Hearts of Demons - BARON [1.1.0] 7/29/22

Projects that alter game functions but do not include new maps belong here.
Forum rules
The Projects forums are only for projects. If you are asking questions about a project, either find that project's thread, or start a thread in the General section instead.

Got a cool project idea but nothing else? Put it in the project ideas thread instead!

Projects for any Doom-based engine (especially 3DGE) are perfectly acceptable here too.

Please read the full rules for more details.
User avatar
Brohnesorge
Posts: 474
Joined: Sat Oct 08, 2016 9:10 am
Preferred Pronouns: He/Him
Operating System Version (Optional): Win10
Graphics Processor: nVidia with Vulkan support
Contact:

Re: Hearts of Demons - BARON [Early WIP] HELP WANTED

Post by Brohnesorge »

Hmm...while you have some interesting and, frankly, pretty cool ideas, I feel as if you might be better off putting them into your own mod. A lot of them don't really fit in with the idea and theme of this mod. I have a hard time imagining a Baron in a mech suit, and just laugh at the idea of a Baron in a nanosuit, but that might be because I just think of him in the Gantz suit.

Now anyway, I feel I must ask the peanut gallery do people even get that reference anymore? for a secondary opinion. I've found some better hand sprites from around, though mysteriously uncredited (its from a BD splinter, so really no surprise there), they have a slight quirk to them...

Image

THOSE HORNS. They would only be present on any sprites involving the hands (so spells) and I'm thinking I should remove them. Should I remove them completely, or make them into the HUD? While I'm not a big fan of them, it does make sense that The Baron could see his own horns, based on where they are on his head, and it is kinda immersive.

Also, I know I said next update will be visuals (Hence the poll), I am also updating something else: the Health Regen is going sayonara. While I liked the idea on paper, and really it was mostly a reference to a D&D character of mine, it takes a lot of edge off. But without it, your almost more fragile then Doomguy because you have no armor even with 1000 HP and can't dodge for shit (which is intentional), so another question for you all: To help balance this, should I raise The Baron's base damage reduction from 15% to 30% (so constant green armor) or make it where Mana drops also give you health and Medkits/Stimpacks give more health?
GOODGOOD
Posts: 82
Joined: Tue Jun 14, 2016 5:36 am

Re: Hearts of Demons - BARON [Early WIP] HELP WANTED

Post by GOODGOOD »

Hmm I've got and idea!

Titanfall JumpKit(Heavy Edition)! You should be able to do it with jpmobility (CopyReich?-- I mean Copyright)
With a slight boost of hover or flight that'll recharge maybe? yeah I think thats good

And a baron in a mech suit was my original idea that was hoing to be given for you until I realize it was stupid(for me)

The Cockpit is a "Morphing" Cockpit like it can be turned into a variable size and forms, so anyone from fat,tall,short etc can enter multipurpose mech (even barons). also you can open the cockpit like a sliding door or something idk the word is? (a vertical sliding door). I suggest you add a fast firing autocannon (not explosive cause those are too overused except like mini explosive upgrade), a double rocket launcher is effective (armor piercing too.homing cost 2 or 4 missiles and lower fire rate and... slower payload).
special? The Equalizer (From Infinite Warfare. also no sponsorship). Except these Equalizer are like the Ermengency Gun from IB(3.8 notsofinal.pk3). although try to decrease the rounds from 75 to 50 on both. And maybe add a new ranged weapon "Crossbow of the Forgotten Nobles" the Barons Legendary Crossbow with ranging ammunition types Dark Lightning Arrow(Red Lightning with crimson outline), Venom of the Hell Serpent Tip Arrow (High Venom Damaged), Shreds of the Forgotten One (Tip) Arrow). And maybe add a speed boots (with mini thruster for hover, full set with pilot jumpkit is flight)
shotfan
Posts: 439
Joined: Tue Mar 22, 2016 1:21 pm
Location: E3M1

Re: Hearts of Demons - BARON [Early WIP] HELP WANTED

Post by shotfan »

