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Lila Feuer

The definitive "what difficulty do you prefer and why" thread

The definitive "what difficulty do you prefer and why" thread  

125 members have voted

  1. 1. I like playing the most on:

    • I'm too young to die.
      4
    • Hey, not too rough.
      6
    • Hurt me plenty.
      33
    • Ultra-Violence.
      94
    • Nightmare!
      3
    • [insert difficulty here] but with -fast
      8


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99% of the time I prefer to play on UV because to me more monsters equates more fun, I've always been like that since moving up to higher difficulties in any older FPS. In addition to liking to slaughter a lot of stuff I also just prefer a game like Doom or Quake or Wolf3D or whatever to be as challenging as possible, albeit without introducing gimmicks like fast and/or respawning monsters. So as hard as it can be normally possible before gameplay modifiers start leaking in.

However I will substitute UV in a rare case where I think it's apparent I'm getting my ass kicked a little too much and need to drop things down a peg or two. So HMP is essentially normal/medium difficulty in Doom and I think that's a good way to play more "casually" while still maintaining a challenge, just not demanding you to be on top of your game. Whereas in a much rarer circumstance I will only go as low as HNTR since that's essentially easy mode now, minus the benefits of ITYTD, those being the reduced player damage and doubled value pickups because I think at that point if I gotta go to ITYTD the PWAD is probably "retard hard" so to give myself my own handicap advantages is just silly to me. Christ, if it gets that bad then I'll just play the PWAD in GZDoom and use an overpowered weapon or gameplay mod, but only if I like the maps that much and they're completely out of my skill range.

Lastly I'll say that I'm not opposed to fast monsters but I have to really be in the mood for it so it is very rare that I flip them on. Respawning is a little too much personally, so Nightmare! as a whole is mainly out, since at that point you pretty much need not only prior knowledge of a level (and know exactly the best routes and what are unnecessary areas to visit) but also essentially have to speedrun the damn thing if I don't want to be in a potentially unwinnable situation and that's not how I play Doom. I can just blast through on UV and that for me is good enough.

E: BTW you can pick more than one poll option if you really need to.

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Always UV. If a wad is too hard for me, I just put it off till later, when I'll be ready. AFAIK many mappers place monsters as intended on UV, only then they remove some monsters on HMP and HNTR.

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I start with UV but if it's too hard I keep scaling it back til it feels right because I'm not too prideful to admit when something is hard.

 

I don't play Nightmare though. The real reason is because I'm too suki to handle it but I'll say it's because I don't have something to prove :)

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Ultravoilet always, im not tough enough for nightmare

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Ultra violence. It's the hardest setting besides the joke that is Nightmare. It feels like the most challenging setting while staying fair.

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Not enough choices, mine would've been "Any setting that is fun for the wad I am currently playing". That's usually HMP though.

 

The UV-only mindset is extremely silly to me, just to be nice about it. And I don't feel like I'm missing anything when playing on lower skills, or the Full Experience™.

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Ultra virtual, because of the

20 minutes ago, dmslr said:

AFAIK many mappers place monsters as intended on UV, only then they remove some monsters on HMP and HNTR. 

and also because I know how (G)(Z)(PR)(B)Doom work and know how withstand most of it "close door behind player and spawn >9000 imps" situations.

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For a short period of time i used 

"I own Doom!" In doom 64 thinking it was the uv equivelant, but halfway through turned to "Watch me die!" finding out that was the actual ultra voilent difficulty as there was no nightmare

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When I'm unsure about a WAD's difficulty I usually pick 'Hurt Me Plenty'

 

If I've beaten a WAD before & found it easy on HMP that's when I bump it up to Ultra-Violence, but sadly replaying WADs doesn't happen all too often.

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UV when it comes to most of the stuff I play, but I don't mind playing HMP from time to time.

UV-fast when I REALLY feel like challenging myself.

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I start on UV since it's about right for me most of the time and then drop down to HMP pistol start if there's so much death in my game that the fun is dying too.

 

On easier levels (e.g. IWAD), I found this great Unholy Massacre difficulty in LZDoom. An alternative to nightmare that you can take at your own pace -- enemies do double damage and drop half ammo.  Doesn't work for all maps, but I'd love it if more ports adopted this.

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Because I know how the vast majority of mappers do their difficulty settings, I play UV so I can fight everything in the map ("get the full experience", if you will). I did experiment with a HNTR phase for a while not too long ago, however, which was pretty fun in the IWADs, but really crap in TNT: Evilution. I'm not actively seeking much of a challenge, though, so if something seems unreasonably hard, I'll probably just not download it in the first place. If I find myself playing a highly difficult map, I'm happy enough to give up (or skip it, if it's part of a community project where the difficulty/quality is an outlier), rather than bang my head against it. I didn't pay for the map, so I don't feel any major investment or requirement to see it through.

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Plutonia difficult is perfect for me. That might mean UV or ITYTD depending on the wad haha

Edited by Deadwing

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UV with fast mode. My choice is nothing to do with popularity, I just enjoy it on that but I may turn the difficulty down if it is too much depending on the wad.

Edited by Avoozl

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Usually UV, but I don't hesitate to move to a lower difficulty if things get too rowdy.

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I almost always start with HMP for a first time playthrough to get a feel for a map without feeling overwhelmed since some modern Wads are more focused on difficulty than balance, but then I'll go back and replay the Wad later on UV if I really enjoyed it. I'm trying more and more for a pistol-start mindset when possible, assuming the weapon/enemy balance isn't ridiculous.

