My First Doom Map, Whiskey-Tango-Foxtrot

[SnowyFoxxo]

I recently picked up Ultimate Doom Builder and decided to try making my first map, I know it's probably not great but for a first attempt at a full level I'm pretty proud of it. I mostly designed the level around the kind of gameplay I enjoy in Doom maps, so even if most people don't like it, it's still my personal project just to take a shot at something I thought I'd enjoy, and mostly did.

 

Feedback would be greatly appreciated, I didn't try to do much with decorations and mostly just focused on the encounters and arenas more than anything, so tips and comments about those would be the most appreciated.

WhiskeyTangoFoxtrot.zip

 

EDIT 4 - 07:06 EST 10-9-2020

 

Putting this update above the first chronological one since it has all the map details and such, thank you user Misty for pointing out I should probably include them, it slipped my mind. Also posting the map description included in the wtf-readme with all its cheesy Doomitude.

 

Description
-------------

    You pick up a strange transmission on your intercom - A frantic plea for help from a squadron assumed MIA, playing on a loop, "Base command, this is Delta team! We have a Whiskey-Tango-Foxtrot on our hands; I repeat, a Whiskey-Tango-Foxtrot! Requesting immediate reinforcements - And big ones. God help our souls, Delta team out."
    A Whiskey-Tango-Foxtrot? You've never heard that call sign before. Sounds bad though. After thinking for a minute, you decide on it - You'll go investigate the source of the transmission; Why not? You're a kick-ass space marine with guns, grit, and bullets to spit. If anyone can figure out what's going on it'd be you. You've been to Hell and back more times than you care to remember - Or the blunt force trauma lets you remember, anyways - what's another lesson for those damned hellspawn that they can't just come on your terf. Not while your shotgun has something to say - And Bessie's a loud bitch.
    Delve into the ancient demonic ruins and find the lost squad, and while you're at it you might as well rip and tear a few demons a new asshole just to make sure they remember who's the real bad bitch. Danger and secrets lurk around every corner; Keep your eyes peeled and your ears sharp, you don't know what vile creatures hide in the darkness, or what goodies might lie right behind you.

Screenshots
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A pretty generous second room, but how to get that backpack..?

 

Do you prefer close-quarters or open arenas? This map has both

Something about these rooms don't feel quite right...

 

Compatibility
-------------
IWAD: DOOM2.WAD
Map Count: 1
Jumping/Crouching/Freelook: None, nada, zilch; This map was made with the intent of being able to play on any Doom port - Whether I succeeded or not, that's a different story.
Builder, Testing Port: Built on Ultimate Doom Builder R3596 64-bit, tested on GZDoom g4.2.0 - If anyone would like to test on additional ports and respond with your findings, I will update this list accordingly and your assistance would be greatly appreciated.

 

Map Details
------------

Map Theme: Somewhat influenced games like The Legend of Zelda in terms of map layout/flow, with backtracking to previous areas which sometimes open up to reveal additional secrets you missed, or might not have been available from the beginning - Not specifically my intent, but I love those kinds of games, and it bled through into this map. Also fairly slaughtermap-ey at points.

Map Difficulty: Hard to judge? With secrets you get plenty of health and ammo, without you end up becoming fairly strained for ammo and with underpowered weapons until roughly halfway through, so take that as you will; If I were to make a rough guess, without secrets, probably up along the lines of some of Plutonia's more difficult maps, with secrets, not terribly harder than anything from Doom II or Plutonia's easier maps - I'm a terrible judge of comparing difficulty.

 

------------------------

 

Once again, thank all of you for your feedback and support, it's been wonderful and extremely helpful, and I can't wait until I release better maps that hopefully stand the test of time better!

 

EDIT 1 - 19:40 EST 10-8-2020

First update to the map! Fixed the too narrow hallway before the exit switch, as well as some random texture oddities I noticed. Also swapped out a few demons in some locations for others for the sake of variety, as suggested by user DragonsForLunch. Keeping the original file for archiving sake, but I'll also be posting the updated files alongside them.

