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[Matt_S]

So last night I decided that HNTR was getting to be a little bit boring for me, and I played a couple of HMP games.  Quite simply, I got my ass kicked.  Even on Phobos Base Entry, the former humans were filling me with bullets.  Then on level 2 there were tons of enemies, including former captains.  I managed to get to Hell's Arena only one time, where I only managed to get to the second round before I got ambushed by cacodemons and died.

Does anyone have some advice for me on how to transition up to HMP?

[thelaptop]

Speed is everything.  Don't charge in, take more cover -- every little mistake will add up quickly.

Don't try to kill everything in HMP -- you can get decent CLev without having to gain 100% kills, unlike in HNTR.  If you have shotguns, use it in conjunction with your pistol to do the ol' one-two unless you are on weapon restriction challenges: blast with shotgun and finish off with (possibly aimed) pistol.  It is a little more effective than blast with shotgun and then switch/reload and blast with another shotgun (damage drop off is nasty).

Scout runs with initial Intx2 goes a long way to make HMP easier.

Since 0.9.9.4, I've not really played much HNTR/ITYTD games, instead playing more HMP, so I can understand your frustration in the early game.

Caveat: Max DLev I've reached is DLev 15 (Marine:6), DLev 10 (Scout:5) on 0.9.9.4.

Fun fact: After playing lots of HMP, HNTR will feel simple, and ITYTD ridiculously easy -- I did my Sunrise Iron Fist run on ITYTD, first ITYTD game on 0.9.9.4 ever.  O.o

[AlterAsc]

Fun fact: After playing lots of

Same with playing HMP after UV an so on. And pretty much the same in lots of of other games.

[Thomas]

If you're dying on levels 2-3 on HMP then you're probably letting the enemies shoot at you way too much. Maybe you're never using the corner trick, or you're trying to reposition yourself during combat too much or something. Here are some suggestions:

1. You're probably using the shotgun, so keep in mind that it's almost always better to just two-shot an enemy from far away than closing in for a one-hit kill. If they ambush you at middle-short range then you can try to zig-zag towards them (unless it's a shotgunner, they never miss and whatnot)
2. Doors are great. Fight near open doors so you can always run away behind them to reload or get in position for a corner trick, and open them diagonally so you reveal less tiles at once (and thus less chance for things to get free shots on you). If you're feeling really non-confident, close doors ('c') as you go through them, because you can see doors open on the map even if they're not currently in view. This can help you figure out where enemies are.
3. (feel free to ignore this tip if it gets you killed) If you're remembering to use your medpacks and always die with 0 medpacks, then that's a good thing but also a bad thing. As a level gets closer to being relatively safe, you should try not to use your medpacks. They're most important at the start of a level where the enemies still control the level and you don't decide where you get to fight them. But at the end, corner tricks are much easier to set up and killing enemies without taking damage is way easier. This might save you 1 or 2 medpacks in the long run and allow you to use them when you're really surrounded.
4. Your shotgun has a range that's a few squares further than your field of vision. In narrow rooms, you can shoot in to the other side of the room and damage things you can't see. If you hear a pain noise, either continue firing (especially if it's a lost soul or a demon or something) or run back in to a spot where you can easily do the corner trick as they follow you (human enemies may require this treatment because who knows what weapon, health packs and armour they have)
5. Fighting lots of things at once isn't a good idea unless they're all on the same side of you, which upgrades it to 'sometimes an okay idea'. If you start off surrounded, run towards the side that looks safer or easier to kill and kill them first. You should be trying to fight at max range in general, but it's especially important when lots of accuracy rolls are being thrown by lots of dudes.

[Sambojin]

Until you get used to it, HMP seems heaps harder. Everything is just that bit faster and more accurate.

I found that either shotgun builds or pistol build were the best while I was learning. A shotgun with Reloader(2) is a very effective weapon, so is a pistol with SoaG/DG. Shotgun builds tend to be pretty specific to a certain character class (otherwise they lose power a lot in late game) where as pistols work with any class.

