Discussion regarding death traps in maps...

[Doom-X-Machina]

Hey all,

So I've been mapping for about 2 years but playing since the early 90's and I've come to find that it's considered a "no-no" for mappers to have death pits and traps with no escape route, teleporter, elevator etc. I myself have a playstyle of caution, I quicksave before moving into an unexplored area just in case I get my ass kicked and have to restart, so I've never found it to be an issue of falling into escape-less death traps. If I die, I reload and I know not to go into that area again... easy, but I know not everyone plays like this. I also use mouselook so I have the advantage of being able to look down and see if there's a visible escape before entering, again I know not everyone plays this way.

I like to build maps with a lot of verticallity so lava pits, spike pits, collapsing bridges (while running across them) etc. are something I toy with a lot, not just for play reasons but also for aesthetics. How important to is to you all as players in whatever style of play you use in Doom to require escape routes from these sort of areas? Also, is there a generally accepted or agreed upon range of damage to inflict in a death-trap sector?

My avenue of thought is... if I see a massive pit of lava... I know lava is bad and I avoid it. I dont have an urge to jump in and explore a lava pit and hope there's a teleporter to get me out... If I jump into lava, I'm gonna die... so I've never really questioned the need for escape-routes as a player or a mapper. Interested in thoughts from the community :)

[Murdoch]

There is a certain logic in your argument. However, particularly with Doom, the game has a certain speed and flow. It is very easy to get into that flow and get (for lack of a less ridiculous term) "in the zone". Deliberate choices to disrupt that flow should not be taken lightly and used with great care and consideration. Does what it add to the gameplay experience outweigh potential annoyance?

 

Do not shy away from traps, but make sure it is designed in such a way that a skilled and alert player has a reasonable chance of avoiding it without first knowing it was there. The other thing to consider is people hunting secrets. Doom's design philosophy as established by the original games tells players there is a chance of finding secrets for those willing to risk a dash through something nasty or at the very least, that there will be a way out. While you are by no means required to follow that philosophy to the letter, again, do so with great care and consideration. Ask yourself, does this feature add anything really good to the map and worth the potential annoyance of your player? I would say no. All it adds is potentially forcing a reload or restart.

[SilverMiner]

They drain your health and nerves, literally

[Matias]

2 hours ago, Doom-X-Machina said:

How important to is to you all as players in whatever style of play you use in Doom to require escape routes from these sort of areas?

It is up to the mapper but let's just say having and exit from a lava/nuke pits have become a standard for a good reason. I for example am not a secret hunter that would jump down to these pits on purpose but i always end up falling down to them anyways... So don't assume people go down to death pits on purpose. And most people don't play doom "carefully", it's a fast paced game that promotes certain carelessness to many people. And when you really get into the flow it's very easy to forget quicksaving, just to have your progress ruined by a pit you can't get out is going to be extremely frustrating in a situation like this.

 

But after all it's up to the mapper. I personally like when mapper knows having inescapable pits are not the norm people are used to and make an effort to tell you in the forum post that they are in fact  inescapable. I have played couple maps like this where author specifically mentions this element of the map,  it makes me play much more carefully around lava and nuke pits and saves some frustration. So if death pits are part of the desing in your map don't steer away from using them, just think about the average players perspective and tell them as clear as you can about it.

[Wagi]

The problem with inescapable death pits is that the punishment is too far out of proportion with the mistake. Main idea is that if you screw up, you should lose a little bit of health (or if it's the Cyberdemon, a lot of it), but everything is survivable if you stay healthy. That goes out the window with death pits because the moment you fall in, no matter what your health total, every single item you've collected up to that point is totally worthless.

[Sunnyfruit]

If you want to punish heavily people in certain traps, there is superlava. Inescapable pits are not even a real penalty, just a flow breaker since they make the player either quick load or get frustrated and go on another wad.

On the other side, making the player losing a substantial amount of health in little time and immediately let him get back to his position will inform him that sloppy gameplay is not an option in this part of the map.

[OliveTree]

in my opinion the problem with death pits has nothing to do with the fact that they're inescapable but that it takes way too long to kill you. If I make a minor mistake and am killed instantly (like by an archvile or something) it doesnt really bother me because death in Doom isnt that big a deal for me. But if I make a minor mistake and am doomed to a fate of standing around helplessly for like 50 seconds waiting to die, it becomes infuriating

[HAK3180]

I have a few guidelines.

