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DJShrimpy

Which character do you use in Hexen?

Which character do you use in Hexen?  

114 members have voted

  1. 1. Which character do you use in Hexen?

    • Fighter
      44
    • Cleric
      37
    • Mage
      33


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I was able to get rid of the Heresiarch real quick by using that Quietus, so it's not a poor weapon, rather balanced instead, considering the Fighter's low mana rating.

By the way, what do Strength and Armor do anyway? I get that Speed measures character's movement speed, while Magic sets the amount of mana gained from items. Is there a way to create new character classes?

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Nothing really. It just gives you a rough idea on how strong the character would be in the game.

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printz said:

I was able to get rid of the Heresiarch real quick by using that Quietus, so it's not a poor weapon, rather balanced instead, considering the Fighter's low mana rating.

By the way, what do Strength and Armor do anyway? I get that Speed measures character's movement speed, while Magic sets the amount of mana gained from items. Is there a way to create new character classes?


The different classes have different maximum armour values. I would guess that strength could be a poorly worded indication of jumping ability.

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Poor mage, never get so much love he deserves.

Yeah I honestly agree, fighter and cleric are far more overpowered, even at magic than mage is, and wraithverge is just straight broken overpowered.

Figher is too damn fast and too damn tanky at the same time, he have great melee weapon that won't let enemies ever hurt you up close, and once you get hammer, you have better ranged magic weapon with perfect accuracy than anything mage does have at ridiculously small cost, making you spam it everywhere and just hit enemies with it's splash damage for the sake of fun of it, as even with arc of death you'd hardly hit any ranged enemy simple because of how dodgy it moves in random direction once shot. But then again, fighter doesn't really need to be at range anyway, since he's fastest class in game, and have strongest damage protection of all classes, so even on hardest difficulty you become a "bullet sponge" and can take up pretty much anything, up to 10 seconds of Wendigo spam while mage gets killed rather quick, at least much faster than fighter.

At third hub, even on hardest difficulty in the game, cleric become such an patheticaly easy class to play since you find 3rd part of you weapon in the very beginning, resulting you to clean maps by single click of left mouse button, and you'd almost level out of ammo anyway, unless you just spam it everywhere at the walls like an bloody idiot. It's capable to kill at least 7 brown chaos serpents and it's ghouls even able to go through closed doors and windows. I'd say it's really unfair trade off for having "worst first weapon". The first level and beginning of first hub it's already very easy for cleric even on hardest difficulty, because unlike mage he doesn't need to fight really annoying afrits, and by just holding M1 while occasionally clicking moving backward button, you'd result to never ever get hit by ettins rather easy. Not to mention, he have the best use of poison potion, making it awesome weapon to destroy centaurs with much ease. Then again, you get serpent staff rather quick anyway. Although I would like if cleric first weapon would be slightly longer range than fighter's fists, so that would make sense since mace have longer range than fists and so that would make it fair and balanced between fighter's OP fists. Yet, mage 4th weapon is literally the worst in the game, it's second most mana consuming weapon in game yet it doesn't really do that much of damage even when piercing enemies through or explodes in face, and it's seeking capabilities of weapon is close to never being really useful in actual combat as most maps is too small to being used it's to full power, and often explodes by tiny sprite-made obstacle or walls while wraithverge ignores such things, and sometimes if corridor is not too wide, the balls explode at walls of corridor because of how big hitbox of balls are, but even on an open area maps, those fireballs mostly just go through single enemy and then hit ground and explodes while not hiting anything with it's explosion. After all this, even a single ettin often can survive a whole 3 fireballs hitting and go through him, such a bs in my opinion, while even quietus at lesser cost of mana does far better damage and capable to kill up to 5 ettins up close because instead of worthless seeking capability of bloodscourge weapon, it does wide spread 5 high damage projectiles with splash damage explosive hit, helping archieving maximum damage.

But I guess, Mage is more for hardcore players, as even in the first hub and the very first level you get more enemies to fight against, because fighter and clerics are too pussy to fight afrits without their OP pickup weapons. But hell, even as mage, afrits worth like 3-5 ettins simple because they like to hide and surprise the player with a burst of fire darts flying at you, not to mention that it's weakest weapon in the game, so it will take some time to kill a single afrit before move on, which wasn't that easy back in the time. And since all other weapons mage have (except maybe bloodscourge) are suck on ice, especially at range (oh irony), you'd end up using your first weapon all the time, although it's very hard to run of off mana anyway. Although Sapphire Wand is such an awesome and beautiful weapon that you sure may fall in love with even if it does least damage per shot than any other weapon in game.

