How to test your Doom map, for first time mappers

Almost the same thing -- both use the same editing profile in whichever Doom Builder variation you're using (or Eureka, if you're a serious weirdo like eg. me). The chief difference is that larger, more detailed levels won't work correctly using the original DOS executable and are thus known as 'limit-removing' maps. Those that respect those limits (the discussion of which are beyond the scope of this post; plus I don't really understand or care about them so they're beyond my expertise anyway olololololololol) and do work in DOS are 'vanilla-compatible' or just 'vanilla' maps.

The advantage of this format is that it will run in any port in the case of vanilla maps or almost anything (other than DOS or Chocolate) in the case of limit-removing ones. The disadvantage is that there is a very limited selection of mapping features available. This can be circumvented at the cost of making your levels into huge Rube Goldberg machines, but you should consider using a more advanced port if you're very ambitious. ON THE OTHER HAND in the absence of scripting and other fancy pants nonsense V/LR mapping will force you to concentrate on fundamentals like good encounter design and clean, functional, proportionate geometry (esp. in the case of vanilla) so it's not nearly so bad as I make it sound. Anyway this isn't really supposed to be a really highly opinionated thread, just a mildly opinionated one, so that's the end of this digression.

What port?
Chocolate Doom for vanilla (really the only choice) or Crispy Doom for LR. Chocolate Doom is a Windows/other, better, modern OS compatible version of the DOS executable and faithfully preserves it's quirks, bugs, and errors; it will spare you the pain of using DOSBox. You may also want to investigate ChocoRenderLimits if you're interested in vanilla (there could be other, newer, useful tools for vanilla bughunters out there, but I'm an LR guy so I don't know what they are. Frankly you're lucky I even remembered this one).
Crispy Doom is a fork of Choco that... removes the limits inherent to vanilla. It also has many lovely quality of life features that make it an excellent Doom 'daily driver' (it's my favourite port so I have a strong bias towards it. No apologies, it's great).

Other options?
DSDA-Doom. Not really recommended due to the fact you'd have to learn about complevels to get vanilla behaviour so Crispy is easier to set up, plus it's limit removing so not really a replacement for Choco. It's a good option if you've already installed it though.

• Boom

One of the earliest 'advanced' ports, from the 90s (so, now a bit creaky). This format is compatible with almost every port, the notable exceptions are Crispy and, of course, Chocolate. Pretty similar to vanilla, but with many new options like GENERALISED LINEDEFS!!! and line teleporters and conveyer belts and so on and so forth to make your mapping life easier. Can emulate scripting using 'voodoo dolls' and the aforementioned belts at the cost of some Rube Goldbergness. A good choice for almost any mapper but has some odd behavioural quirks (esp. regarding monsters falling off things) compared to the original executable. Generalised linedefs are huge though, for real.

What port?
DSDA-Doom. At this point you're definitely gonna have to learn about -complevels but at least it's simpler than for vanilla -- you just type -complevel 9 on the command line (Doom Builder should have an option in it's testing dialogue box where you can add this) OR put a COMPLVL lump in your wad, which I'll talk about in the appendix.

Other options?
PrBoom-Plus. Not really recommended as DSDA-Doom has nicer 'courtesy features', plus it's only developed sporadically. This post by the author of DSDA-Doom is harsh but fair, in my estimation. You'll need to get into the CLI and use -complevel 9 in this case, there's no COMPLVL lump support.

Boom editing reference

• MBF (Marine's Best Friend)

Basically Boom with (very few) new map editing features, most notably 'sky transfers' which allow you to use multiple sky textures within one level (although these have been 'backported' to other ports, including, I believe, Crispy. You can use them in -complevel 9 maps for sure). It's main draw is it's improved DeHackEd support,* allowing you to change more behaviours than plain Boom, so if you're into gameplay mods this is a good option. If not, plain Boom is probably marginally more compatible with other ports than this, although I can't really think of a port that supports Boom but not this off the top of my head, sooooooooo, maybe not. This was a very ambivalent paragraph, for which I apologise, but I just don't have any real opinions on MBF.

