In my spare time, I do a fair deal of “pie in the sky” game design. Since I have basically zero technical skill, and only a modest sense for what would be a “cool” thing to play in a video game, this is an entirely conjectural creative writing exercise; an imagining for how something like this would work, and what would make this class a unique playing experience (instead of just a re-skinned version of X or Y class).
• The Dread Lord Hero Class
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Core Premise : A melee caster who mixes elements of the Warlock, Death Knight and Rogue
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Races : Most of the currently playable races can be Dread Lords, even most of the Allied Races. What follows below are the rationales behind each race’s inclusion in this Hero Class:
-Core Races ( Humans, Orcs, Night Elves, Undead, Dwarves, Trolls, Gnomes, Tauren, Worgen, Goblins, Draenei, Blood Elves, Pandaren ): Obviously, since these races were a huge contingent of the Armies of the Legionfall, they would have had opportunity to be abducted and put into a position to become Dread Lords.
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Void Elves : As members of Alleria’s Ren’dorei contingent, the first Void Elves would have had an opportunity to be on the frontlines toward the end of the battle against the Burning Legion.
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Nightborne : Thalysra’s Nightborne were part of the assault on Argus. They would have had the opportunity to fall victim just like any of the other races.
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Lightforged : The Army of the Light fought against the Burning Legion for a thousand years, supposedly. Tons of opportunity for Lightforged to be captured by the Legion.
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Highmountain : There were tons of Highmountain Tauren in the Armies of the Legionfall, typically representing the Hunter, Shaman and Druid class orders.
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Dark Irons : The Dark Iron Dwarves have collaborated with the Alliance since the formation of the Council of Three Hammers following the Cataclysm. They were well-represented in several of the class orders that made up the Armies of the Legionfall, even if we didn’t get the Allied Race until the start of the Fourth War.
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Mag’har : Like the Dark Irons, we’ve seen Mag’har orcs throughout the Horde’s forces ever since they were first discovered in Outland. Whether an individual Mag’har’s origin is on Outland or Draenor, it’s reasonable to see a Mag’har being part of the Armies of the Legionfall and then being captured by the Legion on Argus.
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Kul Tirans : Cannot be Dread Lords. Kul Tiras wasn’t officially a part of the Alliance during the assault on Argus, and its people did not take part in the formation of the Armies of the Legionfall. There would have been no opportunity for a Kul Tiran to join the fighting and be captured.
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Zandalari : Cannot be Dread Lords. At the time of the assault on Argus, the Zandalari Trolls were still enemies of both the Alliance and the Horde because of their allegiance to the Mogu in Pandaria.
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Mechagnomes & Vulpera : Cannot be Dread Lords. Like the Kul Tirans and the Zandalari, these two races were largely obscure and unheard of outside of the South Seas and Kul Tiras prior to the Fourth War. There was never an opportunity for members of these races to join the Armies of the Legionfall.
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Special Hero Class Features :
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Possessed : As a Dread Lord, you’re actually playing two characters: a Nathrezim Dread Lord, and a mortal soldier of the Armies of the Legionfall. Like the Worgen, you get a special ability that allows you to change between your two forms. Unlike the Worgen, you can choose to remain in your mortal form during combat.
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Two Names : Your character actually has two names: the name of the mortal you’ve possessed, and the name of the Nathrezim living inside your soul.
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Two Characters? : In most respects, when you are customizing your Dread Lord, you are using two sets of customizations: one for your Nathrezim (Skin Color, Face, Horns, Wings, Claws) and one for the poor mortal you’ve possessed. Yes, it is even possible for your Nathrezim and mortal disguise to be of two different genders.
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Fighting Forms : Dread Lords can choose to remain in either Nathrezim or Mortal form while they are in combat. Each offers some benefits: as a Nathrezim, you have access to the full range of your powers, whereas the mortal form can only use select spells and powers from the Dread Lord class. On the other hand, the mortal form fights with weapons, and in some cases a weapon’s better attack speed can mean a higher weapon damage output with basic attacks – and, it should also be noted, only in mortal form can your Dread Lord use ranged weapons (bows, crossbows, guns and wands). Some situations may call for you to fight in mortal form rather than Nathrezim form… or, you may just feel like you want to start a fight in mortal form only to dramatically shift forms in the middle of the fight, like the demonic overlord you are.
