Odamex is Driving me Mad

[purist]

A friend of mine who used to play Doom back in the 90's recently asked me if I play Doom much online. To his surprise I told him I never have. He asked how we'd go about it so we could have a game. So I downloaded Odamex to find out.

Now, please tell me I've got something drastically wrong and you don't have to use a config text file to setup a simple online Doom game? I have to trawl through dozens of compatibility flags when all I want is to play by default with a few basic variables (such as setting difficulty, game type and loading a pwad). Is there a user friendly launcher/front end similar to Doom launcher that I can use to do this??

Even working with the config file is getting me nowhere. I managed to get a pwad co-op game setup in the previous version but in version 0.5.6 it just loads plain Doom II. I've tried set wad x.wad, -file x.wad and various other combinations without luck. I've tried both setting a dir path for the file and putting the file in the same folder as Odamex and neither work.

I think I must have set it up wrong somehow, not being particulary IT literate. Whenever I go on Odalaunch - there's never anyone playing. Or is that nobody plays? I'm in the UK time zone so that probably doesn't help. I have tried connecting to a server in the hope someone will join me but it just disconnected.

Finally, does Odamex struggle with voodoo dolls in co-op? In the previous version I managed to get a working co-op progfic.wad server and played on my own to test. On MAP04 I spawned from the voodoo doll player start location despite it working fine in both single player and Legacy co-op splitscreen.

Can someone please help me out - and don't worry about talking in simple language, I'm so far past the point of frustration that it's impossible to patronise me on the subject.

[AkiraZXE]

I dunno much about Odamex, but...what do you mean "set wad wad.wad"? You can use +wad on the command line or just the wad command in the console. Also, I think it's just a general lack of people using Odamex. I rarely see anybody playing. Personally, I don't use it due to odd performance issues, though I presume most people are just more familiar with other multiplayer ports.

[Dragonsbrethren]

If you just want to play vanilla Doom online and don't mind playing at 320x200, you could play with Chocolate Doom. I've never set up a server for Odamex so I'm not sure what the best way to set compatibility and stuff is. With Choco, it's just:

chocolate-doom -iwad doom.wad -file whatever.wad -server

And your buddy just has to connect with:

chocolate-doom -connect [your ip]

As for people playing Odamex, open the launcher around 8 EST tonight.

[Hekksy]

Hello! I'll be happy to help you :)

Odamex handles pwads a little differently from other Doom ports because of the fact that Odamex can load multiple pwads with the same maps.

For coop, I recommend odasrv.exe -file av.wad -deh av.deh for an example. You do not typically use addmap with coop because addmap follows a script maplist, and does not follow secret exits.

For Deathmatch that can feature multiple pwads, you'll want to use the addmap command to add maps.

addmap map01 doom2.wad dwango5.wad
addmap map02
addmap map03
addmap map01 doom2.wad dwango6.wad
addmap map02
addmap map03
addmap map05 doom2.wad dwango7.wad

If you want, you can set a direct path to your wads so that Odamex can remember where they are. the command is "waddirs"

example: waddirs "c:\users\vulture\doom\iwads;c:\users\vulture\doom\pwads"

You can add multiple paths using ; to seperate on windows, and : on linux/macos.

Also, I have released an unofficial 0.5.6.2u package that comes bundled with Doomseeker. Make sure you get the "full install." You can download it here http://odamex.net/boards/index.php/topic,1585.msg3525.html#new This should make it much easier to launch servers :)

Also Odamex's community is not big enough to have players on all day long. However we do have several people that like to play it! Feel free to join us on IRC in #odamex on quakenet. People here are also probably willing to help you :)

And do not forget to use the wiki to help you: http://www.odamex.net/wiki/Main_Page

[purist]

@Dragonsbrethren: Chocolate Doom is a viable option but limits me to vanilla PWADs. I was under the (mistaken?) impression that Odamex runs Boom PWADs.

@Vulture: I was trying to run it by editing the config file. I makes sense to use a command line though. I'll try that next time and create a batch file if it goes well.

Cheers for your patience, I was in a bad mood when I wrote that first post!

EDIT: I'm still having that voodoo doll issue - any known workarounds?

[Ralphis]

purist said:

EDIT: I'm still having that voodoo doll issue - any known workarounds?

Unfortunately, there is no work around for this right now. The reason that voodoo dolls give trouble in Odamex is because of the client/server structure, as well as being able to have more than four players in a game. Players aren't directly tied to being player 1, player 2, etc so voodoo dolls don't work as intended. We have spoken about finding a solution for this in the past and hopefully we can revisit it soon as it even prevents iwads like Plutonia from being completable.

[andrewj]

The logic for voodoo dolls is that the LAST player thing of a certain kind (1 to 4) is the real player and the rest are the voodoo dolls.

I suggest a pre-scan of the THINGS lump which works backwards and when it hits the first player thing of each type, adds to the spawn spot list and clears that entry to a zero type. The normal scan can then skip the zero types and assume all remaining player things are voodoo dolls.

[Marcaek]

andrewj said:

The logic for voodoo dolls is that the LAST player thing of a certain kind (1 to 4) is the real player and the rest are the voodoo dolls.

I suggest a pre-scan of the THINGS lump which works backwards and when it hits the first player thing of each type, adds to the spawn spot list and clears that entry to a zero type. The normal scan can then skip the zero types and assume all remaining player things are voodoo dolls.

Unless certain ports handle it differently, the first player thing of each type is the actual player and all later things are voodoo dolls.

[andrewj]

Marcaek said:

Unless certain ports handle it differently, the first player thing of each type is the actual player and all later things are voodoo dolls.

No, the last one is the real player.

Just look at Phobos Anomaly Reborn, in E1M1 there is a voodoo doll on the left side of the map (thing type 1) which has index #2. The real player thing is in the outdoor area near the spaceship in the top/left corner of the map and has index #255.

[wesleyjohnson]

Each player position discovered on the map re-initializes the player structure, but this leaves behind the previous player thing (oops), and each of those is a voodoo doll. The thing is configured as a player, and is linked to the player, but the player is not linked to it.
So the last player position discovered is the real player.

If you want to make voodoo dolls work in multi-player, then you should look at my work in doomlegacy. Otherwise the voodoo doll damage always goes to the linked player, according the player start that created it. This means that if player2 touches the electric arc, (which sets off a player1 voodoo doll into a insta-death situation) it will be player1 (across the room) who dies the horrible death (and does not know what they did wrong), see ic2005.wad.
It takes considerable subterfuge in the code to redirect the damage to the player suspected of triggering the voodoo doll.

[purist]

Since I went to the trouble of bothering you all with my whining, I'll update here and say I played my first ever game of Doom online today!

It was just about 20 minutes of Deathmatching with a 2 or 3 other players - and I was the whipping boy - but it was much fun!

Then before I posted I noticed someone in a MAP01 DM Odamex server so I joined him for a few hundred frags :-)

[Ralphis]

Glad to have you a part of a fast-growing community! Hopefully we can have servers filled consistently sooner than later

[purist]

Hopefully. I'll try to get involved quite regulary, providing I have some free time.

Another excuse not to map...

[Ralphis]

Actually it's a great excuse to map too :) Check out the Odamex Community Grab Bag Server. It rotates through small wads made by people in the community 24/7 and you can easily have one of your own maps added to the server by posting in that thread.