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General Exalted Thread

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Additionally, automatic firearms irl are the result of mass industrialization giving people the supply chains to make spraying lead at truly unconscionable levels cost effective. Creation, with its succession of apocalypses reverting lots of people to pre-printing press tech levels, is likely to make cartridge ammo more cumbersomely expensive than its really worth
 
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HamSandLich said:
Additionally, automatic firearms irl are the result of mass industrialization giving people the supply chains to make spraying lead at truly unconscionable levels cost effective. Creation, with its succession of apocalypses reverting lots of people to pre-printing press tech levels, is likely to make cartridge ammo more cumbersomely expensive than its really worth
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Dr. Devereaux mused a bit on the difficult of producing enough ammo in a post apocalyptic situation here:
Fireside Friday, August 5, 2022

From memory, even as early as the US Civil War logisticians were complaining about semi-automatic weapons because of the great increase in rounds required.

In Creation, a full automatic weapon used regularly might require an entire order of alchemists at some very expensive facilities (perhaps one or more manses?) to keep it in supply.
 
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The real reason not to introduce conventional guns to Exalted is that flame weapons are like, an iconic and uniquely weird aspect of Exalted's setting at this point, and deliberately fill the visual niche that early guns would to the point that Righteous Devil is cowboy gunslinger themed. There is not, to me, really a compelling argument for swapping them out for something that shoots bullets beyond some people not liking the aesthetic of a firewand or whatever, and those people not liking the aesthetic is very much something I'm willing to live with.

Like, I understand there used to be an argument about annoying people wanting guns to be unbeatable or whatever, but I don't think that's the most pertinent thing to consider.
 
I'm worried this will come across as more aggressive than I intend... but I'm not honestly convinced flame weapons are that iconic? It feels like something attached to the setting rather than something inherent to it.

This is not to say they don't have their fans or that people don't like them, just that they always felt really accessory.
 
Kingfisher said:
I'm worried this will come across as more aggressive than I intend... but I'm not honestly convinced flame weapons are that iconic? It feels like something attached to the setting rather than something inherent to it.

This is not to say they don't have their fans or that people don't like them, just that they always felt really accessory.
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I believe you that you think this is the case, but it doesn't feel particularly true to me. They've been around since 1e and have filled most of the roles you would use early firearms in up until this point, there are specific charms and martial arts about using them. They feel pretty quintessentially part of Exalted's kitchen sink fantasy approach.
 
If you want to run exalted with guns there are several settings from 2es 'Shards of the Exalted Dream' that can be used. It even includes firearms charms which are fairly well balanced as far as the game goes. I've run an exalted modern setting game for several years and the group hasn't had any issues with it. Nothing says you can't just use those charms in the traditional second age setting either. For third edition... well, we just treat them as elaborate archery weapons.
 
Kingfisher said:
I'm worried this will come across as more aggressive than I intend... but I'm not honestly convinced flame weapons are that iconic? It feels like something attached to the setting rather than something inherent to it.

This is not to say they don't have their fans or that people don't like them, just that they always felt really accessory.
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I'm not sure that I agree. 2e core was my first exposure to Exalted, and one of the things that stood out to me right away was the chapter 8 comic, featuring flame pieces in a very dramatic way in the spot in the book that was specifically leading into 'here's the cool things you can have'.

Flame weapons really have been a pretty consistent part of things at least since I picked up the gameline, to the point that I do think of them on par with, say, Death of Obsidian Butterflies. Not every game will feature them, but it's a strong visual that's absolutely part of your baseline vibes of the world.
 
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At the very least, I think of flame weapons as the thematic replacement for guns - if someone 'should' have a gun, they can have a flame weapon instead. It's only when people start going really hard on the guns-as-end-of-era that the differences between the two matter - if all you want is to portray a cowboy flame weapons are fine.
 
I think something can have been present a long time without being iconic? Fokuf has been around since 1E and been a big NPC in some of the published material/adventures but he is fairly forgettable and relatively easy to swap out for something else at the table.

I would place flame weapons above him on the scale of iconicness to be clear.
 
If something has been present in a game for decades, is unique to the property in question, and has been used extensively and memorably in the fiction, setting material, and mechanics, I don't think it's exactly worth getting weirdly pedantic about the word "iconic".
 
I think that there was an Artifact gun weapon called a Prayer Piece in 2e, but I don't remember where it was or what it's stats are.

In 3e I've mused about an artifact flamepiece/wand that could imbue it's flames with the properties of anything it's burned as a gun alternative.
 
