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General Exalted Thread

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Peanuckle said:
Actually, I think this is exactly how democracy works these days.
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Honestly, US Political Parties are in fact a pretty great model for how Yozi-as-organisations are meant to work. They're less centralised and less good at staying on message than corporations are, and their upper echelons are dominated by both ego clashing and genuine arguments over policy.

So for example, we can look at the Elephant Who Straddles Nations, and the current clash between Riano, the Sitter in the Chair, and Donalada, the One Above All and see how two powerful souls like that might guide the path of their overall Yozi - and fight over competing themes rather than fighting their true foe, the Solar Eclipse caste known only as the Queen of the Hills.
 
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Aaron Peori said:
Anesidora Jars (Artifact * to *****)

These relics of the fallen Shogunate are far more common then they should be and have led to the doom of many an unwary scavenger lord. Savants and sorcerers know well enough to leave any they find alone. In some case, the unprepared handling of these jade casks with starmetal caps has led to the fall of entire kingdoms and the ends of entire bloodlines.

With the collapse of the First Realm the resulting Shogunate found it had an infrastructure of wonders and marvels that it simply did not have the resources to maintain. Without the inspiration of their creators the sophisticated artifacts they had designed were prone to frequent malfunctions; in some case they even seemed to turn on the Dragonblooded who used them. Whether this was intentional, a final bulwark against betrayal, or not is unknown. Even as the Shogunate was working to try and reconstruct their society along less resource intensive lines the continuing collapse of much of their magical necessities threw the populace into chaos time and again. The unexpected failure of some critical but taken for granted industry or artifact led many cities to their destruction and wars were fought between the various Gens to secure the most reliable artifice.

The Sidereal Exalted, foreseeing this, began work on a way to extend key pieces of this society past their fated ends and passed on the secret to the construction of Anesidora Jars to their Dragonblooded allies in secret. Heaven, still wroth with the Sidereal's actions, did not wish this knowledge to pass on but what could one do?

An Anesidora Jar is a reinforced jade flask or urn, usually carved or cast in the shape of particularly inauspicious shapes such as profane gods, demonic faces and (towards the late shogunate) labyrinthine horrors. They are caped with a stopper of starmetal, each stopper is attuned to only a single jar.

When first created an Anesidora Jar is considered 'empty'. The user can then insert the cap into an artifact in the same slot he would a hearthstone. So long as the cap remains inserted the artifact will not malfunction or deteriorate. It continues to have a Repair rating if it does already and continues to go into arrears if not maintained. However, instead of malfunctioning when it goes into arrears the accumulated misfortune is channeled into the jar instead. The rating of the Jar must equal the Repair rating of the artifact it is to maintain. Once the jar has accumulated enough arrears to cause the device to completely cease to function it becomes 'full'. The jar also absorbs any botches that are rolled when the artifact is used. Each botch absorbed counts as one 'period of missed maintenance' for going into arrears. This can result in the jar becoming full without the user being aware.

If the jar absorbs more than its fill it explodes, shattering jade fragments in all directions doing (artifact)L damage to everyone in (artifact) yards. This is the least of the problems caused by the destruction. For the next (artifact) weeks everything within (artifact) miles is more likely to go disastrously wrong as the festering misfortune snarls and distorts the Loom of Fate. This has no effect on beings Outside Fate or any stunted or magically enhanced action, but otherwise every roll that produces 0 successes is considered a botch. This is unlikely to directly hinder most player characters but the ST should feel free to describe the horrific consequences on the area around them.

Once a jar is full the stopper must be removed and placed on the jar before the next calibration and is then carefully disposed of. If the jar is ever opened thereafter it immediately unleashes its accumulated misfortune.
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This is an amazing artifact, I really like this. It could be used in SO many story-hooks. I'll mention a mirror-version near the end of this post.
Bursting Eagerness Soul said:
What happens if this is opened Outside of Fate? Does the local Loom-equivalent still get screwed?
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It seems like the misfortune in them would be a stabilizing element to creatures of the Wyld, as something that closes off/reduces the infinite possibilities of its chaotic nature. It'd almost certainly have a negative effect on the creatures living there, at least the Unshaped. I'm not sure how the misfortune would express itself out there in the Wyld though.
I have no idea what would happen in Malfeas, but releasing creation's misfortune in there might be interpreted as super rude ("don't dump your/Creation's bad luck on us") , schadenfreude-inducing entertainment that demons might want to inflict on others, or maybe actually bad for the place.
My brain immediately goes to something like a toned-down version of the effect that Verumpira's Seal of the Warden does if used in Malfeas (the Seal is a N/A artifact, jointly forged by the Incarnae and Yozis, hence toned-down) which creates a bubble of stability that is treated like Creation by all demons in it, and "the creation of such a bubble Malfeas's inconstant realm is pain beyond imagining" (see Roll of Glorious Divinity 1, Gods and Elementals pg 67 for the full write-up on the Seal of the Warden). I don't think opening a full Anesidora Jar (even the 5 dot version) would cause pain of the same order of magnitude as the Seal, but I doubt it would be pleasant for Malfeas. His own share of bad luck is already enough for him without a massive dose of some DB's too.

