What is your most hated demon in Doom?

[Super Jamie]

Each monster has a specific attack that requires a degree of skill to dodge.

Imps and Barons fire a single projectile, the challenge is to strafe or otherwise get out of the way. Mancs fire dual projectiles, the challenge is to dodge side-to-side without hitting the other one. Revenants fire homing missiles, the challenge is to lead the missile into something else (wall, pillar, monster) before it hits you.

Archviles have one hiscan attack on a few seconds delay during a very obvious sequence, the challenge is to get out of the way during that hitscan. At close range with cover, you can use berzerk, chainsaw, plasma or one of the hitscan weapons. At long range you can use the rocket launcher. At close range with no cover you can use the BFG.

Any map which deviates from these rules (eg: close range, no cover, and doesn't give you a BFG) is either flawed or intended to be ludicrously hard.

I'd argue that plasma and chaingun are preferable weapons to break an Archie attack (ie: put it into pain state) due to their rapid firing rate. Like Jodwin and myk said, you only need to break once. Sometimes you can ace it with the SSG and sometimes you can land 4 hits in a row without one.

[Jodwin]

Super Jamie said:

Each monster has a specific attack that requires a degree of skill to dodge.

True. But the great thing about arch-viles is that their attack isn't all they've got. The resurrecting ability is one of the best things in the whole Doom bestiary.

(of course their ability to attack from behind other monsters is cool too...)

[Maes]

Jodwin said:

And if you're using rockets against a freely running archie...heh.

Why, can't you? ;-)

Of course if you are placed an archvile in front of your face AND you see a fuckton of monsters rushing in you'll try to kill the archie with top priority, else fighting will be futile. "Skill" has nothing to do with performing the obvious. And it has nothing to do with having information about a level beforehand ;-)

If however you're "conveniently" set a "date" with one inside a trap (preferably one that you must go through) and you're supposed to fight it one on one...then unless you have a BFG it's purely luck. You can only hope you'll get a cancel.

[Super Jamie]

Maes said:

If however you're "conveniently" set a "date" with one inside a trap (preferably one that you must go through) and you're supposed to fight it one on one...then unless you have a BFG it's purely luck. You can only hope you'll get a cancel.

Without cover, that's just idiotic level design and removes everything about what makes Archviles such a fun and challenging enemy.

[gravitar]

Super Jamie said:

Without cover, that's just idiotic level design and removes everything about what makes Archviles such a fun and challenging enemy.

I wouldn't say so, because as Maes pointed out the player still has a chance of a canceled attack, and it increases the player's adrenaline level quite rapidly :) Ofcourse it's only fair to pull things like that on a supposedly healthy/armed player.

Archviles are a love/hate monster for me: they really add much to the game, but due to their mostly sudden appearance they probably kill me half the time on first playthroughs.

P.S. teleporting archies after all monsters are dead is much harder than a single archie with no cover imo.(gladiatr.wad or holyhell.wad last map - impossible?)

[Super Jamie]

I beg to differ. An Archvile (or multiple) in close quarters with cover is an exercise in skillful dodging and shooting at the right times.

Placing the player in a coverless room with an Archvile and simply hoping the pseudorandom number generates an attack strong enough to break is poor map design and will get an instaquit and poor review from me.

The fun of a game like Doom is testing your skill in adverse conditions and adapting your skills to suit different conditions, not shooting an enemy and placing faith in randomly generated results that they don't kill you first.

[Jodwin]

gravitar said:

teleporting archies after all monsters are dead is much harder than a single archie with no cover imo

Well, assuming you have full health and enough ammo for either SSG or plasma, you're guaranteed to kill the archie that you're fighting without cover, just as well as it has good chances to blow you up once, but never twice unless you suck at shooting monsters that are standing still. While fighting a resurrecting archie isn't always a guaranteed win for you, so yeah, in that way a trap archie is easier. :P

Maes said:

Of course if you are placed an archvile in front of your face AND you see a fuckton of monsters rushing in you'll try to kill the archie with top priority, else fighting will be futile. "Skill" has nothing to do with performing the obvious. And it has nothing to do with having information about a level beforehand ;-)

Durr, the skill obviously comes from making the archie you priority (rather than, say, the horde of revenants so that the archie can conveniently resurrect them right after you kill them). If the archie is hidden behind the other monsters, the skill comes from herding the horde in a way that you could make a quick way to the archie so that you can kill it before it resurrects too much shit. Of course if the archies are just standing on top of some pillars with no space to move you don't really need to bother with them, because in that case they're not in their resurrecting-role.