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Nathrezim Illusions : Your mortal guise will appear to have a non-hero class (i.e. the nameplate that other players will see on mouseover will display your mortal guise’s name, and the class you are pretending to be). You won’t actually have any abilities or spells to confirm this disguise, but you will have a limited ability to help the disguise along by providing your mortal guise with an illusory outfit. In a sense, a Dread Lord can provide his/her own transmogrification services, but they only apply to the mortal form. (i.e., while you’re in Nathrezim form, you appear to be wearing the actual armor/transmogs that you’ve equipped or enchanted at a transmog vendor)
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Nathrezim Infiltration : If you level your Dread Lord through Legion content, you can choose to infiltrate one of the Class Orders. This gives you the ability to wield a Class Order’s artifacts, but restricts you from appearing in your Nathrezim form while you are in your Class Order Hall. To all outward appearances, per your Nathrezim Illusions ability, you appear to other players as if you are a normal member of the appropriate class.
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Nathrezim Enchantment : All Dread Lords begin play with levelled Enchanting as a bonus profession, reflecting a Nathrezim’s intrinsic magical knowledge. You can choose to ditch Enchanting and pick your own professions if you like, but few are the Nathrezim who would willingly discard such precious magical learning.
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Nathrezim Wings : Nathrezim can’t fly very well, and they can’t glide like Demon Hunters can, but they can flap their wings and gain a self-only Levitation buff while they’re in their demon forms. After reaching the level at which the character can train flight, they gain a class-based flight ability similar in function to the monk’s Zen Flight.
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Dread Lord Class Mount : Dread Lords will acquire, during their first few quests, a Xorothian Dread Courser, another variation on the Dreadsteed, using the wingy model of Arthas’ Invincible mount.
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Death Throes : When you die as a Nathrezim, you explode into a cloud of bats and your shoulder armor and helm clatter to the ground in a heap. If you die while in your mortal guise, you first transform into your Nathrezim form and then do the whole bats-shoulders-helm animation sequence.
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Specs : Dread Lords have three specs:
-Manipulation: This is the Dread Lord’s caster spec, which emphasizes damaging magical spells (Carrion Swarm), crowd control abilities (Sleep, Hypnotize) and tricking the enemy (this spec has spells that trick NPCs and players into believing that the Dread Lord [in mortal form] is friendly). Manipulation Dread Lords are also pet-users: they have a spell called Enthrall that allows them to enslave non-rare, non-elite, non-unique humanoid mobs and force them into the Dread Lord’s service.
• Enthralled Minions come in three types: enthralled melee humanoids become Enforcers, ranged-weapon attackers become Agents, and caster-types become Apprentices. These minions lose whatever abilities they had as mobs, and instead acquire minor abilities that reflect their devotion to their new Dread Lord master.
• Manipulator Dread Lords and Innkeepers can conduct business with one another much like Hunters and Stable Masters; when interacting with an Innkeeper, the Dread Lord will have a dialogue option: “My servant requires lodging… your facilities will suffice.” This opens a stable master screen identical to the Hunter’s, allowing the Dread Lord to stow all of the minions he/she’s Enthralled.
-Vampirism: This is a melee DPS and healer spec. A Vampiric Dread Lord specializes in wielding potent blood magic that transfers health to the Dread Lord and his allies. The Vampiric Dread Lord’s heals are a combination of transferring melee damage into heals for all party members (via Vampiric Aura) and direct healing spells that function like the Warlock’s Life Drain, except you target the healing recipient and then the drain comes from the enemy target of the recipient.
-Domination: This is a tank spec for the Dread Lord. Through a combination of brute strength and mind control techniques, the Dread Lord forces enemy targets to concentrate on him, and employs illusion spells to reduce hit chance and mitigate damage. Dominators are also summoners and can summon Infernals to do their bidding.
• Infernal Minions are the servants of the Dominators. They operate similarly to other tanking pets used by hunters and warlocks, with a slight twist: due to the mind-warping, illusory magics of the Dread Lords, all of the threat generated by the Infernal (and by the Infernal’s Burning Presence and Seethe abilities) increases the threat of the Dominator Dread Lord, rather than the Infernal minion itself. (in effect, the Infernal is constantly misdirected to the Dread Lord master)
• Keeping Up a Tradition : Both hero classes thus far have taken an ability away from the Warlock class. The Infernal Minion is the Dread Lord keeping up this tradition!
