Things about Doom you just found out

On 9/14/2021 at 4:15 AM, Maximum Matt said:

Are there dead marines in E2 and E3? I know, I could check myself, but I don't wanna spend two hours wandering around the levels counting corpses.  I DO know E4 has some (especially the end of E4M6) but yeah

FWIW here are the numbers. Player corpses (type 15) and two identical types of exploded player (10 and 12).

map    pl  x1  x2  tot

E1M1    4   2   2    8
E1M2    8   9   3   20
E1M3    5   4   2   11
E1M4    4   5   5   14

E2M2    4   2   3    9
E2M3    2   2   5    9
E2M4    2   0   2    4
E2M5    2   3   1    6
E2M6    1   0   2    3
E2M7    1   4   1    6

E3M1    0   1   1    2
E3M2    2   1   1    4
E3M3    0   1   1    2
E3M4    1   0   1    2
E3M5    5   3   3   11
E3M6    0   1   1    2
E3M9    0   1   1    2

MAP15   1   1   0    2
MAP17   0   1   0    1
MAP19   0   2   2    4
MAP29   1   1   1    3
MAP31   1   1   2    4

E4M5    1   0   0    1
E4M6    8   1   1   10
E4M7    1   0   3    4
E4M9    1   0   0    1

total  55  46  44  145

On 9/21/2021 at 12:53 AM, Scypek2 said:

I just found out while doing some dehacked work: arachnotrons are unique in that upon seeing you, they freeze in place for more than half a second before giving chase. They're the only monster to do such a thing, and it's probably related to the startup noise they make when alerted - the length of the sound and the delay are about the same.

I must admit to never having noticed the delay. But I concur with your analysis.

I think they made arachnotrons by starting with a copy of the spiderdemon's frames and tweaking them. I mean I think I've seen early arachnotron sprites, they began as resized spiderdemons before being touched up. Anyway as the spiderdemon wakeup sound is full-volume level-wide it doesn't get cut off by the monster making walking noises. However as arachnotrons do not make specially amplified boss noises they appear to have bodged a way to have its wakeup sound played, possibly because they lacked the time to improve the limitations of the engine audio code. Said limitations being the reason its active sound is constantly truncated under the noise of its legs.

10 hours ago, Kain D. said:

1.When a player exit a level in mid air, part of the falling animation is transferred to the next level. And a player kinda crouches when the next map is started.

I discovered this in GLBoom+, I don't know about other source ports.

Well spotted! I think what's more precisely happening is that you've fallen and hit the ground just as you exited. This means P_ZMovement has set player->deltaviewheight, and as G_PlayerFinishLevel doesn't clear it, you get a crouch at the start of the next map. You may have heard an "oof" as the screen melted? If I'm just falling through the air when I exit, my view height is normal at the start of the next map.

10 hours ago, Kain D. said:

2.Some of the attack frames of monsters are lit, some aren't. This is strange. It means, that in complete darkness a Cyberdemon, or a Hell Knight will be completly invisible, in contrary to a Revenant for example.

Yes, I think the model they were aiming for was that if the monster sprite has a visible muzzle flash drawn on or around its weapon, it is displayed with full brightness. Monsters like imps that conjure fireballs from their hands don't light up, the fireball just appears out of the darkness. The problem is they got this wrong in a couple of places, in particular troopers and cyberdemons don't light up when their attacking sprites clearly have muzzle flashes. Also, spiderdemons and arachnotrons light up one frame, and over half a second, too early, which I managed to avoid noticing for 17 years (until this freedoom bug report linked to this post) but afterward began to drive me mad every time I saw it.

A couple things about Heretic. The first is pretty embarrassing to learn this late, but like with the Arch-Vile, monsters won't deliberately attack the Maulotaur. The second is that Ophidians don't do anywhere near as much damage as I thought they did.

In E4M1, I'd gotten one of the ones in the dark cave to attack the Maulotaur, because I knew it would have difficulty retaliating with the water and low ceiling getting in the way of its attacks. I figured if I stayed behind it, the Ophidians would keep attacking it, but I was there a long time. My mistake was that I'd thought for a while that Ophidians were more or less Heretic's equivalent to the Arachnotron.

