VDP-MonsterRandomizer UPDATED September 1, 2022

[ClessxAlghazanth]

Glad to see VDP well alive and kicking , which is one of my most used monster randomizers for a long time

[Plynthus]

New update with 30-40(depends if you count all variations) new monsters.
Including multiple very rare ones.

Bunch of new settings, tweaks, fixes etc.




Details:

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-added "monster types" setting(found in vdp settings/extra options).
VDP-NeutralMonsters.pk3 is not required anymore. it's finally an in-game setting.

-added monsters:

for ShotgunGuy:
-FlamerZombie
-KarasawaGuy

for ChaingunGuy:
-Crash (actor name "crash2")
-DevastatorZombie
-DuneWarrior
-NailBorg
-NailBorgCommando
-RocketGuy2
-PyroZombie

for Demon:
-BloodDemonCloneZ
-D3Wraith

for Spectre:
-D3Wraith2 (slightly slower translucent version of D3Wraith.)

for LostSoul:
-Stalker (actor name "OutcastStalker")

for Cacodemon:
-Grell
-ZombieFlyer

for HellKnight:
-UberImp
-UberSTImp
-UberVoidImp
-UberImpAbomination
-UberCyberImp
(I got the original UberImp also from "The [ZDoom Community Map] Project Take 1")
Because visually UberImp was only a color translation, I was also able to combine it with:
STImp, VoidImp, ImpAbomination and CyberImp (these were already in the mod as Imp replacers) to make multiple variations.
They have different projectiles, but I kept their attack patterns the same so it's easier to learn them.
All of them have different amount of health and some of them different speed. Spawn chances are equal for all.

for BaronOfHell:
-Marauder
Very nerfed version. Same attacks, but very different behaviour from original.
Because Marauder is an official Doom monster I added an option to spawn "RealMarauder" instead.
Pretty much unchanged. And it's way too strong as a Baron replacer, but it's there if you want it.
This setting affects only after restarting or changing a level.

for Arachnotron:
-ZombieTank
-ZombieMissileTank

+9(17 if you count all variations) very rare joke-ish monsters.

-added an option to replace hitscan attacks with projectile ones. which affects monsters that have any hitscan attacks and replace a non-hitscan monster.
Changing this setting affects immediately. It's off by default.
Currently affects these monsters:
Medusa, Haedexebus, CGunspider, Arachnophyte, Marauder(RealMarauder is not affected by this) and Terminator. Also tweaked their normal hitscan attacks. the ones that also have projectile attacks now does hitscan more rarely. and the others randomly stop their hitscan attack to move little bit before attacking again.
Also makes ZombieTanks and ZombieFlyer to never spawn alive Zombie when destroyed. Normally 50% chance.
If I missed any monsters that belong in this category. I will update them later.
I think rail attacks count as hitscan too. But I left Lasershark, BeamRevenant and RailArachnotron unaffected.
Because they all have a charge sound making their attacks fully dodgeable.

-added "Display VDP Monster Counter" option.
shows separate monster counts(kills/total) for:
-All Monsters
-Normal Monsters
-Replacers

-added these to Monster Mixer:
-ChaingunGuy
-PainElemental
-HellKnight
to also replace:
-ShotgunGuy
-Cacodemon
-Baron of Hell
I also added spawn chance settings for these ones.
And "Attack options" for this Pain Elemental: [Normal Only], [Normal + Cacodemon shot], [Cacodemon shot ONLY].
So the Lost Soul spawning wouldn't break the original balance too much.

-added "Display Map Special info" option
it shows:
-which map special
-which special action
-and monster counter for the monster type/types you need to kill to trigger the special action.
Most likely a useless feature for most. I only added it because I already used a simpler version when testing.
But MAYBE this could be helpful if you get stuck in a map. You could turn it on just to check if there's something like this.

-added options to set all "Replacer Spawn Chances" at once to specific setting. and an option to reset all vdp settings except spawn chance settings to defaults.

-made it possible to choose between demon/spectre and lost soul replacers with the setting "Disable any long range attacks by replacers of...".
Before it was all or nothing.

-changed the hitscan attack of GhostRevenant into a homing projectile. Also added another projectile attack. And made this monster less rare because of these changes.
Getting hit by it the homing projectile causes the same blinding effect, but it's shorter and instead of taking 200% damage during the effect you'll only take 150%.
The other attack is more common, faster, non-homing and doesn't cause the blinding effect.

