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sparerib1968

Which wads can new mappers learn the most from?

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I am a new mapper and I want to make fun maps for single player and coop play. Of all the wads you have played, IWADs or PWADs, which ones made you wish all new mappers would learn from them? What was the most impressive feature that made the maps fun or memorable?

I enjoy playing most of the E1 and E2 maps even though they don't offer much challenge any more. Alien Vendetta is my favorite megawad, mostly due to its distinctive architecture and details.

How about you?

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Even though I've never released a single map (and I doubt I ever will), I spent a lot of time playing "classic" WADs, so I can give some recommendations.

1) It's hard to pick something similar to Alien Vendetta, which is quite unique. Whose maps do you like best? If Johnsen's, Deus Vult comes to mind; if Soto's, just look for his maps in other WADs (Classic Episode, 2002ADO, Darkening 2, etc.), and so on. I mean, follow the map authors who made maps you liked and you think you'll be able to imitate their style.

2) Relive for showing all the qualities of Knee-Deep In The Dead, adding the monsters from Doom II.

3) Vile Flesh These maps may be not as memorable as Alien Vendetta or Requiem, but they are all very well made, using basically the standard textures. Watch how the lifts, doors, switches are made. How Gwyn Williams uses "clashing" textures, but almost always with a good effect (metal+flesh in MAP21, marble+black in MAP29).

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Easy question. Your own.

To elaborate: Make something, figure out what you like/don't like about your work and what other people like/don't like about your work. Try to make something you'll like more. If you're not sure how to make something better, try mapping something entirely different. Try a different theme, or a different gameplay style, or a different engine, or some sort of creative restriction. You'll learn something from the attempt without even realizing it.

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Creaphis, I hoped you would reply with the names of some wads you thought were fun and memorable. Inexperienced mappers like myself can only hope to learn from those who have gone before.

I am already trying to do all the things you mentioned. I am even sharing my experiences here at Doomworld, hoping to get that critical feedback from other players. I sincerely wish you would try my latest wad and share your thoughts.

As always, thank you for your reply.

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Creaphis is right in this case. When I first started mapping a couple years ago, sure I took a look at a couple wads to see how to do certain things, but nothing is more valuable than experience. Nobody's first wad is a masterpiece, and you can use your own mistakes (and successes) to know what and what not to do in your next attempt. I've said it before in other threads, I have lots of awful beginner wads sitting on my harddrive which I will never release. Each was a step to a better mapper.

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printz said:

The id maps.


^^^^ What could be better than the originals.

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While practicing on your own is certainly a very important part of becoming a skilled mapper, careful study of the composition of existing wads is like picking the brains of mappers who have already succeeded at what you're trying to do. Espi's Suspended in Dusk and Erik Alm's Scythe series are overall fantastic choices to study for a wide array of reasons, including layout connectivity and use of height variation (these two are very related), gameplay design and pacing, visual design and architecture, and so on.

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Use3D said:

^^^^ What could be better than the originals.


I wouldn't recommend doom 2. Doom 1 Knee Deep in the Dead is a great example of some good maps to learn good design from.

I don't know if you are into megawads, but I'd suggest playing many of the memorable megawads such as Scythe, Scythe 2, Kama Sutra, Biowar, Memento Mori, Memento Mori 2, STRAIN, etc. It doesn't really make a good map by having cool features. For now, I suggest just making a few simple run 'n' gun maps that have enough ammo to kill the monsters with, and throw a few stimpacks around the map.

Since you've played a lot of E1 and E2, as well as Alien Vendetta, you should probably have a decent idea of how to have some fun in doom. As Creaphis said, just make your maps, and if they look and play good in a fashion that's good for you, then we will probably like it too.

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Well, on how I learned is through Final, Doom 2 and Ultimate Doom.
Ulti was for the level design.
Doom 2 was for Texture usage.
Fin-TNT was for the puzzles.
Fin-Plutonia was for the Slaughterfest and monster placement.

Thats all IWAD, and then PWAD....
Pretty much Espi's different ones like Suspended in Darkness (or what ever it's called) and Erik Alm's (Erik) Scythe series*.