WhiskeyTangoFoxtrotV1.2.zip

 

EDIT 2 - 01:07 EST - 10-9-2020

A second update! Thank you all for your continued feedback and support, it means so much to me when this was simply a project I started out of boredom and a desire to make a Doom map, especially to Clippy for going as far to even record a video!
I won't list every little change here, I'm going to start including a changelog with each additional update to more closely track changes to the map, but the general jist of what's been done is;
 

- Added a bit more ammo
- Changed a lot of room heights to make it feel less gigantic
- Revamped the serpentine tunnel and northeastern-most room at the end of the map
- Changed around some demons for variety sake

- Small quality details to make the map flow better/less buggy, i.e. getting stuck in the yellow switch tunnel, jumping to the sector 13 secret, etc.

 

Sorry for not responding to all your comments, I hit my post limit and it won't let me reply to y'all, but once again thank you for your feedback and support, it definitely encourages me to continue looking into mapmaking, and overall just increases my appreciation for the Doom community!

WhiskeyTangoFoxtrotV1.3.zip

EDIT 3 - 01:34 EST - 10-9-2020

Simple update; Fixed a goof with the red-yellow room Barons accidentally becoming turrets, forgot how stairs worked for a moment.

WhiskeyTangoFoxtrotV1.4.zip

 

EDIT 4 - 23:52 EST - 10-9-2020

Deleting some duplicate screenshots I hadn't noticed earlier

EDIT 4.5

Cleaned up screenshot edits 'cause I'm big dum dum and did it wrong

Edited October 10, 2020 by SnowyFoxxo : Updating map

[DragonsForLunch]

Congrats on releasing your first map! I just gave your map a go and I've got some feedback for you. I'm pretty new to mapping myself but I'll give some pointer that I try to think about when making maps.

 

1. Your level was pretty confusing at times. I can be a good idea to sketch out the layout of the map before opening the editor. That way you can come up with a lear path for the player to follow throughout the map. It's great that you're making the player revisit the same locations multiple times. more help with wayfinding would be great. As an example: You have switches that affect things in different part of the map, but the player has not way of knowing what the switch activated.

2. You seem to cluster a lot of the same enemy types together. Although it's pretty satisfying to mow down groups of imps with the SSG, it also gets repetitive. Try to think of combinations of enemies that would be interesting for the player to fight. A chaingunner usually means the player has to take cover, while a demon/spectre forces the player to move. 

3. Fun factor vs. difficulty. Your map is very difficult. I had to cheat to get through it. It's definitely difficult to fight a horde of hitscanners in a giant room without cover, or fighting two archviles in a room without cover, but is it fun? To me, it's not fun. Think about ways to make the map difficult but also fun. Create cover in the room that the player can use to hide behind or encourage infighting between different enemy types to thin down the horde.

 

Btw, I couldn't finish the map without idclip at the last narrow hallway. 

 

Keep mapping!

[SnowyFoxxo]

17 minutes ago, DragonsForLunch said:

Congrats on releasing your first map! I just gave your map a go and I've got some feedback for you. I'm pretty new to mapping myself but I'll give some pointer that I try to think about when making maps.

 

1. Your level was pretty confusing at times. I can be a good idea to sketch out the layout of the map before opening the editor. That way you can come up with a lear path for the player to follow throughout the map. It's great that you're making the player revisit the same locations multiple times. more help with wayfinding would be great. As an example: You have switches that affect things in different part of the map, but the player has not way of knowing what the switch activated.

2. You seem to cluster a lot of the same enemy types together. Although it's pretty satisfying to mow down groups of imps with the SSG, it also gets repetitive. Try to think of combinations of enemies that would be interesting for the player to fight. A chaingunner usually means the player has to take cover, while a demon/spectre forces the player to move. 

3. Fun factor vs. difficulty. Your map is very difficult. I had to cheat to get through it. It's definitely difficult to fight a horde of hitscanners in a giant room without cover, or fighting two archviles in a room without cover, but is it fun? To me, it's not fun. Think about ways to make the map difficult but also fun. Create cover in the room that the player can use to hide behind or encourage infighting between different enemy types to thin down the horde.

 

Btw, I couldn't finish the map without idclip at the last narrow hallway. 

 

Keep mapping!

