Blight (game mechanic)

Quick Guide: This article has a quick guide that shows you how to use the Scout Tower strategy to complete a Blighted Map encounter.

For the skill gem, see Blight.

An exile during a Blight encounter

Blights are tower defense-like encounters that can spawn from Fungal Growths. There is around a 8% chance to find a Fungal Growth in any map area, which will always be accompanied by Sister Cassia. The chance can be increased by atlas passive skills.

Blight encounters are also found in Blighted maps, which are a modified type of map with a large open layout (often Park Map, Pit Map or related), that have all the monsters removed saved for a single special Blight encounter. Blight encounters in Blighted maps are far larger, have many more monsters and have much greater rewards. Players can trade Blighted maps.

Mechanics

A Fungal Growth

Once players interact with the Fungal Growth, Cassia will place a purification pump on the growth, causing it to spawn roots in random directions. At the end of each root is a portal that spawns enemies that slowly move towards the core, only stopping to attack units in its way. The Blight can spawn up to 8 roots, increasing with zone level. Players will be given a short preparation time before the Blight starts spawning monsters. Players can skip this by pressing a button that appears on the bottom right during this preparation period.

Some roots will spawn after a delay, and sometimes a root will have multiplied monster density (indicated by a multiplier). An icon corresponding to a tower can appear over each root, indicating which tower it is resistant to. Along the paths of the roots, players can construct a tower in specified areas. Towers cost resources to build or upgrade, which are given at the start and also acquired from killing blighted enemies.

When an enemy reaches the core, it will lower the durability of the pump and despawn itself. The pump has 10 durability, and the amount of durability lowered is based on the monster's rarity (1 for normal, 2 for magic, 5 for rare, 10 for unique). When the pump's durability reaches 0, the Blight encounter fails and monsters will stop spawning.

Once all enemies from each portal are defeated, chests will spawn at the locations of each portal. These chests persist even if the pump gets destroyed afterwards. Blights always reward at least one oil or one Blighted map.

Blights were introduced in the Blight league. Characters must complete least 1 blight encounter before Cassia will anoint items.

Spawn chance

Blights were the main focus of the temporary Blight leagues. After the leagues ended, Blight was added to the core game, but spawns much less often than in the Blight leagues. By default maps have an 8% chance to have a Blight encounter.

In some leagues, a Zana crafted mod allows players to force Blight to spawn. The Zana mod also has a hidden property that sets the league flag of the map to the Blight league flag,, which is necessary to chance some of the unique items released in the Blight league. GGG also declared some unique are added to core drop pool in the version 3.14.0 reveal video, such as Blight-specific unique .

In addition, by allocating Lira Arthain atlas passive Spores on the Wild, that atlas region can drop maps with the enchantment Area contains an additional Blight Encounter. It is uncertain whether the enchantment is equivalent to the Zana mod or not.

Lastly, using Blight Scarab can also force spawn Blight encounter. However, this is not stackable to other source of the Blight encounter.

Strategy

• Rare and/or Unique Enemies are capable of moving faster and having more life. They are also capable of running past a characters minions instead of stopping and attacking them like normal and magic enemies do.(unconfirmed) These three factors make it easy for them to run past a player with low offense and/or nothing to slow them down. Using slow effects and/or knockback can help to give the player time before the enemy reaches the pump. With a lot of hits per second and knockback and slow, it is possible to not have to worry about the enemy reaching the pump no matter how much time passes. This can be very useful for characters who have low damage.

• Towers - In most situations empowering towers are the best tower per cost. They upgrade the power of multiple useful towers nearby. Some towers have multiple effects that are affected by empowering towers. This makes empowering towers improve those towers more than others. Each tower can only be upgraded by 1 empowering tower max. Choosing between damage and/or slowing towers will depend on your build. A build with pretty good damage but no slowing effects on enemies will probably do best with towers that slow enemies. A build with plenty of slow and knockback effects, but not so great damage, will probably want damaging towers. Enemies can resist some towers greatly and therefore varying damage types and/or slow types will increase the chances of enemies being affected significantly by your towers. Rings can be anointed with the same tower mod on both to stack. This can be useful for stronger mods like Your Temporal Towers also grant you 20% increased action speed, which give 40% action speed with 2 rings. Action speed does not affect minions or other players

