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General Exalted Thread

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ManusDomine said:
Wait, are you telling me that it doesn't already? :???:
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No. Indeed, one of the biiiiiiiiiig reasons for the Mirror blight on the Abyssal Charmset and why it copies the Solar Charmset so closely is because 2e designed Abyssals to be easy to convert to and from being Solars, so their tree structures and their Charmset has to be very similar to make the transformation easy.

Rather than, say, "Abyssal -> Solar means the character is dead, we don't need to care about that, and Solar-> Abyssal... well, convert your Charms back into XP and rebuild the character in full for their new narrative function".
 
Honestly Abyssals make me angry because there's so much room to do cool shit with them and instead we get something that works barely, but is lame enough basically nobody plays it and is thematically about as resonant as tissue paper.

I really wish there was a good Abyssal rewrite out there but a large part of the problem at going at that is that... well...

Fucking 2E, man. :(
 
The Dragon King Paths are genuinely awesome because unlike most other sources of power in the setting they represent not bursts of insight and thus power, but (sadly unspecified) holistic practices of diet, regular personal training, meditation and natural philosophy, which means that even the lowliest practitioner is a devoted warrior-monk who gains her strength from the extreme lengths she puts her body through. They aren't Charms, and they aren't Thaumaturgy, but something else which allows the Dragon Kings to externalize essence through themselves innately through their methods of literally achieving sapience from feral origins to enlighten themselves.

That's sort of fucking incredible, and mostly glossed-over because they're nonhumans and dying-out so its stands to reason that a lot of their particulars are either nonessential information or outright lost, but still kinda amazing for what they represent in the grand scheme of things. Which is a po soul just about transmuting itself into a hun (only humans have the double-soul, after all), and working essence as a matter of ritual rather than skill into their every walk of life. Which, amusingly enough given the other side-discussion going on, is more martial arts than Martial Arts has ever been. If I wasn't so hard into writing about Autochthonia and Alchemicals, I'd for damn sure be lavishing a lot more attention on Dragon Kings because they are such a clearly primordial species and it makes them play and characterize themselves so much more fundamentally different than anything else in the setting.

The reason the final Steps of the Paths are semi-locked off behind Essence 6 is because they represent the ultimate mastery of those practices that no one save a truly long-lived and ancient Dragon King can execute with regularity, and so you have to go a little further than usual to activate it. Dragon Kings have a special mechanic called Leaping Ahead which allows them to execute a higher Step than they currently know in a Path by burning a Virtue Channel in the process and rolling the Virtue to achieve success, only after which the Step activates, which coincidentally drives them to have more varied and extreme Virtues over time than those who practice just Charms.

Before she reaches that level of personal enlightenment, the final Step of a Path always requires this, making it a sort of Ultimate Technique rarely used and relied on, despite its potency.
 
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Dif said:
If I wasn't so hard into writing about Autochthonia and Alchemicals, I'd for damn sure be lavishing a lot more attention on Dragon Kings because they are such a clearly primordial species and it makes them play and characterize themselves so much more fundamentally different than anything else in the setting.
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See, this reminds me of one of my only semi-defined ideas for a surviving "mortal" race created by TDTSC. Their main feature was that they reproduce by sacrificing positive Intimacies - which led many of them to try and befriend or otherwise have positive interactions with humans. Because humans, after all, die so very easily and live such short lives, and thus they were considered perfect "mates": have fun with them while they're around, then carve out your affection for them when they die and use it to make children.
 
EarthScorpion said:
It's one of the very unfair things about Infernals against Abyssals. No one complains when Infernals basically just take a Solar Charm as one Charm in a tree, because Infernal trees are very much not Solar trees and Infernal Charms are very much Solar Charms. Abyssals and Lunars, on the other hand, have a massive problem with being goth Solars and silver Solars.

Or, to put it another way, I can take a Solar Dodge and Athletics Charm for a TED tree, because the Charms in question are clearly being used to aid balance and prevent either person having an advantage, because this is clearly a TED tree which comes off CCC with the theme of "avoiding trouble", and so a flurry breaker and a jumping Charm are totally okay (also, one of them has a repurchase that Solars don't get). But Abyssals have the problem that their entire tree structure is the same as Solars. There's nothing wrong with splats sharing Charms, but Charm tree structures also contribute to the problem for Lunars and Abyssals, because there's just the problem of "Why don't I just play a Solar?".

(And Abyssals literally have that as a major character arc, "I want to just go play a Solar". That's one of the big reasons I oppose Redemption for Abyssals as a thing you can live through - Redemption is fine as the end of your story, but playing as an ex-Abyssal Solar isn't. To put it as a tropism, yes, Redemption does equal Death.)
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My comment was 50% joke, and 50% commentary about the fact that simply telling that the charm was the mirror of another charm doesn't solve the problem of wordcount at all.

