Dealing with Nightmare

[LadyVader1138]

The first time I ever beat Doom, it was on IDWTD. I wasn't happy with that fact, so I went up to HMP and enjoyed myself far more. But wanting a challenge, I went all the way up to UV and was able to beat it. Now, after I have a new goal: I want to beat the original three episodes of Doom on all five difficulties. I'm currently in the process of beating HNTR (taking my time, though, playing it when I feel like it), but Nightmare....I have no idea how I can get through it.

So, how do you deal with Nightmare?

[Kira]

Quoting a very old @Ryback post:

 

Quote

Anyway, here's my foolproof training regime. Follow this and you'll be a D2S-er in no time.

1. Complete every Doom and Doom2 level on UV from scratch.
2. Complete every Doom and Doom2 level on UV, under par.
3. Complete every Doom and Doom2 level on UV, with -fast.
4. Complete every Doom and Doom2 episode on UV, under par.
5. Complete every Hell Revealed level, on UV.
6. Complete every Doom and Doom2 level on nightmare.
7. Complete every Doom and Doom2 episode on nightmare.
8. Do the whole game.

The gist of it seems to be "study the game thoroughly if you want a shot at Nightmare".

[LadyVader1138]

2 minutes ago, Kira said:

Quoting a very old @Ryback post:

 

The gist of it seems to be "study the game thoroughly if you want a shot at Nightmare".

That's beating more levels than I need to for my goal. Though it does support my basic idea of playing on -fast to practice, though I plan on going on lower skill levels first, get used to dealing with fast monsters in smaller numbers, THEN go up.

[Beginner]

That list might be overkill if one plans to just beat OG Doom on Nightmare, though you might want to remember levels like the back of your hand just so you know where the goodies are, where enemies can be and what shortest possible route is. Knowledge of tricks and how to do them is optional, but it can help a lot e.g. e2m6, e2m7.

[Dark Pulse]

You don't conquer Nightmare. Nightmare conquers you.

[Maximum Matt]

One does not simply play Nightmare. 

[LadyVader1138]

1 hour ago, Maximum Matt said:

One does not simply play Nightmare. 

You live it.

Actually, considering the shit I've gone through in the past two years, that's not an inaccurate statement.

[xdarkmasterx]

On 5/3/2019 at 7:14 PM, Dark Pulse said:

You don't conquer Nightmare. Nightmare conquers you.

 

in soviet russia...

[Maser]

I have only beaten the first episode of Doom on Nightmare and honestly I didn't have fun doing so because of the respawing enemies, you pretty much have to speedrun all the maps.  My only advice to give is to know all the maps like the back of your hand so you can always make quick bee lines to the exits. 

[Rathori]

What Maser said. Also keep in mind that relative episode difficulty changes quite a lot on NM: E2 and E3 are the easiest, E1 is harder due to abundant hitscanners, and E4 is hard as hell, at least the start of it is: I've only made it past E4M1 once, and didn't have enough health and ammo left to even give E4M2 a proper try. Can't speak about DOOM II as I've never tried it on NM.

[seed]

7 hours ago, Maser said:

respawing enemies, you pretty much have to speedrun all the maps

 

I think this is pretty important to keep in mind. Unlike all the other difficulty settings NM is not meant to be played "casually", for lack of a better word.

 

You need to kill what actually matters and not waste time on things that are not important to the progression. I've never beaten the IWADs on NM, nor do I intend to since it involves a gameplay style that I can't really handle, but my 0.02$ on the topic nonetheless, based on what others have said and my personal understanding from what I've actually played.

[ReaperAA]

Don't really bother with nightmare unless u r a really really really really good doomer AND know every nook and canny of the mapset in hand.

 

Personally the furthest I got was E1M4 in doom 1. In doom 2, I never got past map 2.