Towers

List of towers

Main page: List of towers

Name	Tier	Cost	Radius	Description	Icon
Arc Tower	IV	500	45	Damage: Medium Casts Arc Ineffective against Blighted Monsters of the same type
Chilling Tower Mk I	I	100	35	Damage: Low Chills and Damages nearby enemies Ineffective against Blighted Monsters of the same type
Chilling Tower Mk II	II	150	35	Increased Damage Increased effect of Chill Affects more Targets
Chilling Tower Mk III	III	300	35	Increased Damage Increased effect of Chill Affects more targets
Empowering Tower Mk I	I	100	35	Improves the effectiveness of other Towers Does not Damage Enemies
Empowering Tower Mk II	II	150	45	Improves the effectiveness of other Towers Does not Damage Enemies
Empowering Tower Mk III	III	300	55	Improves the effectiveness of other Towers Does not Damage Enemies
Fireball Tower Mk I	I	100	45	Damage: Medium Casts a Fireball Ineffective against Blighted Monsters of the same type
Fireball Tower Mk II	II	150	60	Casts 3 Fireballs
Fireball Tower Mk III	III	300	75	Casts 5 Fireballs
Flamethrower Tower	IV	500	45	Damage: High Casts a stream of Fire Ineffective against Blighted Monsters of the same type
Freezebolt Tower	IV	500	75	Damage: Very High Shoots a Piercing projectile which Freezes enemies Ineffective against Blighted Monsters of the same type
Glacial Cage Tower	IV	500	60	Deals no Damage Imprisons Enemies Ineffective against Blighted Monsters of the same type
Imbuing Tower	IV	500	55	Improves the effectiveness of Players in range. Does not Damage Enemies
Lightning Storm Tower	IV	500	45	Damage: High Lightning rapidly strikes around the Tower Ineffective against Blighted Monsters of the same type
Meteor Tower	IV	500	100	Damage: Very High Rains Meteors from the sky Ineffective against Blighted Monsters of the same type
Scout Tower	IV	500	75	Summons 10 Flying Minions Minion Damage: High Minion Life: Low Can only summon Minions when previous Minions are dead Ineffective against Blighted Monsters of the same type
Seismic Tower Mk I	I	100	45	Damage: Low Repeats 3 times Always Stuns Damages and Stuns nearby Enemies Ineffective against Blighted Monsters of the same type
Seismic Tower Mk II	II	150	45	Repeats 5 times
Seismic Tower Mk III	III	300	45	Repeats 7 times
Sentinel Tower	IV	500	45	Summons 1 Durable Minion Minion Damage: Low Minion Life: High Can only summon Minions when previous Minions are dead Ineffective against Blighted Monsters of the same type
Shock Nova Tower Mk I	I	100	20	Damage: Low Creates Shocked Ground Casts Shock Nova Ineffective against Blighted Monsters of the same type
Shock Nova Tower Mk II	II	150	25	Increased Damage Increased chance to Shock Increased Area of Effect
Shock Nova Tower Mk III	III	300	30	Increased Damage Increased chance to Shock Increased Area of Effect
Smothering Tower	IV	500	55	Weakens Enemies in range Does not Damage Enemies
Stone Gaze Tower	IV	500	45	Periodically Petrifies Monsters Does not Damage Enemies Ineffective against Blighted Monsters of the same type
Summoning Tower Mk I	I	100	30	Summons 3 Minions Minion Damage: Low Minion Life: Low Can only summon Minions when previous Minions are dead Ineffective against Blighted Monsters of the same type
Summoning Tower Mk II	II	150	30	Summons 5 Minions
Summoning Tower Mk III	III	300	30	Summons 7 Minions
Temporal Tower	IV	500	45	Persistently Slows Monsters Does not Damage Enemies Ineffective against Blighted Monsters of the same type
Tower Foundation		0	0	A powered base for one of Cassia's towers.

