Dynasty Warriors - Hua Xiong

Hua Xiong should be playable in Dynasty Warriors 8!

Along with all of my other fandoms, I really like Romance of the Three Kingdoms, and I've always been a huge fan of Koei's Dynasty Warriors series of video games based on the iconic story. I've been playing Dynasty Warriors 7, the latest installment in the series, a lot recently, and I got in the mood to draw one of my favorite NPCs in the games, and a character who I wish I could play as in the regular games, even if it's only for a short portion of the story.

Hua Xiong was considered the 2nd (at best) most powerful officer in the army of the warlord Dong Zhuo, after Lu Bu, of course. He is usually considered a far superior leader and tactician, compared to Lu Bu, though, but in that regard, he's not nearly as charismatic or brilliant as Zhang Liao, but I digress. Hua Xiong served Dong Zhuo until his death in the battle of Sishui Gate, where he was the first of many famous victims of Guan Yu, the "God of War". Prior to his demise, he was a demon on the battlefield, easily holding off the enemy coalition, and slaying a number of their vanguard officers, and routing Sun Jian's beleaguered forces before the coalition was able to capture the gate. (This is, however, a fantastical account from Romance of the Three Kingdoms. Apparently, Hua Xiong wasn't nearly as badass in actual history, nor as notable. He was apparently killed in battle by Sun Jian, but this isn't important to this Deviation, or Dynasty Warriors in general).

As a playable character, I imagine Hua Xiong to be a fierce, and wicked warrior, but also a loyal officer to his soldiers and a hero to the lesser members of Dong Zhuo's forces. In Romance of the Three Kingdoms, Li Ru, Dong Zhuo's top strategist, declared after Hua Xiong's demise that "We have lost our best leader", so I imagine him in-game being a sort of "people's champion", who has the devotion and loyalty of the men serving under him, even though he can be a completely evil monster, especially to his enemies. He has no delusions of grandeur, though he is still very arrogant and dismissive of his opponents. He's also very bloodthirsty, and I imagine him being one of the most gruesome characters in the game. He cracks jokes fairly often, and has a very dark sense of humor, being highly desensitized to violence and death. I want his cutscenes and dialogue to convey that he considers himself an evil monster, and enjoys living up to his enemies' expectations of those qualities. He is practical, and extremely lawful, and I want him to call out the coalition forces on their causing rebellion and chaos, when they could easily assassinate Dong Zhuo or do something else more productive than war.

Combat-wise, I struggled coming up with a fighting-style and weapon for him to use, especially since all sources seem on the fence about whether he was more of a cavalry officer, or a siege officer. A spear seemed too generic, and I wanted him to stand out, so I decided on a maul attached to a chain. Hua Xiong's fighting style centers around using slow, but very powerful melee attacks in close quarters, and using his chain attacks to pull enemies closer to him so he can hit them hard with his short-range attacks. He wears a bladed gauntlet on his right arm (I wonder if something like that has actually been used before. I've grown fond of the design, in any case), which appears in some of his melee attacks, but factors heavily into his musou attacks, where he slams his hammer into an enemy's gut, forcing them to double over, before he slams his right forearm down on the back of the enemy's neck, decapitating them. Badass. Anyway, I also wanted him to be a defensive tank, and while he might be a little slower than other officers on foot, he can take a lot of damage. If he gets any kind of elemental abilities, it would probably revolve around earth, stone, and masonry. I just feel like he'd be earth-oriented.

Anyway, that's about all I can think to write down about him. I hope you like the design, and maybe I'll draw some of the other officers I think should be in Dynasty Warriors. Off the top of my head, I think they should make a minimum of two new officers for each force (perhaps except for Jin, because they just got a huge payload of officers in their first appearance), and the ones I would select for each faction are: Jian Yong and Sun Qian (Shu), Cheng Pu and Han Dang (Wu), Yu Jin and Yue Jin (Wei), Hua Xiong and Li Ru (Dong Zhuo), Zhang Bao and Zhang Liang (Yellow Turbans), Yan Liang and Wen Chou (Yuan Shao), and pretty much any two Nanman characters (there are a lot to choose from).

Lastly, I'll leave you guys with some quotes and lines of dialogue I think would work well for Hua Xiong:

(to Sun Jian)
Hua Xiong: "Whisper your final prayers to the heavens, for today I will paint Sishui Gate with the blood of a tiger!"

(to Guan Yu)
Hua Xiong: "What's this? I had hoped Yuan Shao would send more of his famous generals to duel me. Whatever. Try to entertain me for a few moments before you die."

(After losing a climactic duel to Guan Yu, who is about to execute him)
Hua Xiong: "That was unexpected..."
Guan Yu: "If it's any consolation, this was an entertaining battle."
Hua Xiong: "Ha... In the end, I think this is what I was hoping for. Promise me... promise me the future you bring to the land will be free of monsters like me."

Dynasty Warriors is owned by Koei, but I don't think anyone has the rights to Romance of the Three Kingdoms anymore.