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I'll be honest, I've never tried other classes, but mage. Except the first level since I need to check out the arsenal of each classes and the mage was the only one who has a range attack with unlimited ammo, and I loved it despite of its weak firepower. At least it can penetrate the monsters.

Maybe I should try other classes one day. Any suggestions?

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Holy necro.

Anyway, I usually just play a mage. Not too sure exactly why, but maybe its because I played a mage back when I was into WoW.

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I played as the Cleric: having a balanced character that can drain health from enemies? Sign me up!

Also the Wraithverge kicks ass.

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I like the Fighter when I'm just killing shit, but I find the Cleric to much much more versatile. The Serpent Staff is fairly OP by itself, allowing the user to just leech off any and everything while stunning it and killing it. It's great when you have enemies coming one at a time through a tight door. The Wraithverge is nearly broken in its power. But I like the carnage I can inflict with the Fighter.

I don't play the Mage much at all, but I feel like he would be good for a playthrough.

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They all have flaws. I assume the skill is 5:

* Fighter: melee weapons are dangerous against dragons and slaughtaurs. The quietus is good but unimpressive.
* Cleric: the mace sucks and you surely want to find something better. You hope not to play some wad where you use the mace for a long time...
* Mage: the wand is disproportionately powerful, the ice is too slow, weak and inefficient, but satisfying to use. The lightning is pretty good. The bloodscourge I think has a lot of potential but hard to use; it's also disappointing for a mage weapon, even Heretic 1 Corvus (without magic powers) would use it since it's just a powered staff.

I just choose randomly, though the safest to play in PWADs is the mage. Otherwise the chances are great that the map author has put many dragons and you have to struggle with the first weapon a lot...

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I thought this thread was created a couple of days ago because it said January 18th but then I looked at the year.

Anyway, Cleric is clearly the most powerful and the easiest to play. Nothing destroys Centaurs as quickly and efficiently as the Gas Flechettes, Serpent Staff is the most universal and low-cost weapon and Wraithverge murders everything in seconds.

Figher is ok, at least he's fast and hard to kill. But the Mage sucks on every possible level. There's not a single really good thing about him. He's slow, weak and his weapons are too unreliable. You can say the Wand is good because it's the only ranged weapon that requires no mana but it's damage is pathetic and it takes forever to kill anything with it.

Doesn't help that enemies in HeXen are bulletsponges with way too much health.

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Cleric for flechettes and wraithverge. I really don't like weapons 1-2 though, and you tend to spend a lot of time with #2, so there's a downside. If I was replaying Hexen now, or playing a mission pack (I really need to look at Shadows of Chronos and Kristus's heretic/hexen efforts), I'd probably pick another class, probably Mage, just for some variation.

I sometimes dream of a heretic/hexen mod that didn't have preset classes and predeterminism but you evolved in a particular direction, ala RPGs.

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I've used all three classes, but I suck as a fighter -- usually I get killed by the chaos serpents in Seven Portals. Thematically I prefer the mage but the cleric is the strongest choice.

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I can see the Cleric and Fighter as more appealing to a Doom or Heretic player coming to HeXen, than the Mage, due to them, generally, requiring more movement than the Mage.

Also, generally speaking, Doom and Heretic only have one long range weapon, the Rocket Launcher and Phoenix Rod respectively; most of Doom and Heretic other weapons are only (or at least meant to be excluding things like Chaingun sniping) useful at a fairly close or medium range. This is generally the case with the Fighter and Cleric's weapons.

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This thread brings back memories...

Anyway, I still play random classes, but each one is good.


Fighter: It's a bit of a challenge at first. Not with the ettins or anything, but with the chaos serpents in map 2 before you get the axe. The afrits are mildly annoying, but nothing too serious. Once you get the axe, it's still a bit of a challenge, but you'll be killing things quicker. Chaos serpents would take 3 hits instead of 5 or 6 punches. Once you get the hammer, it gets easier, but I still use the axe for many situations, like fighting off a bunch of stalkers. I almost never use the quietus unless it's against the heresiarch or Korax.