*Stick with #2 cause of how beautiful some of the levels are.

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sparerib1968 said:

I enjoy playing most of the E1 and E2 maps even though they don't offer much challenge any more. Alien Vendetta is my favorite megawad, mostly due to its distinctive architecture and details.

How about you?

AV is also my favorite megawad and the main case study for me as a new mapper. Especially Kim Malde's and Andy Johnsen's works.

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esselfortium said:

While practicing on your own is certainly a very important part of becoming a skilled mapper, careful study of the composition of existing wads is like picking the brains of mappers who have already succeeded at what you're trying to do.


Agreed, but I would say that advanced map literacy - the ability to see what maps are really made of - is trained partly by attempting to make your own.

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vdgg said:

1) I mean, follow the map authors who made maps you liked and you think you'll be able to imitate their style.

I do not want to imitate their style. I just want some insight into what other players find enjoyable in their favorite wads.

vdgg said:

2) Relive for showing all the qualities of Knee-Deep In The Dead, adding the monsters from Doom II.


Wow, that was really something! He captured the essence of E1 and doubled the danger level. I had a hard time finding cover because everywhere I wanted to hide opened a door to even more dangerous foes.

vdgg said:

3) Vile Flesh These maps may be not as memorable as Alien Vendetta or Requiem, but they are all very well made, using basically the standard textures. Watch how the lifts, doors, switches are made. How Gwyn Williams uses "clashing" textures, but almost always with a good effect (metal+flesh in MAP21, marble+black in MAP29).


That is exactly the kind of commentary I hoped to elicit. Vile Flesh is already on my to play list, so I will get to it some time soon.

Thank you very much for your reply.

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sparerib1968 said:

I am a new mapper and I want to make fun maps for single player and coop play. Of all the wads you have played, IWADs or PWADs, which ones made you wish all new mappers would learn from them? What was the most impressive feature that made the maps fun or memorable?

I enjoy playing most of the E1 and E2 maps even though they don't offer much challenge any more. Alien Vendetta is my favorite megawad, mostly due to its distinctive architecture and details.

How about you?


You state your desire to make fun maps and then say that your favorite maps aren't your favorites because they are fun but because they look pretty.... It is my experience that when a mapper focuses too much attention on details the gameplay suffers. I'd suggest to you to focus on how the map plays and give it modest to moderate detailing. Hell Revealed is a good example of this: it has fun maps that are modestly to moderately detailed.

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Hellbent said:

You state your desire to make fun maps and then say that your favorite maps aren't your favorites because they are fun but because they look pretty....


Alien Vendetta is both fun and pretty. I am fascinated by Malde's architectures in Map03: Cargo Depot, and Map10: Toxic Touch. Those maps are also great fun for solo play IMHO.

Hellbent said:

It is my experience that when a mapper focuses too much attention on details the gameplay suffers. I'd suggest to you to focus on how the map plays and give it modest to moderate detailing. Hell Revealed is a good example of this: it has fun maps that are modestly to moderately detailed.


I think you are probably right to caution me against focusing on detailing over gameplay. I am definitely influenced by Hell Revealed, and want to try some of the tricks they pulled off. To be completely honest though, I don't anticipate doing many Hell-ish maps.

EDIT: Removed errant tags.

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40oz said:

I wouldn't recommend doom 2. Doom 1 Knee Deep in the Dead is a great example of some good maps to learn good design from.

Also if studying id Doom maps, make sure to ignore any tag 999 that you may encounter on stairbuilder sectors :) They don't do anything and aren't necessary, unless you use the IDBSP node builder (which you probably don't).

Looking at original maps made for other products, like Hexen, pays off more, because you get to see how they built their scripts, so you can make maps with not so different rules. I'm not sure about the new Doom Builder ("2"), but Doom Builder 1.68 can decompile directly scripts from Hexen.wad so you can see their source code in no time.

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sparerib1968 said:
I am a new mapper and I want to make fun maps for single player and coop play.

