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General Exalted Thread

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Blaque said:
I mean, we know enough to see the similairty. That stood out to me honestly when I first saw Liminal Exaltation described. The patron uses the human demiurge to facilitate the Exalting of of a target human-enough construct. For Alchemical Exaltation it is basically a golem, the Liminal is an aimated corpse. Both create a new indivdual with a connection to but not idenitifed as the source of their materials, and whose powers are impacted by the initial conditions of their construction.

The black boxing of the Dark Mother doesn't, to me, mean much difference from it nad Alchemicals. So again, what is the difference here besides knoweldge gap? Because again, what stops from madlibbing the prior post tojust be Alchemicals, Autochthon, and so on?


This is very much explicitly not the case. The planetary gods found and utilized it. Autochthon is never mentioned in either its discovery or use.
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Is that from the Exigents book? It's surprising that they've changed the creation of Exaltation to not require the input of Autocthon.

Gazetteer said:
Details are a little scant, but we can sort of piece together enough about her nature to be going off of until we eventually get a Liminals book. She's a truly ancient being who doesn't belong to any of the major categories of big ancient being, who had a powerful association with Lethe and the pre-Neverborn Underworld.
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It's good to see that a description of her is now in a published book, though again it's surprising to see the creation of exalted without Autochton's influence, by something thatand without the diminishment that other patrons have had to go through.

I hope we find out more about Liminals in the Abyssals book, since it's a lot closer than the Liminal one.
 
Indivisible said:
It's good to see that a description of her is now in a published book, though again it's surprising to see the creation of exalted without Autochton's influence, by something thatand without the diminishment that other patrons have had to go through.
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I think we can assume that she did go through diminishment. It's not avoidable based on anything we know about it.

In this case, she learned the secret of Exaltation by studying the souls of Exalts that Autochthon had a direct hand in the creation of. There's still that lineage there, where he's the inventor who shared it with the Incarnae and the Elemental Dragons.

The other canon Exalt type who has been confirmed to have been created without Autochthon's direct instruction are Getimians, but in the paradigm where it's a secret that others can make use of once they know of it, it's not hard to imagine how Oramus and Sacheverell working together were able to learn it just based on their unique skillsets.
 
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Ryang said:
The other other important thing about Liminals is that between them, Dragonblooded and Architects you can finally have variety in a Terrestial power level game (and also Alchemical when they come out but in 2e they were closer to the non-Solar Celestials than Dragonblooded IIRC?)
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In 3e as in the final version of Essence, Alchemicals are Celestial. There are furthermore other Terrestrial-tier Exigents in their splat: Pakpao the Puppeteer and the Sovereigns of Uluiru. Like Gaz says, the Dream-Souled (optional canon) additionally are Terrestrial. And in a coming book, there will be design seeds present for quite a few more Terrestrial-tier Exigents, such as the Torchbearer, Foxbinder, and the God-Admirals of Cabochon.
 
Lioness said:
I think it's important that Abyssals and Liminals operate on different power levels.

An Abyssal can be a ghost hunter but they're as powerful as Solars and perhaps even more so in this area so this concept risks reaching a level of specialisation where they trivialise all of the ghost antagonists currently in print. Meanwhile I suspect it'll take a while for a circle of Liminals to outgrow the Nephwrack as an enemy and probably have limitations on permanently destroying spirits similar to other Terrestrial-level Exalts.
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Yeah, this expected power level difference is incredibly important. An Abyssal is by default the vampire king, the deathknight, lord over lesser undead. I expect that Liminals will have a bit more of a horror bent, where they're facing terrible gribblies and have to adapt, as more of their 'standard' mode of interaction. They'll be Exalts who are able to run over lesser foes, absolutely, but terrifying strange stuff from the Underworld? Probably a challenge, even where they're reasonably well-kitted for the type of encounter. I very much expect them to feel very different for how they interact with the Underworld.
 
Gazetteer said:
I think we can assume that she did go through diminishment. It's not avoidable based on anything we know about it.

In this case, she learned the secret of Exaltation by studying the souls of Exalts that Autochthon had a direct hand in the creation of. There's still that lineage there, where he's the inventor who shared it with the Incarnae and the Elemental Dragons.

