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11 Overview
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33 The Writhen are a nomadic tribe at the centre of Blight: Survival's lore. Blamed for the Blight that has overrun the warring kingdoms, they have been exiled from their homeland and now wander the edges of No Man's Land. The player character is a Writhen warrior; every run starts at the camp with a Writhen avatar that the player customises.
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55 Backstory
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7+ 
78 In the game's setting, two kingdoms have been locked in an endless war. The blood that soaked into the ground spawned the Blight, a fungal infection that reanimates dead matter. The kingdoms blamed the Writhen for unleashing the infection. Whether the accusation is fair is left ambiguous in the game's communication so far. What is clear is the consequence: the Writhen lost their place in the kingdoms' societies and were exiled into the contested wasteland.
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910 In their exile, the Writhen developed a relationship with the Blight that the kingdoms refused to. They survive on the fringes, they understand the infection more intimately than the kingdoms do, and they are the only people willing to enter No Man's Land not to escape it but to fight it.
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1112 Why the Writhen Enter No Man's Land
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1314 Three motivations are confirmed in developer communications:
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1516 Restoration: eradicating the Blight is the path to lifting the exile and reclaiming a homeland.Survival: the Blight will not stay confined to No Man's Land forever, and the Writhen know it.Reckoning: the Writhen carry the blame for an infection most of them did not cause; entering the wasteland to fight it is a form of answer.
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1718 The Writhen as Player Character
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1920 Each player creates a Writhen character through the Unreal Engine 5 MetaHumans system. The classless character system means there are no archetypes baked in at character creation. A Writhen can be built into a heavy plate-mailed brawler, a stealth-focused scout in lighter leathers, an archer specialising in ranged combat, or any blend in between, through gear choices, attribute allocation, and blessings earned during runs.
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2122 The Writhen identity is the constant. The build is the variable.
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2324 Bloodline and Permadeath
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2526 Death in Blight: Survival is permanent at the character level. When a Writhen dies, that specific Writhen is gone, along with everything they were carrying. The bloodline system carries some progression forward to the next character: the lineage of Writhen warriors continues even when individuals fall. This is consistent with the tribal framing of the lore. The Writhen as a people endure; specific Writhen warriors do not.
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2728 Visual and Cultural Identity
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2930 Writhen aesthetics blend across European medieval visual influences from the alternate 14th-century setting. Players can mix armor pieces from different cultural traditions, recolour them, and change crests, building a personal visual identity within the broader Writhen tribal framing. The Artisan at the camp is the primary source for new gear, modifications, and visual customization.
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3132 Position in the Story
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3334 The game does not have a linear story campaign in the traditional sense. The lore around the Writhen is delivered through environmental storytelling, in-world artefacts, and the gradual reveal of new locations and encounters. See Lore and World for the wider setting and Infection and Environment for the Blight's mechanical and narrative role.