I’ve been thinking about Shadow Witches too.
From the book, it’s clear that a Shadow witch can use hexes and magic to:
- twist the world around them to their whim
- bind limbs
- corrupt animals
- befoul supplies
- weaken troops.
They can also:
- control Burned and Hexed, and the Transformed as pumped up hexed
- fly on devourer (as pictured)
Twisting the world is pretty damn broad, so could easily include invoking energies and warping spaces, maybe tracing hexes in the air around them or belching inky foulness out of themselves. Binding limbs sounds like immobilising opponents and horrible disfigurement. Given the magical weather flavour of Breaker, I think this could be ill winds, burning rains, foul airs, ominous clouds, and poisoned grounds. These could let the Shadow Witch strike from a distance: separating foes, throwing up barriers and deflections, illusions and monstrous phantasms. Taking ideas from Nature’s Fury, but making them more direct attacks from visibly present Shadow Witch, rather than an independent, corrupt force of nature like a storm or fog.
All this flavour of hexing sounds like Shadow Witches specialise in isolating and immobilising foes before sending in their line troops to attack. This makes it seem particularly useful if the Shadow Witch is flying about, controlling the battlefield from afar.
Befoulment could be an obstacle on the road to the mission target or after a confrontation. With befouled supplies, legionnaires might suffer 1-harm from hunger or have to raid for food. I can see a foul, choking miasma that leaves an oily residue on everything.
The Storm Riding ability suggests that Shadow Witches might be already able to harness the lightning forces inside Burned (not body jump, but maybe as a weapon). I don’t think Shadow Witches can call down lightning without Nature’s Fury ability. But the trees the Burned are impaled on have a constant lightning storm, so a Shadow Witch amongst those trees would have a potent weapon in bringing down those strikes on foes.
I’m of two minds about how to use the Burned. At first, I read the Burn as immobile undead, still impaled on trees. But that seemed really hard to use as a line troop. So now I think the Burned can roam free of their trees, literal shock troops that electrify and burn their foes, particularly potent as a group, starting fires with sparks. The trees remain a threat since they have a perpetual lightning storm about them and as a source for creating more Burned.