After I'd died to one stray Ophidian projectile too many, I went into GZDoom so I could summon a Maulotaur in such a way that it was stuck in the wall, summon a friendly Ophidian, and then use one of those monster health bar addons to see its progress. And that was the final nail in my strategy's coffin. :(

On 9/25/2021 at 12:41 AM, RjY said:

Well spotted! I think what's more precisely happening is that you've fallen and hit the ground just as you exited. This means P_ZMovement has set player->deltaviewheight, and as G_PlayerFinishLevel doesn't clear it, you get a crouch at the start of the next map. You may have heard an "oof" as the screen melted? If I'm just falling through the air when I exit, my view height is normal at the start of the next map

It's possible. I'm not really into this coding stuff. It happens at the Map 26 exit of my wad, when it's necessary to exit the level in mid air.

On 9/25/2021 at 12:41 AM, RjY said:

Yes, I think the model they were aiming for was that if the monster sprite has a visible muzzle flash drawn on or around its weapon, it is displayed with full brightness. Monsters like imps that conjure fireballs from their hands don't light up, the fireball just appears out of the darkness. The problem is they got this wrong in a couple of places, in particular troopers and cyberdemons don't light up when their attacking sprites clearly have muzzle flashes. Also, spiderdemons and arachnotrons light up one frame, and over half a second, too early, which I managed to avoid noticing for 17 years (until this freedoom bug report linked to this post) but afterward began to drive me mad every time I saw it.

I look at this from mapper perspective. What I mean this changes balance of demons. For example in complete darkness an Arch Vile will be easier, than Hell Knight. Although I'm aware, that this can be changed in Dehacked.

So I already know you can exit beyond death in doom. Not just death exits like E1M8, but also crossing a line def that exits the map with your corpse.

What I didn't know till the middle of a speedrun attempt was that you can die while flipping an exit switch, and still exit the map and start the next map with the usual kit you have after death

Here's the zip of it happening to me at the end of Doom 2 map 2: bailey_beyond_death.zip

Hit the switch in the middle of a room of 5 shotgunners and instead of starting the map over when I press the use key to exit, I exited. Did not know this could happen.

I made an arachnotron replacement that uses KeenDie instead of BossDeath action, and I found out that the door to MAP07's deathmatch exit is also tagged 666.

A few discoveries on Mount Pain:

1. You actually can save a lot of the health items for when you actually need them. Since the only big health item on the map is one solitary berserk pack, you have to save quite a lot of stimpacks and medikits. You just have to memorize what to take immediately, because you most likely won't come back - too long damaging floor traverse - and which you can save for later when you need a lot of health. The berserk pack also can be saved since the time on the rad suit in the last area is enough not only to take you to it... But also to take you back to that part! 

2. You actually don't need the green armor from the arachnotrons that early since you face very few hitscanners between that place and the Disaster Area. And you anyways get a green armor there. Considering the way you can easily dodge imp fireballs, it basically is no problem. 

3. The final door actually requires the yellow key! The key policy is the worst thing in this map alongside the health policy. In order to get to the red key you have to open a trap. The red door is unmarked. In order to get to the blue key you have to open a trap. The blue door is unmarked. And the exit is basically a trap that opens when you get the yellow key. And the final door is yellow and unmarked. Well... I'd say the player should be able to see the locked doors before seeing the keys. Maybe even all locked doors before seeing the first key. 

tom hall was fired
for the longest time i assumed tom hall was always just sitting in the corner of the id office acting as a second opinion like "hey tom should i put a closet here" "yeah why not"

When you die and your camera position lowers to the ground, homing revenant fireballs will track you downwards. I know that when you die, your hitbox becomes smaller, which is why you can do death exits through smaller spaces than you could normally fit through, but until earlier today, I had never noticed this before. It was sheer luck that I happened to die with a revenant homing missile just in front of where I died, for me to see it dive downwards toward my new camera position.

(I am pretty sure I was playing on GZDoom, so this behaviour may not be native to Doom itself, but may be source port behaviour.)

On 9/23/2011 at 5:32 PM, Nasesrtyhcfhk said:

The Berserk pack lasts the whole level.

Quality of life significantly improved.

