How was your first time meeting the Bosses?

[galileo31dos01]

Here's another generic thread for you to share your experiences, meeting the Cyberdemon and the Spider Mastermind, and if you want to talk about the Icon of Sin you can too.

 

I guess we all (or the majority) had the same feeling of fear when we first heard the ROARRR PUM PUM PUM PUM getting closer PUM PUM PUM, not knowing what was out there, but also feeling curious. From what I can remember, I didn't want to step out of the tower, and when I finally did, I somehow panicked and the cyber appeared in front of me and end of the story... I didn't know how to strafe or run at that time, so I kept shooting rockets at a looong distance and hiding. He was really intimidating.

 

Same when reaching DIS, the music was creepy and also didn't want to come out of the tower. Then I heard her, she was outside and I was inside, with no guts to get closer. The first  problem was that cacodemon and me refusing to learn to strafe lol. And then I saw a huge brain with metallic legs, I said nope... got drilled a hundred times before winning. Another intimidating monster.

 

With the IoS, all I can remember is it's ok to iddqd

 

You can also talk about bosses from the other games like Heretic or Hexen, or Strife maybe. 

[leodoom85]

Hey, when I played the SNES version of Doom (first time playing and knowing it) and encountered the Cyberdemon for the first time (all pixelated lol) and died from the rockets, which is even harder to see it, I was like this: O_O

Same for the mastermind and I didn't knew, of course, that the mastermind attacks you with that super chaingun...

I remember that moment the most when I was a kid....

[Cruduxy Pegg]

Cyberdemon : Wow that was intense, E3 is gonna be epic!

Spidermastermind : wait what that's it? what a garbage boss.

Icon Of Sin : god wtf is going on this is intense as hell. 

 

Iron Lich : Goddamn those things have nasty attacks.. and scary sprite.

Maulotaur : Don't step on the trails don't do it don't DEAD.

D'sparil : Best boss in any id 1 game imo. Still fun to fight from time to time. 

 

Chaos Wyvern : Meh wtf was that, more annoying than fun.

Heresiarch : OOoh the boss from heretic's ending! Wtf are those purple squares and cubes.. Oh my 4th weapon is op!(Was cleric)

Korax : Held m1 to win.. had no idea what I even did. Although after a death to the spikes in the middle and the crushers. But that basically sums the cleric's gameplay once you have wraithverge. 

 

 

[leodoom85]

8 minutes ago, Pegg said:

Heresiarch : OOoh the boss from heretic's ending! Wtf are those purple squares and cubes.. Oh my 4th weapon is op!(Was cleric)

I like the Heresiarch more than Korax. Fun fight, Korax is a piece of cake and the annoying teleportation of his....argh...

EDIT: Can you believe me that I died from those exploding cubes when I thought that was a pickup or something?.....hahahahaha

[Cruduxy Pegg]

I read about people dying to that enough times to know it happened to a lot of people haha.

[galileo31dos01]

33 minutes ago, Pegg said:

what a garbage boss

REGRET

 

Jk, besides, both Tower of Babel and DIS are incredibly easy once you have experience

[KVELLER]

...I don't remember.

 

I was so little at the time that I don't recall the very first time I encountered the bosses. I do remember being really damn scared about MAP30 though, and the unsettling music just made it worse. The worst part is that I didn't know how to beat the Icon of Sin, and that was the bigger source of terror for me.

[leodoom85]

For later bosses like the IoS, I had enough experience for defeating it, just like the bosses in Heretic, Hexen or Duke Nukem 3D for example. But the first time of playing it, even in consoles, was unforgettable for the experience of defeating a monster stronger than you and not knowing how to defeat it like in my case...

[The_MártonJános]

All I remember that I was dreadly restrained from even daring pressing any of the four switches in E2M8, because I thought they would revive the dead Barons.

[leodoom85]

OH....and what about E1M8? especially for that exit deadly trap and facing the first couple of barons....got fucking scared for the first time thinking that I was going to die :D

[Psyrus]

My first encounters were also of SNES Doom...

 

Barons:  The first thing I noticed was their green projectiles and how badly they hurt.  I think I remember dying after two hits shortly after hearing their roar.  As some of us know, the alert sound of monsters is also the roaming sound in SNES Doom.

 

Cyberdemon:  I roamed around the outside area for a while until I decided to retrace my steps.  I turned around just as the SNES rendition of Nobody Told Me About id started its percussion beat, saw a pixelated mass, then a rocket.

