- Location
- Singapore
So.... are you Big Brother, or are you a stalker?
General Exalted Thread
- Location
- Ottawa
Big Brother, definitely.
Anyway...
I like a lot of what you've done here. I'll probably use these, or at least some of these, at my table.
But there seems to be a basic "ideological" difference between you and me when it comes to Charm creation. Probably best way to explain is to take the first Charm in your set...
I can't stand fiddly crap like this. I would hate to spend a Charm slot on a small chance of a 1wp discount on adding a die or two to my Archery attacks. It's not even that it's a waste of xp, although it often will be; it's that I don't want to keep track of this stuff. And you've made it a root Charm so I can't avoid it. Adding insult to injury, it's an entry-level Charm that's useless for entry-level characters but a potential must-have for E5 combat monsters.
If this was a standalone Charm for specialized archers who want to squeeze out the last drop of efficiency from their attacks I could tolerate it, but having it at the root basically offends me.
That being said, maybe you've got good reasons. Is stuff like this important in a way that's not obvious to me? Will there be consequences if I remove it?
Anyway...
I like a lot of what you've done here. I'll probably use these, or at least some of these, at my table.
But there seems to be a basic "ideological" difference between you and me when it comes to Charm creation. Probably best way to explain is to take the first Charm in your set...
I can't stand fiddly crap like this. I would hate to spend a Charm slot on a small chance of a 1wp discount on adding a die or two to my Archery attacks. It's not even that it's a waste of xp, although it often will be; it's that I don't want to keep track of this stuff. And you've made it a root Charm so I can't avoid it. Adding insult to injury, it's an entry-level Charm that's useless for entry-level characters but a potential must-have for E5 combat monsters.
If this was a standalone Charm for specialized archers who want to squeeze out the last drop of efficiency from their attacks I could tolerate it, but having it at the root basically offends me.
That being said, maybe you've got good reasons. Is stuff like this important in a way that's not obvious to me? Will there be consequences if I remove it?
- Location
- ?
If dice tricks really bother you, you absolutely have my blessing to remove them or restructure the Charm trees however you like.
As an explanation, I generally approach the design of Charm trees by beginning with low powered Charms that are broadly useful (Spring Follows Winter isn't the best example of this, but I expect it to come up even at low Essence), then move through to more specialised but still low key effects at E1, provide the meat of the set's competency at E2, then the strongest general use Charms at E3, then back to more specialised effects for flashy and powerful stuff at E4+. There are exceptions to this basic format in most of the sets, but that's the skeleton of the design.
Personally I don't have a big issue with dice trick Charms, but I think you'll find that they are underrepresented here in comparison to the Ex3 Solar set.
- Location
- Ottawa
I don't object to dice tricks in general. Written a few myself. It's this type of dice trick that bothers me: the kind that adds a large amount of fiddling for little benefit. Actually, I dislike Charms like that when they're not dice tricks too.
I also don't think dice tricks belong at the roots of Charms trees, and I think that one ought to be Archery 5 Essence 3, but those are mostly separate issues.
Yeah, it's a reasonable approach. Solars use a similar one.
(Amusingly, it's the opposite of the model John Morke set out during the development process. But whatever, that's beside the point.)
I just don't think stuff like "you have a small chance of extra dice on every roll" is a good way to do "low powered Charms that are broadly useful".
I also don't think dice tricks belong at the roots of Charms trees, and I think that one ought to be Archery 5 Essence 3, but those are mostly separate issues.
Yeah, it's a reasonable approach. Solars use a similar one.
(Amusingly, it's the opposite of the model John Morke set out during the development process. But whatever, that's beside the point.)
I just don't think stuff like "you have a small chance of extra dice on every roll" is a good way to do "low powered Charms that are broadly useful".
- Location
- Singapore
Just read exalted: the sidereals.
If a sworn brotherhood of 12 essence 3 and 4 combat specced dragonblooded were to break into Yu-shan, how many gods and celestial lions can they kill?
If a sworn brotherhood of 12 essence 3 and 4 combat specced dragonblooded were to break into Yu-shan, how many gods and celestial lions can they kill?
Define "combat specced", better yet just write up some character sheets and list which gods they are facing.
- Location
- Singapore
On phone
- Location
- Wörms, the half continent
How large is a Yeddim? Bigger or smaller than an elephant?
An elephant isn't a structure, so I'm going to guess bigger.
- Location
- Canada
About the size of a tyrant lizard, since iirc they're the same size.
(Now the question is "how big is a tyrant lizard", because I'm not entirely certain if they're actually the size of an irl T-rex, and not noticeably bigger.)
- Location
- The sixth circle of Hell (second on weekends)
- Pronouns
- She/Her
Yo yo yo.
