WADWHAT by Randall R. Spangler (rspangle@micro.caltech.edu) version 1.0 - 8/22/94 1. Introduction Have you ever downloaded a WAD file and wondered which maps it replaced? Have you ever wondered if the map you're about to start contains 10 cyberdemons? And how much ammo can you afford to waste in the map, anyway? If you've had any of these questions, then WADWHAT is for you. WADWHAT provides simple, easy-to-read numbers on the contents of any WAD file. Some nifty features: * Prints which maps are contained in the WAD * Tells whether a map can be used single-player, cooperative, or deathmatch (and prints the number of deathmatch starts) * Lists things present in each map at each skill level * Bosses (Barons, Cyberdemons, Spiderdemons) * Monsters * Weapons * Items * Ammo * Total healing and armor * Calculates a difficulty rating for each map based on the ratio of monsters to ammo * FREE 2. Usage Restrictions and Warranty (lack thereof) WADWHAT is free. Completely free. Source is even included, for the curious. (Note that it's even COMMENTED :-) All I ask is that if you use the source for WADWHAT in any other program that you give me credit in the documentation. WADWHAT also comes with no warranty of any kind (hey, you get what you pay for). Use it at your own risk. May contribute to global warming and many other disasters. If, by some chance, you find a way to melt down your computer with WADWHAT, you're on your own. 3. How to Use WADWHAT It's pretty simple. Just give it a series of filenames in the current directory (wildcards such as *.WAD are ok): WADWHAT foo.wad g*.wad doom.wad WADWHAT will then print the contents of all the WAD files to your screen. Because there's quite a bit of output, you might want to pipe the output of WADWHAT to MORE (which comes with MS-DOS). This will pause the output every screenful: WADWHAT doom.wad | MORE 4. Output Format - Normal When run on a WAD file, WADWHAT will produce output similar to the following: E:\GAMES\DOOM\WADS\GOOD>wadwhat dork.wad WADWHAT 1.0 by Randall R. Spangler (rspangle@micro.caltech.edu) ============================================================ PWAD FILE DORK.WAD: ------------------------------------------------------------ EPISODE 1 MISSION 1 L1 L2 L3 L45 + multi ------------------------------------------------------------ Play modes: Single player Cooperative (4 player) Deathmatch (4 starts) Bosses: Baron 3 3 3 3 + 0 Monsters: Sergeant 20 20 20 24 + 0 Imp 40 40 40 56 + 0 Demon 16 16 16 26 + 0 Lost soul 20 20 20 38 + 0 Cacodemon 22 22 22 40 + 0 Weapons: Shotgun 2 2 2 2 + 0 Chaingun 2 2 2 2 + 0 Rocket launcher 2 2 2 2 + 0 Chainsaw 2 2 2 2 + 0 Equipment: Invisibility 2 2 2 2 + 0 Computer map 1 1 1 1 + 0 Expendibles: Bullets 2080 1040 1040 1040 + 0 Shells 1264 632 632 648 + 0 Rockets 24 12 12 12 + 0 Armor points 832 416 416 416 + 0 Health points 1418 709 709 709 + 0 Difficulty: Total monster hp 1920 1920 1920 3078 + 0 Max ammo damage 11408 5704 5704 5816 + 0 RATIO 0.168 0.337 0.337 0.529 + 0.000 At the top of the output is the name of the WAD file. Id has requested that all add-on files be PWADs, but you may run across an IWAD or two out there. After that is the information for each map (the example file contains only one map). The columns contain * The type of thing being counted * The number present at skill level 1 (I'm Too Young to Die) * The number present at skill level 2 (Hey, Not Too Rough) * The number present at skill level 3 (Hurt Me Plenty) * The number present at skill levels 4 and 5 (Ultra-Violence and Nightmare) * The number added in multi-player (cooperative or deathmatch) mode If a thing does not appear in a map (for example, dork.wad doesn't have the BFG- 9000), it won't be listed. Expendibles are calculated differently from the previous sections. These are the total amounts of each thing from all possible sources. For example, bullets come from clips, the chaingun, boxes of ammo, and killed troopers. Armor comes from the green and blue armors, and the helmet armor bonuses. Skill level 1 (I'm Too Young to Die) is the same as skill level 2 (Hey, Not Too Rough), except that all damage to the player is halved and all ammo amounts are doubled. 