General Exalted Thread

[EarthScorpion]

Haar-Hidden Dealings
Cost: 3m; Mins: Essence 2; Type: Supplemental (Dramatic Action)
Keywords: Combo-OK
Duration: Instant
Prerequisites: Intolerable Burning Truths

Outsiders should not be allowed to know what goes on inside the family. It's none of their concern.

This Charm enhances a dramatic organisation-scale action taken by the Infernal or a beloved character. It imposes a +2 external penalty on all Awareness or Bureaucracy rolls to notice anything suspicious about the dramatic action, or +3 if every member of the organisation involved in the action is either beloved or a descendent of the Infernal. This benefit requires the characters involved in the dramatic action to uphold a degree of subtlety - oaths of secrecy to not speak of a conspiracy, sailing under false flags when raiding or disguising demonic icons as gods during a mass summoning would be sufficient.

Kin Over State
Cost: 4m; Mins: Essence 2; Type: Simple
Keywords: Combo-OK, Illusion, Sorcerous, Touch
Duration: Instant
Prerequisites: Haar-Hidden Dealings

To your kin, show honour and kindness; to your foes, show only viciousness. So say the Lintha, repeating lessons their Great Mother taught them.

Laying her hand on a character who is a fellow member of an organisation that the Infernal belongs to, she whispers a few soft words that sound like the surf, rolling (Charisma + Presence) against the target's DMDV. If successful, the target's Compassion and Temperance are modified. When dealing with characters who are not members of the shared organisation and are not blood relatives, they do not need to suppress Compassion or Temperance to act against those Virtues. However, against characters who are members of the same organisation or are blood relatives the individual must suppress the Virtues to act against them, even if they are not rated at 3+.

This Charm costs 0m to use against her own descendants or to use on herself. This Charm's effect is treated as an Illusion, which can be rejected by spending (Infernal's Presence – target's Essence) Willpower, to a minimum of one and maximum of five.

A second purchase at Essence 3+ causes targets to treat mental influence applied by their superiors in the organisation or their ancestors as unnatural. Further, the warlock may increase this Charm's cost to 10m and one willpower to target organisations with a Size no greater than her (Appearance) by touching the leader of that organisation, affecting them and all their subordinates. Countermagic frees only those individuals it targets rather than the organisation as a whole, but individuals who leave the organisation escape the warped view of the world it engenders.

Red Tributary Envelopment
Cost: 1lhl ; Mins: Essence 3; Type: Supplemental
Keywords: Combo-OK, Crippling
Duration: Instant
Prerequisites: Kin Above State

Demonologists know of the terrifying secret oaths of the cultists of the Demon Sea. Better to die than swear them and become one of Kimbery's brood, they say.

This Charm supplements a dramatic action to legally adopt a willing character. This can include adoption into organisations run as a family, such as the Lintha or many organised crime syndicates in Creation. As part of the process, the Infernal feeds them some of her body fluids. This is most commonly blood, though warlocks with a landscape body may have rivers or lakes that someone may sup from. From thereon in, this fluid flows in their veins, making them a descendent of the Infernal as a Crippling effect. This does not affect any children conceived before the adoption, but any future children will be the Infernal's descendents. These children 'naturally' descend from her rather than from a Crippling effect.

This Charm may be repurchased at Essence 4. Any priests of the warlock who are loyal descendents gain this Charm, though they must pay the cost of the activation. Individuals adopted by proxy are both the priest and the Infernal's descendents.

Instruction from Mother
Cost: 14m, 1lhl; Mins: Essence 3; Type: Simple (Dramatic Action)
Keywords: Obvious, Touch, Training, Desecration
Duration: One Week
Prerequisites: Haar-Hidden Dealings

Through love and pain, Kimbery teaches her children the same lessons she learned before time began.

This Charm involves training or instructing a group of non-reviled characters with Magnitude no greater than (Essence), using methods compatible with the themes of the Great Mother. This Charm requires at least an hour of tuition per day. At the end of the teaching, the students gain one of the Intolerable Burning Truths known by the warlock as an Abomination, and the Creature of Darkness mutation.