Thank you for the feedback! The main reason I had for clustering groups of enemies together was to prevent infighting, I was actually a little conflicted about the second hallway with the shotgunners and chaingunners for that reason, but I left it as is because it felt fine in my playthroughs. As for the layout, I honestly didn't go into it with any sort of plan, I just built off of the starting room as I went along and the flow of the map just followed, the yellow door section is honestly my least favourite as I honestly sort of rushed to build it, but I still like how it turned out mostly. As for the difficulty, I sort of had an idea for thinking through actions and rewarding it. I'm assuming the two Archviles you're referring to are the ones in the red key room, unless you mean the two in the hallway, which my thought for that room was to tempt the player with the switch behind the keycard so they would run over it and activate the switch without thinking, wanting them to think more about the room before they just went for the clear objective. I used the thought less and less throughout the map, but I was a little proud of that one when I first made it. I enjoy maps that are reasonable in their difficultly, if not a bit tricky in how they deliver it. As for the last hallway, I actually thought I had fixed that in the little bit of polishing I did, I just ran into that one myself again so I'm going to fix that lol

 

All in all thank you for the play and response! I'll take your words into consideration when I make future levels!

[TheMagicMushroomMan]

Source port? Any screenshots? :)

[SnowyFoxxo]

1 minute ago, TheMagicMushroomMan said:

Source port? Any screenshots? :)

My main port is GZDoom g4.2.0, I do also have Zandronium but that's more for specific mods that don't run on G/ZDoom. I don't have any screenshots of it at the moment, sorry

[RagingKrikkit]

Contrary to Dragons, I didn't really have a problem with the layout, though the map is very reliant on finding secrets to have enough ammo to make it through.  Fortunately, your secrets aren't particularly obtuse.  It's a good little mix of everything, some door fighting, some arena strafing, some popcorn, and an effective usage of archviles.  The cyberdemon arena in particular makes for a good spectacle, and the size is perfect to give it just a little bit of "oh shit".  The use of different keycards for different sides of a door is an interesting move, don't think I've seen that one before.  The visible sound pipe for the archvile in the shotgunner/chaingunner hallway is a bit of a rookie move, and the dropdown from the secret into the cyberdemon arena has a misaligned texture, but the biggest technical fault I see is that I don't think the drop after the yellow key took infinite height monsters into account.  A good, solid first map, probably not destined for the cacowards, but I've seen much more rough first attempts.

[SnowyFoxxo]

3 minutes ago, RagingKrikkit said:

Contrary to Dragons, I didn't really have a problem with the layout, though the map is very reliant on finding secrets to have enough ammo to make it through.  Fortunately, your secrets aren't particularly obtuse.  It's a good little mix of everything, some door fighting, some arena strafing, some popcorn, and an effective usage of archviles.  The cyberdemon arena in particular makes for a good spectacle, and the size is perfect to give it just a little bit of "oh shit".  The use of different keycards for different sides of a door is an interesting move, don't think I've seen that one before.  The visible sound pipe for the archvile in the shotgunner/chaingunner hallway is a bit of a rookie move, and the dropdown from the secret into the cyberdemon arena has a misaligned texture, but the biggest technical fault I see is that I don't think the drop after the yellow key took infinite height monsters into account.  A good, solid first map, probably not destined for the cacowards, but I've seen much more rough first attempts.

Thank you for the feedback! Fair point, I use GZDoom g4.2.0 and it has infinite height monsters off by default, it's been that way since I got it roughly 2-3 years ago and I just never thought about that, it's also the port I used to test it and it auto-loads the default settings I use, which is mostly the default settings for GZDoom (I even have to go into my settings to turn off jump/crouch/free aim), thank you for pointing that out! As for the sound pipes, I can definitely fix those to make them less visible, I just hadn't really put too much thought into that breaking the feeling of the map too much. Thank you for the play and the feedback, it's deeply appreciated!

[RagingKrikkit]

8 minutes ago, SnowyFoxxo said:

Thank you for the feedback! Fair point, I use GZDoom g4.2.0 and it has infinite height monsters off by default, it's been that way since I got it roughly 2-3 years ago and I just never thought about that, it's also the port I used to test it and it auto-loads the default settings I use, which is mostly the default settings for GZDoom (I even have to go into my settings to turn off jump/crouch/free aim), thank you for pointing that out! As for the sound pipes, I can definitely fix those to make them less visible, I just hadn't really put too much thought into that breaking the feeling of the map too much. Thank you for the play and the feedback, it's deeply appreciated!

