4shockblast | H2H-XMas Map 22 UV-Max in 4:18 @4shockblast | Uploaded December 2023 | Updated October 2024, 3 hours ago.
Map name: Elf-Town
Map author: David "Lizard" Reid
This map is kinda just rooms and corridors; it's really quite forgettable, although it doesn't necessarily play all that bad because of the surplus of plasma and decent number of rockets. There really isn't much to say about it. It's a bit too long, spread out, and dull (though the decorative lost soul hallway is cute for sure). Perhaps the most notable thing is the presence of two red keys, for what reason I'm not 100% sure. One of them is right next to the blue key, the other one is solitary, and both can be picked up in any order. The teleporter room is very odd two; you would think the red tele takes you one place, and the white one is either the return location or takes you back or something. And that's sorta the case in the sense that the red one takes you forward, but only one of its sides is tagged, and two of the white one's are tagged, both going to different locations (one to the start, one to the solitary red key side). I couldn't find any reason to use that tele; going to the red key side second doesn't seem like it would be beneficial, since the both keys side leads you straight to the exit. The surplus of plasma is a bit weird in this map; you could theoretically run out but only at the start, and I feel like I naturally stop firing at times when I don't really need to to conserve ammo.
Maxing this is a bit annoying because of the imps mentioned in Grazza's and Veinen's texts. Veinen is correct, the imps usually either hover in the teleporter room or end up near the exit somehow. However, it's never clear where they are, so you end up losing time checking where there is no imp (as I do in this run). Overall, fear of monsters hiding somewhere is strong in this map, and it makes me nervous (you can tell by how many times I look around corners I don't need to). However, aside from those two imps, most monsters don't wander off here, so it's not that huge risk of missing stuff. Still, the two imps alone are deep enough into the run and annoying enough to make me not want to grind this out too much.
The route I take is largely the same as Veinen's in general, as you really have no other obvious path through the map. I do some things a bit differently, the main difference is the shot I fire at the start, which has the benefit of both getting the monsters to open the doors at the start and luring some of the scattered shit in the large room outside the start to the center. I also use plasma far more heavily, there's hardly ever a need to swap to anything else, and I only do that if there's a danger of running out, to avoid weapon switches, or after the teleporter room, as Veinen does, since an SSG shot there is a faster way to do a lot of damage to the rev than plasmaing. Some weapon usage overall is a bit different, but there isn't much to comment on that's too interesting I think. Rockets end up not being all that useful; I tried rocketing the exit room, but I don't think it's faster, and it takes time to swap to RL after the monsters before. I do use rockets a bit more overall, though. Hard to say how fast this can be, sub-4:00 seems far still, but if you were a bit more aggressive with not stopping firing and got a bit better luck, maybe? I'm happy with sub-4:20, though. :^)
Captured using DSDA-Doom v0.27.4
Map name: Elf-Town
Map author: David "Lizard" Reid
This map is kinda just rooms and corridors; it's really quite forgettable, although it doesn't necessarily play all that bad because of the surplus of plasma and decent number of rockets. There really isn't much to say about it. It's a bit too long, spread out, and dull (though the decorative lost soul hallway is cute for sure). Perhaps the most notable thing is the presence of two red keys, for what reason I'm not 100% sure. One of them is right next to the blue key, the other one is solitary, and both can be picked up in any order. The teleporter room is very odd two; you would think the red tele takes you one place, and the white one is either the return location or takes you back or something. And that's sorta the case in the sense that the red one takes you forward, but only one of its sides is tagged, and two of the white one's are tagged, both going to different locations (one to the start, one to the solitary red key side). I couldn't find any reason to use that tele; going to the red key side second doesn't seem like it would be beneficial, since the both keys side leads you straight to the exit. The surplus of plasma is a bit weird in this map; you could theoretically run out but only at the start, and I feel like I naturally stop firing at times when I don't really need to to conserve ammo.
Maxing this is a bit annoying because of the imps mentioned in Grazza's and Veinen's texts. Veinen is correct, the imps usually either hover in the teleporter room or end up near the exit somehow. However, it's never clear where they are, so you end up losing time checking where there is no imp (as I do in this run). Overall, fear of monsters hiding somewhere is strong in this map, and it makes me nervous (you can tell by how many times I look around corners I don't need to). However, aside from those two imps, most monsters don't wander off here, so it's not that huge risk of missing stuff. Still, the two imps alone are deep enough into the run and annoying enough to make me not want to grind this out too much.
The route I take is largely the same as Veinen's in general, as you really have no other obvious path through the map. I do some things a bit differently, the main difference is the shot I fire at the start, which has the benefit of both getting the monsters to open the doors at the start and luring some of the scattered shit in the large room outside the start to the center. I also use plasma far more heavily, there's hardly ever a need to swap to anything else, and I only do that if there's a danger of running out, to avoid weapon switches, or after the teleporter room, as Veinen does, since an SSG shot there is a faster way to do a lot of damage to the rev than plasmaing. Some weapon usage overall is a bit different, but there isn't much to comment on that's too interesting I think. Rockets end up not being all that useful; I tried rocketing the exit room, but I don't think it's faster, and it takes time to swap to RL after the monsters before. I do use rockets a bit more overall, though. Hard to say how fast this can be, sub-4:00 seems far still, but if you were a bit more aggressive with not stopping firing and got a bit better luck, maybe? I'm happy with sub-4:20, though. :^)
Captured using DSDA-Doom v0.27.4
