Rookie Wizards Midround

[UltraNumeron]

Rookie Wizards Midround Event

Short Description: 1-3 Rookies from the wizard federation have been sent to one of nanotrasens stations to cause some chaos, each with a random themed spellset not quite as strong as a regular wizards but good enough to do some magical bullshit.
Coding Difficulty:While i dont know anything about coding myself this doesnt seem too difficult seeing as its just making some nerds spawn midround on the wizard shuttle with spells and equipment already in the codebase.
Reason:Wizard is a rare antag to get thats easy to fail as, leading to most people getting it dying very fast and ending the round, this lets people practice certain wizard shenanigans and just adds a fun new midround for dchat gang to play as, without completely obliterating the balance of the round as a regular wizard spawning might.

Now with that summary out of the way heres a bit more of an in depth explanation of what can be done with this idea, my current idea is that they would have prebuilt loadouts that they are randomly given which are not as strong as a well built wizard however still better then an apprentice with more flexibility on what they can do and generally just more tools, however they could also be just made regular wizards with less spell points.

While just letting them go ham as a regular wizard might could work, that may destroy round balance and fuck with people a bit too much even if other midrounds often do similar, so another path this could be taken is just giving them some regular antag objectives and perhaps some gimmicky wizardy objectives that encourage them to mess around however avoid just murderboning, some examples include (some of which i may have shamelessly stolen from another forums post about reworking wiz objectives):
"The winds of chaos have chosen [Insert random player here] ensure their shift is as turbulent as possible!"
“The captain is doing a poor job as king, depose him and show them how the wizard federation rules.”
"You have decided to become the ruler of [insert nation name of a random department], declare independence and revolt!"
"You must harvest the lifeforce of the stations animals to summon your familiar, kill all of the stations animals!"

So objectives such as that to make sure they dont just use this power to murderbone.
Anyways heres some examples of possible themed loadouts:
 

Spoiler

The HonkMage

-Staff Of Slipping
-Instant Summons
-Banana Touch
-Curse of the Cluwne
-Blink
-Knock

Of course with clown robe and comic sans voice, a build whose longevity isnt amazing however with blink and the normal teleport scroll should be able to survive long enough to cause some chaos, with both banana touch and cluwne curse just being to decide how mean they want to be to their victim. Staff of slipping being their main tool and instant summons preventing them from losing it, and knock just letting them get into places.

Spoiler

Elementalist

-Fireball
-Lightning Bolt
-Sacred Flame
-Blink
-Disable Tech

A loadout with fireball being its main offense and blink giving longevity with a bunch of underused spells to play around with. Good for some good ol fashion fire and lightning.

Spoiler

Arcane Trickster

-No Clothes
-Mindswap
-Flesh To Stone
-Smoke
-Teleport

A stealthy loadout allowing the wizard to teleport around the station assuming the bodies of other crew and turning their old body to stone (to avoid needless permakilling with disintegrate) theyd have to use the abilities of the crew they take hold of and the powers of their departments to cause chaos and accomplish their objectives, with smoke while being shit allowing themselves to create an escape.

Spoiler

Wand Master

-Wand Belt
-Repulse
-Ethereal Jaunt
-Blink

A pretty powerful loadout giving themselves quite a few options to defend themselves and a large variety of tools however due to not having charge being limited in their use, while a powerful loadout one that requires being conservative.

Those are just some examples i could think up, showcasing some less powerful spells and just builds that while being able to survive for some time dont have the power of a full on wizard however could be changed or just go with a lowered amount of spell points for em to use. But yeah this is just a neat idea i had and would like to hear your opinions on it, right now i just feel that there needs to be a way people can play with wizard shenanigans more and to showcase some of the lesser used spells.

[Crazyhair]

I'd say it sounds cool but it's still a wizard though. People will still use it as a murderbone fest regardless of objective and some of the builds help it. I'd think just giving an apprentice a few extra spells like jaunt and repulse with the normal fireball and magic missile  is enough to cause chaos but to not fully disrupt a round. But I'm also extremely dumb, so take everything I say with a grain of salt.

[UltraNumeron]

Really depends on the approach there, if you setup murderbone rules for em then they probably wont murderbone fest as that will get em banned if it doesnt further their objectives and while they could try to stretch em to their limits there that is a thing for alot of antag objectives, however that usually is dealt with. And giving an apprentice a few extra spells while fine is kind of a bit lame, i actually got this whole idea from a round where and admeme spawned a wiz with fireball, blink, knock and repulse which was efectiv enough to cause some chaos for a bit, however it is likely much more interesting if its a more gimmicky loadout you dont see too often, though things like that can be a loadout.

