Brigandine [RC2, updated 2017-05-13]

Viggles said:

....

EDIT: Did anyone miss or nearly-miss the rocket launcher during their playthrough? Should that be signposted better, or perhaps marked as a secret?

I missed it, huh.

Great level! Awesome texture usage and architecture! Good gameplay except the AV rush. I died many times on UV. But I'm not a good player though.

Finally got some free time and . . . whoah! I totally love this map. This is really flat-out awesome. I thought it was a bit on the easy side since I only died about 8 times -- 4 at the final Archie fight -- but the gameplay was consistently engaging, the setpieces well-planned and beautifully staged. There was a tremendous amount of health, so depending on how you want to pitch this, if you want it nastier you could easily remove 25% of the health, maybe more. Then again, maybe you want this pitched to fast-paced aggressive play where elite Doomers can just attack this thing with all-out fury. In any case, I'm not really complaining. Another thing of course is that most of the setpieces can be defused by simply running away. I tend to prefer locking players into the big battles, but giving escape options is fun, too. And in several cases, you placed additional forces in previously safe areas to attack fleeing players, such as the Mancs at the exit.

I found 2 secrets -- the Zerk at the beginning and the BFG. I was unable to acquire the Blue Armor or the Backpack. My compliments on making the progress a bit puzzly but not annoyingly so.

In terms of gameplay, this is damned good work, but in terms of appearance, this is a masterpiece. It's like a 1-map highlight reel of awesomeness, but instead of being showy it's all perfectly integrated into a unified whole. I hardly know what to choose as my favorite part, but the Hanging Victims in Cages is a very strong contender. I loved all the curving stairways, the verticality, the parkour opportunities, the lighting, the expert use of beams to suggest structure while also serving as eye-candy. I could just go on and on, but I think you get the idea. I know this map is going to influence my work. Thanks for getting tired of having it sit on your hard drive. ;)

And another thing . . . make more maps!!!!!! :)

Edit:I got the Rocket Launcher. I would have liked it earlier but it was kinda fun to figure out the pathing.

❤️ Happy valentine's day! ❤️

Breach has been updated to beta2: http://doom.washboardabs.net/brigandine/brigandine-latest.zip
Textfile and changelog here: http://doom.washboardabs.net/brigandine/brigandine.txt

This version fixes broken traps in PrBoom+ on complevel 2, reworks many of the fights (especially the milquetoast final encounter) to make them more interesting and harder to run from, fixes some visual and gameplay bugs, rebalances health and weapon pickups, and makes a few switches more obvious. There's also a couple new things to find.

If you'd previously played through beta1 on complevel 2 (tourniquet and Wilou did at least), please give this beta a go: the level was pretty busted before, and the fixes and changes make the second half much more interesting to play. For everyone else, there's enough new here that if you were thinking of another playthrough then wait no longer! I'd really appreciate feedback on the encounter changes.

Short any new bugs or difficulty problems, this will be the version that gets submitted to idgames I think.

Thanks heaps for the praise and the detailed feedback, SteveD!

SteveD said:

There was a tremendous amount of health, so depending on how you want to pitch this, if you want it nastier you could easily remove 25% of the health, maybe more. Then again, maybe you want this pitched to fast-paced aggressive play where elite Doomers can just attack this thing with all-out fury. In any case, I'm not really complaining. Another thing of course is that most of the setpieces can be defused by simply running away. I tend to prefer locking players into the big battles, but giving escape options is fun, too.

Beta2 addresses this to some extent - there's a little less health on UV, and I rejigged several fights to catch players who try to run away and snipe. On the whole though, I'd prefer that the item balance would encourage players to get rowdy and reckless and dive into the fray without worrying too much. (That's why there's generous health crumbs in the berserk cave for instance: so you can run around Tysoning it up instead of finding a corner and shotgunning everyone. Because who doesn't love punching imps to pieces?)