1. Inescapable death pits are okay if they are near the beginning of the level and/or the level is very short. If the wad is continuous, the player is in all likelihood saving. If not, then they are being more cautious. So the annoyance is mild; the time waste is a couple minutes at absolute max.
2. They are okay if death is clearly communicated. Normally this is done visually, when the player can see every linedef of the pit and there's no teleporter or lift and nothing to "explore" by jumping in. This is not how most iwad pits are, which is therefore a cue that you should maybe dive in. So if the pit is death, don't let the player think "Oh, but I can't see what's over there unless I drop down."
3. Inescapable death pits should always be max damage.
4. Inescapable death pits must never have any items in them.
5. They should not be the "main event." If it's hardcore platforming or tightroping or something, then the pit should not be inescapable, unless #1 is in play. In other words, don't instakill me for not being a parkour prince, but it's okay to kill me for being really careless.

This is all very subjective of course, but I've come to find the above sums up my feelings/expectations on the subject.

[Pełzająca Część Twarzy]

I think that inescapable death pits have no place in classic Doom because they kill player too slowly. It's very frustrating to get fall down and just wait for sweet release of death. However insta-kill pits are okay because they don't fool the player that maybe he can still escape and of course dying is less frustrating than waiting for death.
So if you want to kill player for falling down don't waste his time and do it quickly. I think it's pretty obvious because every other game use insta-killing pits

[Maes]

49 minutes ago, EtherBot said:

But if I make a minor mistake and am doomed to a fate of standing around helplessly for like 50 seconds waiting to die, it becomes infuriating

What about those pits which are inescapable but also non-damaging? Or otherwise getting stuck in the architecture? Or being denied progression (actual progression, not just reaching optional areas or secrets) by one-time doors/platforms/switches?

 

What are you supposed to do then? Reach out to your "player sportmanship", treat it as if they were a deadly mistake, and reload/restart? Or just idclip out of them, totally disrespecting the mapper's "effort"? FWIW I've seen a few READMEs (mainly in older WADs) that say that anything inescapable "should be treated as a death", essentially placing the burden on the player's "honour".

 

Same thing as getting into unescapable/unwinnable situations in other games....or not?

[OliveTree]

Just now, Maes said:

What about those pits which are inescapable but also non-damaging? Or otherwise getting stuck in the architecture? Or being denied progression (actual progression, not just reaching optional areas or secrets) by one-time doors/platforms/switches?

  

What are you supposed to do then? Reach out to your "player sportmanship", treat it as if they were a deadly mistake, and reload/restart? Or just idclip out of them, totally disrespecting the mapper's "effort"? FWIW I've seen a few READMEs (mainly in older WADs) that say that anything inescapable "should be treated as a death", essentially placing the burden on the player's "honour".

  

Same thing as getting into unescapable/unwinnable situations in other games....or not?

idk that I understand why this is specifically being asked to me but it is a pretty interesting question. I tend to interpret situations where the player can be permanently trapped with no fail-state or way to progress further to basically be "bugs" and therefore inherent problems with the game's design. Essentially you're being soft locked. Now I'm wondering what the result would be if a game employed this type of thing intentionally and it's a weird thought.

 

Anyway, I don't see what sportsmanship or honor have to do with it, if you want to progress at that point you have no choice but to reload a save or noclip out of the spot you're in.

[Maes]

Well, the "sportsmanship" bit comes in when you realize that, well, you needn't get yourself in that bad spot after all, and it could be avoided in normal play. That's the difference with a game-breaking bug that you can't avoid at all or has such a delayed onset that you simply cannot trace it back to a clear cause.

 

Compare e.g. the "I jumped into this pit now out of curiosity, and hence I'm trapped now", rather than the "Oops, I forgot to hit that switch with no obvious function half a map away, and now that big-ass door is closed and I can't go back" kind of deal. An extreme example of the first kind is e.g. exterior-looking windows that you can jump out of....but have no way back in, and land you on an inescapable balcony/ledge.

 

Hence, at least according to a certain school of though, the player should at least treat events of the first kind such events as actual -even if unintended- deadly traps, and "honour" them by admitting defeat and restarting, rather than cheating or hacking their way out of them. Some would even say that events of the second kind should be treated as deaths -but personally I would not easily accept forgetting to press a switch (or not pressing it at the "right" moment) as a "player death".

