Hitscanners: Yay or nay?

[Da Werecat]

So if we add to this the ability to smoke the player out of cover - how is this better, exactly? Now you're forced to rely on luck, you can't even cheese it by corner-camping.

[MrGlide]

25 minutes ago, Nine Inch Heels said:

And don't tell me how I play or not.

you forgot the period... period.

[Optimus]

Definitely most people who are really into Doom recognise the feeling, when your brain is hardwired for the sounds and sights of enemies, when you turn around in a corner or open a door and you recognise that here is one shotgunner, three imps, two zombie soldiers, so you instinctively know what to do, which enemy to shoot first while you cover or move around the projectiles, etc. And the distinction between enemies that should be dispatched asap to enemies that you can dance around is an integral part of what makes Doom for me.

 

Someone who hasn't played much the old Doom, and during the discussion about Doom 4, would claim "What makes Doom is no hitscanner enemies" which of course is not the case. I think there are some misunderstandings about what Doom is or isn't or how it should be played, because of other modern FPS in comparison. But it's not the problem of hitscanners. The problem is that in modern FPS All the enemies are hitscanners, they are good and insanely fast alert shots, and they are also bulletsponges. In Doom, the reaction times of enemies are laughable (they would look too cheesy in a modern "realistic" FPS) and they shoot with a chance to have a miss offset. And most of all, they are the opposite of bullet sponge, you open a door, and you blast two of them fast, penetrating three or more with the shotgun or SSG, preferring to dispatch fast the hitscanners and later or while avoiding the projectile monsters. Modern FPS need to show realistic war, so you can't be rambo, and the enemies have to react fast, and also have you cover under trenches and other obstacle, to make it cinematic.

 

So, it's amusing to me when I hear some modern examination of what made Doom, the lack of hitscanners (or at least most of them) or that the gameplay forced you to run around (Personally, I like to play some levels slowly, explore and carefully peak what's behind dark corners) which Doom 4 forces you too much to always run (imps and everything come at you, in old Doom enemies stayed in ledges, so sometimes you would take down few enemies from afar and I find this fun too) and becomes a tedious arena thing without much the variety of changing strategies on the fly depending on the kind of enemies in the next room.

 

Also, I realize that the maps I enjoy the most from mappers, are the ones using more frequently the old classic weaker monsters and fewer bigger monsters. So, definitely most Doom 1 maps, and from Doom 2 maps I prefer those with tons of hitscanners, imps, demons in traps and behind corners, and then maybe small groups of cacos, mancubi, barons, etc. I hate the maps which opens you a trap with 50 revenants for example. I prefer 50 heavy machine dudes than 50 revenants for sure.

[Cruduxy Pegg]

The chaingunner is easily in the same tier with revenant threat wise behind archviles, cybers and masterminds. Minimizing "rng" is a huge part of a lot of games, and it takes a lot of experience and skill to minimize. (Hilariously projectiles damage is way more random and the chance to get hit is way lower than by hitscanners unless a ton of monsters flood the place)

 

Part of the problem is people refusing to understand that chaingunners and shotgunners aren't put in the correct tiers, a Chaingunner is way more threatening than 90% of the game's monsters. A shotgunner can't survive a lot of damage but they sure dish consistent damage to the player. Even the zombie man tends to be a bigger threat than imps especially when many of them are placed against a player without armor. Meanwhile zombiemen are ranked below imps (who are a no threat 99% of the time) and shotgunners get put behind monsters the player can kill in double the time with the RL\Plasma while being unable to hit the player at all without cheesy mapping. 

[Woolie Wool]

3 hours ago, Da Werecat said:

So if we add to this the ability to smoke the player out of cover - how is this better, exactly? Now you're forced to rely on luck, you can't even cheese it by corner-camping.

Simple--you find other pieces of cover and move from cover to cover, watching your peripheral vision for enemies.

[Sergeant_Mark_IV]

I don't like the fact that hitscans FORCES you to take damage, this makes things a bit unfair. For my mods I always use fastprojectile attacks for such enemies; you will never be able to dance around them like if they were imp fireballs, but if you want to bail out and run in a straight direction, you still have a chance to escape unharmed. This reduces the RND difficulty factor and increases the responsibility the player have for it's own failures.

[CzechMate29200]

Hitscan is more life-like though. Though I do understand that it can get very  annoying after awhile... But really if someone were to shoot you, it's not humanly possible to dodge or  avoid them. 

 

[The_MártonJános]

Yay.

Of course, farther encounters often play as a gamble, but hey, easy-to-dodge projectiles* would become boring after quite a while, and this type of challenge is a worthy asset to gameplay.
 

Spoiler

*Not including: homing Revenant rockets, having Partial Invisiblity on, huge hordes of enemies with massive firepower, or these combined.

 

[Deadwing]

IMO, analyzing the hitscanner by itself, I agree that it doesn't look like an interesting concept, and there's not much skill indeed envolved when you deal with them in a "stardard" situation: Or you kill them fast or you take cover.

 

Funnily, though, in Doom they can actually enhance the game's mechanics and gameplay. Fighting hitscanners in a favorable situation isn't that interesting, but if you arrange some interesting encounters, where the player is out of his comfort zone and there's different type of monsters, height differences in the battlefield and dynamic covers (not only monsters as covers, but covers that are sometimes safe and sometimes isn't), then you have an enhanced skill factor there.

 

With projectile monsters only, ""all you have to do"" is to dance and choose a favorite approach, regardless if it's the best outcome or not, as long you're dancing propely. Hitscanners spice things up and create some real danger and enhances target priorization, so if you don't want to get hurt you'll need to be more aware of the surroudings, regardless if you take fast-paced approach or not. Some players will not like to be forced to take some actions, and depending on how the level was designed they will be forced to slow down, but, in other hand, carefully limiting the options and challenging the player to analyze it is not a bad thing, IMO. Ofc, I'm not talking about these boring door/camping fights, but well planned out encounters haha

 

Still, another important aspect of hitscanner usage is the downtempo moments (aka encounters outside of setpieces), where you as a designer can create danger even in small (but well planned) encounters, which avoids the playthrough to get boring while providing the necessary "resting moments" between the harder setpieces.

 

The article @Linguica posted was pretty good and it sums up what I think too haha. Hitscanners are one, if not the main, reason why I prefer the old Doom to the 2016 edition.

[Cruduxy Pegg]

I dislike fast projectiles and instead use build up accuracy\damage. Hit scanners can shred you but their first shot\second of chaingunning deals way less damage to allow you to kill them with less fear of losing 20% of your health the moment they see you.