Part of this is the freedom to withdraw and reengage a fight from a different vantage point; I find it hard to enable that without also enabling players to simply run away, or camp in a doorway and snipe. But if a player wants to play that way, well, that's on them. I'd rather that people play aggressively because it's fun than because they keep getting locked in.

Viggles said:

Thanks heaps for the praise and the detailed feedback, SteveD!
(That's why there's generous health crumbs in the berserk cave for instance: so you can run around Tysoning it up instead of finding a corner and shotgunning everyone. Because who doesn't love punching imps to pieces?)

You know, I loved that encounter. I did exactly what you wanted. I punched out both Revvies, most of the Imps, all of the Pinkies and Spectres and even some of the hitscanners. Keep in mind, I'm a keyboarder and not a great player by any means, but with all that health lying around, I could tank some damage. Besides, it was so easy to dodge around columns of rock to evade homing rockets that I ended up tanking very little damage anyway. I only needed maybe 3 or 4 stimpacks in that whole fight. I had so much fun, and the beautiful staging and atmosphere of that area added immeasurably to the experience.

So yeah, no complaints here. Your approach is fine with me.

So I eventually got round to trying this last night, and wow, that was really good! incredibly polished and professional made mod, only played it on normal but defintely going to be replaying on UV! It did feel a little short on ammo in some spots but that could of just been me

About to go try out Breach now! :)

Nice to hear! :)

Doktor Mandrake said:

It did feel a little short on ammo in some spots but that could of just been me

Could you maybe describe which spots, and which weapons you had at the time? Also, were you playing the beta2 I posted today, or the previous version?

Man, I love this map! Good to know it's updated. This demo is the least thing i can do for you. Usually I like to rush through every part of this map like a suicide soldier taking every hit, every med, every ammo, every possible route and so on, but in this demo I was trying to survive in awkward way and avoid the inevitable, lol. I hope it will help you somehow

Thanks for the demo, that was a lot of fun to watch! Looks like my encounter changes worked well, though I was vexed that you managed to avoid triggering the red key pickup encounter. (It fired later anyway when you used the red key, and I figure players will only manage what you did if they're consciously trying to break it.)

Viggles said:

Thanks for the demo, that was a lot of fun to watch! Looks like my encounter changes worked well, though I was vexed that you managed to avoid triggering the red key pickup encounter. (It fired later anyway when you used the red key, and I figure players will only manage what you did if they're consciously trying to break it.)

Last time when I played brigandine_beta1 map I used to grab the red skull that way and jump in teleporter asap. In this case I even didn't expect this to happen, just an interesting moment - delayed encounter.
I like this update. Seriously, this map was already A+ when I tried it first time, now it's a little bit different but still awesome.

I'm joining the demo fun, here's my FDA for beta.

Lovely map! Difficulty doesn't get too high when you're just coming off Disjunction and Toilet of the Gods, but that probably made me enjoy it even more, heh. Visually it's obviously awesome!

As you can see in the demo, it's possible to press linedef 1047 from the lower floor. It doesn't seem to break anything, but I don't think it's desirable (unless you want to keep it there for speedrunners, heh). Embedding the switch inside of the corner wall with a little rim at the sides would fix that.

It's also possible to crash through the red key bars in the start room. I managed to do this once by a freak accident and couldn't repeat it before my patience ran out, but it's definitely there. You should probably space them tighter and add one more bar. Unless you want even crazier speedruns. :)

I liked nearly all of the fights except the very final one after grabbing YK. As you can see in the demo, I cheesed it pretty badly. It could be even worse if I just left through the BK lift as all the monsters from the exit room already packed themselves under the cliff. You could probably stick two mancos behind a monster blocking line into the last row of the exit room horde to disable a quick sprint into the exit. I'm not really sure what to do about the rest... maybe have another vile on the top floor and port in the bottom vile only when the player leaves the hightest (YK) floor? I'm not entirely sure how that'd work for all various possibilities, heh. Btw, tag 57 around the RL in that area seems to do nothing right now.

