Part 9: Crow's Bridge - units
New Units - The Light
Villagers
- durability: fragile (1)
- melee offense: none
- ranged offense: none
- speed: slowest (9), medium mobility (shallow/medium water, gentle slopes)
There's no description for Villagers in the manual. Gameplay-wise they are just mobile scenery, although you can try to protect them if you like.
Flavor texts:
The humble farmers who feed the West, suffering the worst in every conflict, conscripted before age fifteen to fill the ranks of the army.
"... and then Pelleas arose and asked of the Council of Lords, 'And if the Darkness strives further north, then what shall become of the peasantry?' And the Council answered, 'They shall die, just as we.'"
New Units - The Dark
Thrall
- durability: medium (6), shortened paralysis effect
- melee offense: medium
- ranged offense: none
- speed: slowest (9), "scuba" mobility (all water, gentle slopes)
The reanimated corpses of humans who fought against the Fallen and lost. Because they're dead, Thrall are ponderously slow, but they will also withstand a great deal of damage before the foul sorceries that keep their bodies upright fail. Another one of the benefits of being undead that Thrall enjoy is not having to breathe; this allows them to remain underwater indefinitely.
The only weapon that the mindless Thrall can use with any degree of success is an axe. The Thrall, having no will of its own, can be ordered to taunt nearby enemies to little effect by using the Special Action key.
Flavor texts:
" ... the seventh wave of Thrall stumbled and climbed over the slippery, piled dead and Mazzarin saw The Watcher with them and at last knew the number of his days."
"Bahl'al descended to the flooded, rusting halls of Si'anwon and under the sea there took no breath for nine days, searching the ruined palaces and temples of the Trow for the dream of unlife."
Ghôls
- durability: weak (3), shortened paralysis effect
- melee offense: low
- ranged offense: range=short, damage=?, rate=n/a (if carrying something, will throw as attack)
- speed: fast (19), medium mobility (shallow water, gentle/regular slopes)
The Ghôl is a swift beast which drags its knuckles as it lopes along the ground. Their speed makes them incredible scouts, and although they are relatively weak they can dash up a hill and hack a group of archers to pieces before they have a chance to react.
The Ghôl wields a cleaver longer than its own lengthy and muscular arms.
Ghôls can pick up battlefield detritus and hurl it at their nearest enemy. Axe blades, dwarven grenades, explosive pieces of wights, and scattered limbs of the dead can be picked up by Ghôls and used for a more destructive attack. To pick something up, select the Ghôl and click on the item you would like him to use. He will carry it until told to throw it by targeting another unit or the ground. Ghôls can also taunt nearby enemies using the Special Action key.
Flavor texts:
"The Ghôls have forever been at war with the dwarves around Myrgard and Stoneheim, and the rape of the dwarves' ancestral home there has been the Ghôl's rabid dream for centuries."
"The Ghôls worship enormous pieces of unworked stone, moved in antiquity to the open meadows far below their mountain dwellings. They alone remember the names of the dark gods."
Soulless
- durability: weak (2), immune to paralyze/petrify
- melee offense: very low (double-click to use)
- ranged offense: range=long, damage=light, rate=medium
- speed: slow (13), all-terrain mobility
Their souls literally stolen by sorcery, the Soulless slowly float across the countryside, leaving pestilence and corruption in their wake. Their weapon of choice is a barbed javelin anointed with a toxin that causes excruciating pain that can build up to fatal levels.
Flavor texts:
Called 'Hollow Men' in the West, the Soulless are most feared for the sticky venom with which they anoint their javelins before battle, for wounds contaminated by the toxin never heal...
"... they swept through the fields corrupting all they touched, and the stench they left in their wake was that of a hastily abandoned slaughter house."