 

Spiderdemon/Spider Mastermind:  Anticlimatic.  Shot the BFG and it was dead.  Unsatisfied, I think I decided the next time to run circles around it to see what it did.

[galileo31dos01]

22 minutes ago, leodoom85 said:

OH....and what about E1M8? especially for that exit deadly trap and facing the first couple of barons....got fucking scared for the first time thinking that I was going to die :D

Oh yes, barons scared me too, and I repeated that exit a lot of times before understood that's how to exit the map lol

 

[Major Arlene]

i started off with the freeware version of DOOM, so I thought the barons were the bosses and had no idea what to do with them. boy, what innocent days those were. but yeah. both the big bosses scared the utter shit out of me.

[VOliver9]

When I got to...

E1M8: Spammed rocket launcher 

E2M8: I died about 10 times until I figured out how to circlestrafe

E3M8: Spammed BFG 

 

I never finished E4.

[Psyrus]

1 minute ago, galileo31dos01 said:

Oh yes, barons scared me too, and I repeated that exit a lot of times before understood that's how to exit the map lol

 

ITYTD:

 

Kill barons...

Walls lower...

Hit switch, stairs build...

Step on marble platform...

Two seconds of being attacked from all sides in a zero-light room...

Title screen.

 

"...uh, what?"

[ShoDemo]

Doom bosses:

I don't remember the Cyberdemon encounter much. I just went in and circlestrafed until I killed it. But I must have thought of him as a badass dangerous demon.

 

Then, the Mastermind is another story. I didn't use my BFG first time, because E2M8 taught me to use my Rocket Launcher (I was dumb). To me the Mastermind seemed like a Goliathan with a devastating weapon and I was being really careful in the encounter. So, I died a few times to the Spider and then I did my successful run.

I killed the rest of the monsters, I went to the pillar in the center I opened it and from there I played Peekaboo with the Mastermind. When I killed it, I found its death animation to be really sweet and I enjoyed having finished the game, after such a satisfying boss.

Then I played E4 and I noticed that it takes very few shots to kill the Mastermind with the BFG, so I thought it was lame.

 

The Icon of Sin angered me a bit, because I was trying to immediately land on the raising platform, while descending, after the switch activation. I never got that trick to work, but I then went down and I started wiggling around the platform, dodging as many projectiles as I could. In the end, I got it and it seemed as an ok boss.

 

Heretic bosses:

The Iron Liches were weird at first (even interesting looking you could say) and since I didn't know their attacks yet (other than the continuous firing of tornadoes), I took my Power tome and used it immediately on the Dragon's Claw. They died pretty quickly, but it was a bit of an annoying encounter for me, with the lava around the battlefield (I had to use the invulnerability ring).

Getting the Hell staff later made things really easy and with it powered up, an Iron Lich lasts mere seconds before its doom (sorry for the pun).  

 

Fun fact:

Spoiler

Do you know that Megadeth song called Tornado of Souls? At one point Mustaine says: "But now I am safe in the eye of the tornado"

Just don't listen to him, he is wrong! If you get hit by an Iron Lich's tornado, you are completely open from incoming attacks and there is a chance that you will die by the rest of the Iron Lich's spells.

 

Later, I faced the Maulotaurs. I said: "Pffft, yeah right! What are these cows going to do? They are really slow!"

*Maulotaur flies near me with his dash and I barely escaped*

"Ok, he has a few moves, but that doesn't mean he is scary or a hard boss."

*gets sandwiched by the ground attack of 2 Maulotaurs and dies*

"THAT'S IT!!! PREPARE TO FACE MY POWERED HELL STAFF YOU FILTHY UNDERLINGS!!!"

*hell staff spams for a long time (should have picked the powered Phoenix Rod instead) and kills the Maulotaurs*

"Now those were some bullet sponges!"

 

And for last, I faced off against D'Sparil, riding on his Chaos Serpent. He felt like a decent boss when I faced him with the Phoenix Rod, although his teleportations were somewhat annoying. But he looked and played nice overall.

 

Hexen bosses:

First, the Death Wyvern was a boss I hated, because not only did it do crazy damage, but also its projectiles decided the game was Bomberman instead of Hexen and they blew up after contact with the ground. This boss would be more efficient in bombarding compared to an F16 or some similar jets. I don't like it much and it gave me a hard time with the Cleric.

Then I beat it with the Fighter in the expansion and it died in less than a minute with the Hammer of Retribution.

