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IronmanMutinyHC.zip Category 1 Dead on MAP02 with 56 kills. Mutiny's been on my backlog for a while, so this was a great opportunity to finally give it a try. Brutal stuff, but really good-looking and sounding. After revisiting it with saves and exploring up to MAP05, I'm probably going to drop down from skill 4 for the rest to see if that salves the constant restrictions on ammo & health & space. Even the aggravating stuff is undeniably polished, though. As always, thanks for organizing events and creating these prompts to try stuff out and get killed by it. :)

IEabyssHMPhc.zip Category: 1 Difficulty: HMP Dead on MAP09 with 7 kills. I probably should have tried on UV instead; combat seems very mild with the focus instead being on exploration & puzzle-solving. This levelset quickly trains you to check your map and be aware of all the secret passages within the walls of these castles. I'm not a big fan of hiding secret doors by making them completely indistinguishable from the surrounding walls, with no hints or clues, but I have to admit that this levelset succeeded at making the Computer Area Map feel like a real treasure because of how it opened up progression by revealing those hidden paths. Plus, the E1 maps were all small & concise enough that working out the next puzzle solution was never too much of a chore. For a 1995 WAD, that was actually pretty fun. Cool pick for this month.

Limit-Removing megawads: Both CPD and Uprising by Cheesewheel 25 Years On Earth by Phobus Scythe 2 by Erik Alm NOVA & NOVA II - Episode-length WADs: Return To Hadron episodes 1, 2, & 3 by cannonball Demonic Deviation by cannonball Glaive 1, 2, & 3 by EANB Tangerine Nightmare (except for MAP08) ...Pretty much every Doomer Boards Project.

https://dsdarchive.com/wads/oatb Filling some blank spots in the UV-Speed table for Oops All Techbase. Some levels were too cramped or too deadly for me, but there was a good handful that were really fun to try to run right through. Overall I enjoyed this set. MAP01 Time: 1:46 - oatb01s146.zip MAP03 Time: 3:47 - oatb03s347.zip MAP04 Time: 1:55 - oatb04s155.zip MAP15 Time: 1:41 - oatb15s141.zip MAP16 Time: 5:32 - oatb16s532.zip MAP19 Time: 3:28 - oatb19s328.zip MAP25 Time: 20:09 - oatb25s2009.zip

Ironman_sgnsym_hc.zip Category 1 Dead on E1M1 with 97 kills. After the customary sacrifice of a marine, I went back with saves to see what I'd missed. After getting halfway through the set, I think that's it's very rude, but have to admit that it's actually pretty funny with how it delivers its predicaments. Cool pick for this month.

Bauul is correct in how Hell Revealed 1 & 2 are regarded as the primordial ooze from which the modern idea of slaughtermaps took shape. Certain maps in Kama Sutra qualify as well. The hard limits on the size of the space (and the number of visible sprites at once) mean that it's not commonly done in vanilla, but there are a few examples I can think of: MAP26 of Down The Drain: "Everyone Loves The Beach" by Benjogami MAP28 of Oops, All TechBase: "Corporate Mandated Singularity" by Egg Boy MAP31 of Back To Saturn X Episode 2: "Fireking Says No Cheating" by Joshy, esselfortium, & dew

Here's some musings on that question from 2021: discussions on its style & tone (plus its place in history) and how The Plutonia Experiment got its (overblown) infamous reputation.

I had such a good time building routes for the main three episodes that I figured I might as well complete the set and make a PB for Thy Flesh Consumed as well. Ultimate Doom Episode 4 UV-Speed in 20:06 ep4-2006.zip

IEadonis_HMP_hc.zip Category: 1 Difficulty: HMP Dead on MAP04 with 164 kills.

Ironman_dm2purge_HC.zip Category 1 Dead on MAP14 with 75 kills Y'know, if you hadn't told me that this WAD was from 1995, I don't think I'd have guessed. The texturing & lighting - while nothing spectacular - are quite competent, and the balance between the enemy attrition & the resources provided was actually quite entertaining. I'll definitely be giving this one a replay with saves to redeem myself and at least reach the main ending at the end of MAP15.

Rebirth takes the "techbase-city-hell" premise of Doom 2 and recasts the journey in a distinctly Plutonic light. Everything's more concise and generally sharper than the ordinary id standard - the levels are short but the traps are punchy. It's sometimes too symmetrical, and sometimes the progression can be obtuse, but each level occupies such a small footprint that it's never too much trouble to unlock each area and keep adventuring through. Plus, it's a fun campaign with a great balance between traps & treasure, bane & boon. It's my understanding that the UV settings have much more ammo austerity than the other settings do; it makes for an entertaining ride in Continuous mode because of that eternal conundrum of whether to go into the next area with one of your heavy weapons ready to fire (and risk wasting ammo) or whether to rely on one of the bullet or shell weapons instead (and risk taking an HP hit instead), but one drawback to that approach is that the Pistol Start setups can get a bit tricky. I had a great time solving all these resource puzzles, and present the maze solutions I came up with as a series of -complevel 2 demos recorded in Crispy Doom.

I really enjoy the monthly Ironman competitions: I find them to be a great resource for trying out new WADs and I like how they fit with the mischievous and mean-spirited nature of Doom. It's kind of therapeutic to check my ego at the door and accept that it's going to get me, and just read the encounters, make my plays, & do the best I can in the moment. There's one that I actually did feel sore about, though: one of the first ones I ever did back in 2020. Not all MAP01 deaths are created equal: there's a semi-common tradition in hard WADs to make the entryway just a sheer impenetrable wall, a thematic "GET OUT" so that players who haven't acquired a taste for this will immediately spit it out. But that's not what I'm talking about in this case. Eviternity wanted a smooth ramping up over the course of its episodes; it wanted to give the player the space to get used to the mouse sensitivity, get used to the speed of acceleration & deceleration and get calibrated and in the zone. So when I was ignominiously chewed up by hitscanners before I'd found a single health or armor cache, I felt pretty ashamed that it was over before I'd even gotten started.

https://www.doomworld.com/idgames/levels/doom2/Ports/d-f/ddev https://doomwiki.org/wiki/Demonic_Deviation A limit-removing WAD by cannonball. 11 maps. Use -complevel 2 Suggested file code is ddevXXYYZZ (where X is the map number, Y is the category, and Z is the time.) When NaZa selected this WAD for the March 2023 DWIronman League competition, he mentioned that there weren't yet any demos for it in the DSDA's database, and how something this fun definitely deserved some attention. I agreed with that sentiment, so I decided to fill in the UV-Speed table. MAP01 Time: 0:52 - ddev01spd52.zip MAP02 Time: 0:30 - ddev02spd30.zip MAP03 Time: 1:58 - ddev03spd158.zip MAP04 Time: 1:42 - ddev04spd142.zip MAP05 Time: 4:12 - ddev05spd412.zip MAP06 Time: 2:25 - ddev06spd225.zip MAP07 Time: 9:47 - ddev07spd947.zip MAP08 Time: 7:49 - ddev08spd749.zip MAP09 Time: 4:31 - ddev09spd431.zip MAP10 Time: 12:59 - ddev10spd1259.zip MAP11 Time: 4:41 - ddev11spd441.zip

IEmayhem19HNTRhc.zip Category: 1 Difficulty: HNTR Dead on MAP01 with 35 kills.

MalevolenceIronmanHC.zip Category 1 Dead on MAP01 with 64 kills. After jumping back in with saves and playing a bit more, it seems rather scarce on health supplies. I'm a fan of Cheesewheel's stuff, but this is one which I'll be turning down a notch or two when I give it a proper playthrough.