-the bomb spawned by Catharsi(Imp replacer) now has a chance to be a "dud". collecting the dud bomb gives one rocket to the player.
In the past I also added a chance for the bomb to be fast or slow.
The faster the bomb is the more likely it is for it to be a dud.

-made the attack of imp replacer "illus" more readable. By adding a sound effect and slowing down the animation.
I made this change to make it easier to dodge. Because now you know exactly when it's coming.
I also slowed down the melee animation of the ghost "projection" thing, giving you more time to get out of the way, even if it reaches you.

-fixed decoration object replacer swarm dead bodies clipping through floor more than the original bodies. also made them more rare.
I wouldn't mind if there was a very subtle visual tell when it's a swarm.
But the floor clipping thing wasn't intentional. And not the kind of tell I'd like to have.

-gave the Defiler's(Pain Elemental replacer) lost soul looking homing projectiles a random chance to die over time.
Because you can't shoot them and they're homing at you. You usually would need cover to get rid of them.

-nerfed/buffed Desentinel(Pain Elemental replacer).
It had an attack where it shoots fireballs at very fast rate and wouldn't stop until you hurt it or you hide.
I slowed down the fire rate making it possible to run between the shots. But they also deal twice as much damage now.
It also now has a random chance of breaking out of that loop.

-Revghoul's(Revenant replacer) poison shot doesn't cause infighting with Revenants and other Revenant replacers anymore.

-Avatar(Archvile replacer) buffed/nerfed, but mostly nerfed.
Only buff is that it can also resurrect monsters now.(archvile replacers being able to resurrect can be disabled in the extra settings.)
I nerfed most attacks. Because it was able to kill the player too fast.

-nerfed femaleplasma
slower firerate and lower health
It was too dangerous as zombieman replacer. But it's still pretty strong.

-nerfed the sound PlasmaElemental makes when it dies.
On death it shoots multiple plasmaballs to many directions at the same time.
The sound effect stacks and becomes way too loud.
Now it's louder than a single shot, but far from what it used to be.

-a lot of little fixes/tweaks here and there.

MAKE SURE TO NOT LOAD VDP-NeutralMonster.pk3 ANYMORE
If you have downloaded the August 26th version of the main mod file. It's an in-game setting now and the VDP-NeutralMonster.pk3 is outdated.

[Plynthus]

+Currently an unfinished feature as a bonus(updated September 6th)

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I've slowly worked on this on the side:
https://www.mediafire.com/file/m0rcr51n ... 9.wad/file
VDP-SpawnAnyMonster(unfinished).wad

It adds a new menu where you can spawn monsters.
NORMAL / FRIEND

Currently it has all the replacers(in alphabetical order) for only:
-Zombieman
-ShotgunGuy
-Imp
-ChaingunGuy

You can also check a picture of any of these monsters in the menu.

I'll continue to update it probably quite slowly.
So that's why I'm posting an unfinished version now.

UPDATE 2022/09/06
It now should include all the monsters including decoration object replacers, power-ups and power-up replacers.
You can spawn "Normal" and "Friend" versions of each monster.
You can bind a shorcut key in GZDoom's "Customize Controls" menu.

It's still unfinished. I'll try to clean it up a bit. It's not going to look much better, but some improvements.
And requires a lot more testing.

I'll add it to the main mod once it's completed and tested properly.

For now there might be some monsters that won't spawn correctly. Not sure if there is, but I haven't tested every monster yet.

The pictures in the menu might not perfectly match what you get. If one monster uses another monster's sprites, but has a color translation. It will show you the sprite with it's original color.
And there's some scaled monsters as well, but you'll see the original size.
The size thing I'm probably going to update at some point, but the color thing will stay. The pictures in the menu is just a bonus anyway.

Also most Doom II monsters and some of their replacers will be missing some sprites/sounds if used in Doom/Ultimate Doom.

Posting this another unfinished version now, because there's a lot of progress since the previous. And my progress for finishing this will still be slow.

[cosmos10040]

Great mod so far and lots of fun. Just what I was looking for and it's compatible with weapon mods. Only issue I'm having is that while using smart marines npc mod, when the marines walk their walking frames are changed to I think to a tiny object, happens also when they shoot so they blink in and out, does not happen with other mods. Can you look into that? Otherwise than that all good!

