Boomer Vomit and Witch Crowning Practice Guides

[Entitled]

*new* added video demos of my guides. The witch one is a standard crowning vid, but I think the boomer's more novel.

Boomer Vomit, with guide lines:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=y8ovlRunByg

Witch Crowning, both for normal and expert difficulties:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KzcR21UXbBk

/end new content


I originally wrote most of this in an email to my friends, but I suspect some of you will also find this guide useful. I fixed it up to assume you haven’t been playing 20+ hours a week since the demo with your bestest of buddies, and to assume minimal knowledge of the console commands.

I cover two topics. First is a guide on how to practice boomer vomit, which should help people get a feel for the vomit trajectory and how to vomit survivors over obstacles. The other guide is how to practice crowning witches with either pump-shotgun or auto-shotgun, which should be useful for both versus and any difficulty level for campaign.

As an aside, I don't play L4D competitively. The origins of the boomer guide was just a way of figuring out why the vomit sometimes hit but other times didn't, and the witch guide was to, well, "kill" my fear of the witch. Heh heh, I made a funny.



Credits

This guide pulls heavily from other threads:

http://forums.steampowered.com/forum...d.php?t=781739
- Details the z_vomit_debug command, which draws lines where vomit has crossed. Got a few pictures of vomit paths to boot.

http://forums.steampowered.com/forum...d.php?t=765781
- The stickied Essential Console Commands thread.

http://forums.steampowered.com/forum...d.php?t=778290
- the L4D statistics & faq thread. Has damage figures on witches, and just about everything else in the game.

Thanks to all those that started (and maintained) those threads. Most of the credit for this guide goes to them.



Boomer Vomit Practice Guide ==========

This guide gives step-by-step instructions to starting a single player game as a boomer. In addition, boomer vomit will leave trace lines that explicitly show where the vomit travelled and where it hit. Vomit cooldown time is also effectively removed, since sitting around for 30 seconds is annoying as hell.

I won’t be covering boomer tactics; I’m merely providing boomers a way of figuring out vomit mechanics (the tool but not the means of using it, if you will).

Here's a video I put together to help explain z_vomit_debug:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=y8ovlRunByg

Vomit Overview

Before I go into the step-by-step instructions, I’m going to cover a few vomit characteristics that, at least for me, were not immediately obvious:

- The vomit trajectory isn’t parabolic. It roughly travels straight and then drops downwards. It's as if there's heavy air resistance on the vomit (e.g. roughly how a shuttlecock travels).

- Aiming slightly upwards increases the max range of the vomit, but not by very much due to the shape of the vomit path.

- By aiming up, there’s a surprisingly large “dead zone,” the area where the vomit flies over but otherwise completely clears a survivor’s head. Useful for vomiting over obstacles, but can lead to missing survivors when aiming up to gain the extra reach.

- Vomit has limited travel time. Aiming about > 30 degrees above horizon and the vomit won’t have time to reach the ground. Granted, survivors aren’t lying flat on the ground, so the vomit ending within 5 feet of the ground should be okay.

- Vomiting from high buildings is tricky. Aiming straight down on most buildings should be okay, but aim a bit out and the vomit might not reach the ground due to the limited life time of the vomit.


Instructions

At any rate, you’ll figure out all that stuff on your own if you test it out yourself. Now for the step-by-step instructions:

Enable the developer console if you haven’t already. From the main menu, go to Options -> Keyboard/ Mouse, and then enable “Allow Developer Console.” The default button for console is ~. Hit it to bring the console down, and hit it again to remove it.

(For those that care: I have left over extraneous semicolons at the end of my lines. It’s a leftover of when I was randomly chaining commands, and I decided to leave them. They can be removed, but they have never hurt anyone, and you wouldn’t be so mean to those helpless semicolons, would you?)

Start up a single player l4d campaign, and then enter into the console:

changelevel l4d_vs_hospital01_apartment;

You can use whatever level you want; all versus maps start with “l4d_vs_” and the auto-complete feature should list all the maps.

(Alternatively, instead of starting a game in single player, you can enter from the main menu into console “map l4d_vs_hospital01_apartment”. However, when I do this, I get “No steam logon” errors after a minute or so when I moved myself to the infected side, and this shuts down the game. YMMV.)

The rest of the commands are kinda wacky (and important), so just copy and paste this line into console:

sv_cheats 1; director_force_versus_start; director_no_human_zombies 0; director_no_death_check 1; sb_all_bot_team 1; jointeam 3; z_vomit_interval 0.1; z_vomit_fatigue 1; z_vomit_debug 1;

Then enter this next (this can’t be chained with the previous line of commands):

nb_delete_all;

This allows the player to play infected without survivors (without ending the round), and moves the player to infected. The last three commands (z_vomit_*) reduces the vomit cooldown to .1 second, lets the player move while vomiting (mostly for fun; boomers aren’t supposed to move while vomiting), and draws debug lines for vomit paths.