And I didn't say anything about knowing the level beforehand, I spoke about evaluating the layouts right there and then, for example if you get teleported into a new arena for the first time a good player can get a good overall picture of the layout and all the cover with a quick glance around. Apparently unlike you can, since the concept seems to sound so alien. :P

[Kyka]

However, there are a few times when leaving a player in the open with an archvile might be acceptable.

a)Say doomguy is in the middle of a big, open room area, and an archvile teleports in. The room could be done in such a way that when the arch teleports in, the player has to choose whether to risk triggering the archie's pain state, or turning and sprinting for some crates that were placed at the room's entrance to use as cover. This way, the player at least has a fighting chance.

b)if the player has a BFG/plasma gun, usually he can take down an arch before getting hit.

But generally, like Super Jamie said, archviles and open areas are just crappy and shouldn't be done without some cover.

[Maes]

Jodwin said:

obvious stuff followed by a vague insinuation

Again, you're stating the obvious. Ofc nobody with a decent playing experience will try to go and shake hands with a bunch of angry revenants coming to tear his asshole part, nor will he remain oblivious to his surroundings and fight like a bot, focusing only on immediate threats instead of following a strategy.

In any case, you're missing the point here. The fact is that there are circumstances where fighting an archvile is reduced to a matter of luck, and all the skill in the world can't help you there. Nor will positive thinking :-p

I also am not one to tell you to stop boasting about your alleged skills or scorn the alleged lack of other people's skills (especially when you don't have incontestable proof of either). But as they say in Greece, "Where many roosters crow, the break of dawn is late to come". And you know very well why I mentioned having previous knowledge of a level.

[magicsofa]

I love lost souls. I only hate pain elementals "in character" - meaning I want to kill them as quickly as possible. Although a nuisance they are a unique monster and can have cool fights.


Like someone else said for themselves, I don't really hate any monster. None are ridiculously hard unless in a poor map so poor maps should be hated.

That said, if I had to choose one to hate it would be demons and spectres. The hordes just take so long to clean up without powerful weapons. They are really fun to dismantle with rockets or beserk though... and of course chainsaw saves all your ammo.


Icon of Sin kinda sucks too.

[gravitar]

Super Jamie said:

The fun of a game like Doom is testing your skill in adverse conditions and adapting your skills to suit different conditions, not shooting an enemy and placing faith in randomly generated results that they don't kill you first.

Doom is quite a random game anyway with the wide damage ranges possible. I was just trying to say an archie without cover 'might' be ok if the unfairness of such an encounter is balanced with sufficient health/weapons.

Jodwin said:

Well, assuming you have full health and enough ammo for either SSG or plasma, you're guaranteed to kill the archie that you're fighting without cover

There's always the element of surprise and panic when archies suddenly appear out of nowhere, making the outcome not as certain. Ofcourse it's a different matter when your name is "Total Detonator Marine"

Maes said:

But as they say in Greece, "Where many roosters crow, the break of dawn is late to come".

huh?

[Dragonsbrethren]

I've been playing Doom64 a lot this past week, and I have to say its lost souls are easily the most dangerous enemy in the game. They are so much more aggressive than in the PC games, and just shred your heath and armor if you give them a chance. I prioritize them above almost everything else; luckily they go down with a single shotgun blast in that game. That means pain elementals are my most hated monster in that version. I've taken to killing them from a distance with the unmaker, since they seem to be able to spawn souls even when you're right on top of them, making chainsawing/berserk punching more dangerous than it should be.

For the PC games, I really can't say. I don't hate any of the monsters. Revenants annoy me at times, but that's only in badly designed areas without enough walls to run their rockets into.

[Leo Sosnine]

I disagree. Arch-viles are cute. They make good sounds while running somewhere, something like "arrrrrggggghhhh". Very sexy. And they look so beautiful when they make their fire magic.

In addition they make you jumpy. That helps in some areas.

You see, there's absolutely no point in hating such nice beasts.

Their only disadvantage is the fact, that other monsters never got provoked to infighting with arch-viles. That's really sad and quite stupid. However, that could be considered as a feature, because of that arch-viles live longer and have more possibilities to revive more monsters. And more monsters is always great.