[Plynthus]

Great mod so far and lots of fun. Just what I was looking for and it's compatible with weapon mods. Only issue I'm having is that while using smart marines npc mod, when the marines walk their walking frames are changed to I think to a tiny object, happens also when they shoot so they blink in and out, does not happen with other mods. Can you look into that? Otherwise than that all good!

Thank you for the feedback!
Is this the right mod: https://github.com/inkoalawetrust/Smart-Marines'

I can look into it. It's probably just a sprite which has the same name in both mods.
I'll gladly fix little compatibility problems like this.
But if more problems follow with the same mod then we'll see. Can't put too much time to trying to improve compatibility with one mod.

[cosmos10040]

Actually no need to worry, seems to work I think I had the order wrong. Good job on the mod.

[Exibius]

Fantastic mod. Real winner. 10/10. Exibius approves. Biggest monster randomizer that's monsters only that exists so far, I think. Maximum variety = maximum chaos. It's like Aeons of Death but with monsters. Prefer it much better that way, since you can mish-mash other gameplay mods on top of this. You want variety without the out-of-placeness? No problem, there's a setting for that. You want variety but without it getting too crazy? No problem, there's settings for that. You want equal spawn chances of everything across the board and not give 2 poops about balance? There's a setting for that.

Smooth transition to the statement above: I wish there was a setting to disable ghost properties from monsters such as ghost golems and ghost death knights. The only thing that kills them is explosive splash damage, and if I'm running a mod like DRLA and I just started and I don't get an RL in generally the first level, I'm screwed with UV-maxing. Not to mention, they're not noclip either; if I get 2 ghost golems in a skinny hallway that I can't kill, and I try to pass around them and I get cornered, I'm completely dead. Even with explosives, I'd blow myself up. I could probably just delete said flags from them, but I don't like doing that to other people's mods.

A setting to disable ghost properties from certain monsters, but still keep them transparent for cosmetic's sake. Please? Just a suggestion. And just a setting, so people who prefer to play it that way can still play it the original way.

Anyways, love this. The powerup replacement part and the decoration replacement part is just a cherry on top of an already-delicious sundae. Better watch out for that tentacle sticking out if you're running decoration replacers. (Or Sunday, if you're playing this mod on a Sunday. Which I sometimes do.)

[Plynthus]

Fantastic mod. Real winner. 10/10. Exibius approves. Biggest monster randomizer that's monsters only that exists so far, I think. Maximum variety = maximum chaos. It's like Aeons of Death but with monsters. Prefer it much better that way, since you can mish-mash other gameplay mods on top of this. You want variety without the out-of-placeness? No problem, there's a setting for that. You want variety but without it getting too crazy? No problem, there's settings for that. You want equal spawn chances of everything across the board and not give 2 poops about balance? There's a setting for that.

Smooth transition to the statement above: I wish there was a setting to disable ghost properties from monsters such as ghost golems and ghost death knights. The only thing that kills them is explosive splash damage, and if I'm running a mod like DRLA and I just started and I don't get an RL in generally the first level, I'm screwed with UV-maxing. Not to mention, they're not noclip either; if I get 2 ghost golems in a skinny hallway that I can't kill, and I try to pass around them and I get cornered, I'm completely dead. Even with explosives, I'd blow myself up. I could probably just delete said flags from them, but I don't like doing that to other people's mods.

A setting to disable ghost properties from certain monsters, but still keep them transparent for cosmetic's sake. Please? Just a suggestion. And just a setting, so people who prefer to play it that way can still play it the original way.

Anyways, love this. The powerup replacement part and the decoration replacement part is just a cherry on top of an already-delicious sundae. Better watch out for that tentacle sticking out if you're running decoration replacers. (Or Sunday, if you're playing this mod on a Sunday. Which I sometimes do.)

Thanks for all this feedback! Glad you enjoy the mod.

About the ghost properties. This shouldn’t happen at all. Those are monsters from Heretic and should act that way. Basically just be translucent versions.

So are you sure it’s not because of another mod you’re using at the same time?
They’ve never behaved that way for me. Currently at work so I can’t test if it actually is like that on VDP. Should’ve been very late break for me to not notice it. Also maybe there’s a setting on GZDoom that could affect, but I don’t think that’s the case.

