Funnest uses of the explodey barrels

[Stupid Bunny]

Was really tempting to put “barrels of fun” in the title but there’s enough threads discussing that map already

 

No what I’m interested in is the best, most interesting, cleverest uses for barrels in maps. There’s thread after thread about strategic uses of every monster, about good architecture and layout and item placement and secret design; but I wasn’t able to find much if anything about the big exploding cans apart from a lot of technical discussion of their use with voodoo dolls and other under-the-hood trickery.

 

I make this thread also because it occurs to me I almost never use barrels in my maps for anything apart from above-mentioned chicanery, and have given almost no thought for how to use them in a general sense. My criminal neglect of visible barrels has got me thinking about how to deploy them as something more than just funny, incidentally explosive decorations on the margins of techbase maps, or funny MAP23-style gimmicks that are very forward in their purpose. There must be some good out-of-the-box approaches to barrel placement and usage.

 

To reiterate, I’m mostly interested in “visible” barrels; I’ve used them lots of times for offscreen tricks killing monsters and voodoo dolls and Romeros and making exploding noises for atmosphere and whatnot. 

Edited September 29, 2023 by Stupid Bunny

[Lucius Wooding]

I've always considered barrels to be highly underrated and overlooked. I've given considerable thought to making a community project around barrel-based maps, and have a number of ideas on how to use them as well as fun dehacked variations. I think there's a lot of potential although I doubt it'd generate a ton of interest and I'm not exactly qualified to run a project like that. I'd also need time and motivation to do a lot of the mapping which isn't at hand at the moment.

 

Anyway, a couple basic uses that I like:

 

-Fuck the Icon of Sin, place a bunch of barrels and make him die in a single shot.

 

-Softening up heavier turret monsters. I like archviles and arachnotrons for this; you can fire a single rocket and kill them which speeds up cleanup a great deal, or at least loosen up the ammo balance greatly. You benefit from having very spicy area denial placements, yet they're such glass cannons you can eliminate them in a quick pass rather than focus firing them for several seconds. In the case of archviles, it has the benefit of taking the pain state RNG completely out since you can consistently kill them if you get a single shot off in time. Using imps when you want a soft turret just isn't threatening, yet using something heavy can really make the map drag, particularly if there are many. In a way they can help you stretch the bestiary without giving the player OP weapons and lots of ammo. You can also make free roaming enemies and turrets have very different health values and ammo cost to kill within a single situation.

 

-It's one of the best ways in Doom 1 to make barons tolerable. Place a few barrels, maybe crush them before teleporting it somewhere, voila it's a hell knight. And if you're kiting one through a barrel filled section you probably won't need to blast it 15+ times when you can steer it into the hazard. Think of giving the player 8 shells and a shotgun and giving them a cramped baron fight like this; it's a lot more interesting than just pumping buckshot into it repeatedly.

 

-Using the barrel suicide trick on older complevels just to enjoy the fireworks.

 

-You can use them to really punish a player for poor dodging skills. Place some barrels in a section and suddenly you have to be concerned with where the projectiles go that miss you. Or force them to choose to take hurtfloor damage or splash damage or tank the projectiles. Suddenly having to sweat the details can make a relatively small threat into a nail biter.

 

-Using them as either a visual cue for targeting sniping enemies, or as a buffer for auto aim to lock onto. You can effectively widen the target by flanking them with barrels whether they actually help kill it or not.

 

-They can also be great for keeping snipers in place on a ledge, cheeky fuckers always be moving back and forth to make your pellets miss. Bonus points if you use the blur sphere to make them blow themselves up in a way you couldn't otherwise line up.

 

-Using them for wallrunning, perhaps to jump to a non secret ledge with optional goodies where you can only reach before blowing them up. Or even in a platforming map to damage boost or rocket jump off of. If you wanted to be a dick and make it a one time only thing or otherwise use a death exit it'd be ideal rather than placing a boring old wall.

 

-Turning shotgun and chaingun into an AOE weapon against fodder enemies. Many maps do this by creating nice wedges or lines of barrels that steamroll small areas of enemies.

 

-Dehacking them and making one into a Mancubian Candidate style ordeal. Shoutouts to A Boy and His Barrel which turns this concept into a much more in depth mechanic. 

