An analysis of hot-starts in Ultimate Doom

[ChaingunChaCha]

First topic, so "Hi!"

 

I had a thought recently when doing no-damage runs - what is the longest you can go without damage in a map without doing anything? Looking at Ultimate Doom hot-starts, I've logged the time when you first take damage and your time of death in this sheet:

 

https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/e/2PACX-1vQfa5QDVXcwKrW2fCcsYC3IIRgMcoR9GZ_Gk_6yi9iZkJ4lVReow9IPW9jNP_R-Yc7Qu_GBX5va0vV6/pubhtml

 

I've also included "warm-starts" where I fire the pistol on the first tic, to wake up enemies.

 

Some findings:

 

• E1M2 is where you go the longest without damage (49s), and is a true hotstart. You even win the fight! This can be watched here. It's quite a silly show.
• E4 is pretty brutal for taking damage quickly. It also has the most true hot-starts at 4. 8 out of 9 maps in this episode are hot-starts or warm-starts.
• Despite having the same opening, E3M1 and E3M9 have different timings thanks to RNG. E3M9 also has the longest time to death, partly thanks to being in a pit and harder for the Imps to target you. However if you only count true hot-starts then E4M5 is where you survive the longest.
• Several maps have first damage in 1s and death in 5s.

 

I have no idea if this is of interest to anyone but I did the research so thought I'd share. I hope it is not a repeat of someone else's research. I may do other Iwads if I get the time and inclination.

 

Edited May 18 by ChaingunChaCha

[SPG]

I'm a little confused at some maps I would have thought would be hot starts instead of warm starts, like E1M9 and E4M1. Do those really require a shot to be fired before enemies come after you?

The E1M2 bit was amazing! What are the conditions to reproduce it? Or for that matter, your analysis in general. Are they on UV, for example?

[ChaingunChaCha]

30 minutes ago, SPG said:

I'm a little confused at some maps I would have thought would be hot starts instead of warm starts, like E1M9 and E4M1. Do those really require a shot to be fired before enemies come after you?

 

Yes, both require shooting (or moving into enemy sight). Try them out and you'lll see.

 

30 minutes ago, SPG said:

The E1M2 bit was amazing! What are the conditions to reproduce it? Or for that matter, your analysis in general. Are they on UV, for example? 

 

Thanks - E1M2 feels like a slapstick comedy sketch. To reproduce, run E1M2 complevel 3 on UV with a source port that is true to Doom's RNG, like DSDA for instance. You need to stay still, but turning is ok.

 

Edited May 18 by ChaingunChaCha

[Andromeda]

Lol, amazing find in E1M2! By the way, not sure if you noticed this or not but the zombieman that appears around 1:14 does actually do something - it gets even better, somehow :P

Edited May 19 by Andromeda

[Maximum Matt]

Wow, didn't realise how many monster-blocking linedefs were in that room as well, and how they can be two-way - another Thing About Doom I Just Found Out^tm!!

[ChaingunChaCha]

9 hours ago, Andromeda said:

the zombieman that appears around 1:14 does actually do something

 

Lol I didn't actually notice that he infights too! So that's 3 kills by doing nothing on this map then!

 

4 hours ago, Maximum Matt said:

didn't realise how many monster-blocking linedefs were in that room as well

 

Me too - quite a few apparently. I never really noticed either until doing this research.

[Lila Feuer]

E1M2 is literally violence in the workplace, id were prophetic.

Edited May 20 by Lila Feuer

[Gifty]

I love this idea. Curious about Plutonia now.

[ChaingunChaCha]

26 minutes ago, Gifty said:

Curious about Plutonia now. 

 

I'll hopefully get around to doing this for the other Iwads - but it does take time. I'll update here once I complete future wads.

[Gifty]

1 hour ago, ChaingunChaCha said:

 

I'll hopefully get around to doing this for the other Iwads - but it does take time. I'll update here once I complete future wads.

 

Oh yeah, take your time! Didn't mean that as a "YUM YUM GIMME MORE CONTENT", but your thread has definitely opened me up to a new curiosity!