Definitely wouldn’t have left that in the mod on purpose at all.

I’ll try after work. But please let me know if you think a specific mod might cause it. This is the first time I’ve heard of this problem.

Edit:
Without being able to test my assumption is that the +GHOST flag causes this when combined with some specific mod.
The description for that flag is:
“Actor is a ghost. This does not imply translucency etc. Some of Heretic's projectiles and weapons cannot attack ghosts.”
So if that is the case I could disable that flag anyway as it doesn’t seem to have any affect on Doom.

[Exibius]

I’ll try after work. But please let me know if you think a specific mod might cause it. This is the first time I’ve heard of this problem.

Indeed, after messing around with my load order, it seems Doom Rougelike Arsenal is what's causing this. If I load VDP without anything else, I can shoot the ghost monsters just fine. I tested this with GhostRevenant as reference. I removed the +GHOST flag, and it works totally fine combined with DRLA.

So if that is the case I could disable that flag anyway as it doesn’t seem to have any affect on Doom.

That would be lovely, as I figured the same. For now, I'll just comment out all of the +GHOST flags I can find on any of the monsters in decorate, until an official update rolls out.

This monster randomizer is straight up hilarious, btw. Well done. Kudos for the corruption card compatibility too, since that's one more mod I run with this in my load order by default.

[Plynthus]

I’ll try after work. But please let me know if you think a specific mod might cause it. This is the first time I’ve heard of this problem.

Indeed, after messing around with my load order, it seems Doom Rougelike Arsenal is what's causing this. If I load VDP without anything else, I can shoot the ghost monsters just fine. I tested this with GhostRevenant as reference. I removed the +GHOST flag, and it works totally fine combined with DRLA.

So if that is the case I could disable that flag anyway as it doesn’t seem to have any affect on Doom.

That would be lovely, as I figured the same. For now, I'll just comment out all of the +GHOST flags I can find on any of the monsters in decorate, until an official update rolls out.

This monster randomizer is straight up hilarious, btw. Well done. Kudos for the corruption card compatibility too, since that's one more mod I run with this in my load order by default.

Good to know. Thanks a lot! I'll update it soon. Probably today.
I'm not currently working on another update so it'll be the only change.

And thanks for the Corruption Cards compatibility goes to: Someone64.
I've only added the new monsters to the CCARDS lump.

[Plynthus]

I updated it now.

This is the only change:

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-removed GHOST flag from few monsters.
this change should have no affect on anything unless you use specific mod/mods.
with "Doom Rougelike Arsenal" mod the GHOST flag made those monsters to have certain unintended properties.
thanks to Exibius for pointing this out!

These monsters are:
MummyGhost2
KnightGhost2
GhostRevenant
Phantom

So anyone reading this.
If you're not planning to use specific weapon mods("Doom Rougelike Arsenal" being the only known one) with this. There's no reason to update.

[Exibius]

Indeed, using your download link, spooky ghost monsters are no longer safe from Marine's chaingun anymore. Tested all 4 actors that I recall having issues before, everything is working now as intended with DRLA.

Hope you have a good September.

[cosmos10040]

I experienced a crash in beginning at Title screen using lit doom, not sure if it's compatible but lit doom can run other monster mods.

R_InstallSprite: sprite BMEN fame A is missing rotations

[Plynthus]

I experienced a crash in beginning at Title screen using lit doom, not sure if it's compatible but lit doom can run other monster mods.

R_InstallSprite: sprite BMEN fame A is missing rotations

Thanks for letting me know.

I downloaded that mod and tried it. I didn't get the same error message and the game did start.

Are you using any other mods at the same time?

That kind of error message happens usually when two mods are using same sprite name, but not actually the same sprite.
I also couldn't find a sprite in VDP that had "BMEN" in the name.

Are you sure the error message said "BMEN"?

Other reasons could be a different version of Lit Doom(I tried with the newest) or even GZDoom.

[Exibius]

Oh, no! Seems like our boy PyroPork is having an off-day, today. I thought it was actually how the monster was supposed to work, but when I started this with Legendoom, it doesn't. Uh, transform anymore. Then I realized that's definitely not supposed to happen. Running VDP with DRLA he wants to keep transforming into a blue plasma ball sprite or something. And, as expected:

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We got sprite name conflicts. Just figured I let you know.