 

-Just putting a long line of them like dominoes for their own sake. There's nothing more satisfying than hitting a bunch of barrels, it's like bubble wrap. Or little pyramids of barrels that you can cascade onto a wave of monsters, that stuff is peak Doom.

 

-Making a vanilla friendly destructible wall or at least telegraphing where the G1 linedef is without placing a neon sign. Great way to reward a player for shooting barrels (as if it weren't its own reward).

 

-Blocking teleporters or ceilings in a temporary way. A good example might be behind the scenes using this method to block sound if a certain barrel were destroyed, which prevents enemies from being alerted in another area. You could therefore script one group of monsters in a closet to teleport into different parts of the map depending on which out of several sectors they hear you in.

 

-Stickney used a pretty smart method of preventing circle strafing in a mob fight; you have a mob of monsters in the center with heaps of barrels spawning in the perimeter of the room. It forced you to hug tightly to the monsters which really put the player in a pinch. This is one of the few ways compatible with Doom 1 to prevent circle strafing in a square arena, since there aren't archviles which are the go to enemy.

 

-Using them as a solid method of difficulty adjustment. You can place them (or not) on lower skills where they change fights, even things like blocking monsters from funneling through multiple teleporters or placing them where they act more as a hazard. Or you could even do the health reduction trick on certain ones before a fight as suggested for barons. You can fill a room with monsters and make it look scary but the homie barrels will have your back on ITYTD without needing to change monster count at all.

 

-Placing them below the line of sight to block ledges without making them impassable. Using them as a temporary blockade against cacodemons. Using them to slow down a player running through hurtfloor sections. Using them to waste a little bit of ammo. Using them to make platforms tighter. Using them to prevent the player from staying on a platform for very long in a crossfire.

 

-Just teeing up a juicy imp or hitscanner for gibbing for the sheer joy of it.

[Xaser]

This is less a creative strategy and more a small tactic you can use to make barrels more effective, but I've found that a cluster of 3 barrels in a triangular shape is a great setup -- you shoot one barrel and the explosion will push the other two outward in a V shape before they explode, giving them extra range. Adds a bit of depth too since the player can choose which direction they go by shooting a different barrel.

 

I'd also love to see more barrel varieties -- with MBF21 you could easily make a super barrel with a larger explosion radius, barrels that leave behind fire or clouds of poisonous gas, and fun stuff like that.

[SleepyVelvet]

7 minutes ago, Xaser said:

a cluster of 3 barrels in a triangular shape is a great setup

 

Yup, and barrels are a free mapping tool, as in they cost nothing to put into your map (sometimes... it depends).  They're a free interactive nugget if the player chooses to use them, just like any other monster.  Also, some mapping setups and encounters want mid-tier monsters, but don't want the player to have higher tier weapons like SSG and Rockets - Barrels are an answer here to alleviate the grind of single-shotgunning down caco's and revenants.  I've been sprinkling barrel clusters of 3,4 or 5 into some of my maps in the past year or so since some relevant feedback on the previous matter, and it's helped a bunch.

[LoatharMDPhD]

4 hours ago, NoisyVelvet said:

 

Yup, and barrels are a free mapping tool, as in they cost nothing to put into your map (sometimes... it depends).  They're a free interactive nugget if the player chooses to use them, just like any other monster.  Also, some mapping setups and encounters want mid-tier monsters, but don't want the player to have higher tier weapons like SSG and Rockets - Barrels are an answer here to alleviate the grind of single-shotgunning down caco's and revenants.  I've been sprinkling barrel clusters of 3,4 or 5 into some of my maps in the past year or so since some relevant feedback on the previous matter, and it's helped a bunch.

i built an entire arena devoid of monsters with barrels in is to simulate blowing up some nazi machinery... i remembered the design tenant, if your going to have the player go somewhere, make it a spectacle..

 

due north on this map...

EvilIncarnateMod1.zip

Edited September 29, 2023 by LoatharMDPhD : visual AIDS

[Dreamskull]

I love barrels, but once gone theyre gone.

 

I wish there was something that would continually exist to keep exploding or at the very least, wait and come back.

[Biodegradable]

hey @pavera you LOVE barrels. Got any fun stories?

