MAP30: Excalibur (Eternal Doom)

MAP30: Excalibur is the thirtieth and final level of Eternal Doom. It was designed by Bob Evans.

Essentials
Note that this level is extremely complex to finish, and likely the hardest puzzle solving map in the wad.

You enter the level on a bridge (the first secret area) in the south. Open the main gate by shooting the switch to the left, enter the castle's main hall.

Optional: In the main hall, there are two walls with branches. On the eastern wall, the whole open construction wall on the back side can be lowered to reach the middle part (double-barreled shotgun). On the western wall, there is an X-mark on the back that can be pushed to lower a lift to the middle part of the wall (shells).

Optional: In the south-western corner of the main hall, enter a smaller room with heavy weapon dudes. Push on the barrels in front of the two-headed wolf sculpture. Quickly walk to the side of the lowered knight statue, ride up, and run over into the fire for a megasphere.

In the main hall, go north to the door. If you want a secret, turn around and open the pillar with the blue flag for a megasphere (secret).

Open the door, around the fire/tree block, open the gate, in front of you is a silver knight statue. Behind it, there is an open arena, but its entrance on the far side is blocked.

Turn around, you are now looking at the tree plateau. Climb onto the narrow part of the plateau just in front of the right pillar, carefully move to the right and go into the gray wall's narrow side. Inside the gray wall, activate the skull, which will lower a part of the border to the brown water area behind you. So quickly turn around and use the lift to stand on the border.

Walk on top of the border to the very left, where you can jump down into the edge. You reach a room to the left, one of the walls can be lowered, now just follow the way (fighting hell knights and barons and using the teleport) until the walls around you vanish. Jump down into the brown water. At one end, the wall's bricks are misaligned, lower this wall to reach the area behind. You can open the big pillar for a megasphere (secret). Do not use the teleport to the main hall, but open the gate, climb the stairs, lower the wall at the other end, ride it up. To the left, there is a handle behind a pillar to lower it again.

At the other end of the room (two devil faces), take the gallery to the left without falling down. After a few steps, there is a single skull and opening to your right. Activate it to have a lift rise up to the opening (useful after getting the BFG9000, mark your position on the map). Go further left until you see three skulls and a distant blue circle to your right. Activate the right yellow skull, this allows entrance to the silver knight's arena. The left skull is not enabled yet (no yellow glow).

Go back to the two devil faces and go north between the ornamented pillars. Go to the end of the footbridge, on your way back you will automatically be transported to the western part of a high structure. Turn left such that you face east.

Optional: You can use very small steps to fall right into the center with the BFG9000, jump down, then use the activated lift to get back to the high structure.

Run forward to reach the eastern part of the structure, which is a teleport to the red keycard (secret impossible to miss). Walk around until a lift lowers to bring you out. Go back to the main hall, either the way you came (using the handle behind the pillar and the teleport).

Optional: Jump down from the gallery and make your more dangerous way to west (maybe you should clean the western part of the castle first). Follow the blue water to the northwest, go around the corner into the room with the two graves (no easy way back, only by running on top of the little walls surrounding the lower water part!). You can either lower the metal plated wall on the other side of the room to get out (no direct way back!). Alternatively, you can search for a small red switch on the left side of the left grave (not on the vertical gravestone, but on the rear end of the horizontal tombstone). Use the switch to lower the vertical gravestone, ride up, run over the other tombstone into the hole in the wall which will open, go in. You reach a room with a long wall in the middle. This wall will lower when you walk around the other end, ride up and jump through the hole in the wall onto the top of a column with a switch. Hit the switch, which will lower the column with rockets on the other side of the hall, so be quick to reach it in time.

Secret: stepping on or leaving this rocket column will lower a part of the outer wall in front of you, using this you can ride up, open a hidden door and reach the gallery on the outer side of the castle. On the south side of the gallery you find a lift down to the place with the big cross (secret) you might have seen through the rhomboid window.

Because you have activated the right yellow skull at the blue circle bridge, you can now enter the silver knight's arena (located behind the fire/tree block), activate the skull on the silver knight's base, quickly activate the red button on the lowered platform in the arena's center, this will enable the left yellow skull on the bridge to the blue circle.