If the student already knows one of the Intolerable Burning Truths, the warlock may instead train them in a Style she knows, increasing its rating by one. She may not increase others' traits past her own rating in the Style.

Hidden Family Secrets
Cost: - ; Mins: Essence 3; Type: Permanent
Keywords: None
Duration: Permanent
Prerequisites: Instructions from Mother

The Demon Sea whispers hidden secrets to her favoured children. Only the most loved receive such a blessing.

This Charm upgrades its prerequisite and consists of four variants. When one of her students knows at least one Intolerable Burning Truth and has three dots in a Style, she may choose to teach them an Attribute or Ability which could be used with that Style. The Attributes and Abilities she can instruct them on depend on the variants she knows:

• Whispers from the Deep - Cognition, Occult, Lore, Command, Subterfuge
• Ways of the Water - Reaction, Travel, Bureaucracy, Survival, Athletics
• Ocean's Rage - Physique, Endurance, Melee, Ranged, Awareness
• Beauty Above All - Persuasion, Expression, Presence, Politics, Investigation

She cannot increase others' traits past her own, and may not raise character's traits past 4 dots with this Charm. When she purchases this Charm, she selects two variants to learn. Additional variants may be purchased for 5XP each.

Grasping Ocean Hag
Cost: 8m ; Mins: Essence 3; Type: Supplemental
Keywords: Combo-OK
Duration: Instant
Prerequisites: Haar-Hidden Dealings

Ah, fear the hungry ocean, but fear the monstrous mother and her rapacious cult-family more.

This charm enhances an Organisational Action in the Creation-Ruling Mandate system. It can be purchased multiple times, with each purchase providing a different effect.

• Creation-Encircling Tendril: This enhances a Reallocate Asset action, setting the Reach of the organisation for the purposes of Cumulative Difficulty to zero. In addition, if moving Assets mostly by water, the Difficulty is reduced to 1 and no planning phase is required.
• Remora Finance Practice: This enhances an Attack Asset action. Instead of reducing the value of the other organisation's Asset, the Infernal's organisation may treat up to (Essence) points of currently-unused Capital of the other organisation as "temporary Capital" which may be allocated to projects her organisation is engaged in. These points of capital remain committed until her projects end.
• Ocean-Laundered Dinars: This enhances a Transfer Capital action. If used to transfer Capital to an affiliated organisation, the obscuring passage of resources means that for each three points of Capital invested, Attack Asset and Attack Project actions suffer a -1 external penalty to target either organisation - as if both were defended by a Protect Organisation.

Well-Reputed Grotto
Cost: 10m, 1lhl ; Mins: Essence 2; Type: Simple (Dramatic Action)
Keywords: Combo-OK, Sorcerous
Duration: Indefinite
Prerequisites: Haar-Hidden Dealings

Taking a dramatic action lasting a minimum of six hours, the Infernal constructs and sanctifies a shrine to themselves, Kimbery, or demons who descend from either of them within a structure. As long as the shrine remains intact and within the structure, the faintly pulsing altar protects the sacred place from suspicion. It causes Awareness, Investigation and Bureaucracy actions to notice anything that would rouse hostility or suspicion about the structure or activities carried out in it to automatically fail, unless the observer has at least a two dice benefit from circumstances. Examples of relevant circumstances include rumours of criminal activity in it from an informant (+1), suspicious individuals lurking within (+1), the building being particularly extravagant or prominent such as a castle overlooking a town (+1), and walking in on a ritual of human sacrifice to a demon (+3). Characters who would not consider the activities within to be suspicious or induce their hostility are not obstructed, so drug-addicts looking for a seaside opium den or cultists heading to their secret temple are permitted to find what they are looking for.

This magical protection does not apply if the investigator can perceive the shrine, which pulses faintly with the Infernal's anima and warps to conform to Kimberyian aesthetics. Characters with at least Lore 1 can infer the demonic nature of the shrine with one success on a (Wits + Lore) roll. Destruction of the shrine ends the Sorcerous effect.

