Valiant.wad - now on /idgames!

[skillsaw]

WHAT IT IS:
Valiant is a MBF megawad for Doom II featuring 32 new maps spanning 5 themed episodes. Each map is designed to be played from a pistol start, but some effort has been made to support continuous play as well.

Additionally, Valiant includes a number of new monsters and weapons implemented through an extensive MBF format DeHackEd patch. As a result, Valiant is not compatible with gameplay mods, and can only be played in ports with full MBF DeHackEd support. At present, these include ZDoom, GZDoom, PrBoom-plus 2.5.1.4(complevel 11), and Eternity. Zandronum is also supported through DECORATE. If you're using PrBoom-plus, make sure to update to the 2.5.1.4 build. You can download it here.

A big goal of Valiant is variety, and although you'll see many of my tropes over and over (hordes of weak monsters, Mancubus and Arachnotron snipers, 3-key doors, the occasional arena fight...) I did aim to make a wide variety of maps. There are short punchy maps (MAP03, MAP22), sandboxes (MAP06, MAP18), long adventure maps (MAP10, MAP28), silly gimmick maps (MAP07, MAP19), and everything in between. Most maps are densely packed with monsters, and occasionally you'll see something resembling full on slaughter (although Valiant is not a slaughter wad, MAP31 aside...).

Anyways, on to the good stuff...

SCREENSHOTS:






DOWNLOAD:
Final version:
http://www.doomworld.com/idgames/?file=levels/doom2/Ports/megawads/valiant.zip

http://www.mediafire.com/download/77yq6ppm3rjt50o

RC3 (outdated):
http://www.mediafire.com/download/dp6wgs75jgfwegu

RC2 (outdated):http://www.mediafire.com/download/uhi8uokal5p4d30

RC1 (outdated):http://www.mediafire.com/download/1b6rxv7t46roakk

DIFFERENCES IN SOURCE PORTS:
In (G)ZDoom, Eternity, and Zandronum, each episode is selected from the main menu. In PrBoom-plus, Valiant plays like a conventional 32 level megawad with a death exit at the end of each episode.

Episode ending texts and splash screens are implemented using MAPINFO and therefore are only present in (G)ZDoom, Eternity, and Zandronum.

Music changer objects are used a few times. These are not supported by Eternity, and thus Eternity will simply continue playing the map's default midi track in these situations.

The final boss will graphically glitch in ports without DECORATE support but this does not impact gameplay.

I recommend playing in ZDoom or Eternity for the optimal experience. If you would like to record demos or play multiplayer, PrBoom-plus or Zandronum are recommended, respectively.

PLAY INFO:
Valiant's difficulty is somewhat higher than Vanguard or Lunatic. If you've played either of those and found them too difficult, I recommend playing Valiant on skill 3 or skill 2.

As stated above, gameplay mods will not work with Valiant due to the extensive DeHackEd patch included.

HISTORY/DEVELOPMENT:
I started building Valiant in February 2012 as a speedmapped megawad focused on small maps. After making 10 or so of these, I grew tired of limiting myself to small maps and decided to make whatever maps I wanted to. It took three years of off and on work, with breaks from mapping lasting as long as 9 months to get here, and a total of 39 maps, but I'm finally done!

You can take a look at the map list and see when each map was made here: http://www.mediafire.com/view/4933m6r0i5tuavl

CREDITS:
Special thanks to dew, esselfortium, Seele00TextOnly and Tarnsman for testing, quality control, criticism, and technical advice, and also for being chill dudes. Thanks so much for your help!

Special thanks to the creators and maintainers of utilities, source ports, and wikis, without which this project wouldn't have been possible.

Special thanks to the Doom community as a whole, but especially the Doomworld forums and #doomtwid for making me feel at home.

Resource credits are included in Valiant.txt.

Edited April 22, 2023 by skillsaw

[dew]

Awwwwyisssss. This thing is good.

[tourniquet]

uhh fabuloso......downloading

[Cacatou]

Couldn't you have released this during the holidays rather than during university time? I'm going to have to make sacrifices in some way to play this because it looks bloody amazing.