* DeHackEd is a patch format that allows gameplay modifications to be made to the original DOS version of the game. Be aware that it's not very powerful, and extremely fiddly, compared to the ZDoom equivalent, DECORATE.

What port?
DSDA-Doom, again. Use -complevel 11.

Other options?
PrBoom-Plus. Same caveats as above apply.
Pooch. This is a sort of 'Chocolate MBF' in that it's an update of the original MBF code, and so deliberately retains the limitations inherent to that code -- consequently, I understand that many of the high profile MBF wads out there, notably Valiant, won't actually work as intended in this port. As such I hesitate to recommend this unless you have a 'vanilla mindset' and enjoy working within/around limitations.
I'd better cop to the fact that I'm pretty ignorant on the matter and I may be wrong about this, so if you, gentle reader, know that I am, say so, and I'll correct this post and make it less sucky. Thanks.
Woof! WOOF! IS GREAT! It's my second favourite port -- it's not quite as nice as Crispy but it's getting there. Why don't I recommend it then? Well, it's pretty new and some things still don't work like they do in other ports (recent example, hopefully fixed by the time you read this). So until everything's mature and consistent, I can't really recommend it for testing purposes. I strongly recommend it for playing maps, however, and please report bugs or other weird behaviour so it can mature faster and I can just use it for everything. Woof! also uses complevels and helpfully includes human friendly aliases, including -complevel vanilla, boom, mbf and mbf21, depending on what you're doing. At the time of writing it doesn't support the COMPLVL lump but a ticket has been opened on GitHub so it will soon, fingers crossed.

MBF editing reference

• MBF21

What port?
DSDA-Doom -complevel 21.
Woof! -complevel mbf21.

COURTESY FEATURES

soon

EDGE doesn't use scripts for 3d floors, horizontal sliding doors, swimmable water and most mapping stuff: it has it's own custom line/sector types is all.

thanks 40oz !

Lobo since you were one of the diehards I was thinking of can you please explain the sorts of things you'd use RTS for? I guess I misunderstood it's purpose so I'll update the post as necessary. Also, do you know if COAL is gonna be some sort of ZScript/VavoomC kinda thing or is it's purpose more limited?

xeepeep please talk to some girls asap

Thanks Lobo! I'll update the post... soon (I sat up til 2am last night fucking with Dehacked stuff so I'm too tired to work on this today sadly)

For which target?
Chocorenderlimits does display it and affords a bit more wads than vanilla/Chocolate.

I'm actually glad to see something like this written out; I've had a less verbose list sitting around on my google drive for years as a personal reference.

ReBoom is one of Gibbon's many port updates. Looks like this is trying to capture a modern Boom baseline.

Chocolate Doom++ is a limit-raising (but not removing) port by Axdoomer updated to Choco 3.0 updated by (once again) Gibbon. It's no Crispy, but it is something to look into.

Hail ReBoom and that Gibbon guy. Finally we have a port that doesn't have MBF features working in Boom compatibility! Always dreamed of having one. That's the way it should be done.

Chocolate Doom++ is also cool for not being limit removing. The accent of mapping should be on not having to deal with visplanes overflow, but not for the sake of making maps look pretty. Doom was envisioned as gritty rather than pretty by its own developers back in the day.

P.S. Also, when I played Doom in my childhood the defining feature that stuck out to me was not fast pace (I never played it that way), but about having to deal with crushers, remotely activated lifts you need to hurry to board - obstacles to your progress within the map. The platform moving stuff that breaks up player's movement and makes it inconvenient is the defining feature of Doom.

comradekirov, well CrispyDoom's target is limit-removing with maybe some more frivolous dehacked, it's not Boom, so in addition to Zdoomisms you may have encountered legit features not working because they are not intended to work.