I feel like there should be shard conversions for 3e
General Exalted Thread
- Thread starter Aleph
- Start date
A Shard is pretty much just an alternate setting, lorewise and/or mechanically.
We technically already have one; Essence.
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- Ottawa
If you want Heaven's Reach, Gunstar Autochthonia, or Exalted Modern in 3e...what's stopping you from making them?
Even if you lack of the skills and energy to make them fully, you can start. Others might join in if you do.
Perhaps you could try running games that are meant to be short?
If the plan from day one is to play six sessions, then running out of steam on session seven is no problem at all. And there are premises that naturally lend themselves to short games.
Even if you lack of the skills and energy to make them fully, you can start. Others might join in if you do.
Perhaps you could try running games that are meant to be short?
If the plan from day one is to play six sessions, then running out of steam on session seven is no problem at all. And there are premises that naturally lend themselves to short games.
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- Washington, USA
Get some of those great players together, tell them up front that every three-die stunt provides 1 xp, and whoever scores the most such stunts in a given session becomes the ST for the next session, all notes on setting background and longer-term plans to be handed over accordingly. Documentation often ends up better organized when the writer knows it'll have to be read by someone else, and players might find all sorts of small ways to make the ST's job easier (rather than a matter of endless giving and scrambling) if they know it could be them in the hot seat next time.
Generally, I think that regular gods are more than enough to cover most needs.
If you want something more eldritch, but don't want to get a demon involved though, I do think it could be possible to have those in Yu-Shan. They wouldn't be gods proper, not in the way Ahlat or Ryzala are. Just something weird and bespoke, something that the Primordials made for a specific purpose. Whatever they are or do, they sided with the gods and the Exalted in the war and were rewarded for that. They may have official position with the Bureaucracy, but if they don't spend their time in the Jade Pleasure Dome like the Incarnae they're probably focused on whatever they were made for.
Likely, the Celestial Bureaucracy has a number of unenviable positions and jobs that mostly entail keeping those things happy and out of everyone else's hair.
I would stress though, that these things should be rare if they appear at all. While I do like reminders that Yu-Shan was made by the Primordials for the Primordials and their souls, the gods have spent thousands of years taming the place. They'll never get rid of every remnant of the Age of Glory, that doesn't mean they haven't made a very spirited attempt at just that.
If you want something more eldritch, but don't want to get a demon involved though, I do think it could be possible to have those in Yu-Shan. They wouldn't be gods proper, not in the way Ahlat or Ryzala are. Just something weird and bespoke, something that the Primordials made for a specific purpose. Whatever they are or do, they sided with the gods and the Exalted in the war and were rewarded for that. They may have official position with the Bureaucracy, but if they don't spend their time in the Jade Pleasure Dome like the Incarnae they're probably focused on whatever they were made for.
Likely, the Celestial Bureaucracy has a number of unenviable positions and jobs that mostly entail keeping those things happy and out of everyone else's hair.
I would stress though, that these things should be rare if they appear at all. While I do like reminders that Yu-Shan was made by the Primordials for the Primordials and their souls, the gods have spent thousands of years taming the place. They'll never get rid of every remnant of the Age of Glory, that doesn't mean they haven't made a very spirited attempt at just that.
Partially I imagine one thing is that people want to have various books. Like, part of the draw of the various alt settings is often putting familiar things in a different light which is why they become more popular as an edition goes on. But at the moment we're still missing major old factions, not to mention things like Liminals or Getiams which are new.
Though, honestly, another thing is that the shards themselves are pretty low weight? There are gun/car rules but other than that you don't really change much of the rules themselves, so there's not a ton there unless you are really attracted to one of the shards.
- Pronouns
- They/them
Maybe my vision is profoundly limited, but this sounds like a great recipe to end up with an absolute mess of a campaign.
You should not give this advice to someone who struggles running games on their own. It will not help.
Is this because the initial strong premise that got you excited about the game gets resolved in those one or two story arcs?
How long do you feel like your games should run before ending? Every game of Exalted I've run has lasted between 10 and 20 sessions, so they haven't been super long, but I'm of the opinion that a campaign of a moderate length with a clear central theme and a satisfying ending is a pretty good thing, something to be proud of.
HalfTangible
Only half sane (it's less cringe)
- Location
- Valkyrie, Primus
No. Its usually more that I prepared far enough ahead to cover that time, left enough open for PC heroes, and then when I try to keep going I end up floundering.
I don't think the solution is to write up like 30 sessions worth of material and try to stick to it because at that point im just writing a book.
They dont tend to have satisfying endings or make it to 10 sessions.
ST rotation in my experience is a recipe for a mess of a campaign at best. Not the fun kind of mess either.
