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Shadow Hog posted:Yup. Shamblers have never been Cyberdemon-level threats, a Cyberdemon can kill you instantly in many circumstances while a Shambler's lightning attack hurts, but not that much. They're much more comparable to Archviles, but Archviles don't have the weaknesses Shamblers have, there's no equivalent to the Super Nailgun to shut them down relatively painlessly (the Shambler might get one shot off, but you can tank a Shambler bolt with no worries if you have yellow armor or access to health, standing there and trying to go toe to toe with an Archvile is not under any circumstances worth taking >80 damage from a single blast, they are even more mobile, and they resurrect monsters. I'd much rather fight two Shamblers than two Archviles in the same space. Even that three Shambler encounter would have been plenty manageable with more space to kite them with, a bit more cover, and some ammo because I was likely to run out of shells fighting them even if I did survive their attacks, and then I'd be SOL. I once did fairly handily beat three Shamblers in The Brothers Djinn from Map Jam 2. If they had been Archviles they would have resurrected half the map and I would have been hosed. In many cases Vores are considerably worse than Shamblers because even the slightest hesitation or clumsy movement when dodging a Vore ball will make it swerve around the cover you were relying on to protect you and hit you anyway. Woolie Wool fucked around with this message at 05:12 on Aug 27, 2015 |
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Aug 27, 2015 05:04
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Shadow Hog posted:Yup. It's clear iD wanted Shamblers to be the Cyberdemon of Quake 1, but they're much, much easier to deal with to the point where the traditional, boss-style encounters with them in the original maps are pathetically easy instead of the challenge they're supposed to be.
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Aug 27, 2015 05:04
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Well maybe some of them did, but Sandy Petersen used them much more liberally, to the point where if you play Palace of Hate on hard and don't plan ahead you'll be facing four of the fuckers gunning for you in a single area.
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Aug 27, 2015 05:09
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Shamblers are more analogous to barons or maybe arachnotrons or mancubi. Not cyberdemons. Archviles represent a huge immediate threat that gets worse over time, so I think it's more fair to compare them to votes, particularly around spaces with multiple enemy types or even multiple vores.
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Aug 27, 2015 05:11
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I would disagree with that, a Baron is barely even a threat unless the area is specifically built around them. A single Mancubus or Arachnotron is closer in threat level to a Death Knight. A Shambler represents a much more immediate threat (hitscan attack) and a significant drain on your resources due to Quake's low ammo caps. Shamblers are not Archvile bad, but they're bad.
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Aug 27, 2015 05:16
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I'm feeling the urge to lay some  on how Black Mesa screwed up in balancing their little slice of the scource engine. Anyone mind/call dibs/sick of Half life was my first serious FPS by the by, I went through it with the content lock on and I still remember all the stumbling blocks and screw-ups that I encountered along the way. It is always unpleasant to see hacks butcher something dear to your youth.
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Aug 27, 2015 05:28
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https://twitter.com/doom_txt/status/636756830279102464?s=09
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Aug 27, 2015 05:30
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doom_txt is a community treasure. While this comment is pretty idiotic, I do think that the demonic/occult/Lovecraftian imagery of Doom and Quake actually sanitize the violence and makes it less offensive, unless you're a fundie who thinks playing Doom will invite literal demons into your brain to possess you. Barons of Hell don't have families, there is no pervasive societal persecution of Shamblers, nor is there a war going on by real space marines against Archvilistan. It's not propaganda for the American military, it's not reflective of any societal animus against any group, it's a nebulously defined protagonist fighting inhuman avatars of pure evil disconnected from any real places, events, or issues. Doom and Quake, Quake even more than Doom, take great care to say nothing about anything. Quake especially doesn't even have guns in the sense that Call of Duty has guns. It has ideas of guns, archetypes of guns, but abstracted to the point of being completely, deliberately detached from reality. Woolie Wool fucked around with this message at 05:43 on Aug 27, 2015 |
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Aug 27, 2015 05:33
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I notice the map that's from has about 4 stars on idgames, like every map in the history of idgames.Klaus88 posted:I'm feeling the urge to lay some Heavy Metal fucked around with this message at 06:59 on Aug 27, 2015 |
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Aug 27, 2015 06:55
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Heavy Metal posted:I notice the map that's from has about 4 stars on idgames, like every map in the history of idgames.
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Aug 27, 2015 07:00
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Replace the star voting system with yeah/unyeah.
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Aug 27, 2015 07:09
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Segmentation Fault posted:Shamblers are more analogous to barons or maybe arachnotrons or mancubi. Not cyberdemons. Archviles represent a huge immediate threat that gets worse over time, so I think it's more fair to compare them to votes, particularly around spaces with multiple enemy types or even multiple vores. I always consdier Vores the first enemy to kill in a room because of how dangerous their bombs. They do serious damage for Quake 1 and can gently caress you up if you forget about them. Thankfully, their bombs make them great bait to start infighting with. Just lead a bomb to your local Shambler, Death Knight, or Fiend and watch as the Vore gets its poo poo kicked in.