Primordial Smuggler's Trail
Cost: 15m, 1wp ; Mins: Essence 3; Type: Simple (Dramatic Action)
Keywords: Combo-OK, Sorcerous, Stackable
Duration: Indefinite
Prerequisites: Well-Reputed Grotto

Taking a dramatic action to travel between two locations the Infernal has previously sanctified with Well-Reputed Grotto, the Infernal maps out a smuggling trail with demonic skill as she leaves markers and carries out Kimberyian rituals along her way. She may permit characters or organisations to make use of the trail, though certain actions the Infernal specifies must be followed daily while on the trail to enjoy the benefits - for example, they must fly a certain banner, or carry out evening prayers to her. Failure to perform the actions means that the benefits of this charm cease to apply for the rest of the journey. No more than (Essence) Magnitude characters may make use of a given trail at once. This Charm terminates if either Well-Reputed Grotto at either end is destroyed.

This Charm has several variants and may be repurchased to unlock extra ones:

• Kindly Winds Way: Fortunate weather and demoniacally untiring animals ease the smugglers' way. Travel by water via the smuggler's trail moves at the speed of Tireless Rowing, while travel by land moves at the speed of a Horse Relay (Simple). If the characters would move faster anyway, they travel an extra five miles a hour.
• Bribed Watchers Practice: The power of Kimbery conceals the passage of those who would rather not be noticed. Characters on the smuggler's trail enjoy the benefits of the Solar Charm Traceless Passage, except they do not add their Essence to any opposed roll that would contest this effect.
• Nothing To Declare Statement: The Demon Sea's toxic power corrodes the minds of suspicious border officials and bandits. Onlookers who attempt to evaluate the worth of anything or anyone using the smuggler's trail see them as 'not worth their time', seeing only worthless trash and scrawny merchants who wouldn't even be good as slaves. This is an Illusion effect which costs two willpower to resist.

Multiple versions may be used to enhance a single trail, though the Charm must be activated separately for each variant as she refines her maps and hides idol-waystones along the way.

 

[horngeek]

Excellent overall, but

Red Tributary Envelopment
Cost: 1lhl ; Mins: Essence 3; Type: Supplemental
Keywords: Combo-OK, Crippling
Duration: Instant
Prerequisites: Family Above State

Click to shrink...

I think you mean Kin Above State for prerequisites.

 

[Aaron Peori]

disguising demonic icons as gods during a mass summoning would be sufficient.

Click to shrink...

The wonderful thing about Exalted is how it encourages, nay almost mandates, everyone in power be a paranoid authoritarian asshole who trusts no one they don't have absolute control over.

This Charm alone can be used to justify every Immaculate purge of the Hundred Gods Heresy ever.

 

[notthepenguins]

The wonderful thing about Exalted is how it encourages, nay almost mandates, everyone in power be a paranoid authoritarian asshole who trusts no one they don't have absolute control over.

This Charm alone can be used to justify every Immaculate purge of the Hundred Gods Heresy ever.

Click to shrink...

Well... if that Charm was out in the world, it might.

 

[Aleph]

Oh. Oh yes.

This is very pleasing to me.

Mwaa haa~

 

[SerGregness]

Red Tributary Envelopment
Cost: 1lhl ; Mins: Essence 3; Type: Supplemental
Keywords: Combo-OK, Crippling
Duration: Instant
Prerequisites: Kin Above State

Demonologists know of the terrifying secret oaths of the cultists of the Demon Sea. Better to die than swear them and become one of Kimbery's brood, they say.

This Charm supplements a dramatic action to legally adopt a willing character. This can include adoption into organisations run as a family, such as the Lintha or many organised crime syndicates in Creation. As part of the process, the Infernal feeds them some of her body fluids. This is most commonly blood, though warlocks with a landscape body may have rivers or lakes that someone may sup from. From thereon in, this fluid flows in their veins, making them a descendent of the Infernal as a Crippling effect. This does not affect any children conceived before the adoption, but any future children will be the Infernal's descendents. These children 'naturally' descend from her and this may not be healed by effects that cure Crippling.

