Doom hunter

Concept art of the Doom hunter.

A close-up view of the Doom hunter, with its energy shield active.

The Doom hunter is a new monster which first occurs in Doom Eternal. It is a half-demon, half-mechanical monstrosity armed with multiple weapons, including a large cannon, a dual-bladed chainsaw, two forward-facing guns which fire plasma projectiles, and a multiple-launch missile system. It hovers and moves via a jetpack on its back and a sled upon which its plasma guns and missiles are mounted.

It has been referred to as an "arch-nemesis" of the Doom Slayer by id Software. A voice-over from Deag Ranak, one of the three Hell priests, indicates that the Doom hunter is an ancient type of demon specifically created to hunt the Doom Slayer and the Night Sentinels. Though it once stalked the Earth millions of years ago in the Arctic, its present form was designed by this Hell priest, whom it now serves.

"I thought you'd appreciate the sentry I chose. The great Agaddon Hunters from the Telos Realm, though long thought to be extinct, created to hunt only the Slayer and his Night Sentinels during the Unholy Crusade... Some improvements on the design have been made; enjoy what is undoubtedly my finest work."

―Deag Ranak 

Tactical analysis

The Doom hunter first occurs in a boss fight at the end of the Doom Hunter Base level, first in a one-on-one conflict, followed immediately by a battle with two at once. The Doom hunter's shield, like other energy shields, is weak to the plasma rifle, particularly when combined with the heat blast or microwave beam mods; however, the shield will eventually regenerate as long as the hover sled is intact. When the shield cannot be attacked directly, the sled is always exposed and can be damaged with any weapons. The sled itself is particularly weak against the blood punch. It is notable that the first boss encounter with the Doom hunter has more health than the following encounters after its initial fight.

Once a Doom hunter's sled has taken enough damage, it will break down and the Doom hunter can be heard saying "CRITICAL DAMAGE" as it jettisons its torso. It will then permanently lose the ability to generate its shield and perform the attacks that depended on the sled's weapons (the plasma guns and the missile strikes), but will instead become faster and slightly more aggressive with its attacks. Breaking the sled is necessary, as the Doom hunter's first life bar represents only the condition of the sled. Once the sled has been destroyed, the boss bar will refill to represent the health of the Doom hunter's organic body and must be fully depleted again in order to defeat the creature.

After the Doom Hunter Base level, Doom hunters will begin to occur regularly as super heavy demons during particularly intense encounters.

Glory kills

• The Slayer punches the Doom hunter to the side and proceeds to cut through the demon's head with the Doomblade twice, vertically bisecting it.
• The Slayer slices the Doom hunter's arm that is holding the cannon and then slices the demon's head off as it attempts to attack the Slayer with its chainsaw appendage.
• The Slayer punches the Doom hunter's chainsaw arm away, slices the jetpack off below the demon's torso and then impales the blade through the demon's jaw and out the top of its head.
• The Slayer stabs the Doom hunter in the back, swings the blade upwards and rips the demon apart by pulling on its horns.

Lore

Doom hunters are created from the corpses of beast-like hunters known as "Agaddon Hunters", which were known to Sentinel warriors as lethal stalkers of the Metal Age. Carbon dating of corpses found in the glacial wastes surrounding an ancient Argenta settlement located near Earth's northern pole suggests they are nearly 80 million years old, predating all other known forms of complex Earth-based life, but there is no fossilized record of them beyond the territory of the settlement.

Millenia ago, the Hell priests (then known as Deag Priests) bred the Agaddons and genetically modified them to become "Doom Hunters" - mutants designed to battle the Doom Slayer and his Night Sentinels during the Unholy Crusades on Argent D'Nur. The UAC cultists have continued the cyber-demonic experiments that began on Mars and focused their efforts on updating and upgrading the Doom hunter schematics; from an assembly plant near their main facility, cutting-edge technology combines with occult rituals to resurrect the Agaddon Hunter corpses before replacing most of their body parts with cybernetic components; the resulting beast retains a high degree of mental faculty, described as "a sentient, brutal hunting instinct augmented with the armaments of a tank division."

Pre-release

Though displayed as a concept render with a "final/refinement" designation during the QuakeCon 2018 game play presentation, the monster was not seen in action at that time. During the QuakeCon 2019 keynote, id Software showcased a teaser of the Doom hunter in game play, revealing it as being able to use an energy shield to protect its upper half from attack, as well as displaying various facets of its attacks and behaviors in brief, including an ability to smash through obstacles in its path and to fire a missile barrage.

In an interview it was stated the fight is two-staged. First, the player will have to disable his hover platform. As it is destroyed, the Doom hunter will lose his missile launchers and plasma guns, detaching from the destroyed battle sled and hovering across the room, attacking the Slayer with its cannon and chainsaw.

Cut content

Golden boss variant

A "gold" version of the Doom hunter was intended to appear in the unreleased Master Level version of the Doom Hunter Base level. Despite the name, it would be visually identical to a normal hunter, but would have more health and various changes to its attacks. The sled would have larger projectiles which could be fired more often, and would leave a trail of fire when the Doom hunter moved that would damage anything moving through it. The arm-mounted cannon would shoot skulls, and the hunter would be able to throw its chainsaw, which would spawn bombs upon hitting the ground. Lastly, destroying the sled would spawn a buff totem, two revenants, a Hell knight and a Maykr drone.

Trivia

The cadaver in the Cultist Base that resembles a Doom hunter.

• The Doom hunter's appearance and its part-organic, part-cybernetic design are reminiscent of Sabaoth from Doom 3.
• The Doom hunter's designation as the Doom Slayer's "arch-nemesis" may be a reference to Nemesis, the villain of the Catacomb 3D series also developed by id. As with the Doom hunter, Nemesis shares a skeletal design.
• The Cultist Base level includes a huge crucified four-armed demon torso, most likely the body of a larger Agaddon Hunter.
• The Doom hunter has four unused voice lines.
• According to Hugo Martin the plasma shield was supposed to be on after, not during, the introduction cutscene, but because of bugs it was left this way.
• The boss version of this enemy is immune to ice bombs.^{[citation needed]}
• A Doom hunter that survives the stagger duration has more health than a normal one.

Gallery

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  Front view.

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  Right side.

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  Left side.

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  Backside.

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  Closeup of the jets under the sled.

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  The Doom hunter's organic body floating in a tube.

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  The Doom hunter being lowered onto the sled once it is finished.

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  The Doom hunter's eyes light up as it is activated.

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  The Doom hunter's collectible toy.