Dire Lord

AVAILABLE RACES

Dark Myr
Halfling
Human
Ogre
Skar

Dire Lord

The Dire Lord is a proficient combatant that is known for their swift and brutal melee attacks and their relentless self-healing.

But while battling their enemy in a corporeal sense, Dire Lords are also waging war in the imagination of their foe. By infiltrating the essence of a being, the Dire Lord can ravage their enemy with horrifying phantoms, alter the properties of their essence and even steal their essence completely. By mastering Essence manipulation, the Dire Lord is able to wield their own blood in battle, using it to replenish themselves or to assail their enemies from the inside out.

Primary Role: Tank (Nightmare)
Secondary Role: Physical DPS (Carnage)
Available Races: Human, Halfling, Ogre, Dark Myr, Skar
Weapons: Simple and Martial Slashing Weapons. Some Exotic Weapons unlocked at high skill levels
Armor: Up to Light Plate
Combat Skills: Dodge, Parry
Spell Skills: Corruption, Fortification, Enervation, Manifestation, Augmentation

Blood Debt: As Dire Lord’s take incoming damage, a portion of that damage will be converted into Blood Debt. Instead of taking this damage immediately, the damage from the Blood Debt is applied over time. The higher your Blood Debt, the higher each tick of Blood Debt damage will get. This allows the Dire Lord to more easily survive high-damage attacks by spreading out the damage from them over a longer period of time.

Additionally, Dire Lords will have several ways to reduce or heal their Blood Debt, and damage from Blood Debt alone will not be able to kill a Dire Lord, but can reduce the Dire Lord to a single point of Health. Alternatively, several abilities, and the Carnage Dire Lord benefit greatly from higher Blood Debt, and may be incentivized to drive their Blood Debt higher in combat.

FEATURED ABILITIES

Abyssal Touch

Drain life from your target equal to your missing Health and deal damage equal to half life absorbed.

Corrupt Blood

Deal Fire damage over time to your target. Becomes stronger when applied with higher Blood Debt.

Devour Strength

Drain some of the target’s Strength and grant it to yourself.

Life Tap

Deal Curse damage to your target and heal yourself for a portion of the damage dealt.

Provoking Phantoms

Affect an enemy’s mind with relentless apparitions. When you strike the enemy in combat, Provoking Phantoms will gain 1 stack. Each additional stack will increase the threat you generate on the target.

Devour Dexterity

Drain some of the target’s Dexterity and grant it to yourself.

Thresh

Slash the target, dealing Physical damage and inflicting Bleeding Essence, cause them to bleed rapidly for a short time.

Devour Presence

Drain some of the target’s Presence and grant it to yourself.

Blood State: Nightmarish

Manifest a nightmarish visage, causing additional threat every time you deal damage.

Blood Fiend

Gain a small amount of healing from all of your physical attacks, OR activate the effect to reduce some of your Blood Debt with each strike while the activated effect lasts.

Dark Revenge

Counterattack with a vicious strike after receiving spell damage.

Leaden Blood

Progressively slows your target’s movement speed until they are rooted to the ground for a short time.

Deafening Whisper

Interrupt an enemy’s spellcasting for a short time.

Blood State: Torrential Veins

Empower your blood flow, increasing the amount of damage converted to Blood Debt.

Dire Grip

Pull nearby enemies to your location and root them in place.

Harmshield

For a short time, reflect a portion of incoming spell damage back at your attackers in the form of Curse damage.

Splatter

Spread the Essence Bleed from Thresh on your primary target to other nearby enemies.

Spiky Bloodcoat

For a short time, reflect a portion of incoming physical damage back at your attackers in the form of Curse damage.

Essence Harvester

Rip into your enemy with corruption running through your blade, dealing damage and healing a portion of your Blood Debt.

Call of the Dire

Reduce your target’s movement speed and force them to walk towards you, unable to resist.

Blood State: Famished

Enter a bloody frenzy, increasing your chance to critically hit, and causing you to be healed for each critical hit while active.

Imposing Visage

Instill a primal dread in your opponents, forcing them to flee for a short time.

Darkfall

Sacrifice a portion of your health to reduce the enemy’s resistance to magic and destroy a portion of their Mana over a short time.

Canopy of Blood

Sacrifice a portion of your health to shield your group members from damage for a short time.

Essence Thief

Manifest at the location of an enemy and deal Curse damage to them.

