Really REALLY hard speedmaps

[40oz]

Before the Doom's birthday let's get some speedmapping going on in here. Make a REALLY hard map.

The goal is to utilize anything in DOOM2.WAD to create the most difficult map you can to KILL the player. Your map should be painfully difficult to survive and should require obtained knowledge to survive it's perils. Think of yourself as a DUNGEON MASTER who's goal is to torture the best doomers you've ever witnessed play. Disregard making your map look good, just put the most powerful 'best of the best' doomers to the test. Make them beg for mercy!

Rules:
-Doom 2 format. Nothing new with the exception of music.

-The map must be POSSIBLE, as in it must have an exit switch or walkover line at some part of the map that is reachable.

-Refrain from usage of environmental hazards like unreasonable damaging floors that occupy all of the land you can stand on, crushers that cannot be evaded, or stagnant 0 lighting everywhere.

-Refrain from obstructing the player's movement. No 56-64 width hallways. No blocking the only path the player must take with hordes of monsters.

-Don't spoil the player by giving him any items for free. Make him "work" for them. Be generous enough to include some rewards for tough obstacles. If you don't want to be nice, at least put the rewards in a difficult to find secret.

Watch some demos of speedruns. Expect that people who play your map are some of the most talented and experienced Doomers ever. Do your very best to make them utilize the best of their acquired skills.

[General Rainbow Bacon]

HOLY SHIT! MY DREAM COME TRUE!!! Alright. You asked and you shall receive. When are we doing this??

[40oz]

YOU HAVE AN HOUR AND FIFTY SEVEN MINUTES STOP READING POSTS OPEN UP DOOMBUILDER

[ArmouredBlood]

God damn how I've needed to do a speedmap. But I need to do some physics that's basically due tomorrow, so not likely to stick around. Have a go at this though - finally used that midi ;)
http://www.mediafire.com/?3g26l2cnhz0imm6

[40oz]

Saint Scream
http://jbserver.com/forums/attachments/8342_ss.zip

[valkiriforce]

Cold Fist - built within 2 hours.
http://www.mediafire.com/?jcirr2cuu46ee7y
[EDIT] Fixed link. :D

[Walter confetti]

I think is too late for make anything, isn't?

[General Rainbow Bacon]

I started this one late. I pity the fool who tries it.

http://www.mediafire.com/file/d1t5p8ly7emcn62/BegforMercy.wad

[Sigvatr]

Can I submit Cesspool?

[Phml]

Great, I don't think I'll get any real work done today. ;)

FDA for AB's map. Doesn't complete, had to split into two parts due to falling into an inescapable HOM pit where no monsters could access and kill me.

Comments : I don't think the map is completable, due to the aforementiond HOM pit (where the blue key is). Looking in DB2, it seems the sector is only supposed to raise once with a W1 line at the start, and as it's next to another sector at the same lowered height, it'll never actually raise. Archviles flames while running into a cybie corridor were rather cheap, and the difficulty lowers as you progress, with the notable exception of teleporting back into a horde of revenants, archies and cybies near the end. Otherwise, a fun map to run through.

[Phml]

FDA for 40oz's map. Some deaths, exit, no bug that I could see, seems maxable.

Comments : the hardest parts about this map were the MIDI being too loud (and I'm not sure if you can fiddle with options without breaking the demo while recording, so I didn't) and the lightning a bit dark. A better player than me would have understood you were supposed to ride the elevator and would have finished the map on first try, whereas I died multiple times just trying to understand where was I supposed to go next.

[Phml]

FDA for valkiriforce's map. A few deaths, exit, no bug that I could see, 100% kills.

It started off promising, but the revenants on stairs were just tedious - too many to skip past, yet not really a challenge to hang back and wait for them to come 1 by 1.

Then the map "breaks". You can simply sit safely and let the cybies infight the revenant horde, there's a BFG and eleventy bazillion cells, tons of megaspheres and invuls. Even blindly walking into the crusher trap didn't kill me, thanks to the invul.

The fake exit/final part was actually difficult, but again that difficulty was negated by the amount of megaspheres laying around (and with knowledge of the map, a smart player would have saved the second invul sphere for that part).

