Walpurgis 0.99 (For Doom/Heretic/Hexen) [NEW RELEASE!!!]

[PresBarackbar]

Just to go off of what Crudux said and give my own two cents (pence?)-

Baselard might not be super exciting as a melee weapon, but I LOVE hucking the things around. Its my favorite melee starting weapon for that reason!

For the amulet, I don't HATE the monochrome (even though I commented on it before), it can just make navigating some maps kinda troublesome when you cant see colors. I actually solved that problem for myself by equipping another weapon and then only switching to the amulet and "transforming" when I was ready to use it. It gives you kind of a cool effect of transforming into a beast and then transforming back to a human when you put it away. I definitely find the ground pound the most useful attack with the beast form. I was also wondering, do you think it might perhaps benefit the Druid to be able to do free melee attacks in beast form like the Vorpal Axe gets? I don't feel like the claws are exceptionally powerful that they need to cost 1 mana per attack. I really do like this weapon and I can see some pretty good upgrade potential (having cleave on the melee attacks would be really awesome).

For the serpent staff, I can definitely see why the primary is so powerful as a way to make up for the beast form. I'm ok with the poison cloud (and it'd be really cool as a "panic button" if it could be upgraded to not deal self-damage) but what I found most lacking was the hypnosis. Its not BAD, but whenever I used it I found that I was better off just shooting everything rather than trying to get the monsters to infight. I don't even really think the behavior needs to change, and it might be better potentially if the upgrade gave the monster hypnotized more damage or HP.

I actually really like the bow. I'm still not entirely sure what the secondary and tertiary do, but I do like the primary fire, it feels very rocket launcher-esque.

[eharper256]

Just to go off of what Crudux said and give my own two cents (pence?)-

Its fine, you don't need to act British on my behalf. Though you'd say "tuppence" in that case if you're my age.

Baselard might not be super exciting as a melee weapon, but I LOVE hucking the things around. Its my favorite melee starting weapon for that reason!

Yep, I loved the throwing effect from the moment it was created. I spent about three hours perfecting it and was very happy with it!

For the amulet, I don't HATE the monochrome (even though I commented on it before), it can just make navigating some maps kinda troublesome when you cant see colors. I actually solved that problem for myself by equipping another weapon and then only switching to the amulet and "transforming" when I was ready to use it. It gives you kind of a cool effect of transforming into a beast and then transforming back to a human when you put it away. I definitely find the ground pound the most useful attack with the beast form. I was also wondering, do you think it might perhaps benefit the Druid to be able to do free melee attacks in beast form like the Vorpal Axe gets? I don't feel like the claws are exceptionally powerful that they need to cost 1 mana per attack. I really do like this weapon and I can see some pretty good upgrade potential (having cleave on the melee attacks would be really awesome).

Yep, I also do the unequip thing for the monochrome, but again, I realised that would be a pain in the ass for some people, which is why I included the option to just have it off. The only side effect, as you say, is that the transformation isn't quite as cool.

I'm glad you noticed the 1 mana cost. Yeah, this was something I was on the fence about. Originally, the Wolf-Form was flat out not going to have 'firing' costs and instead just had a constant drain whilst it was active, but that felt restrictive and frustrating. So, the cost of slashing was a leftover relic from when this stopped being a thing. I left it in as a kind of 'maybe I should also then apply it to the axe and hammer melee if people approve of it', but honestly that was never going to happen, so this cost will probably just go in the next version.

And yes, the upgrade will likely be using vorpal slashes on the claws.

For the serpent staff, I can definitely see why the primary is so powerful as a way to make up for the beast form. I'm ok with the poison cloud (and it'd be really cool as a "panic button" if it could be upgraded to not deal self-damage) but what I found most lacking was the hypnosis. Its not BAD, but whenever I used it I found that I was better off just shooting everything rather than trying to get the monsters to infight. I don't even really think the behavior needs to change, and it might be better potentially if the upgrade gave the monster hypnotized more damage or HP.

Whilst its possible to render the Druid immune to poison for the cloud, its a double edged sword, because that means they would also be immune to the mushrooms in Hexen and projectiles of the Brown Serpents. I could fenangle it so its technically a different damage type (in the same way 'Fire' created by the Crusader is actually "Blast" damage so that he can't nuke himself with Firestorm too much), but that means we don't get the unique Ettin puppy-bark sound which is tied specifically to Poison and Fire (lol). I suppose the latter is not too much of a loss, but I find that noise funny.

