Wraithwalk — Weave Light and Shadow Across the Veil

What is Wraithwalk — Weave Light and Shadow Across the Veil

Wraithwalk is played on a six-by-six board of runes and a single meter called the Veil. Light runes carry a positive weight, shadow runes a negative one, and the number printed on each rune says how hard it pulls. You drag across neighbouring runes, diagonals included, to weave a path of two or more; release, and the whole path is scored and cleared. The sum of the weights you just collected is added to the Veil, which slides toward the Seen or the Unseen and stays where you left it. Reach either end, at plus or minus ten, and the walk is over.

What keeps the board moving is the drift. Once the Veil has strayed two steps from the centre it slips one further out after every path, and from the third region onward it slips two once you are past the seventh step. Standing still is not an option: a path that leaves the Veil untouched still loses ground. So each turn asks the same question twice over — which runes score the most, and which of them pull the Veil back the way you need it to go. Twelve regions open as your score climbs, and every one of them multiplies what you earn from then on.

How to play

1. Drag from one rune to a neighbour, diagonals included, to build a path of two or more, then release to weave it and clear those runes.
2. Light runes push the Veil toward the Seen and shadow runes toward the Unseen; the small number on a rune is the weight it carries.
3. The Weave button shows what the path is worth before you commit it, and a rune that would push the Veil past nine refuses to join.
4. The Veil carries from path to path and never resets; at ten in either direction the run ends and your final score is locked in.

Strategies that work

• A path whose light and shadow cancel out exactly, three runes or longer, pays a flat 150 and leaves the Veil untouched. It is the cheapest big bonus here, but it only holds the line: the drift still fires afterwards, so a balanced path at plus three ends the turn at plus four.
• The length bonus is length times length-minus-two times eight, so it grows much faster than the path does. Three runes pay 24, five pay 120, eight pay 384. Two paths of four give you 128 between them; one path of eight gives 384. Hunt for the long route first.
• The multiplier beside the Weave button climbs a tenth for every path of five runes or more, and falls straight back to one the moment you weave a shorter one. Sitting at 1.8 times, a quick three-rune pair costs far more than it pays. Protect a hot combo.
• The Twinstone has no weight and no side, so it never shifts the Veil and never breaks the light-shadow alternation you are counting. What it does is double the whole path; two in one path quadruple it. Never spend one on a pair — save it for your longest weave.
• Wraiths appear from the third region onward, and every third path one of them turns a neighbouring light rune into a shadow three. Left alone they strip the board of the light you need to climb back from the Unseen side. Eat the ones that pulse.

A little history

Wraithwalk was written for puzzle-me.com. It belongs to the family of grid puzzles where you draw a line through neighbouring tiles rather than swapping two of them, and what it adds is a single number that survives from one path to the next. Every rune carries a signed weight, and the running total of what you collect has to stay inside a band, so the problem underneath is choosing a connected path whose weights sum near zero while still being long. The drift makes that a question of control rather than a puzzle solved once, because the pull grows as you leave the centre.

Frequently asked questions