Indivisible said:
I think that there was an Artifact gun weapon called a Prayer Piece in 2e, but I don't remember where it was or what it's stats are.
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Prayer pieces did shoot an actual projectile, but also were like... extremely specifically 2e in that they were a miniature temple filled with miniature gods and they fired the projectiles with prayer or something.

3e has devil casters and dragon sigh wands.
 
Flame pieces are, like, fine. I think the original decision was kind of silly and better replaced with a sidebar about heroic combat, but it's a very easy hack to add guns to the game to suit your group's tastes and it's not something I need the developers to add it back now.
 
I run creation with early firearms and it works pretty damn well. Hand Cannons are fairly widely used by the Realm and various groups in the southern parts of creation. And more 'advanced' forms of firearms are found in Malfeas cause Cecelyne cowboy aesthetic I run with lmao.

What I do tend to go really hard on is Essence Cannons. They tend to vary tremendously with some using shells holding their wielders blood to feeding off their essence to form crystalized essence bullets.
 
Automatic firearms are against the vibe. And Exalted has taken a very firm stance on vibes with the flame pieces. I actually respect how upfront Exalted is on the "no guns because it doesn't fit the vibe" thing.
 
Come of think of it, there was also another form of "gun". 2E necrotech could produce firearms. One of the antagonists in Compass Underworld uses maggot-casters.
 
I think the important thing is that firearm development shouldn't be an easy, costless way to lock out supernatural sword-users from fighting you. You can have sweeping flamethrowers in trenches backed by high-accuracy mundane siege weapons to replicate the WWI experience, but the flamethrowers are short ranged enough that an Exalted or similar can just leap from the edge of your killing range into the trench, and direct hits from a trebuchets are still survivable with enough motes. Or you can have a truly deadly rapid-fire railguns straight from Authchthonia backed with essence cannons, but these are all bespoke pieces crafted and manned by Exalted, and thus can never cover every border (if it can, time to expand your borders).

What isn't allowed is browning machine guns manned by anyone who went through 1 year of basic military training that can hose down demons, spirits and the Exalted from long range. Now, why it isn't allowed is something many people have opinions on (standardisation of parts, ammo logistic chains, whether bullets are that deadly relative to Exalted's own ranged weapons which don't necessarily follow ours) but that's the line, I feel. There's probably still some wriggle room, like, Gunshoza armour is at or near the peak of what really good equipment can do for a mortal with no supernatural powers, but that's still bespoke pieces in limited numbers.
 
Yeah, the way I see it, there's no real mechanical difference between a firearm and a crossbow in 3rd edition and Essence's rules, so if you like the aesthetic--go for it!

They're just not specially privileged because they're firearms. Everything is viable, but the skill and infrastructure to make one as opposed to something simple like a firewand (Which only needs you a brass tube and a stock for the most part), is so much higher for so little value that they're just not produced on a large scale.
 
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UrsaTempest said:
I've mulled over Godblooded and Exigent since my previous Exigent post, and while I don't disagree Godblooded could fulfill similar role with Exigent upon new edition... well, my expectation already set, you know? Like to me, Godblooded is more 'attached' to their divine parentage. After all, most common way of getting them is via a god doing things with a human. They might be more or less powerful, they could stay 'mortal' or ascend to Godhood. That sort of thing.

While Exigent, being Exalted, is more independent to me. They got usual deal, got power and the gods can't take them back short of murder. They got selected in some way, that isn't just because of divine inheritance. Basically, more free agent.

Of course if it's 'just' custom Exalted or equivalent is desired there are many ways to do that aside from Exigent - Devil-Tiger is one. But we got Exigent, and they do the job well enough.
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Exaltation also has an aspect that it kind of "catalyzes" power in a way that god-bloodhood doesn't to me. Kind of an example to look at is Janest. I think the idea that the child of a field god is that powerful is kind of against some of the setting's versimilitude, while Exalts surpassing their patrons is something often emphasizes with Solars and Abyssals at least. So her strength being something tied strongly to not just her patron but the situation of her patron, and the unique interaction with that and the Flame of Exigence is pretty important and in a way that I don't think demigods quite do. It being focused on gods, for example, does a good amount in that since we don't have Dragon-Blooded, Infernal, or Abyssal knock-offs as a result, but encouraging to look at this category of Weird Guys that gods are in a neat lens.

I think a big thing that helps Exigents work IMHO is that there's well, the Exigence. THey're msic. Exalts, but they're still a particular thing, which just carte blance allowing gods to do would not have done and makes it distinct for god-bloodhood in that there's the price, unpredictability, and understanding that an Exalt is built on the themes of the god plus the Chosen's own capabilities, rather than a bit of this assumed subset of the god's power.
 
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