I missed the secret, and while I suspected it was in the first part, I couldn't get back to it by the point I was looking for a secret.

Overall a fun map that could be challenging with less megaspheres/invuls (possibly NO invuls) and triggering the cybie/revenant horde only *after* the player has gone down.

[Phml]

FDA for DoomHero85's map. Dies a lot, doesn't exit, HOM at some point.

Another map that doesn't really seem hard unless you play fast - the catch is, it's pretty boring if you don't play fast. So I did play fast and died a lot.

Everything is OK until the end, though the "fight cybies through 128px wide corridors" is so overdone it's not funny. The final part is total bullshit though, with blinking lights and tiny ledges. This is the kind of stuff that I'd rather see stay in the past decade. I have no doubt it can be done, but it's simply boring and tedious.

Admittedly I didn't make things easier for myself by playing this on -complevel 9 (just like I did for any other maps ; no offense to anyone, but on speedmaps designed to be hard I don't trust everyone to actually test in -complevel 2 and didn't want to run into a gamebreaking Boomism at the end of a hard map), so the PEs litterally filled the place with lost souls.

Overall it'd be an OK-to-fun map, but the final part breaks it down to a resounding YUCK.

[gemini09]

I'm hyped.

You didn't mention any rules, so I'm going to see about churning out a map in an hour's time. Is that cool?

[General Rainbow Bacon]

Yeah, I kinda thought the narrow ledges part in mine was cheap, but I couldn't think of anything else to do. I'll do something else with the end part and re-upload v2 later today.

[40oz]

Sigvatr said:

Can I submit Cesspool?

No. Make a new one fagface

[Melon]

I'll have time a bit later today to make one of these. Looking forward to doing it!

[General Rainbow Bacon]

Here's a better version of mine:

http://www.mediafire.com/file/13751bs8138oywl/Beg4Mercyv2.wad

My map only works in -clvl 9, there are a lot of boom lines in the beginning.

[ArmouredBlood]

Phml said:

Great, I don't think I'll get any real work done today. ;)

FDA for AB's map. Doesn't complete, had to split into two parts due to falling into an inescapable HOM pit where no monsters could access and kill me.

Comments : I don't think the map is completable, due to the aforementiond HOM pit (where the blue key is). Looking in DB2, it seems the sector is only supposed to raise once with a W1 line at the start, and as it's next to another sector at the same lowered height, it'll never actually raise. Archviles flames while running into a cybie corridor were rather cheap, and the difficulty lowers as you progress, with the notable exception of teleporting back into a horde of revenants, archies and cybies near the end. Otherwise, a fun map to run through.

Ffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffff, I added the blue key bit last, thought it worked -.- will be back to fix it in a couple hours ...

[RjY]

This map is very simple. You must press the eight switches around you (four on HMP, two on HNTR.) Soon, monsters will appear and try to stop you. However, as you press switches, you will receive extra health and ammunition. If you press the required number of switches, the level will end shortly afterwards.

I call it "Bugger This." Enjoy!

[Phml]

FDA for RjY's map. Doesn't exit, lots of deaths, 5 switches pressed.

Would have liked a mention of it being for Map30 here. The text file shows a gibberish character instead of linebreak for me, so it's hard to read and was faster to open up with DB2 to figure it out. :P

Map seems interesting, but I don't know much about monster spawners, so I don't know how to avoid telefragging without hugging the walls, or if it can be reliably avoided at all for that matter. With the complete lack of visual clues it's also hard to tell where you are if you're not, once again, hugging the walls.Because of that, it becomes repetitive quick, and I didn't push for more than 5 switches.

Cool concept and entertaining for a while, but either I'm missing something or this is completely luck-based.

[RjY]

Phml: thanks for the feedback and demo.

I'm sorry I didn't make the map number clearer but I felt that would give the game away :) I could put the map in any slot provided I insisted on MBF compatibility level and comp_telefrag=0, but in Boom if you don't use map30 everything gets stuck together.