By now, you should have the red keycard. From the castle's main hall, go all the way east until you can see the dark blue horizon outside the castle. The outer ledge in front of you is quite low in this part, but you cannot directly step onto it. Go up the stairs to your left, but instead of entering the arena (the upper area surrounded by a metal fence), stay on the outside and walk on the little wall supporting the fence to jump onto the lower outer ledge.

Secret: Staying on top of the ledge, climb up the stairs to the right, through the tunnel, to the round room at the other end. One of the walls has brown texture on it. After several pushs, the wall gives way. Go up the stairs to a room, go up the other stairs, activate the red button, return to the room, between the stairs a dark opening appeared in the wall. Run forth and back several times into it, until all the walls inside have risen, do not fall down into the gaps. On the other end is a room with a megaspere (secret). Return to the lower part of the ledge.

Staying on top of the ledge, go to its northern ending. Standing at the wall, run north-north-east such that you fall into the small opening right below the ledge. On the left, there is a skull on one of the sides of a wooden column. Activate it to lower a wall in the eastern arena.

Optional: One of the walls to the right can be opened, go to the room at the end. Open the opposite wall for some ammo guarded by a Baron of Hell. Push the handle at the right window to open a megasphere column outside. Stand on the stairs until they go up again, go back and jump out of the opening, collect the megasphere, use the lift to the left of the megasphere column to get back in the opening below the ledge.

You can now jump out of the opening, use the lift to the left of the big column to get back onto the ledge, jump down the other side, go up into the eastern arena and through the lowered wall into the room behind the eastern arena.

Secret: One of the walls to the right of the wall lowering skull can be opened (secret) for a faster access to the room behind the eastern arena.

Go through the door in the north, a guard room will open high above behind you, lower the wall below to reach this room. Activate the skull. Now you can go up the stairs into a room with two fires. Go up the next stairs, then return to room with two fires. There should now be tunnels a few steps from the fires.

Activate the face stone inside the eastern fire and quickly enter the opened door in the tunnel. As you already have the red keycard, you can activate the red keycard symbol to lower the red skullkey down to water level. Activate the yellow skull switch to open the door you came in.

Secret: Have a good look at the lowest step of the stairs. There is an X-mark on the left. This is a switch that lowers the stairs, so you can reach a skull switch on the right that is normally covered by the stairs. This switch opens a not very well concealed door to the right of the red keycard symbol. Quickly enter the hidden room behind, turn left for the outside area (secret) guarded by a baron of hell. See the pillar in the corner? From the balcony above you might have noticed the megasphere on its top, so lower the pillar to get it.

From the room with two fires, go up the stairs into another room. You can leave out the balconies, go forward between them, all around the big brown stone building at the end, which will open. Approach the blue keycard, it will transport to a column out of reach.

Go back. The door will be blocked. When you are at some spot, some of the three stones on each side will lower, ride one up and position yourself on the stone next to the blocked door. Jump down onto the stones beside the door.

Go down to the room with two fires. Activate the skull inside the cobweb under the ceiling, this will lower a wall at the end of the green stones on the left. To the left and right from the cobweb, you can (with a distinct angle) jump over to the other side with the green stones.

Secret: Jump to the green stones on the right side, shoot the half-covered yellow skull with your pistol, raising a wall, then step backwards (or do not jump but try to shoot the skull with the double-barrelled shotgun from further away). Jump into the hole for a plasma gun (secret).

Jump to the green stones on the left, jump into the hole at their end, turn around and activate the skull, turn around and jump into the blue water, collect the lowered red skull key, lower the wall to the left of the green torch, go all around. A Cyberdemon is hiding behind one of the gray pillars. Use the handle at the back of this pillar to lower a lift on the same pillar's opposite side. Ride it up for the transported blue keycard. (If there is no handle, you may not have approached the blue keycard at its original place yet.)

Return to the red skull key's place, to the right is another opening in the building, the rightmost wooden pillar has a handle on its right side (you must stand on the right to see it), activate it to open a teleport in the wall to the right, now you are back in the eastern arena (warning: there are several places from which monsters running around may teleport to this very same spot, and because this happens to be MAP30, they may telefrag you there!).

