, it will certainly Bite down and start making you suffer, but not until the late-game, and you'll be ready for it by then.

34 minutes ago, head_cannon said:

It also provides the complete (weapons 1-6) arsenal by the start of MAP04, which lets you avoid the "smothered with no close-range DPS" situations you can get yourself into in Episode 1's introductory chapter.

Playing continuous won't make you a better player, its basically starting every level with IDFA. 

3 minutes ago, Lucky_Edie said:

 

Playing continuous won't make you a better player, its basically starting every level with IDFA. 

My policy is to complete a Continuous playthrough of a megawad as step 1, then start tackling the levels from Pistol Start as step 2, before finally making attempts at saveless Pistol Start runs as step 3. I assumed that the OP was new to the game and looking to slowly ramp things up rather than immediately jumping in the deep end.

That's a lot of time spent playing the same levels. HMP pistol start of BTSX is hardly the deep end. 

31 minutes ago, head_cannon said:

My policy is to complete a Continuous playthrough of a megawad as step 1, then start tackling the levels from Pistol Start as step 2, before finally making attempts at saveless Pistol Start runs as step 3. I assumed that the OP was new to the game and looking to slowly ramp things up rather than immediately jumping in the deep end.

This is a seriously bad "work ethic"...

If you want to beat something on UV, then play it on UV, drop several saves for the map you wanna beat, practise each part that gives you trouble until it doesn't, then do a full run of the map...

Playing everything under different circumstances, all maps consecutively, and then returning to map01 after having forgotten most of it does nothing for you...