History YMMV / Heretic

** Disciples of D'sparil also compete for this position thanks to their ability to fly, ability to flicker between ghost and corporeal mode, and fire a spread of three fire balls that cause 3-24 damage each. If a Disciple gets the drop on you by hovering next to you by surprise, you can lose up to 72 of your unarmored HitPoints. They can also move unexpectedly if damaged, and suddenly be right in your face about to deliver a lot of ouch. To make matters worse, D'Sparil can summon as many of them as he wants, leading to BulletHell of triple fireballs flying at you constantly, especially on [[HarderThanHard Black Plague]], where they annoyingly love to flicker all the damn time. Unlike with Undead Warriors, a Shadow Sphere won't save you here and will just make dodging the spread shots harder than necessary.

** The closest to such in the first game are the ethereal undead warriors, who always throw red axes that deal quite a bit of damage (7-56 damage without armor). Because they're ethereal, physical weapons can't damage them.[[note]]Which honestly isn't much of your arsenal, but it does make the ethereal crossbow far less effective, as two of its three projectiles are physical.[[/note]]
** Disciples of D'sparil also compete for this position thanks to their ability to fly, ability to flicker between ghost and corporeal mode, and fire a spread of three fire balls that cause 3-24 damage each. If a Disciple gets the drop on you by hovering next to you by surprise, you can lose up to 72 of your unarmored HitPoints. They can also move unexpectedly if damaged, and suddenly be right in your face about to deliver a lot of ouch. To make matters worse, D'Sparil can summon as many of them as he wants, leading to BulletHell of triple fireballs flying at you constantly, especially on [[HarderThanHard Black Plague]], where they annoyingly love to flicker all the damn time.

* HellIsThatNoise: The Iron Lich's EvilLaugh. It's very distinctive and can be heard from quite a ways away.

** Disciples of D'sparil also compete for this position thanks to their ability to fly, ability to flicker between ghost and corporeal mode, and fire a spread of three fire balls that cause 3-24 damage each. If a Disciple gets the drop on you by hovering next to you by surprise, you can lose up to 72 of your unarmored HitPoints. They can also move unexpectedly if damaged, and suddenly be right in your face about deliver a lot of ouch. On Black Plague, they're more annoying, as they're constantly flickering. To make matter worse, D'Sparil can summon as many of them as he wants, leading to BulletHell of triple fireballs flying at you constantly, especially on [[HarderThanHard Black Plague]].

** The original-flavor Staff has the disadvantage of being overshadowed arguably every other weapon. It's very rare to be in a situation where it's the best tool for the job, and it's also ineffective against ghosts, even with a Tome Of Power. Usually, the Crossbow boasts abundant ammo and a devastating short-range burst that's even more powerful with a Tome. While the Gauntlets of the Necromancer don't reliably StunLock monsters, you can backpeddal while zapping to evade melee swings, and power it up for greater range and a LifeDrain. The Staff was corrected in ''Heretic II''.
** Subverted with the Elven Wand. Even without a Tome, it still runs on its own ammo pool (Unlike Doom's Pistol) and has a niche for its long range and as a tool for finishing off weakened foes. It can be powered up into respectable SpreadShot that works like an auto-shotgun that is very likely to StunLock a single foe. Its always effective on ghosts too!

* TheWoobie: Poor, poor, [[TheHero Corvus]]. In the first game he opposes the D'sparil after he comes to conquer Parthoris and is branded a heretic by his followers and monsters. He manages to [[OneManArmy singlehandedly kill all the monsters including D'Sparil himself]], only to find D'sparil set a trap so the portal wouldn't take him home but would just send him to a random planet and leave him stranded there. By the second game, it's implied he's spent ''decades'' wandering from planet to planet via naturally occurring portals, with only his sentient Tome Of Power for company. He [[HopeSpot finally manages to get back to Parthoris]] [[YankTheDogsChain only to find that it has been ravaged by a new threat in the form of a deadly plague that turns people into murderous psychos.]] He soon gets the plague himself, though his Tome can at least keep him from going insane. [[spoiler: at the end he does finally manage to cure the plague, giving him some semblance of a happy ending.]]

