- Pronouns
- They/Them
Would you mind if I use Mankalvar in my SI story? I could really use another faction to give the ancestor cultists foreign supporters, really round out the 'Cold War' analogy.
General Exalted Thread
- Location
- Brittany, France
- Pronouns
- He/Him
I write more of this setting stuff than I can ever actually use in my own games. I like nothing more than for other people to take my homebrew and run with it to do their own thing.
- Pronouns
- They/Them
Great, thanks! Got any other fluff deluges?
I'm sorry if this link has already been posted, but [Exalted] Normal Charms
This link contains several assorted charms of the quirky, cracky variety, including one which I suspect may be the archetypal Malfean stealth charm.
This link contains several assorted charms of the quirky, cracky variety, including one which I suspect may be the archetypal Malfean stealth charm.
Dynamesmouse
Bzzzzzz
I'm On A Boat
Cost: 1m; Mins: Essence 3; Type: Reflexive
Keywords: Combo-OK, Obvious
Duration: Instant
Prerequisite Charms: Crowned With Fury
Sometimes Malfeas is on a boat. It would seem that, banished from the world, laid low, wrongfully imprisoned and mutilated, that the sea, and the rocks, and the ships have forgotten his dominion over them. They would attempt to keep him from being on a boat. But so long as there is a drop of Essence left in Malfeas, the Devil Tyrant will not concede. He is, in fact, on a boat, and there is nothing anyone can do about it.
Whenever some event would inflict a penalty on the continued operation of a sailing vessel that the Infernal is currently on, they may activate this charm to make the penalty inapplicable so long as he remains upon the vessel in question. In doing so, he must shout at the source of the penalty, some kind of proclamation of his spacial existence upon the boat.
For example, were an iceberg to tear a hole into the side of the Infernal's vessel, he could shout "I'm on this boat, ************!" at the iceberg, and while the boat would still bear a crippling hole on its side, it would not impair the function of the boat so long as the Infernal remained upon it. It would remain buoyant, and maneuver correctly, and so forth.
It is possible for an Infernal to dock a perfectly operational ship, now composed entirely of a half dozen splintered planks and a scrap of torn cloth, held together only by his spite and stubbornness, only to step off of it, and have its remains collapse into nothing.
A second purchase at Essence 4+ allows the Infernal to convince everyone and everything around him that he is on a boat, even if he isn't. This adds an 8 mote surcharge onto the regular cost of this charm, and requires that they be committed. So long as they remain so, the Infernal is, for all intents and purposes, sailing on a Large Yacht (see the Scroll of Kings). He may even store cargo in this mostly fictional vessel, and bring others with him, as his authority convinces them that they too are also on the boat that the Infernal is clearly on as well.
This charm is perfection, as decreed by the Unconquered Sun. And Malfeas, who is on a boat.
Cost: 1m; Mins: Essence 3; Type: Reflexive
Keywords: Combo-OK, Obvious
Duration: Instant
Prerequisite Charms: Crowned With Fury
Sometimes Malfeas is on a boat. It would seem that, banished from the world, laid low, wrongfully imprisoned and mutilated, that the sea, and the rocks, and the ships have forgotten his dominion over them. They would attempt to keep him from being on a boat. But so long as there is a drop of Essence left in Malfeas, the Devil Tyrant will not concede. He is, in fact, on a boat, and there is nothing anyone can do about it.
Whenever some event would inflict a penalty on the continued operation of a sailing vessel that the Infernal is currently on, they may activate this charm to make the penalty inapplicable so long as he remains upon the vessel in question. In doing so, he must shout at the source of the penalty, some kind of proclamation of his spacial existence upon the boat.
For example, were an iceberg to tear a hole into the side of the Infernal's vessel, he could shout "I'm on this boat, ************!" at the iceberg, and while the boat would still bear a crippling hole on its side, it would not impair the function of the boat so long as the Infernal remained upon it. It would remain buoyant, and maneuver correctly, and so forth.
It is possible for an Infernal to dock a perfectly operational ship, now composed entirely of a half dozen splintered planks and a scrap of torn cloth, held together only by his spite and stubbornness, only to step off of it, and have its remains collapse into nothing.
A second purchase at Essence 4+ allows the Infernal to convince everyone and everything around him that he is on a boat, even if he isn't. This adds an 8 mote surcharge onto the regular cost of this charm, and requires that they be committed. So long as they remain so, the Infernal is, for all intents and purposes, sailing on a Large Yacht (see the Scroll of Kings). He may even store cargo in this mostly fictional vessel, and bring others with him, as his authority convinces them that they too are also on the boat that the Infernal is clearly on as well.
This charm is perfection, as decreed by the Unconquered Sun. And Malfeas, who is on a boat.
- Location
- Denmark
- Pronouns
- She/Her
Also, I've been bugging him about this on Discord for several days now because Bunraku quest is love, and I like to think that he did this to satisfy my hunger.
- Location
- The Pagoda of Masks
The Wild is like the tide, and Creation's edge like the shore it washes over. It is a gradual shift from Creation>Boardermarches>Middlemarches>Deep Wyld>Pure Chaos.
"The Bordermarches are the periphery of the Wyld, where the shallow waters of Chaos ebb and break on the shores of reality. The forces and forms of Creation still dominate the Bordermarches; they are warped rather than entirely changed. Barbarian and beastmen tribes dwell here, as do those raksha who like the taste of Creation without fully being a part of it.