The other canon Exalt type who has been confirmed to have been created without Autochthon's direct instruction are Getimians, but in the paradigm where it's a secret that others can make use of once they know of it, it's not hard to imagine how Oramus and Sacheverell working together were able to learn it just based on their unique skillsets.
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It'll be interesting to find out how Sacheverell was able to do stuff while asleep, since keeping him asleep is one of the few things that everyone agrees on, but it will be a long wait until Getimians.
 
Indivisible said:
It'll be interesting to find out how Sacheverell was able to do stuff while asleep, since keeping him asleep is one of the few things that everyone agrees on, but it will be a long wait until Getimians.
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That was only ever the case after he was a Yozi, unless I'm wrong? I don't think there was ever any indication that he was like that before/during the Divine Revolution. He had an entirely different name and identity, like Adorjan.
 
Gazetteer said:
I assume that Liminals in particular will have access to charm tech that makes defeated ghosts go to Lethe, it's very much in theme for them. Maybe not at Essence 1.

Presumably they'll really be able to fuck up a lot of ghosts if they need to, though.
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I can see the cases for and against it. Really depends on how you're supposed to get ghosts to enter Lethe this edition.
 
Recent thoughts. From the description it is possible that the Dark Mother is a goddess instead of something weirder. And the epicenter of the Three Sphere Cataclysm was clearly in the West which is why it is so empty. That was intended as a joke.

Also, I am reading the 2e Industrial not-Exalted. And I like them for some reason. It might be because I like themed powers more than generic powers. And I don't think that every character type has necesarily has to be Exalted to actually be cool.
 
Gazetteer said:
That was only ever the case after he was a Yozi, unless I'm wrong? I don't think there was ever any indication that he was like that before/during the Divine Revolution. He had an entirely different name and identity, like Adorjan.
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Yeah, he was the Lidless Eye that Sees, but Essence used the name Sacherevell, which is his Yozi identity that if he ever wakes up he'd end free will, maybe.
 
Indivisible said:
Yeah, he was the Lidless Eye that Sees, but Essence used the name Sacherevell, which is his Yozi identity that if he ever wakes up he'd end free will, maybe.
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Article:
Created in the Divine Revolution, the Getimians were jointly born of the ancients known as Oramus and Sacheverell, who sought to create their own champions to counter the warriors of the gods. The cost of creation and the nature of the new Exalted horrified their patrons, and the Getimian Exaltations were sealed in the stronghold of the ancients as a result. Both titans are bound now, their natures irreparably diminished and changed, and possess only the dimmest awareness of their revolutionary heroes. Yet if they knew the reason for their Chosen's freedom, they might well rejoice.
Source: Crucible of Legend pg.153


The Getimians were created during the Divine Revolution, before their patrons were broken and doubly bound, and before they suffered diminishment. I don't think the intent is for them to have been exactly the same beings then that they are now.
 
Gazetteer said:
Article:
Created in the Divine Revolution, the Getimians were jointly born of the ancients known as Oramus and Sacheverell, who sought to create their own champions to counter the warriors of the gods. The cost of creation and the nature of the new Exalted horrified their patrons, and the Getimian Exaltations were sealed in the stronghold of the ancients as a result. Both titans are bound now, their natures irreparably diminished and changed, and possess only the dimmest awareness of their revolutionary heroes. Yet if they knew the reason for their Chosen's freedom, they might well rejoice.
Source: Crucible of Legend pg.153


The Getimians were created during the Divine Revolution, before their patrons were broken and doubly bound, and before they suffered diminishment. I don't think the intent is for them to have been exactly the same beings then that they are now.
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The Lidless Eye that Sees had the White Ram as his fetich, and the White Ram was killed at the beginning of the war, and when Sacheverell emerged he was asleep, with his earliest mentions in Games of Divinity being about how even the Gods and Yozis were able to agree that they want to keep him asleep.

whitewolf.fandom.com

Sacheverell (AOS)

Sacheverell, He Who Knows the Shape of Things to Come is one of the Yozis, the surviving Primordials that were sealed off within Malfeas at the end of the Primordial War. Unlike his siblings, Sacheverell is trapped in endless slumber, a state he's been in since his original Fetich Soul was slain...
whitewolf.fandom.com whitewolf.fandom.com

Oramus is able to access things that aren't possible, so maybe he collaborated with an awake Sacheverell that didn't exist to create the Getimians?
 
