Help me Map the "Possibility Space" of RoTT!

Discuss anything ZDoom-related that doesn't fall into one of the other categories.
Post Reply
User avatar
DoomN00b
Posts: 45
Joined: Sat Apr 22, 2017 3:33 pm

Help me Map the "Possibility Space" of RoTT!

Post by DoomN00b »

Yeah!

Ok, you say - what do you mean by that? Simple! In Doom, every enemy has a unique role, a specific reason for existing as a different obstacle for the player - this is one of the many reasons why Doom is so fun to play.

The concept is explained very well by Mark Brown from "Game Developers ToolKit" - a guy who teaches game design and discuss this online, in a Youtube essay-series.

"What we can learn from Doom"
https://youtu.be/yuOObGjCA7Q?t=4m6s

The enemies from Doom can be placed, plotted, on a simple graph according to speed, damage and/or health - the various types give a very good variety of play. But something I've noticed from playing RETURN of the Triad, the Doom-TC whom tries to recreate the RoTT experience in Doom (to a reasonable extent at least, I would say), is that the enemies are not as varied... not as easy to tell apart, and not quite as interesting, or dare I say it... as FUN to fight!

As such, it would be interesting to see what the plot-out of RoTT looks like, when compared to Doom - what is it that makes Doom different from RoTT, and what can, or should, one change in order to improve the enemy-types of RoTT?

One of the obvious issues is that the high-level enemies of RoTT feels a lot cheaper somehow... the Enforcer is a bullet-sponge, but the HIT-SCAN crap just doesn't work for such an enemy, imho! That gives an unfair advantage to such an enemy - this is why so many disliked the Archvile in Doom2 - they have HUGE amounts of health, while retaining a hitscan attack that does tremendous damage - imho, the Archvile is unbalanced, and should have been nerfed in one aspect or another - either lower health, or a projectile-attack, like the other high-health enemies.

The Shadow priests in RoTT also seem to suffer from some kind of imbalance... they are bullet-spongues, while retaining some kind of delayed hitscan attack that does tremendous damage - INSTA-kill, more or less...!

SO! What are the issues with RoTT's enemies, and how do they differ from Doom's? = )


EDIT:

Ok... so, I just spent some time trying to find stats for the different enemies, but it's turning out fairly difficult, all I can find is merely health-stats, where I see a tremendous disparity! As expected, the Enforcers have waay, way too much health - but I need to compare it with the Baron of hell, since that seems like a reasonable comparison.

I've also done a preliminary map-out of the various enemies... just from playing Return oTT, but I can't be entirely certain about the chart, since I don't have definitive data here... El Zee could certainly be of help here *wink wink*. My initial grouping finds quite a few problems though... there's a bit too much clustering of stats going on! Even though many enemies have interesting, unique behaviours, the actual statistics are not as varied as Doom's. The robot is obviously completely o-p as well - that thing needs to be completely gimped in one stat or another.

What do you say, folks? Am I close in my estimates of basic enemy-stats?
Attachments
Preliminary Graph-chart showcasing the "Possibility-space" -statistical differences between enemies in RoTT.
Preliminary Graph-chart showcasing the "Possibility-space" -statistical differences between enemies in RoTT.
User avatar
Sgt. Shivers
Posts: 1743
Joined: Fri Jun 22, 2012 5:39 am

Re: Help me Map the "Possibility Space" of RoTT!

Post by Sgt. Shivers »

I feel like you're leaving out one of the most important and unique things about RoTT: the map hazards. While the basic enemy roster isn't too exciting, the wide variety of traps and hazards in the stages spices things up a lot. I think it would be a good idea to put together a graph for those too.

It might also be a good idea to measure enemy HP too. Some enemies may not be very threatening, but if they have a lot of HP they'll be dangerous to run into in a group.
User avatar
DoomN00b
Posts: 45
Joined: Sat Apr 22, 2017 3:33 pm

Re: Help me Map the "Possibility Space" of RoTT!

Post by DoomN00b »

Sgt. Shivers wrote:I feel like you're leaving out one of the most important and unique things about RoTT: the map hazards. While the basic enemy roster isn't too exciting, the wide variety of traps and hazards in the stages spices things up a lot. I think it would be a good idea to put together a graph for those too.

It might also be a good idea to measure enemy HP too. Some enemies may not be very threatening, but if they have a lot of HP they'll be dangerous to run into in a group.
Hmm, good point, actually. It's an interesting one, since I see many of the old ROTT guard discussing that they were pleased that a fair amount of the RoTT-traps were successfully ported to ReOTT.

It's a little bit different though, I don't think most of us even think about it - for instance, there are tons of different traps in the Zelda-games, but you never really see anyone clamoring for any particular ones to be brought back - nor do you see anyone clamoring for specific puzzle-types from the Portal-games to be brought back for the next game. I think there's something to be said for the iconic nature of the traps though - they're very distinct, and are used in a much more continous way than traps in other games.

Currently playing original RoTT on DosBox btw - finished Ep1-3 and am on ep 4, but decided to go with Shareware instead of tackling the final episode - I hear that one is unanimously disliked because many people hate the monk-enemies.


I've been thinking about mapping the health of the enemies as well - that's obviously as important an aspect as the move-speed and damage-output they have - it all makes for differences in the encounters.


I do feel that the enemies design needs to be improved to some extent though, because the striking iconic visuals and unique sounds the enemies of Doom make, all add to the game experience.

Anybody happen to know of an active RoTT community btw? I could totally use their minds in order to find the info on accurate damage and speed numbers - the health-numbers for the enemies are all available though!
User avatar
PlayerLin
Posts: 580
Joined: Sun Nov 11, 2007 4:20 am
Graphics Processor: nVidia with Vulkan support
Location: XinZhuang, XinBei/New Taipei City(Former Taipei County), Taiwan.
Contact:

Re: Help me Map the "Possibility Space" of RoTT!

Post by PlayerLin »

DoomN00b wrote: Anybody happen to know of an active RoTT community btw?
It used to has some a little, but now seems all dead...sadly. :(
Post Reply

Return to “General”