#rexan

OC

Play it on Steam: https://store.steampowered.com/app/792570/BattleCON_Online/

New patch. New fighter! Marco plays Rexan against Anath in this new episode of Making CONnections!

Welcome to the Character of the Week! Every Monday, we'll be giving you insights on a specific character. Think of this as a primer for everything about a character from one of our games. From lore to game-play, you'll find most of what you need to know here! For this week, our Character of the Week is Caringort Rexan!

Lore

“Countrymen, together we will stand and shout once more: ‘We will not be left behind!’”

Note: In the game, he is referred to as ‘Rexan’, ‘My Lord’, or ‘Overlord’. Only personal acquaintances use ‘Cairngort’.

 Story

Gesselheim is a blighted land of undead, beast men, barbarian tribes, and monsters. Three hundred years ago, the Overlord of Gesselheim banded the people of his desolate wasteland home together, forming a modern empire. In a war at the turn of the century that came to be known as the Centennial War, he led this massively overpopulated and undersupplied nation to war against the northern neighbors who refused to trade with them or recognize them as equals.

After Rexan was betrayed by one of his closest confidants and murdered by the four warriors who went on to be remembered as the "four heroes", three centuries passed, and the Gesselhemian nation dissolved back into chaos. Seeing the plight of the people in this land, the legendary healer Hepzibah Culotre resolved to revive the overlord from the dead, and succeeded in doing so. Returned from the Afterworld with Hepzibah's spell of true resurrection, the Overlord prepares to reunite his people once again and demand a place for them in the world.

10 Facts About Rexan

His family is descended from an estranged noble line from Relecour.

He grew up in wealth and splendor, but his ancestral home was burned and his parents were murdered in a slaves’ revolt.

Rexan is an expert in mysticism, the branch of magic that deals with curses, shadows, summonings, and the secrets of the world. He seems to have brought these skills back from beyond death with him, as he did not possess them in his first life.

He rarely fights, but when he does, his preferred weapons are a hatchet and sickle.

In his previous life, he was never married and left no heirs or successors. This was part of the reason for the downfall of the Empire of Lesion after his death.

He carries with him a key, which he used to escape his parents mansion during the day of the slaves’ revolt. It is the only keepsake he has from that life.

He is farsighted, and has a little trouble reading small print, thus the pence nez.

He is a patron of the arts, and collects works of art for his keep at Rubara. He was a great patron of Galston House, at the height of the Gesselheimian culture movement 300 years ago.

He has personally never traveled outside of Gesselheim, due to the poor diplomatic ties between his nation and the rest of the nations in Indines.

Since his return to life, his dreams have been plagued by strange visions of something terrible to come.

Game-Play

Rexan is a powerful counter-attacker who weakens his opponent while strengthening his own position every time he trades blows. He boasts some of the strongest trading abilities and hit confirm in the entire game. An ability to force opponents into unfavorable positions and trades is key to good Rexan play.

Thick-Skinned and Cursing

Rexan's defensive kit is unique. Unlike other counter-attackers, he doesn't directly boost his defenses. Rather, he mitigates the effects of opponent hits by reducing their impact, through a number of power-reducing effects and damage caps. This means that Rexan is not as susceptible to "armor-piercing" effects such as Ignore Soak or Stun Guard. When Rexan is allowed to freely apply these penalties to his opponent, it usually means that he is going to trade up.

As these effects are the only defenses he has, he needs to use them wisely in order to make up for his overall lack of Stun Guard. Devastating Strike or Devastating Shot with a Force Overload of Stun Guard combine defenses with a damage cap. Enervating Malediction and Enervating Shot combine Stun Guard and Power penalties.

 Aggressive Politics

The second half of Rexan's kit, his offensive capabilities, work with his already potent defenses to exacerbate his advantage even further. There are two aspects to this: his Power, and his hit confirm.

Firstly, Rexan has high general power. With attack pairs like Devastating Shot or Strike (recommended above), he will deal damage that is above his damage cap – in other words, it guarantees that he will deal more damage than he takes. With these kinds of moves, as well as the high Power on his Styles, he is able to deal 4 to 5 damage every beat.

Secondly, and perhaps more significantly, Rexan has an abnormally large amount of "hit confirm", which means that he has a lot of Range, pulls, advances and other effects that allow him to ensure that his attack hits the opponent (such as Unyielding). This means that the usual strategy against a character very good at trading blows, namely not getting hit in the first place, is very difficult against Rexan.

These two considerations should be thought of as working together in harmony to construct a powerful offensive kit overall. His best pairs combine high defense, offense and hit confirm.

Far Far Away

Rexan seems on the surface to thrive in melee. However, Rexan tends to actually have an advantage at range against most non-rangers.

The reason for this is his hit confirm. At long range, his opponents don't have many ways to hit him – usually a Shot paired with a specific Style. However, Rexan has far more ways to hit his opponent. He has pairs like Unyielding Strike to catch careless Curse antes. Malediction hits the entire board and Vainglorious or Overlord's can be paired with a Shot or Drive at ranges 4 and 5. In this manner, he can punish the opponent with free hits while they do not have the range to hit him back.

In addition, Rexan is fully in control of this state of affairs. If at any time he feels that the situation on the board, or the state of the discards has become disagreeable to maintaining long range, he can return to melee with Devastating or close the gap with a well-placed pull. In this manner, he controls the range between characters while forcing melee characters to come to him.

Summary and Discards

Strengths 1. One of the best traders in the game. 2. Some of the best hit confirm in the game. 3. Some of the usual tactics against counter-attackers aren't as effective against Rexan. 4. Has no "weak" or "recovery" beats – is able to rotate very strong attack pairs over and over.

Weaknesses 1. Isn't able to consistently go fast. 2. Can be a little predictable if he sticks to playing obvious, strong moves. 3. Is immobile, which means he struggles against dodge effects (especially Dodge at Range 1) and frequently sets himself up against positioning-based fighters. 4. Unyielding is a very situational Style, so he tends to have only 2 "real" Style options in hand most of the time.

Discards 1. Unyielding Burst 2. Special Dodge

Video Guide

CLICK HERE if you want to watch Rexan's BattleGUIDES video.

Credits