[BeachThunder]

There's this part from Solar Struggle (@Jark):

The elevator in front of you is controlled by the button to the right. Soon after the elevator starts moving down, you hear some monster noises emanating from the shaft. Chances are, your instinct is to shoot the monsters as soon as possible; but if you react too quickly without paying attention, you'll blow up some barrels that are also on the elevator - and probably take a bunch of damage.

 

It's some good 'gotcha' design that tests your alertness.

[SitarA]

Starting an online server with a custom map where I'd stack a building full of barrels.

 

Then as the first players start to join in and shoot at stuff in or near the building (lure monsters/shootable switches etc.), I sit back and grab some popcorn while a chain of explosions is triggered killing the players and crashing the server. 

[Razza]

If you'll allow me to toot my own horn here, I made a map where barrels would be "dispensed" to either help or hinder the player. There's even a secret that blocks off some monsters from coming out of a couple closets (3:00 in the video)

 

[Naarok0fkor]

[Stupid Bunny]

So many good ideas in this thread already. The tiny-triangle-of-barrels layout is one I’ll have to exploit at some point. I’ve never thought to use them for teleport denial either, it’s such a simple but effective way to put them to work. 
 

@Razza that is one of the best map names I’ve ever read. I think I’ll have to play that one for some idea farming.

[Mystic 256]

we need a barrels o fun community project

[galileo31dos01]

I liked the barrel escape puzzle in Dark Scythe map 23, very simple yet requires thoughtful approaches.

[ducon]

23 hours ago, Lucius Wooding said:

-Dehacking them and making one into a Mancubian Candidate style ordeal. Shoutouts to A Boy and His Barrel which turns this concept into a much more in depth mechanic.

I remember an old WAD with very slowly moving barrels.

[JM_andtheArgonauts]

1 hour ago, Mystic 256 said:

we need a barrels o fun community project

Let me know when you start one up. I would love to make a ridiculously fun map 😂

[TheSlipgateStudios]

Blowing zombiemen into giblets is my jam

[Stupid Bunny]

8 hours ago, ducon said:

I remember an old WAD with very slowly moving barrels.

If I remember right The Sky May Be had moving barrels that blew up when they got close enough to you. Also moving flaming barrels that were unkillable and resurrected dead monsters. What a nightmare. God I love that map.

[ducon]

It was not The Sky May Be as far as I remember, it was a rather standard Doom (1 or 2? maybe 2) WAD with moving barrels and maybe zombies with strange eyes.

[Havok]

On 9/28/2023 at 1:09 PM, Stupid Bunny said:

Was really tempting to put “barrels of fun” in the title but there’s enough threads discussing that map already

 

No what I’m interested in is the best, most interesting, cleverest uses for barrels in maps. There’s thread after thread about strategic uses of every monster, about good architecture and layout and item placement and secret design; but I wasn’t able to find much if anything about the big exploding cans apart from a lot of technical discussion of their use with voodoo dolls and other under-the-hood trickery.

 

To reiterate, I’m mostly interested in “visible” barrels; I’ve used them lots of times for offscreen tricks killing monsters and voodoo dolls and Romeros and making exploding noises for atmosphere and whatnot. 

 

What are those tricks you did with barrels killing monsters offscreen and voodoo dolls, etc?

[Stabbey]

Watch this video from 2:50 , and wait for it...

 

I also used crushers in monster closets to crush barrels which then blew dead corpses over teleport lines to produce dead bodies in certain places, perfect for an Arch-Vile to later have fun with.

[famicommander]

Using them to make monsters that won't normally infight do so, like with the two Barons of Hell at the end of Knee Deep in the Dead. Shoot a barrel, lure a Baron over to it, get the other Baron to blow up the barrel which splash damages the first Baron, and there you go. The two bosses of the episode get into a melee brawl to the death, leaving you with the ability to kill the survivor with a single rocket or a couple shotgun blasts.

[Klear]

This might be a bit outside of the scope of the original question, but I love this setup with a crusher and silent teleporter:

 

Lets you spawn an explosion anywhere on demand.

 

Replace the second barrel with a zombieman and you're spawning chunks of meat instead.

[Fletcher`]