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Messages - Icy

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121
Discussion / Another Journey to 100%
« on: July 03, 2020, 18:08 »
Hello once again! I hope you've all been well under these extraordinary times.

Continuing my trend of playing this game every few years, I've had an itch to pick it up again and am keen to push even further and faster than I did previously! For those who may be unfamiliar, I had a daily blog of sorts with my progress before, "The Journey to 100%", and think it would be fun to do it another time. Maybe I'll get much closer to 100% this time, maybe I'll crash and burn after playing so much again, who knows. Maybe there will be a part 3 in 2024 or something.

The main thing that always draws me in is D***RL is it's an extremely fun, well-designed, satisfying game to play, even if there are some balance issues. It really fits well with my grindy and analytical gaming playstyle, and I can enjoy playing single-player at my own pace.

Since I know so much more now and am far more experienced coming into the game this time, I think I'll quickly get back to where I was before. For reference, the last time I tried this, I clocked in over 300 hours within 2 months, while also working full time, and at the current moment, I just finished my last day of any sort of productivity for the next couple months. I did have some backups of my progress before, but not up to when I stopped last time, and quite honestly, I think it would be a lot more fun to start fresh anyway.

I'm thinking of doing the same type of blog style I did before, both to provide some interesting reading material, and to also contain everything I do in one place instead of flooding out what other players post in the mortem section. It's also helpful to have a lot of strategy ideas for those who are also seeking achievements, and I definitely will be referring to my old mortems to help myself.

I also think this time I'll try some non-badge challenges that seem like fun to keep things interesting. Some sort of difficulty existing between Diamond and Angelic would be wonderful as the jump between them is quite ridiculous and can be demotivating. That said, I really want to try to catch Papilio and Tormuse. One itch that I never scratched is I was an Angel of 100 on Nightmare from getting the last Medal and with it, two more Diamond Badge, which I really wish I did.

Anyway, I hope you all enjoy what I have to share and hopefully don't take this in as spammy or anything like that. :)

122
Discussion / Re: The Journey to 100%
« on: November 11, 2017, 06:32 »
Thanks, Sereg!

Day 65:

A whole lot more of nothing. I definitely think and agree I overrated the difficulty of a few badges, and I'm capable of a lot more than what I posted previously.

That said though, I think I'm going to take a break from playing for awhile and let the fire re-ignite. DoomRL is a super fun game and very well-designed, but with going non-stop in my free time for over 2 months now, I'm burning myself out a bit. I'm at well over 200 hours of play already! I'd rather take a break than to end up quitting altogether, as I've done in the past with other games, so that's what I'm going to do.

I'll be back with new badges sometime soon. The journey will continue!

123
Discussion / Re: The Journey to 100%
« on: November 10, 2017, 13:57 »
Thanks guys, I appreciate it. :) I've just been stuck on a lot of challenges lately and wanted to vent a bit and express some frustrations. Journeys come with bumps sometimes I guess. :P

Day 64:

Continuing on from yesterday, nothing new or any decent runs at all, lol. I tried some more for Pacifist Angelic Badge and had a few more runs near the end of Phobos. It really is a great challenge to go for on the side, so if I play for long enough, I think I will actually get it eventually.

On the positive, I have a long weekend and want to grind hard, so hopefully I'll get some new shinies. :)

124
Discussion / Re: The Journey to 100%
« on: November 09, 2017, 15:55 »
Surviving the nuke is nice for quick clears, but I didn't want to risk the Invulnerabilities getting destroyed or getting attacked in the open. Hoping for luck or using cheesy tactics may not be the most appealing method for many players, but I'm an optimizer and strategist, and will always use all my resources available to achieve my goals. :)

Day 63:

Against what was recommended, I tried some Angel of 100 with Max Carnage on Nightmare and it didn't go too well. :P While Max Carnage is advantageous in combat and ammo conservation, the monster density is high enough where many starting points are surrounded and hard to control. I'll have to settle with raw Angel of 100 attempts.

I rotated a bit more, but didn't do anything spectacular. I also tried some more for Pacifist Angelic Badge and reached a new furthest point. This was a sketchy situation with nothing dying fortunately:

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Lucky floor 5:

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Lucky floor 6:

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Rougher floor 7. To avoid monsters killing each other, I had to take a long swim through acid:

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It seems that for Phobos Anomaly though, you need yet even more luck with a Phase Device for a realistic chance to get through without anything dying:

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Another Lost Soul got trashed too lol:

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And now for an overall progress discussion and how I'm feeling about all the remaining challenges. :)

One of the things with massively improving (in anything really) is having a stronger realization and understanding of how difficult certain tasks are, how talented top players are, and what's realistic. When I first started playing and writing here, I figured that while being a noob, I could eventually develop enough skill to get absolutely everything. Of course with plateaus, you begin to think that (now easy) other challenges are impossible until they are overcome and the process cycles until the next bump.

The thing is that I've learned a ton about this game now and I'd like to think I'm quite competent with how to play effectively. Yet, I truly don't think I'll ever achieve absolutely 100% of everything, not that I couldn't, but I don't want to end up investing thousands of hours just for certain badges. Speedrunner Angelic Badge comes to mind, but there are a couple others that are totally fucked too. Surely, anyone can get Speedrunner Angelic Badge with enough luck, but to beat the game in 4 minutes on Nightmare has very little to do with skill or learning. It's entirely a slot machine that would take a ridiculously stupid amount of time to get, which could of course be used on countless other things.

With all of this in mind, I also have a much better understanding of why people are very skeptical about 2Dev and VANDAM. I'm a firm believer of innocent until proven guilty, but being so casual about Demonic Angelic Badge doesn't make any sense, not to mention actually achieving it. If there were a supercomputer that would calculate all the mathematics and probabilities of every action and choose the best one each time, I imagine it still wouldn't be able to achieve the badge on most runs. Or just maybe, they know some secret tactics that I haven't figured out yet. Or perhaps they clocked in an ungodly number of hours.

For confirmed players, I'd strongly argue Papilio is the DoomRL's #1 with countless videos and mortems of super difficult challenges, duplicating many of those badges, and beating many without challenge abuse. Tormuse is definitely in that same tier by flaunting the most confirmed angelic badges, especially Everyman Angelic Badge. I'd say I'm a comfy 3rd place, but still behind by a major skill gap that I want to overcome.

Now, this isn't me giving up and vanishing or anything like that, but having learned and improved a lot with the game, I'm definitely going to scale my goals back a bit. Mindless grinding with little to no meaningful input by the player is not appealing at all (I'm perfectly fine with churning out runs though), but there are still many badges that offer a fair and difficult challenge that I want to accomplish. And because the game is a ton of fun, I'm definitely going to do a lot of my own personal challenges. One in particular I want to do eventually is a 100% kill game of Archangel of 666 on Ultra-Violence. I also want to do a bunch more of Max Carnage + Angel of 100 runs. Perhaps I'll also go for "un-Sereg'd" badge challenges too.