[esselfortium]

Congratulations on finally getting this thing out the door!

Spoilers: It's awesome

[Jimmy]

downloading right the fuck now

holy shit those screenshots

be still my beating dick

[Breezeep]

Downloading this shit.

[General Rainbow Bacon]

Holy shit! This looks great!

[Demonologist]

*drops jaw*
Oh fuck, this'll keep me busy for a while...

[mouldy]

Wehay! Looks bloody lovely.

[Walter confetti]

Holy carp, finally is here! Downloaded!

[scifista42]

First level of E3 was fun and awesome, and the new content and DEHACKED work seems great, well enhancing the game while keeping it player-friendly! Clever usage of barrels to help you against strong opposition, while your own weaponry is weak. I'm hyped to see the megawad in its entirety! The claim about variety sounds only great.

EDIT: I was actually talking about MAP14 here. I've selected it as the first one because it was the middle episode choice, I forgot that there are episodes and thought they're difficulties, and didn't pay enough conscious attention to the difficulty selection afterwards. :)

[kmxexii]

i got a feelin 2015 is gonna be a good year

[dobu gabu maru]

A skillsaw megawad I WASN'T PREPARED FOR THIS TODAY.

[Tarnsman]

0/10. Shit sucks. Gave me double cancer. Would not play again.

[kmxexii]

dobu gabu maru said:

A skillsaw megawad I WASN'T PREPARED FOR THIS TODAY.

im not ready for this man IM NOT READY FOR THIS

[Urthar]

Oh hell, it's not like I was going to get any mapping done this weekend anyway.

[franckFRAG]

SURPRIIISE !!!!

/download it.

[Breezeep]

Tarnsman said:

0/10. Shit sucks. Gave me double cancer. Would not play again.

10/10 best troll ever

[Du Mhan Yhu]

Downloading now!

[Ribbiks]

hot damn

[Mechadon]

Hell yea! I remember seeing some of those screenshots, but this is still a pleasant surprise :D. Beautiful stuff, and I'm betting the gameplay is just as good.

Congrats on the release!

[Ch0wW]

We did a Zandronum server on Valiant a few hours ago. Feel free to test it by the way!

It's a really enjoyable wad, difficult, but really fun to play, with lots of nice ideas!

10/10 would continue playing it

[AD_79]

[Fuzzball]

You say no gameplay mods, but what about things like simple decorate patches that replace the blood with correct colours? Is that okay still? Or are monster sprites different anyway

[VGA]

What are the minimum compatibility settings in Zdoom? Just the Boom preset?

[skillsaw]

Thanks everyone, especially Tarnsman for keeping it real.

FuzzballFox: I don't know if even simple mods will work. If you give me a copy I can try to test it and let you know, but I wouldn't count on it. If it's something purely cosmetic like blood colors, you might want to try just going without it if you don't mind.

VGA: As far as compat settings in ZDoom go, I just play with the default settings, except I enable infinite height monsters and the setting that allows projectiles to pass through decorations (as in vanilla).

[ReFracture]

Awwww yeah, Dime hyped us up on this last night by playing Lunatic first. LET'S DO THIS SHIT.

[NuMetalManiak]

FuzzballFox said:

You say no gameplay mods, but what about things like simple decorate patches that replace the blood with correct colours? Is that okay still? Or are monster sprites different anyway

I wanted to ask this too. does this mean I can't play this with Random Deaths & Decorations or Perkrisian's custom sounds? :( :( :(

[skillsaw]

Getsu Fune said:

I wanted to ask this too. does this mean I can't play this with Random Deaths & Decorations or Perkrisian's custom sounds? :( :( :(

There are a lot of sound effects stored in odd places in the wad by necessity - eg, the hell knight death sound becomes an active sound used by a new, completely different monster. You'd be hearing perkrisian's HK death sound constantly while that monster type is present, so I don't think you should use a complete sound overhaul mod.

I'm not familiar with RD&D but assuming it replaces decorations you will run into problems. Several monsters occupy thing slots previously occupied by decorations, so you'd see blue torches for instance where a monster was intended to be.