This Charm may be repurchased at Essence 4. Any priests of the warlock who are loyal descendents gain this Charm, though they must pay the cost of the activation. Individuals adopted by proxy are both the priest and the Infernal's descendents.

Click to shrink...

The bit about 'this may not be healed...' only applies to the children, right? I had to do a double take the first time I read the thing ('What's the point of making it a Crippling effect if you can't cure it like one?'), so it might be clearer to specify that the children are not under a Crippling effect.

 

[MJ12 Commando]

A Qaf-based organisation would be ranked by guru-ish enlightenment: 'We're all walking this road, but I'm further down it'.

Click to shrink...

Disagree. Qaf's associations aren't about organization and religion, but about sharing enlightenment, endlessness, distance, and creation, I daresay that Qaf organizational charmtech will not be religious cult enlightenment, but rather more... anarchic.

Qaf's organizations are Anonymous. The Internet Hate Machine. Twitter mobs and Stand Alone Complexes. They're people who you've enlightened, acting in a way which isn't formally organized yet on a large scale become organized, coherent action. People who the Qaf Infernal enlightened before, sharing facts about the world with no cost, tend to act in the same way, to find like-minded people or simply to copycat others who act before them. The fact that this gets you the oWoD Mt. Qaf reference in is icing on the cake.

 

[EarthScorpion]

The wonderful thing about Exalted is how it encourages, nay almost mandates, everyone in power be a paranoid authoritarian asshole who trusts no one they don't have absolute control over.

This Charm alone can be used to justify every Immaculate purge of the Hundred Gods Heresy ever.

Click to shrink...

Let's be honest, when writing these charms I was basically amusing myself by imagining Deep Ones and star-spawn with the attitude of Italian mobsters.

Fat Dage: "Why you gotta be that way, eh? Got no respect. My mamma, she works hard making our all-natural fish soup, and you don't wanna come in and taste it? And then you go snooping around, Mister All-Seeing Eye Man? Big mistake. Tell 'em, 'Thuluia."

Big 'Thulhuia: "Big mistake. Smash your head in kinda mistake."

Fat Dage: "You said it right. Not the kind of mistake you wanna make twice, because, Mr All-Seeing Eye Man, you're gonna be sleeping with the fishes soon. One way or another."

Big 'Thulhuia: "I've been lookin' for a husband."

Fat Dage: "She's been looking for a husband. So what's it gonna be, Mister?"

 

[Ct613hulu]

These new Kimbery charms are certainly very interesting. I hope that you add them to the Book of Ten Thousand Scorpions as having all the best homebrew Kimbery charms in a single easily accesible document will make it a lot easier to use them.

On another note I wonder about the possibility of Lintha gaining access to these charms. It certainly seems like access to these charms could explain how their perverse culture managed to survive and prosper but I understand that there are a lot of good reasons to not allow the Lintha to have access to Celestial Exalted level capabilities. Do you have any opinions on this?

 

[EarthScorpion]

These new Kimbery charms are certainly very interesting. I hope that you add them to the Book of Ten Thousand Scorpions as having all the best homebrew Kimbery charms in a single easily accesible document will make it a lot easier to use them.

On another note I wonder about the possibility of Lintha gaining access to these charms. It certainly seems like access to these charms could explain how their perverse culture managed to survive and prosper but I understand that there are a lot of good reasons to not allow the Lintha to have access to Celestial Exalted level capabilities. Do you have any opinions on this?

Click to shrink...

No Celestial Charms for Lintha. Ever. Well, unless they Exalt as a Celestial, obviously, but then they lose their Lintha Charms.

On the other hand, appropriately balanced for them similar effects might well live within the Lintha Charmset. For example, a Lintha captain might be able to make it harder for non-Lintha people to suspect their ship, and all relatively pure-blood Lintha may be able to get a Permanent Charm for "non Lintha aren't people" because they have SUPER RACISM (that actually targets outsiders to the group they're part of, rather than non-Lintha, which is how the Lintha can fool themselves into believing their blood purity stuff).