I doubt anything about the Lidless Eye or White Ram will be explicit canon in 3E, even in a Getimians book. They don't like talking about the Divine Revolution in that kind of detail.
 
I know they prefer to leave the Primordial War vague, and for the most part that's probably a good call. But the Getimian origin kinda demands elaboration. So I don't think they can reasonably leave it all unexplained.

I just hope they don't make Sacheverell's eternal sleep into the result of creating an Exalt type. That'd be awful.
 
Indivisible said:
Is that from the Exigents book? It's surprising that they've changed the creation of Exaltation to not require the input of Autocthon.
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Autochthon's input was going down even in late 2e. By the end he taught hte Incarna how to Exalt, the Incarna still did the creation of their Exaltations. 3e has so far presented Exaltation more like something that beings of sufficient power can learn how to do. Autocthhon as described in Essence still is this. And Crucible of Legends has it be that the Incarna were who decided to go with it and he helped.

Kind of notable too is that Exaltation isn't relaly soemthing a deity designs. So far as I can tell, the Exaltation a god gets is what best fits the god. The SUn probably couldn't have made Solars in any way besides how he did them. Autochthon doens't need to oversee it. This again, is a process from 2e.

Kind of ironically, 3e is more like 2e there. Autochthon outright inventing Exaltation didn't become really a thing until Exalted: the Autochthonians. In Games of Divinity he's attributed to teaching the Exalted and gods how to use the magical materials. In Time of Tumult his advise was about again, tool-use, incluidng Exaltation but notably not creation of Exaltation.

3e has been pretty consistent with the Games of Divinity take as a whole. The Sun is who propsed doing it first. The other gods signed-up. The process was implied to of been found by them or Autochthon, and the latter was at least advisory about it. So yeah, chalk this up to something later on changing it and then 3e just like...going back to the original there. The original GoD quote by the way:

"In addition to Gaia, another Primordial had aided the gods in their rebellion. A tinker and trickster, it was named Autochthon, and it had shown the gods the secrets of smithing weapons that could slay the Primordials and taught the Exalted the many secret powers of jade and lunar silver and planetary steel and orichalc. ..." Games of Divinity p. 7

Indivisible said:
It's good to see that a description of her is now in a published book, though again it's surprising to see the creation of exalted without Autochton's influence, by something thatand without the diminishment that other patrons have had to go through.
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Who said she wasn't diminished? And it appears she figured out Exaltation mostly during the Usurpation and Shogunate. Lots of death to study there. Again, Autochthon advised. It's a trick out in the world though that the mighty can tap into if they kind of dare.

Indivisible said:
I hope we find out more about Liminals in the Abyssals book, since it's a lot closer than the Liminal one.
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Abyssals will probably have a section on them along with the other Exalted, but this has been standard practice for every book so far. Until then Crucible of Legends has a lot to work with, though.
 
Indivisible said:
Yeah, he was the Lidless Eye that Sees, but Essence used the name Sacherevell, which is his Yozi identity that if he ever wakes up he'd end free will, maybe.
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The entire Lidless Eye and White Ram stuff from 2e is so far been brought back. In general, 3e uses 1e until it don't. So far as we know, him and Oramus if anything are double-bound in part due to their joint creation of Exaltations. The idea that the Yozis have different names from their pre-impriosnment names is something 3e so far hasn't been going with unless there was a legitimate for sure fetich death like with Adrian becoming Adorjan, and in general teh pile of like half the Yozi being fetich-killed in 2e is likely not to come back.
 
Gazetteer said:
That was only ever the case after he was a Yozi, unless I'm wrong? I don't think there was ever any indication that he was like that before/during the Divine Revolution. He had an entirely different name and identity, like Adorjan.
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2e kind of got up its own ass on this. See the Ebon Dragon becoming teh Dragon's Shadow due to the soul-pruning I guess making everyone's name different to be special. And at least five canonical Yozi were fetich-killed to boot on that in 2e. (Including Cecylene for some fucking reason.)
 