** If you like to play on [[HarderThanHard Black Plague]], you'll quickly learn the danger's of the Maulotaurs' "line of fire" attack as they love spamming it. If you try and take the high ground or low ground to kite the walking bull, they will start smashing their hammer on the ground and sending a line of flames towards you. If you touch the fire without invulnerability, you usually die or lose a large % of your health and armor. Don't be fooled and think the ends of the "line fire" are safer, you'll usually die or lose a lot of health touching it like eating a [[{{Videogame/Doom}} Cyberdemon rocket in Doom.]]

* GoddamnedBoss: D'sparil's second phase, and not just because his lightning blasts deal a crapton of damage on direct hit, either. He can also summon additional disciples, but on top of that, he starts [[TeleportSpam teleporting more often]] the lower his health gets. Fighting him on [[HarderThanHard Black Plague]] can make him ThatOneBoss due to the constant teleporting when he's nearly dead, in addition to the swarms of Disciples making you likely wish for [[VideoGame/{{Doom}} Doom's]] {{BFG}} to blow them all away. The silver lining is if you manage to get a Tome Of Power from one of the fallen Disciple and can unleash another 30 second of heavy firepower.

** If you like to play on [[HarderThanHard Black Plague]], you'll quickly learn the danger's of the Maulotaurs' "line of fire" attack. On the hardest skill setting, if you try and take the high ground or low ground to kite the walking bull, they will start smashing their hammer on the ground and sending a line of flames towards you. If you touch the fire without invulnerability, you usually die or lose a large % of your health and armor. Don't be fooled and think the ends of the "line fire" are safer, you'll usually die or lose a lot of health touching it like eating a [[{{Videogame/Doom}} Cyberdemon rocket in Doom.]]

* GoddamnedBoss: D'sparil's second phase, and not just because his lightning blasts deal a crapton of damage on direct hit, either. He can also summon additional disciples, but on top of that, he starts [[TeleportSpam teleporting more often]] the lower his health gets. Fighting him on [[HarderThanHard Black Plague]] can make him ThatOneBoss due to the constant teleporting when he's nearly dead, in addition to the swarms of Disciples making you likely wish for [[VideoGame/{{Doom}} Doom's]] {{BFG}} to blow them all away. The silver lining is if manage to get a Tome Of Power from one of the fallen Disciple and can unleash another 30 second of heavy firepower.
* HellIsThatNoise: The iron liche's EvilLaugh. It's very distinctive and can be heard from quite a ways away.

** also D'sparil's [[LovesTheSoundOfScreaming long and drawn out death scream]], mainly due to CatharsisFactor.

** All the Iron Lich's attacks hit like a freight train, but are fairly easy to dodge...except for the tornado, which chases down the player, lifts them up and flings them around (and can easy hurl the player into a damaging floor if there are any around,) can easily last a very, ''very'' long time, and in certain scenarios can absolutely ravage the player's health. The only saving grace is that they get fairly easily hung up on the architecture.

*** The Maulotaur (there are 3 on expert difficulties at the end of Episode 2: Hell's Maw) is usually quite tough, at 3000 HitPoints (Players can have up to 400 HP with armor) but activate an invulnerability ring with a tome, and attack with your Phoenix Rod. Each full burst of the flamethrower eats through the Maulotaur's HitPoints with ease as long as you keep your aim steady. One of each item, save Wings of Wrath, transfer between levels, so you can pick up another Ring and Tome on e2m8 to continue roasting the 'taurs.

*** While most weapons are very useful with the Tome of Power, special mention goes to the Gauntlets of the Necromancer. When powered up, the gauntlets will drain health from your enemies. Against just about anything weaker than an iron lich, you'll be able to gain life faster than your enemies can take it from you, and it's a great way to get an emergency health boost to boot if you run out of Quartz Flasks.

* GuideDangIt:
** '''[=E4M9=]: Mausoleum''': The secret level of episode four is a grandiose underground tomb with a cryptic progression. There is a subtle hint at the southern ends of the mausoleum on how to progress that you can gloss over, but you'll likely wonder why none of the doors work for several minutes. Fortunately, once you've figured out opening the first room, you can open up your "automap" to see what new sector lines have been drawn upon the display after patrolling the corridors for a minute or two. [=ZDoom=] engines even redraw the map for you while in map mode, so you can look for new lines being drawn with the map open.