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Weapons : Dread Lords are able to equip all weapons except warglaives. Practically speaking, a Dread Lord actually doesn’t wield an equipped weapon; a Dread Lord (in Nathrezim form) always attacks with his/her claws, using a set attack speed and the damage/stat boost provided by equipped weapons and gear. Equipped weapons do show up and are used by the Dread Lord’s mortal form; equipped weapons help determine what Nathrezim Illusions you can weave over your mortal form to trick others. (incidentally, this means that Dread Lords in mortal form can auto-shoot ranged weapons just like a Hunter. Doesn’t really serve any practical purpose since they don’t have any ranged combat powers, but it’s kinda cool)
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Armor : All Dread Lords wear plate. When they die, their big plate-y shoulder armors collapse to the ground in a heap as they dissolve into a cloud of dispersing bats. The mortal form’s illusionary transmog can use appearances from the full range of the player’s appearance library, from Cloth to Plate.
DREAD LORD START EXPERIENCE : ( a proposed outline of what a Dread Lord starting questline might look like )
It is Argus, and the Armies of the Legionfall are assaulting. The players are part of a contingent of Nathrezim Dread Lords aboard a Legion ship, the Venginax, that has arrived to mount a last-ditch defense of the Legion’s homeworld. The Venginax is being commanded by Anetheron, who has proclaimed himself the interim leader of the Nathrezim while Tichondrius recovers in the Twisting Nether after his defeat at the Nighthold.
As the Venginax arrives on Argus, the player Dread Lords are free to roam about the ship. It is a large and spacious craft, with a different interior layout than the Fel Hammer and other Legion ships we saw in the Legion expansion. The player’s first few quests are indicative of their station as aristocrats within the Legion hierarchy: the Dread Lords engage in petty politics amongst themselves, and when they engage in the war effort, it is by way of a mission table (where each Dread Lord begins with a randomized assortment of Burning Legion followers).
The player also has a quest that introduces him/her to the Dread Lords’ three specs. We learn that the Nathrezim aristocracy is divided along factional lines into three groups, and that association with these groups will yield rewards:
• The Dominators are the militaristic faction of the Nathrezim. They are the warriors among the Dread Lords as well as the slave masters, marshalling droves of the lesser races of demons into battle formations, and summoning the fiery Infernals to serve as their enforcers. Their leader on the Venginax is Dread General Terrordar. After meeting with him, a Dread Lord player gains access to the Dominators rep faction. Dread Lords gain rep with this faction by levelling with the Domination spec and completing any quests that the Dread General offers. Rewards include things like unique plate shoulders, a Dominators’ tabard, unique horn and claw appearances, and an infernal pet.
• The Bloodletters are the “healers” of the Nathrezim… but even their concept of healing is twisted and evil. All of the Bloodletters, each and every one, practices vampirism and blood magic, and they do not so much heal their clients as steal life forces from one source only to transfer them into another. The leader of the Bloodletters is Count Zenedar, and meeting with him grants access to the Bloodletters rep faction. Dread Lords gain rep with the Bloodletters by levelling with the Vampirism spec, and doing quests for Count Zenedar. Rewards, again, include unique plate shoulders, a Bloodletters’ tabard, unique wing and facial appearances (with fangs!), and a red-tinted felbat pet.
• The Manipulators are a scholarly faction that has devoted itself to mastering the arts of mind control and illusion. They are the ultimate infiltrators: throughout history they have established many of the most violent and destructive cults across the face of Azeroth – including, most recently, the Scarlet Crusade. Their leader aboard the Venginax is Lord Banehollow, former master of the Shadow Council cult at Jaedenar in Felwood. Meeting with him opens the Manipulators faction, whose rep is gained by levelling with the Manipulation spec and completing Lord Banehollow’s quests. Rewards: unique plate shoulders, a Manipulators’ tabard, unique wing and horn appearances, and a blue-tinted succubus pet.
After being introduced to the three specs, and having an opportunity to choose which spec to start adventuring in, the character is sent by a quest to Lord Hel’nurath, who assists the Dread Lord in acquiring his/her Xorothian Dread Courser.