It lasts around four years

1 hour ago, Womneare said:

It lasts around four years

I mean, I've yet to play a level that lasted that long :P

On 9/26/2021 at 10:35 AM, Kain D. said:

I look at this from mapper perspective. What I mean this changes balance of demons. For example in complete darkness an Arch Vile will be easier, than Hell Knight.

I see, I never considered this angle. If I may borrow your phrasing, I'm not really into this game designing stuff :).

On 9/28/2021 at 4:08 AM, BaileyTW said:

Hit the switch in the middle of a room of 5 shotgunners and instead of starting the map over when I press the use key to exit, I exited.

Nice, you are the second person to whom this has happened. I remember debugging it for the first. Basically the game loop starts off by processing your input, so your use-key press activates the exit switch. However, that only sets a game action flag that isn't processed until the start of the next game loop. The rest of the current game loop runs, during which a sergeant shoots and kills you. The level has in a sense already ended, but he doesn't know that.

3 hours ago, Kyka said:

When you die and your camera position lowers to the ground, homing revenant fireballs will track you downwards. [...]

(I am pretty sure I was playing on GZDoom, so this behaviour may not be native to Doom itself, but may be source port behaviour.)

I think you are right that it is port behaviour. In vanilla A_Tracer the missile simply stops tracking its target if the latter's health is zero or less (i.e. it is dead).

A very basic (and ancient) mapping trick I just learned about:

Ever want to light up a floor but not a ceiling? Just sink the part you want unlit into the flat, and leave it untextured.

I had always wondered why some classic wads had big chunks of ceilings at random levels and untextured, and now I know why. I've used untextured pits for pop-up traps, but hadn't considered using them for aesthetics yet.

Editor view:

Game view (there are no HOMs):

9 minutes ago, EANB said:

A very basic (and ancient) mapping trick I just learned about:

 

Ever want to light up a floor but not a ceiling? Just sink the part you want unlit into the flat, and leave it untextured.

I had always wondered why some classic wads had big chunks of ceilings at random levels and untextured, and now I know why. I've used untextured pits for pop-up traps, but hadn't considered using them for aesthetics yet.

Oh damn, and I used the BooM light transfers for that. Nice to know for the future.

2 minutes ago, Pechudin said:

Oh damn, and I used the BooM light transfers for that. Nice to know for the future.

Boom light transfers are a cleaner way to do that, so when mapping for Boom or higher, it's much better than using render hacks.

For example, you won't get side effects such as the lines appearing on the automap (okay, sure, you can mark them as hidden, too) or, when applied to the floor, the player bumping up and down on an apparently flat surface.

58 minutes ago, Pechudin said:

Oh damn, and I used the BooM light transfers for that.

that is The Right Way. unless your map is strictly vanilla, PLEASE, use Boom specials for such effects! it is a PITA to support such hacks in hardware renderers, and it may break in unpredictable manner with modern sourceports.

When learning Boom stuff for Eviternity I made a set of tags for light transfers that I think turned out quite useful. I can now copy this setup into every new map I create. The tags are 3 digits long, with the first being 1, 2, or 3. Tags starting with 1 affect the ceiling, 2 affects the floor, and 3 affects both (for the '3' series tags, I need two lines each since there's no single line special to transfer light value to both floor and ceiling). The second two digits are the last two digits from the target light value: 0, 16, 32, 48, 64, 80, 96, 112, 128, 144, 160, 176, 192, 208, 224, 240, 256. (I realize the correct would be 239, 255? since it starts at 0 240 and 256 are identical, right?).

This means if I want a sector's ceiling to be 208, I just tag it 108, for a floor to be 176 I tag it 276, and so on. Obviously if this sector also needs another action, like if it's a lift, I have to create a custom light transfer for it.

For anyone wondering why I have the '3' series tags, it's useful to light transfer both floor and ceiling rather than setting the sector light level if you want to affect walls and sprites separate from FLATs.

The DOOM II PC box or the CD-ROM disc has the cyberdemon on the left side, when you load DOOM II it has the cyberdemon on the right on the title screen.

I didn't notice this... the title music is really distracting (in a good way) and thats why I think.

On 9/23/2021 at 8:05 AM, RjY said:

Burning Barrels

 

It turns out there are no burning barrels in Doom2's city episode. This was a surprise given that future post-apocalyptic cities in media seem to be full of the things.

