I was wondering about everyone's opinion when it comes to using pistol start for individual levels, similar to how Doom regulates their individual levels. I'm not necessarily saying we retroactively remove runs, unless they are impossible to bypass otherwise (such as the records in E1M9, where you can just run straight at the boss instead of grabbing a chaingun and ammo.) Personally I would prefer us to use PS, to give individual level runs a different flavor than full episode runs.

For me it doesn't really make a difference, i know in specifically later E1 runs, i've had the machine gun carried over from previous levels and just used it, that can also be applied for the chain gun as well to get faster times. Though you propose not retroactively removing times, If we were to move to pistol start i don't really know how we'd go about that since there are a decent amount of IL times and wr's that don't start with pistol.

I also don't think they should, there are already a lot of runs that would violate the new "rule" which makes me stray away from the idea.

yeah for me the 9floor timing add to run is real more important to implant. but anyway 1 year passed without any change lol

My take is I think we all have a pattern to the game. I always see the episode should be completed as a whole even with a level by level speed run. I think Wolf 3D has a different element to it (Ep5 Fl 7). I’ve done pistol runs there and I play a lot of no chain gun (which I believe should be a category itself, as well as 100% episode runs). Either way I like the loose rules right now and if we’re talking doom, 100% IADI level runs should have a stronger community like in doom community. There are strong runners here but exploration is the root of this game IMO. Been playing this since ‘92 and just recently posted my stuff. I believe in the game as a story, not as a speed run challenge to handicap new members. Doom has never had that same feel IMO. With that being said, I agree with the rules now as it’s where most runners and players should be in the story (the game was designed to slaughter you if you die..... play episode 2). I still believe a no chain gun category should be added because it’s a different game with different strategies, and 100-% level runs on IADI. Awesome run shin on EP 4 CIPD..... I’m coming for you .

After looking through, not many runs actually don't use pistol start anymore (at least world records,) the only ones that don't is Alex's E1M6 run, and every WR for all categories of E1M9. Otherwise, each floor has at least pistol start world record, which means not many runs would be lost in the end. If we were to switch, I wouldn't remove Alex's E1M6 run, mainly for the reason that more than just having the machine gun made him get the time he did. I also wouldn't remove non-WR runs that don't use pistol start, because they can all be beaten/tied with pistol start, and to preserve history. I would remove the E1M9 runs, just because I think the empty slots could be refilled quite quickly with pistol start runs of their own. Then again, it is still up to you guys.

Also if you guys want a 100% episode category I would be glad to add it.

late: but pistol starts are the only thing that makes sense to me tbh

We would have to make an exception for the PS3/360 version as you can't warp to individual levels in that version.

You could use a save right before you died in a level to reset the level with just the starting ammo

Well I'll be honest, I just don't enjoy trying to arbitrarily create a different flavor. Each category already feels different when watching; Mistakes in IL runs are minimal, whereas full runs are much more suspenseful and feature generally less precise play overall. I like being able to use whatever weaponry would be available as if I had played through to that level normally, it allows for the fastest possible times on those levels.

There's also the question of someone beating an IL time during a full game run. Hard to say doing it in one shot is less impressive or legitimate than making multiple resets, even if the person started with a chain gun and more than 8 ammo.

I've heard something about E4F10 that you can actually do a pistol start and kill everyone. But don't use your gun though, use your knife and stab them in the bottleneck. I don't want to try it because I don't have enough patience for it. I suggest you should try that out.