Tower upgrades

Upgrade paths

Tier I	Tier II	Tier III	Upgrades	Tier IV	Upgrades
Chilling Tower Mk I	Chilling Tower Mk II	Chilling Tower Mk III	Increased Damage Increased effect of Chill Affects more Targets	Freezebolt Tower	Increased Damage (Very High) Shoots a Piercing projectile which Freezes enemies
				Glacial Cage Tower	Deals no Damage Imprisons Enemies
Empowering Tower Mk I	Empowering Tower Mk II	Empowering Tower Mk III	Increased effect area	Imbuing Tower	Improves the effectiveness of Players in range
				Smothering Tower	Weakens Enemies in range
Fireball Tower Mk I	Fireball Tower Mk II	Fireball Tower Mk III	Increased effect area Cast more fireballs (1-3-5)	Flamethrower Tower	Increased Damage (High) Casts a stream of Fire
				Meteor Tower	Increased Damage (Very high) Rains Meteors from the sky
Seismic Tower Mk I	Seismic Tower Mk II	Seismic Tower Mk III	Repeats more times (3-5-7)	Stone Gaze Tower	Periodically Petrifies Monsters No longer does damage
				Temporal Tower	Persistently Slows Monsters No longer does damage
Shock Nova Tower Mk I	Shock Nova Tower Mk II	Shock Nova Tower Mk III	Increased Damage Increased chance to Shock Increased Area of Effect	Arc Tower	Increased Damage (Medium) Casts Arc
				Lightning Storm Tower	Increased Damage (High) Lightning rapidly strikes around the Tower
Summoning Tower Mk I	Summoning Tower Mk II	Summoning Tower Mk III	Summons more minions (3-5-7)	Scout Tower	Summons 10 Flying Minions dealing high damage
				Sentinel Tower	Summons one durable minion with a high life pool

Rewards

Completing a blighted map or a blight encounter on a regular map will grant many of the following:

Image	Type	Typical drops
	Random	Random assortment of items including armour, weapons and common currency
	Blight	Oils, small chance for rare oils like , and Blighted Maps
	Currency	Common currency, can contain s Small chance for s, s, s, s
	Harbinger	s, Beachhead map, Small chance for s & s
	Jewelry	Rings, Amulets, Jewels, Abyss Jewels and Belts, which may be veiled, fractured, or influenced
	Divination Cards	0-4 s, Random cards
	Fossils	Fossils, Resonators
	Map Fragments	Scarabs, /Dawn/Noon/Midnight, , Small chance for valuable map fragments
	Maps	Valuable white and yellow maps (T1 to T10). Small chance for red maps (T11+).
	Uniques	Low level unique items, small chance for unique maps and valuable uniques like .
	Armour	Armour, some of which may be veiled, fractured, 30 quality, or influenced
	Weapons	Weapons, some of which may be veiled, fractured, 30 quality, or influenced
	Abyss	Abyss Jewels, Stygian Vise belts
	Essences	All tiers of Essences, small chance for Deafening Essences or
	Gems	Skill gems, which may have levels and quality. Does not contain Anomalous/Divergent/Awakened/Phantasmal gems
	Prophecy	Random prophecies
	Talismans	Corrupted Talismans
	Labyrinth	, Rare armour that has a Labyrinth Enchantment applied
	Metamorph	Catalysts for rings & amulets, small chance for valuable s and s
	Delirium	s, Cluster Jewels, Delirium orbs
	Breach	Breach Splinters, and rarely Breachstones or Empowered Breachstones
	Perandus	s, can also contain Perandus Scarab
	Legion	Legion Splinters, Incubators
	Scarab	Scarabs

See Also

• Blighted map

Version history

Version	Changes
3.14.0	Spawn chance in map has changed to 8%
3.12.0	Arc Towers now cast 74% faster. Shock Nova Towers now cast 50% faster. Chilling Towers now have 50% more Chill effect, and have a cooldown of 4 seconds (from 7). Seismic Towers now have 50% more skill effect duration and have a cooldown of 4 seconds (from 7). Minion Towers now wait 3 seconds before resummoning their dead minions (from 8). Freezebolt Towers now cast twice as fast and have half their previous cooldown. They now fire an additional projectile. Stone Gaze Towers now reduce action speed by 20% (from 15%) and have slight reduced cooldown. Scouts from Scout Towers now have 38% more Attack Speed and deal 50% more damage.
3.8.0	Introduced to the game.