(Likewise, although akuma don't get Exalted Charms they do get Charms themed around their Yozi patron which means that in practice you can port effects to them balanced around the limited Charms you allow this single akuma to learn, so in practice Durkthanka may know some of these Charms even if they're technically Panoply Charms which say "see these Kimbery Charms for mechanics")

 

[samdamandias]

Would ad-hocracies/agile development be a Qaf-esque or Adorjani organization? You basically toss a problem to a (from the Infernal's perspective) undifferentiated group of followers. The followers then differentiate, organize, peel off a number to deal with the problem you put in front of them, and when they solve that problem, they collapse back into being part of the faceless mass of followers.

 

[BossFight]

Qaf?

 

[Estro]

Article:

Qaf is described in many places as a mountain with "neither base nor summit". Qaf is isolated from the other You in his own dimension with blank white skies, connected to Malfeas by Black nacre portals amongst his many coloured slopes. Along the paths exist stations of ascent, with surface and alien lessons from those who would learn from the Spear, including many demons who seek enlightenment themselves. Climbing speed is controlled not by physical ability but by the wisdom of the climber

Source: rathess.xi.co.nz/exalted/index.php/Qaf

Thinking about it, I'm now wondering if those that wish to become Sublimati visit Qaf.

 

[Leetsepeak]

For those that care, Wastevens, creator of the 3e's Sidereals: Where Fate Has Lead, has reappeared from the aether of the Internet. He said he doesn't love doing editing as much as he likes making up new stuff, but that people poking him is encouraging him to get on that grind.

Some editing suggestions or clarification questions seem like a good opportunity to get some sense of his intentions and maybe help clarify things, if not for his version than for your own personal errata.

State of Sidereals: Where Fate Has Lead?

 

[EarthScorpion]

The wonderful thing about Exalted is how it encourages, nay almost mandates, everyone in power be a paranoid authoritarian asshole who trusts no one they don't have absolute control over.

This Charm alone can be used to justify every Immaculate purge of the Hundred Gods Heresy ever.

Click to shrink...

Incidentally, you got the systematic weakness of these Charms right away, that I deliberately engineered into them. They're fundamentally weak against people who are being indiscriminate in their use of force.

Take Well-Reputed Grotto, for example. The protection it provides does nothing when someone is ordered to turn every single house in a district upside down, regardless of whether there's anything suspicious about it. It thwarts precise investigations really well, because if you're careful not to stand out they're going to find it really hard to get the circumstantial bonuses required to track you down. But if the satrap just decides that they're going to clear the ghetto to get rid of the drug problem, then they can catch your secret protected drug den in their wide-area action (and then when their soldiers are looting the place as "tax", then they stumble across the altar and PLOT HAPPENS because the satrap's men stumbled across a blatantly demonic altar hidden in a place they hadn't suspected and now the satrap is going to act).

Or Primordial Smuggler's Trail, which means your smugglers can move really fast, don't appear to be carrying anything of value, and can't be tracked - but if they run into a border patrol with orders to turn back anyone, the Charm does nothing to help. Closing the border removes most of the advantages of this Charm, forcing them to try to dart across the perimeter and hoping that their lack of tracks will keep them safe. And they have to follow the trail to get the benefits, so they can't cross the border wherever, so if someone finds out where the trail passes through, they can lock it down.

So, yes, it's a feature, not a bug, that they "justify" Realm oppression and are also weak to oppressive overreactions and indiscriminate purges. Kimbery's organisational stuff is slow and corruptive and takes over from within - and can be burned out with fire.

 

[MJ12 Commando]

Would ad-hocracies/agile development be a Qaf-esque or Adorjani organization? You basically toss a problem to a (from the Infernal's perspective) undifferentiated group of followers. The followers then differentiate, organize, peel off a number to deal with the problem you put in front of them, and when they solve that problem, they collapse back into being part of the faceless mass of followers.

Click to shrink...

I think Adhocracies work for both Qaf and Adjoran. The difference is in how they'd express themselves. Adjoran's would probably be short-term goal oriented stuff. People getting up in arms about a single temporary Cause they're passionate about, then forgetting about it and their group, falling back into squabbling, once that Cause is accomplished.

Qaf's would be more long-term and unpredictable, because it's based on the enlightened realizing how to better this world in similar fashions. Adjoran would create a protest about a thing, Qaf would create ideologies.

 

[Imrix]

Kimbery's organisational stuff is slow and corruptive and takes over from within - and can be burned out with fire.

Click to shrink...

The Sea The Marched Against The Flame is not eager to repeat the experience.

 

[EarthScorpion]

Penzmadarka, the Coin Fetches
Demon of the First Circle
Progeny of the Custodian Abstract

A penzmadarka is no larger than a man's hand, and takes the form of a songbird with brazen feathers and a head of an aged woman. In Hell, they flock around the door-mouths of their maker Quv and pick forgotten treasures from his door-mouths. Their music is ugly to the ear and yet alluring, and while they sing men ignore things that are unpleasing to the eye and see only beauty. This tarnishes their hearts, coating them in a thin sheath of verdigris and from this verdigris is born greed.

Such men gather their wealth together and sit by it day and night, watching and endlessly recounting it. This pleases the coin fetch, for when the greed-wracked man falls asleep the demon swoops in. Despite their diminutive size, their hunger is immense and pains them constantly and a single penzmadarka can consume tens of times its volume in wealth in a single feast.

From such avaricious gluttony the coin fetches lay priceless eggs, made from precious materials and encrusted with hellish gems. These eggs are so beautiful as to break the mortal heart, and many who own one become ascetics, suffering exquisite agony from the knowledge that nothing else they own is as beautiful as this. However, not all hearts are so soft and many eggs are smashed open and the metals and jewels sold for base wealth. The penzmadarkae do not care about the destruction of their eggs, however, and they will gladly feast on their shattered remnants.

Summoning: (Obscurity 1/3): Sorcerers know well of the coin fetches, and call on them to take wealth from others and for their eggs. Quite apart from their beautiful nature, the hellish gems that encrust them have many thaumaturgical and sorcerous purposes. It is not rare for a particularly avaricious sorcerer to walk around with a penzmadarka on their shoulder. Hunger inflicts suffering on these greedy birds, and they gain a point of Limit for each day that they do not consume things worth at least Resources 3. A coin fetch can escape Hell when a snake egg is hatched by a brooding bird, the demon breaking out of the leathery egg.

 

[Maudova]

Penzmadarka, the Coin Fetches
Demon of the First Circle
Progeny of the Custodian Abstract

Click to shrink...

What inspired this demon?

 

[EarthScorpion]

What inspired this demon?

Click to shrink...

They're birds that lay Fabergé eggs - and like Fabergé eggs, they involve ruinous taxation (well, theft often) to produce them since their makers literally eat money.

Also, independently, they're a more classical "avarice demon" that a demonologist might summon because they want to be wealthy, but might well beggar themselves keeping it fed because it eats Resources 3 a day so you need to already be rich to keep it fed without having to engage in PLOT STUFF to keep your bird that lays the golden eggs happy.

 

[Eukie]

Disagree. Qaf's associations aren't about organization and religion, but about sharing enlightenment, endlessness, distance, and creation, I daresay that Qaf organizational charmtech will not be religious cult enlightenment, but rather more... anarchic.

Qaf's organizations are Anonymous. The Internet Hate Machine. Twitter mobs and Stand Alone Complexes. They're people who you've enlightened, acting in a way which isn't formally organized yet on a large scale become organized, coherent action. People who the Qaf Infernal enlightened before, sharing facts about the world with no cost, tend to act in the same way, to find like-minded people or simply to copycat others who act before them. The fact that this gets you the oWoD Mt. Qaf reference in is icing on the cake.

Click to shrink...

A place to put my Charms about making people believe strongly in the value of publishing manifestos, ideological purity, factionalism, and the value of abstract ideals and slacktivism over actual tiresome work! : D

 

[Aaron Peori]

I think its a mistake to make every Yozi have their own 'take' on each type of activity. The Infernals are not meant to be able to get everything they want from a single Yozi and should be required to branch out to fill gaps in their abilities. Malfeas, Cecelyne and Kimbery should have organization charmtech but Yozi like Adorjan, The Ebon Dragon and Isidoros should most definitely not have access to such a thing. If you want to have the ability to maintain and run organizations with supernatural competence then invest in a Yozi with that as one of their themes. Any attempt to beat a sword into a plowshare when it comes to Infernal charmtech should be discouraged if not outright impossible.

The Ebon Dragon doesn't develop organizations, because cooperation is anathema to his themes. Instead he targets the head of a existing organization and subverts them. Adorjan doesn't create cults or stand alone complexes, she accomplishes her whimsical goals by murdering things and falls in love with individuals which she enlightens and discards when she is finished. Qaf does not found religions, he encourages people to remove themselves from secular affairs and focus on enlightenment. Oramus does not have a cult he cares about, he inspires madness because his eyes are focused to the Beyond and the crazed acolytes who follow in his wake are insignificant to him and any meaning they find in their visions is disconnected from his goals.

Similarly, for a Yozi such as Elloge or Szorzeny if you want to go out and fightkill stuff, you should be forced to invest in a proper combat Yozi like Malfeas or Isidoros.

Remember, the Yozi not having convenient charmtech located in one tree is a feature not a bug.

 

[GardenerBriareus]

Any attempt to beat a sword into a plowshare when it comes to Infernal charmtech should be discouraged if not outright impossible.

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I disagree; one of the big things I like about Infernals (and which @EarthScorpion has discussed before) is the way Infernal charmsets are designed to twist you toward a certain villainous archetype*, and how Infernals who don't want to surrender to that must twist and warp and loophole their way around their own powers' dark nature - or make it their own by twisting multiple Yozis' charmsets together/going Devil-Tiger.

As for the rest of it, I'd say you can totally use Yozi Mythos Excellencies to run organizations under most circumstances - Isidorans stunt it as "people falling into their momentum" or something, while TED-invokers focus on subverting or opposing an antagonistic force placed opposite their own. Actual charmsets built around organization are a little more questionable, but I'd allow it as long as it's well-done.


* Malfeas wants you to roll around oppressing your thralls allies and incinerating your enemies like Sauron or Darkseid, Szoreny tries to warp you into murderous Gilderoy Lockhart, Metagoian Charms are all canted toward making you John Carpenter's The Thing, etc.

 

[EarthScorpion]

I disagree; one of the big things I like about Infernals (and which @EarthScorpion has discussed before) is the way Infernal charmsets are designed to twist you toward a certain villainous archetype*, and how Infernals who don't want to surrender to that must twist and warp and loophole their way around their own powers' dark nature - or make it their own by twisting multiple Yozis' charmsets together/going Devil-Tiger.

As for the rest of it, I'd say you can totally use Yozi Mythos Excellencies to run organizations under most circumstances - Isidorans stunt it as "people falling into their momentum" or something, while TED-invokers focus on subverting or opposing an antagonistic force placed opposite their own. Actual charmsets built around organization are a little more questionable, but I'd allow it as long as it's well-done.


* Malfeas wants you to roll around oppressing your thralls allies and incinerating your enemies like Sauron or Darkseid, Szoreny tries to warp you into murderous Gilderoy Lockhart, Metagoian Charms are all canted toward making you John Carpenter's The Thing, etc.

Click to shrink...

I think you might be misunderstanding @Aaron Peori's point a little.

Let's take my own Oramus stuff, because it touches on something he's said. My Oramus has no "Bureaucracy" Charms. That is because Oramus doesn't run things. He's a source of maddening knowledge, and madmen are susceptible to him, but he doesn't make super-effective cults or anything.