[magiciansjudge]

1.  It's a bad idea giving wizard items like staff of slipping or belt of wands since if your doing a stealth mission it'll be a dead get away and if your in a group and one gets caught, sec will search everyone's stuff and see there things like the belt of wands or or staff of slipping making it impossible to get your goal done without to much chaos plus it might lead to power gamers being utterly focused on them to get there magic items.

2. even if you tone down the power, sec will immediately get lethal and the more RP objectives like you suggested will be impossible like" You have decided to become the ruler of [insert nation name of a random department], declare independence and revolt!"  would either not go with it and rat or if it was like revolution specifically for that department, it would just be an arms race and end with a everyone killing each other and a call the shuttle, if you get "The winds of chaos have chosen [Insert random player here] ensure their shift is as turbulent as possible!" that'll just end up as a murder bone as that isn't specific enough to say what's allowed or it'll cause sec to think its a normal wiz round and immediately go lethal.

3. if you let them randomly give them a kit it'll might be bad for the objective you get, lets say you get Elementalist your sorta stuck with a completely offensive loadout are forced to go loud, or if you get the honkmage you wont have any direct ways to damage people which will lead to a sec dog pile but if you let them pick the kit, it'll lead to power gamers to pick the meta kit making it rather annoying to see the same kit over and over again or it'll lead to the same gimmick over and over again.

I don't hate this idea but this would be better if stealth goals were involved and were given a less powerful but varied choices, since a lot of these goals seem to require roleplay and if you wanted this to automated into the system without admin intervention, this would lead to defaulting to murder bone or just sec not trying to deal with the roleplay in the round. 

Edited November 1, 2021 by magiciansjudge

[UltraNumeron]

2 hours ago, magiciansjudge said:

1.  It's a bad idea giving wizard items like staff of slipping or belt of wands since if your doing a stealth mission it'll be a dead get away and if your in a group and one gets caught, sec will search everyone's stuff and see there things like the belt of wands or or staff of slipping making it impossible to get your goal done without to much chaos plus it might lead to power gamers being utterly focused on them to get there magic items.

2. even if you tone down the power, sec will immediately get lethal and the more RP objectives like you suggested will be impossible like" You have decided to become the ruler of [insert nation name of a random department], declare independence and revolt!"  would either not go with it and rat or if it was like revolution specifically for that department, it would just be an arms race and end with a everyone killing each other and a call the shuttle, if you get "The winds of chaos have chosen [Insert random player here] ensure their shift is as turbulent as possible!" that'll just end up as a murder bone as that isn't specific enough to say what's allowed or it'll cause sec to think its a normal wiz round and immediately go lethal.

3. if you let them randomly give them a kit it'll might be bad for the objective you get, lets say you get Elementalist your sorta stuck with a completely offensive loadout are forced to go loud, or if you get the honkmage you wont have any direct ways to damage people which will lead to a sec dog pile but if you let them pick the kit, it'll lead to power gamers to pick the meta kit making it rather annoying to see the same kit over and over again or it'll lead to the same gimmick over and over again.

I don't hate this idea but this would be better if stealth goals were involved and were given a less powerful but varied choices, since a lot of these goals seem to require roleplay and if you wanted this to automated into the system without admin intervention, this would lead to defaulting to murder bone or just sec not trying to deal with the roleplay in the round. 

Gonna do a rebuttall here 

1. Wizard is kind of meant to be go loud, their good spells need a robe after all i really dont see how this is a problem. Stealth is a niche build in wiz which is represented with the mindswap one here it really is not the main thing you really should not be hiding unless your build revolves around it. And well its alright to cause quite a bit of chaos, generally its still tamer then quite a few other midrounds like swarmers just wrecking everything and terrors killing everyone and taking over. And taking the items may be counted as contraband.

2. Honestly the objectives were an option, they werent overly thought out but its just something to give the wiz something other then killing everyone and well they dont even need to be there its just nice to give them a goal honestly with the power level of these loadouts and generally with how midrounds are  it might even be okay to go without them as the builds are designed to make their kills not be too unrecovable, and sec should go lethal for they are uncontainable. And if they do get objectives  might be a good idea to ptu validhunting rules on them like other antags.

3. I mean again its just how wizard rolls it goes loud with stealth being a niche build and as honkmage you dont really need direct damage just cluwne them and slip them or steal weapons after cluwning its really not that big of a deal. And picking a kit can work but i generally prefer it to be randomized, in the end the kits and objectives here are just my personal ideas all that stuff is pretty interchangable.

Really i dont think you just get the point here, its not supposed to be stealthy as its just how wizard is and the goals are still just an idea which could be removed or just made optional with a general pass to do whatever like alot of other midrounds, as the kits are already balnnced around not being able to wreck shit too bad. Likely other midrounds would be just as destructive if not more so then this even if they were given a hijack pass.