I'm aware of the reason why some Yozis had their names change from before the Surrender Oaths, it just felt like really getting into the weeds to get into it too much for a conversation that was only referencing them in the context of Getimians.
 
mothematics said:
In 3e as in the final version of Essence, Alchemicals are Celestial. There are furthermore other Terrestrial-tier Exigents in their splat: Pakpao the Puppeteer and the Sovereigns of Uluiru. Like Gaz says, the Dream-Souled (optional canon) additionally are Terrestrial. And in a coming book, there will be design seeds present for quite a few more Terrestrial-tier Exigents, such as the Torchbearer, Foxbinder, and the God-Admirals of Cabochon.
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Thanks, I keep getting Alchemicals mixed up! That said, with maybe the Sovereigns as an exception, the other Extigents are quite restricted in scope and flexibility... not that that's a bad thing, but I was really impressed by how they snuck an entire Exigent type with as much scope and variability as the Architects in one chapter.
 
Sanctaphrax said:
Not at all.

Even in 3e you can play as a mortal, and 2e had several non-Exalted splats. Some canon, some fanmade, one co-created by me.

Most of them didn't fall into the pitfalls you mention. Though I will admit that Raksha were so different as to cause mechanical problems.

It's only the profusion of new Exalt types that's given people the idea PCs absolutely have to be Exalted. Which I don't care for at all.
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I personally think the Domini as they're presented here are too close to being Exalts. It's clear they were born out of the premise of Autochthonian Dragon-Blooded before becoming their own thing (which I think is legitimately cool) but they're closer to being Exalted than any of the non-Exalt character options in print save for Half-Caste and DotFA's Refuge Lintha.
 
You're not wrong. if we did it all again, they'd probably be less Exalt-esque. Or at least, they'd be differently Exalt-esque.

Back when the line wasn't really doing new Exalt types, people who use magitech to become weaker versions of the Dragon-Blooded felt more "enlightened mortal / godblooded" and less "new type of Exigent".

But now the only real thing stopping the Domini from being Exalted is their low power level. And that's not nothing, but it's probably not enough.

It might help if the Domini existed alongside other mortals with a wide variety of dangerous magitechnological upgrades, most of which were very obviously not even vaguely like an Exaltation. Put the Binding Stone at the top of a little pile that has basic stuff like "robot eye" at the bottom, and deliberately call out its similarity to an Exaltation. Say something about how the pinnacle of the cybernetic arts is an attempt at seizing Exaltation, using human strength and ingenuity to take power by force from spirits than rather being given it.

(In the context of 2e that probably wouldn't make sense, because there aren't any non-Alchemical Exalted around to emulate. But 3e Autochthonia will probably have no shortage of Exigents.)

Paradoxically, leaning into the similarity might make it feel more distinct. If it's a deliberate copy of Exaltation, then it obviously isn't actually Exaltation.

Also, cyborgs are just plain cool. I think it'd be fun to see a wide variety of them amongst the Taken. Especially since the rest of their society is actually pretty low-tech; it'd be a neat contrast.
 
Gazetteer said:
I'm aware of the reason why some Yozis had their names change from before the Surrender Oaths, it just felt like really getting into the weeds to get into it too much for a conversation that was only referencing them in the context of Getimians.
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Fair and you're right. I think that's the big thing htere. Anything on Sachverell's per-inpriosnment is not really important. He made the Getimians and it weakneed enough to apparently make him in his dobule-bound state. The whole why he's asleep is likely even not that important, all told.

Like, what he was really in 1e was this:
"... Lucien kills those whose deeds would awaken Sacheverell, the Demon Prince that knows the shape of things to come, for Sacheverell's sleep is prized by gods and Yozis alike. ..."

That's literlaly it. HIm being this ultimate "collapse the waveform" thing was 2e there. And while elements of it are cool, I think the entire universe pivoting on him is something that need not be made the case, and then it's not something that needs to be explained away.

It's a bit like (to me) the "Why didn't the Primordials, assuming they had ability to command the gods to do so, tell the gods to stop Exalting people?" and then creating autonomous Exaltation from there. The solution is "Why assume that's even the case?"
 
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