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Aug 27, 2015 08:20
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Woolie Wool posted:* The Terra episode proved unbelievably, impossibly difficult starting from level 3 (3 Shamblers in a tiny L-shaped arena when I'm out of nails? Sounds fun for someone who isn't me!) The shamblers spawn in to scare you, then after 3 seconds they're telefragged away.
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Aug 27, 2015 10:06
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If you think Terra is impossible, try Contract Revoked. On Hard. 
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Aug 27, 2015 10:08
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Not sure if this was mentioned already, but MiniQL is a pretty cool launcher for Q1. I'd been using Simple Quake Launcher before but it never remembering my previous settings was really annoying - this one seems to do the job perfectly. Only issue now is that Quakespasm won't launch mods that are more than one directory deep from the .exe, but I guess there's no handy workaround for that one 
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Aug 27, 2015 11:36
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Woolie Wool posted:doom_txt is a community treasure. I agree completely; Doom COULD be considered a Christian game. You are literally fighting Hell. You are kicking rear end for the lord 
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Aug 27, 2015 12:21
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That launcher is pretty slick. It even has a shortcut button to open Quake Injector.
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Aug 27, 2015 12:39
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Rupert Buttermilk posted:I agree completely; Doom COULD be considered a Christian game. That was Sandy Peterson's opinion on it - as a Mormon he thought it was ok to enjoy Doom as you're literally fighting Demons and sending them back to Hell.
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Aug 27, 2015 13:08
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Sucks about the music being removed. I'm trying to rectify that by taking FLAC rips of the soundtracks, including the unofficial expansions. However, I ran into the issue of the music being "pre-emphasized." Thought I fixed it with foobar2000 and foo_dsp_effect, but there's still some weird clicking at the start of songs in the extracts. Tested by converting to WAV for Quakespasm and Darkplaces. Please Quakexperts, lend us your patching power.
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Aug 27, 2015 13:22
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Commander Keenan posted:Sucks about the music being removed. I downloaded the game before they took the oggs out, I'll throw them up on mediafire when I get a chance at work today.
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Aug 27, 2015 13:30
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Ok, so black mesa was bound to happen sooner or later one way or the other, A full remake of the original Half life in a mordern engine? Sounds like a god send right? Well... Black mesa is a very impressive mod when it comes to voice acting and visuals, but much like a termite infested house with a fresh coat of paint slapped on it, that means nothing unless the underlying frame work is sound. I figured I'd start out the Hgrunts since Black Mesa loves throwing marines at you. Here are the original marines and the HD marines.   I bet every single one of you who has played HL knows what each of those marines does don't you? You know which one presents the most immediate threat (hint: its the rear end in a top hat with the grenade launcher) you know which one is the wild card (the Sergent), you know which one is most dangerous at close range, and you know which comes last in the target priority. The Black Mesa Hgrunts are based on some kind of RNG system for appearance. This means you have no clue which marine has what weapon and which marine should be your first target. Also minor quibble, but the Black mesa grunts look like they just stepped out of a Call of Duty game and that bugs me. Fun fact: The black mesa Hgrunts seem to have exactly the same damage and health on medium that they did in the orginal black mesa. Fun fact the second, there seems to be a third again as many hgrunts per encounter thanks to the scource engine and modern home computing power. Fun fact the third: Hgrunts enjoy a vastly improved AI and the ability to fire on the move thanks to the scource engine. So basically there was actually no balancing done that took into account the new abilities of the grunts and their larger numbers.  Hope you like hailmary bullrushes with the shotgun lads!
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Aug 27, 2015 14:07
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I remember when BMS launched having to go in and edit the marine's AI to make the game tolerable. If I remember right, they went from unalerted we-have-no-idea-Freeman-is-here to accurately shooting you in the face in literally 0.1 seconds.
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Aug 27, 2015 14:12
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czg posted:Sounds like you died fast there! Actually I hit esc instantly, seized by utter panic and terror, weighed my options, decided I was hopelessly hosed, and quit. Sorry, guess I'll have to try it again!  E: Jesus Christ it was still pretty drat scary even when I knew what would actually happen. And then I had to run back through the level scrounging up every bit of ammo I could find when two more Shamblers were waiting at the end, this time for real. How many are there in the fake encounter? 5? 7? Woolie Wool fucked around with this message at 15:19 on Aug 27, 2015 |
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Aug 27, 2015 14:27
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Six I think. E: Having to fight six shamblers just out of nowhere would totally be a dick move unless you had pent or quad, yeah. czg fucked around with this message at 15:27 on Aug 27, 2015 |
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Aug 27, 2015 15:25
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Many of the other fights in that map were quite interesting in how much they used infighting. Quake doesn't usually go for Doom-style "let's get all the monsters killing each other" fights that often, but starting infighting on "Shotgun Experiment 1" was intuitive and highly effective to thin out groups of monsters that would be daunting to take on all at once. Also being able to play a modern map set that's software friendly is nice. E: I would play an episode that combined ikblue, ikwhite, and all the various extensions and additions people have added to those themes over the years. I would play it so hard. Woolie Wool fucked around with this message at 15:37 on Aug 27, 2015 |
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Aug 27, 2015 15:30
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A point I forgot to put in, we're starting to see enemy numbers creep up in mordern games but enemy health remains at early 3d levels.
