Talk:Blackguard/@comment-95.83.160.116-20180315145646/@comment-26393217-20180410170104

Don't forget that game interest is defined as much as by compulsory lore/flavor/settings in which the player immerges and learns to perform (e.g. Dark Elves love poison, and every unit plays with it, even if redundant or not useful against some ennemies), than by comfortable/playful flavor/gameplay that lessens player's frustration (e.g. Dark Elves are a balanced, powerful and versatile side, even if it would mean (it dosen't) mixing elven arrows, daemonic magic, dwarven tech, Undead hordes, and... a Protoss hero). Just to say that Invisibility is not necessarily misplaced, and that lack of fire spells is not necessarily hurting.

I have an alternate source for the Blackguard concept and it's from Warlords 4 TBS game. Blackguard is one of the playable classes of warlords ("king" units who don't leave their capital city), a hybrid warrior/warlord proficient in the primary sphere of Combat, and the secondary sphere of Necromancy. As such, the Blackguard get four world- (map-)wide skills and two combat abilities (when the capital is attacked): As regard to the other hybrid warrior classes, the two closest are the Ranger (secondary in Nature) and the Flameknight (secondary in Summoning/Fire), because they only differ by their sphere of magic (one of the four skills), and by their second combat ability (Rangers have Negate or decrease of "most of" enemy buffs/combat abilities; Flameknight have Death Gaze or chances of killing any new attacker on sight). Other hybrid warriors are less related: Barbarian (Rune) and Templar (Divine). Warriors are the only pure warrior class (Combat as both a primary and a secondary). Finally, note that the Deathknight class is less combat-oriented, as it's defined by a primary in Necromancy, and a secondary in Combat. Well, it looks like the Blackguard and the Flameknight had been merged (not unlike the shared interest of Dark Elves with both Necromancy and Summoning), and you might get a point.
 * Weaponmaster: all newly produced unit get starting experience and all units get more combat experience (like Intelligence, Lore skills, and Crusade research in WBC3);
 * Morale: all units get a chance of getting bonus attacks during a combat turn, and they are de facto protected against morale damaging spell and powers (loosely related to the Morale effect in WBC3);
 * Archmage: grants higher maximum mana and mana regeneration rate, thus enhancing the spellcasting ability of the warlord;
 * Necromancy: just this: casting necromantic spells, summoning Undead, protecting evil units, dispelling "good" spells, etc.
 * Armor: during a siege, the Blackguard gets reduced physical damage;
 * Terror: during a siege, the Blackguard gets a chance to scare/disable any new attacker (who sadly get its HP and Combat stats down to 1).

What could be these "Dark Powers", then? As for the huge blade attack, well, it's perhaps a regalia of the convoluted Dark Elven Society? It would be fun if this symbolic weapon had a magical power, such as cleaving the soul of its victim and either granting the Blackguard a limited life-leeching or a vampirism ability, or creating Souls to fed their summoned Daemons. I fear that neither are possible without modifying the code, however.
 * Stats: high armour, resistance, and combat are clearly magical, given the unit was formerly a magic user (as currently);
 * Abilities: currently poison, but could be fear or terror, although one has to check balance for a fear inducing unit wandering around while invisible. Perhaps not balanced, but a suitable dark mix;
 * Spells: currently Invisibility. This spell is useful to fulfill covert conversion and assassination tactics. Giving Invisibility to Assassins would have been unbalanced. Other spells could be added, like Hand of Flame (granted, a lesser fire spell but remember that it can be cast at mastery 2), Summon Skeleton, or even Raise Dead, or Blink. Raise Dead would give the Dark Elves quasi-liches, although costly units, and is perhaps unbalanced (you could have a Liche in your retinue instead). Perhaps, adding more spell would allow to get rid of that annoying Sacrifice button. Another possibility would be to give Pillar of Fire to the Black Guard, and give the Sorceror Hand of Flame instead. This would definitively weaken the Sorceror (and reduce his usefulness as a tower trap).