MAP09: Sabbath Sewer (Memento Mori II)

MAP09: Sabbath Sewer is the ninth level of Memento Mori II. It was designed by Mark Klem, who also composed "Disposition," the music track used in this level.

As with several other levels in this WAD named after heavy metal bands and songs, "Sabbath" is perhaps named after the band Black Sabbath.

Mission Briefing
According to both the text file and the Infopack:


 * [Agent report follows]
 * We appear to be in some sort of inescapable hole inside the city. My shotgun lies on the ground from where I dropped it when I fell in this hole. You know, like those idiots do in the movies.
 * We managed to pry up a manhole cover and toss it aside. This is the only way possible to get any further.
 * There is an old abandoned church here that is accessible from the sewers. Heavily gaurded [sic] and they ain't preaching the gospel.
 * The church holds a super shotgun and some major health provisions.
 * The exit is here, but will require a blue key.
 * Better get movin'; there's no time to pray.
 * [End Of Report]

Walkthrough

 * Letters in italics refer to marked spots on the map. Sector numbers in boldface are secrets which count toward the end-of-level tally.

Essentials
Fall into the pit. In the sewage tunnels turn right at the first intersection and then right again at the second one. At the end of the hallway there is a big room with a crescent-shaped ceiling. Entering this room is enough to open a new passageway (it is not necessary to step on its tiled floor, just go through the entrance marked with wooden pillars), so enter it, turn around, return to the second intersection, choose either path and notice that two portions of southern walls have disappeared. Press a switch which has become accessible. It will open a new path in the second intersection, which will now have four ways instead of three. At the new entrance there are silver bars to your left (southwest) and a switch to your right (north). Press the switch and run past the temporarily open bars. Behind the bars there is a room with walls covered with vines, as well as a maze-like ceiling. Go to an alcove (located at the northern end of the room) which will lower like an elevator. Press the switch and ride the elevator back up. Press the western switch to open the bars once again, allowing you to return to the sewage tunnels.

Go again to the room with a crescent-shaped ceiling. Turn left (west). Walk to the red skull key, even though it is standing behind two columns and is temporarily unaccessible. A portion of wall to the east will open, revealing a curved stairway leading down. Pull the lever and return to the red key. Pick it up, return to the room with the crescent-shaped ceiling, go straight (east), up the stone stairway to the red key door. Open it, fall down to a huge waterfall area and find the only staircase leading to its upper level on your right (north).

Climb the stairs. Go to a set-up yellow skull key which will disappear upon approaching it, but a new passage will open instead. Turn right and go to the teleporter. It will warp you to a tower, after which you will be standing on another teleporter pad. Turn around and enter it. You will return to the second intersection in the tunnels, but now you will be able to go south. Head south until you see a large pool of slime and a second yellow skull key on the top of an elevator. Take the radiation suit if necessary, lower the elevator, take the key and head into a newly revealed teleporter in the eastern side of the ledge surrounding the pool of slime (where the radiation suit was standing). It may take a few seconds until the ledge will rise.

You will be warped to the sewage tunnels again. Go straight, open the yellow key door, pull the lever at the dead end and press a switch near the southeast corner. A wall will open to the northeast, revealing a short L-shaped hallway with a teleporter at its end. Take it to be warped to the waterfall area again. Now you don't need to climb up the stairs as there is a new passage straight ahead (south east). Turn right (west) to a blue room, press the only switch and head to the northeast. Go down the staircase, go straight until you find a red brick portion of the wall blocking your further path. Walk around it by turning left and then right and press a skull switch which will open the aforementioned red brick wall. Fall down, turn left and pick up the blue skull key lying at the end of the hallway.

Turn around, go right (a new thin hallway will be revealed), enter a teleporter, go left, climb up the stairs and go through the bars (there is a glowing arrow at the floor pointing at the only set of bars which can be passed through). Turn right, then left to the church, open the blue key door and fall down the pit to exit the level.

Other points of interest
In order to get 100% of the items, in the exit room, you have to walk carefully over the pits edge from the north, paying attention not to fall down. Slowly walk (counter)clockwise around the edge southwards, always hanging half above the abyss. As you step on the pit's easternmost (westernmost) edge, you should hear the room's eastern wall lowering, revealing a soul sphere. Immediately stop moving as walking to far southwards exits the map. Grab the soul sphere and once again slowly walk over the pits edge from the north, this time falling down onto the soul sphere resting on the ground. After grabbing it, move southwards to exit the map.

