Alright, let's talk the Wes "Rework" that happened on April Fools Day.
I get it, making the challenge character a joke update that really changes nothing, but honestly I was pretty hyped for that update, because for a challenge character he's not much of a challenge. Genuinely, I'd say Webber is more of a challenge than Wes is. That said, the primary reason is because most of Wes' general difficulties can be overcome by farms, gear, and listening instead of relying on character prompts. That said, I have some ideas on how to make him a genuinely playable character, with some actually hard to overcome downsides.
Okay, to make this make sense, we have to talk about the Constant's supposed behavior, and on Wes' backstory.
In theory, the Constant takes existing abilities and skills, and turns them into powers that could aid our characters in survival, and Wes has exactly one skill. Miming.
In turns of backstory, Wes was born in a wealthy family in Paris, before his house burned down, and he lost everything, leaving him a homeless, mute, orphan. I think we can work with this.
- Fire
To start off, I'd assume that losing your home, your family, and your voice due to a fire would give a good deal of trauma, regardless of who you are. So hows about this, if an object in Wes's view begins burning, an instant -10 sanity, like how wormwood takes sanity damage from hurting plants. But if any type of house burns down, Pig, Merm, or Bunnyman, -25 sanity, since it probably reminds him of his own house burning down.
And that's not all, maxed out fire sources that can actually burn things down, including Fire Pits, and campfires, drain your sanity, more so the more on fire it is. Up to minus 20 per second with a maxed out fire pit. Endothermic versions don't give this penalty.
2. Family
Having followers gives him extra sanity, but followers dying hits him for -30 sanity each. It's all about the trauma people.
3. Mime
This is where we get in deep, so hold on tight.
Wes does decreased weapon damage, so maybe, at the cost of cutting his sanity, similar to Maxwell, he can create illusion weapons, which deal the full amount of damage, and have the penalty of disappearing when you put them down or take it out of your hand. Maybe a melee weapon that does ~45 damage, and a ranged weapon that does ~30 damage. You also have to get your sanity back to full once you get back your lost sanity, it doesn't just max back out like with Maxwell.
Wes can at the cost of half his current max sanity, make an illusion barrier, and block an attack.
and finally, make his balloons do more damage so they can be working traps and not just distractions.
4. Misc.
In the sake of balancing out Wes's hyper focus on sanity without any way to combat losing it short of putting on the bee queen crown and standing next to The Deerclops, maybe use one of the little things from his Verdant skin, that says he's an avid landscape painter in his downtime. Once a day, randomly generate a biome, and while in that biome, gain a positive sanity aura of maybe +10 per minute.
Face paint! Wes more than likely has scars from the fire that he'd rather cover up, but who says you can't do it stylishly? Add some different facepaints that could add different buffs, or perhaps, maybe make a way to see him without the face paint on, like during the rain, that gives him a sanity penalty for insecurity.
He gains bonus sanity when eating food while on low hunger.
Keep all current penalties, so he's still difficult.
I understand that a lot of these ideas have to do with sanity, but I wanna make him a sort of Antithesis to Maxwell. They have similar powers, but where Maxwell is completely in control of his mind, Wes has gone through so much, from losing his family to being imprisoned by Maxwell, that he simply isn't in control of his.
Tell me what you think, I'm pretty happy with it.