Here are my current thoughts on my remaining unachieved badges:

Strongman Platinum Badge - Tough, but doable with Invulnerability luck and using the Chainsaw for Babel and Dis.
Elite Platinum Badge - I don't think this challenge is too bad, but having to go through a long game with Mortuary/Limbo waiting near the end is scary. I'll probably go for 100% kills on this run for the needed experience.
Demonic Platinum Badge - Many of the bonus levels can be immediately exited, so I don't think this is too much harder than a regular Nightmare game. Again, Mortuary/Limbo waiting near the end is going to kill a lot of long runs, but I can definitely get this.
Marksman Platinum Badge - Probably the hardest platinum badge in my opinion. I'll likely go with a Sharpshooter build for this, but I've really never been a fan of using Pistols. Needing to kill everything keeps the player honest and also means mixing with Overconfidence is unrealistic.

Heroic Diamond Badge/Centurial Diamond Badge/Dervis' Medallion - Mostly needs a lucky start, ideally early Inquisitor set, and then it's just a stairdive. Even if this was much tougher, my last medal and a pair of diamond badges is a huge incentive to finish this soon.
Strongman Diamond Badge - Pretty damn hard. Papilio has achieved it, but I might be skipping this one.
Elite Diamond Badge - Basic Nightmare game with respawn grinding on the floor before Dis. Pretty easy, but time-consuming.
Demonic Diamond Badge - Very hard badge to earn. I think it will take a really lucky Phobos episode, followed by Invulnerability luck. Might skip it.
Everyman Diamond Badge - A step up in difficulty from platinum, but I can and will definitely get it.
Arena Diamond Badge - Really dumb luckfest badge, lol. I think only Tormuse has got it? I think the only way I'll be getting it is with a Butcher's Cleaver on floor 2, which I'm not too ecstatic to go for.

UAC Angelic Badge - Totally fucked. Nobody confirmed to have achieved.
Strongman Angelic Badge - Only Tormuse has it, and I'm not exactly excited for punching enemies for hours on end lol. Will probably skip it.
Speedrunner Angelic Badge - lol
Elite Angelic Badge - A couple players have this one which is surprising to me. Maybe I can get it on a Trigun run. :P
Demonic Angelic Badge - Shouldn't be realistically possible.
Berserker Angelic Badge - Tormuse has it from a lucky run. I'd definitely need more Invulnerability luck to get it.
Marksman Angelic Badge - Papilio and a couple others have it I think? I'm already not keen on Marksman Platinum Badge lol. I think a stair-dive with respawn grinding at the end would work, but I don't think I'll go for it.
Eagerness Angelic Badge - Nope.
Inquisitor Angelic Badge - Totally fucked.
Quartermaster Angelic Badge - It seems quite a few players have this one, and I think I can get it too. I'll definitely play for it.
Masochist Angelic Badge - I believe this is the "easiest" unachieved angelic badge? While health boosts are blocked, you can still run around Invulnerable. It's essentially a lighter version of UAC/Demonic, except you can't restore tactics either. I might try for it.
Centurial Angelic Badge - Will definitely get this one at some point.
Pacifist Angelic Badge - Never achieved and I don't think I will be getting it either. It requires far too much luck to be worth grinding for. On the plus side though, it's a nice fallback during a bad gameplay session, or for a few quick runs, so who knows. Maybe after long enough, I'll accidentally get it.
Everyman Angelic Badge - Totally fucked, but Tormuse somehow got it. Of all things though, not being able to use Intuition x2 is keeping me away from it lol.

In summary, I will go for all the remaining platinum badges, most of all the diamond badges (skipping Strongman, Demonic, and Arena), and I'll get at least up to 6 angelic badges for another ranking promotion. I'll probably be getting Centurial Angelic Badge, Quartermaster Angelic Badge, and one other, maybe Elite Angelic Badge.

I'm still overall happy with my progress thus far and have been having a blast, but this is now The Journey to 95%. :P When you shoot for the stars, you still get pretty far into space, and I definitely wouldn't have got as far as I have if not going for 100% to begin with. The top 10 in anything competitive are not players who just want top 10, but 1st.

You do indeed earn your namesake with "No-Life King", and I'm not willing to take that kind of plunge. :P I'll continue doing my best and while I think I won't be going beyond 3rd place in ranks/badges, I'd like to close the gap a bit to Papilio and Tormuse, as well as getting as far up as I can. I just wanted to share my thoughts on the game at this point where I'm seriously running low of realistically doable challenges and being nearly forced to grind for stupidly difficult challenges, but as I said, I'll still be continuing strong, so don't worry. :)

125
Discussion / Re: The Journey to 100%
« on: November 08, 2017, 10:08 »
Day 62:

Good progress this day! First was more attempts at Quartermaster Diamond Badge. For the most part, gameplay is just based around not getting hit and making sure to find the stairs while exploring the levels. There's usually enough time to be killing every enemy with Max Carnage, except for the odd cases where they're teleporting around, or they become difficult to control. As you get further into the game, the difficulty stays roughly the same, maybe a bit easier as you get more useful traits to speed up, as well as buffed up weapons. A Plasma Rifle with plenty of ammo is enough to clear entire floors very fast!

Some screenshots; I went for a full clear on Hell's Armory and barely escaped in time:

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On one floor, I had a double Invulnerability stacked near each other but didn't know where the stairs were. The floor was a "city" and one of the rooms hadn't been explored in, yet it turned out the stairs was on a random dark tile I hadn't checked yet. Fortunately before discovering that, I decided to use my Homing Phase Device after grabbing the Invulnerabilities, and it also turned out to be a good idea for the following floor:

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The rest of the run was pretty basic stuff. It's not too hard of a challenge, but it's a fairly long game where you can't make too many mistakes for the entire duration. Each floor individually is easy, but playing flawlessly as a whole is a bit tough.

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Slightly off-topic, here's a cool screenshot of a random game I played about a week ago that I forgot about:

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Anyway, after that badge, I went for Berserker Diamond Badge. Given that melee is very hard on Nightmare when you can't be skipping everything, I opted to rush to floor 7, and then create a setup where I could repeatedly kill a weak enemy to buff up my kill count requirement. I got lucky with getting a run after just a few tries!

This was definitely a lucky start to this floor, and was also fantastic for experience:

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And even luckier than it would appear!

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With the double Invulnerability and a lucky floor 6...

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I was able to clear out an arena type floor on Hell 7, and wiped out all the corpses too, leaving just a single Revenant. While they're fairly dangerous, they have very low HP and are easy to repeatedly kill:

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Once I reached enough kills (went a fair bit higher than necessary lol), I used the Chainsaw Berserk trick on Dis, charged the Spider Mastermind, and hit her with flinching hits until she died!