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Aug 27, 2015 15:41
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As  as it might sound I don't think we've had an FPS with a better enemy bestiary than Doom. Even mods that completely/partially redo the roster are better just for using Doom as a base, usually.
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Aug 27, 2015 16:00
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Commander Keenan posted:Sucks about the music being removed. All the way back when the game first came out I remember people arguing about whether the soundtrack really had pre-emphasis or the flag being set was a mastering error, because by 1996 basically nothing was using pre-emphasis anymore. I think that the TOC flags also varied between pressings, adding to the confusion. I personally think that the sountrack sounds a lot better without any de-emphasis applied, but I've never seen a definitive answer on what is right. Somebody should e-mail Trent Reznor and ask him what it's supposed to sound like.
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Aug 27, 2015 16:00
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My favorite thing about watching shamblers fight other monsters is that it almost always results in their opponents exploding into chunky meat. Unrelated: this is a bit petty, but is there a way to get Quakespasm to play the e1m3 demo on startup?
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Aug 27, 2015 16:30
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There's mirrors for all the Quake + Expansion soundtracks here. Just unzip, drop into your id1/hipnotic/rogue folders and go.
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Aug 27, 2015 16:32
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A FUCKIN CANARY!! posted:All the way back when the game first came out I remember people arguing about whether the soundtrack really had pre-emphasis or the flag being set was a mastering error, because by 1996 basically nothing was using pre-emphasis anymore. I think that the TOC flags also varied between pressings, adding to the confusion. I agree that it sounds best without de-emphasis, and if you look at the spectrum of the tracks ripped straight from the CD, there is no skew towards the higher frequencies as you see with pre-emphasized releases. It sounds muffled if you try to de-emphasize it. Basically only a small number of releases during the 80s and early 90s actually had pre-emphasis, and they were mostly Japanese editions for some reason.
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Aug 27, 2015 17:22
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Geight posted:As Maybe those scorpion things from Powerslave, as well, when you want weak pistol fodder, but don't feel like having it shoot back at you, instead having it rather quickly hop up toward you and start nipping at your ankles. (Then again, Quake's Rottweilers probably count here?) Although the situations where Doom and Quake's bestiary start to overlap are a bit questionable. For instance, I could go either way on whether the Revenant or Vore are more of a threat (generally speaking Revenants are bigger annoyances, since they're faster, hit harder and modders love throwing in about fifty of them every time you turn a corner because Plutonia, but the Vore's missile's homing algorithm is more difficult to shake off). I think I'd take Doom's Possessed Humans/Sargeants/Commandos over Grunts and Enforcers, as I like the wider variety in attack choices that provides, and how you can fairly easily tell them apart just from silhouette (unlike Quoth's attempt at doing the same, where you have to rely solely on shirt color).
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Aug 27, 2015 17:26
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If you're thinking about making Doom maps, Linguica just released a detailed, beginner-friendly tutorial for making vanilla-style maps. Also in the new Tutorials subforum at Doomworld: A lengthy essay on monster placement that's worth a read.
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Aug 27, 2015 18:14
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I've only ever played with doom mapping and modding long enough to make a penis-shaped room with a version of the imp with the specter effect on it. I might have to read those.
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Aug 27, 2015 18:49
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Keiya posted:I've only ever played with doom mapping and modding long enough to make a penis-shaped room with a version of the imp with the specter effect on it. I might have to read those. The only thing I ever did was construct a max height octagonal room loaded with thousands upon thousands of lost souls. My computer did not appreciate that.
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Aug 27, 2015 18:52
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Keiya posted:I've only ever played with doom mapping and modding long enough to make a penis-shaped room with a version of the imp with the specter effect on it. I might have to read those. Sounds like you already reached the pinnacle though 
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Aug 27, 2015 19:25
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Linguica posted:Yeah no kidding. I'm thinking about how to redesign the whole thing and one of the big questions I have is how to change the rating system to not be a waste of time. Something like Half life's RSTL site seems to work pretty well. 
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Aug 27, 2015 19:40
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Klaus88 posted:Black Mesa
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Aug 27, 2015 20:43
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I actually didn't pay any attention to visual differences between the marines when I played the game. They all blurred together into one generic "marine" enemy, in my mind. Well, except the assassins, given they looked and behaved wildly differently from the others.
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Aug 27, 2015 20:48
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Lork posted:Wait, the different marine skins were actually supposed to act differently somehow? I thought it was just "Shotgun guy" and "MP5 guy", with some visual variation given to the latter since they were more common. Also out of curiosity, are you playing the paid version of Black Mesa? I played the free version when it first came out and the enemy design was much worse than the original across the board, but supposedly they made a lot of improvements in that regard with the paid version, which I have yet to try. I'm pretty sure they all run on the same code in the original half life, with the beret dudes being the leaders. The cigar comping mothers are the ones with Grenades for their 203s which is actually important information to convey to the player since those things take off 50 health per shot. In Black Mesa it is not readily apparent which marine fills which role, which is the point I was trying to make. Also the paid version doesn't really change all that much.
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Aug 27, 2015 21:03
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