I tend to say that they're about as big as a Paraceratherium; the largest land mammal ever to walk the earth, and roughly as they're depicted in Exalted 2e corebook on pg 250. That fits nicely with yeddim being the size cap for Objects, and puts them at about 15-20 tonnes and ~5 yards high at the shoulder.
Edit: Size reference
Yeddim. They are big. This also puts them about level with Tyrant Lizards, which fits:
- Location
- Wörms, the half continent
That's... Large. And I do wonder how it is economically feasible to feed them for their use in caravans, but looking at Exalted's economics is not particularly wise.
Eukie
Powered by furious Canadian redheads
Do you have a moment to talk about the gold standard and the evils of paper currency? :3
Imrix
Periodically Malevolent QM
Oh, I'm fully aware. But, relative to the standard fantasy milieu which generally derives from D&D, where everybody and their dog spends gold pieces because D&D is largely uninterested in the intricacies of economic theory, Exalted is still pretty good.
It also helps that the economic flaws of Exalted kind of suit the setting that it lays out. The gold standard is a pretty weak system, but it is a historically popular system in the periods Exalted draws on.
- Location
- ?
Well, I disagree. An effect that can potentially benefit any Archery attack is as broadly useful as you can get in an Ability which is 100% based around Archery attacks. I myself have used this Charm in one of my test games to useful effect.
I don't think keeping an eye out for three 1s is a particularly fiddly thing to keep track of. There are an intentionally limited number of these conditionally activated effects applicable with each Ability so it doesn't get that complicated.
The Charm has roughly a 15-35% chance of triggering depending on your dice pool (that's on 14-21 dice, if you're curious, I did run the numbers). Given that archery attacks are something you are almost always going to be doing, I expect the benefit to come up in combat a fair bit.
It is, as I said, a weak Charm, though it scales more with Essence as the rerolls themselves become more potent.
- Location
- Wörms, the half continent
Well, yes, they are okay by fantasy standards, but given that I hesitate to even call that a standard is not a particularly high bar.
I mean, the Order Conferring Trade Pattern is a fairly decent justification for a Jade currency, and when you have a Solar handling interest and exchange rates and jade mining, you can stabilize the system with relative ease.
What, no, it's totally superfluous, unnecessary, and long-since defunct. The Order Conferring Trade Pattern should never be mentioned in the modern era - it's a First Age curiosity, nothing more.
The Realm has perfectly good reasons for using a jade currency, even though jade is inherently deflationary (as bastards take your high value coins and turn them into swords), because the Realm controls the Pole of Earth and thus can counter the deflation using its white jade. With a jade currency, the Realm can insist that taxes are paid in jade, and as a result other nations and satrapies must get their hands on jade to pay their taxes and tribute. That means they either need jade on their lands (in which case the Realm gets jade), they need to trade with the Realm selling them things for jade (making them a captive market, see the British Empire for how they did that), or they need to trade with other nations for jade (in which case the Realm gets jade).
It's win-win-win.
The Realm is economically much more similar to the British Empire than the Romans or the Chinese, as a colonialist naval empire reliant on its oceanic dominance and control of world sea-trade. Jade currency serves its mercantilist aims - it's a weapon of economic geopolitics.
Notice that the day-to-day trade in the Realm is carried out in jade scrip, which despite the derogatory name is actually a perfectly functional fiat currency (in theory it's backed by the Empress' purse, but it's practically fiat) which is bluntly a better currency than jade or silver.
Actually IIIRC at least one of the Core books of most editions point out that most trade is done with a barter economy and that Adventurers primarily using gold is a really weird thing that people usually chalk up to "Adventurers, bah!".
It's also one of the reasons that kids think of "run off to become an Adventurer!" in a pretty similar way to the "run off to join the Circus!" thing that used to show up in media.
Last edited:
- Location
- Wörms, the half continent
Another question, related to the first.
Do spirits (demons, elementals, ect) heal and calculate soak as exalted?
Do spirits (demons, elementals, ect) heal and calculate soak as exalted?
- Location
- The sixth circle of Hell (second on weekends)
- Pronouns
- She/Her
Which is the image from core that I mentioned, and roughly matches the size I put them at.
Azrael
Sakura Saber
- Location
- Throne of Heroes
All supernatural beings soak like Exalted. Exalted soak like Exalted because they are supernatural beings. Not sure on the healing thing.
Touch of Sepia
Artisan of the Vital Tincture
- Location
- Connecticut
God ES, you are a poet. As an ST who loves himself some Socio-Economic themes in his games, I'm ecstatic that you can speak to such volume at the drop of a hat in this thread. I wish there were a thousand thousand more of you - storytelling would be the veritable city on a hill.