The Drift
By the developer
"The air drifts wrong around this place."
That line shows up when a zone has no flavor text of its own. I never found a better one-line description of the Drift, so I left it.
The Drift is what a zone turns into after its raid boss dies. In the story, the boss was the warden holding that zone's anchor to the Veil. Kill it and the anchor slips. The zone keeps its name and its map, and everything inside it goes bad.
How a zone falls
- Hunt a zone until a raid doorway opens.
- Go through alone and kill the zone's defender.
- The Drift for that zone unlocks. Switch it on whenever you are there.
- Die in the Drift and it switches off. You turn it back on when you are ready.
While the Drift is on, raid doorways stay shut. The defender is dead. Nothing is left to answer.
Same forest, wrong forest
Those are both Thornwood Edge. The game's line for it is "The thorns drift closer with every breath." Every one of the 29 hunting zones has a corrupted twin like this, with its own line:
- Bogmire Marsh: "The mire drifts, and the rot follows."
- The Deep Mines: "The mines drift deeper than stone should allow."
- Sunken Crypt: "The crypt drifts where the dead still listen."
- Nightmare Realm: "The nightmare drifts behind your eyes."
The full list is in the Realm Atlas.
What it does to monsters
The regular monsters are still there, corrupted. They get a Drift name prefix that tells you how bad they are. Prefixes vary with the zone theme, with generic names used elsewhere. These names distinguish normal, elite, boss and named rare enemies.
Drift monsters also scale to your level, and some roll higher. A level 1 zone in the Drift will still hurt a level 40 hero. That is on purpose. Every Drift Zone stays worth farming.
They also get abilities they never had. Some hit you over time: Rot Burst, Soul Rot, Ashen Burn, Drift Chill. Some punish you for hitting them: Static Surge, Ember Veil, Grave Pulse, Crystal Shard. Some weaken you, like Mire Grasp and Hollow Curse ("{monster} marks you with Hollow Curse."). And some throw up a shield: Ashen Carapace, Hollow Veil, Grave Ward.
The one I like best is Reality Tear. The log just says "Reality fractures around" the monster, and then you take the hit.
Things that only live in the Drift
Every zone also gets three creatures that do not exist outside its Drift. 87 in total. Thornwood Edge already has the Briar Boar. Its Drift adds the Edge-Warped Boar, which is worse.
Some others: the Rotjaw Leviathan in Bogmire Marsh, the Bell-Tower Drowner in the Drowned Village, the Choir of Teeth in the Forsaken Temple, the Sanctum Error in the Void Sanctum. There is a list per zone on Names of the Corrupted.
What it does to you
Stay in the Drift and it gets into you too. Each corruption lasts 30 to 45 minutes. Corruptions are temporary effects with names like Veil Haste, Riftfang, Hollow Ember and Rotbrand. Veil Haste speeds up your auto-attacks. Riftfang gives you a second, weaker strike. Rotbrand stacks rot. Some help, some hurt, a few do both. I wrote them as one force because in the story it is one force. The Drift does not care whether it helps you.
Why anyone goes back
Shards.
Drift elites, named rares and bosses drop Drift Shards. Nothing else in the game does. Take them to Runecraft in The Sanctuary, add gold, and you forge a Fractured Drift Rune. Spend that rune and your hero gets +1 to a stat for good. That is covered in Shards and Runes.
Drift gear can also roll resist lines (Poison, Fire, Shadow, Magic) that lean toward the zone's theme. Ash zones favor fire. Bogs and forests favor poison. Crypts and the void favor shadow. Other resist schools can still roll. Resists have per-item and total equipment limits. Resist lines come only from Drift drops and cannot be added through enchanting. Raids ignore resists.
The Quest Journal tracks Drift work too. The daily titles read like orders from someone who has done this too long: Thin the Drift, Cull the Warped, Break the Anchor, Name the Horror, Unbroken Thread.
FAQ
When do I unlock the Drift? When you kill a zone's raid boss. Each zone unlocks on its own.
What happens if I die in the Drift? The Drift turns off for that zone. Turn it back on when you want.
Is the Drift harder than normal zones? Yes. Monsters scale to you and use abilities they do not have outside it.
Can I raid while the Drift is on? No. Doorways stay shut until you turn it off.
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