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Two diamond badges in one night is pretty sweet at this point! This brings my count to 19, still with Heroic and Centurial in the bank waiting! :)

I'll probably start playing for Angel of 100 on Nightmare now and hopefully it doesn't take too long. :P I'm thinking of doing a Shotgun->Melee build with Intuition x2 -> Hellrunner x2 -> Dodgemaster -> Brute x2 -> Berserker -> Brute -> Beyond. It works out well since I'd of course want Blademaster, but only take 3 extra traits beforehand, all of which are helpful for melee builds anyway. Completing this challenge will give the double diamond badge and the last remaining medal, giving me my last major group of rewards, completing another page on my player stats, and leaving a great mark on my progress!

Hopefully I get some good luck on my runs!


126
Discussion / Re: The Journey to 100%
« on: November 07, 2017, 13:57 »
Thanks guys! :)

That's good to know that Angel of 100 on Nightmare doesn't actually take very long at all! Maybe I'll try for some tonight then.

Day 61:

Not much in terms of progress! I played some for Everyman Diamond Badge, and while it's functionally the same as the way I did Everyman Platinum Badge, the bump up to Ultra-Violence is enough where it's significantly harder to complete. More enemies, more damage, and the bonus levels require extra Med-Packs when using Azrael's. No luck on completing it yet.

I also tried for some Quartermaster Diamond Badge with use of Max Carnage. I had a few good runs, but died in all of them. Arachnotrons and Former Commandos are brutal. :(

Playing for Quartermaster Diamond Badge is a lot of fun, so I'll probably focus on that next. That's all for now!

127
Discussion / Re: The Journey to 100%
« on: November 06, 2017, 06:41 »
Thanks guys! Shoutouts to Khiijol again for the suggestion too! :D

Day 60:

I dabbled a little bit with Pacifist Angelic Badge, and it's super dumb, lol. The furthest I got to before dying or having an enemy die was floor 5, so this will definitely require a mega grind to get. On the plus side, the actual execution is pretty simple, but it'll take many, many attempts to get the needed luck.

I also tried a bit more for Angel of Humanity as a Conqueror on a normal game and on Angel of 100, but neither were working out. After awhile, I did some brainstorming and I came up with an absolutely amazing strategy for the run!

As shown in the code before, you can do Angel of Humanity + Overconfidence, complete the 4 floors, and receive the rewards, but all of the bonus levels are pretty insane to do. However, a very important point is that when you start off with one of each basic mod pack, a Combat Knife, and a Red Armor, you can create both a Ballistic Red Armor and a Chainsword immediately! This trivializes Unholy Cathedral! You can use a nice setup for the Lost Souls, destroy all the Demons once Berserk, and then fighting the Angel of Death with Berserk + Ballistic Armor, you'll only be taking 1 (10%) damage each hit!

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

Once a Lost Soul appears, step into the corner and ideally, the Lost Soul goes where you just were, giving a safe kill. Dancing around isn't too hard if they're uncooperative, and you'll usually need to use a Large Med-Pack anyway, so it's a great way to starting the level.

The other important key is that with both Angel of Humanity and Overconfidence, you receive all the Large Med-Packs for both challenges, giving you a total of 4 of them! You'll almost certainly need 2 for the Unholy Cathedral, but still have a pair for before or after.

Now, if you play on Hurt Me Plenty, which is harder than the necessary difficulty of Hey, Not Too Rough for the challenge, you can get Azrael's Scythe, which is the absolute key to completing the other bonus levels! Because you can use it indefinitely so long as you can keep healing (maximum HP has a minimum but still works), you can use it and wipe out both The Vaults and Mortuary/Limbo! In fact for Mortuary/Limbo, you start beside two Soulspheres, so you don't even necessary need all the Med-Packs. Once you clear the level by Whisper of Death spam, you then gain 4 extra Large Med-Packs, Angelic Armor, Red Armor (P), a nuke (via Nuclear BFG), and a Soulsphere on your exit! These two floors are also fantastic for experience!

Ideally for Lava Pits/Mt Erebus, you can enter while Invulnerable and nuke the place, then killing the Lava Elemental (2ish hits) once it warps to you. With Red Armor (P) + Berserk + Large Med-Packs, you have enough healing to survive, so long as you don't get dunked in lava.

With the Lava Element, you can then use it for floor 7 if you still have your nuke (for Dis), or otherwise enter Dis, spam all that you can left of Azrael's Scythe, then approach while Invulnerable and repeatedly make the Spider Mastermind flinch until she dies.

It's such an amazing strategy for this challenge! I can't recommend it enough! The start of floor 1 can be tricky, but Assault Shotgun + Shell Box is usually enough. It's important to also be collecting all the Med-Packs you can and to grab an Envirosuit if possible for the Lava Elemental. Another minor detail is if you find a Rocket Launcher before The Vaults, you can scavenge both of the side vaults for potential goodies.

I strongly recommend using the Scout and going with Brute x2 -> Berserker -> Brute -> Intuition x2 -> Hellrunner x2 -> beyond. The first four are for key for Angel of Death, though with a low experience floor 1, reaching just level 3 is fine. Intuition is also critical in my opinion because after spamming Azrael's, you absolutely need to minimize damage as you're running around with 5 HP and really benefit from seeing where Invulnerabilities are. Despite collecting the traits for Blademaster, it's not really useful since you should be avoiding groups of enemies.

I also recommend using a Scout for stair sense. I tried a bit with Marine, but wandering around the floors is too dangerous, despite having Vampyre and double Berserk/Invulnerability bonuses.

Once I pieced the strategy altogether, it took a few runs to get going, as well as getting a touch of luck, but it's very easy! You can also use the same strategy on Ultra-Violence for Everyman Diamond Badge, which I plan on doing in the future.

This was my setup at the end of floor 1:

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Double Invulnerability on floor 5:

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Lava Pits two steps away on floor 6:

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Some bad luck with a late warp by the Lava Elemental:

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Envirosuit + Berserk saving the day. I killed the Lava Elemental in just 2 attacks, though I did need to be careful and used some Med-Packs:

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Lucky floor 7:

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Lava Element setup for Dis:

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And indeed, I received both Thomas's Medal and Everyman Platinum Badge! Very happy to get these, but also to do so with brainpower! :)

At this point now, I just need one more medal, which is Dervis' Medallion. With that, I'll also receive two diamond badges with Centurial Diamond Badge, and Heroic Diamond Badge! I'm pretty confident I can beat Angel of 100 on Nightmare. I'm tempted to use Max Carnage, but I'm thinking it'll make the ending way too difficult, and will probably just do a standard challenge. The only thing is that the run itself takes some time and I don't really want to have my computer running overnight, so I'll try for this on the weekend. In the meantime, I think I'll go for Everyman Diamond Badge next and rotate a bit for the remaining platinum badges I haven't achieved.