Secrets

 * 1) On your way to the red skull key, take the stairway east of the lightning bolt-shaped hole in the ceiling, kill the opposition there and run into the dead end where you will hear some lifts lower. Wait for these to raise and ascend the stairs (thus lowering the lifts again) to find a temporarily opened cave in the southeast of the stairs with an imp on easy, two chaingunners on medium or even three on hard skill levels, also six rockets and a stimpack. Return to the dead end downstairs and wait for the lifts lowering and raising again. After that, dash up the stairs as fast as you can and enter the newly opened tunnel (sector 303) to the south of the lightning bolt-shaped hole's eastern end. At the end of this tunnel is a rocket launcher. Walk towards the west to exit the tunnel. Repeat the procedure once more: At the western end of the lightning bolt-shaped hole, a third wall is lowered like a lift, revealing a megasphere. You need to straferun from the dead end to that wall to reach it before it raises again.
 * 2) After obtaining the red skull key, the wall in front of you moves; walk through the now fake wall, (facing a revenant on hard skills,) round the bend to find a teleporter and enter it six times. On the sixth time, you will be warped to an alcove in the corner of the room with a soul sphere. Drop from it, a tunnel in the west with a box of shotgun shells, a revenant and backpack will be opened and a switch in the north of the now useless teleporter will be revealed; flip it to open another tunnel (with a revenant and a baron of hell on medium and hard skills). At the end of this tunnel is another shell box and you will be able to jump to the southern alcove (sector 350) in the western portion of the sewer. Resting there are two boxes of rockets and two (one on easy) cacodemons (if not killed before).
 * 3) To the north of the red skull key door, on the fourth stair from above, there is a portion of the northeastern wall defaced with a pentagram and some skeletal faces. Open this wall to find a stimpack, a box of bullets and a blur artifact (sector 339).
 * 4) In the wooden room following the fake-out with the yellow skull key, a portion of the eastern wall is scratched. Open it, traverse through the long hallway and you will eventually discover a room (sector 113) with grates providing a view of the buildings behind the starting portion of the level. In this room are six armor bonuses, three clips, four sets of shells, three rockets and a compartment with a green armor. Grabbing this armor will close off the hallway and open windows to reveal enemies, but will also cause a skull switch in the distance to rise from the ground. Shoot this switch to open the path out of this room.
 * 5) At the western platform of the lava cavern, there is a section of wall in the southwest that is jagged. Open this wall to access the lake of blood with (skill dependant) one/two/three cacodemons behind this area. In the southwest is a tiny island (sector 422) with a megasphere. In the north of the wooden walkway you find a rocket box.
 * 6) At the end of the hallway with the blue skull key, the portion of the northern wall between the two westernmost torches is lit more brightly in contrast to the portions beside it. Open this wall to find four health bonuses, a medikit, five sets of shells, four clips and a box of rockets (sector 218).
 * 7) In the dark room with the computer map southeast of the waterfall area, after flipping the switch to access the red stone hall, grates will be revealed and you will obtain this secret if you walk into any of them. (sector 62) The second grate from the east has a glowing arrow on the floor and ceiling pointing to it and can be walked through. Jump across the gap to the sludge fall on the other side, where the grate and wall can also be passed through. Behind these is a soul sphere.
 * 8) In the hallway where secret #6 is located, the easternmost portion of the southern side does not have an inset containing a blue torch. After obtaining the blue skull key, rush back to this location to find a secret hallway has opened behind the metal panels. Enter this area to find one (two on hard skills) imp, two sergeants, a demon and a teleporter. Taking this teleporter will warp you back to the red stone hall. Instead, look to the teleporter's east and you will find a section of wall with a different texture behind the panels than the rest. Shoot this wall to find a secret teleporter (sector 183).
 * 9) Enter the teleporter in secret #8 and you will be warped into one of the cages (sector 233) beside the red skull key door, obtaining a blue armor in the process and telefragging a sergeant on easy, a chaingunner on medium or a revenant on hard skills (if not killed before). Enter the nearby teleporter to be taken back to secret #8.
 * 10) In the church, one of the pews has a white seat instead of a red one. Climb on top of this and a portion of wall in the southwest will lower. Ride this wall like an elevator to reach the top of the western, stone wall (sector 64). On Hey, Not Too Rough or lower, a soul sphere can be found in the northwest. On higher difficulty levels, it will be found in the southeast atop the opposite wall. This can be reached by straferunning from the northwestern platform to the northeastern one.
 * 11) The stained glass window in the southwest of the church is aligned differently than the one in the southeast. After climbing onto secret #10, walk through the wall south of that window to find a path leading to a tiny room (sector 284) looking into the exit room, containing a berserk pack.

Bugs

 * There is a deathmatch player spawn (thing 4) in the southeasternmost part of sector 62. Unless jumping is enabled, this place cannot be reached in single-player or coop game mode. Leaving (or entering) it causes (Linedef 625, Type 109 - W1 Door Open Stay (fast), Tag 62) a wall (sector 433) to its northeast to open, revealing the BFG9000. Also some sectors are raised (Linedef 683, Type 19 - W1 Floor Lower to Highest Floor, Tag 65) to the adjacent sectors' floor height: Sectors 428 (with a rocket launcher (thing 689) on it) and 429 (with a plasma gun (thing 685) on it), each with a floor height of -1024 map units as well as sectors 430 (with a chaingun (thing 690) on it) and 432 (with a chainsaw (thing 692) on it), each with a floor height of -512 map units. Although the aforementioned weapons can be obtained only in deathmatch mode, these are not flagged as multiplayer only.

Routes and tricks
This level is one of the few in Memento Mori II that can be completed in under a minute. The reason for this is a death slide that can be performed in secret #11 by killing yourself with the rocket launcher while running backwards, with your weapon aimed at the northern wall and your back facing the southern half of the exit hole. If done correctly, the blast will fling your corpse through the window, and across the exit linedef, ending the level. The linedef is located inside the southern half of the hole rather than its outer sides, so your aim must be true, lest you miss the exit. The fastest way to obtain a rocket launcher is to do so through secret #1.

Current records
The Compet-N records for the map are:

Trivia
The background music in this level was one of the favorite songs of fellow level designer Eric Sargent.