Deathknights

[Drakefriend]

The description of the Deathknight says they would rise spontanously from their hatred, and wielded the weapons they used in life.
But they use axes instead of the swords Wesnoth officers and Orc chieftains wield, who are the closest to the deathknight...
But more importantly, do other people find no rest (consider that "only [his] hatred and the runelore of old substained me [Karrag] until I became as I am", which could be interpreted as meening that he was at least to some degree transformed like a Deathknight)? What are the Death Squires, maybe lesser restless commanders? And how can they command armies that are not sentient like them (see undead Lionel in Heir To The Throne)? And why do some work for necromancers?

[Telchin]

I suppose that the purpose of the fact that Death Knights and Skeletons use axes instead of swords is to add variation to unit appeareances (just like Drakes exchanged swords for "war blades"). Deathblade's description imply that Necromancers provide equipment for their minions, but that doesn't explain how they get those weapons, as most mortals (human, elves, orcs) use swords. I think there are campaigns (Northern Rebirth) where skeletons are supposed to be reanimated dwarves (who use axes), but most are supposed to be human (like Lionel in HttT) Are there some undead blacksmiths? (How do they deal with that -20% resistance to fire? ) I agree that it's hard to explain Lionel changing his sword (he's a general in Delfador's Memoirs) for a Death Knight's axe.

On topic how they lead their armies: The Skeletons are sentient enough to obey Necromancer's orders (Draug's and Banebow's descrition mention they have blurred memories of their past selves) and Ghosts are sentient enough to occasionally rebel (as seen in DID), so I suppose they can understand Death Knight's orders. As for why some Death Knights obey Necromancers/Liches: I guess they origin might be different from those "filled with hatred and angst" types like Lionel. Perhaps some of them were nobles who wanted to schieve immortality, but didn't bother to learn black magic themeselves, so they sought a necromancer's help at cost becoming his servants. Other might be fallen enemy generals, who were reanimated, stripped of their free will, but left with enough memories to become a walking tactical handbook.

[Skrim]

Skeletons and Ghosts are both 'soul-possessing' Undead beings, unlike Walking Corpses, although the soul is normally enslaved to the will of the controlling necromancer. This means that in the hands of a sufficiently weak or unskilled necromancer, or in the rare case of a sufficiently strong-willed soul, they can break free - and indeed have, several times, as seen in DiD, NR, UtBS.

While that is a disadvantage, it does carry the advantage of undead creatures being able to call upon the skills their souls possessed during life, like archery, and even learn and improve them - WCs cannot execute any action which their animating enchantment hasn't already programmed into them (though on the upshot, they can't break free).

Most Death Knights are just an advanced skeleton type of being, with the soul of a powerful warrior or general locked to the will of a necessarily very powerful necromancer. While Lionel claims to have been able to turn undead out of sheer hatred and a desire for vengeance, I'd posit that what actually happened is that a necromancer came by at some point and raised the dead general and his army to serve him or her. Unfortunately for said necromancer, Lionel was particularly strong-willed, and he and his loyal troops broke their enslavement, slayed the necromancer, and took leadership of the remaining free Undead. Inevitably his sword wore out or broke, so he just killed some nearby dwarves and took their axes.

As there are no other recorded cases of Death Knights spontaneously coming into existence without a true black magic user having a hand in it, I find this to be most logical explanation for Lionel's case.

As for why Skeletons in general use axes, it's because they don't need the fine skill that swords require (allowing them to be used effectively by newly raised and still-raw skeletons) and are probably cheaper and easier for the necromancer to acquire. Human settlements probably have axes, even if no Loyalist combat unit uses them. And Dwarves of course have axes a dime a dozen. Death Knights, being part of skeleton armies would thus have pretty easy access to axes, and even if they can and do use the swords they wielded in life, those swords aren't gonna last forever.

P.S: Karrag I believe DID know proper dark magic in addition to whatever runelore he possessed - he underwent a lichification ritual not too different from the one Malin undergoes. I don't buy the entire 'spontaneous undeath caused by feelings of hatred' thing - although negative emotions are certainly a component of black magic, you still have to have a knowledge of necromancy to turn undead.

[homunculus]

Well, there are a lot of ghost stories where victims of injustice and betrayals have become ghosts.
Especially if they are not properly buried.
And there are movies where some girl was killed and the corpse drowned in river or a well, or something like that, and then she became a vengeful spirit.
And, some ancient people tied the hands and feet of their dead when they buried them so that they could not become revenants (I don't remember which ones, but quite certain I read it somewhere).
Now, modern people might think that some extremely special necromancy thing would be needed to create a revenant, but I don't think the less modern people saw it that way.
What about the statement 'may the soul find peace' and nailing the coffin, etc?
As far as I remember the campaign, Lionel was betrayed somehow, and had some unfinished business so his soul did not find peace nor was he properly buried and he became a vengeful undead.

