What makes good monster placement and encounters?

[BrassKnight]

I've been mapping for a while but from all the maps I've made, many of the encounters just felt maybe boring or something is wrong? I can't really describe it. Some encounters I make end up just monsters infighting the moment it starts or everything just feels cramped, some also again feel boring. This is also the same with items, I either give too much or too little. If anyone knows any tips, please share them.

 

Also if you can, maybe a list of roles that's best and worst for each monster? That can help too.

[Stabbey]

An article I found helpful was this one on monster placement, which goes into monster roles:

 

 

The tl;dr summary is this:

 

The basic categories for monsters are:

Standing - You walk into a room and monsters are there waiting.

Turrets - Monsters placed at long ranges which can't approach the player

Roaming - Monsters which move around the map (requires a map design suited for roaming).

Ambush - Monsters placed so that the player doesn't easily expect them. The two basic types of ambush are monster closets and teleport traps.

 

Monsters fit different roles:

 

Threats - The most dangerous monsters, which make players seek cover, and can kill the player even if the player is paying attention.

Trash - weaker monsters which are not very dangerous, but keep the player occupied.

Obstacles - Monsters which constrain the player's movement.

Infighters - Monsters which are good at causing chaos and provoking threats.

 

Encounters have different types as well:

 

Waste - a fight intended to drain resources, such as health and ammo, without endangering the player.

Challenge - putting the player into an interesting situation which damages them, but may not necessarily kill them, such as ambushes which include a way out.

Punish - draining the player's mental resources - making them nervous or jumpy, or surprising them with the unexpected

Kill - difficult encounters intended to be a lethal threat to the player.

 

***

 

There's another article with tips, but that's more for layout and architecture.

 

https://www.dfdoom.com/tips-for-making-an-engaging-doom-map/

 

***

 

If an encounter feels boring, it's likely that you're not providing enough of a threat. Perhaps there is too much room to move around for the amount of monsters. Perhaps the encounter can be run away from and dealt with at a bottleneck. Perhaps the mixture of monsters infights itself to death instead of being a threat to the player.
 

There are different kinds of pressure to put on the player. There was an article about this, but I can't seem to find it. I remember though, that it talked something about Time Pressure as one type of pressure. For instance, Pain Elementals add time pressure to an encounter, because the longer they live, the more Lost Souls they produce. Arch-Viles are another time pressure, as the longer they live, the more enemies they resurrect. When a player is under time pressure, they are forced to engage, instead of running around in circles letting monsters in-fight. When a player is forced to engage, they are more interested in the fight because not paying attention means they take more damage.

 

I had a fight earlier which I fixed not by adding more monsters or changing the architecture, but by increasing the rate at which enemies appeared - adding pressure.

Edited December 26, 2020 by Stabbey

[ReX]

On 12/26/2020 at 10:42 AM, BrassKnight said:

... a list of roles that's best and worst for each monster?

@Stabbey did a terrific job of summarizing the categories of enemy attacks. The following is a slightly expanded version of that summary.

 

Each enemy can create a completely different set of challenges. For example, in E1M1, the shotgunners pose little threat, as the player has plenty of room to maneuver. In E1M4, however, the player is put in direct, close contact with shotgunners, making them a bigger threat.

 

Likewise, in E2M8, the cyberdemon is encountered in a somewhat large arena, allowing the player to duck and dodge to good effect. In other maps you might engage the cyberdemon might in close quarters, resulting in splash damage as well as difficulty in side-stepping the rockets.

 

But here is a general menu of the way enemies can be spammed:

 

1. Hit-scan enemies [zombies, shotgunners, chaingun guys, even the Spider Demon]: Placing many of them in open areas at long range from the player.

2. Fireball enemies [imps, cacodemons, hell knights, mancubi, barons]: Allowing them to surround the player without providing a way out.

3. Resurrecting/regenerating enemies [archviles, pain elementals]: Placing them in open areas at long range from the player.

4. Homing projectile enemies [revenants]: Pretty much any scenario where there are too many of them will create problems for the player. Plus, if you place them in open area afar from the player.

 

And these are some of the ways by which you can give the player a means to counter these threats:

 

1. Give the player an avenue to avoid a fight that is too intense. This might be via the map geometry, where the player can temporarily escape.

2. Give the player a means to engage in a fight that might otherwise be too intense. This might be via weaponry, powerups, and health that allow the player to survive an onslaught until the herd can be thinned.

3. Create scenarios that allow the player to incite monster infighting. This will allow the enemies to be distracted, while also allowing the player to conserve ammo.

4. Allow the player to avoid a fight temporarily, until s/he is properly equipped. For example, several maps in The Ultimate DooM require the player to dart past opposition to acquire, say, a shotgun and then return to properly dispatch the nasty hordes.

 

Ultimately, each enemy has a place in DooM's pantheon. The trick is to balance the risk and the satisfaction to be gained from the proper use of each.

[SpaceTrash]

I've asked myself the same question a lot recently, and while I won't go into detail as much as the other comments in this thread have, but there are a few things I wanted to add:

• Don't just have everything in front of the player, have them coming at you from all angles
• Punish/prevent escape, if a player can just leave, it makes the whole thing feel less impactful - make them work for it
• Give multiple ways of approaching your combat encounter, whether it's playstyle or literally how they approach the encounter
• Most importantly, playtest, playtest, playtest - if you're not having fun, then others likely wont

[SuperCupcakeTactics]

Think about lines of sight, how a monster wherever would impact the gameplay, and the pacing of your encounters throughout the map to keep yourself and others invested in playing your map.

 

Adjust the resources so that you have enough to feel comfortable or mindful of, then add a little more when finished for other players. This would also depend on how you like to play Doom if you like having to scavenge and find ammo or just like having the big boxes up front. You can adjust the resources to encourage the use of some weapons over others so that there isn't mindless SSG spamming and that gives some challenge in resource management as well besides health.

 

Chainguns/Arachnotrons: Good at being turrets to apply pressure and denying area/encouraging the player to find cover. The Arachnotron is projectile based though so you can also use it to just keep the player moving.

Baron of Hell: Meatshield that's good at soaking up damage and demands attention in tighter areas as an encroaching threat. You'll likely want other enemies to fight alongside this one and/or a good weapon.

Lost Soul: I like using them as curveballs to mix up and add spice to the everyday encounters of low-tier baddies (imps/zombies that are fun to mow down)

Revenant: The most versatile enemy that you can't go wrong with and will always provide sufficient challenge to keep players engaged. 

Edited January 21, 2021 by SuperCupcakeTactics