Few more thoughts:
1) At the very least, "the concentrated misfortune of by a warrior wielding a weapon beyond his ken" sounds like a rare ingredient that Ligier might use in his forging projects, so it could be useful to anyone contracting him to make artifacts. That misfortune sounds like something that First Age Solars could have been shaping/crafting into existence in the Wyld.
2) I suspect these jars, when at least partially filled, would be something that the Fae would want to experiment with. The taste of misfortune and a 'cursed destiny' might be an interesting addition to their stories and narratives and thus be sought after, or a unique novelty worth resources 2 or 3 at least (just for the misfortune, not the jar itself). I can easily picture them wanting to do/craft something with purified/concentrated misfortune.
3) I picture a "flipped" version of an Anesidora Jar, one that draws successes from an equipped artifact to store good fortune. Shogunate DB's could have intended them to be used during training exercises or other low-risk situations in daiklaves that were (at the time) still mass-reproducible to store up good fortune for later use to boost the prosperity of the House or region they uncap it in. Plans to produce more of the fortune-storing version were abandoned after a DB spectacularly botched an Athletics roll during initially testing of the 5-dot version, tripping and fatally impaling themself on their jar-equipped daiklave (utterly destroying the brand new daiklave) but filling the jar significantly in the process. I can imagine Fair Folk making some serious mischief by swapping out one version for the other, when given the opportunity.
 
Now I kind of wonder what would happen if you made an N/A-level version, stuck it on a daiklave and stuck that into Oblivion. Bad things obviously, but what kind?
 
Bursting Eagerness Soul said:
Now I kind of wonder what would happen if you made an N/A-level version, stuck it on a daiklave and stuck that into Oblivion. Bad things obviously, but what kind?
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One of the Neverborn falls into Oblivion, massively expanding the area it affects and causing a chain reaction of things falling in and expanding the area affected, causing more things to fall in, ect, ect...
 
Okay, I've copied - I think - all of my update posts over from this thread to a Kerisgame one. I initially tried to copy across the replies and commentary as well, but ran into the issue that I had accumulated more than 400 replies and comments to copy by session 40, and the board won't actually let me copy that many.

I guess I'll copy them over in shifts at some point in the future. One nice thing about the copy tool is that it adds things in their chronological place, so I can do that.

Edit: changed the thread title to be more informative
 
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Aleph said:
Okay, I've copied - I think - all of my update posts over from this thread to a Kerisgame one. I initially tried to copy across the replies and commentary as well, but ran into the issue that I had accumulated more than 400 replies and comments to copy by session 40, and the board won't actually let me copy that many.

I guess I'll copy them over in shifts at some point in the future. One nice thing about the copy tool is that it adds things in their chronological place, so I can do that.
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Look, if triple-posting is bad, it might not be the greatest idea to 73-post. :V

On a more serious note, it does at least spare me the trouble of searching through 1231 pages to fetch a single Kerisgame log.
 
So! A question.

What sort of things would the Regent of the Realm spend their time doing, assuming they were not in fact as much of an utterly useless fuckup as, well, Fokuf?

I invite commentary based both in the canon setting and in any divergent headcanon versions of the Realm that you lot like to use.

I'm still vaguely planning out a possible Regent Quest - and by that I mean I've figured out what the opening posts would be, settled on a mechanical framework to use and even worked out how to model the conflicting interests of the various Houses - but I find myself curious about just what sort of thing an actively involved Regent would actually end up doing on a day-to-day basis.
 
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Kerisgame Homebrew: Imperial Ministry
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    • Maugan Ra said:
    What sort of things would the Regent of the Realm spend their time doing, assuming they were not in fact as much of an utterly useless fuckup as, well, Fokuf?
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    In the version of Creation used in Kerisgame, the role of "Regent" does not exactly exist.

