Not all adventurers seek fortune, not all that defend the world have good deeds in mind.
Lately the number of sightings of horrors have grown tremendously. People wander off the beaten paths only to be found years later, horribly mutated and partly insane, if they are found at all. It is becoming evident something is stirring deep below Maj'Eyal.
That something is you.

Forbidden Cults is a big expansion for Tales of Maj'Eyal to let you explore the horrors that lurk beneath the surface, to delve in long lost knowledge and lore and as usual to die a lot!

Forbidden Cults makes two new classes available to play:

• Writhing One: Give in to the corrupting forces and turn yourself gradually into an horror, summon horrors to do your bidding, shed your skin and melt your face to assault your foes. With your arm already turned into a tentacle, what creature can stop you?
• Cultist of Entropy: Using its insanity and control of entropic forces to unravel the normal laws of physic this caster class can turn healing into attacks and call upon the forces of the void to reduce its foes to dust.

Both those classes use a new resource called Insanity that gradually makes you both more chaotic and powerful as it fills up.

Forbidden Cults makes two new races available to play:

• Drem: A corrupt subrace of dwarves, that somehow managed to keep a shred of sanity to not fully devolve into mindless horrors. They can enter a frenzy and even learn to summon horrors.
• Krog: Ogres transformed by the very thing that should kill them. Their powerful attacks can stun their foes and they are so strong they can dual wield any one handed weapons.

Forbidden Cults adds many new zones for you to explore and die in:

• Kroshkkur: An ancient Sher'tul Fortress laying half in ruins that serves as a focal point, and home, for all kinds of creatures seeking lost knowledge.
• The Maggot: A huge living corrupted worm about to destroy Kroshkkur! Teleport inside and save your sanctuary of horrors!
• The Godfeaster: Deep undergroud the ground shakes as ... -- redacted by corrupt forces --
• The Scourge Pits: On the south of the Iron Throne lays a fool pit of ... -- redacted by corrupt forces --
• Forbidden Tomes: Find special artifact books of ancient lore. But, read at your own peril, for the story they tell may very well suck you in... quite literally.
  Maybe you will even find The One That Writes...
• Occult Egress: A strange, extremely old, contraption of unknown origin. It seems to require some kind of code sequence to activate. Maybe you will find some during your adventures?
• The Entropic Void: So you think you are strong? Powerful? Invulnerable? In the end, entropy always wins, as you will learn...

What would an expansion about horrors be without a bunch of new horrors to torment you with? Please give a warm welcome to:

• Searing Horrors: You liked luminous horrors? You loved radiant horrors? You will absolutely adore their searing big brothers!
• Nethergates: It sleeps. Maybe it should stay that way.
• Netherworms: Vampiric worm masses that are bound to tickle your fancy! And tickle hard.
• Fearful Symmetry: Geometry has never been so lively!
• Entropic Shards: Take an entropic crystal, shatter it with tentacles. And die.
• : And more ...

"DarkGod, is that all?" Obviously not! You will also find your usual addition of:

• Lore: Delve into the dark forgotten secrets of the world, where sanity is a very tenuous idea.
• Artifacts: Discover new objects of power and use them to further your own goals.
• New wyrmic tree: Unlock the scourge drake for your wyrmics.
• Glass Golem: Unlock the glass golem option for your alchemists.
• Events: Discover new strange contraptions in familiar zones. What could go wrong?
• Achievements: Because there can never be enough!

Stoics are warriors who dedicate their lives to mastering countless secret techniques.
Their wide variety of abilities allows them to fight their way out of any situation.
However, in order to fight at full effectiveness, they must first focus and steel themselves against the battle to come. Exceptionally skilled Stoics are said to infuse their attacks with elemental powers to create radical new fighting styles.

Stoics are a warrior subclass inspired by the Samurai class from Hengband. They are a melee class with a wide variety of specialized combat techniques, but require judicious use of their unique Focus resource to succeed. Their advanced trees allow them to alter the element of their attacks and grant passive effects as long as the stance is maintained.

Features:
Cunning/Dead Secrets - generic category available to Necromancer, Doomed and Shadowblade.
Grave Resolve: passive. Bonus to Fear immunity and Mental save.
Darktouched: active. Small resistance bonus against darkness, cold, undead. + touch attack Heals undead/harms others.
Dead Whispers: active. Grants telepathy Undead for a short time. Also let's you see what your minions see.
Necroanatomy: passive. You do increased damage to undead. Decreased damage you do to your own minions. Adds healing to Surge of Undeath. Increases max life of Doomed Shadows.

Spell/Charnel - class category available to Necromancer only.
Blood Burst: radius 1 blight damage ranged burst, splash heals undead.
Grasping Claws: mass pin/bleed.
Meat Shield: sustain, grants a physical ward on kill.
Vampiric Gift: moved from Spell/Grave

Tweaked Categories:
Spell/Grave
Chill of the Tomb: no change
Will o' the Wisps: Also buffs your cold damage and resistance a little. Grants a chance to summon a wisp on spell hitting.
Frozen Flames: Slowly burns status effects from friendly and enemies. Selective about whether it burns beneficial or detrimental.
Ghost Touch: Curse, lowers mindsave, cold resist and stun resist.