[Cruduxy Pegg]

You either speedrun or you die horribly. You can still save scum but that'll just make it an absolute chore. If you want to smooth up the difficulty do this:

 

Spoiler

Doom 1 UV -> Doom 2 UV -> Plutonia UV -> Doom 1 UV pistol start FAST monsters -> TN2 Pistol start Fast UV -> Doom 1 Episode 4 FAST -> Heretic episode 3-5 wand start on black plague (optional, but will dramatically force you to learn to dodge a lot of projectiles or die) -> Plutonia pistol start fast -> Watch any nightmare speed run (unless you know all the tricky shortcuts already, You don't need to learn things like passing through gaps/glitching outside map boundaries) but those maps are gonna be way harder than the speedrun makes it seem) -> Doom 1 E2 NM -> E1 NM -> E3 NM (IMO you can do them in any order anyway, I find e1 easiest just because chaingun and RL eradicate zombies).

 

As you can see it needs a lot of playing to even bother trying to do it reliably. Plutonia is going to be absolutely brutal and some maps in heretic are going to be torture unless you figure them out. Heretic is optional of course but its difficulty on pistol start isn't meant to do anything but fine tune dodging skills.

[Rathori]

I would argue against playing unrelated WADs such as TNT, Plutonia, etc (unless it's these WADs that you're going to be playing on NM).

 

You need to practice getting as fast as you can through the levels you're actually going to play on NM. Learn the locations of all the secrets with meaty powerups, all the good weapons, all the shortcuts that you might need. Beat par times on all the levels on UV, then you can pretty much follow the same routes in your NM run, with a few adjustments for things such as fast pinkies and lost souls (and deadlier hitscanners).

 

Whether to play on UV-fast is up to you, but I think you might as well play on NM at this point, because the most important difference between NM and UV is not the speed of the monsters, but the fact that you can't--and shouldn't even try--to kill them all because they respawn endlessly. Just go to the exit, while killing only what you need to kill in order to get there.

 

And once again, if you want to beat Doom/Doom II IWADs on NM, playing TNT, Plutonia, Sunlust, whatever, on UV, will not help you in any way. Doom I/II is still very much same game as Doom I/II on UV - with the same number of monsters and their placement, the same level layouts, secrets, and item locations. Learning to beat the toughest fights in Plutonia, Sunlust, whatever, will not help you, because these fights and levels are not in Doom I/II.

[Cruduxy Pegg]

Doom 1 and 2 are too easy on UV in comparison to Plutonia and TNT (Which is easier than Doom 1 on NM, although Plutonia fast is probably harder). Playing those 2 will just help bridge the gap. Just knowing the maps won't do much when your skill isn't enough to handle all the monsters shooting at you. Fast has enemy projectiles moving much faster than normal UV (mostly at double speed, becoming super fast like mancubs projectiles and possibly glitching through walls without port fixes), that is a huge difference especially when combined with enemies attacking without delays. Heretic helps because monsters attacks are harder to dodge (good for dodge training); Disciples especially with their 24 speed projectiles (compared to the average 20), D'sparil and his serpent as well with 28 speed projectiles. If someone can make it out of heretic they can dodge anything in doom.

 

NM has double ammo in play. You can take your time if you want if you know a safe spot. You can even cheese armies of demons by herding them all, killing them with BFG/Plasma then doing a dash to a key/exit.

[Nine Inch Heels]

Running anything on Nightmare requires knowledge of the entire map, or at least knowledge of all the areas you have to visit to reach the exit.

 

Routing is the word.

-What's the fastest way to weapons/armour/powerups/keys?

-How can I get there while taking the least amount of damage possible?

 

Beating any map on NM usually means you have to be in "speedrun mode", the faster the better. Kill only what's necessary, and keep in mind NM gives you double ammo, so user higher tier weapons to make otherwise lethal situations easier. Also: Hitscanners on NM fundamentally suck, so be prepared to tank that sweet sweet RNG.

A few NM runs I recorded for valiant can be found in this playlist, just for the sake of credibility:
https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLTmV4zpWzC8kEyI5QnOOZBDyEDN9Ji_HS

 

[Maximum Matt]

On ‎5‎/‎5‎/‎2019 at 10:37 AM, xdarkmasterx said:

in soviet russia...

ON SOVIET DEIMOS, BERZERK PACK YOU