[Shadeykins]

We used to have wizards w/ objectives before.

It ended up creating incredibly tame rounds that dragged on for hours on end with no satisfying conclusion. Wizard shows up, pretends to be friendly, completes their objective silently, then farts around w/ Command for 1:45. Their current objectiveless schema is very intentional.

[UltraNumeron]

24 minutes ago, Shadeykins said:

We used to have wizards w/ objectives before.

It ended up creating incredibly tame rounds that dragged on for hours on end with no satisfying conclusion. Wizard shows up, pretends to be friendly, completes their objective silently, then farts around w/ Command for 1:45. Their current objectiveless schema is very intentional.

Ya i  thought that may happen too so put it in as a possibility likely would be bettert o just let them do whatever, as that isnt too different from how many other midrounds go so its not too crazy and just works.

[AffectedArc07]

My word holds no weight now, but I am still saying it.

 

TLDR:

Midround wizards bad

[Viz]

Wiz causes massive widespread disruption, permakills a lot of people, and their items if looted can easily fuck other antags over. Their existence alone can make the round very LRP because they make everyone go unga, and in addition to that the weapons people get for wiz will remain in their possession after. I'm personally not a fan of wiz rounds continuing after the wiz is gone, and midround wiz is the same deal. 

[Charliminator]

playing as wizard, isn't how people get better at wizard. I have never rolled wizard in 2000+ hours. would I be a more robust wizard than 80% of them? yes. general playtime and experience gets you better at wizard. IMO, wizard should be timelocked behind antagonist playtime. that way, wizard cannot be your first antag experience, and you need atleast 2-3 antag rounds before you can even sign up for wizard.

[UltraNumeron]

3 hours ago, Woje said:

Wiz causes massive widespread disruption, permakills a lot of people, and their items if looted can easily fuck other antags over. Their existence alone can make the round very LRP because they make everyone go unga, and in addition to that the weapons people get for wiz will remain in their possession after. I'm personally not a fan of wiz rounds continuing after the wiz is gone, and midround wiz is the same deal. 

I mean im not even sure you read the suggestion here, im not suggesting wiz as a midround, i am suggesting a toned down midround which uses wizard stuff while builds being geared around avoiding permakilling, lootable gear and potential for widespread disruption. And i will agree that wiz rounds generally should not continue after the wiz is gone, and this also with that more toned down nature makes it so its much less needed for mass ungaing. Though the kits may need to be adjusted more as they are just examples i thought up late at night especially ones like the wand one as that definetly could fuck shit up for other antags.

2 hours ago, Charliminator said:

playing as wizard, isn't how people get better at wizard. I have never rolled wizard in 2000+ hours. would I be a more robust wizard than 80% of them? yes. general playtime and experience gets you better at wizard. IMO, wizard should be timelocked behind antagonist playtime. that way, wizard cannot be your first antag experience, and you need atleast 2-3 antag rounds before you can even sign up for wizard.

Well you dont got much of a thing to say here never being a wiz, making this kind of just speculation but i do see your point. Experience gets you better at any antag and wiz is no exception though from personal experience of having rolled it many times it really helps to have experience of it specifically so you know quite a bit of what to do. Though that still isnt the main point of this just being an added bonus, the main point is letting more people experience wizard items and spells and adding another midround to look forward to.

[AffectedArc07]

2 hours ago, UltraNumeron said:

Well you dont got much of a thing to say here never being a wiz, making this kind of just speculation

Never rolling wizard doesnt make any point you make regarding wizards invalid. If you have played against enough of them, or tried any of the abilities on a local server, you have most likely learned enough. 

 

 

I said it before but ill say it again. Midround wizards arent going to happen for a variety of reasons. Its not what we need here. 

[Esenno]

On 10/31/2021 at 11:38 AM, UltraNumeron said:

-Curse of the Cluwne

I think people greatly misunderstand how powerful this spell kinda is. It's a touch spell that means you can then ignore the person and they'll just be killed off because Cluwnes are valid.

6 hours ago, UltraNumeron said:

Well you dont got much of a thing to say here never being a wiz, making this kind of just speculation

Some one never rolling wizard doesn't mean they can't add to a conversation in a positive, constructive way. Experience as a specific antag isn't entirely a make or break when you have a lot of time on the server. What I've seen a lot of wizards win or lose on isn't not knowing what the right spells to take it's getting outplayed. I've seen absolute monster wizards get taken down because they didn't know some mechanic or they made a mistake that got capitalized on by a more advanced player.

[UltraNumeron]

Ya i think i really misjudged how this would really play out, ya guys are probably right and this is a bad idea. I take back my suggestion.