- Location
- Washington, USA
Well, if you don't want to let someone else take the reins while you recharge, or write a noninteractive book, do you have an explicit endpoint in mind that you're trying to steer things toward? Not in the sense of negating PC choices to force a specific preconceived outcome, of course, just some central location and/or event which the various flexible consequences of those choices could plausibly be made to converge on. Such a focus may help choose which threads get full brain-space and table-time, and which you need to handwave or backburner. Triple Tragedy And Thankful Theory Latter half of Erfworld seems like an excellent example of narrative bloat running wild, with too many shiny things and shocking reversals but too few inevitable-in-hindsight conclusive results, while All Night Laundry - An interactive horror webcomic is a similarly noteworthy case where the massive number of loose ends were successfully tied up, even as a crowd of players continued to participate every single day.
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UrsaTempest
Don't Panic!
The way I see it you should have fun GMing. Throw players to scenario you think would (also) be exciting to you, make them encounters characters you like (whether of your creation or expy), encourage your players to do things that's fun for you, that sort of thing.
- Location
- Brittany, France
- Pronouns
- He/Him
There are definitely unmentioned Essence 7+ gods. Like, if you want the God of Time to look like Chronos Hadestwo and be one of the top contenders for "most powerful gods under the Incarnae," knock yourself out, I think that's rad. The question is more whether there are dozens or hundreds of Essence 7+ gods who could give Bahal Hesh or Wun Ja a run for their money in terms of raw power or combat power, but who happen to be all in the Jade Pleasure Dome or busy being Shoggoths, and I think the answer to that is "no," because I feel like that cheapens the gods we do have and who do matter. But absolutely there are some unmentioned gods of very important concepts who don't get page space in the books, same way as, as you say, there are potentially unnamed deathlords (though I think Ex3 walked back the whole "there's this many deathlord and we are only writing this many of them ever, all the others are left as empty slots and will be forever," now it's more like "these are the deathlords, there could well be more.") Just like... Not very many.
It doesn't really matter whether Heaven has parity of numbers of high-Essence gods with Hell. That's (part of) why they made the Exalted; for them to win this war on their behalf. The geass certainly played an important part in needing the Exalted, but it doesn't mean that "the gods and the Primordials would have been evenly matched without the geass," because they don't need that, they had the Exalted. And third circle demons are numerous, but they are scattered. There is no Infernal Bureaucracy that concentrates power and gives each demon specific directions on what their role is supposed to be and who can harness their collective strength by issuing orders. The Celestial Bureaucracy is dysfunctional as hell, but the Infernal "bureaucracy" straight up doesn't exist; that couple hundred 3CDs are just off doing their own thing, and most of them have weird, esoteric purviews that are narrower than those of equivalent gods'.
Plus, yeah, there's less than twenty deathlords total, so if the Underworld is meant to be a broad threat to Creation's order, you probably wouldn't want there to be ten times that many gods who can directly contest their power?
I feel like Sorcery kind of has a bit of the "powerful but weird creature that doesn't exactly inhabit a specific category".
Like, the spell that summons a "Prince of the Fallen Tower" and I have no idea what that is.
Like, the spell that summons a "Prince of the Fallen Tower" and I have no idea what that is.
TenfoldShields
Lounging on a Hoard of Words
- Pronouns
- He/Him
It's something that 3e's been leaning into that I quite like. Charting Fate's Course introduces The Hidden Judges of the Secret Flame, beings who swore themselves to the Unconquered Sun shortly after his creation (interestingly they're wraith-like figures made of blue fire, clothed in black, and who can be tasked with various- well judicial duties), and The Wardens of the Nepenthean Gardens, gentle creatures who heal and tend to all those in need and who were banished beyond Creation by spiteful Primordials increasingly certain of their defeat and increasingly bent towards wrecking whatever they could get their hands on before the victors could claim it.
There's also a similar development in Necromancy which is really cool. The Sworn to the Grave manuscript talks about Jackals Who Feast on Lies, servants of someone called the Gaoler of Uqad, who are like- six foot tall bandage wrapped undead canines who can be summoned by speaking half a truth abhorrent to the Gaoler.
It's a device I like, this sort of gesturing at these other kinds and other clades of spirits that don't cleanly fit into the extant hierarchies.
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- Location
- Washington, USA
They were already a thing in 2e, referenced in both Books of Sorcery 2: the White Treatise (spell to call them and stat block), and Compass: Malfeas (implied backstory).
Walker of the Yellow Path
Ho There!
- Location
- The Land of Memes
From my personal experience, create a hook that can be resolved in one arc.
This is from my DnD times, but it's applicable anywhere I feel.
According to my group, the best game I ever run was what we called the Prison Game. The game started with the premise that the group got trapped in a max security prison that an Evil Empire designed to be almost impossible to escape, alongside a number of high level monsters, villains, and other heroes. Every so often, they would be forced to do gladiatorial combat against other inmates.
It was clear from the start that the game would end once they'd escape the prison. I did all my design work before the game started, and then just let them explore the prison, get to know all the inmates, form relationships and rivalries.
And eventually lead a jail break.
It was like, 20 sessions long? It could have been shorter but I structured it as 'one session role play in the prison, next pointless arena combat to satisfy the Emperor' so it was really more like 10 in terms of actual plot stuff.
