rd speedmaps (19 Boom-format maps so far)

I'd just like to say here that I beat your 12th map. Probably no-one cares, but I do so there. :P Having massive traps behind every weapon pickup is kind of obnoxious after a while, but considering the brevity of the experience it doesn't matter too much in this case. Good map otherwise, very hectic.

Obsidian said:

I'd just like to say here that I beat your 12th map. Probably no-one cares, but I do so there. :P Having massive traps behind every weapon pickup is kind of obnoxious after a while, but considering the brevity of the experience it doesn't matter too much in this case. Good map otherwise, very hectic.

I care. :D

--

Here's a tiny plasma-centric breather map. Was conceived as a three-hour birthday speedmap but I might as well post it here since it fits in with my intended breather map "arc". No changes since then except for beefing up the last fight a bit. Has HMP and UV.

http://www.mediafire.com/download/34u1chuc0bs6cq6/JMBM.wad

Managed to catch up by playing through 11-14 in reverse order. Sorry, I don't have many well formed thoughts in my head right now, but I enjoyed each map. FDAs

11 was remarkably nasty with some of those traps. Even when expecting a claustrophobic scramble, the the switch fake-out in the tiny closet was brutal and caught me off guard. Making sure the player only has 20 cells for the green teleporter was a nice touch. I was very grateful to find that little pack at the back of the room, even if I didn't take full advantage of the opportunity.

12 seemed quite straightforward in a run around like a headless chicken and let the monsters sort themselves out kind of a way. I got remarkably lucky with the archviles and cyberdemon rockets.

The weird spider mastermind conveyor belt in 13 was very amusing. I think I found the safest place to stand at the start of the map, though it could have easily been my downfall if a stronger enemy were to pop out of those teleporters. The teleporting revenant at the start of the yellow skull key gauntlet was a good indicator that walls would lower and stuff would be teleporting behind the player. For a moment I was concerned that I had somehow missed the rocket launcher given the trail of ammo crates.

14 was a good time but the first half felt very different from everything else seen thusfar. Playing methodically and clearing out the snipers seemed to take any sting out of the mud pit and overall it was far more of a breather than than anything in 13. On the other hand, the second half of the map was a real scramble. I'm really glad that charging forward paid off, though it looked like it wouldn't.

http://www.mediafire.com/download/ojjbr1mhdp5do24/15b.wad

Not a breather map.



Old version for FDA compat:

koren said:

11 was remarkably nasty with some of those traps. Even when expecting a claustrophobic scramble, the the switch fake-out in the tiny closet was brutal and caught me off guard. Making sure the player only has 20 cells for the green teleporter was a nice touch. I was very grateful to find that little pack at the back of the room, even if I didn't take full advantage of the opportunity.

This had me expecting more than 2 deaths. :p

heyo. fun map. fda with saves and a death or two: https://www.mediafire.com/?4u9q2t2b1h8fvhm

hectic start, though the spaciousness (or mob sparsity, rather) does accentuate the piecemeal nature of the layout. Texture scheme is nice, a comparison to sunlust 14/15 is unavoidable :p. the blocky rock structures are pretty distinct though, I also really like the large-scale "macro" structure of the natural area.

the arenas were good as well, the crusher use is mostly superfluous but I like it. the RSK is probably my favorite, very cool setup there. btw vile sprites clip through 64x64 pillars, so some of the surprise was gone. a notable design trope throughout this map (and a few of the others) are timed multi-part fights, ey. I like it for the most part, because the player is constantly on edge because the encounters aren't "what you see is what you get" (feel like I already posted this exact thing earlier, but ohwell), though the YSK viles were a little dickish.

surprised there are so many maps here. enjoyed em all, owing partially to how many of the design sensibilities are similar to my own preferences. I'm curious to see what direction these go in.. (assuming these keep going)

Brutal map. Here's an fda attempt that got about two thirds of the way through & my first successful exit after a break and some experimentation.