Getting all the medals is a major milestone I'm looking forward to completing!

128
Discussion / Re: The Journey to 100%
« on: November 04, 2017, 14:06 »
Day 59:

First time posting progress on the day of in quite awhile! :D

So as said, I decided to go for Veteran Angelic Badge with combining Max Carnage and Overconfidence. I had a pretty good start:

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Part way into the level, I found the unique that spawned, which was Revenant's Launcher! Definitely a big help for corpse disposal:

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All the rockets collected from annoying Mancubi and Revenants will come in handy now. I generally don't like using Rocket Launchers since they destroy walls and scatter enemies around, but I didn't have much of a choice for this challenge. I got through the first floor pretty well, which is nice. Not much struggling yet!

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

Floors 2 and 3 weren't anything special; I just killed enemies with the Assault Shotgun and then blew them up. One thing that stood out for me though is I was playing exceptionally well and had a massive kill streak after just a few levels:

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Floor 4 is very crucial to the run since I need to safely get the Nuclear BFG. While an Invulnerability did spawn, it was unfortunately very far away from the stairs:

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I actually took my first hit in awhile here to a Nightmare Cacodemon, which got me back on alert:

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I found a Power Battery and the Hell Staff close together! Two very critical items for success!

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The good luck continued with rolling Limbo. I didn't really have a plan for Mortuary, so I'm glad I got this:

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I had quite the arsenal ready for Limbo. I had to be very careful to getting to the top-right:

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Fortunately, there were no Archviles on that island and I made it there while still Invulnerable. I made the stupid mistake of forgetting that the corpses around can respawn and nearly died for it:

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I really wanted to save the Soulsphere, but didn't have a choice and had to use it right away to blow up the island. Once that was done, I started firing away at the enemies:

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I didn't bring much for health, so I had to run across earlier than I had planned while I had over 100% health. Once I cleared out the middle area, I used up my last Large Med-Pack to cross again:

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I was very careful on keeping one of the middle Soulspheres intact for later. Once again, I continued firing off to the far-off islands:

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Once the level was cleared out, I was in fairly good shape overall:

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I was already at the one hour mark as this takes forever to do. I started considering that a Trigun run with floor 7 Invulnerability might be a much better strategy, although it would be a massive grind to get that luck. Limbo on Nightmare is so brutal though.

Floor 5 was pretty easy and nothing special. Floor 6 greeted me with this however:

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I was super tempted to use the Nuclear BFG to wipe out a ton of enemies, but I was worried I could potentially destroy a nuke or something, so I just took cover and fired away countless shells into the crowd:

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Turns out, doing that was a good idea:

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I rolled Mt Erebus, which I definitely prefer over Lava Pits. Happy to have got both bonus levels I wanted. Once I cleared out some of the Pain Elementals and Lost Souls around the starting area, I used the Hell Staff:

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Kind of lucky to get inside honestly, as clearing out the Revenants while having cover is nice. Once they were cleared, I phased out some more:

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Eep.

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So stupid. I had to waste all of my Med-Packs. After grinding this run for a good chunk of time, this would be the dumbest way to lose the run. This is one major disadvantage of Mt Erebus over Lava Pits. I had one try left:

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Thank god, and honestly, I got warped in the ideal place too. I flipped the lever and cleared out the enemies around:

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I noticed this Mancubus's corpse wouldn't get gibbed, so I stood on it for a moment while killing the others:

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Even a BFG shot wouldn't destroy it?

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Lava Armor!

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I was pretty well set for the Lava Elemental:

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Killed him without getting hit! Pretty good!

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After leaving behind the two undestroyable corpses, figuring they were dummied out or something, I checked my status to be sure:

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Had to waste an Envirosuit, which was worrying:

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One of them would be destroyed after respawning, but the other still wouldn't so I dunked him in lava instead:

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So I was pretty well set to fight JC now, but I wasn't entirely sure how I'd go about killing him, since I've had awful luck every time I tried during my Apostle rank grind. I was really hoping floor 7 would give a second nuke and a nearby Invulnerability. I got a decent floor, but nothing I really needed:

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Some complications with clearing:

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Entering Dis, this was my status:

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After I blew up the Spider Mastermind, I was a little undecided what to go with for JC, but I went with this setup:

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At this point, I was actually set for the angelic badge, and this was all on my first attempt, but I honestly was worried:

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This realization however made my heart rate spike WAY up:

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The Revenant's Launcher is SO GOOD for JC, and I realized I might actually kill him!

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Once I read "severely wounded", I started to get a bit nervous as I had a real shot at killing him now. 15 years of competitive gaming and at this point, it's exceptionally rare for me to feel nervous when playing. This was one of those moments. JC backed me up by taking a rocket hit, which worked out since I block most of fire damage and wanted to be out of sight of the other enemies:

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HOLY SHIT I DID IT ON MY FIRST TRY!!!

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Spoiler (click to show/hide)

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

This was BY FAR by leaps and bounds the most amazing thing I've ever done in DoomRL! This was literally my first attempt at going for this angelic badge and the run immediately after when I got Masochist Diamond Badge! A ton of it was good luck with Revenant's Launcher, Hell Staff, both good bonus levels, clear Nuclear BFG, not getting stuck in Mt Erebus, and no nasty floors! It's hard to show of course, but I definitely performed very well here and used a ton of great tactics throughout too! I really didn't think I would get this badge without some insane, goofy Trigun run, but I did it! I'm so elated!

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

129
Discussion / Re: The Journey to 100%
« on: November 04, 2017, 07:06 »
Day 58:

The focus this time was on the Masochist Badges. Since I could mix them with Max Carnage, they weren't too bad to go for. They played out mostly like a normal Max Carnage run where I couldn't heal, so I just needed to be a little extra careful. Invulnerability and Berserk still works like normal, so that helps a lot.

I went for Masochist Platinum Badge first and got it pretty quickly. Nothing really remarkable happened, just careful gameplay and normal levels:

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

Next was Masochist Diamond Badge in the same manner. On runs outside of Angel of 100/666, I never get high enough experience levels to ever want Ironman or Badass, so that restriction wasn't a big deal.