But are you a new player? If you aren't, you've already got a large amount of WADs to look to, which you have enjoyed playing. Consider also the mediocre or even bad WADs that have some incipient ideas that, if worked on, could bring some interesting results.

If you like stuff like AV and HR you might want to pay attention to demo recording, since those WADs are oriented toward demos, and following the demos you'll discover many other such good WADs, with tips on why they're good, given in the form of the playing itself as well as comments from the players in text files or forums.

How about you?

In the dev document for a WAD I'm working on I have a list of WADs and notes on things I liked about them or aspects I could imitate or learn tricks from, but I'd rather keep that to myself and answer with a WAD whenever it's ready, than give you part of or the basis of the ideas I'm working on :p

I also like being surprised, so I kind of dislike recommending things just because I would pursue them myself while editing.

You can also get ideas while interacting with players directly, such as playing a WAD in coop and then commenting stuff over an IM session or the like, especially if the other player is a veteran as well, or maybe also a mapper. Another thing you can do is review WADs (for T/nC, for example.) While examining them in a more formal way than during the usual playing, you get ideas on what you could have done instead, or just learn from their merits.

40oz said:
I wouldn't recommend doom 2.

Oh yeah, let's leave out a more experienced John Romero, a more versatile Sandy Petersen and all of American McGee. I wouldn't say DOOM is better than DOOM II as far as design goes. It just grasps the game's basic aesthetics more closely. That's just an aspect of what makes levels good and also predisposes people toward nostalgia; that it is good because it was special when it came out in a way the sequel, which was less of a novelty, could not be.

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One of the first maps that I released was inspired by Doom 2's MAP01. I studied the layout, and then made my map have a similar layout without flat-out replicating it. I also looked at the texture usage, and altered to to match my preferences. But really, the big thing was, I stepped back and looked that the big picture. I asked myself, "Okay, what's going on? This level looks like a base. Okay, how did the player get inside? What's with the brown rocky room? It doesn't look like part of a base. What's going on in the tech room? Where is the player going after he beats the level?"

I guess the take-home message here is that the original levels were incredibly abstract, while still being solidly built in terms of flow and gameplay. So, studying the flow and gameplay of those levels is great for giving you a solid base to start from, and their abstractness gives you incredible freedom for reinterpretation, to allow you to work to finding your own style.

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geekmarine said:

One of the first maps that I released was inspired by Doom 2's MAP01.
. . .
So, studying the flow and gameplay of those levels is great for giving you a solid base to start from, . . .

All of Doom 2, or Map01 only?

I think I know what you mean about studying the layout, but I want to avoid copying anyone else's map. It is my belief that experienced mappers must eventually develop similar techniques to implement their ideas, and I am looking for some of those techniques in the maps discussed here. Doom is a fairly simple world after all, and there are only limited ways to do certain things.

For example, very frequently a player will open a door into a darkened room and is confronted by a number of enemies. Every map has this scenario. Why do we keep playing the game more than 20 years later if the scenario never changes? There must be ways to make the scenario more effective, and let it contribute to the atmosphere intended by the author.

geekmarine said:

I asked myself, "Okay, what's going on? This level looks like a base. Okay, how did the player get inside? What's with the brown rocky room? It doesn't look like part of a base. What's going on in the tech room? Where is the player going after he beats the level?"


I used to ask those questions about the original games all the time. Eventually I came to accept that the story is sketchy at best, and the world of Doom doesn't make any sense. The only thing that matters in those original maps is atmosphere and play.

Of course you are right to say the original games are abstract by design. Isn't the main challenge of every mapper to attain a high level of play without breaking the illusion?

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First, I meant all of Doom 2. And second, my discussion of the abstractness was meant as an inspirational tool. Don't simply accept that the levels are abstract - come up with ideas to explain what a room is supposed to be - might give you inspiration for your own map. Think of the original maps like a Rorschach test (the ink blot test, you know, where you have the ink smudge and you find a picture in it) - there are many different ways of interpreting a given level or a given structure, figure out what it means to you, and incorporate that in your own levels.

And I'm not talking about copying layouts, merely using them as inspiration.

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