GOODGOOD wrote: (...)
Destroyer:The Ultimate Weapon From the Dark Age of Technolo-- i mean nothing. It has all of the ability as the last four suits, it has toggleable slow down or a limited time timestop machine(might need to nerf that) an explosive gatling shoulder with a mini rocket launcher, and on the right it has a lock on cannon. and AN UNLIMITED CLOAK? HERES-- nothing
Dark Mechanicum sent you? Are they now experimenting with weaponizing Greater Daemons and locking them inside Power Armour? :D
GOODGOOD wrote: I suggest you add a fast firing autocannon (not explosive cause those are too overused except like mini explosive upgrade), a double rocket launcher is effective (armor piercing too.homing cost 2 or 4 missiles and lower fire rate and... slower payload).
Vulcan and FLASH are already in the mod, the former being fast firing autocannon and the latter quadruple barreled rocket launcher.
Brohnesorge wrote:Hmm...while you have some interesting and, frankly, pretty cool ideas, I feel as if you might be better off putting them into your own mod. A lot of them don't really fit in with the idea and theme of this mod. I have a hard time imagining a Baron in a mech suit, and just laugh at the idea of a Baron in a nanosuit, but that might be because I just think of him in the Gantz suit.
IMO, the only suit that is appriopiate for the Baron of Hell is this one. :ugeek:
Now anyway, I feel I must ask the peanut gallery do people even get that reference anymore? for a secondary opinion. I've found some better hand sprites from around, though mysteriously uncredited (its from a BD splinter, so really no surprise there), they have a slight quirk to them...

Image

THOSE HORNS. They would only be present on any sprites involving the hands (so spells) and I'm thinking I should remove them. Should I remove them completely, or make them into the HUD? While I'm not a big fan of them, it does make sense that The Baron could see his own horns, based on where they are on his head, and it is kinda immersive.
Incorporate the horns as the part of the HUD. They should be always visible. It would make wonders for immersion.
Also, I know I said next update will be visuals (Hence the poll), I am also updating something else: the Health Regen is going sayonara. While I liked the idea on paper, and really it was mostly a reference to a D&D character of mine, it takes a lot of edge off. But without it, your almost more fragile then Doomguy because you have no armor even with 1000 HP and can't dodge for shit (which is intentional), so another question for you all: To help balance this, should I raise The Baron's base damage reduction from 15% to 30% (so constant green armor) or make it where Mana drops also give you health and Medkits/Stimpacks give more health?
I do not rely on health regeneration at all, and neither I find the Baron fragile. 1 000 HP is a whole lot to be battered away - you can no-sell some very nasty ambushes and still have roughly half of your health left. I am for increasing Baron's innate DR to 30%. Stimpacks/Medkits/Berserk Packs healing him more than Doomguy do not make sense anyway, since they are supposed to be optimized for human physiology, and consequently our Baron should be thankful that they work on him at all.

Other comments:
- Devastation now, well, brings some REAL devastation. Holy s*** that is plenty of green flames of death erupting for only 50 mana! I like this spell even more now!
- Good change with making Immolation deflect off hard surfaces, feels like a proper plasmathrower weapon now.
- Footstep SFX are too quiet for Baron. What are they?
- The HUD does not work for me. Does it require Open GL? I have to use the minimal HUD.
- M202 SFX are appreciated. Also: it is only me, or is this gun even more powerful than before?
- New Vulcan SFX is more fitting.
- New Flak Cannon SFX is an improvement, but IMO still needs something louder... maybe a tank cannon blast?
User avatar
Brohnesorge
Posts: 474
Joined: Sat Oct 08, 2016 9:10 am
Preferred Pronouns: He/Him
Operating System Version (Optional): Win10
Graphics Processor: nVidia with Vulkan support
Contact:

Re: Hearts of Demons - BARON [Early WIP] HELP WANTED

Post by Brohnesorge »

The HUD is just the basic Full Screen HUD set up so it actually displays what weapons and spells you've picked up, how much ammo of each type you have and puts your mana above the health. Make sure you have Alternate HUD turned off, User Interface Scale to 1 and Screen Size set to 11. It's a placeholder; I was mostly sick of not seeing my ammo until I switched to the weapon that used it. It shouldn't require Open GL.