Part way into the run, I had an interesting scenario. I entered with a nuke nearby while already Invulnerable, but there was another Invulnerability not far off. I also was in dire need of healing. I decided to set off the nuke in place and made a mad dash for the second one:

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

I fortunately made it before the Mancubus shot at me:

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

I had another arena level two floors later and found a Phaseshift Armor:

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

Found another Invulnerability nearby:

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

After the Cyberdemon, I had a bit of luck with the stairs:

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

Which kept continuing:

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

Then on Hell 5, I had another Invulnerability spawn, which meant my run was quite close to being finalized:

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

Unfortunately, the spawned enemies on both sides of me were not nice:

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

Sucks since I was so close to the ending, but that's how it goes on Nightmare sometimes. All it takes is one nasty floor and the run is over. Of course, I kept trying though. Getting pretty deep into a new run, I had a nasty room but some awesome luck:

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

Immediately after was essentially an Arachnotron cave. I had Enviroboots so close by, but I unfortunately couldn't risk grabbing them:

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

Into Hell, I had some much-needed Invulnerability luck:

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

Then on Hell 6, being near the end again, I got another totally awful floor with a tough maze with both staircases on the far opposite side:

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

Through some close calls and clever tactics, I managed to not die:

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

The game gave me a break at the end, which followed with another easy Spider Mastermind kill:

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

Very happy to get this pair of badges done! I've now got Tormuse matched and beaten in platinum and diamond, with just Evilpotatoe, Thomas, and Papilio edging me out in platinum, and with just Papilio left in diamond badges. Of course there are others, but nobody else who are confirmed. Pretty cool!

I'd like to try for another angelic badge soon, and going off Khiijol's advice, I think I'll do Veteran Angelic Badge next. Given that I can abuse any of Max Carnage, Light Travel, and Overconfidence, it doesn't seem too insane of a challenge. The main issue will be killing JC. Ideally, I'd just double nuke the ending, but I need to survive which is the problem. I'll see what I can figure out for that! It'd be great to get another ranking promotion and match some more players! :)

130
Discussion / Re: The Journey to 100%
« on: November 03, 2017, 09:00 »
Melee builds are probably the way to go for speedrunning, but I figured I had enough time to work with to use something I'm more capable with. For the Speedrunner Angelic Badge, I'll definitely be using melee. Keep in mind that the majority of that run was me speeding through while Invulnerable. The traits I chose are the ones to best support doing that.

Yes, Dervis' Medallion is only earned on Angel of 100, while Centurial Angelic Badge is only earned on Angel of 666 (obviously). However, Centurial Diamond Badge can be earned on either. Here's the code for why that is:

Code: [Select]
OnMortem = function ()
if player.depth >= 16 then player:add_badge("century1") end
if player.depth >= 51 then player:add_badge("century2") end
if player:has_won() then
player:add_badge("century3")
if DIFFICULTY >= DIFF_VERYHARD then player:add_badge("century4") end
if DIFFICULTY >= DIFF_NIGHTMARE then
if ARCHANGEL then player:add_badge("century6") end
player:add_badge("century5")
end
end
end,
Code: [Select]
if ARCHANGEL then
ui.msg_enter("Or wait... false alarm. Still 566 to go.")
else
if DIFFICULTY == DIFF_NIGHTMARE then
player:add_medal("dervis")
end
player:win()
end
On that note of digging into the code, I was curious what the lever beneficial/neutral/dangerous feelings refer to when you only have Intuition x1, so I made a quick list:

Beneficial: Enemy damage, armor repair, health boost
Neutral: Water flood, forces explosions
Dangerous: Acid flood, lava flood, destroys walls, summons enemies

Day 57:

I tried more for Angel of Humanity + 100, but it's simply too luck-based when the intended method is much easier. Most of the combat is fine, you just need to be careful, but any bad start is hard to deal with. It'd be very unlikely to avoid Arachnotron caves for an entire 100 floors, or any starts with a dangerous group of enemies nearby. Almost all of my deaths were unfortunate insta-kills, but given that I've been making it to the 30s in floors, that's a good sign I can get through the floors of a normal game. As cool as it would be to flaunt the new strategy of Humanity + 100, I'm going to go back to normal attempts next time I try for it. I'm undecided which I'll do for Everyman Diamond Badge though.

I played for Quartermaster Platinum Badge this time with mixing Max Carnage. It plays a lot like a regular game, but there's a slight time limit. I had a few close calls, but never blew up on any floors.

On one of my runs, I reached the Cyberdemon with a collection of guns, including Elephant Gun, Double Shotgun, Chaingun, Plasma Rifle, and also a Chainsaw. I went for the Dodgemaster abuse strategy and was continually shot each reload, and ended up dying. I never realized that the Shotgun is the fastest weapon at reloading! I also really dislike the Elephant Gun with it's awful reloading speed. Combined with Shottyman trait is nice though, but I never reached that point. I also tried Gunrunner again and still hate it. :P

Juggler is a really sick trait to have for Max Carnage runs by the way, especially with the mouse wheel trick. :)

I had another nice run that got far into Hell, but a single Arachnotron cave was the end of that. While I'm still dying at the same rate as I would on Angel of Humanity, at least Max Carnage allows me to fight back properly in most cases. So I tried some more and got a solid run going.

This was a particularly nasty start given I was on Max Carnage:

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

Fortunately, I managed to scrape by and grab the Invulnerability too:

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

Towards the end of the run on Hell 5, I happened to leave a single tile uncovered on the far right side, which I later learned was hiding the stairs. Because I had to quickly run over there through a group of Mancubi to avoid the nuke killing me, I used up most of my health items and other gear. I got super lucky with a nice Hell 6 though:

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

Those are Phaseshift Boots by the way. :) After that I had a pretty simple, though slightly scary Hell 7:

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

Once I got to Dis, I clicked RunWait and got the badge!

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

Hitting the nice milestone of platinum badge count being the big two-oh is really awesome! Next will be some more platinum badges that I think I can get. Angel of Humanity as a Conqueror is on the backburner for now. I do want to get that finished at some point though since I would really like to finish collecting all the medals and being done with that, but it'll have to wait for now.

Good progress and lots of fun! :)

131
Discussion / Re: The Journey to 100%
« on: November 02, 2017, 13:50 »
I think you misunderstood, Sereg; that's the actual code in the game. I was pointing out that with how it's structured it prevents the conqueror trick for other challenges.

Day 56:

With my new strategy idea, I've been trying Angel of Humanity mixed with Angel of 100 for Thomas's Medal and Everyman Platinum Badge. I'm still close to certain it works, but there's still the obstacle of actually doing the challenge, and it's quite hard.

So far on all of my runs, I've been instakilled by something. It's pretty insane actually how safe I have to be playing. Letting up defense just for one moment against just one enemy kills the run. I have to really respect the danger and assume the worst scenario with every decision. I'm also thinking that Cerberus Boots are going to be almost essential since fluid damage is massive and there are cases where I can't get around dealing with it. I'd rather not have to always be carrying an Envirosuit, so I'll definitely need those boots, or at the very least, Enviroboots.