Yep, I knew the hypnosis was another victim of 'its cool but its inefficient' the moment I finished it. Its still there as sunk cost fallacy to be honest. That said, it still has alot of use in situations like, say, where you're low on Verdant mana but still have two Mancubuses and two Barons to deal with in Doom. Hypno one of those, and the infighting will be vicious and almost entirely end the problem for you (since, again, Druid Fast, Druid Dodgy, Druid runs away, lol). A Hypno Centaur in Hexen can also cause some shit to go down due his bulkiness in Walp.

I actually really like the bow. I'm still not entirely sure what the secondary and tertiary do, but I do like the primary fire, it feels very rocket launcher-esque.

The secondary drops a cloud of butterflies that hover around for awhile before suddenly going into evil seeker death mode and chasing targets. The Tertiary lets out spinners as it flies which do a similar sort of thing. Honestly I wasn't terribly happy with either of them, and it clearly shows that the Primary is the best attack. As I said to Crudux Cruo I do think it needs some revision.

[whirledtsar]

Whilst its possible to render the Druid immune to poison for the cloud, its a double edged sword, because that means they would also be immune to the mushrooms in Hexen and projectiles of the Brown Serpents. I could fenangle it so its technically a different damage type (in the same way 'Fire' created by the Crusader is actually "Blast" damage so that he can't nuke himself with Firestorm too much), but that means we don't get the unique Ettin puppy-bark sound which is tied specifically to Poison and Fire (lol). I suppose the latter is not too much of a loss, but I find that noise funny.

You can add a new pain state to the ettins and centaurs for the new damage type (ie "Pain.Poison2" if its called poison2) and make them play the whine sound from there.

[Gen5lock131]

I kinda got soft on the gray filter for the wolf morph. It made it easier to see in dark environments.

[eharper256]

You can add a new pain state to the ettins and centaurs for the new damage type (ie "Pain.Poison2" if its called poison2) and make them play the whine sound from there.

Yes, its not too difficult, just a bit more work. I was likely going to implement it in any case.

I kinda got soft on the gray filter for the wolf morph. It made it easier to see in dark environments.

Yep, that is the upside of the effect, which is quite realistic, interestingly.

[Anonymous9000]

Not sure if its something to complain about as my PC is abit old,is there a option somewhere to tone down the wizard lighting bolt attack? it chunks my frame rate to a crawl yet its my favorite weapon

[eharper256]

Not sure if its something to complain about as my PC is abit old,is there a option somewhere to tone down the wizard lighting bolt attack? it chunks my frame rate to a crawl yet its my favorite weapon

Yes, Fulgur's Lightning Hose might be tough on low power graphics cards; each bolt is technically about 200~300 small shock sprites overlaid on one another, there are two of them out at once, and some of the residue can generate dynamic lights. Its funny that you mention it now, though, since I actually optimised it slightly for 0.9, as can be seen in the changelog.

Out of interest; do you also have problems with the Crusader Lightbringer? Notably, the disco lasers fired by the Tertiary Prism when you hit it with the secondary.

I ask because they're both using the same sort of effect.
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You can also run some tests and isolate which is worse:

If you can turn off all GZDoom's dynamic lights modes (Display > Dynamic Light Option).
And also make sure you DO NOT have have High Quality Resize on your Textures (Display > Texture Options). (i.e. it is not set to 2x or higher)

Fiddle with those to see if either or both improves your performance, then let me know. If its high-quality resize, there's not much I can do, just leave it off as that is by far one of the toughest things for a low-power card to handle (GZDoom even warns you it uses like 4x or higher memory). If its lights, I can add in a few lines of code for you for less impressive but lightless Fulgur mode.
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If neither works, then there's the obvious ones; make sure your drivers are up to date, if you have an AMD card try the Vulkan mode instead of OpenGL when you boot up the game (I use it on my RX580, which is admittedly moderately powerful, and still get a performance boost comparitively). And if its a laptop get rid of it, gaming laptops are a lie

[Anonymous9000]

That seems to have done the trick! usually i dont mess around with options in order to not break something,now its smooth as hell due to your recommendations

thank you for addressing my concerns even if they were small

[Crudux Cruo]

Just to clarify/expound a tad:

1.) having a throwable weapon is nice. (would be kind of nice if daggers stuck in monsters). I would second the whining option, and if i were coding i would add a line in painstate for damage from the baselard's damage that would mimic poison damage - perhaps even directly refer to the existing poison pain state in the game? for simplicities sake. The graphics are fine, it's more the flow of combat and the options, lack of combos, responsiveness, ect.

