klokwerkaos

Long Dead
Herald of the Dead
Immemorial
Malleus Monday
OG 2020
Old World
Harbinger
Nov 8, 2020
117
72
63
Wights cosmetically I see as being more bestial forms than even the typical ancient vampire artwork, ie, more horns, talons, plates, scales, and rotting flesh and definitely no eyes, just sockets that may or may not glow for funsies.

My general inspiration in this design is the mouth of Sauron.

Wights in this design specifically fill a passive role of healer/anti enemy cleric units that are likely to be potent against undead, because the wight drains their essence with touch, significantly limiting their role in the battlefield. I've set them up to be a "resource hungry" class, which fits with their theme and playstyle. Wights have a host of passives they can spec into, however the most potent of these will deplete essence over time while toggled.

I think at a base wights should select a passive elemental attunement being that they are creatures of essence. This would provide them with a standard hefty DR against said damage types and reduction in status effects of that type, as well as provide a vulnerability to enemy targets in a persistant PBAoE around them for a reserved resource cost (whatever the resource for essence is). Half of that is applied to other traditional elemental status effects and damage, but only their attunement is projected as a weakness in an aoe. If projecting the associated aoe, damage of that type inflicted by that wight is leeched into their essence, giving them a regular source of regen. Wights will be a resource hungry class but will be a specifically hard to kill type but not terribly offensively strong in comparison to a revenant or lich.

Wights gain a passive attunement to any cairn for any player/clan custom home, so while defending such grounds they gain enhanced defenses and additional X bonuses they can spec into, this can also be applied to a cairn 1 player hub that extends a bit into the surrounding territories and can be reattuned by interacting with a new hub cairn. While they make potent defenders, wights generally want to feed their ravenous hunger, so balancing this is part of their gameplay loop.

This attunement also affects various attack and defense spells they will have access to. Shifting wight attunment on a character should only be done with a ritual at a player hub/clan/home cairn they are attuned to.

Wights are instead healed by negative energy/void damage that targets them, so enemies using void damage or shadow strikes and such that might be more effective on other undead actually help maintain the wight. I say help maintain because say a shadow sword or something exists, it probably does more physical than void damage, so it would still chip at them, but compared to other undead might make them disperse much faster than usual.

Wights drain living enemies of essence with physical strikes, with upgrading this can be applied to melee weapons.

Wights also don't suffer general undead weaknesses from stuff like running water and similar environmental effects.

Living creatures drained to death of essence by a wight automatically become lesser wight minions for a time on the battlefield, this being something they can spec into for greater effect.

Wights can spec into negative energy essence spells that both heal undead allies and harm the living simultaneously and can be specc'd into to apply withering effects to the living (ie, debuffs like slow, reduced physical damage output, etc.).

Wights can channel their own essence at range into another ally's health, mana or essence, sacrificing their own essence to preserve other undead.

Spectral sight Wights can naturally see any threats and allies in other realm states that could apply harm/aid to them in their current state, also applies to mission objectives/interactables.

Wights have three special skinnable totem objects they carry that are treasured objects, either from their life or unlife. These objects when activated can effect various zone control aspects as they affect an AoE around the target placement. These objects can be targeted and destroyed physically, but not spectrally. If destroyed physically they will regrow over time (between an encounter) or the wight can dump their own essence to recharge it. Totems that are activated can be specced into for increased radius, duration and effect at the cost of additional essence resource drain. The key with this is that they can only carry three totems, and while they can swap totem abilities at a player hub with a ritual, they will leave and come back with the same 3. Access to different kinds of totems is also based on player progression.

Example effects:
-Tether living/dead this applies a tether to targets in an area (friend of foe) and applies a slow debuff to them.
-Apply the wight's attunement damage and status effect persistantly in the area, effects friend and foe
-Negative energy zone, heals wights and to a lesser extent, other undead, drains essence from the living and feeds it to the wight
-Decoy totem, all enemy creature spells up to X damage cast within or passing by X range of the totem are directed to the totem instead, this also applies to enemy heal spells that will heal the totem.
-Essence link whereby all allies in the area are linked by either health, essence or mana (only 1 per totem) and every second players are redistributed to share the same average of percentage, this prevents players going down individually in boss encounters, but if used poorly can lead to all in the area being wiped at the same time.
-Regen totem, provides additional x% a specific resource regen for allies (health, mana or essence, could be specced to be lesser but cover all three)

More totems can be designed but this is a basic gist. Overall they should have lots of options for totems allowing them to fill in weaknesses in their gear or play to the strengths of their build.
 
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  • Magus - Great Design Input
Reactions: Denis Dyack
Hey, I did some research on Wights in other media: Wights - The Guardian Undead?

Keeping that in mind, Denis said that they were going to do something completely original, not being tied to any known definition.

Still, there are some things I can correct:
My general inspiration in this design is the mouth of Sauron.
Actually, the inspiration from Wights in literature was used on the Barrow-Wights and the Nazgûl in the Lord of the Rings, the Mouth of Sauron is a mystically empowered, but mainly just a devoted lieutenant.
 
Hey, I did some research on Wights in other media: Wights - The Guardian Undead?

Keeping that in mind, Denis said that they were going to do something completely original, not being tied to any known definition.

Still, there are some things I can correct:

Actually, the inspiration from Wights in literature was used on the Barrow-Wights and the Nazgûl in the Lord of the Rings, the Mouth of Sauron is a mystically empowered, but mainly just a devoted lieutenant.
I didn't see that post before, but I specifically did know of the draugr connection when making the design.

This is why they have cairn defenders in the profile. Wights also are known to be ravenously hungry in some myths, but that's also a typical undead trait.

The Mouth of Sauron was my "Visual inspiration" not really so much for the powers set. Powers sets were informed more by their place on the trinary config and the desire to make each class play differently.

Anything that deviates from the traditional mythos in any of the designs I put forth is likely explained as follows:

1) is there a full powers set?
2) where does it sit on the trinary?
3) what related references can I look at that fit that theme of the trinary to try and reimagine this thing and still make it unique in playstyle?