I only noticed the "eyes" for the backpack secret on the automap and didn't notice the eyes for the berserk secret at all... the problem is that they're kinda hidden more than usual in your rich, detailed scenery. Did other players have more luck finding them? If everyone keeps missing them, consider lighting the eyes up as the default state. If I'm just blind, ignore this part. :)

Oh and please specify the target complevel for prboom-plus. I used cl9 (Boom), because you recommend GZDoom with advanced features as the best option, but I've seen some folks recorded on cl2 (Doom2+ aka limit removing)... setting a base for demos is important, but it's up to you what that base should be!

dew: Wow, great demo, thanks! Riiiiight up until the final battle, and yeah that sucked. The rev/caco fight on the balcony worked out as I hoped, but clearly you just can't fight the lower enemies properly from up there when you can't aim down and they clump up under the ledges. If the player gets down onto the lower level or drops into the water, then the fight works okay I think; but the clumping discourages the player from trying to drop down in the first place because you can't see what you're dropping into. Back to the drawing board.

(The intent was that the pinkies would remain in the exit area until you were out in front of it, to stop the player rushing the exit. They're set to ambush, but evidently the sightlines on the balcony are tripping them early. I'll try the manc idea you suggested instead to fix that.)

Re the 1047 pillar switch - were you trying to flip it from ground level just to see if it was exploitable, or did you actually think that was the intended progression? Assuming it's the former, I'm tempted to leave it how it is. It's a soft sequence break, not bypassing a key or anything, and if a speedrunner can get through the HK meatwall quick enough to save any time there, then more power to them I think. (Slipping through the red bars definitely needs to be fixed though.)

Re the berserk secret - you were looking straight at the switch at least once, so it must be blending in too much. I like the design of it otherwise so I'll look at restyling it or lighting it better. I may redesign the backpack secret to something more obvious, and not just another tiny switch; it's a minor reward that's better to get early, and it's disappointing to end up hunting for it once you've already cleared the map.

beta2 is fully compatible with complevel 2 now, so I guess that's a good basis for demo recording. I'll make a note in the textfile for the next release.

Viggles said:

Nice to hear! :)
Could you maybe describe which spots, and which weapons you had at the time? Also, were you playing the beta2 I posted today, or the previous version?

I think the area I struggled with ammo the most was probably the room with arch-vile

Though that could of just been me missing too many shots on the enemies and not being careful enough with ammo :p

I'll try and make a video playthrough sometime, I'm a casual player so if I make a video it should give you a good impression of how your average joe would tackle the map

Viggles said:

Re the 1047 pillar switch - were you trying to flip it from ground level just to see if it was exploitable, or did you actually think that was the intended progression? Assuming it's the former, I'm tempted to leave it how it is. It's a soft sequence break, not bypassing a key or anything, and if a speedrunner can get through the HK meatwall quick enough to save any time there, then more power to them I think.

It's the former indeed, speedrunner instincts. And you're right, having to slip around the HKs is a risky and somewhat cool move, so it could make an interesting fairly benign sequence skip.

Here's a bonus issue: a pair of hoveritems. Both should be moved slightly southwards so they don't stay stuck on the higher step. As far as I can tell, no other items are affected.

Speaking of sequence-breaks, the RL secret makes it theoretically possible to vilejump your way up to the yellow key balcony. This takes patience, health and no small amount of herding, so it's probably not a time-saver for speedruns.

Just had a chance to properly play this all the way though. Really enjoyed, and seriously amazing architecture. Funnily enough, the it was the area around the Exit teleporter I liked the most. All that geometry just hanging in the void was a really nice touch.

I did discover one thing: it's just possible to pick up the yellow key without triggering the final fight. It's not that much of a sequence breaker as I quickly discovered the yellow door isn't actually openable with a yellow key, but thought I should mention it anyway.