For pistols, just try a non-master build. Making either Speedloader Pistols or using bulk-mods on them helps a lot.

For shotguns, there's a huge range of options. Here's a few early-game builds to try:

A marine with finesse, juggler and badass. Switch with shotguns to double tap enemies (all un-armoured formers, imps and even demons will usually die to two shotgun blasts), and you can also pull out a pistol or chaingun as an instant backup weapon. 200% life is nice as well.

A technician with reloader, reloader, shottyman. Use your tech-mod in the first shotgun you get. Having a 0.8 sec fire time, 0.6 sec reload and moving reloads is very nice early on.

A scout with Int(2). You'll have perfect corner shooting, excellent radar shooting, know how much life there is on the level and be able to run to the stairs whenever you want. You'll also know how to time your "run mode" bursts and whether you can zerk/imvulnerabilty bounce through this level. So very powerful early on, you almost can't help beating the arena even in UV.

None of these builds are necessarily great for the late game, but they're all good starters so you can get deeper into the game and learn some tactics as you go. And remember, when using a shotgun, press the run button (tab key). You can run more than you realise, so use it a lot. The damage you dodge really adds up, and every health globe keeps giving you more running time. Shotgun builds should be running as much as melee builds (ie, almost constantly).

Hope this helps.

[Matt_S]

Thanks for the helpful tips.  I just played a HMP run with a partial melee build, with the planned master trait of Vampyre, though I was taking a detour to get Whizkid 2 so I could mod my would-be assemblies; I only had Brute 1, so not a whole lot of meleeing yet (and interestingly I found the Jackhammer in the Armory, but it sort of burns through ammo so I kept my modded combat shotgun as my primary).  I made it to The Wall while maintaining 100% kills.  The trick was doing more to avoid getting shot at, and generally playing smarter than I usually do.

I say I made it to The Wall.  As I discovered as soon as I entered, somewhere an unknown number of floors back I had left my rocket launcher lying on the ground while I was managing my inventory.  This is something that's happened shockingly often, as I usually drop weapons, since they are at the top of the inventory, to pick up and use things that are on the ground.  I had a shockwave pack, so I used it and hoped it would destroy enough for me to get through and kill the Barons, but it wasn't enough.  It just totally wrecked my motivation to continue, since I had 100% kills up to that point.  So I ragequit.  I guess I need to start training myself to drop ammo, so if I do forget it it's not so bad (though as far as I remember I've only forgotten when it's the rocket launcher because everything else I use often enough to notice it's gone before I leave the floor).

[raekuul]

For the Wall, the trick is to plan the first leg of your run around going there. There will come a time when you can't get 100% Kills and Conqueror on some challenges, so if you're on one of the Weapon Angel challenges, go ahead and start skipping it.

As for other things... Learn how to survive before you learn how to kick ass. It doesn't help to finally get to Cybie with 100% Kills if it leaves you with less than 10 HP (20% without Iro or Marine) on DLev 25

[Sambojin]

It's actually an excellent idea to try melee runs when going to a new difficulty, either an AoB run or melee based with gun backup.

It teaches you so many viable strategies for any game type. It also teaches you what can be ignored, dodged reliably, as well as the real tricks of doomRL. If you can take out the big nasties with a knife or a chainsaw, imagine how easy it'll be with an actual gun.

This is something I'm very guilty of actually. Learning the skills required in AoB (gift dropping, cautious play, globe bouncing, run-time limits) and then completely forgetting or ignoring them in my normal games. The amount of times that dropping a peice of armour and waiting would have saved me is amazing. But I still choose a lack of tactics, firepower and inevitable death for some reason.

Well, time to get back into melee runs I guess. Since a simple chainsaw works so well, how can a modded plasma rifle seem to cause me to die so much more often? Hopefully the skills will become second nature for all my games eventually.....