It worked really well entirely because it was self contained and relatively short.
Anyone have thoughts on who the strongest non-legendary size statblocks are in 3e? Effectively, who would you nominate for a hypothetical 8-person Ultimate Tournament of Ultimate Power? (I know that the finals will almost certainly be FAFL and Anys Syn, but still, I'm curious.)
My current thoughts are something along the lines of FAFL, Anys Syn, Ahlat, Octavian, Ma Ha Suchi, Five Metal Tang, and then I'm not too sure. Some combination of Sublime Danger, Siakal, Ragara? But I might be forgetting some of the more interesting Exalt stat blocks.
Top slot goes to the FAFL and Anys Syn for my money, Five Metal Tang and Fakharu following close behind. When/if we ever get Bahal Hesh he'll be near the top as a spirit with SMA unless they just don't give him an Excellency. Everyone following those matters rapidly less, there's too big a gulf between them. Siakal and Ma-Ha-Suchi are both very underwhelming, Ragara is using canon DB Charms so he's not even a meaningful competitor. You'd need to fix the DB set or make him an Evocations master first, and also give a bunch of good Evocations amounting to a custom Charmset.
Just to note, I dismissed Fakharu because he's legendary size. Otherwise it would be FaFL, Anys, the 3rd circle demon, the behemoth in the Abyssals book, the three(?) elemental dragons we have so far, including the basic one and the Thousand Forged Dragon, by my accounting. And yeah, I agree that the quality of the competition drops off sharply even once you get past the first two.
(Also, quick question, but if I post homebrew here, should I post the text directly, or a link to it?)
(Also, quick question, but if I post homebrew here, should I post the text directly, or a link to it?)
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Sibri is not particularly strong or threatening, tbh. Not a combat demon to begin with and not really optimized with what she's got. She's fun, but pretty limited.
- Location
- Nova Scotia
- Pronouns
- She/Her
She's more of a very large, very unpleasant environmental hazard in her regular shape and it feels weird to compare her against like, a guy with a sword or something in the state.
Her weaker human shape can like, participate in combat, but like... Not reliably beat a combat Exalt. She doesn't necessarily need to beat you to tag you with infinite suffering Venom or something, but that's not like, disputing the point.
- Pronouns
- He/Him
it sounds like we need a quick character tournament arc
I am curious what that would look like! But again, I think you need at least eight to make that work, and I don't really know who comes after the first 4/5.
And yeah, that's very fair, I just remembered her being somewhat scary and a 3CD.
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- Ottawa
Think I'm gonna leave the god argument there, lest it turn into a pure verbal shoving match.
But it did lead me to consider a couple of related questions.
How many Divisions do y'all imagine for each Bureau?
Destiny has five, obviously, but the rest are left open. Seasons has one for each of the four main seasons, but also has a Division of Rain, which might imply more weather-type Divisions. And there are some oddballs like the Division of Blessed Pomology. Other examples include War, Peace, Symbiosis, Plants, Aquatic Life, Inevitable Reckoning (cops), and Inviolate Gatehouse (guards).
Given that I've been arguing for large numbers of Division-head-tier gods, it probably won't surprise anyone that I could see almost a hundred Divisions overall. I suspect I'm on the high end, though.
And what do you imagine the spirit court of the Incarnae are like?
I've always imagined that, with the Incarnae more or less enjoying retirement, they'd have their friends with them. Who would presumably also be very major gods. They may have once have worked hard for the Primordials or fought valiantly against them, but they're now basically just enjoying the rewards of cosmic victory. And of course there'd be some directly-associated gods like Nysela, who tend to be fairly big deals themselves. Plus some flunkies, sycophants, servants and hangers-on.
But that's just me, not something I took from the books.
I would think both, for redundancy and convenience.
But it did lead me to consider a couple of related questions.
How many Divisions do y'all imagine for each Bureau?
Destiny has five, obviously, but the rest are left open. Seasons has one for each of the four main seasons, but also has a Division of Rain, which might imply more weather-type Divisions. And there are some oddballs like the Division of Blessed Pomology. Other examples include War, Peace, Symbiosis, Plants, Aquatic Life, Inevitable Reckoning (cops), and Inviolate Gatehouse (guards).
Given that I've been arguing for large numbers of Division-head-tier gods, it probably won't surprise anyone that I could see almost a hundred Divisions overall. I suspect I'm on the high end, though.
And what do you imagine the spirit court of the Incarnae are like?
I've always imagined that, with the Incarnae more or less enjoying retirement, they'd have their friends with them. Who would presumably also be very major gods. They may have once have worked hard for the Primordials or fought valiantly against them, but they're now basically just enjoying the rewards of cosmic victory. And of course there'd be some directly-associated gods like Nysela, who tend to be fairly big deals themselves. Plus some flunkies, sycophants, servants and hangers-on.
But that's just me, not something I took from the books.
I would think both, for redundancy and convenience.