...Okay, 80% joke and 20% commentary. Not obvious commentary.

To do something more productive, Dif , could you please clarify for me something about your Virtue hack? Nevermind, reread the hack and found the answer myself. Ignore the half written question down here.

As far as i understand, the Desire is unrolled but can be used like the canonical virtues if need arises, the Restraint must be actively activated by winning the roll to be used like the canonical virtues, and the
 
Elero said:
It did note though that the final act that earns you redemption very often ends in the Abyssal's death. Something which people wanting to play a "cured"/curse-free Solar of course completely ignored.
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As someone who likes the idea of the redemption arc being survivable, I do think the ST should never let someone start out with a character who's already gone through that. It's... boring. "Let's play a character who's already gone through her most important character arc!"

Hah. No.
 
azoicennead said:
What method of combat is invalidated by removing the Martial Arts system?
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Everything but the canonical charms?

Also, here it is 1:30 AM so there is no way i won't ramble, but the way to keep martial arts without combinatorial hell is time consuming but "simple": make a martial art equilibrated with the charms of an exalted splat, stop the exalted splat from using any other charm but those of the martial art when it has effects active from the martial art, and then stuff the martial art with Merged Keywords to not rewrite half of the charmset and not make spend the exalted learning those charms a frackload of XP.

Now you can have unusual and "equilibrated" combat styles!!! CHEERS!!!!!!!!!!!

And now to bed i go: G'night!
 
landcollector said:
You're overreacting just a bit re: Martial Arts imo.
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No, he isn't. Besides the Eclipse anima power, martial arts is the worst combinatorial hell balance problem in the game. Because every splat (that matters) can use them, they need to be balanced for every splat, and every splat's stuff needs to be built around the assumption they exist. This creates a massive quality assurance problem because you take a bunch of separate disconnected sets and link them together such that if martial arts exists, Sidereal Charms need to be balanced around martial arts charms, Solar Charms need to be balanced around martial arts charms, Sidereal Charms and Solar Charms need to be balanced around the effect they have on martial arts charms and each other, etc, etc. If you kill martial arts and Eclipse charmsharing, you free yourself immediately from this, and only need to balance splats as isolated silos.
 
You know, Jon, the thing you call combinatorial hell is a thing I quite like.

I wish I knew a better term for it, without the implied judgement.

Robotninja said:
What would be a good way to stat up a hearthstone that ensures honesty among a radius around the bearer?
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Ensuring honesty probably shouldn't be possible. There are plenty of people with mental defenses and super lying powers in Exalted. So such a stone really ought to be fallible.

I'd probably just make it launch an automatic social influence attempt on anyone who comes nearby.
 
Jon Chung said:
No, he isn't. Besides the Eclipse anima power, martial arts is the worst combinatorial hell balance problem in the game. Because every splat (that matters) can use them, they need to be balanced for every splat, and every splat's stuff needs to be built around the assumption they exist. This creates a massive quality assurance problem because you take a bunch of separate disconnected sets and link them together such that if martial arts exists, Sidereal Charms need to be balanced around martial arts charms, Solar Charms need to be balanced around martial arts charms, Sidereal Charms and Solar Charms need to be balanced around the effect they have on martial arts charms and each other, etc, etc. If you kill martial arts and Eclipse charmsharing, you free yourself immediately from this, and only need to balance splats as isolated silos.
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What's worse is that it even forces fucking Spirit Charms to be balanced around the fact that they can go grab some martial arts charms when they feel like it.

Martial Arts gave us Sidereal Martial Arts, it gave us Even Blade Style, it gave us Blade of The Battle Maiden.

Why would I keep this?
 
Sanctaphrax said:
You know, Jon, the thing you call combinatorial hell is a thing I quite like.

I wish I knew a better term for it, without the implied judgement.
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Well, it's combinatorial hell because the huge number of possible combinations make testing for degenerate builds and trends in builds a royal pain in the arse, such that it can be described as a hell. Not much you can do about that, except hire some crazy bastard who likes testing (nobody likes testing) and give him time to run tests, which increases exponentially (nobody does this).
 
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ManusDomine said:
What's worse is that it even forces fucking Spirit Charms to be balanced around the fact that they can go grab some martial arts charms when they feel like it.

Martial Arts gave us Sidereal Martial Arts, it gave us Even Blade Style, it gave us Blade of The Battle Maiden.

Why would I keep this?
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Reminder that Black Claw Style sets the precedent that there are CMAs that can be learned by any First Circle Demon.

Another reminder that while sorcery is explicitly something you can't filter for when summoning a 1CD, "knowledge of a CMA" is therefore not limited in that way.

Hey, guys, you can ensure that any combat 1CD you summon knows a CMA.
 
EarthScorpion said:
Reminder that Black Claw Style sets the precedent that there are CMAs that can be learned by any First Circle Demon.