[johndh]

Much of this has already been discussed.

http://forums.wesnoth.org/viewtopic.php?f=32&t=31270

[Rozard]

But they use axes instead of the swords

Dosent people usually buried swords with their wielders (atleast for generals..)
Maybe grave robbers stole his swort? And now his angry?

[Boldek]

I always attributed the axe thing to WINR, and I wish good luck if you can try explaining why they don't fight with hammers or swords. I figured that Lionel became undead because his men and him swore such a terrible oath to find the sceptre, that not even death would release them, making them just keep living in torment. doesn't it say in the dialogue that he starved to death? maybe he just stood there, and stood there, and when you become undead, you aren't really nice, that's why he just when berserk and started waging war on dwarf and konrad.

[powershot]

@about Ghosts:In fellowship of the clay the ghost tried to stay away from people to protect them, so apparently it had a will.

Edit: In the death knight portraits, his axe has bone symbols on it. What's with that?

[Sapient]

Some people never heard of the Rule of Cool?

[Shinobody]

Yes. it's obvious. People of Wesnoth have holy rules against using axes in a battle. It's detestable and unholy, and better left for those savage dwarves and those foreigners Khaliphate.
Please, restart your thinking. Yes, people in Wesnoth use axes for warfare. Not all knights have winged helmets, some possibly prefer axe or mornigstar to a sword; According to lore, humans use arbalests (slurbows), because orcs are able to loot them. But why there are no squads of axemen? Because they'd be just cloning spearman, but with blade damage and without Firststrike. Why there are no crossbowmen? Because there are already archers. There's no need for that.
"Battle for Wesnoth" it is turn based strategy. Something which does not improve game experience won't be put in there. Obviously, some generals use axes, some use swords. But this is strategy, and giving units randomly selected weaponry would be lot of boring work, and even more animating (and again, it wouldn't improve gameplay).
So they all use swords.
Do we need new acronym for that? WGINWW? Or something different, I don't know - B4WINI? But it would help.

[Drakefriend]

Well, besides, I read somewhere at the restricted art forum that they might want to have a Level four Death Knight as a possible undead main villain and equivalent to the Ancient Lich. I decided to call him "Death Conqueror" and have the following description:

"Sometimes, even the most brilliant strategists suffer devasting calamities. At best, their enemies archieved a Pyrrhic victory. But more often, this means an very dangerous oppugnand has eleminated one of the other side's most trusted leaders and the army that served them. But even if this results in a national disaster, this is far from the worst outcome. No, the worst thing that could happen is the defeated commander does not accept his death and defeat., and rises from all consuming thirst of vegeance, and his army joines him to his campaign for revenge.
These most dangerous of the Death Knights are known as "Death Conquerors", and though very rare, they are as much a threat as the most powerful Liches. They plot great wars, possibly spanning centuries, with their hate raising their victims as new recruits. Woe betide those the Death Conqueror turns on."

[johndh]

Do we need new acronym for that? WGINWW? Or something different, I don't know - B4WINI? But it would help.

Gameplay and story segregation

[Tron91]

This game is very much add-on friendly to incorporate new things. Working with graphics just to create a different weapon wielding unit is a waste of time. It would be better off to use the existing graphics and think of a better story line for a new campaign with newer traits and abilities, which can juice up the playtime. Have you thought of an AMLA which improves the weapon damage with each level up? Those can juice up things, as most say using the lvl 3 or lvl 4 units you don't gain much by using them, but what if their weapons get improved each time they level up. Surely killer units like those will become a great thing in the MP matches; Simple think, i have an Archer who causes 100 damage with each arrow!!!

[blueknight1758]

i have an Archer who causes 100 damage with each arrow!!!

Exactly why that doesn't happen,because that is way too overpowered and would make the game entirely stategyless.

[Tron91]

i have an Archer who causes 100 damage with each arrow!!!

Exactly why that doesn't happen,because that is way too overpowered and would make the game entirely stategyless.

You don't get an Archer with 100 damage without iterating the tweaked AMLA snippet around 90 times. So, is this possible? At most you will be able to iterate the AMLA snippet 5 or 6 times till the game ends, so you can gain around 5 or 6 damage in the arrow attack, with each AMLA increasing it by 1. So its kinda workable.