2.) My mistake, it's pretty similar from a glance with the filter on. I do appreciate it can be very difficult producing quality graphics, so it's a nitpick more than an imperative at this point. The ground pound, to me, is a "stand your ground" attack. not something i would run back and forth to do hit and run attacks. but that's just me. Being a large werebeast to me should be "beast mode". that's also why i wish it were more beefed to a level 3 weapon.

3.) What i had meant is something a bit more visually serpentine apart from the pattern. More green, less glow, more earthy poisony sound effects, idk how to describe it. The hypnobeam doesn't really fit with a druid theme to me on further thought. I would like a creature summoning, like a NAGA imp or something, or other animals, rather than a hypnobeam which is perhaps a little too abusable. The poison cloud could be useful but again, i think the nature of the attack just needs more balance and polish. I love the serpent staff from hexen because it's cool and versatile. Ideally i'd like faster firing but smaller damaging twin projectiles, like hexen - that weave in opposite directions. the poison cloud could instead be a unified poison ball that bounces and then bursts on enemies or after a short distance. Those are some ideas anyway.

As for the rest, i'm not sure how you want to go about it but to me the druid is my chance to go ape on people in beast form, and needle with lighter weapons. that's why i'd rather that be the focus, but i think at the minimum the beast form should be the mainstay weapon of the game and NOT the serpent staff, which is certainly how it's shaping up to me.

[eharper256]

That seems to have done the trick! usually i dont mess around with options in order to not break something,now its smooth as hell due to your recommendations

thank you for addressing my concerns even if they were small

No problem! Glad to hear that worked.

Just to clarify/expound a tad:

1.) having a throwable weapon is nice. (would be kind of nice if daggers stuck in monsters). I would second the whining option, and if i were coding i would add a line in painstate for damage from the baselard's damage that would mimic poison damage - perhaps even directly refer to the existing poison pain state in the game? for simplicities sake. The graphics are fine, it's more the flow of combat and the options, lack of combos, responsiveness, ect.

Stuck daggers in monsters is nigh on impossible, sadly. I think I've mentioned before I wanted something like this with Algor's Ice Shards, but its just probably beyond DECORATE.

2.) My mistake, it's pretty similar from a glance with the filter on. I do appreciate it can be very difficult producing quality graphics, so it's a nitpick more than an imperative at this point. The ground pound, to me, is a "stand your ground" attack. not something i would run back and forth to do hit and run attacks. but that's just me. Being a large werebeast to me should be "beast mode". that's also why i wish it were more beefed to a level 3 weapon.

Nah its fine; you are right in that it needs another pass or two, its just not high on my hit list right now. I always saw it as a lithe and fast beast mode. Originally, the (3) slot was planned to be a complimentary bear form to be the 'strong' form, but then I figured there needed to be more to the Druid than just animal forms.

3.) What i had meant is something a bit more visually serpentine apart from the pattern. More green, less glow, more earthy poisony sound effects, idk how to describe it. The hypnobeam doesn't really fit with a druid theme to me on further thought. I would like a creature summoning, like a NAGA imp or something, or other animals, rather than a hypnobeam which is perhaps a little too abusable. The poison cloud could be useful but again, i think the nature of the attack just needs more balance and polish. I love the serpent staff from hexen because it's cool and versatile. Ideally i'd like faster firing but smaller damaging twin projectiles, like hexen - that weave in opposite directions. the poison cloud could instead be a unified poison ball that bounces and then bursts on enemies or after a short distance. Those are some ideas anyway.

Admittedly, the shooting noise was me mixing together a set of noises called 'Acid Gunk' and various permutations of a 30.06 sniper rifle in Audacity, since I wanted it punchy. If you listen when the acid hits, there is also a more subtle hissing from that. The glowyness was an odd side effect of the sprites I used for the acid snake parts, but I actually ended up quite liking it (I wanted it to look distinct).

Again, interesting you mention this as originally there was going to be a summoning of a snake as the tertiary fire, but finding a quality set of snake sprites that fit in and had a full set of animations was difficult (unless I wanted Snake Imp), so that was shelved and swapped with the Gas Cloud (and the summoning idea was moved over to the Frenzyweed Flechette). I'm probably not going to make the Hebiko exactly mimic the effect of the old serpent staff as honestly it was my least favourite original Hexen weapon and the Hebiko was my effort to make it great again, in my opinion (lol).

As for the rest, i'm not sure how you want to go about it but to me the druid is my chance to go ape on people in beast form, and needle with lighter weapons. that's why i'd rather that be the focus, but i think at the minimum the beast form should be the mainstay weapon of the game and NOT the serpent staff, which is certainly how it's shaping up to me.