 

So I wondered, where, if not in the city episode, are they? Well, Barrels o' Fun, obviously, and a couple in a secret level. But the first ones are on Circle of Death.

 

And I realised, they are another one of those subtle hints, such as we were talking about on the previous page; a warning of what you are about to face.
 

Almost as if the archvile's aura had set fire to the objects in its vicinity. Well obviously not the shell box. Nothing flammable in a box of shells. And the blue key as well. But my weird analysis aside, this is a really interesting observation. Yellow flames in the barrels are a clue about the yellow flames you are about to face. It is obvious to say this, but things we don't even notice are things that the designers would have thought about and planned and designed and put into the game.

23 hours ago, Pechudin said:

Oh damn, and I used the BooM light transfers for that. Nice to know for the future.

22 hours ago, ketmar said:

that is The Right Way. unless your map is strictly vanilla, PLEASE, use Boom specials for such effects! it is a PITA to support such hacks in hardware renderers, and it may break in unpredictable manner with modern sourceports. 

Exactly, that thing is only for Vanilla, Limit-removing maps. Additionally it will spam a map analysis mode with missed textures and an editor may put a default texture in there, breaking the effect.

As for things I've found out. It's more difficult to punch, or chainsaw a wide enemy, like Mancubus, or Arachnotron.
This is due to Blockmap bug, if I remember correctly and zdoom sourceports fixed that.

22 hours ago, ketmar said:

that is The Right Way. unless your map is strictly vanilla, PLEASE, use Boom specials for such effects! it is a PITA to support such hacks in hardware renderers, and it may break in unpredictable manner with modern sourceports.

Don't worry, I will as I do map for BooM usually. This is only "good to know" in case I decide to map for Vanilla.

Standing here in MAP18 of Plutonia with full screen will cause a Visplane crash in Vanilla.

Map 07 in TNT Evilution can be beaten with no monsters, making it the only commercial Doom MAP07 to be beatable without requiring the use of Mancubus and Arachnotrons to proceed the rest of the map later on.

That means it's possible to do a no monsters run of both the June 1996 & November 1996 versions of TNT Evilution without cheats, or doing a 100% items & secrets run without monsters in both the June 1996 & November 1996 versions of TNT Evilution, thougn in the case of the June 1996 version, Map31 & Map32 should be skipped if doing said runs.

SHAWN2 is made from two identical sections mirrored vertically.

On 10/1/2021 at 12:42 PM, EANB said:

A very basic (and ancient) mapping trick I just learned about:

Ever want to light up a floor but not a ceiling? Just sink the part you want unlit into the flat, and leave it untextured.

FWIW the old Doomworld editing pages called this shadowcasting. IMO it's one of the better vanilla mapping tricks: simple to create in any editor (nothing more complex than raising a ceiling), the results are subtle but effective, and it doesn't require breaking the map with intentionally unclosed sectors.

21 hours ago, Wadmodder Shalton said:

Map 07 in TNT Evilution can be beaten with no monsters, making it the only commercial Doom MAP07 to be beatable without requiring the use of Mancubus and Arachnotrons to proceed the rest of the map later on.

Technically Map07 of Doom 2 can be by using a rocket jump.

There is a name for players who save too much.

13 hours ago, Marn said:

SHAWN2 is made from two identical sections mirrored vertically.

Interesting. SHAWN2 also has the effect of causing me to projectile vomit and convulse uncontrollably. 

There is another way of triggering that normally inaccesible secret on Doom 2 map 15 without cheating or the Pain Elemental exploit.

You only need to quicksave and quickload on the edge of the teleporter and you will lower to the floor registering it.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_0JSCDBnXRo&feature=emb_title

Works with the original vanilla/Chocolate too. No such luck on Crispy :(

Why does no one address this? Is already common knowledge? Because saving is not allowed on speedruns?

Hard to believe nobody tried this for 25 years. 

58 minutes ago, Alfonso said:

Why does no one address this? Is already common knowledge? Because saving is not allowed on speedruns?

Indeed because it's irrelevant to speedruns, and also irrelevant to any port that fixes the sector lists for saved games. The vanilla save games themselves having incomplete sector lists causing you to get stuck in small holes is already common knowledge.