5. Output Format - Brief If you're trying to compare a number of WAD files, the full output may be a bit unwieldy. WADWHAT has a brief output mode which prints one line per map, assuming a given skill level: E:\GAMES\DOOM\WADS\GOOD>wadwhat -B4 *.wad WADWHAT 1.0 by Randall R. Spangler (rspangle@micro.caltech.edu) File Map Play Bosses Monsters Weapons Equip RATIO -------------------c-de--ba-c-s--tr-se-im-de-sp-lo-ca--cpscrpb--bvsiral------- ANTHILL.WAD E1M1 4 6 2 1 0 32 35 33 14 1 0 4 1234567 B..IRA. 0.215 BIOTECH.WAD E1M1 4 9 7 1 0 7 5 38 89 9 1 6 123456. BV.I... 1.085 CIRCLE.WAD E1M1 4 4 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 123456. B...... 0.000 DETHMAZE.WAD E1M1 4 4 2 1 0 0 11 12 2 15 18 3 .234567 B.SI... 0.463 SNIPER.WAD E1M1 4 7 0 0 0 7 38 49 6 1 0 2 .23456. ...I... 0.055 TREE3.WAD E1M1 4 4 3 0 0 7 34 53 14 6 13 3 12345.. ...I... 0.544 TREE3.WAD E1M2 4 4 2 0 0 1 26 51 14 2 11 6 123456. B.SI... 0.263 TREE3.WAD E1M3 4 4 3 0 0 5 30 61 24 5 15 7 .2345.7 ..SIR.. 0.310 URBNBETA.WAD E1M1 4 17 1 1 1 41 8 0 0 0 7 3 1234567 B.S..A. 0.222 DIEFAST.WAD E1M1 4 4 0 6 0 22 13 38 7 0 0 3 12.456. BV..... 2.645 HITMEINF.WAD E1M1 1 5 0 0 0 0 2 0 0 0 0 0 123456. ...I... 0.014 DORK.WAD E1M1 4 4 3 0 0 0 24 56 26 0 38 40 12345.. ...I.A. 0.529 The brief output has the following sections: File The file containing the map. Map Which map is being replaced. Some files (TREE3.WAD, for example), contain more than one map. Play Play modes supported. "c" is the number of cooperative players, and "de" is the number of deathmatch starts. Bosses The number of barons, cyberdemons, and spiderdemons. Monsters The number of troopers, sergeants, imps, demons, spectres, lost souls, and cacodemons. "++" will be printed if more than 99 of a monster are present. Weapons Which weapons can be found in the level: 1=chainsaw, 2=pistol, 3=shotgun, 4=chaingun, 5=rocket launcher, 6=plasma gun, 7=BFG- 9000. Equip Which equipment is present: B=backpack, V=invulnerability, S=berserk, I=invisibility, R=rad suit, A=computer map (allmap), L=light amp goggles. RATIO The difficulty ratio of the map at the specified skill level. Some levels add additional items in multi-player mode. To see the brief totals in multiplayer mode, add a 'M' to the end of the -B flag (so "-B4M" instead of "-B4"). 6. Difficulty RATIO The difficulty ratio is an attempt to provide some indication of how challenging a map is, based on the number of monsters and the amount of ammo in the map. Total monster hp is the damage required to kill all the monsters in the map. Max ammo damage is the amount of damage that could be done by using up all the ammo in the map. This assumes that every pellet from a shotgun hits, and rockets always hit directly. The higher the RATIO is, the more difficult the map. Some numbers from the DOOM episodes: Average of all episodes and skill levels 0.310 Average episode 1 0.170 Average episode 2 0.394 Average episode 3 0.368 Average skill 1 0.187 Average hurt me plenty 0.308 Average ultra violence 0.436 Easiest map: E1M1, skill 1 0.010 Hardest map in shareware: E1M8, ultra violence 0.338 Hardest required map: E3M6, ultra violence 0.738 Hardest secret map: E2M9, ultra violence 0.915 7. Bugs and Limitations If -respawn is used, the effective number of monsters in the map will increase because they keep coming back to life. The RATIO ignores damage that may be done by exploding rockets, barrels, BFG- 9000 blasts, and monsters killing each other. It also doesn't take into account damage done by the chainsaw or fists. A better measure of map difficulty would probably also use the amounts of armor and health available (any ideas for how they should be counted?) In multi-player mode, there will be slightly less ammo available because each weapon can only be picked up once per life. However, players which die start over with 50 bullets each time, so the net effect is probably small. 8. Information About the Author You can send comments, money, etc. to me at: Snail mail: Randall R. Spangler Caltech 116-81 Pasadena, CA 91125 Internet: rspangle@micro.caltech.edu I have also written some inexpensive shareware programs - try them out! (available by anonymous FTP, or e-mail): HOWITZER 0.95 (a SuperVGA artillery simulation game, 386 required) ftp to ftp.uml.edu, /msdos/Games/Misc/hwitz095.zip UNIXCORN 1.3 (enhances any shell or DOS Prompt, for Windows 3.1) ftp to oak.oakland.edu, /SimTel/msdos/windows3/unixcn13.zip ftp to winftp.cica.indiana.edu, /pub/pc/win3/util/unixcn13.zip