Spoiler
Dealing With Voidborn
-Excerpt from "The Darksbane Toolkit V. 27"
While Darksbane training equips Darksbane to deal with many different scenarios and situations, the main one is Voidborn. This section is the beginning of your training on how to deal with Voidborn in the battlefield.
As always, you should first assess the situation. Voidborn are dangerous creatures and only Darksbane are equipped enough to deal with them, so your first duty as Darksbane is to protect those who cannot protect themselves and perform damage control to property and people.
If possible, a Darksbane should isolate the Voidborn from the public. Voidborn are attracted by large uses of magic. That is your first tool. For Darksbane, magic usage is thus, scaling from most amount of magic used to least,: Opus, Burst, Inscription Activation, Aura Activation, General Aura usage. For distraction and luring purposes, it is not recommended to use an Opus, as that will wear the Darksbane out.
If a magic lure is not available for whatever reason, there are several other methods to try. It is speculated that Voidborn are also attracted to extreme expressions of emotion. Voidborn have limited eyesight and hearing based on Darksbane accounts, but it can be helpful as a last ditch effort to try and get a Voidborn's attention through use of noise or visual distractions.
If isolation is not possible, then a Darksbane needs to take down the Voidborn immediately to reduce the amount of time the beast is a threat to the people around them.
Destroying Voidborn
Voidborn are capable combatants and the main reason for the Darksbane existence. It is important not to under estimate a Voidborn when coming across one.
Voidborn are modeled and formed after natural predatory animals across the continent. The closer a Voidborn looks like its animal counterpart, the more juvenile it is. As Voidborn absorb magic, they grow larger and gain more features that separate them from their animal counterparts. Many of these features are more ways of spreading their infection and attacking. It is important to keep in mind that, although Voidborn look like animals, they do not behave or fight like those animals. It is easy to be lured into a sense of normalcy from inherent biases even when fighting these creatures.
Although Voidborn are mostly complete black, they have a silver sheen to them that makes it easier to tell them apart from natural shadows. The most obvious difference between Voidborn and their animal counterparts are their faces. Every Voidborn has some sort of mask for a face, modeled after what seems to be bone. These masks resemble human expressions and have at least two holes for the Voidborn's eyes. The eyes themselves are only read glows and the easiest part to notice a Voidborn in the dark.
A Voidborn can only die one way: by destroying the mask. Attacking any other part of a Voidborn's body will not result in death. Both a Voidborn's body and mask are naturally tough and resilient to all attacks. The Voidborn's body naturally regenerates from attacks by absorbing magic around it. The larger the injury done to a Voidborn's body, the longer it takes to heal and reform.
It is possible to destroy a Voidborn's body. It is estimated that it takes about five minutes for a Voidborn to fully regenerate its body after destruction.
The most common way of destroying a Voidborn is to separate the mask from the body. This can be through destroying the body or by forcibly separating the mask -- causing the body to dissipate.
Once destroyed, the mask will dissipate just like the body.
Voidborn Wounds
Voidborn taint everything they touch, like an infection. This infection will feed upon magic around it and fester, grow, and spread. It is this way that Darksbane can track Voidborn, by tracking the infection on the surrounding vegetation. This is how it was discovered that Elderbeasts, mature Voidborn, travel in packs and migrate.
A Voidborn wound works similarly. Auras are susceptible to Voidborn attacks and even the most experienced Darksbane can only tank a few direct attacks from Voidborn with their auras. A Voidborn attack that pierces skin will taint the wound.
This taint will make the wound itself unhealable from an aura as it drains the aura faster than the aura can heal. Additionally, the taint will fester and its infection will spread. If not dealt with promptly, the wound can be deadly.
A Voidborn wound's infection can be removed by one of two ways.
The first way to remove the infection is to overpower the infection with a burst of magic. This essentially burns out the infection, but can make the infection spread faster if done improperly.
The second way to remove the infection is to use a inscribed cloth to wipe away the infection. The infection will be attracted to the cloth's magic and stick to it instead of the wound.
Hope to see folks there! 