After dying there a few times, I tried some more of beating a standard Nightmare game in under 20 minutes. On my first attempt of the night, I had some luck in Deimos with an early Invulnerability, got through some floors, found a few Homing Phase Devices, and just before fighting the Cyberdemon, there was an Invulnerability that was literally adjacent to the stairs! I also switched off from choosing Dodgemaster as my fifth trait for Brute to massively increase my melee damage (mostly due to the accuracy buff). I destroyed the Cyberdemon and reached Hell for the first time in awhile. From there, I finally got the stacked Invulnerability needed to get through in a reasonable amount of time, and then for the last touch of good luck, had another double Invulnerability on the last floor before Dis!

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

It was very relieving to finally get these badges! On top, I finished with a pretty good 12:16, though it's sadly still so far away from the angelic badge. Besides Speedunner Angelic Badge, I now have all the real-time badges and medals, which is nice so that I can actually play at my preferred pace.

Since I was speedrunning, I didn't take much for screenshots, but I did snap this ending here since I noticed the swag experience level of 6/66%! ;)

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

Happy to get some progress, especially since it came unexpectedly while I was just rotating challenges. I'm going to try some more for Humanity, but I'm beginning to think that despite how cool it would be and how simplified playing is, that I might not do Angel of 100 after all. I might try some stairdiving next time and see how that goes.

132
Discussion / Re: The Journey to 100%
« on: November 01, 2017, 02:53 »
Dervis is the other missing medal, yes. You can click the image in my signature for full details of what I need to get.

While true that Centurial Angelic covers for that and Centurial Diamond, I'd argue the difference in difficulty is significant enough to warrant doing them separately, so that I can enjoy having earned the easier rewards earlier.

Also, I believe VANDAM did achieve Centurial Angelic, according to his signature.

Day 55:

I tried some more for Angel of Humanity as a conqueror, and had a really sick start by the end of floor 2:

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

Unfortunately, with a single misclick, I got killed, lol. :(

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

Boo. After that, I tried some more of beating Nightmare under 20 minutes, but still no luck there.

Afterwards, I starting looking into the coding some more and I'm quite confident in saying I believe I've made a new discovery!

Code: [Select]
OnMortem = function ()
if player:has_won() then
player:add_badge("everyman3")
if statistics.bonus_levels_completed == statistics.bonus_levels_count then
player:add_badge("everyman4")
player:add_medal("thomas")
if DIFFICULTY >= DIFF_VERYHARD then
player:add_badge("everyman5")
end
end
if DIFFICULTY >= DIFF_NIGHTMARE and ARCHANGEL then
player:add_badge("everyman6")
end
end
end,
It seems that the game only checks if your bonus levels completed and count are equal, instead of checking if you're actually a conqueror! This means that if you were to play Humanity + Confidence / Overconfidence / 100, you won't get the reward for being a conqueror, but the game will still give you Thomas's Medal and Elite Platinum Badge! Seems that it's a very similar oversight to the Max Carnage + Overconfidence trick for the Destroyer Badges.

This trick will also work for Everyman Diamond Badge if it works for the others!

Here's some other chunks of code that would usually avoid this error:

Code: [Select]
-- elite badges
if DIFFICULTY >= DIFF_VERYHARD  and is_conqueror then player:add_badge("elite4") end
if DIFFICULTY >= DIFF_NIGHTMARE then
if is_90kills then player:add_badge("elite5") end
if is_maxkills and is_conqueror then player:add_badge("elite6") end
end
Code: [Select]
register_challenge "challenge_aocn"
{
name        = "Angel of Confidence",
description = "Are three episodes too much of a grind? Try beating the game in just two! Having seen the destruction of Phobos beforehand, you asked to be dropped off at the Deimos base to save yourself the trouble. At least they were nice enough to give you some more gear.",
rating      = "VERY HARD",
rank        = 4,
abbr        = "AoCn",
let         = "N",
removemedals = { "icarus1", "icarus2", "explorer", "conqueror", "competn1", "competn2", "competn3", "untouchable1", "untouchable2", "untouchable3" },
Code: [Select]
register_challenge "challenge_aooc"
{
name        = "Angel of Overconfidence",
description = "Not three episodes, not even two: now we're down to a single count! You were so ready to face the legions of Hell that you were sent directly to their home turf. Good thing you snuck some extra supplies!",
-- In memory of our best abuser of AoOC
rating      = "SEREG",
rank        = 6,
abbr        = "AoOC",
let         = "V",
removemedals = { "icarus1", "icarus2", "explorer", "conqueror", "competn1", "competn2", "competn3", "untouchable1", "untouchable2", "untouchable3" },
Code: [Select]
register_challenge "challenge_a100"
{
name        = "Angel of 100",
description = "100 levels, and you win. No Cybie, no Spidey, no JC, no special levels, just 100 normal levels. And yes, there are more and more enemies after level 25...",
rating      = "HARD",
rank        = 5,
abbr        = "A100",
let         = "O",
removemedals = { "gambler", "aurora", "explorer", "conqueror", "fallout1", "fallout2", "fallout3", "ironskull1" },
Now, Confidence and Overconfidence with Humanity, while in theory should give Thomas's Medal, are still very difficult, if not more difficult because you won't have the Arena Master's Staff for The Vaults. It could potentially be done on Ultra-Violence with use of Azrael's Scythe since you can use it indefinitely as far as max health is concerned, but then the Angel of Death is an issue.

So instead, I'm genuinely considering going for Angel of Humanity + Angel of 100 for Thomas's Medal and Everyman Platinum Badge! While it's a ton of floors, they're all just normal floors, of which I can skip through, don't need to kill everything, etc. No more having to deal with Deimos Lab or Mortuary or Abyssal Plains or any of those! :P When I did my Ultra-Violence 100% kill Angel of 100 awhile back, I would go through dozens of floors before ever getting touched, and now that I'm significantly better at the game and would be playing on Hey, Not Too Rough, I honestly think I can do it! Plus, it would be an amazing proof of concept! I searched through the mortems, and there isn't a single Angel of Humanity + Angel of 100 in there, which might be why this wasn't discovered.

It's still possible there's some sort of code preventing this trick, but I can't find such a thing and I'm ~99% sure it does actually work. If anyone can confirm if it does or doesn't, please share!

133
Discussion / Re: The Journey to 100%
« on: October 31, 2017, 14:30 »
Thanks!

That's some solid advice for sure, and I agree that it'll likely be the next angelic badge I go for. :) I'm quite confident I can do it, but it might take a little luck with corpse control and getting a good start on every floor.

Day 54:

With just 2 medals left, I put my attention to Thomas's Medal, which would also give me Everyman Platinum Badge. Despite running around with just 10 HP, Hey, Not Too Rough is super easy to play. :P I've mostly been finding a safe spot and spamming RunWait to kill everything.

