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Christmas is back at SBS! As this chaotic year of 2022 comes to a close, and we look forward to a much-needed reset going into the next year, we've still come prepared to celebrate as we do every year. For the entire month of December, you will notice our new Christmas and Holiday themed loading screen as you load into the server and that the school has been decorated and filled with the Christmas and Holiday spirit. Additionally, you'll find that all student jobs have been equipped with a special Gingerbread Man player model variant that can be selected. You'll also find snowball crates placed in various locations across the map, so snag some up and get to throwin'! This year for the Holidays, we're doing a lot of the same as we have in previous years, however, we've got some new exclusive goodies for you to get your hands on. And for the first time ever, we will be awarding double XP during this holiday event! This double XP is now live at the time of posting this announcement, and it applies to both the passive experience that you earn, as well as double the XP that you get from homework books. The timeframe of which this double XP will be available is not to be disclosed until it's concluded, so don't miss out on this first-ever opportunity while it lasts! Moving on, let's take a dive into all of the other festivities that await you, and, at the end of this announcement, more information regarding some exciting news of things to come will be shared.

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We will be conducting an SBS Holiday event during this time similar to that of last year, simply known as the Christmas 2022 Event. From today until about a week or less after Christmas, an additional random global class has been added to the class system. This will trigger the Christmas event. The fabled and spooky Krampus will randomly spawn in a hidden position on the map, as pictured below.



Once you discover the location of Krampus, and though he is normally out to get those who are naughty, he's had a change of heart this year. He will instead award you with the unique and limited-time staff, or sceptre in this case, known as the "Sceptre of Winter". This sceptre will only be available to obtain during this time and potentially not another time in the future, so hop on and get it while you can!





Christmas 2022 Event Pt. 2

Not only will you be able to snag the new limited-time Sceptre of Winter, but this year's event will also feature the return of the Ice Barrage spell from last year, showcased below. On Christmas day only, Santa Claus himself will be placed on a static location on the map, and when you find him, he will award you with this spell. Ice Barrage is heavily influenced by and themed after the spell from Old School RuneScape. This spell will only be available to obtain during this time and likely unavailable at any point again in the future, so hop on and get it while you can! To be clear, it should be stated that this spell isn't intended to be entirely viable in combat situations. It's more intended to be a fun and unique spell for you to obtain for a limited time while paying homage to its origin. Much like the actual spell in OSRS, it has a chance to fail (splash) and a chance to also inflict a damage amount between 1 and 30 or no damage at all. It will function similarly to that of Entangle, however, instead of a projectile, it operates as a trace target spell, with a limited range of 500 units. Our version of Ice Barrage is pretty accurate to the original, however, the single major difference is that ours is a single-target spell, and will not be able to target multiple enemies as it does in OSRS. We have, however, even gone as far as adding a similar casting animation as well as the infamous hitsplats from OSRS for this spell to indicate the damage that is done to the target! If you've never heard of the spell before, you can learn more about it here https://oldschool.runescape.wiki/w/Ice_Barrage.




Christmas 2022 Event Pt. 3

Present Hunting, Christmas Ghosts, Snowman Bosses, oh my!

Throughout the course of this entire month alongside the other parts of this event, the bosses and present hunting from last year will be making a return. At random positions on the map and at random times, you'll stumble across destructible Christmas presents. You can break open these presents which will supply you with candy. This candy can be collected and used to buy temporary items and buffs from Mr. Frosty in the mid-courtyard. Though the items and buffs are only temporary, the candy you collect will remain stored on the player until the event concludes at the end of the month. A scoreboard can be found in the mid-courtyard near Mr. Frosty which will display the leaders who find and destroy the most presents! In addition, you'll find that Snowman bosses will spawn at several fixed positions on the map at random times. These bosses are quite tough and will require a solid team of various combat orients to defeat, as even a large group of spells sometimes won't be enough to finish the job. Finally, keep an eye out for those spooky, pesky Christmas ghosts! They're out to get your candy!

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If you'd like to indulge in a sneak peek of the school decorations and otherwise, I've taken the liberty of gathering some neat shots for you to gaze upon below.



















Final Details

• As many of you have likely been eager to know, and, if you haven't been reading the last few announcements closely, we do have a rather large update for the server that's been in the works for the last couple of months, and it's nearly done. I would say we are about 2/3rds of the way there, and it's been a monumental task due to the high quality of the coming models, and the workload required to have said models made. A large majority of the coming update is going to be adding new models for a ton of new jobs, characters and creatures, some we had lost, some the server has never seen before, and replacements for existing ones that are using less than favourable placeholders. This includes several new animation sets for various creatures as well. There is more to this coming update as well, but I won't spoil it all for the sake of the announcement that will be coming upon completion, which shouldn't be more than a few weeks away.
  
  
• Additionally, you can expect yet another announcement before the coming update, regarding our custom map's development. This announcement will be the first one dedicated entirely to the new map that's been in the works, and I think you are all going to love what we have to share thus far. This announcement is planned to be posted either at the end of next week, or the beginning of the following week, so stay tuned!
  
  
• After this year's Christmas event concludes, we will be shifting back to a trial phase of different maps and will be using the forgotten school map less often. We will likely mostly be using feudal, and various versions of the medieval map once again, especially firelink_medieval. As we all know, the maps we have been stuck with have been less than ideal, but we have to settle for something that a majority of the community at least moderately enjoys until we get the first playable version of our custom map. We are also still actively open to suggestions for any maps that you might think could work for us, so feel free to share any you may have found or know of.
  
  
• We plan to start running a handful of ads again this month for the server, while we continue to trial the ad system before our big campaign that's still planned for the future. Expect to see some new faces over the weekends during this month!

We hope that you enjoy this year's Christmas event and are looking forward to what we will be sharing in the coming weeks regarding the server in general. The limited-time items along with the boss fights, candy collecting, and more, are a combination sure to bring entertainment and something to look forward to all month long, just as we believe they have in previous years. We look forward to enjoying the end of another year together with you and ringing in the next. We also appreciate your continued patience while we work on rebuilding the server to a state that you all expect. Merry Christmas, Happy Holidays, and Happy New Year!