In the midst of the questing, while associating with your fellow Dread Lords, you are caught up in a game of sport where several Dread Lords are wagering on fights-to-the-death between enslaved imps. Through Storyline Contrivance™, the player is thrust into a pact with one of the imps, Pyzzip, who is sure that he will die if he’s not assisted by a Dread Lord’s mental powers. (your incentive: if you help Pyzzip win, you get to cause embarrassment to a Dread Lord rival of yours) The player can then either offer to train Pyzzip (gaining Battle Pets skill and entering with Pyzzip into a one-on-one pet battle against a series of successively more powerful Venginax Imp Slaves), or promise to use his/her illusion and mind control powers to rig the fight in Pyzzip’s favor (i.e. skip the pet battle, complete the quest). Completing the quest by either of these two methods ensures Pyzzip survives, and becomes an IMPORTANT PLOT POINT LATER ON.
All the while, the players are lead to believe that the war effort is going well, even if there have been a few set backs. This changes when, during an audience with Anetheron, an NPC demon bursts in and lets slip that he heard a rumor Kiljaeden had been killed, and the Broken Isles were lost. The demon is destroyed by Anetheron, and the player character who overheard the exchange is immediately assessed for loyalty to the Nathrezim.
Anetheron decides the player is not worth the risk, and sends the PC on what is meant to be a suicide mission: intelligence has learned the location of the Krokul Hovel, where Broken Draenei renegades under the leadership of Hatuun are in hiding. The Dread Lord is to lead an assault on the Hovel personally, to be accompanied by two of the player’s random demon followers (from the mission table). En route to the Hovel, the player is waylaid by the Krokul broken and his followers are killed. This patrol is lead not by a Broken, but by another Dread Lord, who wears an Illidari tabard and identifies himself as Lothros.
Lothros explains that the Burning Legion is finished; Kil’jaeden is dead, and it is only a matter of time before Sargeras is slain as well. Argus, the very heart of the Legion, is under assault – and the invaders are winning! Lothros explains that he left the Legion many years ago after being bested in battle by Illidan, but his new allegiance does not mean he wants to see his race, the Nathrezim, obliterated along with Sargeras.
After pointing out that Anetheron sent the player into a trap, he convinces you to switch sides. You agree to use your Venginax Beacon to bring yourself and Lothros, along with his Krokul warriors, aboard Anetheron’s ship to confront him.
The confrontation does not go well. You initiate a boss fight with him, and you, Lothros (who uses Vampiric Aura during the fight to heal you) and the Krokul all attack and beat him down to half health. Then, in an explosion of bats, he stuns everyone (in that cheap way that important bosses sometimes do), kills all the Krokul and traps the player and Lothros in soul gems. Anetheron laughs as the screen fades to black.
The screen fades in again and we are in a cage on the world of Nathreza, the Nathrezim homeworld now ruled over by Anetheron. HOWEVER, the player is no longer controlling a Dread Lord, but rather the mortal character that the player created at the outset. The player sees a cutscene where Anetheron takes several other captive Legionfall soldiers out of their cages and sacrifices them, one by one. A large soul crystal dominates this chamber; through dialogue, we learn the soul crystal contains the soul of Tichondrius, and Anetheron is using magic to ensure that Tichondrius never regenerates, such that Nathreza perpetually remains under his control. It seems that Anetheron, as well, has decided that Sargeras’ days are done, and is planning on taking control of what’s left of the Burning Legion’s forces, abandoning Argus and rebuilding the Legion on the Nathrezim homeworld, preparing for an eventual campaign of vengeance against Azeroth.
After Anetheron is done giving us a LOT of really helpful exposition in his monologue, he leaves the room and several imps emerge out of the darkness and start picking through the bloody remains of the sacrificed Legionfall soldiers. One of the imps approaches the player’s cage, and offers: “Hey… you, you want out?”
The imp is PYZZIP!!! Good ol’ Pyzzip! Pyzzip offers to release the player, IF the player will help Pyzzip free his friend. “Friend help us escape. You help Pyzzip help friend, Pyzzip help you and Pyzzip FRIEND also help you!.. You want out?” Agree, and Pyzzip opens your cage with a large key he is holding. Your reward for this quest is gaining Pyzzip as a battle pet in your collections (he’s different from the other imp pets because he’s still holding the key he used to open your cage, and he has voice cues when you click him, like “You want out?”). Even if you have a different pet out for the rest of this scene, Pyzzip will still follow you around and serve as your guide until your escape from Nathreza.
While you are controlling your mortal character, you have only a few basic warrior abilities. Your character wasn’t a hero when you were captured: you were just a rank-and-file soldier in the Armies of the Legionfall who answered the call to serve and fight the Demons. You weren’t a powerful mage or a heroic paladin: you’re just a dumb grunt. But your destiny will soon have so much more in store for you…
Pyzzip gets you to a small armory, where you steal the weapons and armor of the Felguards, then are forced to kill a Felguard or two when they find you rooting around in their stuff. Then, he leads you to one of Anetheron’s arcane laboratories, where a certain soul gem is stored.