(Side note: nb_delete_all removes the AI survivors, and the problem with chaining this command with jointeam 3 is that the AI survivors are removed before the player gets moved to the other team, leaving a single AI survivor. I suspect this is caused by the single player behavior where using console pauses the game, since starting up the game using “map l4d_vs_*” doesn’t have this problem.)

You should now be on the infected side, ready to spawn in as smoker. But we want boomer instead:

z_spawn boomer; give health;

The z_spawn spawns you in as a boomer, but for some reason it doesn’t give a HUD. The “give health” command rectifies that.

Now you’re ready to have fun! Vomit paths are in green, and will persist for a few seconds. After they fade, there’ll be lighter green lines that show where the vomit registered hits.

If you spawned in as a wrong infected type, use “kill” to, well, kill yourself. If you spawned in other infected (that you’re not controlling), use “nb_delete_all” to remove them.


A few things to try/learn

Spawn in a hunter (z_spawn hunter). Try getting the vomit to land behind him without splashing him, and then try landing vomit directly on his head. Try varying angles and varying distances away from the hunter. This’ll give you an idea of the “dead zone” created by the vomit trajectory. (I actually want to spawn a regular zombie, but the AI director removes zombies spawned in with z_spawn. I read somewhere how to get them to stick, but I don’t remember where I saw that. Anyone know how to do it?)

Try maximizing the area that the vomit will hit (keep in mind the dead zone, so aiming near forward at one point or another is necessary). I sweep left/right and up/down in an elliptical motion, though I suspect any number of methods will do.

Vomiting over barriers/infected/survivors and having the vomit land directly behind the obstacle (Bonus: do so without granting survivors line of sight to the boomer).

Vomiting downwards off rooftops. Due to the limited travel time, there’s a tendency of the vomit never reaching the ground if you aim too far out, so test out the tolerance of the aim. NM1’s alley way is a prime example; aiming straight down from the tallest building is okay, but any other angle and the vomit never lands.

Vomiting off rooftops without being near the edge (so no line of sight to the boomer). Arc the vomit so it hits the ground where the boomer can’t directly see. This is tricky and probably only possible with low (1 story?) rooftops.

This is just a starter list. Try out different maps and what not.





Witch Crowning Practice ==============

This guide explains how to spawn in witches so you can practice crowning her on all difficulties. Crowning is only possible with shotguns. With a bit of practice, you should be able to consistently and more-or-less automatically pull off a crown with a pump-shotgun.

Here's a video that I put together that shows a few example crownings on normal and expert:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KzcR21UXbBk


Instructions

First, start up a single player game. I prefer No Mercy 1, since the rooftop gives a decent amount of space, but anywhere will do. Enter into console:

sv_cheats 1;
nb_delete_all;
god 1;

“god 1” makes you invincible, since I assume you’re going to botch a handful of the crowns. nb_delete_all removes the AI survivors, so they won’t interfere. To spawn a witch where you’re pointing:

z_spawn witch;

It may be useful to bind that to a key, since you’ll probably go through a few witches:

bind \ “z_spawn witch”

Replace the \ with whatever key you like. You can get weapons with the give command:

give pumpshotgun
give autoshotgun

To change game difficulty, just call a vote.


Crowning tips

- Don’t panic.

- Get a feel for how long it takes before she gets spooked. It actually takes a while.

- Get as close as possible, as in you should be pressing right against her.

- On normal difficulty (versus is locked on normal), both headshots and body shots do the same amount of damage, so as long as all the shotgun pellets land on her, she’ll die. It’s easiest to go behind her and shoot her in the lower back, since that offers the largest surface area. Crowning her from the front is less reliable, since there’s a tendency for the pellets to fall through the gap formed by her arms and legs, though once you get the hang of it, any angle is possible. It may be useful for her to stand up a little before crowning, especially if you’re stuck crowning her from the front.

- On advanced and expert, body shots do 75% and 50% damage respectively. A headshot with shotgun is necessary. It seems impossible to kill her from the back, since her head is too far forward to get all the pellets to land on her head. My method is to walk up to her front, crouch, wait for her to stand up a bit, and then aim up at the bottom of her jaw. My friend does it without crouching, so find whatever’s most reliable for you.

- On easy (wuss), body shots do 200% (headshots still only do 100%). You can miss half your pellets and still crown her.

- Don’t Miss™


Oh, and while crowning technically means a one shot kill, at least according to the achievements, click-spamming a witch with the auto-shotgun works miracles. Usually, you’ll get 3 or so shots off before she has time to swipe you, assuming she managed to survive those three shots. However, you should still go for the crown on the first shot. This is even more relevant on expert, since she can take more body hits than on versus/normal mode.

Now get crowning! I don’t want to see another botched crown attempt on versus or expert, you hear?





End note

Comments/Feedback appreciated, especially if I somehow borked the commands or didn’t explain something clearly. Thanks!

And as always, good luck, and have fun!

[Woden]

Quality post, deserving of a bump.

