Why are double traps so rare in pwads?

[printz]

Quite often, when a level has traps, I notice this pattern. There's a switch that opens the way to a key or another important object. It also releases monsters into you. But after you kill them all and pick up the key (or other object), nothing extra happens. Why don't mappers do this extra step, making monsters ambush you both when you free the key, and when you pick it? It becomes really predictable… id Software did what I'm talking about in Doom E1M6 near the exit.

[Walter confetti]

Because will make people angrier and more frustrated?

With all that monster spawning? Is just a thing that come in my mind now...

[scifista42]

E1M6 near the exit? What do you mean? There's not even any key. Nor a double trap which I could recognize as a double trap.

[BaronOfStuff]

^
Approaching the switch opens a load of monster closets, and using the switch opens the room to the exit, which contains yet a bunch more monsters. Taking on both groups at once could have been considered putting yourself against overwhelming odds back in 1993. Sort of.

[scifista42]

Interesting, I never noticed that, because I always quickly press the switch as soon as I approach it, then find out that multiple doors opened around the room and one of them leads to the exit, so that I considered them all to be one ambush. I always just lurk near the switch until I kill all or most of the monsters that are coming at once.

[Maes]

Throw also a triple trap, for good measure. For example, if the player says "fuck it, I'm not picking this up/pushing this button, I'll just idkfa and walk off". In that case, NOT picking up the key will NOT disable an even worse trap that awaits cowards & cheaters on the way out ;-)

[VGamingJunkie]

There's a simple solution to that, booby-trap the key door. Fill your level with so many traps that the player decides "Screw it, I'm no clipping".

[Maes]

Then include an area accessible only by no-clipping containing an offensive message for the player (e.g. texture the inside of a booby-trapped wall with an offensive texture, so that only a no-clipping player would see it ;-)

Also, fuck with the iddqd face so that it offends the player or make it so large that it breaks the screen rendering or crashes the game.

[40oz]

No particular reason. I do notice sometimes when playing that a trap in some wads may seem kinda light, and seems almost suspicious. I like when a monster closet has monsters in it and a health kit, then when you grab a second layer monster closet opens. Joe ilya made a triple monster closet trap in his map with chaingunnerx for Mutiny, and of course it was pretty fun. I've got a couple of these in some of my own maps that are overdue for release too.

Traps are kinda hard to squeeze into a map after its already done. You sort of have to anticipate that your trap is going to be kinda weak ahead of time, so you can reserve enough space for your second wave trap. I suppose this is usually the reason.

[Woolie Wool]

It's easier to set up "double traps" and the like when you have some rudimentary scripting. The Quake map "Halls of the Blood God" by Scampie has wall-lowering/monster closet traps that proceed in multiple stages on a timer:

Unfortunately to do that you either need to use ZDoom or have a good understanding of Boom voodoo doll tricks.

[scifista42]

^No problem doing it in vanilla Doom too. Just use a floor-lowering action on multiple floors with the same tag, but placed in various heights. This way, you can trigger the action once, all floors will start lowering, and they will finish lowering each at a different time according to your choice, depending on the initial floor height of each of them. Use such floors (instead of classic doors) to block gateways, and you can make them open gradually, like with a timer. The great thing is that floors can even be placed above their own sector's ceilings, so that you can set the floor heights really really high but keep ceiling heights low. A ceiling-raising action instead of floor-lowering is also possible, and even a door-opening action would suffice to make this effect, although doors are faster and would require you to set the ceiling heights very low in order to make a decently long timer.

[snapshot]

because mappers are too lazy to make double traps :P .

[40oz]

Says the guy with no mapping background.

[Maes]

Well, now we really need an "asshole Doom" PWAD. Not just an annoying jokewad like UACMN that will sodomize your childhood, but something that really makes even the most hardened speedrunner cower in a corner and weep, for he'll be divided: it will be ragequit-inducing every step of the way, but appear to be doable ;-)

[Looper]

40oz said:

Says the guy with no mapping background.

At least he's not lazy.

[RjY]

Most of my released maps have been saturated with traps. Almost every time you go into a new area, press a switch, or pick up a key or new weapon, it'd set off yet another one. Usually a monster teleporter.

