Left 4 Dead 2 "All Campaigns" Speedrun FAQ V1

Left 4 Dead 2 All Campaigns Speedrun FAQ


Q. Why do you play on Easy mode?

A. Because it's faster; common infected do less damage and the smoker reacts more slowly overall. The general AI level of the tank is also lower, and it will miss its rock throws and have less HP which helps a lot in finales or when tanks appear.


Q: Wait now it's Expert. Why is that?

A. Because it's faster...
...Long answer: We swap to expert mid-run to incapacitate a teammate or have their death take less time in order to complete the level more quickly. This is usually swapped back to Easy before the level ends so it stays for the next level as you only get 2 votes per level in the latest version of L4D2.


Q: Do you use scripts in your runs?

A: No, as these typically allow the player to do things like perfectly bhop or bop commons without falling, allowing the player to do otherwise extremely precise/next to impossible skips.


Q: What version of L4D2 do you use?

A: The latest patched version on Steam. A lot of tricks that were "patched" still work in the latest version using different methods. Other than this, it is the most readily available version, so we use it over any other.


Q: What campaigns are played?

A: All of the campaigns; this is all original L4D1 and L4D2 campaigns and the DLC, so:
No Mercy, Death Toll, Dead Air, Blood Harvest, Dead Center, Dark Carnival, Swamp Fever, Hard Rain, The Parish, The Passing, The Sacrifice, Crash Course and Cold Stream.

That's all 13 of the campaigns currently in L4D2.


Q: Why do you keep restarting on Swamp Fever?

A: We need to get a grenade launcher to do a skip that saves roughly 2~ minutes of time.


Q: Why play on a local server?

A: The only difference between a local server and a dedicated server is that Witches die instantly to explosive based damage (pipe bombs, grenade launchers, propane tanks, etc). Otherwise, it is for stability as running on an online server can cause a lot of issues due to server modifications; for this reason alone it is probably best that we use local servers for playing the game.


Q. Why do you kick the survivor bots?

A. This is faster because we don't have to deal with survivor bots, which do not benefit the run in any way.


Q. Wow how did you gain so much height from an item?

A. Using a trick called item jumping, you can gain a lot of height and reach areas you're not supposed to go to in normal gameplay. This works with molotovs, pipe bombs and bile jars.


Q. Wow how did you gain EVEN MORE HEIGHT? You're out of the entire map!

A. The grenade launcher has special properties when hitting the feet of a player, causing them to fly extremely high into the air, very quickly.


Q. But...how are you standing on midair?

A. There are huge blocking volumes (clip brushes) that block the player from passing into areas of the level. Some of these do not extend all the way to the skybox of the map, allowing you to stand on them. These are usually the infected player clips, as only infected can pass through them; you can stand on top of them as if it were a flat surface.


Q. Why do you constantly jump?

A. I am using a trick in the game called bunnyhopping to gain speed whilst moving across the level. I will try to do it as best as I can; it is quite tight timing in this game (1 tick @ 30 tickrate, or 1/30 frames). I can crouch bhop and do standing bhops with varying success.


Q. Those infected look pretty mad...but why are they mad?

A. They are mad because they can't get to us, as their pathing nodes are either blocked or don't exist for the area we are in. This causes them to despawn, which is useful in certain levels. The spots in which they get mad are called "mad spots" by me and HDL.


Q. You're bad, you went down on Easy?

A. No, this game is full of RNG, and got unlucky. That, or we intentionally set the difficulty to Expert and got incapacitated to save time OR was incapacitated for a specific skip. Going down on Easy difficulty usually happens if you get horded, then put out of action by a special infected, whilst your teammate is dealing with a tank or something like that.


Q. Why not 4 player speedruns?

A. We don't have 2 additional players unfortunately. Technically 4 would be too many; 3 is actually the optimal amount, as one can manipulate the common infected limit whilst simultaneously having 2 players beat the level.