Corrupted areas

Work-in-progress Alpha-1 preview corrupted area on Alpha island by Mia DelCasino.^[1]

How the world kind of reacts and changes to the nodes, you see these intrusions of corruption beginning to pervert and infest the lands; and these are obviously going to be sources by which NPC events are driven based on player progression within the world. And these sources of evil need to be addressed by the players, or else they'll grow out of hand.^[2] – Steven Sharif

Corrupted areas (zones/points of interest) can dynamically evolve with the progression of nodes and story arcs.^[3]^[4]^[5]^[2]^[1]

Harbingers that exist on Verra as dungeons are where The Ancients are capable of pushing into the material plane. They can continue to do so under the guise of the effects of corruption as it spreads.^[6]
These are sources of NPC events that players need to address before they grow out of hand.^[7]^[2]
- Players need to participate in these events to stop the spread of corruption and hold back the intrusion on the material plane.^[6]
- If players fail to address these corrupted areas, the frequency of NPC events against their node will increase. These can lead to node buildings and services being disabled, increasing the node's vulnerability to node sieges.^[8]

It can be a very detrimental thing if corruption is not addressed; and that's the intent of corruption, is to present a challenge to the players that if not addressed it becomes exacerbated and a problem over time.^[8] – Steven Sharif

Corrupted areas do not confer corruption onto a player. Only PvP related activities lead to player corruption (in the flagging system).^[9]^[10]

To degree your mortal coil, as we call it, or what some might consider a soul from your character's perspective within this story- can be influenced and can be changed into a shape that's more in tune with corruption; and that's through doing PvP things you can accomplish that.^[9] – Steven Sharif

Corrupted areas will likely be impacted less by seasons and weather.^[11]

When it enters the corruption state outside of weather, in that corrupt state, you will probably see a little bit less of the influence of the season because really it's adopting that corruption, which in-and-of-itself is kind of a season.^[11] – Steven Sharif

List of Corrupted areas

Corrupted Essence

The Wreckage of Carphin corrupted area.^[12]

Corrupted Essence (commonly referred to simply as Corruption) is a negative aspect of The Essence that was spread by The Ancients during the Apocalypse.^[13]^[14]

Corruption is a representation of The Ancients' magic: The Ancients hatred. The Ancients desire to strike back at the creation of what their the gods who banished them to the void have tried to accomplish on Verra. And so corruption is this influence of The Essence that permeates around locations in the world and tries to pervert what that creation really is.^[9] – Steven Sharif

Corruption was brought to Verra by the Harbingers, which are comet-like celestial bodies powered by a very strong source of magic.^[15]^[16]

Corruption is present in corrupted areas/zones that evolve with node progression and story arcs.^[3]^[17]^[5]^[4]^[15]^[1]^[18]
- Corrupted areas do not confer corruption onto a player. Only PvP related activities lead to player corruption (in the flagging system).^[9]^[10]

There are events that lead to the spreading of corruption that players will have to fight back against the intrusion.^[17]^[1]^[6]

Blood magic

Effects of Blood magic near the Tower of Carphin.^[19]

Blood magic is a school of magic that creates a certain amount of corruption in the caster. This corruption can bleed over into the environment and other things that the caster draw Essence from in order to cast these spells.^[20]^[21]

The curse of Carphin was born from blood magic.^[22] This began with the blood sacrifice of Veric Pulsifer by Laria Lemonte, which started a ritual that led to the mass killing of the residents of Carphin, turning them undead.^[23]

The ability to wield blood magic might be considered "illegal" by certain lawful citizens and nations of Verra. There may be ramifications when players discover and experience blood magic in the world.^[20]

When we say that blood magic is "illegal", we're talking about in the context of a normal everyday player who's a citizen of Verra having come from Sanctus. You are adhering to the local laws and guidance from nation governments and/or node governments to be a good upstanding citizen of Verra. You adhere to these laws. The ability to wield blood magic might be seen in some storylines we'll see. That is left to the players to experience and discover. Those types of choices might have ramifications on your character and or ramifications within story lines... Whether players will be able to wield blood magic is up to the different story lines you all explore.^[20] – Steven Sharif

The developers adhere to a style guide for blood magic, along with other schools of magic.^[20]

When we talk about how do we create a blood corruption setting, well what is the associated colors, what's the shape language of blood magic. This flowing river- you saw some of them in the VFX of the zone and Carphin- you saw the mist in the deep red saturation. Each of the environments and the magics and what we create has an associated style guide that includes color wheels and palettes across different influences.^[20] – Steven Sharif