I'm not sure it works as a gameplay mechanic, as none of my maps have been particularly well received at release, especially not the first one (CC2 map05). However, I love building monster teleporters and making them as efficient as possible, so it can't be helped.

[purist]

Is this really true? I've always thought PWADs were in general more trap heavy than IWADs and some concious decision amongst mappers had to be made to reduce the predictability of almost every action taken in a map triggering a trap. A few years ago I remember there being a consensus of opinion that it had become blasé that every key triggered a trap for example.

[VGamingJunkie]

Woolie Wool said:

It's easier to set up "double traps" and the like when you have some rudimentary scripting. The Quake map "Halls of the Blood God" by Scampie has wall-lowering/monster closet traps that proceed in multiple stages on a timer:

Unfortunately to do that you either need to use ZDoom or have a good understanding of Boom voodoo doll tricks.

(G)ZDoom would probably be the best bet for that kind of thing. You could even set a line to activate a script that changes a different line so that, when you grab a key or something that looks obviously booby-trapped, it changes a line in the way out to open up a monster closet right in your face. The player won't expect it because they already walked through that line to get to the key.

[VGA]

EDIT: nevermind, I got to test it out for myself :-D

[scalliano]

Woolie Wool said:

It's easier to set up "double traps" and the like when you have some rudimentary scripting. The Quake map "Halls of the Blood God" by Scampie has wall-lowering/monster closet traps that proceed in multiple stages on a timer.

Unfortunately to do that you either need to use ZDoom or have a good understanding of Boom voodoo doll tricks.

I do this arguably way too often in my levels, although it's usually wave-based rather than timed.

[Fonze]

I love doing double/triple/however-many-I-can-fit-in traps. Anything to screw with the player's head. Of course, it should also be doable, but changing things up and adding variety is important. It also keeps the player on-edge. Same with the occasional spot that looks like it should be a trap, but isn't.

Playing with people's perceptions is one of the fundamental facets of Doom mapping. It is somewhat of a horror game, after all.

[snapshot]

40oz said:

Says the guy ...

Says the guy, says the guy , Says the guy, that's all i've been hearing out of you last few days , Instead of complaining about what a guy said why don't you actually do it yourself .

[dew]

Maes said:

Well, now we really need an "asshole Doom" PWAD. Not just an annoying jokewad like UACMN that will sodomize your childhood, but something that really makes even the most hardened speedrunner cower in a corner and weep, for he'll be divided: it will be ragequit-inducing every step of the way, but appear to be doable ;-)

Make a vanilla map where you need to walk along a precise path and look in precise directions otherwise the game bombs out on VPOs.

DMGUYDZ64 said:

Says the guy, says the guy , Says the guy, that's all i've been hearing out of you last few days , Instead of complaining about what a guy said why don't you actually do it yourself .

Is this a rare case of double irony?

[Avoozl]

40oz said:

Says the guy with no mapping background.

Well there's a reason why they are an "ignorant member".

[yakfak]

a lot of levels seem to have double traps from my point of view... like if a cupboard full of Barons opens and, thinking "I don't want to fight so many sexy satyrs" I evade them and move beyond their station to another trap full of mancubi, I am now trapped between a horde of barons, a horde of mancubi and the concrete ball of idiocy within my mind

[jmickle66666666]

i did a 'quadruple' trap (by your definition) in a couple recent maps. its fun

[snapshot]

Avoozl said:

Well there's a reason why they are an "ignorant member".

By the way, Ignorant member simply because i don't mod too much ?

[Maes]

dew said:

Make a vanilla map where you need to walk along a precise path and look in precise directions otherwise the game bombs out on VPOs.

I like the way you think.

[deathbringer]

I've been thinking of making some different assholey traps, though not quite double traps. Maybe a sparsely populated map with big open areas, except one of these big open areas suddenly becomes a Hell Revealed massacre with very little warning. The warning in question being loads of ammo and health teleported in around you, milliseconds before the monster horde teleports at a slightly greater distance.

Another idea was to have one of the other large areas you've been through previously fill up with monsters, when you collect an item in a distant room. You think you have a clear run to the exit, then blam!

[Fonze]

deathbringer said:

Another idea was to have one of the other large areas you've been through previously fill up with monsters, when you collect an item in a distant room. You think you have a clear run to the exit, then blam!

<3 repopulation