One issue I had before that I forgot about was handling Deimos Lab, and I rolled it again. I was a little more prepared this time with some fancy Blue Armor:

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

I also setup a super good strat for the Arachnotrons:

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

Basically, I close one of the doors, step outside the other, and use RunWait. Once one appears, I go to the top right corner to cornershoot the Arachnotron once it goes outside the little room. It's perfectly safe and easy!

I left all the crates intact this time for cover against the Shamblers, but I got a little worried with them roaming around, so I opted to do a cornershoot strat. Unfortunately, one appeared directly beside me. I switched the Super Shotgun, though I forgot I didn't have Juggler, and after firing I made the stupid mistake of reloading, got double melee hit and died. :(

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

I'm absolutely certain I can beat Hell's Armory, not just because there's only one Shambler, but because the landscape is significantly better for fighting them. However, I still haven't come up with a solution for Deimos Lab. I was considering Brute x2 + Berserker, but it's a massive waste of traits, especially since I can use the two-step trick against Angel of Death.

Perhaps I'll just grind out runs until I roll Hell's Armory instead. In any case, I was a bit unmotivated to start another run, despite being able to save for this challenge, so I spent my time doing a little theorycrafting and planning. The entirety of Phobos is pretty easy, with the only scary parts being Chained Court and Phobos Anomaly, but both are consistent enough not to worry too much. Deimos has Deimos Lab to worry about as said, and Abyssal Plains is a bit risky with the cramped area. The other levels are all pretty easy, and I'm not too concerned about Spider's Lair either. The Cyberdemon can be killed with Dodgemaster abuse.

Phobos Lab is a bit annoying with the cancellation of Envirosuit, so I might use a Phase Device in that case. The other thing is if I'm unlucky and get warped to the same area in the acid, I'll have enough time with the power-up to continue on as if I hadn't used a Phase Device. I might also consider using one for Abyssal Plains.

Unholy Cathedral should be fine, so long as the strat is as simple as it looks. I'll definitely have Hellrunner x3 and Tactical Boots by then, so it shouldn't be a problem. The Vaults is also cake. However, Mortuary and Limbo are both scary, and I'm not entirely sure what I'll do for those. I believe I actually can nuke them and still achieve Conqueror, so I'll absolutely do that if possible. Otherwise, I'll probably just make a mad dash for the Nuclear BFG and hope for the best. This is kind of a problem, so if anyone has some advice, that'd be greatly appreciated. :)

Lava Pits and Mt Erebus are easy, so long as I have an Envirosuit or two. And besides all those special levels, the regular floors are all easy. Only an Arachnotron cave or an exceptionally awful start filled with dangerous enemies can pose a threat. Dis is also super easy.

It might take awhile to get this medal, only because the runs themselves are quite long, but I also need some special level luck. I think ideally, I would want Military Base, Hell's Armory, The Wall, City of Skulls, Halls of Carnage, Limbo, and Mt Erebus. Hopefully I can get some fortune there.

Not much more else to say! Please give me some tips though! :D

134
Discussion / Re: The Journey to 100%
« on: October 30, 2017, 13:52 »
Day 53:

I put most of my focus on getting Gutts' Heart this time. I figured that because of how rare it can be to get an opportunity for this medal, I might be tempted to botch a different run if I had a random Dragonslayer appear. Instead of potentially ending up in that crossroad, I grinded for it a ton to get it done.

I tried a bit of the I'm Too Young To Die strategy, but it takes way too long to get going, so I mostly used Angel of Berserk + Overconfidence. To my surprise it was laughably easy, which is cool to see since I struggled with it before when I was grinding for JC kills. The monster count and dangerousness is so low compared to all the Ultra-Violence and Nightmare runs I've been doing lately.

During a few attempts, I had a couple of cool runs. One in particular was when I found the Trigun on floor 2 and found a lot of Invulnerabilities, so I went for a goofy mass nuking! :D I even got a second Fallout Platinum Cross, and another JC kill!

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

I actually had a couple more early Trigun runs, but this was the best one.

I also noticed with how empty the levels are, I could really speed through each floor waiting for "Something valuable", and decided to see just how fast I could do it:

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

Not bad! ;) Now to do that with all 3 episodes on Nightmare at the same pace and we'll be in business.

On another interesting run, I found Berserker Armor on floor 1 and decided to see if a Baron would pick it up, and it seemed like it didn't. To confirm, I checked the coding:

Code: [Select]
OnEquipCheck = function (self,being)
if not being:is_player() then return false end
if not being.eq.weapon or being.eq.weapon.id ~= "udragon" or (being.hp >= being.hpmax / 2) then
ui.msg("How am I supposed to wear this thing??")
return false
end
return true
end,

It seems that this is the only armor that has this check. I suppose nearly invincible enemies would be too dangerous, though a lot of fun! :P I was thinking of possible strategies with abusing this, such as giftdropping damaged Gothic Armor (BO) to slow down enemies to a halt. The main downside is the armors can be potentially destroyed by explosions. Fully damaged Necroarmor seems like a fun way to drain out enemy HP, but isn't really all that viable.

Anyway, after goofing around in a lot of runs, I had a big mental swing on floor 7 of one run:

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

Given that I was already invincible and on the floor just before Dis, this was the perfect setup! Once equipped, I still took the floor slow to eliminate any risk of dying. I definitely didn't want to have to repeat finding Dragonslayer. I set myself up with a great camping spot:

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

As you would expect, everything got demolished.

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

Gutts' Heart achieved and 41/43 medals reached! That just leaves Thomas's Medal and Dervis' Medallion. Funny enough, going for these will give me 2 rewards and 3 rewards, both for a total of 5! I think I'll try some Angel of Humanity Conqueror attempts soon. I watched through parts of Papilio's run on Ultra-Violence to pick up on some tricks. I actually didn't learn much besides the two-stepping trick against the Angel of Death, which will be super useful. Is it perfectly safe? The rest I picked up on was playstyle differences. I'm assuming others play a lot like him with blind firing and more inventory variety, but it's such a contrast to how I play DoomRL. I absolutely love using Intuition and Shotguns, and I'd rather not stray from that. Besides, it's done me well so far! :)

I did another thorough checking through the players on the boards here to see how others have done in collecting all the medals and badges. Tormuse and Papilio are the two best confirmed players by far and completely edge me out at the moment, while there are also VANDAM and 2Dev who I understand have some suspicions about their legitimacy. I also noticed Evilpotatoe and Thomas outdo me in platinum badge counts (especially Thomas at 25/26!), and Appuru who has at least 3 angelic badges. There are also Ridonk and Fanta Hege who may be ahead of my counts, though I can't confirm that. Who knows what lurkers out there have too, and there are possibly players out there with 42/43 or 43/43 medal counts.