Return to the castle's entrance bridge. The railing on one side is insecure, step over it. Use various ledges to go along the castle's outside wall without falling down into the castle-moat. At the end, you reach a lift.

Activate the skull to lower the lift. On the lift, activate the other skull to ride to the top, push the rectangle in the metal wall (attack from behind!), enter, you will be teleported to a circularly shaped room. Go through the door. There is a structure with a chess board pattern column in the middle part. Under the structure, stand on the western side of this column and try to go further to the west into the gray stone. There will be a crack and now you are below floor level. Activate the face stone to enable the blue handle for later, use the red button for a lift out of the pit.

Return to the lift that brought you all the way up. Jump down over the lift, go back into the tunnel, but only half-way, then push the brown wall to the right, it will open. Jump down, follow the tunnel, activate the blue handle behind the wooden boxes (enabled in the chess board pit). The blue handle will open the pool around the yellow keycard. Return to where you jumped down, the biggest box can be lowered, jump over.

Return to the lift, activate the skull to lower it this time all the way down, jump down. (If you later want to ride up here, activate the skull to lower the lift, then, standing on the lift, use the handle on the bars to let the lift go up again.) Get the yellow keycard in the opened pool part.

Optional: Lower the baron of hell's column, ride up, open the back wall, run onto the wooden boxes in the middle, use the gray stones to climb up to the computer area map.

By now, you should have the yellow keycard. Return to the castle's main hall, explore the western part until you are in the room with a well.

Optional: From the top of the stairs you can run onto the middle column in the lower hall giving you some rockets.

To the left of the well, there are stairs to a bridge-like construction leading to a Cyberdemon. Do not ascend the bridge, but walk on the right side of it all the way to the blocking bars and back. This will open a door to a balkony to the left of the bridge. Lower the wooden pillar to the left of the balkony, stand on the right side of the pillar and ride up to the balkony. Activate the face stone to lower the bridge bars.

Go on the right side of the bridge to its end, you see a yellow keycard symbol. As you already have the yellow keycard, you can activate it, lowering a lift to the Cyberdemon's room, where you get the yellow skull key.

By now, you should have all three keycards, the red and yellow skull keys, and done your work in the silver knight's arena. On the fire/tree block, again enter the gray wall etc. to get on top of the border to the brown water area. This time, directly jump down into the water (to the left of the column, because on the right there is a teleport below). You can get another megasphere inside the big pillar (secret). Open the gate, activate the skull to the right, enter the lowered lift, activate the skull in front of you, ride up, you are now in a room with six imprisoned Arch-Viles.

On the other end of the room, do not come too close to the rotating stones. On the right side a skull must be switched to lower the entrance lift for your way out, do this every time you enter this chamber. On the left, there is a blue keycard symbol. As you already have the blue keycard, you can activate it, the left rotating stone will open, so you can pass through it to get the blue skull key.

For each key you got (not by cheating), you can activate the respective arch-vile chamber here, which will not only release the arch-vile, but also enable the respective key switch at the blue circle bridge. Release the six Arch-Viles. They are standing on teleports, so try to quickly attack them here, otherwise they will teleport to the main hall and wait for you there.

Now go back (to main hall, to fire/tree block, into gray wall, lower border, jump down on the left, etc.) to the gallery with the blue circle. Activate the left yellow skull (you enabled it in the silver knight's arena) to raise the bridge (takes some time), activate all six key symbols on the wall to raise the blocks, walk into the blue circle, you will be teleported with no chance to return.

In the final arena, a Cyberdemon awaits you. High up on the surrounding walls, there are two face stones, a gray rectangle, and a black rectangle. Shoot at both of the face stones. You can do this from the ground with whatever weapon you like, but it may take several bullets. When both face stones are dead, the big gray rectangle opens, revealing fire and a demon spitting head. Lower one of the thin gray columns, ride up on it, and shoot rockets at the demon spitter at the back of the fire when you are at the same height. It will take at least three rockets until it explodes.

Things
This level contains the following numbers of things per skill level: