April Fools 2021 news

Greetings, companions of the Edain!

After hearing your feedback, we already hinted at our willingness to keep spiders in the Misty Mountains faction. In fact, one particularly powerful and seductive spiders will fulfil a key role for the faction: Today we would like to introduce you to a reworked ring heroine of a special kind. Veterans among you may recognise part of the concept from earlier versions. However, the new part is based on a great desire of parts of the community. It's about:

Shelob works a little differently than other ring heroes. You don't have to kill Gollum to get your hands on the ring, just capture him with Shelob's nets. The captured Gollum then presents the ring to the great spider out of reverence. However, this can be more difficult than it may sound at first. With Ring, Shelob has two forms she can switch between.

Shelob: Elemental Force

Shelob eating light with Gollum admiring her

Light-Eater:
"Shelob draws in all light in the environment to heal herself and enable the use of one of her abilities. Activate with left click."

Temptress:
"Shelob changes to her seductive human form. While transformed, Shelob cannot do anything for 5 seconds. Activate with left click."

Embodiment of Darkness:
"Requires Light-Eater. Requirement: Level 3
Shelob is now the complete and absolute embodiment of darkness. Through her unity with the shadow, she is able to be wherever the darkness is.
Moves to the selected position in seconds. Consumes the extracted light. Left click on target area."

Cocoon of Darkness:
"Requires Light-Eater. Requirement: Level 5
Shelob weaves an impenetrable cocoon of darkness around herself. Shelob and all units around her are cloaked and gain +75% armour. Shelob cocoon of darkness lasts for one minute. Consume the extracted light. Left click on target units."

Deprived Life Light:
"Prerequisite: level 7.
Shelob eats the life light of all her victims in the area.
Can only be used near enemy units. Activate with left click."

Devouring Greed:
"Prerequisite: Level 10.
Shelob's desire for light to devour increases immeasurably. In her madness, she darkens the entire land. Shelob gains +100% attack and defence for 5 minutes and unleashes a legion of her children to devour the enemy. After the time expires, she dies as she devours herself in her insatiable greed. Activate with left click."

Shelob: Temptress

Shelob in her stunning form in front of the sunset.

Elemental Force:
"Shelob changes to her formidable, large shape in spider form. During the transformation, Shelob cannot do anything for 5 seconds. Activate with left click."

At her service:
"Prerequisite: Level 3.
The sight of Shelob is unique among dark creatures and enchants even the strongest orcs. Shelob's servants are just waiting to fulfil your mistress' every wish.
Call 5 battalions of random orcs to Shelob's side. From level 5, additional spiders are summoned from Shelob's brood. From level 7, 3 additional trolls are summoned.
Left click on target area."

Her most loyal servant:
"Prerequisite: Level 5
Loyal to his mistress, Gollum scouts an area and lures enemies into a trap near his mistress. Send Gollum to scout, if he encounters enemies there he returns to Shelob. Enemies uncovered by Gollum focus and attack only him automatically and follow him into his mistress' nets. Enemies pursuing Gollum lose 30% armour and are poisoned on arrival at Shelob. Left click on a selected area."

Lapsed to her:
"Prerequisite: level 7.
The seductive arts of Shelob cannot be resisted by even the most powerful in Middle-earth. Corrupt any hero for a very, very, veeery long time.
Left click on the desired hero."

Beauty of Shadows:
"Prerequisite: level 10.
Shelob is the most beautiful creature under the sun, but her beauty spreads most in the shadows. Shelob wraps herself in a great cloud of shadow that protects her from harm. All other units in the cloud of shadows admire Shelob's beauty and, filled with jealousy, wildly attack everything else in the cloud.
Affected units in the cloud fight each other, taking 30% more damage and gaining no experience. Activate with left click."

The idea behind this concept is to show Shelob as accurately and uniquely as possible in the various guises presented to us so far. As always, we try to stay as faithful as possible to Tolkien's original.
The form of the elemental force is therefore based on Ungoliath. The only change to the abilities compared to earlier versions is that Shelob can now change into her second form.
The form of the temptress is based on Shelob's appearance in a prominent Lord of the Rings game. Her abilities show her as an absolute beauty with which she can beguile all other beings and make them her subjects. The influence of the ring does the rest.

Her abilities without the One Ring remain the same. We hope you enjoyed this update and that we were able to fulfil the deep wish of the community for a corresponding Shelob. As always, we would be happy to receive your feedback!

Your Edain Team