 

Granted, that's all easy to say with prior knowledge of what to avoid and what to do.

 

[BoxY]

If death pits are properly telegraphed and fit into the gameplay theme of the map (for example having a core focus on platforming, like sunder map05) then I have no problem with them, but if I'm half an hour into a big complex adventure map and happen to fall in a random one and die, then it's a bit of a mood killer. It's understandable that most players don't like to be punished with certain death for making what is usually a minor movement error or innocent mistake.

[RonnieJamesDiner]

1 hour ago, HAK3180 said:

I have a few guidelines. [...]

 

I think this is the best breakdown of it, personally. Like anything (and this point has been beaten to death around here in various discussions), it's one of those contextual elements that I believe depends more on "how it's used", rather than any sort of black-and-white "whether or not it should be used". There will always be people for and against it, but as a mapper, that shouldn't stop you from using it if it feels like the right decision for your map.

 

A recent (personal) example was my MAP30 for 1KL2. It's a small, relatively short IoS battle where you're scrambling along walkways to gather 3 keys in order to unlock the platform necessary to actually kill the Icon. The whole thing is supposed to be floating in the "void", and the entire playable space is surrounded by a death-pit (falling at any point = death). Because the player has access to Soulspheres, Megaspheres, tons of health and armor, etc. I knew that as soon as I put escape teleporters down in the pit, I would basically be giving players the option to "bug out" whenever they wanted to -- to leap into the void and just teleport to safety (the 20-damage pain sectors wouldn't mean anything). I didn't want that to be an option. Reviews for that map (and that decision in particular) weren't always favorable, but, I had a very specific vision in mind for that map and I stuck to it. 

 

I do agree, though, that insta-kill sectors feel like a better approach over pain sectors in a death-pit (which is exactly what I did for Tartarus and Deadtech). I know @Aurelius figured out a vanilla-compatible way to do that for someone else's map, I just haven't looked into what it was. 

[Fonze]

For every reason to not put in an inescapable pit or death trap into your map there will be somebody out there to note that there is no right or wrong answer in art.

 

I do think that proper conveyance of any important idea in a map is important though; put a few dead marines in that pit and of course no supplies.

 

My suggestion with this is to think about the player's end experience and what kind of map you're trying to make. Are you making a challenge map that gives no shits about its players? Then put in plenty of these because that's your artistic vision of your map and dont complain when people treat your stuff as "super hard," "unforgiving," and a "time sink." If you're not making a literal challenge map maybe ask yourself if it's possible for a player to fall into one of these after 30 minutes to an hour of not saving into the map and how that would make them feel when they could also just play any of the other thousands of wads that come out per year.

 

Also keep in mind that your popularity is a large factor in what you can get away with: if people like you they'll play your map for that reason, and will also be more forgiving of your design decisions. If people dont know or dont care who you are then you're probably equally likely to find that they either dont finish the map or steer clear of your future works.

 

People make a lot of points about mapping and playing for yourself on here but I think the more powerful goal is mapping and playing for your friends.

[_bruce_]

 

Given the deathtraps are far and few between then I do not mind. I liked them in the original - adds a certain unforgiveness to the map.

[Aurelius]

2 hours ago, RonnieJamesDiner said:

I do agree, though, that insta-kill sectors feel like a better approach over pain sectors in a death-pit (which is exactly what I did for Tartarus and Deadtech). I know @Aurelius figured out a vanilla-compatible way to do that for someone else's map, I just haven't looked into what it was. 

 

This was actually for Boom, and it was originally discovered by Ribbiks, or possibly re-discovered as he hypothesized that the behavior in 242-affected sectors was intentionally made to make this sort of effect possible.

https://rbkz.blogspot.com/2020/08/cl9-death-floors-pwacpwad.html

[⇛Marnetmar⇛]

I'd be disinclined to use inescapable traps at all, but if you're going to use them, they should be communicated clearly to the player beforehand and shouldn't rely entirely on using the player's muscle memory against them. They also shouldn't force players to repeatedly traverse the entirety of a rather gigantic and confusing map in coop because of the two aforementioned problems.

Edited November 24, 2020 by Marn

[Dark Pulse]

Make them if you want to make them - don't kowtow to a community's opinion just because some people don't like them.

