Hell Gate; New community project. (New Zdoom build No3.)

I have removed the DECORATE monsters since the people who do not like them speak volumes about their annoyance rating. I have changed the 3rd secret to a secret exit room. And I have added more cool stuff to the final area.

Have fun!

This map requires my Hellpak texture wad:

http://www.doomworld.com/idgames/index.php?id=14019

Load the tex.wad with the map for textured goodness. sorry about the missing link ;).

I have just upgraded to Suse 10.0 and I downloaded a Linux binary of Zdoom 2.0.98. And so I decided to move to Zdoom to create monsters I thought would add more of a challenge. And there are many more places to hide.

I am developing a new map and I want community feedback on my level design. I am going to use user feedback to develop this map just like I did with Nexus of Evil.

http://www.geocities.com/hungry_mancubus/evil.zip

I hope you like this map, I want to make a really hard and challenging map using infighting and cool Boom tricks.

Well it's a pretty good hardcore map, typical of your style. Too bad the last part is just a BFG blast-fest and the number of arch-viles is a bit retarded. There aren't exactly easy to hide from as well in that open area.

Stuff that didn't work out too well:

- the monsters in the cage next to the red key invul. Hard to kill and some of them didn't wake up at all making them impossible to kill.

- the mancs way up high and far away in that last area. Hello and welcome to pl29.

I think the whole final area would work better if the archies were hidden behind the walls together with the spiders. This would make concentrating on causing infights between the cybers and the barons much easier. Try adding some walls or other cover to hide from them once they're released as well.

Looking good Bejitas!

In all honesty I didn't have any problems with the Hell Knights or Barons in the Red Skull Key Area, it was the Viles that were originally there that gave me the headache. I'd go ahead and mix a few Hell Knights and Barons in with the Shotgunners and Imps to add a bit of flavor to it...

The only thing that I'd say needs more tweaking is the lack of armor that the map has. I get mowed down quite fast because of the hit scan enemies that are stationed all over the level (namely the Chaingunners).

Still needs some touching up, but the map is getting better each time.

Hmm, I get a lot of missing textures.

And I can't say I enjoyed the new monster set. This is a completely different map now.

The teleporter back from the central structure secret didn't work.

I had to wait for a very long time for the exit to lower.

The former spider traps, now arch+manc+spider traps in the final area are not too effective. The monsters are deaf, far away, and the northern box is behind a wall even when it lowers so the monsters will stay inactive. This makes them easy prey to a quick invul+bfg run. In general I didn't find the additional elements in the final area to be much of an improvement.

EDIT : Just got done playing the Zdoom version, and I have to say that it's 100% more fun in my eyes. The changes that you made were very, very beneficial, and smart in my opinion. I'm glad that you made them.

When playing it with Zdoom I can only get 1 of 3 secrets, and for some reason I couldn't get 100% kills on the level (1212 out of 1215), I was missing three monsters and couldn't find them anywhere.

Great changes and map Bejitas, hope to see more from you.

K I'm done with this. Adding those crappy DECORATE monsters killed it for me. I just love fighting nightmare cacodemons that shoot transparent (actually almost invisible) projectiles and spectres that can kill me in one bite at 100% health.

And the way the mastermind traps work now is even worse than before.

About the only thing that I can agree with Belial on is the fact that the Decorate monsters do suck a bit. It really isn't too fun fighting the Nightmare Cacodemons or the Boss Spectres in all honesty. I'd use normal Caco's and regular Demons or Spectres.

However, I'd have to say that the Mastermind/Mancubus pillars (in the levels end) work just fine. They seemed to do what they needed to do, and to me that was more then enough.

Also, why is that pillar near the blue key a secret sector? There isn't anything benificial to it, well, at least not from what I've noticed.

I'd leave the level how it is, but pitch the decorate enemies.

My problem with the final spider traps is that I've really liked the original idea. Being swarmed by archviles created quite a bit of fast action which was lots of fun. Right now it is exactly the opposite of what it was: a slow positional fight with the monsters confined to their sector. In fact there is nothing in the map that forces you to kill them, so for me it's only an annoyance in maxkill runs.

And I usually like the 'less bigger monsters' approach (like what this map used to be) more than 'more weaker monsters', but the DECORATE monsters are really not a good way of doing it.

I think the level is set Bejitas. This version of it seems to be next to perfect. The only part that I can't seem to get is the 3rd Secret (the blood pillar that drains your health). How do you get onto that pillar without having to use the jump option? Also, why is it even a secret? It makes no sense.

The changes that you've made are good ones, the spectres are much better as they are and the lack of 9 million Nightmare Cacos also adds to the fun factor.

So one final time, hehe, how do you get that 3rd secret?

PS - The battle near the red key area is great! I love the added Barons and Revenants in the compartments that open after snagging the rocket launcher.

Great job!

I have to agree, those decorate monsters are just bullshit. One bite took me from 70 health to nothing. WTF??

The way he uses the decorate monsters now is much, much better then in the versions that we played prior to this one. The spectres do take off a helluva lot of health, but, it's not too hard killing them before they have any chance of biting you.

I'd keep the decorates as they are now. There's not too many or too few.

Very very nice level I must say. Tons of action with just the right health and armor. And it has mass amounts of monsters...that equals instant fun for me :).

The decorate monsters are also used well. Not too many to be annoying at all. Boss Spectres were easy to deal with (So what if they can bite for high dmg? They're slow enough on UV to be taken out before they can really pose a threat).

Other than that, can't think of anything else to say. I'll probably run through the level again tomorrow to see if there is anything that should be changed, although I doubt it.

Great map :)!

EDIT : I just downloaded the level again (to see if it had been changed), and to my surprise it had! The changes have perfected the level in my eyes Bejitas, the Megasphere room added at the levels end really makes the levels final battle a helluva lot funner.

GREAT map Bejitas!