Fair enough, I'm running GZDoom as well, though it's probably a few versions out of date.  If you want to test for vanilla functionality, I'd suggest going to Options>Compatibility and setting it to Doom (strict) mode.  It's not going to be exactly the same as loading the wad up in DOS, but it should help with most of the more obvious differences between vanilla and advanced functionality ports/settings.

[Isquilt]

Things I liked:

- The final fight with the 2 cyberdemons and 2 spider masterminds. Difficulty is fairly low, but setting up the infighting for the four boss monsters simultaneously is satisfying, and it's one of the places where the size of the map makes a lot of sense.

- Chaingun and revenant overlook behind the red door requires a relatively fair but tactical approach to balance whether you can be shot by shotgunners, chaingunners, or risk taking missiles. Would be nice if the ceiling was a little lower though so that aiming at the revenants wasn't as awkward.

- The yellow key fight. A small number of demons in a confined space is more than enough to force a player to think about it. Again, the difficulty of the encounter is relatively low (teleport in an archvile or two after about 8 seconds of fighting if you really want to make that hard for difficulty's sake), but it's not mindless.

- The jumping secret behind the blue door. It's pretty intuitive, but also requires the player to intuit what the map geometry really means.

- The archviles coming into the hallway outside the red key door. Again, it's not a terribly difficult encounter, but it is one that takes advantage of how the map pathing loops in on itself and forces the players to confront it in one way or another eventually.

 

Things I didn't like:

- The first two fights (zombiemen and imps). Running for cover from hitscanners at the beginning of the map isn't great, it's such a health drain, and the imps in the quantity provided and without a rocket launcher is just an ammo sink. The demons after the imps are in a similar boat. Adding more demons of the same type always makes things take longer, but it doesn't always make things harder or more interesting.

- The first cyberdemon fight came out of nowhere. Unsupported cyberdemons are a test of nothing but strafing ability and super shotgun/plasma gun patience.

- The hallway to lower the platform blocking the exit door switch: too many long range hitscanners at the start, too many repetitive arachnotrons at the end. Overall the flow here feels weak. My personal thoughts for the area would be to set up some highly localized fights with tough and dangerous monsters (revenants/mancubi/cacodemons/arachnotrons come to mind) that players will be tempted to clear on their way through. Once they get through to the final hallway with the switch in it though, spawn in an archvile or two to refresh those fights, possibly with a few new monsters. The cover provided for dodging arachnotrons is enough to make archviles doable too.

- The hallway with the switch mentioned above. With the height difference, the mancubi and chaingunner sniping is just awful. With limited cover in the hallway proper, I don't see a good way for a player to actually advance methodically, but the cacodemon placement makes just running past them a little unreasonable too.

 

Things that are probably broken:

- The archvile secret in the red door room can be reached without activating the sector tagged 13. You can just jump out the window onto the platform directly.

- Sector tag 24 can be passed under while it is lowering, trapping the player in that alcove and requiring no-clip to escape. You may wish to implement some straightforward 1-way geometry (read: a downward floor step of 25 units or more) to make that part work without trigger shenanigans. If you wish to do so without immediately tipping the player off as to what's going on, two 24 unit steps can work fine too (just lower the lower one once the player walks over it).

 

Overall though, I enjoyed the overall design behind the map, and I think the map progression was pretty solid. However, the combat was more often tedious than interesting. I feel the map would benefit from aesthetically from some simple lighting details, just to give the whole thing more depth. Maybe a few torches and shadows in the long curvy hallway by the exit switch? Or similar aesthetic choices. Also everything seems really tall.

[Clippy]

 

[Biodegradable]

It's ambitious, but also makes plenty of the classic Beginner Mapper mistakes. I can't say it was boring, but you've definitely got a lot of work ahead of you to improve your skills, which is of course a good thing and it'll be fun to watch you grow should you decided to make more. Rather than just echo what other people say-though they are good points and you should definitely take them board-I'll just link this video by Doomkid that is an excellent resource for newbie mappers, along with my gameplay so you can see your map in action so you can gauge my reactions and bits of advice I put forth in it.