 

Then followed Heressiarch. Believe it or not, I found Heressiarch to be excellently designed (what do you expect from someone who likes Dark Bishops?) and I may like him more than Korax for that.

At first, I was like: "Taste my Wraithverge!!!"

*fires and ghouls return back to me, killing me"

"What is this sorcery??? I need a new tactic!"

*pulls out flechettes and bombards Heressiarch, while firing the Wraithverge*

 

*Heressiarch disintegrates and earthquake happens*

"OH COOL!!! AN EARTHQUAKE IN ID TECH 1!!! I SHOULD GET OUT OF HERE FAST!!!"

*gets out of the building and witnesses an atomic explosion*

"WOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOW!!!"

 

Finally, Korax seemed like a total monstrosity (good job Raven) and I got him with a second try. I didn't enjoy that boss fight as much as D'Sparil, but I kinda liked the ending. His teleportations were somehow more annoying than D'Sparil's, even though D'Sparil teleported more frequently. And he surprised me with the damaging souls coming out of his corpse, while I was like: "OH NO, GET IN THE PORTAL, BEFORE YOU DIE!!!".

*gets in the portal and beats game*

"Phew! That was nice and tense!!!"

 

Strife bosses:

I have only played against the Programmer, so that doesn't make me the best person to talk about Strife's bosses.

[galileo31dos01]

Turns out, with the BFG, E3M8 is done in less than 6 seconds, pistol-starting is more complicated but not hard, and -fast is a little hard. There is no BFG in episode 2, so E2M8 takes some time but is easy in whichever way, only lost souls are distracting. I wonder what would have people think about the map if there was a BFG to carry on the second episode until the end.

 

About Heretic, when I first faced Iron Liches they killed me multiple times with that tornado attack. Malotaurs didn't even hit me once but I figured their attacks would be deadly so I always stayed far away from them. And D'Sparil took a long time but almost never hit by him. All of this already knowing the Doom mechanics, though Malotaurs usually killed me more than once in the later episodes. 

 

Hexen and Strife are still untouched. 

[leodoom85]

14 minutes ago, Psyrus said:

ITYTD:

 

Kill barons...

Walls lower...

Hit switch, stairs build...

Step on marble platform...

Two seconds of being attacked from all sides in a zero-light room...

Title screen.

 

"...uh, what?"

HAHAHA, I remember that too. If you finish it in the easiest skill, then you'll have the title screen. And I remember saying "I have to do this fucking thing again???....nope, tomorrow I'll do it"

XD

[ShoDemo]

1 minute ago, galileo31dos01 said:

Hexen and Strife are still untouched. 

You should definitely give them a try sometime in the future.  :)

They are quite unique with interesting settings and they differ in some aspects of the gameplay, compared to Doom.

At least try Hexen, because it is a total upgrade to Heretic. Everything got changed for the better and if you liked Heretic, you will most likely enjoy Hexen.

And Strife is very interesting for what it accomplished in id Tech 1. Plus it has a great story. 

[Cruduxy Pegg]

Hexen a total upgrade to heretic? That's really debatable :P.

[idbeholdME]

I don't remember how I felt after meeting most of them for the first time. The one I remember however, is D'Sparil. On Black plague possesses thee, he is absolutely insane. One of the toughest boss fights ever. Not because of him, but because of the rate at which he spawns his disciples. He is mostly annoying, because he avoids a lot of the damage you send his way with his teleports and the fight is basically a race against time to see if you can kill him before the disciple count reaches critical mass. Many hours have been spent, before I made my finally victorious attempt as one of the tens of disciples finished him off with a stray projectile. I couldn't even stop moving at that point, because I would die instantly to the wall of projectiles behind me and was one hit away from death. I didn't even notice he died at first.

 

The incessant spawning of minions was kind of annoying, but the feeling after he died was that much greater for it.

[ShoDemo]

Ok, that might have been a 30% exaggeration on my part.   :)

Heretic had some cool things too, like the monsters or all those projectile weapons and many well designed levels, but I still find it to be a "preview" for Hexen in a way. 

 

Its atmosphere is not as strong and the levels may feel too abstract. In Hexen, you know that you are fighting in realms once full of life and purpose, that are now utterly destroyed, by Korax and his minions. Plus, the enemies in Heretic are more or less bullet sponges, compared to Hexen, where enemies exist in a more balanced way. And to make things even more interesting, Hexen has RPG elements mixed in a good way with the FPS gameplay. The class system gave to the player gameplay choices. In Heretic, Corvus would probably be the equivalent of a Mage/Cleric, with some weak Fighter elements. And he is great. However, in Hexen you can be a Fighter or a Mage or a Cleric and in each case the weapons are viable to use, from start to finish. In Heretic I would never go with a melee only approach, because I only have a stick and the Gauntlets (those are cool) as available melee weapons. In Hexen though, even the Fighter's fist is useful and remains fun to use later.