On the other hand, Oramus does have plenty of Charms you can use to help you lead an organisation. It's just that in terms of Solar Charmtech, they're mostly Performance. For example, Echoes of Enlightenment lets you hear it when people pray to you. Unlike Cecelyne's effect, however, it doesn't give you a way to answer their prayers - but people who pray to you can hear music you play, so if you can coax a cult into praying to you regularly, you can strengthen their faith by hitting them with social attacks. But thematically, it's a "cultists reach out and touch my cosmic chords" thing, while Cecelyne's is "I'm a desert goddess who answers the prayers of those lost in the wilderness".

Likewise, That Horrific Wisdom helps you make social attacks designed to "instruct, educate, or reveal truths" to a character. Yes, a player can use it to instruct someone in the best way to run an organisation and so control them, but that's you being a twisted sage and manipulating the current leader. Sanity-Shattering Instruction? It's akin to Solar HAM, a Lore Charm, even if it lets you create a cult of people obsessed with studying your mysteries. Even Society-Breaking Truths, the closest Oramus comes to a straight Socialise Charm (as it's similar to Taboo Inflicting Diatribe) requires you to reveal truths or unveil falsehoods to encourage the behaviour you way. Oramus cannot just arbitrarily set taboos like a Solar (or, indeed, like Cecelyne and her laws) can - he can only tell you the truth you didn't know or reveal what you believed was false to create a taboo against a certain action.

That's the difference between Oramus and Kimbery. Kimbery is supernaturally good at things that would fall under Bureaucracy and Socialise for a Solar, because by composition Kimbery is akin to a Dawn/Eclipse Charm-wise. Oramus is not, because I specifically built Oramus to be the largely equivalent to a Zenith/Twilight [1], and thus he's got Performance stuff, he's got Presence stuff, he's got Integrity Stuff, he's got Occult stuff and a bit of Craft and Survival and so on. But no, it's outside of thematic scope for him to set up an intricate criminal syndicate where no one betrays anyone else and there's a code of omerta that no one breaks (while that's totally Kimbery-OK).

Yes, Infernals can brute-force things by throwing Excellency dice at them, but that's basically irrelevant. When it comes down to it, remember, the difference between the Terrestrial and Solaroid dicecap is only two dice, so when you're running purely off Excellencies in non-combat fields you're barely better than a Dragonblood. And there are a lot more of them.

[1] Cecelyne, incidentally, I would say is Zenith/Eclipse in terms of her focus, Malfeas is Zenith-Dawn, @Revlid's SWLIHN is Twilight-Eclipse, Adorjan is Dawn-Night, TED is Eclipse-Night, @Revlid's Metagaos is Night-Zenith, @Revlid's Elloge is Night/Eclipse, and @Revlid's Isidoros is Dawn-Zenith

 

[changeling]

Yes, Infernals can brute-force things by throwing Excellency dice at them, but that's basically irrelevant. When it comes down to it, remember, the difference between the Terrestrial and Solaroid dicecap is only two dice, so when you're running purely off Excellencies in non-combat fields you're barely better than a Dragonblood. And there are a lot more of them.

Click to shrink...

On top of that if you are outside the excellency theme, Infernals outside it are worse than generic non-combat Dragon-blooded with presence+performance+socialize excellencies. Infernals are worse than Dragon-blooded without access to specific circumstances outside combat. I know it's obvious..

Oh, I wanted to say that I just read the whole Oramus charmset and it's brilliant. I kind of want to run a campaign with Oramus Chosen.

Also, would it be possible to create heretical charm that would allow to disregard EB' Witness to Darkness Charisma penalty to Oramus music charms? Or would it be imbalanced?

Proposed charm:

Twin Dragons Dirge
Cost: - ; Mins: Essence 3; Type: Permanent
Keywords: None
Duration: Permanent
Prerequisites: Witness to Darkness, Maddening Astral Piping

Ebon Dragon and Oramus are kin and creatures of transgression. It's no wonder that warlock may discover strange harmonies between horrible lies and terrifying truth offered by Twin Dragons.

Social attack involves making music never incur penalty from Witness to Darkness charm and warlock may use Manipulation in place of Charisma while making social attacks involving music.