Mage Apprentice (Fantasy Weapons for Doom 1&2)

[Perfect Bear]

Ghouls wielding hand cannons? Giant brains on clockwork legs? The Serpent Riders' work, no doubt. Pah! My erudition will be their unmaking. Let darkness be riven by spellfire.

 

 

Download: v3.2

 

This here's a weapon/item replacement mod playable on Ultimate Doom, Doom II and their many PWADs. You're a young mage student thrust from Cronos into the Doom universe. Use sixteen arcane artifacts and spells (with graphics and sounds plundered liberally from Heretic, Hexen and Realm667) to fight your way through the hordes of Hell in fantastical style. But for as vast and varied as the arsenal is, the gameplay is kept as simple as vanilla Doom's; there are no alt-fires or an inventory system.

 

You'll need GZDoom v4.11 or newer. Not compatible with Heretic or Hexen-- just Doom 1 and 2. Instructions and credits can be found on the included readme file.

 

The Weapons

Spoiler

Weapons that have no mana cost are cycled through with the 1 key.

 

The Sapphire Wand, constant companion of the hero Daedolon, is yours as well. Shoots narrow, quick, penetrating beams. Its pinpoint accuracy keeps it situationally useful throughout the game.

Though strictly a melee weapon, the Thunder Rod packs a juicy wallop. Pinkies won't hold up long under a beating from this.

The Emerald Wand unleashes a bundle of seven hitscan attacks, working not at all unlike a shotgun.

Homing sparks shot by the Ruby Wand won't hit hard, but any capacity for hitting the baddies from behind cover is always nice.

 

Weapons that spend blue mana are cycled through with the 2 key.

 

The Frost Shards is a well-known attack spell to mages of the Arcanum. It fires a great many chunks of ice that spread out before you. Enemies killed by it won't leave behind a corpse that arch-viles can heal.

Parias the Cleric always had moral misgivings about making use of the Serpent Staff. You are more open-minded. Firing bolts of poison magic forward in fairly rapid succession, it makes for a dandy workhorse against fodder monsters.

The Phoenix Breath replicates the attack used by a tome-empowered Phoenix Rod in Heretic, acting like a short-range flamethrower. It's fantastic for getting crowds of baddies off your back, but will guzzle your blue mana.

Gallosynthesis is a summoning spell that calls forth a few bloodthirsty fowls that attack your foes in melee. Expecting a demon ambush? Use this to set a trap for them. The familiars will expire after getting off a set number of attacks. Since chickens are flightless birds, they won't be effective against cacos and the like.

 

Weapons that spend green mana are cycled through with the 3 key.

 

Taught in the Arcanum for many a year, the Arc of Death is the bane of the centaur race. Its cieling-to-floor lightning bolts travel across all terrain and are the last word against monster window dressing. Devastating for single targets, but you may struggle trying to use it against large groups.

A secret shared by the Church as a thank-you gift to Daedolon for helping to defeat Korax, the Firestorm causes an instant area-of-effect conflagration in the target area.

Wendigos were notorious hassles during Korax's reign of terror, but now you can have their wretched ice projectile for yourself with Hand of the Wendigo. In fact, you're better at it than the ice monsters ever were; the shards each projectile bursts into will bounce off of walls and floors for some time before expiring.

With each firing, the Necroscepter calls forth an undead servant. It floats around shooting projectiles at baddies for you, and returns to the grave once it's gotten a set number of said attacks off.

 

Weapons that spend both kinds of mana at once are cycled through with the 4 key.

 

That which Daedolon considered his masterpiece-- the Bloodscourge-- may, with luck, be found in the UAC's compounds or in Hell. Each firing sends three homing projectiles forth. They will rip right through lesser baddies, and combust on obstacles or stronger monsters for considerable damage.

Death Metal is a mean one; it sends forth several flying, homing daggers that will bounce off of walls and floors on their mission to wedge themselves into the nearest demon's heart. Great against bosses and small groups, but when faced with large hordes, your mana might be better spent elsewhere.

It's not certain whether this lightning-charged artifact is truly the Staff of D'Sparil (and how it found its way out of Parthoris if it is), but it's a mighty useful thing regardless. Whenever the situation calls specifically for a vanilla BFG 9000-- as many slaughtermaps do-- this weapon's projectile and tracer hitscans behave in much the same way.

The Grimoire may not have hailed from any world you know. It calls forth the spirit of a winged monster which proceeds to rapidly fly toward enemies and shred them with its spectral claws. It will carry on with the onslaught until it has attacked a set number of times, and then vanish.

 

Edited August 1 by Perfect Bear

[Matt Eldrydge]

Gave this a go, it's quite fun! I think this mod could use something like a radial weapon wheel given the weapon per slot density seems rather high.

 

Gotta say I never expected I'd have a little army of chickens helping me out. :P

 

Will definitely record a showcase of this when I have the time, more people should play this!

[LadyMistDragon]

https://youtu.be/MoRVA9U9lAw

[Perfect Bear]

I appreciate the signal boosts. ^_^

 

I've put up a minor update and changed the OP's download link accordingly. It's just an adjustment to the Necroscepter summoned ally's behavior that should get it to properly engage baddies it has closed into melee range with.

 

The OP is kinda barebones and could use descriptions of the weapons and such. I'll flesh that out when I get a chance.

[LuciferSam86]

A really good mod, indeed. Having fun right now with Mayhem 2019.

[Perfect Bear]

I realized, at long last, that requiring the Necroscepter to be aimed at the ground is a biiit counterintuitive to those who play Doom without freelook. The weapon's been tweaked accordingly; it spawns the minion in front of you without concern for your facing, only demanding that there's enough space there-- similarly to how Gallosynthesis and the Griomoire already function.

 

I don't think any further bug fixes are needed, but do let me hear some feedback on how the balance of things feels.

[Zonky]

thank you so much, you have indirectly taught me about word wrapping and you have changed my fucking life. 

Also this is a good mod : )

[Perfect Bear]

On 8/6/2024 at 3:52 PM, Zonky said:

thank you so much, you have indirectly taught me about word wrapping and you have changed my fucking life.

 

Isn't Notepad wonderful?!

[LuciferSam86]

Hey Bear, I keep playing this mod and it's really good, always having fun with any mapset I'm throwing at it. 

 

A suggestion: would be possible having something more powerful than a bfg replacement? For some maps would be nice having a weapon that clears the area in front of me, of course such weapon should be difficult to obtain and uses a lot of mana ( maybe a third type of mana, more rare). 

[Perfect Bear]

@LuciferSam86: The Staff of D'Sparil ought to serve such a role; I added it so there'd be something mimicking the BFG's behavior in case of slaughtermap situations that were made with a BFG in mind. If you haven't had that spawn anywhere (RNGs are mean sometmes), enter "give sparilstick" in the console and see what that does for you. Maybe it just needs a damage buff?