* TheWoobie: Poor, poor, [[TheHero Corvus]]. In the first game he opposes the D'sparil after he comes to conquer Parthoris and is branded a heretic by his followers and monsters. He manages to [[OneManArmy singlehandedly kill all the monsters including D'Sparil himself]], only to find D'sparil set a trap so the portal wouldn't take him home but would just send him to a random planet and leave him stranded there. By the second game, it's implied he's spent ''decades'' wandering from planet to planet via naturally occurring portals, with only his sentient Tome Of Power for company. He [[HopeSpot finally manages to get back to Parthoris]] [[YankTheDogsChain only to find that it has been ravaged by a new threat in the form of a deadly plague that turns people into murderous psychos.]] He soon gets the plague himself, though his Tome can at least keep him from going insane. [[spoiler: at the end he does finally manage to cure the plague, giving him some semblance of a happy ending]]

* GoddamnedBoss: D'sparil's second phase, and not just because his lightning blasts deal a crapton of damage on direct hit, either. He can also summon additional disciples, but on top of that, he starts [[TeleportSpam teleporting more often]] the lower his health gets. Fighting him on [[HarderThanHard Black Plague]] can make him ThatOneBoss due to the constant teleporting when he's nearly dead, in addition to the swarms of Disciples making you likely wish for [[VideoGame/{{Doom}} Doom's]] {{BFG}} to blow them all away.

* GoddamnedBoss: D'sparil's second phase, and not just because his lightning blasts deal a crapton of damage on direct hit, either. He can also summon additional disciples, but on top of that, he starts [[TeleportSpam teleporting more often]] the lower his health gets. Fighting him on [[HarderThanHard Black Plague]] can make him ThatOneBoss due to the constant teleporting when he's nearly dead, in addition to the swarms of Disciples making you likely wish for [[VideoGame/Doom Doom's]] {{BFG}} to blow them all away.

* GoddamnedBoss: D'sparil's second phase, and not just because his lightning blasts deal a crapton of damage on direct hit, either. He can also summon additional disciples, but on top of that, he starts [[TeleportSpam teleporting more often]] the lower his health gets. Fighting him on [[HarderThanHard Black Plague]] can make him ThatOneBoss due to the constant teleporting when he's nearly dead, in addition to the swarms of Disciples.

** Sabreclaws. While they only have melee attacks, they're ''much'' faster and more resilient than golems. Their attacks aren't quite as strong as golems', but they can attack much more quickly and can shred your health to nothing if you get surrounded. Interestingly, the gauntlets of the necromancer aren't all that useful against them since they have a high pain tolerance and will often get a few hits in on you regardless. And they're ''everywhere''. They're the third most common enemy in the game behind gargoyles and fire gargoyles, which is really impressive considering they don't appear ''at all'' in Chapter 1.

** The nitrogolems, which are just like normal golems but shoot {{Homing Projectile}}s that, while they do little damage make a really annoying howling noise and are really hard to dodge, meaning you pretty much have to kill them just to shut them up if nothing else.

* FirstInstallmentWins: A strange case in that ''Heretic II'' plays very differently from the first game, and to some fans it helps distinguish it greatly from being the literal ''VideoGame/{{Doom}}'' clone that the original was. However, from a lack of marketing, to distribution rights making it impossible to play the game without either an original copy or piracy, to ''VideoGame/HalfLife'' coming out three weeks later and overshadowing ''II'' in every way, most people are far more familiar with the original ''Heretic'', and many don't even know that ''II'' was a thing.

** Disciples of D'sparil also compete for this position thanks to their ability to fly, ability to flicker between ghost and corporeal mode, and fire a spread of three fire balls that cause 3-24 damage each. If a Disciple gets the drop on you by hovering next to you by surprise, you can lose up to 72 of your unarmored HitPoints. They can also move unexpectedly if damaged, and suddenly be right in your face about deliver a lot of ouch. On Black Plague, they're more annoying, as they're constantly flickering. To make matter worse, D'Sparil can summon as many of them as he wants, leading to BulletHell of triple fireballs flying at you constantly, especially on the HarderThanHard "Black plague possesses thee" skill.

* FirstInstallmentWins: A strange case in that ''Heretic II'' plays very differently from the first game, and to some fans it helps distinguish it greatly from being the literal ''VideoGame/{{Doom}}'' clone that the original was. However, from a lack of marketing, to distribution rights making it impossible to play the game without either an original copy or piracy, to ''VideoGame/HalfLife'' coming out three weeks later and overshadowing II in every way, most people are far more familiar with the original ''Heretic'', and many don't even know that II was a thing.