I missed every single secret though. It wasn't until I just watched a playthrough linked earlier on this thread did I realize there were tiny switches for me to hit. I had no trouble navigating the map, but amongst all the detail I just didn't twig they were activatable.

That said, I am notoriously bad at spotting secrets, so probably not really worth worrying about!

Bauul, glad you liked it! Did you find the early rocket launcher, or just the one at the end? And how did the final battle work out for you?

I'm making a couple of the secrets easier to spot (and one of them less switch-y) for the next version, though I'm making the BFG one less obvious as most demo players found that straight away. I have a hard time judging the difficulty of switch secrets; I'm so used to working in this level of detail that anything out-of-place looks obvious to me.

I'm currently preparing a version with some significant revisions to the final encounter, and I'd like to ask for private testers for it before I do another public release. Both people who have played a previous beta and people who have never played it before. Is this a good place to ask for that kind of thing, or is there a better channel?

I'll give it a spin. Drop me a PM. I haven't played either of the betas yet but was planning on doing so.

I'll be glad to help, just send me a PM when it's ready!

I can playtest.

I enjoyed it very much! I found the first rocket launcher (the one that triggers the cool teleporting AV, right?) no problem. Didn't find the BFG at all though. Just didn't occure to me at all that was a switch!

The final encounter was good! The AV was the true trouble: I died a good three or four times tackling it head-on before trying a method where I just ran away and sniped at the AV until it eventually died. Once he was down, the rest was more straightforward.

I'm not the best Doom player ever and played it on HMP, and it seemed like a good challenge. I probably died a dozen times in total (and save scummed like crazy!) but at no point felt the map was unfair. So very nicely done!

Happy to beta test the new version too if you need another reviewer. I'll make sure to record a video this time.

I had a lot of fun.

Dragonfly:
Brigandine Speedrun - Skill 1 - 1.11

ZDoom skill 2 with dew switch press exploit

Viggles:
Speaking of sequence-breaks, the RL secret makes it theoretically possible to vilejump your way up to the yellow key balcony

Practically it took 3 very painfull blasts to get up there

Viggles:
I'm currently preparing a version with some significant revisions to the final encounter

Are you trying to make it harder?

Bauul:
I did discover one thing: it's just possible to pick up the yellow key without triggering the final fight. It's not that much of a sequence breaker as I quickly discovered the yellow door isn't actually openable with a yellow key, but thought I should mention it anyway.

Same with ssg, i like that

This level was so good it made me register an account to tell you that it's so good. It's so good!

Alright, if rocket jumps are okay then have a sub 20 seconds.

Haha, well done.

Woah, this is amazing! This architecture remembers me a lot Dark Souls, with all these stairs and vertical stuff! The song itself is really good, though I would be expecting something atmospheric. Not really like this, but that gave a similar feel: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2llS87avh2w

I think that this really rich environment could allow some more ambitious and experimental track, though the current one is really good, but more focused on the "action" aspect.

Awesome vids, Dragonfly! Nice midair duck on the rocket jump as well I guess? I had thought that (G)ZDoom prevented explosion physics from letting you cross linedefs you couldn't otherwise reach by jumping, but I guess not.

Deadwing, the actiony track was a deliberate choice: I was coming off the back of Doom 2016, and wanted something that would set a similarly muscular rhythm for the level and keep the player fighting-fighting-fighting, rather than encouraging them to slow down and play cautiously.

Player177 said:

Are you trying to make it harder?

Not harder, but better behaved; the final encounter in beta2 turns out to be easy to rush and the monsters tend to clump up in a state where it's not much fun to fight, and the player is encouraged to just cheese them or avoid them rather than dropping down and wading into the fray.

I've fired off a new version to those who offered to test, so check your PMs.

I think the music could stand to have some more variation, I found it very repetitive and was honestly surprised to see it was as long as it is -- when discovering it the first time during play, I thought it was a short track that looped often.

You're welcome to add me to the pool of testers if you'd like :)