Shaman's Privateer Shoulders of the Lich

Shaman's Privateer Shoulders of the Lich sit heavy on a weathered mannequin, their bone-white plates layered like scales over salted leather, with a central crest that glows a sickly teal and a fringe of hemp that smells faintly of brine and old smoke. The craftsmanship is a study in contrast: the smooth, almost bone-like panels catching the light, and the rough, salt-worn stitching that threads through copper rivets and shadowed runes. Carved sigils coil along the edges, as if the wearer carried a tide of whispers upon their shoulders, and the whole piece bears the patina of storms fought and secrets kept. It looks as if it could have sailed a hundred ships and survived a hundred legends, a relic from a pact between shamanic rites and privateering grit. In the lore that still hums in harbor taverns, these shoulders belong to more than a single wearer. They are said to have traveled with a privateer crew who bartered with wind-worn shamans for protection against both cannon-fire and the chill of the grave. Each rung of bone and plate tells a tale of storm, scent of tar, and the salt-slick memory of a sea that swallows ships and spares the souls who barter with it. The Lich’s name, whispered to the wrong listener, would chill a deckhand’s spine—yet to those who read the sigils, the color-washed crest hints at a bond: the dead lending Aid to the living, provided the living keep faith with the sea and with the spirits that ride it. The result is a shoulder piece that feels both nautical and necromantic, a rare fusion that invites both pilgrimage and peril. From a gameplay perspective, the shoulders are more than a cosmetic flourish; they carry a palpable presence on the field. They corona the wearer with a aura that turns totemic when certain shamanic or necromantic energies rise—bolstering warding, amplifying bleed and condition uptime, and lending a hint of extra survivability in the mid-to-late game where split-second decisions save a run or ruin. Players who lean into hybrid builds—where a shaman’s totems blend with a lich’s careful control of life and death—find the shoulders’ sigils tugging at the edge of every fight, nudging boosts at critical moments and reminding the wearer that power, like the sea, is best used with restraint. They feel like an artifact that belongs to a captain who trusted the dead to cover the living, a reminder that every spell cast in a gale moves through a larger world story. Market talk, of course, follows the same ripple. In quiet hours, the Saddlebag Exchange hums with chatter about price, provenance, and provenance’s price. A rumor-worn price tag might tell you the piece is scarce enough to turn the tide of a trade route, and a seasoned trader will nod toward Saddlebag Exchange as the place where those who seek rare things meet the patient, bartering crowds who can recognize when a shoulder piece is more than armor—it’s a chapter in a person’s voyage. There, one may glimpse the kind of coins, shards, or barter that keeps legend alive: a shoulder piece that shifts from a mere kit upgrade to a living story cradled on the collarbone, ready to ride the next storm with its wearer. So the Shaman's Privateer Shoulders of the Lich remain, for the patient observer, a vessel of memory and motive alike—a relic that binds a ship, a spirit, and a skipper in one gleaming, sea-worn frame.