Wormwood Has Been Taking Hits, Never Getting Favored

[Sofy Happy]

  For the sake of "plant creature" realism, Wormwood has received more environmental damage in recent updates. But plants shouldn't just succumb to environmental factors—they should develop better resilience while adapting.

List of damages Wormwood has suffered due to updates:

1. This update's electric damage. It's already a bad mechanic for plant creatures to catch fire when electrocuted, especially since they often appear in plant-heavy areas where fires can easily spread. Normal plant creatures only burn without being stunned, yet Wormwood suffers both burning AND stun—double the pain.
2. Increased fire damage. This was originally a fair trade-off for his wetness sanity immunity, but with the new electric mechanics, this weakness has become overly punishing.
3. Extra acid rain damage. This feels targeted. If "realism" is the excuse, why doesn't WX-78's metal body corrode?
4. Brightshades forcing Wormwood off farms. For nearly three years, there's been no official counter to Brightshades. They invade farms, kill Lureplants, and Wormwood—a non-combat specialist—gets frontline exposure.

Suggested Adjustments:

1. Rework plant electrocution effects. Remove burning and replace it with, say, a "weakened" state (reduced damage or lost aggro). Also, standardize Wormwood's shock response—either the player stun OR the plant-electrocution effect, not both.
2. Higher fire/acid damage is acceptable, but unacceptable that Wormwood only suffers penalties without environmental adaptations. Examples:

• Moon hail immunity (consistent with his moon-gem origins).
• Brightshade non-aggression after learning faction skills (like WX-78 and clockworks).

     3.(Sidetrack) Moon Guardian skills are too gear-dependent:

  Only Brightshade Armor triggers bind effects (whereas Wortox can use any lunar armor). This inflexibility will worsen as more gear gets added.
  Changes:

• Moon Guardian I: Let all lunar armors (except Bramble Husk) trigger binds, like Wortox.
• Moon Guardian II: Allow lunar ranged weapons to summon Brightshade tentacles (not OP given Wormwood's combat fragility).

[Mysterious box]

27 minutes ago, Sofy Happy said:

Brightshade non-aggression after learning faction skills (like WX-78 and clockworks).

Clockworks are still aggressive to Wx they just have a lower aggro range

 

27 minutes ago, Sofy Happy said:

• This update's electric damage. It's already a bad mechanic for plant creatures to catch fire when electrocuted, especially since they often appear in plant-heavy areas where fires can easily spread. Normal plant creatures only burn without being stunned, yet Wormwood suffers both burning AND stun—double the pain.
• Increased fire damage. This was originally a fair trade-off for his wetness sanity immunity, but with the new electric mechanics, this weakness has become overly punishing.
• Extra acid rain damage. This feels targeted. If "realism" is the excuse, why doesn't WX-78's metal body corrode?
• Brightshades forcing Wormwood off farms. For nearly three years, there's been no official counter to Brightshades. They invade farms, kill Lureplants, and Wormwood—a non-combat specialist—gets frontline exposure.

These aren't really as bad as they seem. Electric and fire damage isn't super common vs players and the shadow umbrella makes acid rain pretty trivial as for brightshades they aren't really specific to Wormwood but even then Wormwood is a combat specialist just not the standard kind even pre skill tree people just assume he's not meant for combat due to his hp downside.

He has bramble husks for counter attacks and a proactive thorn attack, traps, sleep blast for crowd control, a binding vine ability and a vine attack. He does have abilities that support a non combat focused playstyle as well but he's definitely not a non-combatant character.

As for brightshades since you kinda need them to aggro you to properly fight them and lowering their aggro range would also probably do more harm than good I think a good compromise would be to make it so carrats will harvest the resources they're guarding when you get within range.

Edited July 22, 2025 by Mysterious box

[Blue Tangerine]

Well said, I actually posted some similar suggestions before,like the clockwork/brightshade one.

[Edible Coal]

wormwood is actually good at fighting and is also a good support

[Sofy Happy]

46 minutes ago, Mysterious box said:

Clockworks are still aggressive to Wx they just have a lower aggro range

Ah yes, I meant he shouldn't aggro him (not necessarily avoid attacking) - my phrasing was probably unclear.

Edited July 22, 2025 by Sofy Happy

[Mysterious box]

38 minutes ago, Sofy Happy said:

Ah yes, I meant he shouldn't aggro him (not necessarily avoid attacking) - my phrasing was probably unclear.

If Wormwood doesn't aggro brightshades he won't be able to properly kill them because they won't let him damage their vines to drop their defenses while there are ranged alternatives this would make brightshades more annoying for him instead as there really isn't advantage to keeping them around.

[Blue Tangerine]

16 minutes ago, Mysterious box said:

If Wormwood doesn't aggro brightshades he won't be able to properly kill them because they won't let him damage their vines to drop their defenses while there are ranged alternatives this would make brightshades more annoying for him instead as there really isn't advantage to keeping them around.

Maybe taking less damage from certain enemies would be an alternative?Like Woodie does extra damage to treeguards and mushgnomes.

[Jakepeng99]

I want more characters like wormwood.