[brownyboi]

Wow dude, you must have spent a long time on that.

In the case of the witch, i don't think you need a tutorial.
It's easy enough for any noob to kill a witch single handedly.

Tho good work. +1 rep.

[narn1234]

BEAUTIFUL article. I tried it and it worked out well for the boomer! Those green lines were very helpful! Thank you!

[Morning]

Nice, easy to follow. Will try this out right away.

Great job on the write-up.

[Entitled]

Glad to see a few of you are finding this guide useful. After half-price weekend, I wouldn't mind having both better teammates and stiffer competition, and hopefully this will help :P

Originally Posted by brownyboi

Wow dude, you must have spent a long time on that.

In the case of the witch, i don't think you need a tutorial.
It's easy enough for any noob to kill a witch single handedly.

Tho good work. +1 rep.

Thanks for the rep! I agree that on versus/normal, killing the witch is straight forward (get as close as possible with shotty, don't miss), but I definitely benefited from spending 10 minutes with a pump shotty, god mode, and an infinite supply of witches, even if only for confidence building purposes.

The true kicker though is expert campaign. At the time, I couldn't find instructions for crowning on expert, and experimenting in-game seems like a bad idea, seeing as you skip incap and go straight to death :P

And according to: http://www.steampowered.com/status/l4d/, only 17% have CR0WND. I'm mildly tired of seeing people pistolling the witch :/

[:censor:]

A novel on how to aim.

[Woden]

Quality posts get bumped.

[Entitled]

Thanks for the bump. Not sure what the stance on bumping is on this forum, but I don't mind the additional views.

Originally Posted by :censor:

A novel on how to aim.

Man, if you hate the wall of text, you're gonna hate the vids I added. A movie adaptation? On aiming? Is it even possible? *gasp*

I added these vids to the starting post, but in case you're too lazy to scroll up, here they are again.

Boomer Vomit, with guide lines:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=y8ovlRunByg

Witch Crowning, both for normal and expert difficulties:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KzcR21UXbBk

[SeanVolt]

This is very nice, very awesome.

The AI director will remove zombies you place because there are no survivor bots remaining.

What I did testing out my boomer vomit, I used NB_delete_all, and SB_add zoey. Then, I typed "sb_stop 1" so she wouldn't shoot me, and now when I vomit I get a nice purple confirmation that my vomit hit. Much better than looking for yellow lines on a hunter.
I do have a question though, related to this. What is the console command to limit the amount of time Zoey stays purple? At the moment she's purple for 15 seconds or so and I'd like to test my vomit more often than that.

[Snipe*Star]

excellent post.

boomer vid is gone though

i posted the first comment on the witch guide though

[Entitled]

Originally Posted by SeanVolt

This is very nice, very awesome.

The AI director will remove zombies you place because there are no survivor bots remaining.

What I did testing out my boomer vomit, I used NB_delete_all, and SB_add zoey. Then, I typed "sb_stop 1" so she wouldn't shoot me, and now when I vomit I get a nice purple confirmation that my vomit hit. Much better than looking for yellow lines on a hunter.
I do have a question though, related to this. What is the console command to limit the amount of time Zoey stays purple? At the moment she's purple for 15 seconds or so and I'd like to test my vomit more often than that.

I'm not sure about the command to clear the purple glow; I tried a few of the commands that seemed like it'd do it, but not worked: sb_vomit_blind_time, z_vomit_fade_duration, z_vomit_fade_start.

Try this work around though: I bound a key to despawn Zoey and then spawn her in at where I'm pointing:

bind b "kick zoey; sb_add zoey; warp_all_survivors_here"

It's annoying to have to reposition her, but it'll clear the glow. Of course, it'll be useful to have "sb_stop 1" as you mentioned, along with "director_stop".

Originally Posted by Snipe*Star

excellent post.

boomer vid is gone though

i posted the first comment on the witch guide though

I was about to call you crazy, but yeah, the vid was actually down for a while. I don't know what was wrong with it, but when I checked, the low quality version was down but the higher quality one still worked. At any rate, the vid is back. Oh, and your youtube handle terrifies me. A lot.

[Woden]

Useful thread gets another bump.

[Dr.Aaron]

Never knew a body shot was a one shot kill on the witch on normal/vs, so this was quite a moderately good use of these few minutes.

I guess the sterotypical thing to do would be to give you some reputation, so here.

[Entitled]

Yeah, the achievement description is mildly misleading, and a headshot I don't think is necessary. At the very least, I remember getting CR0WND without a headshot (but I could be remembering wrong).

I might be wrong about vomit having a limited lifetime. It's either limited lifetime or limited range for both (there's z_vomit_lifetime, z_vomit_range, z_vomit_target_range, and maybe more). I assumed, without checking those additional console values, that it was limited lifetime since vomiting off tall buildings seemed to make the vomit travel further (attributable to gravity). I'll test this out later, but at least the general gist that vomit doesn't travel forever is correct.