Again, probably an effect of my own Tabletop druids coming to the fore, where I always preferred them to be sneaky spellcasters hitting with poison and elemental effects, with a side in transforming, rather than the standard shifter archetype. You are right that the Hebiko is too strong relative to beast form, so that will get a tweak.

And as I've mentioned for future roadmap, I am considering extra in-slot weapons as probably the feature of around the 0.93-0.96 area of patches, so perhaps I'll consider a second stronger shifter form for those updates.

[eharper256]

As I've already noted, of the main features I'm working on for the 0.91 release is making the bosses of Doom, Hexen, and Heretic less squishy to the class ultimate weapons and to have more interesting mechanics!

Here's the first look at that: a revision of Menelkir, the Mage Lord boss in Hexen. He's now styled to be a lightning master.

This is the first revision, so it still needs some tweaking (I wasn't expecting him to die so quick to Firestorms lol), but its a nice start.

[eharper256]

So here's a quick; but VERY important question for everyone that will determine some of the future focus of the mod:
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For Monsters... Would you

1. Prefer that Walpurgis offers its entire own bestiary.
2. Prefer that Walpurgis stays open to other custom monster mods.

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There is a Strawpoll here if you don't want to post your answer:

Poll's Closed! With Option A the victor.
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At the moment, other monster mods work fine if loaded after Walpurgis, and all you lose in the deal is some of the unique death and pain methods. However, the more unique bosses and monsters I add, the more you lose in that deal.

Regardless of what happens, I will include a CVAR toggle eventually to flat out revert to the Vanilla bestiary.
So if we go with option A, this will be the main way in the future to use custom monster mods, switch mine off and use whatever you like instead.
If we go with B, I will only make a handful of uniques, and instead make it so everyone's suggested monster mods intergrate perfectly, so they get unique deaths and other effects from this mod, and even become extended to cover Heretic and Hexen, rather than disabling them.

In the latter option, Colorful Hell, Brutal Doom Monsters Only and VDP Monster Randomiser are the most likely suspects to made fully compatible. Shades of Doom could also be an option, though its meant to be vanilla. If you use something else, mention it.

And yes, you can only pick one. Sorry.

[PresBarackbar]

Honestly I think I prefer option B. While option A would be really cool, having broader compatibility with a lot of popular monster mods seems like a better option because some of the more popular ones are really well made and why re-invent the wheel. A lot of those monsters don't really fit the theme of Walpurghis, but this is only really an issue with Doom since Hexen and Heretic don't really have many "monsters only" mods. As for a monster pack I would really like to see made compatible, I've used this Daggerfall Monsters Pack I found here a while ago with Walpurgis. Its really good and it gives you a more medieval fantasy flair to go with the characters of the mod.

[eharper256]

Honestly I think I prefer option B. While option A would be really cool, having broader compatibility with a lot of popular monster mods seems like a better option because some of the more popular ones are really well made and why re-invent the wheel. A lot of those monsters don't really fit the theme of Walpurghis, but this is only really an issue with Doom since Hexen and Heretic don't really have many "monsters only" mods. As for a monster pack I would really like to see made compatible, I've used this Daggerfall Monsters Pack I found here a while ago with Walpurgis. Its really good and it gives you a more medieval fantasy flair to go with the characters of the mod.

Option B was also my initial path; I really enjoy a few of the community offerings and making them work universally with Hexen and Heretic would have been pretty cool, even though, as you say, some are a bit odd moved over from Doom. Since no-one really commented on Menelkir and the new monsters so far that much; I actually thought this would be the community preferred option as well going by the lack of interest.

But so far, the Strawpoll is 10:2 in favour of option A, which is surprising. EDIT: Its now quite equal!

Not that I mind, really. They are roughly equivalent amounts of work, with A being more spriting and new code, and B being alot of translating other people's spaghetti code and making sure it co-operates with Walp's functions. Doing both would make the next few patches take months though, and that would kill my motivation, which is why I'm getting people to pick one. I guess people are in favour of a more fantasy replacement pack, though who knows? Obviously I'll leave it open for at least the next week, since I'm still working on the boss replacers right now regardless of what happens.

I missed out on the Daggerfall Pack, and it looks a bit abandoned right now. Its quite a clusterfuck of code, but its an interesting base for other features.

[Lagi]

this menelkir boss wideo is jaw droping.
monster itself as sprite and animation is meh. But his attacks are mastercrafts. All looks amazing and looks fun to dodge, like in some BulletHell game.

I swear my self to stop playing computer games - maybe I try Walpurgis this weekend... as a review ofc