MAP09: Baleful Confines (NDCP)

MAP09: Baleful Confines is the ninth map of the Newdoom Community Project. It was designed by Nuxius, and uses the music track "chris3.mid" by Christopher Jon Wilkins.

Essentials
This map is generally non-linear, so you can get the keys in any order. The outdoor areas are generally empty, but there are platforms with mancubi and a few walls with imps. The exit is in the center, which is reached by pressing three switches around it. However, these switches are also barred with colored key bars which need to be opened separately.

To get the red key, go all the way to the northwest. If you are coming there from the east, there is an aside with a berserk pack and an invulnerability. Be prepared though, as a roomful of revenants will attack as you attempt to get the BFG9000. In the northwestern section is a large arena with imps, mancubi, and two cyberdemons. To get the key, press the switch in the northwest corner of the room. Now run on each lowering platform that each mancubus is on to lower the next one in front on it, going in a clockwise manner. Be careful as arachnotrons and revenants attack you as you do. When you step on the north central platform, a teleporter north of you will open, giving you the red skull key.

The southwest corner of the map is a large library with a large number of monsters. There are also three secrets and a red door. If you have the red key, open the door and kill two Hell knights before pressing the switch. This removes the bars around the southern switch near the exit. The door south of the red door has an arachnotron and another switch, lowering a teleporter in the southeast section of the map.

If you are going for the yellow key next, take this teleporter and go around the wall to find it just southwest of the super shotgun. The teleporter takes you into a cage where you can pick up the yellow key. Be wary of arachnotrons, and in order to get out you need to solve a puzzle. Hit the correct switch that is different from the rest or you will trigger a crusher. The solution is west (satyr), south (gargoyle), and north (lion). Go back to the room with the super shotgun and open the yellow bars for the switch that lowers bars around the switch on the eastern side near the exit.

You can get the blue key by going to the northern part of the map. Go up and around using the staircase, going into the door to the north, around the barricaded switch into the next room. Grabbing the rocket launcher here lowers some of the faceted walls and reveals various monsters. One of the northwestern rooms has a switch to lower the northern faceted marble face for another switch. Going into this cage opens up other ones behind you and releases an arch-vile. The switch here lowers bars for the switch that you past up because it was barricaded. To leave this room in order to press that switch though, you need to remove the bars by heading into one of the eastern side rooms and pressing the switch there. Now go and press the previously barred switch to raise a bridge to the blue key. If you fall in the nukage, use the bridge as a lift.

An area to the east has blue key doors. If you have the key, enter it and take the stairs down and the elevator up to a teleporter. You will end up in a small tower with two barons of Hell (if you have not killed them yet) and a switch, which lowers the bars around the northern switch near the exit. Be prepared for mancubi when you get back through the teleporter.

Secrets

 * 1) In the southwestern corner of the map there is a library. In this area, near the northwest corner on the ground floor, there is a lone book lying on the ground. Walking over this book causes a lift to lower in the southwest corner of the room. This temporarily allows access to a hidden area behind it which contains a backpack. (sector 16)
 * 2) Ride the lift that allows access secret 1 back up to the top. Step over to grab the green armor on top of the bookcase to the north. Upon doing this, a lift lowers on the west end of the library. Ride this lift up to access a alcove containing a soulsphere. (sector 709)
 * 3) On the eastern side of the library, there is a lift that takes the player up to a ledge that allows access to the red key door. Upon stepping off of this lift at the top, a door opens along the east wall of the room, temporarily allowing access to a shootable switch behind it. Shoot this switch to open a door along the north side of the room, allowing access to a plasma rifle. (sector 937)
 * 4) Going through the blue key door takes the player to an area with a teleporter in the middle of it. Stepping on this teleporter takes the player to a structure in the middle of the map that contains a switch which lowers the blue skull bars in the middle of the map. This switch also lowers the water level in an area on the northeast corner of the map, allowing access to a hidden teleporter.  Stepping through this teleporter takes the player back to the room behind the blue key door, inside of a alcove on a pedestal containing a megasphere. (sector 246)
 * 5) Lowering the blue skull bars in the middle of the map allows access to a switch that lowers a set of bars blocking the exit teleporter. This switch also lowers a teleporter in the southeastern section of the map, opposite of the teleporter that allows access to the area containing the yellow key. Stepping through this teleporter takes the player back to the room behind the blue key door, inside of a alcove on a pedestal containing a computer map. (sector 411)

Bugs
There are two possible softlocks in the map. First, in the library in the southwest corner of the map, it's possible to get behind the circular desk surrounding the octagonal bookcase by running off the tops of the bookcases. No legal way out. You have to idclip to continue. The second involves the collection order of the keys. You can get them in any order. They open bars blocking three switches which open the exit path. The red key opens the doors to the exit, the yellow key raises the bridges to the exit (they are also escape lifts), and the blue key opens the barriers to the bridges. If you get and use the blue key to open the barriers before using the yellow key to raise the bridges, you can end up on the ground below the exit with no way to continue.

Current records
The records for the map at the Doom Speed Demo Archive are:

The data was last verified in its entirety on January 12, 2022.

Player spawns
This level contains twelve spawn points:
 * 1) facing east. (thing 855)
 * 2) facing west. (thing 856)
 * 3) facing north. (thing 857)
 * 4) facing south. (thing 858)
 * 5) facing south-east. (thing 859)
 * 6) facing north-west. (thing 860)
 * 7) facing north-east. (thing 861)
 * 8) facing south. (thing 862)
 * 9) facing west. (thing 863)
 * 10) facing north-west. (thing 864)
 * 11) facing north-west. (thing 865)
 * 12) facing east. (thing 866)

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