Now mind you, I'm not playing strictly to compare myself to others, but as I'm getting further and further ahead with badges, it's nice to know what to expect in terms of difficulty for the rest. Matching their achievements also makes for nice short-term goals, and like I've mentioned before, perhaps firing up some activity and friendly competition! :) My end goal is still to get absolutely 100% in everything, but I have no clue how long it will take me to get some of the scary angelic badges. Some other active players to bounce ideas off with or to motivate each other in progress could be very helpful. I'm also more than happy to help out anyone who wants some tips or to share strategies with for anything I've done so far! :D

I think my next focus will be Angel of Humanity as a Conqueror, but it's quite the challenge it would seem! The main advantage is that I can play on Hey, Not Too Rough, so I have a lot more control on each level, but a full game with basically no mistakes will be tough. Unholy Cathedral, Limbo/Mortuary, and Abyssal Plains in particular will require lots of careful planning and strategizing!

135
Discussion / Re: The Journey to 100%
« on: October 29, 2017, 08:05 »
Day 52:

After some more attempts on beating Nightmare under 20 minutes, I started going for a different badge. I decided to try for Scavenger Diamond Badge by using the Azrael strat. It's a bit difficult to get a start with Angel of Berserk+Overconfidence, but I've really learned the power of RunWait in secluded areas, particularly with a door outwards. I'm finding DoomRL is much easier when you let enemies approach and you retaliate, rather than vice versa. You take so much less damage when you get the first attack against most of everything.

Anyway, I had numerous runs past Unholy Cathedral, but the main difficulty is having 3 Med-Packs before entering the Vaults. Eventually though, I got this start:

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

Berserk + Invulnerability lined up + Phaseshift Armor (A) + Chainsaw (A)! Level 4 in experience too with 66% towards level 5. I actually opted to use Hellrunner inside the Unholy Cathedral because it would mean I could outspeed the Angel of Death. I tried the long Knife strat around the whole building, and then a shorter more riskier one around the pillars inside, but it takes forever. Now, I'm a patient player, and if this were a situation where I couldn't immediately regain what I had in the run, I would absolutely continue throwing knives at him, but while this run had a strong start, it wouldn't be that difficult to get a pretty good one again. I chose the optimal decision based on series of runs, and not just this particular run. Got to be thinking deeper than just face value. ;)

After I grabbed Azrael's, I had an initially scary, but ultimately awesome floor 2:

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

Using RunWait with most enemies wanting to attack, they got turned inside out fast. Once the floor was clear, I found a couple Med-Packs, plus a Soulsphere!

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

So literally all I needed to do was dive into the Vaults and got this on floor 3:

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

Ohhhh! Now, I did think for a moment that because I still had 100% kills and an awesome run going, that I could be trying for Gargulec Cross, but I decided that since I had a guaranteed diamond badge, which would be my 15th for the ranking promotion, that I wouldn't risk it. The main factor is because I got Hellrunner early on, I blocked Vampyre.

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

With cautious tactics upon entry and 3 Med-Packs, I could use Azrael's 4 times, which is enough to kill everything. After that...

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

Umm????? I was still hearing a Revenant in the centre vault? I thought for a moment that maybe Azrael's Scythe has a range limit or something, but that's not right, and then I realized what happened.

So the first two Whispers of Death kill Revenants, and then after the fourth, the Archviles die. Which means that between that in that very small window of time, one of the Revenants got revived. :( Literally, if I had one more Med-Pack, that would mean I'd have enough damage to kill him, which super sucks since I dove right down the stairs on floor 3. I was extremely disappointed in this. On top, I couldn't get 100% kills now either. I did have a Shockwave Pack though and not knowing what I was even looking for, I check the left vault, but unsurprisingly found nothing:

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

I spent the time to finish the run to at least get Berserker Platinum Badge, which is nice I guess, but since I'd be going for Gargulec Cross eventually anyway, it's kind of irrelevant.

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

I decided to try some more with my new knowledge. The plus side is that for sure I would need just 4 Med-Packs. I got to this crossroad in another solid run after many attempts:

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

I found Malek's Armor right away, had Vampyre, and was in good health, but only 3 Med-Packs. I could try again for The Vaults, or I could skip it and get Gargulec Cross. After some time deciding, I went for The Vaults, in hopes I could kill everything before a Revenant gets revived again:

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

Thankfully, it worked this time! One of my 3 "Med-Packs" was the Chainsaw boost, which I used first. I'm pretty sure it doesn't affect the speed of using consumables, but because of dropping the Chainsaw and picking it up takes longer than just healing, I did that first. I went on to continue the run by abusing RunWait and murdered everything. In the rare cases I'd get hit, mostly when a group of monsters would come knocking on my door, Vampyre covered for damage. It's honestly a sick strategy, and I might consider using it more in regular games! The fact that it blocks Hellrunner, Eagle Eye, and Intuition isn't a big deal when you're just camping anyway.

With 100% kills, I also got my Gargulec Cross! :)

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

Some tips for those trying for Scavenger Diamond Badge with this same strategy: I really recommend going with Brute x3 -> Berserker, rather than Brute x2 -> Berserker -> Brute, because you really need to be sure your attacks are hitting when you're hiding. The more damage you take, the less Med-Packs you'll have. Berserker isn't super helpful either when you can kill most enemies in 2 hits anyway. For the Unholy Cathedral, use the Chainsaw boost just before fighting the Demons, because all those kills with Berserker will give you enough of it for the fight against the Angel of Death, and again, you want to reduce the damage you take by as much as possible. After that, the rest of the run is pretty basic and straight-forward.

At this point now, I only need angelic badges for rankings promotions! It'll be tough, but I can definitely get 1 more for the next promotion, and as said before, since it seems most of the 2nd/3rd tier of players are at 2 angelic badges, it'll be a good way to demonstrate to myself my progress by reaching above! Hopefully, it can motivate some more activity too! :)

After all the annoyances with grinding for a diamond badge, I took it easy with one of the funnest platinum badges I was missing with Daredevil Platinum Badge, while mixing it with Max Carnage.

I actually didn't take any screenshots it seems, but it was a pretty normal game. Although not intended, I collected all the traits needed for Gunrunner, and decided to try it out (literally my first time ever), and while it seems to be somewhat popular, I really don't like it. It conflicts with my style of slowly killing all the enemies, but when you're running around and alerting everything, you'll set off a horde after you. I also don't like the idea of running around in front of enemies where it would be useful too. It's decent for crazy starts, but I literally had Phaseshift Set and Max Carnage, and didn't like it. I'd rather have more control in my gameplay. The extra run duration is alright though, but again, I'm usually already covered by the time it would normally run out anyway.

The most annoying thing I didn't realize was it blocked Whizkid. I had two Firestorm Packs which I was going to use for my Plasma Rifle, but went with Gunrunner first. Oops.

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

Another solid day of progress! I'm going to focus on collecting more of the missing easier stuff like Gutts' Heart and some platinum badges before trying more for difficult diamond and angelic badges.

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