Vague notes:
- Liking the use of invisibility orbs combined with the mancubus. They suddenly become very dangerous and you have to react to where they're shooting rather than doing the normal autopilot dodge.
- Saw the switch in the slime on the automap and took a gamble. I'm glad it was a teleporter and not a lowering platform.
- Those chaingunners overlooking the valley are brutal. I had a lot of trouble hitting the ones at the top of the platform for some reason. Though it might just be me because being invisible makes figuring out where the centre of the screen is a bit more difficult.
- The red key room is a nice set piece, though very easy to get out of safely and dismantle. The arachnotron doesn't really act as an effective barrier unlike the mancubus by the ssg or guarding the yellow teleporter.
- That chaingunner closet when you flip the two switches was sneaky. First time I encountered it I took about 70 damage and almost died.

ty both. I made the RSK area harder to escape, because it's my favorite fight too.

All skill levels are implemented, for the few non-hardcore players (like me) who follow this thread.

I'll probably start using cl-1 to record FDAs for some people's maps. ;)

http://www.mediafire.com/download/ojjbr1mhdp5do24/15b.wad

http://www.mediafire.com/download/djic2tckr83k7zo/16b.wad



edit: HNTR/HMP are calibrated now.

interesting layout between encounters, almost thought I had broken the progression or something.

here's a rather shit cl9 demo with saves: https://www.mediafire.com/?tpmij9al9hu81p8 I end up cheesing the RK area I went into by getting AV blasted out of it. Demo dies a lot, I should play more and map less I guess, I'm getting fairly bad at this game now -.-

seems balanced well enough, only encounter I didn't like (I went back to check out the areas I missed after recording that ^^) was the ssg. the idea was good but it felt disproportionately difficult compared to the other areas, or maybe I'm just bitter because it took me several deaths before figuring out where the cyb was coming from :p, because ssg is given away later it almost seems like it was intended to be skipped then revisited with a BFG or something. rest was enjoyably cramped and brutal. glowy circle room was neat.

A boxing Day FDA & a maxdemo that covers both key paths.

-I managed to take the sting out of the ssg trap by not firing a shot until a pain elemental waddled into view and threatened to make things complicated.
-The circular island fight was cool. I didn't even notice the extra few diamonds of safe space to fight on until I went to record a maxdemo.
- If you leave the starting revenants alive there's a very precise position in the circle where you can finish them off. It's just before the end of auto-aim range and not so close that it hits the barrier. Leaving them alive was not a good time.
- Glad I didn't take the rev/cyberdemon red key fight first. If the cyberdemons don't play nice it's really easy to get boxed in. The crescent of zombiemen that opens up when you go for the cells was very non-threatening and required no real attention.
- The threat of the other red key fight primarily comes from viles. If you save one cell shot and neutralise them quickly, there's not much else to pressure the player.

Balance conundrum: I guess the warp-in AVs in the first SSG area can go on a scrolling floor, but the start of the map actually seems more fun when it's easier (pacifisted). That means the three-AV RK wing should actually be harder*, maybe with five AVs and/or stronger fodder monsters. But that would make pacifisting the earlygoing practically obligatory (for sanity purposes) and UV difficulty somewhat "obscure". I guess I can just Leave It In (TM), since it's a speedmap.


*The intention was for this part to be somewhat easy if you go through the trouble of getting the optional early BFG. It plays much harder if you only have the RL (and pretend that AV jumps are impossible -- the barrier should have been higher).

http://www.mediafire.com/download/1x58d121k75904d/16_alt.wad

The fix is actually really fast, so I guess it doesn't violate the sanctity of what's considered a "speedmap". Just posting it here in case I decide it should replace 16b.

--

I'm probably going to start making more moderate-difficulty (on the lower end of "hard") three or four fight maps with some unifying progression concept (like #6 in this set) or clever use of space or something like that.

The release of How to Train your Pet Cyber taught me that people willing to play on HNTR/HMP are rare (and thus quite valuable). I'm assuming the thread got few responses because UV (and even HMP) are very hard until things are figured out, not because the map sucks, because people would have said that the map sucks, right? :(

But it's not to appeal to more people's UV sensibilities. It's mostly that these six-hour jobs (not including time put into SLADEwork and post-release tweaks) are extremely exhausting. :)

rdwpa said:

http://www.mediafire.com/download/1x58d121k75904d/16_alt.wad
I'm assuming the thread got few responses because UV (and even HMP) are very hard until things are figured out, not because the map sucks, because people would have said that the map sucks, right? :(

Of course they don't suck, played and enjoyed almost all of those maps here, i'm just a post-lazy moron -.-'

Yeah I meant only HtTyPC.

