High Cultist

**High** **Cultist** is a Evil Hero in Dark Deeds. He is a strong all-round evil with an unique skill set that starts at level 2. He can wind walk, create a mirror image, create fake items to spawn a powerful mimic. When he reaches level 7, he can blink short distances which becomes a game changer.

When a player dies whilst High Cultist is in the game, the player who died is not revealed. This is a unique trait to the High Cultist. As such, players who join Evil as minions will have their identities protected.

Apart from having certain skills disabled during the day time, High Cultist can operate during the day and the night. In exchange however, the High Cultist must continually maintain their Dark Faith level by using their Pray ability.

## *Abilities*

### **Pray**

Channeling Spell that increases your current faith. Your faith decreases by 1 every second, you must pray (channel) to increase it by 9 every second.

-200 Dark Faith a lightning bolt will start hitting you every 1.5 seconds dealing 20 damage.

-250 Dark Faith, a purge is cast on you every 2 seconds dealing 20 damage.

-300 Dark Faith, a frost nova constantly hits you every 2 seconds dealing 30 damage.

All negative Dark Faith penalties will stack and will hit you in farmer mode as well which essentially reveals who you are if no one knows yet.

### **Book of Dark Rituals**

**"**Open your book to perform an evil incantation or summon the power of the Dark Gods." Requires Night-time

Level 1:

* Shadow Bolt - "A bolt of death that can heal a friendly Undead unit for 300 hit points or deal 150 damage to an enemy living unit
* Cloud of Pain - Creates 6 waves of pain, each causing 15 damage to units in a small area. Deals 20% extra damage to buildings.
* Haunt - Haunts a target enemy with evil spirits, reducing their armor by 2 and giving vision of that unit. Lasts 2 minutes.
* Unholy Frenzy - Increases the attack rate of a target unit by 50% but drains 4 hit points per second. lasts 10 seconds.
* Summon Mimic Trap - Creates an evil trap in the form of an item imbued with an evil incantation. When an enemy picks up the item, the Mimic comes to life, and attacks them.

Level 2: Upgrades all current spells and adds:

* Summon Ghosts "uses 200 Dark Faith - Summons an amount of ghosts that depends on your current Dark faith level. Ghosts will wander around on their own. Maximum of 10 ghosts.

### **Illusion**

Confuses the enemy by creating an illusion of the High Cultist and dispelling all magic from him.

Level 1: Creates an illusion that deals no damage and takes 20% extra damage

Level 2: Creates an illusion that deals 25% of the original High Cultists's damage and takes normal damage.

### **Shadow Sneak**

Allows the High Cultist to becomes invisible and move faster for a set amount of time. When the High Cultist attacks a unit to break invisibility, he will deal bonus damage.

Level 1: 20% move for 30 seconds, 25 bonus damage

Level 2: 30% move for 30 seconds, 50 bonus damage

### **Warp (Ultimate)**

Learned at Level 7. "The Ultimate elusive ability, Warp allows the High Cultist to teleport a short distance."

### **Compel (Legendary)**

Persuades a target enemy unit to join your cult. Cannot be used on farmers, heroes, Sorceresses, Knights or creeps.

## *Perks*

### Faithful Fervor

Pray increases more Dark Faith. Additionally, the maximum of Dark Faith is increased by 100.

### Master Trapper

Mimic lasts until killed. Additionally, mana regeneration of Cultist is increased.

### Pandora's Box

Gives a Pandora's Box item to the Cultist, allowing him to shuffle all player names and colors at will. Pandora's box provides 4 armor when carried. Once chosen, you will be given the item when first transformed to the Cultist. This item has infinite uses.

## Strategies

### **Strategy as evil**

* As with all evils, collect stones and small trees to increase your damage output.
* You can technically stay in the High Cultist form the entire game without transforming back if you wish.
* Kill the wife if you see her roaming as soon as you can, as she can reveal your shadow sneak. Once she is dead, it not only sets the farmer back 100 gold, it prevents players from seeing you before you shadow sneak and start attacking them to death.

* Summon mimic traps on the ground in the areas where players would most likely pick up items. If another player attempts picks up a mimic trap, it will instead summon a powerful time-limited mimic. In the early phases of the game, they are very difficult to kill, and the minion is small enough to bypass a player's base if they are building tightly.
* When trying to destroy a building, use Unholy Frenzy to increase your attack speed. In the early phases of the game, the benefits of using the ability greatly outweigh the drawbacks of the ability, so use it openly.
* Cloud of Pain is a useful skill to use when you are trying to destroy a building but a player's workers are repairing the building. If aimed correctly, Cloud of Pain will not only damage workers, but also the building itself. It is important to note that Cloud of Pain does not affect the main farmer.

### **Strategy versus evil**

* High Cultist is one of the few evils in the game who cannot naturally bypass tight areas. They are able to once they obtain the Warp ability at level 7. Until then though, farmers should build their bases in a way where only small units can enter in and out of their base.
* The High Cultist is strong, as such it can be difficult to kill a cultist in the early to mid phases of the game. Build up an army to kill the Cultist. Utilise mana draining units and abilities such as Priests (with feedback upgrades) or Heroes (with the manaburn ability obtained from the neutral tavern shop) to stop the High Cultist from fleeing using Shadow Sneak or Warp. The Sorceress frostbite is very useful in keeping the High Cultist from fleeing.
* In the later stages of the game, A gem of true sight or dust of appearance is essential to killing High Cultists who rely on running from battles using Shadow Sneak.
* The High Cultist can be "stalled" during the early phases of the game (to a certain degree). If a cultist is attacking your farm, use your farmer to auto-repair your farm and then garrison your farmer whenever the High Cultist gets close to the farmer. The farmer can then be released at a different position to then again repair the farm, and the cycle repeats itself. Your farm will eventually fall, however stalling the High Cultist allows for the other unharassed farmers to continue teching up.

### **Strategy as minion**

* Build and act as you normally would. At night, you can use Evil Crusade to turn your army into an "anonymous force of evil". When using Evil Crusade, you can assist your master in attacking a base without revealing to other players your status as a minion. Be wary that Uther will now be hostile to you at this time. When it is almost day, either flee so you are not revealed or if the enemy farmer is going to die, stay since they will probably soon be on your side.
* Spear throwers upgraded with their net ability can trap farmers from running away. They can also quickly destroy buildings as they deal siege damage to buildings. Use these highly efficient units to help your master!
* Consider building assassins to assist your master. Once you have upgraded your Assassins with the wind walk ability, you can sneak into a player's base and unsuspectingly kill their main farmer.
* As other farmers cannot be sure if you have been turned into a minion, use this to your advantage to gain their trust and then ultimately back stab them where required. Be warned however that there is a simple way to check if a player has been turned into a minion.

### **Strategy versus minions**

* To find out who is a minion, simply attack a player's unit. If the player's unit receives a 'death coil effect', they are a Cultist minion.
* If there are multiple minions in the game, consider fortifying the entrance to your base with a Guard Tower (with true sight upgraded). This can potentially stop enemy assassins from easily entering your base.
* If you have similar armies, a minion's army will always lose against your army. This is because units controlled by a Cultist minion receive more damage from attacks.