Cleric: It starts slow, and you get the second weapon later than the other classes (not by much, but it doesn't seem that way), but once you do get it, it gets fun. Centaurs are a pain though, especially if you're trying to sap some health from them and they use their shield. The firestorm is interesting, but it seems to work more on larger enemies. On smaller ones, those flames sometimes simply rotate around them and do minimal damage. The flechettes are fun to use. I especially like this trick:



As for the wraithverge, it's really best when there's a lot of enemies around, like in the deathwind chapel or Zedek's tomb or the dungeons after a few minutes (those ettins will just continue to pile up over time). Just fire it once or twice and watch them all explode. It's also good for those tricky places like the armory or sump in Deathkings. However, try to not use it against the heresiarch.

Mage: That first weapon is weak, but it can hit anything at any range, and it doesn't stop at the first enemy. It just keeps right on going. I still prefer to use something a little faster, like anything else. Still, it's a good sniping weapon, since the frost shards scatter like a shotgun, and the arc of death is too unpredictable to hit anything from far away. The bloodscourge also works, unless it finds something else to go after before it reaches your target.

The frost shards are kind of tricky. There's a specific range where it seems to do the most damage. Too close and those ice shards don't seem to fully materialize, unless it's melee range. Melee range does seem to do more damage than right outside of it. But a step or two further, and all the shards emerge. If you're just the right enough distance away, those shards will all hit the target. The best thing is that unlike the serpent staff, melee attacks won't be reflected by the centaur's shield.

The arc of death is really best in open areas or against larger targets. Too many times I've tried using it on a centaur in the wastelands, only for it to hit a wall and dissipate. But if there's no wall around, that centaur or slaughtaur is as good as dead. Speaking of centaurs, I sometimes use the wand to stun them, then put down a flechette or two in front of them. That usually gets them. Another fun thing about the arc of death is that it hits enemies that are nowhere near you vertically. Go to the wastelands entrance area on shadow wood. For some reason, there are ettins or whatever at the bottom of those cliffs. Fire a shot in the right spot and the lightning will get caught on something until it dies. Or in that same area, you might get bothered by an attin that's parked above you. Fire at just the right spot and it would hit that afrit without you even seeing it.

Then there's the bloodscourge. Like the wraithverge, it's really good when there's a lot of enemies bunched up, or fighting a death wyvern (not possible in either Hexen iwad since you wouldn't have the weapon yet). Fire one or two of them, and they will keep tracking it until it's dead or they hit a wall, which would be unlikely when it comes to death wyverns. It's also good against hard to hit enemies like Menelkir.

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usually mage, would love the fighter if you could use is sword without mana like you could with his axe.

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I tend to choose player class randomly, but by myself, not ZDoom's random button. Sometimes I specifically feel like trying out the one with ranged base weapon, sometimes rather the ones with melee base weapons. That said, I don't think I ever played Hexen or any Hexen wad for more than 15 minutes before giving up the playthrough for getting bored.

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All of them. I think the Fighter is the most immediately fun though, you get more from the Cleric and especially the Mage once you learn the tricksy little things about how the weapons and artifacts work; there are a lot of things you can do in Hexen that aren't obvious right away.

printz said:

* Fighter: melee weapons are dangerous against dragons and slaughtaurs.

Throw flechettes at 'em. You can use them in fast succession for much quicker kills than punching/chopping and this eats serpents for breakfast if you land a few on them.

printz said:

* Cleric: the mace sucks and you surely want to find something better. You hope not to play some wad where you use the mace for a long time...

If you get the range of it down, you can hit melee enemies from further away than they can hit you (same range as Timon's Axe I believe, and further than the graphic might have you think). Also, keep it for use on centaurs since it doesn't have the drawbacks of the Serpent Staff (poison bouncing back even at melee range) or the Firestorm (they tend to take only the initial hit and block the timed effect). It is the weakest starting weapon, but still better than most people give it credit for.

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Jon said:

Could you explain what's going on, there?

