MAP30: Excalibur (Eternal Doom)
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| Eternal Doom maps 21-30 |
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MAP30: Excalibur is the thirtieth and final level of Eternal Doom. It was designed by Bob Evans.
Contents
Walkthrough[edit]
Essentials[edit]
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 section. Open the main gate by shooting the switch to the left, then 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 (with a super 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 (with shells).
Optional: In the south-western corner of the main hall, enter a smaller room with heavy weapon dudes. Press "use" 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. Open the door, then go around the fire/tree block, then open the gate, and there will be a silver knight statue in front of you. Behind it, there is an open arena, but its entrance on the far side is blocked.
Turn around, so 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, where one of the walls can be lowered, then, for now, just follow the path (fighting Hell knights and barons and using the teleporter) 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. Do not use the teleporter to the main hall, but open the gate, then climb the stairs and lower the wall at the other end, then ride it[?] up. To the left, there is a handle behind a pillar to lower it again.
At the other end of the room (with two devil faces), take the gallery to the left without falling down. After a few steps, there is a single skull switch 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 automap). 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 so 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 teleporter to the red keycard (secret impossible to miss). Walk around until a lift lowers to bring you out. Go back to the main hall via the way you came (using the handle behind the pillar and the teleporter).
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, then go around the corner into the room with the two graves (there is no easy way back, the only way is 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, then ride it up and run over the other tombstone into the hole in the wall which will open. You will reach a room with a long wall in the middle. This wall will lower when you walk around the other end, so ride it 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.
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 switch on the silver knight's base, then 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.
Staying on top of the ledge, go to its northern ending. Standing at the wall, run north-north-east so that you fall into the small opening right below the ledge. To 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, if you do so, go to the room at the end. Open the opposite wall for some ammo guarded by a baron of Hell. Push the handle on the right window to open a megasphere column outside. Stand on the stairs until they go up again, then go back and jump out of the opening, collect the megasphere, and use the lift to the left of the megasphere column to get back into the opening below the ledge.
You can now jump out of the opening. After you do just that, use the lift to the left of the big column to get back onto the ledge, then jump down on the other side, then go up into the eastern arena and through the lowered wall into the room behind the eastern arena.
Go through the door to the north, and a guard room will open high above and behind you, so lower the wall below to reach this room. Activate the skull switch. 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 skull key down to water level. Activate the yellow skull switch to open the door you came in.
From the room with two fires, go up the stairs into another room. You can ignore the balconies, instead, go forward between them and all around the big brown stone building at the end, which will open. Approach the blue keycard, and it will transport to a column out of reach.
Go back. The door will be blocked. When you are at some spot[which?], some of the three stones on each side will lower, so 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, and 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.
Jump to the green stones to the left, then jump into the hole at their end, and turn around and activate the skull switch. Turn around and jump into the blue water, then collect the lowered red skull key, lower the wall to the left of the green torch, and go all around.[?] A cyberdemon is hiding behind one of the gray pillars. Use the handle on the back of this pillar to lower a lift on the same pillar's opposite side. Ride it up to find 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, where, to the right, there is another opening in the building. The right-most wooden pillar here has a handle on its right side (you must stand on the right to see it), activate it to open a teleporter in the wall to the right. After taking it, you will be 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, so step over it. Use various ledges to go along the castle's outside wall without falling down into the 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, and 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, then 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, then go back into the tunnel, but only half-way, then push the brown wall to the right and it will open. Jump down, following the tunnel, then 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), then jump over.
Return to the lift, and activate the skull to lower it this time all the way down, then 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, then ride it up and open the back wall. Run onto the wooden boxes in the middle, then 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, to get 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 balcony to the left of the bridge. Lower the wooden pillar to the left of the balcony, then stand on the right side of the pillar and ride it up to the balcony. Activate the face stone to lower the bridge bars.
Go on the right side of the bridge to its end, where you will 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 can 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). Open the gate, then activate the skull to the right and enter the lowered lift. Activate the skull in front of you, then ride it up, and you will now be 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, and 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 teleporters, so try to quickly attack them here, otherwise they will teleport to the main hall and wait for you there.
Now go back (to the main hall, to the fire/tree block, into the 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 (which takes some time). Activate all six key symbols on the wall to raise the blocks, then walk into the blue circle, and 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, then ride it up 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.
Secrets[edit]
- The sector you start in is a secret and is impossible to miss. (sector 44)
- In the main hall, go north to the door. Turn around and open the pillar with the blue flag for a megasphere. (sector 621)
- Go to the two devil faces and go north between the ornamented pillars. Go to the end of the footbridge and, on your way back, you will automatically be transported to the western part of a high structure. Turn left so that you face east. Run forward to reach the eastern part of the structure, which is a teleporter to the red keycard. (sector 466)
- Jump down from the gallery and make your more dangerous way to west. Follow the blue water to the northwest, then go around the corner into the room with the two graves. Search for a small red switch on the left side of the left grave (on the rear end of the horizontal tombstone). Use the switch to lower the vertical gravestone, then ride it up and run over the other tombstone into the hole in the wall which will open, so go in. You reach a room with a long wall in the middle. This wall will lower when you walk around the other end, so ride it 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. Stepping on 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 you might have seen through the rhomboid window. (sector 392)
- 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, stay on the outside and walk on the little wall supporting the fence to jump onto the lower outer ledge. 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 pushes, the wall gives way. Go up the stairs to a room, thengo up the other stairs and activate the red button. Return to the room, and between the stairs a dark opening will have appeared in the wall. Run back and forth several times into it, until all the walls inside have risen, but do not fall down into the gaps. On the other end is a room with a megasphere. (sector 588)
- One of the walls to the right of the wall lowering skull can be opened for an energy cell pack and faster access to the room behind the eastern arena. (sector 136)
- In the 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. 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, then turn left for the outside area 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. (sector 265)
- In the room with two fires, jump to the green stones on the right side, then 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 super shotgun from further away). Jump into the hole for a plasma gun. (sector 402)
Areas / screenshots[edit]
Speedrunning[edit]
Routes and tricks[edit]
Current records[edit]
The records for the map at the Doom Speed Demo Archive are:
| Run | Time | Player | Date | File | Notes |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| UV speed | 2:12.34 | Elmle | 2019-08-31 | et30-212.zip | |
| NM speed | |||||
| UV max | 17:10.57 | TimeOfDeath | 2010-11-12 | et30-1710.zip | |
| NM 100S | |||||
| UV -fast | |||||
| UV -respawn | |||||
| UV Tyson | 1:13:03.46 | j4rio | 2019-12-01 | et30t7303.zip | |
| UV pacifist | |||||
| NoMo 100S | 12:50 | Kai-Uwe Humpert (Gazelle) | 1997-11-24 | et30o1250humpert.zip | Make-believe NoMo 100S, no exit |
The data was last verified in its entirety on June 3, 2022.
Statistics[edit]
Map data[edit]
| Things | 363 |
| Vertices | 5964* |
| Linedefs | 5482 |
| Sidedefs | 8054 |
| Sectors | 693 |
* The vertex count without the effect of node building is 4508.
Things[edit]
This level contains the following numbers of things per skill level:
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