It's often difficult to garner a particularly large initial response to a single map in general (especially one in a pre-release state by a relatively new author), all stylistic considerations aside. Hell, I'm pretty damned guilty of that myself--for years and years I've always found myself much more readily drawn to mapsets than to single maps, perhaps signifying a gluttonous temperament, I suppose. Whatever the case, lots of other folks seem to be just the same way, for good or for ill, and so one tack you might take is to stretch your usual modus operandi a little, maybe doing 3-4 speedmaps in a more or less loosely coherent theme and then presenting them together, rather than serializing them one at a time.

That being said, sometimes time and the stamp of 'completeness' are all it takes--both Crumpets and Swift Death, popular/successful recent WADs both, got a pretty limited (public) response while they were in beta too, as I recall. ;)

FDA for the latest version (I think) of map 16, BTW. I guess I know which cluster of which mapset this was loosely inspired by....

Quite liked the island/poison fight, and the use of broad circular windows across dead airspace in the second of the RK fights is devious/ingenious as well. My success in the first SSG/BFG fight was sheer idiot luck--turns out if you don't intentionally do what I accidentally did to distract the viles there, that fight's a fucking nightmare, might make the soulsphere there a megasphere instead, at least for difficulties below UV.

The elevated caco-cave overlooking the island fight would be a good place for a little secret, methinks--maybe another armor vest or perhaps a berserk pack to give a player a shot at starting one of the RK fights at 200% health, might also help with the ammo balance in a ledgewalking alternate route that either skips the first SSG/BFG fight or saves it for later. I was thinking the same thing about having another SSG on the island itself (since again, the ledgewalking 'sequence break' at the start of the map is so obvious that a lot of folks will probably try it), but I dunno, maybe that's going a little too far in the direction of marine-friendliness?

I've been meaning to include more secrets, but I guess it's the main thing the time limit has made me punt -- now that I'm no longer ignoring lighting ;).

The mix of influences are:

-- Speed of Doom map31, where the main structural texture was compblue, which I thought was awesome.
-- A Ribbiksian layout style (a lot of my more recent speedmaps have traces of this, if not wholesale borrowings -- his compact layouts lend themselves well to smaller maps).
-- Overall large-scale ideas from Danne's Sunlust fight style in some places.

That demo is absolutely hilarious. The caco-HK simultaneous infight kill probably takes the cake.

http://www.mediafire.com/download/767cd0d4mqqloeh/17.wad



Has all skill levels. The next map will be simple/easy :).

Skill 4 FDA for map 17.

Fun one. Both total chaos and minutely detailed choreography have their place, but if you demanded I pick just one I'd probably choose the former. The last gimmick battle is cheeky as hell, but it's only a problem if you panic, overthink it, or have just plain terrible luck, I suppose.

I'm not sure that allowing the player to snipe away at the first cyberdemon with impunity is a good idea, though. Also reckon that the distribution of the warp-in spheres could use a bit of retooling, maybe have one of the megaspheres appear up top, and perhaps one of the soulspheres appear elsewhere as well. As is it's really, really easy to squander them when they're all piled up together.

heyo, it's an invasion map.

cl9 fda: https://www.mediafire.com/?wpid28xdap9aux4 dies a few times, eventually beats it.

pro:
- nice compact layout, includes enough LoS and height differences to make it interesting when flooded with mobs
- good pacing, you're always just about done with previous wave when next one starts, and the waves seem to get incrementally close together, escalating in intensity
- final fight is funny. I take a straight rocket to the face before realizing how wide you have to dodge to ensure the invis-rng doesn't end up hitting you. definitely a fun gimmick to experiment with.

con:
- the spheres getting doled out on top of eachother is kinda eh
- speedmappyness aside, flood-filling with horizontal bars doesn't look very good to me :p

fda. another fun map. not much more to say that hasn't already been said!

- the map was very generous with the soulspheres. you can use them to absorb a lot of silly damage/mistakes and sledgehammer through the first few waves of monsters.
- the chaingunner sitting on his own on that little ledge was very cheeky.
- towards the end, the flood of cacodemons, hell knights and the distribution of viles makes things very chaotic and puts pressure on the player to carve some space with the bfg, which is cool.
-it was a welcome relief to be able to see the final arena and mentally prepare before going in. stood in stark contrast to the scramble that dominates the majority of the map. fighting a cyberdemon with an invisibility orb is always immensely stressful and gives me flashbacks to being bullied by map27 of scythe.

http://www.mediafire.com/download/eb0ls9sxusksmvj/18.wad



Not quite as simple/easy as I had planned, but not complex/brutal. Has all difficulties.

FDA. Not sure what metric you're going by, because that felt pretty damn brutal and the fights had enough angles of attack to require some improvisation.

- The zombiemen at the start didn't seem to do anything. I can't remember them doing any damage to me, even when I sat right in front of their pillars.
- The pain elementals took an arena that requires precision and confidence and throws it into absolute chaos. I liked it.
- I liked the look of the honeycomb platforms at the end. they reminded me of hive mother, which also started with four revenants pinning the player into a corner.

another fda for the pile (cl9+saves): https://www.mediafire.com/?kt951kch7ohospg a few deaths, mostly because I'm apparently inept at not falling off the play area.

as is common with such multi-part fights: jarring and difficult on first attempts, easy/medium difficulty once you know what happens. was fun overall. only thing that I felt wore out its welcome was the caco-swarm, a few too many perhaps, at the risk of copy-pasting from the previous fight replacing a few cacos with a PE would increase their spatial threat while reducing ssg cleanup time. liked the exit.

koren said:

FDA. Not sure what metric you're going by, because that felt pretty damn brutal and the fights had enough angles of attack to require some improvisation.

- The zombiemen at the start didn't seem to do anything. I can't remember them doing any damage to me, even when I sat right in front of their pillars.
- The pain elementals took an arena that requires precision and confidence and throws it into absolute chaos. I liked it.
- I liked the look of the honeycomb platforms at the end. they reminded me of hive mother, which also started with four revenants pinning the player into a corner.

I think zombiemen are inherently funny, which explains some of my usage of them.

The parallels to "Hive Mother" are a bit eerie -- I hadn't got that far in Sunder yet.

Ribbiks said:

only thing that I felt wore out its welcome was the caco-swarm, a few too many perhaps

Hey what's this, an "episodic" texture theme? It's possible I'll make a wad out of this after all. ;)

BGM is a placeholder. Medium-sized map.

http://www.mediafire.com/download/7353d459s96okfr/19b.wad



Going on a mapping spree because I settled some long-standing philosophical issues about what I want my maps to play like (not the issue about set pieces I mentioned in the Sunlust DMWC).

Old:

cl9, saves, couple deaths, yada yada: https://www.mediafire.com/?q7ynefix0397iaa

misc comments:
- I imagine weapon switching at the start can get a bit frustrating if the hitscanners don't play nice.
- some of the hp was a tad obtrusive, notably along the BK route, it seemed to always be in the way of switches
- shells along BK route felt a bit excessive, but I'm guessing that's to account to the AVs making a rez-mess out of the caco/rev room
- the 3AVs pushing you into the canyon area along RK route is a cool idea, a bit abrupt, and mostly dumb luck that I made it through that without dying. For lower difficulty settings it might be nice to have an extra second to process what's going on before getting fried x3, could be done by removing the imps on the opposite side, or moving the AVs back a tad. just a thought.

Nice map, here's a ponderous FDA where I manage to get myself lost and bump into lots of fireballs and archvile blasts.


- Liked the use of 3 viles to force the player to push into the unknown, for resources & cover to fight in. I was hurting for shells, but I think I totally wasted at least one box earlier on.
- The lift going back up to the blue armour had a frustratingly long delay, not necessarily a bad thing. However, given how the trigger for the secret is a walkover indicated by a health vial, I was sure that it would be some kind of a one time deal and i'd missed out.
- The teleporter for the imps in the yellow skull key area seemed rather slow. I think a couple never made out of their closet.

Here are my FDAs for all 19 maps thus far uploaded on my Mediafire due to filesize going over forum limit.

Very nice HR/Scythe/SOD maps over all, they were more difficult then I originally anticipated which I felt strange since last I recall you like to FDA other peoples maps but not on UV xD

Here's a short summary from what I remember:

1 - Nice opener, uses pain sectors to restrict your movement and tele ambushes for close quarter encounters.

2 - Crimson cave with close encounters unveiled through teleporter traps, has a SOD feel to the encounters.

3 - Dangerous map with high tier enemies in closet traps, accidently missed the SSG after several fails wondering why the map is particularly difficult haha!

4 - Claustrophobic cave with cramped set piece encounters, seems more minimal on ammo, the teleporter into the central fight with AV's on sides is very reminiscent of a Death-Destiny setup.

5 - Cool courtyard styled map with the ominious last track of Scythe X, not as difficult compared to the previous, well crafted boats!

6 - Lethal claustrophobic cave with group encounters and minimal room and cover, the AV's make the subsequent fights fatal in this regard if you don't think fast.

7 - Hard map with a quirky tune and an azure night sky, first encounter is annoying if infights don't happen immediately. Terrible placement of those death pits in the central area after falling off one of the 4 corners, you can't see them or predict where to land so you'll inevitably die unless you hurl yourself off in a sproadic manner, please don't do this mappers :>

8 - Holy BBQ this map is nuts, how fitting with the SWTW tune lel. Outside area is crazy with the fireball hell and no real cover, becomes a problem when the Revenants teleport in for the last wave and your pretty screwed, amusing hardcore exit.

9 - Nasty HR/SOD set piece slaughter, the struggle was real!

10 - Awesome space station setting with a Vanguard vibe due to the grey textures, nasty beginning with the Berserk and Revenants, sprawling through the subsequent rooms is tricky with evading monsters in close quarters, very surprised I survived the BK without the SSG haha!

11 - Cool interior space station thingy map with Scythe X tunes, the amount of Revs at the start seems overkill, too unreliable to get past them or stand your ground, didn't like the corner trap with the bars raised, pretty luck based as you need monsters to infight immediately or not overrun you or you'll get trapped, laughed at the duel AV trap blasting me out of the window.

12 - Awesome HR/SOD outdoor slaughter and surprisingly on the easy side, fun, action packed carnage.

13 - Cool metallic map with a Sunder 11 or Italo 16 vibe, interesting encounters while challenging don't seem overboard, the finale seems like a let down however with the abundance of 3 Megasphere, I was surprised at the BFG placement right next to the exit as I expected a trap so I didn't take it till the end.

14 - Cool outdoor map with balls to the wall plasma soaked carnage, perplexing choice in texturing, particularly the mud texture which seems out of place somehow. Awesome Lego themed ending arena.

15 - Very hard beasty, split into 2 demos as I accidently exited at one point. I don't like the YK area due to the absence of armor or a Soulsphere, it makes it a grueling ordeal where you have to be very careful not to get hit just to survive the AV's which come out later and it isn't always reliable tackling the room given monster movement.

16 - Hard map, feels like high tier SOD with the very close quarters + horde encounters, no genuine complaints about balance however.

17 - Awesome one room gauntlet with constant waves of incrementally tougher beasties, forces you to keep hammering away at the current horde before the next arrival to avoid being overrun, liked the balanced distribution of ammo and health .

18 - Tricky bastard outdoor map, beginning is hard with utilizing the pillars for cover from the AV's as they have to be in the right place at the right time to avoid being plastered by everything else. The biggest threat from the BK encounter is being blasted out of the arena by the AV's ironically, finale doesn't seem to bad if you don't panic and mind your footing.

19 - A nice return to a caverny map, tough beginning with the hitscanners in particular, subsequent rooms have high tier enemies in your face with little room to move, Mancubie and HK cavern encounter is intimidating with the absence of space. NE Honeycomb area is definitely on the easy side and could use toning up.

Hey, thanks for the stream/FDAs/writeups. <3

I FDA most people's maps on UV except for Ribbiks's.