1. drop cleric flechette to create poison gas cloud
2. use disc of repulsion to blast cloud towards monster
3. monster receives massive impact damage and is gibbed


Here's an in-depth explanation:

	// Check for blasted thing running into another
	if(tmthing->flags2&MF2_BLASTED && thing->flags&MF_SHOOTABLE)
	{
		if (!(thing->flags2&MF2_BOSS) &&
			(thing->flags&MF_COUNTKILL))
		{
			thing->momx += tmthing->momx;
			thing->momy += tmthing->momy;
			if ((thing->momx + thing->momy) > 3*FRACUNIT)
			{
				damage = (tmthing->info->mass/100)+1;
				P_DamageMobj(thing, tmthing, tmthing, damage);
				damage = (thing->info->mass/100)+1;
				P_DamageMobj(tmthing, thing, thing, damage>>2);
			}
			return(false);
		}
	}
tmthing is our poison cloud, thing is the ettin. Notice that the ettin is inflicted impact damage equal to one hundredth of the cloud's mass. What's the cloud's mass, then?
{		// MT_POISONCLOUD
-1,		// doomednum
S_POISONCLOUD1,		// spawnstate
1000,		// spawnhealth
S_NULL,		// seestate
SFX_NONE,		// seesound
8,		// reactiontime
SFX_NONE,		// attacksound
S_NULL,		// painstate
0,		// painchance
SFX_NONE,		// painsound
S_NULL,		// meleestate
S_NULL,		// missilestate
S_NULL,		// crashstate
S_NULL,		// deathstate
S_NULL,		// xdeathstate
SFX_POISONSHROOM_DEATH,		// deathsound
0,		// speed
1,		// radius
1,		// height
MAXINT,		// mass
0,		// damage
SFX_NONE,		// activesound
MF_NOGRAVITY|MF_NOBLOCKMAP|MF_SHADOW|MF_NOCLIP|MF_DROPOFF,		// flags
MF2_NODMGTHRUST		// flags2
 },
Oh, it's MAXINT, also known as the maximum value a 32-bit integer can have. Even divided by 100, it's several orders of magnitude greater than the hit point amount of any creature in Hexen.

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If memory serves me right, I played as Parias (the cleric) the first time I played Hexen. I use him occasionally, but most of the time nowadays, I play as Baratus (the fighter) because he's easier to use and requires less strategy. They're both great, though.

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Thanks for that, Gez. I always assumed it was some weird glitch pertaining to the cloud normally being a pass-through object, but I guess it was a lot simpler than that.

Why can you bounce flechette clouds but not the ones from the squeaky mushrooms?

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ETTiNGRiNDER said:

Why can you bounce flechette clouds but not the ones from the squeaky mushrooms?

IIRC, they're stuck in the corpse of the mushroom. Notice that when you destroy a poison mushroom, if you walk over it, your view height increases a bit: the poison shroom has a normal height of 20, and when killed, like all other actors, its height is halved, so it gets to 10. However, contrarily to monsters, it does not call the function that clears away the SOLID flags, so it remains "blocking". I forgot the precise details of why it actually happens, though, because the cloud is normally spawned 28 units above the shroom, which should clear it of collision -- it's probably an issue in Hexen's collision code. I forgot the details, last time I looked at this was basically nearly six years ago.

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Gez said:

1. drop cleric flechette to create poison gas cloud
2. use disc of repulsion to blast cloud towards monster
3. monster receives massive impact damage and is gibbed


Thanks! I missed the disc of repulsion. I was trying to figure out what relevance the icon of the defender had to the situation ;)

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To really appreciate the game, you have to play through Hexen and Deathkings with all three characters. So many nuances come out.

I didn't know about this flechette trick! I wish we had some really challenging maps for Heretic and Hexen in which creative use of artifacts was integral to the gameplay, rather than being an auxiliary element. I think the iwads are designed with the assumption that players do not have their artifacts hotkeyed. But this changes the game tremendously.

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Gez said:

Oh, it's MAXINT, also known as the maximum value a 32-bit integer can have. Even divided by 100, it's several orders of magnitude greater than the hit point amount of any creature in Hexen.

Christ, that's so broken I don't even... Did ZDoom "fix" it? Because I'd make a concession and play Hexen with that bug patched, because it sounds like the kind of thing that makes the game too easy...

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printz said:

Christ, that's so broken I don't even... Did ZDoom "fix" it? Because I'd make a concession and play Hexen with that bug patched, because it sounds like the kind of thing that makes the game too easy...


If you use the exploit, sure. But you may run out of flechettes pretty quickly.

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Bosses are already immune to getting any sort of blast damage (you've noticed the !(thing->flags2&MF2_BOSS) bit, right) so it's just a way to spend two inventory items to kill one trash mob.

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