PWAD: PLUTONIA.wad (The Plutonia Experiment)
IWAD: DOOM2.wad
Map: 30
Skill: UV
Category: Stroller (TAS)
Source Port: DSDA-Doom v0.29.4cl4
Tools: Rewind & 50% Slow Motion via DSDA-Doom v0.29.4

Comments:

This run is Tool Assisted!

Much to my surprise, there was absolutely no Stroller run for Map 30 of Plutonia on DSDA. I expected a TAS to exist, but even that doesn't exist on the leaderboard.

The run posed a significant challenge from the moment I spawned. To actually achieve this run, it required a lot of rewinding and many "less than optimal" small routes to manipulate the RNG, as you will no doubt see.

Starting out, once I exited the main starting area, I needed the two Archviles to be positioned so that they wouldn't instantly target me when I moved forward and hid to the right while the main wall lowered. Along with some intense hitscanning from the Chaingunners, this particular part wasn't terribly difficult.

One of the most difficult objectives to maintain during the run was making sure the Archviles and the Cyberdemon didn't die. This allowed me to be successfully double Archvile-boosted from the Cyberdemon platform across to the Icon's brain opening for the first rocket to damage the Icon. However, I had to rewind hundreds upon hundreds of times to avoid touching the Megasphere inside the Cyberdemon, as this was required for the second and final boost.

This had an unfortunate element to it - I needed to wake up the Icon and constantly keep firing to get the attention of the Cyberdemon. As soon as this was achieved, the actual rocket doing splash damage to the Icon had to be precise. I needed to move forward and off the edge directly within a few milliseconds. This had to be done directly in front of the brain opening while facing the Cyberdemon. Revenant rockets and Mancubus fireballs unfortunately had no effect here.

Now the truly hard part began. Going to the stairs to the left was absolutely not an option; every single attempt ended in pure disaster, so I was forced to use the right stairs. The issue with these stairs were the Archviles constantly running downstairs to ambush me in the tight spaces, but this also had the advantage of at least one of the Archviles not being targeted by hitscanners and projectiles.
 
Exiting the stairs was the worst part of the entire run. The stakes were high and I was already on low health. It quite literally required an act of "RNGod" to find the right pathway without being relentlessly killed over and over by the Archviles, Revenants, Arachnotrons; basically the whole map. That's not to mention the insane amounts of de-aggroing the Archviles who were to boost me again. When I finally got to the Cyberdemon and grabbed the Megasphere, the boost across was less than optimal; this is where the run could've been significantly better.

The final boost across had me landing to the right of the brain hole, and to my absolute surprise, after I aligned myself, I accidentally fell of the edge while testing a new RNG path. This somehow allowed the Cyberdemon to kill the Icon on the second his. It surprised me as for many demo attempts, the second rocket did not kill the Icon at all.

So that's it. Feel free to improve this with proper demo building and/or RNG pathing.

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What is a Tool Assisted Speedrun?

A tool-assisted speedrun or tool-assisted superplay is generally defined as a speedrun or playthrough composed of precise inputs recorded with tools such as video game emulators. Tool-assisted speedruns are generally created with the goal of creating theoretically perfect playthroughs. This includes but is not limited to the fastest possible route to complete a game and/or showcasing new ways to optimize existing world records.