MAP11: The Grotto (Community Chest 4)

MAP11: The Grotto is the eleventh map of Community Chest 4. It was designed by Chrisbo Sonnekins (Christoph) and Josh Sealy (Joshy), and uses "Grotto," a music track composed by Stuart Rynn (Forty-Two) specifically for this map.

Walkthrough

 * Letters in italics refer to marked spots on the map. Sector numbers in boldface are secrets which count towards the end-of-level tally.

Secrets

 * 1) At the start, head through the brown corridor on the right with blue floors. As you ascend the steps, look to the right for a piece of damaged wall. Open it and climb the steps for a partial invisibility. (sector 927)
 * 2) South of the starting point is a depression with a chainsaw. Open the door near the chainsaw and enter the next room with staircases leading up. Ignore the staircases and look towards the walls that have UAC written on them. One is colored differently; open it for four backpacks. (sector 590)
 * 3) Just opposite of Secret #2, open the wall that has a radiation symbol on it for a soul sphere. (sector 732)
 * 4) Go south of Secret #3 into the room with the force field. Enter the elevator and take it down one level, then open the northern door. If you look real closely at the northern rocky wall, you will notice some red parts. Press the wall to lower it and follow the red path down to a room with an armor and energy cells. (sector 304)
 * 5) In Secret #4, an arch-vile quickly teleports into the room, and then out into the rocky cavern. To reach the BFG 9000 on the rocky pillar, you need to lure the arch-vile into attacking you while he is out into the cavern, and perform a well-timed arch-vile jump to the pillar. (sector 747)
 * 6) Take the stairs up near Secret #2 into the brown-floored hallway and go west. You will notice some broken bars on the floor, which you can climb through the window into a room with ammo, a berserk pack, a megaarmor, spectres, and chaingunners. (sector 503)
 * 7) Use the red skull switch at the western section of the map to open the nearby door, then circle around to go through the door. At the top of the steps, open the door you see and manuever around the blue column to get a soul sphere. (sector 522)
 * 8) Head up the stairs straight north from Secret #7 into a blue-floored hallway. When it bends a bit, veer off to the right down the steps to another room with barrels, imps, and demons. There are several computer terminals on both sides of the stairs in this room. On the left side of the staircase, press the computer panel in the middle and you will open a secret behind you. Quickly get the invulnerability inside. (sector 83)
 * 9) When you reach the north central part of the grotto, look for the door to the northeast that has green lights around it. From there, head south until you find a brown ledge with a dark entrance. Hop onto that ledge and follow it into a small cove with a revenant, a chaingunner, a plasma gun, an energy cell pack, and a box of rockets. (sector 741) Follow the stream to leave this cove.
 * 10) In the large room with the switch that opens the bars to the yellow keycard (the room is on the eastern part of the map), open the wall opposite of the switch to find some imps, energy cell packs, and a plasma gun. (sector 264)
 * 11) Inside of the cave with the yellow keycard, jump onto the ledge that has imps on it. From there, follow the ledge into a tiny passage where you can get a medikit and an energy cell pack. (sector 1880)

Current records
The records for this map at the Doomed Speed Demos Archive are:

Last updated on March 31, 2013.

Miscellaneous Demos
Last updated on March 31, 2013.

Inspiration and development
The up and down elevator switch textures in this level were put together for it by project leader Eric Baker (The Green Herring) during compilation. The original submission featured regular switches, where the directions they would cause the elevators to go were marked by the handles' orientations.

Trivia
There is a switch in Secret #4 that lowers Secret #5 in the underground cavern, for about five seconds. However, at the very beginning of the game, the switch is closed off well before you are able to reach the secret. This is because the same arch-vile that is supposed to teleport into Secret #4 is in a dummy sector where the first linedef he crosses closes off the switch for good. Therefore, you are only able to access this switch if you are playing in -nomonsters mode.