The footsteps are amplified, reverbed and pitch shifted sounds of concrete blocks banging together. I might go back and redo them, but I want them to be there but not be annoyingly loud. The idea is cloven hoofs on stone, as thats most levels, and I don't think barons are large enough to justify big booming footsteps. Well...not the classic ones. The Doom 4 Barons sure, but not this one. I may make them a little louder though, and add more for more variety.

The Flak's main fire SFX will get updated again in the near future, as I am not a huge fan of it after extended use, but the Alt-Fire is staying. It's almost exactly what i was looking for.

I might have buffed the Krak Missile damage and forgot to write it down.

...though my productivity is going to plummet when D4D ver 2 comes out so who knows when the next update will be...
User avatar
Brohnesorge
Posts: 474
Joined: Sat Oct 08, 2016 9:10 am
Preferred Pronouns: He/Him
Operating System Version (Optional): Win10
Graphics Processor: nVidia with Vulkan support
Contact:

Re: Hearts of Demons - BARON [Early WIP] HELP WANTED

Post by Brohnesorge »

The changelog might be small but this update is kind of a big deal. I promise, this update, while it doesn't do much mechanically, make the mod at least 50% more enjoyable.
I feel comfortable saying, after this update, this mod is reaching late alpha/early beta stage.

Changelog
Spoiler:
DOWNLOAD https://www.dropbox.com/s/804imnoxej323 ... 6.pk3?dl=0

Special note: If you want to try out the HUD with horns, it is commented out in SBARINFO, so open that bitch up in SLADE and delete the //. It only works right on 800x600 resolution, which is why it isn't featured. Once I get it worked out, it'll be a main feature.

Next update will focus on Powerups and Items, so it'll be another long stretch. Thank you all (well, all like two of you) for your patience and input during this whole thing. My updates have been crazy fast, but will start slowing considerably because of the more complicated nature of what I'm working on and RL stuff.
shotfan
Posts: 439
Joined: Tue Mar 22, 2016 1:21 pm
Location: E3M1

Re: Hearts of Demons - BARON [Early WIP] HELP WANTED

Post by shotfan »

You are welcome! :)
I will test the latest version soon and edit/repost accordingly for any commentary.
GOODGOOD
Posts: 82
Joined: Tue Jun 14, 2016 5:36 am

Re: Hearts of Demons - BARON [Early WIP] HELP WANTED

Post by GOODGOOD »

shotfan wrote:
GOODGOOD wrote: (...)
Destroyer:The Ultimate Weapon From the Dark Age of Technolo-- i mean nothing. It has all of the ability as the last four suits, it has toggleable slow down or a limited time timestop machine(might need to nerf that) an explosive gatling shoulder with a mini rocket launcher, and on the right it has a lock on cannon. and AN UNLIMITED CLOAK? HERES-- nothing
Dark Mechanicum sent you? Are they now experimenting with weaponizing Greater Daemons and locking them inside Power Armour? :D
No i'm just a cyber imp with a multi core hyperdrive (You betrer not search for my name of my youtube channel). and a dual shoulder charge cannon, and no the i'm not with the imperium nor the dark mechanicum, i'm freelance and yet I was once a human.
Not Every Monster is A Monster
because humans (Homo Sapiens) are the true monsters
User avatar
Brohnesorge
Posts: 474
Joined: Sat Oct 08, 2016 9:10 am
Preferred Pronouns: He/Him
Operating System Version (Optional): Win10
Graphics Processor: nVidia with Vulkan support
Contact:

Re: Hearts of Demons - BARON [Early WIP] HELP WANTED

Post by Brohnesorge »

Now on to something that makes more sense: AN UPDATE!

https://www.dropbox.com/s/86kfu0tva91ok ... 7.pk3?dl=0

CHANGE-O LOG-U
Spoiler:
You no longer need to play with 5:4 now. All weapon sprites should fit on screen.
shotfan
Posts: 439
Joined: Tue Mar 22, 2016 1:21 pm
Location: E3M1

Re: Hearts of Demons - BARON [NotAsEarlyWIP]

Post by shotfan »

I did not get to test the previous version properly before you beat me to it! Well, sorry for that. This time I will be faster. I will post something about the new version until tomorrow.
User avatar
KarolineDianne
Posts: 66
Joined: Sun Jan 05, 2014 11:06 am

Re: Hearts of Demons - BARON [NotAsEarlyWIP]

Post by KarolineDianne »

This is starting to look really promising, I like how this is going! I've got a few suggestions, though! And if you'd like the help, I'd be more than happy to assist!

For starters, I feel your mobility is very... Janky. You run absurdly fast when going straight forwards and backwards, and jump incredibly high... But you cannot strafe side to side worth a damn. It creates a really weird feeling, as you can't freely move around, but you actually seem to have TOO much movement in those limited parameters. I feel like reigning that in is going to be necessary, make movement feel less constrained. I'd personally suggest going for the 'lumbering tank' feel and just make the player slightly slower all around, but without the weird lack of sideways speed. If possible, maybe give more 'momentum', where you start slow but pick up speed if you keep running. Though that's likely complex to implement.

Second, I think the claws and spells need to be condensed into fewer unique weapons. Have a single weapon for melee, a single weapon for spells, and then your all your guns like normal. Set up a system of A_JumpIfInventory() checks and Reload key triggers to alternate between the effects. I did this in my own mod, Project Ironclad. Whenever you do a melee attack, have it check to see if you have the 'Enhanced Claws' item in your inventory. If so, do the Enhanced Claws attacks instead of the normal ones. (I'd also suggest making the melee attacks swing automatically as you hold them down, or add a little more weight to the animations to make it feel less janky when you slap dudes).

Similarly, you can use the Reload state in weapons to switch between firing modes, again as I did in Ironclad. Make your spellbook items add a dummy item to your inventory, such as 'HasFireball'. When you have BaronBall equipped, you press the Reload key. It checks to see if you have 'HasFireball' in your inventory. If you don't, nothing happens. If you do, it adds another dummy item called 'UsingFireball' to your inventory. You would have a similar setup in the Fire: state to jump to FireballFire: when you have 'UsingFireball'. If you press Reload again and you already have 'UsingFireball', you set it up to take that dummy item away.

Thirdly, something pretty minor, I think the footsteps need more weight and oomph to them, the light clop-clip-clop seems odd coming from a big powerful Baron of Hell. But that's just me.

Ultimately, I see a lot of potential in this! I'm mostly making suggestions based on what would make the game more fun and convenient. The thing with the spells is mostly because they're all similar versions of the same thing, just throwing green fireballs, and they all share the same idle sprites. So it just feels weird to be swapping between 5 different versions of the same pair of hands. It would probably be nice to have the spellcasting hands glowing with green flame even when idle, to make them look different from the melee hands. And again, I'm willing to actually assist in implementing these ideas if you want to. Just lemme know if you'd like the help!
User avatar
lwks
Posts: 212
Joined: Thu May 28, 2015 9:19 pm
Location: Fucking Brazil

Re: Hearts of Demons - BARON [NotAsEarlyWIP]

Post by lwks »

Well, interesting mods, I played Doom 2 with that and though the levels were impossible to beat due to the size of the player it's very easy to see that this mod is made to be plaed with slaughtermaps. There are a lot of points that I'd like to say but probably everyone already said it.
And just to make sure I like the horns, put it on the HUD as an optional file, will ya?
Also, the sound really annoys me. Agreed 100% with the guy above about the movement. Less speed and more control.

Question, how to use the Tome on the weapons?
User avatar
KarolineDianne
Posts: 66
Joined: Sun Jan 05, 2014 11:06 am

Re: Hearts of Demons - BARON [NotAsEarlyWIP]

Post by KarolineDianne »

You can crouch to get through doorways that are only Doomguy-sized.
User avatar
Brohnesorge
Posts: 474
Joined: Sat Oct 08, 2016 9:10 am
Preferred Pronouns: He/Him
Operating System Version (Optional): Win10
Graphics Processor: nVidia with Vulkan support
Contact:

Re: Hearts of Demons - BARON [NotAsEarlyWIP]

Post by Brohnesorge »

Crap, I did forget to say how to use the tome, I'll update the OP; I was very VERY tired when I posted it and it slipped my mind. You hit your Use Item key. It's a temporary measure. It's hard to tell when it's on because the gun just gets bright, so you straight up can't tell in brightly lit rooms. It's first on my TODO for the next update to make it more visually obvious that its on. And making activating it make more sense. It's was put in pretty early but only very recent could I actually get it to work.

Now, anyway let me say thank you both a lot for your input, and to be perfectly honest, I share a lot of the same concerns as you do.

-The movement-
This is very much a botched execution. The idea is that your are slower, but you can charge forward at great speeds, like a straight line sprint, but as it is now, its very...slippery. Like The Baron has butter on his hooves. And charging straight backwards makes no sense. I'll try the lower overall speed and re-enabling side sprinting and see how that is. It's something that's been pretty low on my TODO to fully iron out because I suspect ACS will be involved, but I'll give it greater priority. IIRC, Project MSX has a straight sprint, so I can take a look at what they did and make something similar. If anything, I'd need the most help with this aspect.

-Too many hands-
This issue is a combination of half-implemented ideas and novice DECORATEing. See, the idea was you would have a total of 6 uniquie melee moves: 3 on the Enhanced Claws: The actual Enhanced attack, the Groundslam, and then a heavy kick or punch. Then 3 on the normal claws: The slap, a grab, and a Demon's Soul Soul Sucker like attack. The idea is that you would find an item similar to the Enchantment Tome, but for spells, and the third effect would be the effect if you have the Tome active over the Alt (the second). I'm just going to slim it down, however, to having the heavy punch or kick be an always accessible melee attack, and the Soul Sucker being another spell.

Any animation help would be greatly appreciated. I am not an animator to any capacity, though the sprites for the hands are somewhat...limited. They are a lot shorter then they appear, probably because they're from Blood.

I will focus on slimming the amount of hands, because, on top of it being a little silly, I also feel that switching spells should be instant. And making one switch between Grab and Groundpound with a button...once I put in the grab.

-The Size-
This ones a doozy, because I want the player to be big, like a Baron should be, but at the same time, if crouching is disabled on a map, like say, BTSX or Going Down, you're fucked. I may make it where your actual height is that of Doomguy, but your View Height is Baron level to solve this issue without compromising the height effect TOO much. Unless there is a way to override disable crouching that I am unaware of.

-The Sounds-
Not gonna lie, this one is still a pretty low priority to me. I'll bump it up some now that I know more people aren't too satisfied but I'm mostly waiting on getting The Zombie Killer's footsteps ACS working: it wouldn't compile correctly for me before, but I suspect that's because I had my computer in Japanese locale. Now that I've switched it back to English, I'll give it another shot. If doing the hands thing doesn't take me too long, I'll get this taken care of next update.

Wow, thank you guys so much for the input! You've both made mods I'm a pretty big fan of, so it means a lot!
User avatar
KarolineDianne
Posts: 66
Joined: Sun Jan 05, 2014 11:06 am

Re: Hearts of Demons - BARON [NotAsEarlyWIP]

Post by KarolineDianne »

You can actually set the /camera height/ of the player in the playerpawn decorate, as well as the height from which projectiles and hitscans are drawn from, separately from the actual radius and height of the player. That's what I did in Ironclad, your camera is higher and you shoot from a higher position, but your actual hitbox is exactly the same as vanilla Doomguy. You may want to do that.

And again, if you need any help with Decorate, I'm happy to lend my hand! I'm still mostly a novice, but I've learned a lot from my own tinkering with my DUMP3 entries and my development on Ironclad.

(Also, as far as your explosion effects poll goes, I think your fireballs look goddamn sweet as they are. Like really, the baron ball and fireball spells are really nice. And completely unrelated, I just had a silly idea. Make the player sounds PSX/64 Baron sounds, just to differentiate the player from enemy Barons :D)
shotfan
Posts: 439
Joined: Tue Mar 22, 2016 1:21 pm
Location: E3M1

Re: Hearts of Demons - BARON [NotAsEarlyWIP]

Post by shotfan »

Brohnesorge wrote:Crap, I did forget to say how to use the tome, I'll update the OP; I was very VERY tired when I posted it and it slipped my mind. You hit your Use Item key. It's a temporary measure. It's hard to tell when it's on because the gun just gets bright, so you straight up can't tell in brightly lit rooms. It's first on my TODO for the next update to make it more visually obvious that its on. And making activating it make more sense. It's was put in pretty early but only very recent could I actually get it to work.

I figured out it is an item to be used, but some better signaling for Enchantment mode is needed, indeed. And since I am on the topic of Enchantment modes...
For Vulkan, a simple overpenetration (rounds can pierce multiple enemies) mod would be enough.
For FLASH, the ability to fire quad shots, either Napalm or Krak. We need to put these four barrels to good use! :twisted:
-The Size-
This ones a doozy, because I want the player to be big, like a Baron should be, but at the same time, if crouching is disabled on a map, like say, BTSX or Going Down, you're fucked. I may make it where your actual height is that of Doomguy, but your View Height is Baron level to solve this issue without compromising the height effect TOO much. Unless there is a way to override disable crouching that I am unaware of.
There is a way to go around this. Inside options, go into Gameplay Options, and set the "Allow Crouch" option to On. If you left it to default, then BTSX or other such wads will leave you with crouching disabled, but the On setting forces them to enable crouching. Ditto for "Allow Jump" and "Allow Freelook" options. So, no tinkering in the mod files required :wink: !
KarolineDianne wrote: (Also, as far as your explosion effects poll goes, I think your fireballs look goddamn sweet as they are. Like really, the baron ball and fireball spells are really nice. And completely unrelated, I just had a silly idea. Make the player sounds PSX/64 Baron sounds, just to differentiate the player from enemy Barons :D)
I have not noticed. I find original sounds way too tacky for my hearing taste (so to speak). I auto-load PSXSFX soundmod every time. (to be fair, original Baron sounds are not that bad, but most of the other monsters (that Zombies...))

Other comments:
- Good thing you nerfed Stimpacks and Medkits healing efficiency on the Baron. Now you need to watch your health more closely, since you will have a hard time recovering it if you take too much damage, despite having ten times health of Doomguy's. So, counteracting this by making Soulsphere and Mana essence (soul essence actually) heal you as well was a good decision in my book.
- That Baron Heart is HUGE! (HARK! HE HAS HUGE GUTS! :lol: )
- I thought of a defensive spell: Plasmashield. You cast a full-body shield of thin plasma that absorbs projectiles (not melee attacks though). Might last 30 seconds and consume 25 mana.
- Faster Baron Ball (slot 2) hurling was not needed, but can stay anyway :wink:
- I like the new Flak Cannon! Looks more detalied.
- The Vulcan's altfire is not really useful. If it had at least better accuracy (ala Red Faction's HMG), then maybe it would be worthwhile...
Overall, the mod slowly becomes more robust as a whole, and fun increases with every update. Keep up the good work! :thumb:
Last edited by shotfan on Sat May 27, 2017 2:10 am, edited 1 time in total.
Post Reply

Return to “Gameplay Mods”