I agree it's a bit hard to know where you are after a while. I keep track by using the automap - I know the switches are all spaced 45 degrees apart on points of a compass, so as long as I can see a bit of the wall, I'm good.

I don't hug the wall, the ring of spawn spots around the edge is in the same place as the ring of spawners, so you need to note where the cubes are coming from to know where not to stand. (I could have put the switches in front of the ring instead of behind it, but I didn't think that was evil enough for this thread ;) )

HNTR is easy, especially since the spawners only work half as fast there, and I can just about manage HMP, but I did wonder if UV was a bit too much. Oh well. Maybe I should reduce to six or five switches and give the player an invulnerability for reading the last one. Not sure. Also, already, I've had Yadex open for long enough that it's starting to get on my nerves...

And finally, I'm sorry about the problems you had reading the text file - I am somewhat nonplussed that, even in 2010, Windows still can't cope with non-CRLF line endings.

Thanks again :)

[gemini09]

You're still going?

I scratched the map I started on. I started on a new one, but I'm going out in 20 minutes. It seems there's no immediate deadline, so I'll see about finishing it by tomorrow.

[valkiriforce]

Phml said:

It started off promising, but the revenants on stairs were just tedious - too many to skip past, yet not really a challenge to hang back and wait for them to come 1 by 1.

So what is your suggestion for this? You didn't really fill me in on how this can be fixed. Replacing them with enemies that take less hits make it easier. Replacing them with tougher enemies makes it tedious again. What is your suggestion exactly?

The fake exit/final part was actually difficult, but again that difficulty was negated by the amount of megaspheres laying around (and with knowledge of the map, a smart player would have saved the second invul sphere for that part).

Wasn't that part of the challenge? Previous knowledge of the map to beat it. I did remove some megaspheres, as well as moving others around. I also took out a lot of rocket/cell ammunition.

Anyway, thank you for the advice. It's likely I missed those points cause I was in a rush to complete the map.

[Phml]

So what is your suggestion for this? You didn't really fill me in on how this can be fixed. Replacing them with enemies that take less hits make it easier. Replacing them with tougher enemies makes it tedious again. What is your suggestion exactly?

I don't make suggestions, I just give feedback. ;)

But if you're asking me for one, I'd give the rocket launcher already at that point ; maybe replacing the secret megasphere, with some rocket ammo laying outside (leading the player to suppose there must be a RL somewhere). In those confined spaces + stairs it would actually be dangerous to use, while also speeding up the process of clearing the revs. Win/win situation for the purpose of this challenge.

Wasn't that part of the challenge? Previous knowledge of the map to beat it.

My point here was that part could have been hard, but wasn't because of the amount of megaspheres (as you can see, I survived that part on first try), and so knowledge of the map and using the invul would have made it even easier.

[Solarn]

Vanilla Doom2 format or limit removing? (Can I go crazy with puzzles involving crushers or should I keep the moving platforms to a minimum?)

[valkiriforce]

Dang, you made me hate my map! Anyway, here's the fixed one; hopefully that gets it done.

http://www.mediafire.com/?i5dlqacrqo87ow9

[Creaphis]

I just recorded a UV STROLLER demo (pacifist, no running, no strafing) of 40oz's speedmap and posted it over here. 40oz, this isn't a statement about your map or anything, it's just something I had to do :)

Also, I included your wad in the zip file. I hope that's okay; otherwise I can remove it.

[ArmouredBlood]

Fixed my map, made some things a little harder, gave some more ammo for the 3 cybers and a bit more for the jaunt back.

E: would help if I remembered the link -.-
http://www.mediafire.com/?c3wg48cxz3j3hkb

[Solarn]

In the end, I made a Boom map, because I needed the generic linedef actions to do what I wanted. I went over the time limit with it and a vanilla compatible map would have been more in the spirit of the challenge, but I thought I'd post it anyway. It's probably not as hard as everyone else's maps (I haven't played them yet), but I tried my best. It hasn't been playtested yet and probably has a ton of bugs because I had to rush with the finishing touches, but I'll post it as it is now and fix things after I wake up tomorrow.

http://www.zshare.net/download/837469930b3791f6/