 

But Hexen has its weaknesses too. First of all, it revolves around a lot of exploration and getting lost while searching for a switch or item, which might turn off many players from the start (I can't think of a more important reason to not like Hexen, than this one). Second, its bosses might in fact be worse than Heretic's bosses.

 

This is why I think Hexen has mostly improved Heretic's formula.

[ReX]

7 hours ago, Pegg said:

Spidermastermind : wait what that's it? what a garbage boss.

Agreed that, in the context of E3M8, it was a garbage boss. But, if used properly, it can be a devastating enemy (as I'm sure you're aware).

[Aldaraia]

Barons(shareware): probably the most memorable for me, since it was also one of the first times I was introduced to having my ass-whopped by a game in a relatively frank way. It took a few tries to overcome them, seeing as I'd run out of rockets or get killed by splash damage, succumb to their projectiles, get torn to shreds/blown up baiting them towards the barrels, and of course my one foolish attempt of hiding behind the barrels in the hopes that they wouldn't see/reach me.

 

Cyberdemon (Doom2): Before I even met the boss in game, I vividly remember being distressed from its description in the included level guidebook - specifically the sentence about how much damage those rockets did.

MAP08 - cornered by Barons, the Cyberdemon was harmless and instead helped me to save a bunch of ammo. With the presence of invulnerability spheres, there was no real fight.

MAP20 - My first open battle with the Spider Mastermind and the Cyberdemon. The latter killed me without hesitation. The rockets were worse than I had read. Swift, and damaging to the point that reloading would be the worry rather than hunting for medkits. Once the two started infighting, the collapse of the big-brained spider only made the Cyberdemon appear even more fearsome, as it would then proceed to swat me like a fly. I'm not sure the first time I actually beat it, but it was quite an imposing monster and had the worst trouble dodging those rockets. 

 

Spider Mastermind(Doom2): Pretty laughable considering it was accompanied by something who happened to be a Cyberdemon. Rather than knowing it to be the final boss in Doom, I first saw it as that boss who was quickly put in its place by a superior threat, inevitably becoming rocket fodder. Ever since, I've always had trouble taking the Spider Mastermind seriously, and despite its size, it's one of the least imposing monsters in Doom for me - although those bullets really can hurt after awhile.

[galileo31dos01]

51 minutes ago, Aldaraia said:

Spider Mastermind(Doom2): Pretty laughable considering it was accompanied by something who happened to be a Cyberdemon. Rather than knowing it to be the final boss in Doom, I first saw it as that boss who was quickly put in its place by a superior threat, inevitably becoming rocket fodder. Ever since, I've always had trouble taking the Spider Mastermind seriously, and despite its size, it's one of the least imposing monsters in Doom for me - although those bullets really can hurt after awhile.

I invite you to see this:

 

 

Gotcha just doesn't doesn't do justice for her, even though my first time watching the show it ended up in a draw

[Aldaraia]

To be fair, she's no pushover in close range/open ground. The level just didn't leave me with the best impression of the SM, which is somewhat due to my all earliest memories involving the level being those of deaths by rockets.   

[Cruduxy Pegg]

Well if the cyber is a bit further away the mastermind is going to get destroyed. Also it is hilarious to see an arachnotron solo their mom\father. 

[RightField]

When first arriving at e2m8 as a kid I though each button would resurrect a baron so that the boss was basically 4 of em in a tight room. That scared me to death, then I saw the real boss and was terrified and like "okay this is impossible".

 

the spiderdemon I just hugged with the bfg. zzz.

[LordShadowZ]

The Cyberdemon in MAP10 Refueling Base always terrified me as a kid with its teleporting and it's ludicrous damage output.

The Spider Mastermind on MAP06 The Crusher was a joke because of the crusher.

 

By the time I finally played Ultimate Doom years later, E2M8 and E3M8 weren't threatening at all.

[Fuzzball]

When I first met them I was anxious but really I think they are a nice couple! Sure they have their spats but to be honest it was a pleasure to have tea and cake- the Mastermind makes a really good Victoria sponge and the Cyberdemon knows how to put on a good conversation! Would visit them again for sure- really enjoyed it~!