[Mysterious box]

2 minutes ago, Blue Tangerine said:

Maybe taking less damage from certain enemies would be an alternative?Like Woodie does extra damage to treeguards and mushgnomes.

I could see it perhaps some base additional planar defense?

[flamboyant wolf]

1 hour ago, Mysterious box said:

If Wormwood doesn't aggro brightshades he won't be able to properly kill them because they won't let him damage their vines to drop their defenses while there are ranged alternatives this would make brightshades more annoying for him instead as there really isn't advantage to keeping them around.

What if they still sent their vines at Wormwood, but the vines themselves didn't attack Wormwood until provoked?

[Sofy Happy]

1 hour ago, Mysterious box said:

If Wormwood doesn't aggro brightshades he won't be able to properly kill them because they won't let him damage their vines to drop their defenses while there are ranged alternatives this would make brightshades more annoying for him instead as there really isn't advantage to keeping them around.

This is easily solvable - just make Brightshades still extend their tentacles when detecting Wormwood, but have the tentacles no longer attack him.

[Edible Coal]

29 minutes ago, flamboyant wolf said:

What if they still sent their vines at Wormwood, but the vines themselves didn't attack Wormwood until provoked?

so....they just pet wormwood??

[hoxi]

4 hours ago, Sofy Happy said:

Increased fire damage. This was originally a fair trade-off for his wetness sanity immunity, but with the new electric mechanics, this weakness has become overly punishing.

This was rarely a downside with how specific it is to be set on fire, and it's still better than catching on fire without warning for daring to be near a campfire to cook something like in DS, because there are more direct ways to prevent getting struck by lightning, and fighting electric creatures is something you'd prepare yourself for. The only case where it could get really really bad for how common it is, is with Warbot, and it's already addressed by Klei as something they'll keep an eye for feedback.

 

4 hours ago, Sofy Happy said:

Extra acid rain damage. This feels targeted. If "realism" is the excuse, why doesn't WX-78's metal body corrode?

As far as I'm aware, Wormwood doesn't take extra acid rain damage, but receives blooming fertilizing along with the damage he takes (based on how much damage). That said, WX-78 having a damage modifier for acid rain would be cool.

 

4 hours ago, Sofy Happy said:

Normal plant creatures only burn without being stunned, yet Wormwood suffers both burning AND stun—double the pain.

This might get changed, it is a weird inconsistency.

[Evelo]

Hey, Wormwood main here.

Good. Make it punishing. Fire is his weakness and electrocution ignites him. 

The only thing I agree with in this post is that Brightshades should not be hostile to Wormwood (especially after taking one of the Lunar Affinity skills on either side). In order to aggro Brightshades, Wormwood could open them up once for a few smacks as if they were stunned from defeating their vines. At which point they become hostile.

Edited July 22, 2025 by Evelo

[Sofy Happy]

40 minutes ago, hoxi said:

As far as I'm aware, Wormwood doesn't take extra acid rain damage

Wormwood receives twice the normal health drain from acid rain exposure.

[hoxi]

34 minutes ago, Sofy Happy said:

Wormwood receives twice the normal health drain from acid rain exposure.

There's nothing in the code suggesting this, and from testing he's losing the same amount of health as Wilson at the same rate.

[Well-met]

fortunately he has a ton of benefits to compensate for those niche, meaningless weaknesses.

Next.

[Mysterious box]

4 hours ago, Sofy Happy said:

This is easily solvable - just make Brightshades still extend their tentacles when detecting Wormwood, but have the tentacles no longer attack him.

 

4 hours ago, flamboyant wolf said:

What if they still sent their vines at Wormwood, but the vines themselves didn't attack Wormwood until provoked?

It could work but it feels like it would look kinda weird though.

[reddocc]

People are sleeping on Wormwood's Crowd control capabilities, he's like a lunar Maxwell.

Spoiler

please klei never nerf mushroom spore cloud and lunar guardian 1.

 

Edited July 22, 2025 by reddocc

[Evelo]

7 hours ago, reddocc said:

People are sleeping on Wormwood's Crowd control capabilities, he's like a lunar Maxwell.

  Hide contents

please klei never nerf mushroom spore cloud and lunar guardian 1.

 

I do agree, the skill tree over buffed him. I love wormwood but it is serious egregious how powerful he became.

[Milordo]

Oh, COME ON. 

We have finally malus coming back (the other one is Wx having bad punishment after drowning because "realism", which the author forgot it). And yes, I agree with removing the stun effect for standardization, but leave the fire malus come on.

Btw I am a Wormwood main 100% from the head to the toes.

I agree with @Evelo with the shopcat and his comment about it.

9 hours ago, Well-met said:

fortunately he has a ton of benefits to compensate for those niche, meaningless weaknesses.

Next.

Very well said. 

[Sofy Happy]

  Don’t assume electric shocks are as rare as burning—during a Celestial Storm, Moonglean will constantly electrocute players. If Wormwood doesn’t wear lightning-proof gear, they’ll spend half the Celestial Quest on fire. And since the quest also requires sandstorm protection, the only early-game lightning defense is the Rain Coat—meaning choosing shock resistance forces you to sacrifice armor.

Edited July 24, 2025 by Sofy Happy