Here, your two characters meet each other. The Dread Lord reaches out through the soul gem and asks the mortal to free his/her soul, taking the soul into his/her body and joining the two characters together as one. The deal is, both characters will survive and escape, even if they wind up having to share a body for a time. (all for the low low price of having your immortal soul cut off from the Light forever and being doomed with a demon curse for all eternity… did I say that or think it just now?) Before accepting, the player has the option of asking a LOT of clarifying questions about what is about to happen. The Dread Lord will answer them, sometimes becoming annoyed, other times with refreshing honesty. In the end, the deal they work out is that of a partnership: the Dread Lord and the mortal will SHARE their common body, make decisions on what to do TOGETHER, and possibly the mortal gets to exercise some veto power over who the Dread Lord decides to decimate with his/her all-powerful demonic magic.
Now the character is whole, and acquires both the Dread Lord’s class powers and the mortal’s racial abilities, and the special spell to shift back and forth between Nathrezim and mortal forms. The Dread Lord provides you with your next quest breadcrumb: freeing Lothros, who was also trapped at the same time as the player Dread Lord. Exploring more of Anetheron’s palace, they come across another lab/torture chamber, where Lothros’ soul gem is stored alongside a preserved corpse floating in a large glass vat of fluid: Zelifrax Wobblepox, the gnome warlock who died at the very beginning of the Warlock’s order hall quest line. Shattering Lothros’ soul gem, he possesses Zelifrax’s corpse and joins you in your escape.
Lothros (in Zelifrax’s body) explains that escape is the best option… but escape with a major distraction is an even BESTER option. First, you will need to find a Venginax Beacon, because stealing Anetheron’s command ship will be just the best. Then, right before you activate the beacon and get the fel out of there… you’re going to free Tichondrius from his prison, and let Anetheron have a little taste of some sweet, sweet come-uppance. The mortal character manages to extract a concession from the Dread Lord: they will also set free as many Legionfall soldiers as they can, and beacon them up to the Venginax.
So you get the beacon, save some soldiers, free Tichondrius and zap aboard the Venginax. Maybe here there is a neat Blizzard cut scene of Tichondrius busting out and turning to look at Anetheron, like the 1980s parents who return home from a weekend getaway and find their teenage son has partied just a little too hard.
The next sequence aboard the Venginax involves fighting your way onto the bridge, securing the allegiances of powerful Dread Lords (like Terrordar, Zenedar, Banehollow and Hel’nurath), and fighting Talnivarr the Sleeper, who was left in command of the Venginax by Anetheron.
You take the Venginax to Azeroth (because your mortal self wants to return the prisoners home), but you get intercepted by the Army of the Light. Lothros intercedes and manages to get a parlay going, since he represents two of the Legionfall’s factions (the Illidari, and the Black Harvest [because he is controlling Wobblepox’s body]).
At this point, a pair of representatives show up on the Venginax’s bridge: the warlock Shinfel Blightsworn (wielding the scythe Ulthalesh), and Lothraxion the Lightforged Dread Lord. Ulthalesh is the first to notice what’s going on here: both the player and Lothros (and, he notes, several of the freed Legionfall soldiers!) are possessed by Nathrezim. There is a long, drawn out, lore-heavy NPC discussion, largely as an argument between Ulthalesh and Lothraxion.
Lothros/Zelifrax insists that in order to survive, the Nathrezim (who are now basically on their own) will need to court the friendship of both the Alliance and the Horde. So, those Dread Lords whose mortal belongs to a Horde race (Orcs, Trolls, Tauren, Undead, Blood Elves, Goblins, Nightborne, Highmountains and Mag’har) go with Shinfel and Ulthalesh to Orgrimmar, to present themselves to (insert name of current faction leader here). The Dread Lords who possessed an Alliance mortal (Humans, Dwarves, Night Elves, Gnomes, Draenei, Worgen, Void Elves, Lightforged and Dark Irons) will instead go with Lothraxion (who explains that his loyalty is forever with Turalyon and the Army of the Light, and so his cause is with the Alliance) to Stormwind to present themselves to King Anduin. Pandaren get to choose.
Glad it entertained more than expected!