Haunting Blade

Deal physical damage and purge a beneficial magical effect from your enemy.

Purge Essence

Sacrifice a portion of your health to cleanse yourself of Poison and Disease effects.

Note: This is not a full list of Dire Lord abilities available within the game and is intended only to provide an overview of the class. Many of these abilities have upgrades and variations that become available as the character levels up.

Nightmare Mastery Examples

The Nightmare Dire Lord is a dark bulwark that turns pain into power and locks enemies in a grip they cannot escape.

Mastery	Description
Ability Unlock: Terrormancer	The duration of Fear effects on you is dramatically reduced.
Ability Unlock: Relentless Vitality	The lower your health becomes, the stronger your natural health regeneration becomes.
Phantom Recoil	When a target afflicted by Provoking Phantoms hits you with a melee attack, it suffers a small burst of Curse retaliation damage. This damage scales with stacks of Provoking Phantoms.
Debt-Fed Apparitions	While your Blood Debt is above 60%, each strike against a target afflicted with Provoking Phantoms will grant 2 stacks instead of 1.
Blood Shock	Corrupt Blood now does initial damage when it lands. Additionally, each instance of damage will generate a small amount of bonus Threat.
Calculated Infusion	When you are healed by Life Tap, 20% of the healing amount will be applied as Blood Debt reduction instead of healing you directly. Additionally, Life Tap is now immune to spell pushback.
Marked Blood	If Vital Cage absorbs or reduces Spell Damage, you gain increased resistance to the same spell school for a short duration.
Unyielding Leech	Using your Life Tap when you are below 50% health will reduce the damage you take for several seconds.
Baleful Ground	If Dire Grip pulls 2 or more enemies it will create a 6m area of effect beneath you for 5 sec. This zone increases your threat generation while you remain in the area of effect.
Bloody Provocation	Reduce the initial damage of Thresh, but increase the Threat generated by the attack.
Ruinous Carving	Blood Fiend’s passive healing effect when using two-handed weapons is increased. Additionally, the threat generated by offhand attacks when using the activated ability is increased.
Immutable Call	Call of the Dire is now effective against Iron-Willed enemies.
Nightmare Crown	A portion of the threat you generate when attacking a target inflicted by Provoking Phantoms is converted into Blood Debt reduction.

Carnage Mastery Examples

The Carnage Dire Lord is a berserker of blood and ruin, turning their damaged bodies into raw offensive power.

Mastery	Description
Ability Unlock: Bloodrot	Usable on targets afflicted with Bleeding Essence. Infect the wound, increasing the bleed damage per tick and causing the wound to burst at the end of its duration, consuming all stacks of Bleeding Essence and dealing higher damage based on the number of Bleeding Essence stacks consumed.
Ability Unlock: Sanguine Blast	Sacrifice a portion of your Health to form a blast of power from your own Essence, dealing Curse damage. Damage taken from Sanguine Blast will add to your Blood Debt.
Ability Unlock: Carnage-Soaked Adversary	You gain bonus damage and other ability-specific advantages the lower your health and the higher your Blood Debt.
Ability Unlock: Edge of Midnight	Deal damage to your foe and gain a stack of Malefic Power, increasing your own damage but reducing your armor for a short time. Stacks up to 2 times.
Debt-Fed Affliction	Increase the amount of bonus damage applied to Corrupt Blood based on your Blood Debt.
Open the Vein	Thresh is now able to apply up to 5 stacks of Bleeding Essence, increasing the damage per tick with each stack.
Baleful Pact	A portion of the damage inflicted by your Bleeding Essence, up to a cap, will contribute to your Blood Debt. Additionally, increase the damage bonus effect of Carnage-Soaked Adversary.
Bloody Chain	When Splatter spreads Bleeding Essence to nearby enemies, newly afflicted targets will inherit the same stack count of the original target if the Essence Bleed was at 3 stacks or more.
Memory of Rot	When Bloodrot bursts, the target will take increased Physical damage for a short period of time.
Overdrawn Malice	The malefic power generated by Edge of Midnight now grants more of a physical damage increase, but further increases incoming damage as well.
At the Brink	The Famished Bloodstate now grants additional critical hit chance and increased healing on critical hits while you are below a certain health threshold or your Blood Debt is above a certain point.
Waning Mind	Darkfall also dramatically reduces the outgoing spell damage of the target’s next damaging spell.