    The Realm is run on a day to day basis by the Thousand Scales, which is headed by the Council of Imperial Ministers. These include such luminaries as the Grand And Supreme Shogun Of War, Cathak Cainan, and other such Imperial Ministers who head up their departments at the Empress' pleasure. So there's the Ministry of the Interior, the Foreign Ministry, the Ministry of the Exterior (which handles Satrapies), the Minister of Eugenics...

    All of these figures are currently plotting against each other like scorpions, forming ever-changing alliances, using the Imperial Ministries to expand the influence of their houses without being so obvious about it that one of the others can shame them about it, hiring parties of young Terrestrials to sabotage their rivals, and generally acting like very suitable patrons for a party of Dragonblooded PCs.

    The figure who is officially in charge by precedent is the Daimyo of the Treasury, who is the first of the Ministers and prime advisor to the Scarlet. The role traditionally goes to a bean-counter who can be relied on to keep a very close eye on all the funds and make sure that the Empress always has enough money before engaging in any long term wars or the like. It is an important role and the Scarlet usually desires someone who will, in fact, tell them that "No, we can't afford a war right now" because it's better to know that you can't afford a war now than have to humiliatingly request a special tax from the High Deliberative, who will extract all kinds of concessions from them". The Scarlet wants a hard-working, conscientious, detail-orientated individual to keep a track on all their finances.

    This is not the sort of personality who really wants to have to deal with the Imperial Ministers full time. Unfortunately they now control the pursestrings since they can authorise payments in the Empress' absence.

    The Ministers want money and want their budgets raised.

    The Ministers want their rivals to have their budgets cut.

    The Legions need paying.

    Princess Nemone is trying to usurp the Daimyo's authority and has assumed control of the Imperial Household and the Scarlet's private purse, which she is technically entitled to do as the (interim) Empress-in-Waiting.

    Any new tax bills have to get past the High Deliberative and the Houses hate paying money.

    There is a great need for more money because the Anathema are back.

    The Daimyo very much doesn't want to get assassinated, and is therefore are living on a knife's edge, trying to maintain the financial probity of the Realm while also not annoying anyone enough that they send more than the regular number of assassins after him while also dealing with the fact that quite a few Dragonblooded are starting to go "Do we really need an Empress? This chap in the Treasury can handle the beancouting. Why don't we just have the High Deliberative elect the Ministers if any die?" and then sometimes adding "Wink, wink" while looking meaningfully at a Minister they don't like.

    The Daimyo therefore has fully dived into the "quick, hire Dragonblooded PCs to do things for me" school of thought since he can't be seen to be acting openly or someone might have him killed.

    More than usual, I mean. All the Imperial Ministers are used to assassination attempts.
     
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    • Chloe Sullivan said:
    Dodging assassination attempts, crying over the reams of paperwork and accounts, attending endless meetings.
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    Yeah, but meetings about what?

    I know canon says that Fokuf basically signs whatever is put in front of him, but I'm curious about what sort of documents those might actually be. What bills and orders require the express approval of Her Redness or the Regent in order to become legally valid?

    ...

    And sidereal'd by ES, of course.
     
    Listening to various factions and houses' proposals and reports. Answering them.

    Like, you might not have the power to say "I don't like those guys, lets go to war", but you do have the power to say "yes House Ragara, you have Imperial support for this new trade route. Funds and/or soldiers will be sent there, instead of increasing garrisons in the Threshold Satrapies like House Cathak wanted"

    Or something. You have been empowered to maintain and run the Realm and it's interests until the Empress returns or someone manages to take control. The trick is to make it so that people want to move through official channels, instead of just offing you or something.
     
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    So! Given the particular time of year it is, just taking a brief break from posting Alchemical stuff to toss out some ideas for minor plasmic beasts, since recently I have been enamored with the idea of Underworld-fauna being low-key spooks like you read in cheesy creepypasta or see in Totally True Real Ghost Stories, rather than displaced Silent Hill knockoffs or translucent animals. It also makes a fun time of explaining why those things happen in Creation outside of nefarious ghost mischief and shadowland wierdness. Something from the Underworld just happened to escape and has now taken up resident spook status in the area, perfect sense!


    Squirms:
    Abandoned places, ravaged by fire or decay, are the usual haunts for squirms to manifest, mindlessly pawing around their domains to gather up what resonant remnants of former life and activity its surroundings contained. Like a hermit crab, once a squirm roots itself to a particular place, such as underneath old furniture, inside bottom drawers in cupboards, and dark closets or crawlspaces, it rarely leaves except to gather these tiny trifles into its growing hoard. The presence of such a heap secreted away, and scrapings of eerily human-like handprints extending outward from it through the dust or soot, are usually the only evidence of a squirm's occupancy.