 

 

Welcome to Doomworld and I look forward to seeing how you improve over time.

 

Addendum
One thing I forgot to mention but was reminded while looking back at my footage:

 

 

If you feel the need to draw giant arrows on the map to literally tell the player where to go, then your map isn't well designed. Direction should be hinted at through the map's layout. Have its geometry convey little hints on where the player has to go instead. This is very much evident in my footage as your arrows weren't helpful and only further confused me mainly because of the repetitive texturing which created an optical illusion and prevented me from seeing where I had to go next.

Edited October 9, 2020 by Biodegradable

[Misty]

Hey, congrats with first map release, it's always nice to see fresh face here. Well, I'd suggest edit op a bit and include main information like: iwad, map slot, mapping format you used, couple of screenshots and link with latest wad edit. You can look at this thread for more information below. 

 

[Trupiak]

Finished it on UV. Well, I died a couple of times so the map isn't that easy! There's a ton of pickups though and I never had to worry about ammo. Health was just a question of whether I can sneak away, backtrack and pick up the medkits I left for later. Most of my deaths were a result of me getting shot into the back as I was crawling away. In general, I like when there's a lot of secrets, but if they're easy to find I don't like it when they reward you too much.
- Cool first archvile fight. At first I pressed the switch immediately and got terrified when the columns collapsed then died. The second try a cyberdemon sneak killed me from behind, because he prolly saw me running in and out of the archvile room. Thought it was intentional and a cool idea but at my fourth try he didn't walk in; I just used the columns for cover, killed the archies, then collapsed the columns to find out... each was a secret somehow ? cmon. [ This first archie fight could use more monsters. Anything really to distract doomguy for long enough so they can even attempt to resurrect the cacos. I never let them. ]
- Map has sexy shapes, especially the cave area, too bad there's not much decoration ( I didn't expect any, I know. )
- Kool boss fight by the exit switch
- I hated the rooms where the enemies were high up on the boxes etc. I don't like shooting enemies I can barely see at the top of my screen and having to worry whether my shots will go to doomguy's eye level or at the monsters :/

If I were you I'd split the map into two levels, the second one beginning when you enter the cave. I like short levels but I guess you like long ones.
Also if I were you i'd put some monsters into the huge boss fight area that you first pass through but yeah you might like that sorta thing.

.........this is really good for a first map and I think you can become an awesome map maker with time.

[SnowyFoxxo]

10 hours ago, Trupiak said:

Finished it on UV. Well, I died a couple of times so the map isn't that easy! There's a ton of pickups though and I never had to worry about ammo. Health was just a question of whether I can sneak away, backtrack and pick up the medkits I left for later. Most of my deaths were a result of me getting shot into the back as I was crawling away. In general, I like when there's a lot of secrets, but if they're easy to find I don't like it when they reward you too much.
- Cool first archvile fight. At first I pressed the switch immediately and got terrified when the columns collapsed then died. The second try a cyberdemon sneak killed me from behind, because he prolly saw me running in and out of the archvile room. Thought it was intentional and a cool idea but at my fourth try he didn't walk in; I just used the columns for cover, killed the archies, then collapsed the columns to find out... each was a secret somehow ? cmon. [ This first archie fight could use more monsters. Anything really to distract doomguy for long enough so they can even attempt to resurrect the cacos. I never let them. ]
- Map has sexy shapes, especially the cave area, too bad there's not much decoration ( I didn't expect any, I know. )
- Kool boss fight by the exit switch
- I hated the rooms where the enemies were high up on the boxes etc. I don't like shooting enemies I can barely see at the top of my screen and having to worry whether my shots will go to doomguy's eye level or at the monsters :/

If I were you I'd split the map into two levels, the second one beginning when you enter the cave. I like short levels but I guess you like long ones.
Also if I were you i'd put some monsters into the huge boss fight area that you first pass through but yeah you might like that sorta thing.

.........this is really good for a first map and I think you can become an awesome map maker with time.

