Angelic Aviary v0.97.1: Life and Death (Updated 04/01/2022)

[fakemai]

Would have never guessed it'd be so effective. May have to edit the amount of damage it does.

I'm surprised if it's supposed to be heavily nerfed against any +BOSS monsters, unless you didn't set it as such. Alternatively D'sparil actively attempts to teleport out of it, much like how the Maulotaur starts charging against the tomed Phoenix Rod.
EDIT: The actual code for the damage reduction since the wiki says little. The special case for D'sparil is further up as well.
EDIT2: I was actually wanting to try this with Guncaster since you say Vindicated works, but I couldn't get the monsters to show up, loaded before or after. I can do it in vanilla Guncaster with the adapter (probably without too but that's an iffy idea for most monster mods, DRLM exempt).
EDIT3: Never mind I figured that out, you have to change the spawner settings, but openmenu CasterMenu to access due to, reasons. New question, how do you actually see the "fun" tags for the different enemies? I assume it's for target-spy and such. That entire list was worth a giggle or two.
EDIT4: I am preferring vanilla Guncaster with the adapter mod by Vindicated's author. Cardinals can be damned lethal if they pin you, or in an E1M4 secret where you get teleported into their presence and you're playing on Dragon difficulty. I've also noticed they give the generic obituary but that seems to be a bug with that mod combination. Anyway I'm having a lot of fun with this.

[CherubCorps]

I don't think it'll make a substantial difference. It isn't a matter of ammount. Timebombs are not very useful because most of your chicks fly.

Timebombs can be extremely powerful once you learn how to bait the angels. Many of the angels have windows of opportunity where they are vulnerable to timebombs. For example, after the cardinal attacks, she become tired out and can be bombed easily. Cherubs do 1 damage at melee range so you can gather a bunch of them together and wipe them out with a bomb. Ophanim and Principalities are slow and a player can plant 2-3 bombs before they attack. I might actually extend some of these vulnerable periods to make them more obvious and the bombs more effective.

I love the concept of the timebomb, but I feel the item was never implemented correctly. This mainly has to do with it being tied to the inventory system. Most inventory items are gamechangers except for the timebomb (And Quartz, but that's easy to use). The item isn't rare, but is just uncommon enough so that it encourages hording and makes players afraid to use or experiment with it. Personally, I wish that it was on a cooldown system, but Heretic was designed before cooldown systems were a thing. The goal is to have enough of them drop so that they can be worked into gameplay and players see them more like ammo as opposed to inventory. I also want players to not be worried if they miss with a timebomb in the same way a player isn't super concerned if they miss with a gun and lose a little ammo.

Sorry, that was kinda long-winded. Angelic aviary: Heretic edition is shaping up, but it has a long way to go.

The special case for D'sparil is further up as well.

Oh nice.

how do you actually see the "fun" tags for the different enemies

This is actually an easter egg when playing the game with Codename: Demolitionist (Formally SWWM). I wanna add more custom fun tags at some point.

Glad everyone is enjoying it so far.

[RKD]

You're right about the timebomb being poorly implemented in its vanilla form, haha, but modifying that is understandably out of the scope of this mod so I'll take what you decide it's best

I do agree that trying to balance this mod for Heretic is hard, so I won't be obnoxious and further the debate. I gotta say, tho, from what I've seen, Principalities always attack immediately as soon as you get in "timebombing" range (granted, they barely do any damage, but if you decide to buff their projectiles someday that could change). So far in my experience, Cardinals and Cherubs are the only ones I find them as effective usage of TB. Ophanims, only half of the times (when they don't spawn in turret platforms, ofc) but you've got a point.

All and all, I appreciate you take the time to polish this to make it work nicely with Heretic. There aren't many monster packs for that game, so stuff like this comes like a blessing from heavens (pun totally intended). Looking forward to v1.0!

[fakemai]

Random comments, in no particular order but mostly to Heretic.

• Consider weakening the Heretic versions of angels to not be such a major damage increase over their vanilla counter-parts. Mainly Cardinal, hits harder than Golems (10-40?) and do it twice, and Authority is Revenant missile bullshit 10-80 compared to the 2-16 of the Undead Warrior while the red slashes have possibility to one-shot an unarmored elf boy. These are basic enemies, not bosses, and a lot of Heretic's levels are pretty cramped, plus the odd teleport trap, and the 100% HP limit.
• Sprite name conflict with Guncaster Addon's "Prophet" kick (KOCK).
• Cardinal is a bit bigger than Heretic golems, shockingly they're not often jammed in walls but it happens. Probably applies to Ophanim and Principality too.
• Thanks for clarifying swwmgz_m funtags. The multiple names some angels get though, that ain't gonna work with how it's currently written, which return() to use needs to be randomized, best practice for that in ZScript I don't know.
• Maybe allow Cherubs to slap with holy water so they are not zero threat close-up, even though that's funny.
• Ohohoho Principality is water-soluble.
• An option to disable drops would be nice, at least the ones added by the mod, the time bombs in particular can be a balance issue with weapon mods.

With that I was also trying this with Wrath of Cronos Lite, it's not a sensible pairing with certain classes but it works and it's an option. The lower HP does come to the forefront though even more than it does when used in standard form with Hexen.

EDIT: Forgotten Maidens can't attack until they start moving, in some situations (Heretic E1M1 or E1M2 is great to see it) you can ensure you're pinning them as you free them, in WoC they're experience piñatas.