    For its own safety, the creature prefers to keep itself withdrawn and unseen, and when witnessed in its immaterial state snakes out as a flat, thin shadow from its den before forking off into multiple creeping appendages of varying sizes to cast along walls, floor and ceiling for footholds. Where such an anchor is found, the limb extrudes a human hand of the appropriate size, from a baby's fist to a broad and withered palm, to grasp and pull forward, physically lengthening its form across the surface in the direction of its choosing as the limb retracts like a grotesque inchworm.

    Despite unpleasant appearances, squirms are relatively harmless as plasmics go, with the only danger of inadvertently transplanting one from a location by placing its trinkets in a pocket or bag, causing it to follow suit. Some minor adepts in the arts of the dead perform this deliberately, "taming" squirms to occupy a water jug or satchel, baiting the creature over time into filching obols and small jewelry during its nighttime forays before finally returning to its portable home.


    Skitters:
    If the underworld could be said to have vermin, skitters would fill the role of rats in many ghostly homes. Skitters dance at the sills of windows and the thresholds of doorways seeking entrance to briefly unoccupied dwellings, for only when people are present in an abode is the creature comfortable, as a tiny and intangible wisp of homesickness. Six robins feet hold the flightless plasmic aloft as it gambols blindly, small chill breezes extending outwards in its wake like an unexamined draft. These tiny wafting currents pass through panes and walls the immaterial creature refuses too, and so it uses them to trick unsuspecting inhabitants into ushering it inside without notice.

    Curtains unexpectedly buffeted, papers or small items clattering across windowside desks, doors left ajar slamming shut or yawning open with a definite creak, all these things can give the impression of an unwanted intruder within the home. Once an alarmed homeowner nearby rushes inside to investigate, the skitter ambles along behind and takes up residence properly, usually nesting in the rafters or cupboards until it is disturbed.

    In Creation, skitters are a nuisance at best, and frequently beckoned by malicious hedge-mages to bedevil rivals and poor-paying clients by disordering papers, rattling cookware and frightening small animals and pets, such as cats or birds, which are sensitive to its chilling presence. The only method outside of banishment, usually supplied by the same cunning man who conjured it, to be rid of a skitter's haunting is to vacate the home for several days, until the loneliness of the creature compels it out into the world again to seek a new home. Unsavory practitioners and thieves may use this period of absence to break in and take what they please before the owners return.


    Slumps:
    Ranging from three to eight feet in height, slumps are easily identified by an oafish, loping gait which characterizes their nature. But to those who are not well-versed in Underworld lore, the indistinct head atop two tall, trunk-like legs can readily give the impression of a looming human figure from a distance, or while seen in passing within darkened indoor spaces. Echoes of unfulfilled wanderlust, slumps travel the land without exploring, stand like monuments for hours without observing, ignorant of both themselves and the surroundings save when they are impeded by some fashion of terrain or magic.

    A lone slump trudging docilely through the wilderness can lead travelers astray, rouse paranoia of being followed or watched, while a small herd can accidentally suggest a waiting ambush or ominous procession. Slumps give the cities of the underworld a wide berth, usually misidentified as suspiciously silent wanderers and subject to a hostile welcome at arrow-point. However, these creatures are sometimes captured and collared when they approach too closely, left bearing a weight chained around them holding some secret, piece of evidence or proof too dangerous to remain within the cities, but too valuable to consign to Oblivion and the risk of recovery by the agents of the Neverborn. Thus these slumps are set free to shuffle errant courses far away from the civilization of the dead, and some, by simple chance, end up in the living world.

    The aimless meandering of slumps becomes an even more unsettling presence in Creation, as they can be seen in reflective surfaces without materializing. In a mirror, placid lake or the interior of a room as viewed against a dark window, the slouching movement and docile demeanor of a slump means that a quick glance of the creature is all which is needed to spur panic, even before a second look confirms nothing standing there at all. Worse yet would be to freeze and watch the plasmic beast in motion, as the "visitor" splits all the way up to the neck and strides quickly away. Entire villages have been rendered ghost towns by the sudden and unprovoked appearances of two or more slumps loitering into and out of public spaces and residences, as the populace would sooner leave the land to whatever malicious sorcery had taken hold than uncover the identity of this stalking spirit who can be in multiple places at once.
     