Spell/Advanced Necrotic Minions
Undead Explosion: If used on a Wisp, it will be a radius 1 freeze. If used on a Bone Giant it will provide the Bone Shield and do physical damage.
Soulwind: Increases minion's movement speed and grants a chance to recover a soul when a minion dies.
Assemble: Better level scaling.
Minion Mastery: Added a Greater Mummy that upgrades on Ghoul King. Also protects your minions from interminion damage.

Spell/Necrotic Minions
Aura Mastery move to Necrosis.
Undeath Link moved to slot 2, now does less damage to your minions, but also adds all minions life drains together.

Spell/Necrosis
Undeath Link moved to Necrotic Minions.
Impending Doom moved the slot 3.
Aura Mastery added to slot 2.

Spell/Shades
Shadow Tunnel now also includes the effect of Curse of the Meek.
Curse of the Meek removed.
Nether Breach added to slot 2. Its like Aether Breach but does darkness damage and won't hurt minions with Invoke Darkness 5.

Tweaked the talent levels granted by Blighted Summoning.

Also adds in a new class called the Spiritmancer:

The dead do not always rest easy, even free from fell influences.
Some linger, wishing to finish some unfinished business.
Others want to pass on a message to a loved one.
Some seek another chance for glory in battle or revenge against those who killed them.
They all eventually find a Spiritmancer, and bargain temporary servitude for closure.
The Spiritmancer can give form to the lost souls, allowing them to fight again. They also have powerful light and lightning magic.

Categories:
Spirit
Ghost Light: active. Summons Wisps of light. Melee light damage.
Spirit Guide. sustain. each summon you control increases your defense and saves.
Rest In Peace: active. bolt does light damage. more vs undead. becomes a beam at 5.
Spirit Form: active. can walk through walls temporarily. Light affinity.

Karma
Sprites: active. Summons Wisps of lightning. Ranged zappers.
Jolt of Fate: active. Lighting hits a random visible enemy.
Karmic Shield: active. Absorbs damage for a few turns then explodes based on damage absorbed.
Karmic Wave: active. weakish lightning damage cone. stronger when you are low on health.

Life Giver
Clay Golem: active. imbue a clay golem with the soul of a fallen warrior. Golem grants a physical resistance aura.
Poltergeist: sustain. randomly inflicts disarm or knockback against nearby enemies.
Gift of Life: active. give part of your life to your summons, healing them and making them tougher.
Hope: sustain. reduces debuff durations, increases fear resist.

Ghosts
Ghost Bulwark: active. summons a ghostly bulwark which can block attacks against adjacent allies.
Pale Veil: passive. allows your ghosts to Fade.
Ghost Berserker: active. summons a ghostly berserker. Choppy ghost.
Banshee: active. summon a banshee. Caster ghost.

Dawn
Shining Binds: active. ranged explosion for light damage and pin.
Pool of Light: active. Ground effect. Heals friendly. Lightblind enemies.
Holy Word: active. All nearby enemy undead/demons/horrors take light/arcane damage and are deafened.
Endless Light: sustain. increases light damage, light penentration and decreases spell cooldowns.

Justice
Lightning Flash: active. Throws a ball of lightning that explodes for lightning and blindness.
Peacemakers: active. Increases your summoned creatures strengths and speeds.
Indignation: active. Inscribe a symbol of justice on the ground. After a short delay it explodes with high lightning daze damage.
Righteous Fury: Lightning Mastery that also adds lightning damage to minion attacks.

This pack compiles several classes, with an emphasis on hybrid design. Not all classes are complete: the ones which I'm not satisfied with are marked as either INCOMPLETE or "in BETA".

The classes included in this pack are:
- The Transcendent Fist is an unarmed Psionic warrior, using a gem in his TK slot to hit with flexible energy types.
- The Storm Warden is a melee-and-ranged skirmisher with magical mobility and support spells.
- The Striker is a cunning and covert class, with a focus on delivering shock-and-awe thunderbolts from stealth.
- The Gravitic Infantry is a melee-focused Chronomancy user (formerly named the Heavy).
- The Creep is a stalker in the dark, cunning and covert in his hate.
- The Vector uses disease and debilitation to keep his foes at range while he snipes them to death.
- The Flenser is a Defiler whose knives debilitate and torture his victims.
- The Blood Mage is a Vim-based caster with a mild dip into staff-melee combat.
- ... and more!

(BETA) Shield Hero is an Adventurer who starts with heavy armor and a shield. Not very exciting unless you were annoyed about not being able to equip your Adventurer's shield right away.
(BETA) Prototype Hero is an Adventurer who starts with 1.3 mastery in every category. Not very useful for players, but it might be interesting for addon writers to spitball new category combinations.

(INCOMPLETE) The Flux Marauder is a Paradox thug, stealing time from his enemies.

x (Removed): The human-only Embers of Gerlyk are fire-using magical martial artists. Removed pending new content / 1.6 features.
x (Removed): The skeleton-only Fossils are geomantic martial artists. Removed pending new content / 1.6 features.