The Presence

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The Presence
effort 4.0 6 quality 3.166666666666667 6 reasonability 2.0 6
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The Presence is an entity that preys on the insane, stalking and killing them. The Presence, when it spawns (probably a rare or uncommon spawn) will first look for whoever is insane and in the Dark sea, then look for who is sane and in the Dark Sea, then they’ll look for who is insane and not in the Dark Sea, and finally if none of those criteria are met, it waits until one is, at which point it targets them.

Once the Presence has found a target, it will appear far far behind them, out of sight of the target. Other players are unable to see it. From here on out, it will begin getting closer, and after around 5 minutes, it will reach the target.

The Presence produces no noticeable effects when it is 5-4 minutes away, simply staring and getting closer. When it is 4-3, the screen of the target dims slightly, and continues to slowly get darker and darker the closer the Presence gets. 3-2 minutes away from the target, and a message pops up on the Targets screen; “You feel something Watching them”. At this point the Presence will stop teleporting away whenever the target sees them, and instead just stop and stare. 2-1 minute away, and now the Target’s screen will have a distorted filter placed over it, subtle at first but getting worse as the Presence gets closer. Luckily, staring at the presence in this time period will cause it, after a couple of seconds, to immediately find a different target. 1-0 minutes away, and all the previous effects get worse. The Presence no longer stops when stared at, and the target heard whispering in their ears. Looking at the presence temporarily blinds you. Finally, if the Presence reaches you, you just die. Your screen fades to black and you respawn somewhere. You had your chance, and, well, you didn’t take it.

If the presence is hit by an attack, it will teleport away and double it’s speed of approach. After 3 attacks though, it dissapears and despawns.

The Presence just looks like a cliche black silhouette with 2 glowing white eyes. If anyone has better ideas for it, I’d love to hear em.

As for why adding this would be a good idea, it would help lend an element of danger to Insanity beyond “take 20% of your health bar in damage”. I doubt mental instability is good for anyone after all. It would also help to add a bit more horror to AO, and you can never have too much horror unless you do. It would also be pretty easy to add, just have a PNG slowly move towards the player and reuse or improve some existing insanity affects.

So yeah, let me know your thoughts

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So… basically, this isn’t a Sea Monster, but rather, a Dark Sea/Insanity gimmick.
(Because it’s literally just a hallucination that can just randomly end up killing someone, if they aren’t paying attention)
Not sure about this getting added, especially with the "attacking some random lvl50+ who has nothing to do with insanity or the dark sea if no insane target or anyone in the dark sea is available"thing.

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Mmm I see where you’re coming from and tbh I agree about classifying it as a sea monster.

However, I feel that it’s fairly obvious if the Presence is after you, what with the whispering, literal message popup, and distorted screen.

4

It should probably just despawn if there are no insane people, and noone is in the dark sea when it spawns.

5

It has no drops and cannot die (only disappears). It’s better as a rare insanity effect if neither of those are met.

6

Yeah I agree. Thought I changed that whoops

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It could totally be a sea monster if it had health and at least one unique drop, but it is better as an insanity effect rn.

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Idk bout y’all but a I dig the FUCK out of a boo type enemy in an exploration game like this.

Certified INSTOTED

1 Like
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I want it to mimic the player’s character model but with some fucked up proportions yet still look like human, like a long head, long limbs, unrealistic eye and abnormal skin color

I don’t like the fact that it can target people outside of the Dark Sea, I feel like this type of enemy only appears in Insanity 2-4 ranges of the Dark Sea. The only place it can realistically appear is Akursius Keep but other than that, no to Bronze Sea

I’m unsure about it one shotting you after you let it get you, because looking at the current patch notes, we’re already gonna be dealing with a bunch of shit that will make dealing with a presence more of a pain than needed . Example is Insanity disorientating effects, the potentially busted NPCs with Brigs,Giant Sea Monsters, and ocean effects

Overall, I like the concept of a stalking enemy in the dark sea for some psychological horror

2 Likes
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So an alternate?

11

Yeah

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i feel like there are better ways to do horror in adventure games. dont really like the “cannot be killed” thing and how the only benefit to getting them to despawn is being left alive. plus, new players will find this frustrating and older players will almost never be killed by it.

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One shotting seems a bit extreme, and taking someone to low health is aleeady dangerous enough in the dark sea. The visuals and how it functions are not that unrealistic as shadowy figures are already an insanity effect

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Cool idea for when you are in the dark sea, waiting for a new area to explore whilst relaxing on the boat, , being slightly insane, and then suddenly you see a team mate looking around constantly and slowly dying, not knowing what it was, until you sense a weird ghost like presence watching you, and then you, you start looking around and it all makes sense now.

however i personally dont see any use of it, as it is kind of the music box of fnaf but in arcane odyssey, its just something u have to keep track of sometimes but nothing else for the rest, like no drops or any gain from the experience.

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now all we need is for The Presence’s lore to be a child that ventured into the Dark Sea with a corrupted Warding potion
that child then died, and became The Presence

^if this was the lore of The Presence than AO would be added to the already growing pile of games with dead children (FNAF, Undertale, etc)

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literally pointless :yawning_face:

17

let me loot in peace damnit :rage:

18

Would be cool if it was just left as a spooky event and not a flat out “get ganked by evil shady creature”. Still makes me wish insanity was more subtle.

19

Average Indie Horror Game

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