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2 hours ago, holaareola said:

I found this great Unholy Massacre difficulty in LZDoom. An alternative to nightmare that you can take at your own pace -- enemies do double damage and drop half ammo.  Doesn't work for all maps, but I'd love it if more ports adopted this.

 Heh, i removed it recently from the menu. I added the proper Unholy Massacre to RUDE and will be back soon in LZDoom. This is what it's about: double the monsters, lesser health pickups, more accurate and powerful pistol (not much) and somewhat beefed up punch. For LZDoom these last two features won't be present and it will be slightly different in Heretic (1K Deaths await thee): monsters with half hit points but you take 50% more damage.

 Try it with RUDE it's fun, can be tweaked with the halfammo and xpain parameters (actually there's also a 2xmonsters parameter). Also i added backpacks and stimpacks to share supplies for coop but that's another story.

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1 minute ago, drfrag said:

 Heh, i removed it recently from the menu. I added the proper Unholy Massacre to RUDE and will be back soon in LZDoom. This is what it's about: double the monsters, lesser health pickups, more accurate and powerful pistol (not much) and somewhat beefed up punch. For LZDoom these last two features won't be present and it will be slightly different in Heretic (1K Deaths await thee): monsters with half hit points but you take 50% more damage.

 Try it with RUDE it's fun, can be tweaked with the halfammo parameter (actually there's also a 2xmonsters parameter). Also i added backpacks and stimpacks to share supplies for coop but that's another story.

Cool.  I really enjoyed it so I'll give that a try for sure. I see RUDE's a Chocolate fork with some goodies from Crispy (I used LZDoom on my work Macbook), even better.

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UV since otherwise I feel like some of the map is missing. Sure the WAD will probably be hard as shit but I don't mind, I like the challenge and I gotta get better somehow.

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Usually Ultraviolence (or its equivalent).

 

Had to dial down to I Own Doom! on my current playthrough on Switch Doom 64 after about 7 levels (starting over at level 1 of course).  I will play through again on Watch Me Die!, once I have the nuances of those levels down.  Gotta know where all of those secrets are, as you really need all that extra ammo to get through the bullet sponges that are Hell Knights and Barons of Hell.  D64 WMD levels have them in abundance.  

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UV. Even if REALLY HARD on UV and have never played the WAD before, I feel like a failure if I go lower...

 

Stoopid really, especially if architecture is amazing.

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UV if it's an older mapset or one that I'm familiar with. HMP if it's a first playthrough of a new WAD and I feel like a slightly more relaxing experience. I never play on ITYTD or HNTR.

 

Slight tangent, but navigating my way around levels is usually the most difficult aspect of play for me, less so the monster count, which are more there to get in my way and distract me from where I'm supposed to be going. I have a hard time with maps that are new, very large and non-linear, that are very detailed but repetitive and indistinct design and it's hard to figure out an optimal route on a first playthrough, or if it was designed by a mad person and the progression is simply contrived out the arse.

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22 minutes ago, Baratus said:

 

 

Slight tangent, but navigating my way around levels is usually the most difficult aspect of play for me, less so the monster count, which are more there to get in my way and distract me from where I'm supposed to be going. I have a hard time with maps that are new, very large and non-linear, that are very detailed but repetitive and indistinct design and it's hard to figure out an optimal route on a first playthrough, or if it was designed by a mad person and the progression is simply contrived out the arse.

I also have a difficult time navigating convoluted maps in some cases on a first time playthrough, and the difficulty is really compounded with key placement sometimes as well. I don't know how many times I've found a key but didn't know where the door was and couldn't find it on the automap or vice versa, which is often worse. Of course its always more aggravating going back to an older map you haven't played in forever and thinking, "I know I figured this out a lot more easily last time!" which also tends to happen to me if I forget the secrets, ha ha.

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4 minutes ago, 666shooter said:

I also have a difficult time navigating convoluted maps in some cases on a first time playthrough, and the difficulty is really compounded with key placement sometimes as well. I don't know how many times I've found a key but didn't know where the door was and couldn't find it on the automap or vice versa, which is often worse. Of course its always more aggravating going back to an older map you haven't played in forever and thinking, "I know I figured this out a lot more easily last time!" which also tends to happen to me if I forget the secrets, ha ha.

 

That was me on Doom 64 Outpost Omega, a few days ago (the secret level where you can snag the Unmaker well ahead of schedule, and grab the first Demon Artifact...I hadn't played it in at least 16 years or so).  It's especially a bit tricky to get the artifact.  I was digging DEEP into the ol' memory bank to try to figure it out...then finally had to look up how to get both the Unmaker and the DA.  Hate having to do that, but I'm embarrassed by how long I kept meandering about trying to put it all together without assistance.  

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1 minute ago, Devils950003 said:

 

That was me on Doom 64 Outpost Omega, a few days ago (the secret level where you can snag the Unmaker well ahead of schedule, and grab the first Demon Artifact...I hadn't played it in at least 16 years or so).  It's especially a bit tricky to get the artifact.  I was digging DEEP into the ol' memory bank to try to figure it out...then finally had to look up how to get both the Unmaker and the DA.  Hate having to do that, but I'm embarrassed by how long I kept meandering about trying to put it all together without assistance.  

If I had a dollar for how many times I had to check playthroughs to finish Eternal Doom... twice- I would be a rich man. xD

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