 

But at the same time, don't make them cheap. Make sure they're fairly obvious as an actual danger. For some (high drops that lead to an inescapable lava pit) this is self-explanatory; for others this is less obvious (especially if sometimes you have damaging slime and other times, it's not damaging - a little "Warning" patch wouldn't be a bad idea).

 

And if it's ever something the player wouldn't expect - the strobe flashes in E2M2 come to mind, or occasions where water-like flats may hurt you - generally it's better to have an escape if you're not going to give the player warning.

 

Follow those and you'll be fine 99% of the time, in my opinion.

[JustCallMeKaito]

They're a very outdated concept that should be laid to rest. Co-op with inescapable pits and obnoxious platforming do not blend well together.

Doom II's "The Chasm" serves as a pretty timeless example of why they're god awful.

[Stabbey]

I'm a cautious player and save often, but I tend to dislike death pits. If I fall off, fine, punish me with damage for my clumsiness or bad luck, but I want a way out. I don't mind dying if I don't have the health to make it to the escape route, but there should be an escape route.

 

There are ways to visually convey that a pit is death and shouldn't be explored, but that can be tough to design properly.

 

10 hours ago, Maes said:

What about those pits which are inescapable but also non-damaging? Or otherwise getting stuck in the architecture? Or being denied progression (actual progression, not just reaching optional areas or secrets) by one-time doors/platforms/switches?

 

All of those are bad design or bugs and should be fixed. And personally speaking, I think one-time doors/platforms/switches should usually be avoided for secrets as well.

[baja blast rd.]

just dumping stuff from Discord since I'm too tired to properly think in non-listicles 

Quote

 

Tabitha "Agatha" BagathaToday at 10:30 PM

- a lot of the distinction between escapable pits and inescapable ones is aesthetics and immersion. with the right sort of map identity, an inescapable pit might help reinforce the theme properly; with the wrong sort, they can just look out of place.

 

- what also matters is the emotional experience of playing the map, and how they push the player to play around them -- even when there is 0 risk of falling. sometimes a cautious, tense slower burn might be ideal. sometimes you might want the player to move around more recklessly.

 

- those things aside, there is sort of like a U curve wrt when stuff is better off escapable. if a moving sequence or platforming bit is pretty easy, then it matters less if it's escapable. if it's really extensive, and not broken into checkpoints, like Ribbiks' Frog and Toad degress of extensive (sequences that are minutes long), it probably should be inescapable just as a matter of convenience [going back to the start and trying again and again, lots of minute-long failures, would be awkward and more unpleasant, so this pushes you towards either saving mid-platforming a lot or practicing until you can one-shot it]. between that is where escapability peaks.

 

- they shape whether players can use a nearby pit as a tactical source of pressure relief during a big fight.

 

- a few people have provided "playing a long map" as a good case of when to avoid them, but I think FDA-ing something like CC4 m12 or whatever it was and having an easily avoided [in]escapable pit 30 minutes into the run was thrilling, because I knew I probably wouldn't fall, but the risk made for a big ramp-up in excitement.

 

 

Edited November 25, 2020 by rd.

[DapperApples]

The inescapable pits at the end of The Chasm are lame.

[spd7693]

If I use such, I do one of two things: 

 

• Make them so that they can be jumped over with a single (strafe-)jump. 
• Put a switch nearby which raises a bridge. 

One exception comes in my newest map, but I won't spoil it. :P 

[Doom-X-Machina]

This is why I ask...

[wrkq]

Well, this is pretty damn clear "nothing to find there other than your death" kind of pit. Good telegraphing.

Although if it's near the end of a hour-long hardcore map, it might cause some significant frustration.

[Thermal Lance]

I hate deathtraps in Doom. I find them cheap and annoying. Always have a reasonable way out is what I say. Punish the players with minor backtracking... not slow agonizing death.

[Doom-X-Machina]

17 hours ago, Thermal Lance said:

Punish the players with minor backtracking... not slow agonizing death.

Oh it's not slow... these are instant death pits. None of that -10% per second agony here. Although I do give you a couple of seconds to question your life choices before you reach the bottom ;)

*SPLAT*

[Murdoch]

20 hours ago, Doom-X-Machina said:

This is why I ask...

 

I concur with wrkq, that is pretty clear visual communication that no good will come of curiosity nor careless footwork. However, such sections are still very "non-Doom" and will be polarizing. Some may enjoy the change of pace, others will get pissed off. My advice - keep them brief and not needlessly dickish.