[Pagodia] MAP02: Tozan (UV-Max Demo)

the next pagodia map is a little trickier than the first, but it's mostly pretty workable if you go in with the right plan... except for one encounter that'll burn your fingerprints off, no matter what you do. a lot of the early parts of the level are innocuous even - a lot of picking off hitscanners and imps with the pump action or chaingun, eventually culminating in fighting a green cyber and three revenants that are basically primed to turn on each other. that leads you to a big open area with two green cybers watching over it; unfortunately without cells there isn't a great way to deal with this, so it's best to save them for later. that leads you into a mansion area that's pretty fun to fight through and then back to where you started, this time under the cybers. picking up the red key launches a pretty nasty trap, but you can give it the slip by hiding behind a pillar until the mancubi move a bit. the next area with the yellow key is tougher yet, but if you got the plasma in an earlier secret it helps a lot. otherwise you're trying to run around and dodge behind pillars while firing rockets everywhere, which is pretty hazardous to your health.
then... we get to the cyber/archvile secret. you get two archviles and one green cyber in a tiny area that locks you in. quick infighting 101: archviles will always retaliate against whoever damaged them last, but other monsters will never retaliate. so you have to keep the archviles inbetween you and the cyber so they keep focusing on it and the rockets hit them instead of you, and try to get some plasma in to the cyber without hitting the archviles (or just waiting for the cyber to kill both archviles - it doesn't take splash damage so it'll always win). there are many ways for this to go terribly wrong unsurprisingly, and i had to practice this for a little bit just for a shot at clearing the map. if you're cool, you can pull off a squeeze glide to save some time leaving this area; i'm not that cool although i tried. from there it's just cleaning up the central area and the map's over. oh also a megasphere opens when killing all the cybers, but by then you really don't need it, no matter what you do. nice for continuous play, i guess.
pagodia: www.doomworld....
get the demo: s3.yrriban.net...
source port used: dsda-doom 0.27.5
sound font used: SC-55.SoundFont.v1.2b.sf2
flags: -complevel 2