Another reminder that while sorcery is explicitly something you can't filter for when summoning a 1CD, "knowledge of a CMA" is therefore not limited in that way.

Hey, guys, you can ensure that any combat 1CD you summon knows a CMA.
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oh fucking kill me already will you?

why do you lengthen my torture?
 
Thanks in part to this discussion, and also my own crazy thoughts about running 2e again, I was looking over my old major system rewrites again and some inspiration came to me for a rules-tweak that could add some fun plot hooks.

Destiny Trading

One of the most important aspects of a young Sidereal's training is crafting their first Resplendent Destiny, though it would take many mortal lifetimes to truly master the art. Breathing a life and personality into being directly through their own vision can be as beautiful as the heights of artifice during the Age of Wonders, though few use it as such in modern times. While the elders may mourn the loss of the elegant shadow plays that once permeated both the Heavenly and Exalted courts, where they were both actor and writer. During the Shogunate, when all Sidereals were reeling from the breaking of the Mask, many would lose themselves in the wondrous Destinies that remained from the First Age, spending as much of their time living that idealized life as they could. However, the iron-clad laws of bureaucratic necessity demand that the destinies forged today are simple and built to purpose, there is simply no time to spend forging a truly glorious destiny when a simple tool will suffice.

A beautiful Resplendent Destiny would take the entirety of the identity being created into account and allow the Sidereal to live an entire mortal lifetime if they so chose, and take a significant fraction of one to create. It's personality would resonate throughout it's entire being, ensuring that its wearer would always know what would be in character and the correct actions would flow from the personality with hardly a thought. Such mantels brought their wearers to the same level as the greatest of the Solars in their performances and also glory to the weavers that created such a character. But the same laws which allowed diviner and performer to align their thoughts have resulted in an ugly reality where destinies are traded as a matter of convenience. The day-to-day appearances of a prominent patrician may not be interesting, but it is vital that they do occur.

The hours spent attending a normal dinner with the family are hours that a senior Sidereal will never get back, but such a task is the perfect test for a neophyte who's not yet trusted with taking over an important role. Being entrusted with a truly important destiny is a sign that one has been accepted within their bureau... and their Faction.

In the shadow war between Bronze and Gold, particular identities are often the main targets. One side will attempt to insert one of their sympathizers into the other in hopes that the young one can trick their overworked elders long enough to be trusted, without also being converted away from their beliefs. And as soon as they have the target, then they will reveal their true nature by handing it off to someone else.

Mechanics

A Sidereal can pass one of her Resplendent Destinies to another, who still has room remaining for more, by spending a point of willpower and touching them. The recipient can wear the destiny as if it was one of their own, gaining all of the normal benefits including the disguise, but they lack the innate understanding of what is out of character unless they took part in creating it. Any of the original creators can impart this knowledge through a detailed explanation. Alternatively, it can be obtained by studying the destiny's 'life' up until that point. This requires an Intelligence+Lore roll at a difficulty of 8. The difficulty can be reduced by 1 for every important source of information already known. These could be interviews with other wearers, biographies, publications, astrological readings, and many other potential sources.

Even for those with the knowledge, such study is very important because the destiny does not come with the knowledge of any of its past actions or acquaintances.

Potential Hooks

Outside of the new options for Sidereal intrigue, destiny sharing also gives other Exalts more of an opportunity to interact with or catch Sidereals in the act. The big fish will often give boring duties to their subordinates and no disguise is perfect. A mountain of a woman from the North suddenly becoming a slight, Western man will be as hard to notice as said woman's other identities normally are, but when someone does see through the disguise, something more obvious is going on.


Thoughts?
 
ManusDomine said:
What's worse is that it even forces fucking Spirit Charms to be balanced around the fact that they can go grab some martial arts charms when they feel like it.

Martial Arts gave us Sidereal Martial Arts, it gave us Even Blade Style, it gave us Blade of The Battle Maiden.

Why would I keep this?
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Blade of the Battle maidens?


What's the broken part about Even Blade?
 
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Jon Chung said:
Well, it's combinatorial hell because the huge number of possible combinations make testing for degenerate builds and trends in builds a royal pain in the arse, such that it can be described as a hell. Not much you can do about that, except hire some crazy bastard who likes testing (nobody likes testing) and give him time to run tests, which increases exponentially (nobody does this).
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Does the combinatorial hell abate if you disallow the use of charms from a Style with charms not of that Style? Say, not in the same combo?
Graypairofsocks said:
Blade of the Battle maidens?


What's the broken part about Even Blade?
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2e Charm from the default Sidereal style, which was supposed to basically be their "Hero Style", but suffered from the fact that it was available to anyone and everyone. Also the charm was a scenelong reflexive dice-adder in the vein of Infinite (Ability) Mastery at Ess 2 MA 3, making it...poorly designed.

And Even Blade was a product of Scroll of the Monk. 'Nuff said.
 
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