I love DOOM because of monsters, how can I hate them?

[Archy]

Lost Souls and Pain Elementals, however, I LOVE Arch-viles :) well, love to kill them...

[Genki]

i also like cyborg monsters such as cybermastermind.it seems easy in easy mode.but can you defeat it in hard mode?i dare ya!!!!!!!!

[Super Jamie]

saifi said:

i also like cyborg monsters such as cybermastermind.it seems easy in easy mode.but can you defeat it in hard mode?i dare ya!!!!!!!!

*fires two point-blank BFG blasts*
There, done.

[Maes]

gravitar said:

huh?

It's a way of saying. It roughly means that when everybody is too busy swaggering, boasting himself, and dissing others (like a multitude of competing crowing roosters would do), there is often very little actual work done/results seen/substance to back up the claims etc.

(Every rooster wants to be THE ONE announcing the new dawn, but with every other rooster wanting the same, the dawn ends up coming too late).

[Splatter]

But roosters don't cause the dawn.


















































OR DO THEY????????????

[Sergeant_Mark_IV]

Masterminds and Arch-Viles.

Why?

I hate arch-viles because they are... well. the WORSE thing in Doom.
They are ugly and don't look like hellspawn, their attack is stupid, they are resistant as barons of hell, and they can resurrect all those who made you spend a lot of ammo. So, arch-viles will always make you deplete your ammo if you can't hit him with a bfg shoot quickly.

I hate the Mastermind because that's one of the most easy final boss I ever beaten in my life. 4 BFG Shoots can kill her even in Nightmare. Or if you don't want to use a BFG on Dis, you can run arround the map, making her attacks hit the two Cacodemons and the Baron of Hell, and they will kill the Mastermind for you.
Mastermind should have double hp.

[Mithral_Demon]

Sergeant_Mark_IV said:

Masterminds

Why?
4 BFG Shoots can kill her even in Nightmare.
Mastermind should have double hp.

Actually 1 would kill her in any mode, 4 is for Cyber.

[Maes]

Splatter said:

But roosters don't cause the dawn.

....

OR DO THEY????????????

In any case, it's just a folk Greek saying :-p

Worthless fact of the week: it appears that the Greek language is chock-full of sayings and proverbs, and unlike other languages, their use is very common and even includes archaic forms. Imagine if they still used Old English sayings in, say, Australia :-p

[Jodwin]

Maes said:

Worthless fact of the week: it appears that the Greek language is chock-full of sayings and proverbs, and unlike other languages, their use is very common and even includes archaic forms. Imagine if they still used Old English sayings in, say, Australia :-p

Enter Hellen cultural heritage!

[Sergeant_Mark_IV]

Mithral_Demon said:

Actually 1 would kill her in any mode, 4 is for Cyber.

Weird.I remember having to shoot her 2 to 4 times to kill it.

(Maybe I missed some shoots)

[DOOMman8745]

say it's that damn pain elemental because he spawns to many damn lost souls

[gravitar]

Maes said:

It's a way of saying. It roughly means that when everybody is too busy swaggering, boasting himself, and dissing others (like a multitude of competing crowing roosters would do), there is often very little actual work done/results seen/substance to back up the claims etc.

(Every rooster wants to be THE ONE announcing the new dawn, but with every other rooster wanting the same, the dawn ends up coming too late).

That might explain the origin of Gyros: some greek got pissed with all the crowing and kicked those rooster's asses.

Atleast it's a theory.

[Maes]

gravitar said:

Gyros theory

Heh.

gravitar said:

Enter Hellen cultural heritage!

Hell yeah, it's a part of our heritage. However most foreigners react with a "wtf" or negatively when exposed to it, because they think that Greek are some sort of wannabe Miyagi-sans that speak in cryptic zen koans all the time.

[Airman266]

If you have a hard time fighting Revs you should stick to Doom1 maps

[DuckReconMajor]

I try to but myk gets mad at me.

[darkreaver]

I have changed my mind.

I hated Revenants before, but I have come to like them! At least in my own maps, for others to fight, hehe

I have to say I hate imps the most, acctually. So damn annoying

[Pedro VC]

Chaingunners,because they can drop your health quickly.
Revenants, because the homing missiles and Mancubi because the double attack.