Sorry for taking so long to respond! They limit posts with new accounts apparently, understandable though lol
Yeah, the cyberdemon in that area seems to be really inconsistent, sometimes he'll follow you back to the Archie arena, sometimes he wont, he does it pretty reliably for me but I've definitely had him get stuck myself. As for the crates in the red/yellow keycard room, I tried to add those to give slightly more cover from the hitscanners and fill the room a bit more, but through my playthroughs it just feels more tedious and cluttered, if I do future updates to this map (Already working on another, so that might take a bit) that's one of the first changes, maybe just a mancubus or two, or probably some more cacos instead of the crates? Maybe I'm overusing them already lol, but I like the ones by the wall, as well as the chainer/revenant cubby, but I understand why you don't like aiming at high up enemies, it definitely gets a bit tedious, and on the older versions where the room was a lot higher it shows more. Also, I did intentionally leave that initial cavern after the giant gate empty, I wanted to give the player a moment to look at it and go "Oh shit" when they saw the size of it (Which works MUCH better after rescaling the rest of the map) without immediately getting gangbanged by demons, if I put more in that room it would be in such a way that the fight would start automatically. I like rather having the long serpentine corridor and the northeastern-most room to serve for combat up until that point, I really like the ending with the empty, quite room opening up to a big boss battle with all sorts of high-tier demons, it gives a decent 'Calm before the storm' kind of effect; You just see it and know something's gonna be there, no matter how calm it looks at first.
The decorations is also something I'd work on if I revisit it, I mostly made the level for the proof-of-concept rather than making it pretty, the textures are something I definitely need to work on as the video from Biodegradable shows just how confusing it can get - Not to mention that I felt the need to add arrows, which are just bad at best and distracting at worst - Again, as Bio's video shows. I definitely agree with the opinion most people have that it's a decent framework, it just needs some heavy reconsideration at parts, and a graphical overhaul to make everything look better/less same-y would help a lot - I wanted to design it sort of like a tomb/crypt, which the maze-like layout works for, but it gets a bit tedious, especially when you have to backtrack to the yellow key door and all the way back, which is why I added the lift in the big gate room after you get the yellow key, so you don't have to redo that whole run again.

 

Thank you so much for playing and for the feedback! I appreciate the support and I hope to impress with my future maps!

[ElPadrecitoCholo]

Whiskey-Tango-Foxtrot

Ultra-Violence mode || GzDoom || VaF mod

status:
*Deaths: 0

*Saves: none

 

 

This map was really interesting for my taste, and a real challenge in certain parts that I was discovering little by little, as in the case of the room with the Cacodemons, that after picking up the red key, I ended up running into two Archviles, or but That was not all, when I returned to the beginning of that same area, I had found who the Cyberdemon would be waiting for me in that area, and in the middle of the escape that I had made from the Archviles, now it turned out that I had to spend ammunition with a huge mechanical demon, well, at least in that part, I had the Cyberdemon attacked by the Archviles, who in turn, died from the missiles that the giant had sent to the two of them, and after that, with the Super Shotgun, and the It launches rockets, I ended up killing it entirely, and now that I mention the Archviles, these enemies appear in various places around the map, where the BFG 9000 is found for the first time in a secret, when returning through the door that required the key yellow (with many Hitscanners and Pinkys serving as a shield for those 2 bastards) and at the end of the map, but in that part, it is the easiest to be honest, in short, everything on the map seemed pretty cool to me, how everything was structured, the decorations that certain rooms received I really liked, like the addition of huge boxes, or the fact that large structures built from a lot of wood, as if it were some kind of ancestral temple or something like that, really great everything, although Yes, there were some parts that... for some reason suffered from certain failures in the textures, such as a secret in which you must enter by climbing a platform to later fall into the area where the CYberdemon that I mentioned earlier appears, and so on, but in general, everything seemed great to me, including the ending, with the arrival of two Cyberdemons and 2 SpiderMasterMinds, and the Archviles with the Revenants, it was certainly tolerable thanks to the fact that the They couldn't climb the steps that led to the end of the level. The Wad was very good for you, and with the secrets that were included, I was very satisfied to have found them all, excellent map design, and a very good way to keep things full of action and without complicating them too much.