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    Dif said:
    Skitters:
    If the underworld could be said to have vermin, skitters would fill the role of rats in many ghostly homes. Skitters dance at the sills of windows and the thresholds of doorways seeking entrance to briefly unoccupied dwellings, for only when people are present in an abode is the creature comfortable, as a tiny and intangible wisp of homesickness. Six robins feet hold the flightless plasmic aloft as it gambols blindly, small chill breezes extending outwards in its wake like an unexamined draft. These tiny wafting currents pass through panes and walls the immaterial creature refuses too, and so it uses them to trick unsuspecting inhabitants into ushering it inside without notice.

    Curtains unexpectedly buffeted, papers or small items clattering across windowside desks, doors left ajar slamming shut or yawning open with a definite creak, all these things can give the impression of an unwanted intruder within the home. Once an alarmed homeowner nearby rushes inside to investigate, the skitter ambles along behind and takes up residence properly, usually nesting in the rafters or cupboards until it is disturbed.

    In Creation, skitters are a nuisance at best, and frequently beckoned by malicious hedge-mages to bedevil rivals and poor-paying clients by disordering papers, rattling cookware and frightening small animals and pets, such as cats or birds, which are sensitive to its chilling presence. The only method outside of banishment, usually supplied by the same cunning man who conjured it, to be rid of a skitter's haunting is to vacate the home for several days, until the loneliness of the creature compels it out into the world again to seek a new home. Unsavory practitioners and thieves may use this period of absence to break in and take what they please before the owners return.
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    For some reason, I find these guys to be strangely adorable and I've got at least one Abyssal who'd happily keep one as a pet.
     
    Dif said:
    minor plasmic beasts
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    Oh, that is awesome! Plays right into every idea I've had for the Underworld being influenced not only by the memories of the dead, but also by the dicarded or supressed feelings of the living, and is right in the middle of that 'weird and creepy, but ultimately harmless and sometimes even pitiable' aesthetic that I like for parts of it.

    And now you've inspired me to try to put some more of my own ideas for the Underworld to electronic paper.

    Just, uh, can anyone help me with locations and the names of both places and people? Currently I have three ideas for places in Creation touched by the Underworld;
    First, an imperial city-state satrapy that's being squeezed dry by a greedy, debauched and corrupt governor with the aid of brutish guards and predatory taxmen, second a rather desolate slum or destitute village, ideally in the desert and among ruins, where nonetheless the inhabitants have managed to build a happy existence for themselves, and third a commerce-focused city whose canals are it's primary means of transportation.
     
    Gnarker Homewbrew: Blank-faced Artists
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    • Meishujia Kongbaide, the Blank-Faced Artists

    Small, hunched-over figures with lanky limbs, that instead of faces have blank and unmoving white porcelain masks. Stemming from the frustration mortal men experience when they cannot adequately convey what they think and feel, they are left mute and incapable of expressing themselves save for whatever methods they may learn by themselves; Phantomime and expressive dance, music played on an instrument, or painting, usually on-the-fly on their own masks to give themselves a proper facial expression.
    Alas, they are not born with any special talent for these skills, but instead have to laboriously learn and practice them for their entire lives, which they either tend to do with fervent desperation, or else resign themselves to an existence lonely and bereft of the meaningful social interaction that they so crave.

    Young ones will try to get by with their lacking skills as best as they can, conversing with ungainly exaggerated gestures, crude grafittis, and discordant screeching noises coaxed with difficulty from their chosen instrument, trying to practice their skills while peddling them to make enough money to buy the necessary supplies, all the while seeking enough companionship to not go insane from isolation.
    But the oldest ones, those that persevered through all frustration and difficulty, will have become masters at their chosen craft, capable of telling entire stories with minute movements, dance or play with such emotion to make a man weep, or painting and repainting their face within seconds with one beautifully elaborate masterwork after another, all of which they will do gladly for the appreciation and acclaim people give them for it.

    Those that gave up, on the other hand, that threw their hope away along with their tools, that grew bitter and misanthropic, will proceed to shun all interaction, seek themselves a quiet dark place in which to sulk for the rest of their existence, and will try to throw out or scare away any perceived intruders so they do not have to be reminded of what they cannot have.
    And yet, projecting displeasure and intimidation, wether by physical force or by donned facepaint and costumes, or setting traps and conducting elaborate terror campaigns without even once showing their faces, are expressive skills to practice in and of themselves. And if a masked man has stewed in his chosen haunts for long enough, always keeping out any visitors or pondering and planning on how best to deal with the next ones, eventually without noticing, they will in a twisted and pitiful way have learned how to communicate and inspire emotions after all. Such is their tradegy that even having reached their discarded old dreams and hopes only further brings them misery instead of happiness.


    Spot the Inspiration!
     
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