Beyond and around the Bordermarches lie the Middlemarches, where the Wyld has made the landscape malleable and reality is like wax, soft and easily sculpted. Here dwell the majority of the raksha and other creatures strange and potent enough to survive the shifting world around them.
Further out yet lies the Deep Wyld, where even the raksha, creatures of Chaos as they are, find themselves endangered. Here the unshaped roam, and bedlam rules. One's surroundings change with every passing second, and outside the sanctuaries ruled by the lords of this realm—who are, of course, as insane as the place itself—or the occasional fragment of solidity, the world is a sea of rolling change and madness.
Beyond the Deep Wyld lies pure Chaos, the utter antithesis of reality. Here dwell things that are as alien to the raksha as the raksha are to mortals. The gods themselves dare not travel here."
"The Bordermarches are the periphery of the Wyld, where the shallow waters of Chaos ebb and break on the shores of reality. The forces and forms of Creation still dominate the Bordermarches; they are warped rather than entirely changed. Barbarian and beastmen tribes dwell here, as do those raksha who like the taste of Creation without fully being a part of it.
Beyond and around the Bordermarches lie the Middlemarches, where the Wyld has made the landscape malleable and reality is like wax, soft and easily sculpted. Here dwell the majority of the raksha and other creatures strange and potent enough to survive the shifting world around them.
Further out yet lies the Deep Wyld, where even the raksha, creatures of Chaos as they are, find themselves endangered. Here the unshaped roam, and bedlam rules. One's surroundings change with every passing second, and outside the sanctuaries ruled by the lords of this realm—who are, of course, as insane as the place itself—or the occasional fragment of solidity, the world is a sea of rolling change and madness.
Beyond the Deep Wyld lies pure Chaos, the utter antithesis of reality. Here dwell things that are as alien to the raksha as the raksha are to mortals. The gods themselves dare not travel here."
- Location
- Gladstone, OR
Thesis of Charm Design
This is primarily focused on Exalted and their Charms. The Charms of Raksha, Gods and other non-Exalts are special cases and not actually relevant to the core thesis of this document.
Stripping aside any thematic statements that Exalted make via their charm sets, the point of any charm printed in the books, (2nd edition primairly), is to make an improbably challenge approachable by probable means and actions.
The most obvious example of such are the Perfect Defenses. Exalted is a setting where there are beings capable of wielding vast, all-or-nothing powers that are for all intents and purposes, unassailable. Their nature is to be nearly all-dominating in a given field or action.
The Exalted exist to force conflict with these beings into something that A: human players can understand, and B: the system itself can support. A perfect defense essentially forces an unmaking reality beam into a mechanical phrase of 'I defend against the undefensible. Now we move on to the next round.'
This applies to almost any aspect of charm design and development- though thinking about it, I note another axis of design; Charms which expand or create new subsystems.
Now, 2e and 3e have the problem of these charms bloating the system, to the point that I honestly believe they should have BEEN the core system and then charms built on top of that to accentuate their mechanics. Alas that did not happen.
But let's take say, Speed the Wheels (2e). As the charm works, it essentially is intended to make sure any begin project action will take no longer than 3 months. This immediately and visibly pushes any form of dramatic scale 'organizational' play into a timescale that players can understand and the game supports.
So to summarize, Charms are designed with an eye towards recontextualizing 'the game world' into mechanically digestible terms, or enabling new approaches within that framework. Designing charms that don't do this leads to late 2e and modern 3e charm design problems.
This is primarily focused on Exalted and their Charms. The Charms of Raksha, Gods and other non-Exalts are special cases and not actually relevant to the core thesis of this document.
Stripping aside any thematic statements that Exalted make via their charm sets, the point of any charm printed in the books, (2nd edition primairly), is to make an improbably challenge approachable by probable means and actions.
The most obvious example of such are the Perfect Defenses. Exalted is a setting where there are beings capable of wielding vast, all-or-nothing powers that are for all intents and purposes, unassailable. Their nature is to be nearly all-dominating in a given field or action.
The Exalted exist to force conflict with these beings into something that A: human players can understand, and B: the system itself can support. A perfect defense essentially forces an unmaking reality beam into a mechanical phrase of 'I defend against the undefensible. Now we move on to the next round.'
This applies to almost any aspect of charm design and development- though thinking about it, I note another axis of design; Charms which expand or create new subsystems.
Now, 2e and 3e have the problem of these charms bloating the system, to the point that I honestly believe they should have BEEN the core system and then charms built on top of that to accentuate their mechanics. Alas that did not happen.
But let's take say, Speed the Wheels (2e). As the charm works, it essentially is intended to make sure any begin project action will take no longer than 3 months. This immediately and visibly pushes any form of dramatic scale 'organizational' play into a timescale that players can understand and the game supports.
So to summarize, Charms are designed with an eye towards recontextualizing 'the game world' into mechanically digestible terms, or enabling new approaches within that framework. Designing charms that don't do this leads to late 2e and modern 3e charm design problems.
Touch of Sepia
Artisan of the Vital Tincture
- Location
- Connecticut
Don't really agree with this. Those charms are to hand-wave and enable lazy storytellers and players - deforming not only the game but the very setting itself. You go from a world like Princess Mononoke or Conan and turn it into something silly like Gurren Lagann with perfect attacks and impossible parries. It reduces the majesty and magic of the whole story to empty motions.
Becoming an Exalt is about a new life and the long and lengthy challenges of that new life. The new ways society views you and how you will deal with that with only experiences that have never prepared you. Dealing with the dangers and treats of the world that has become so open to you - and they should be threats.
I know we all play different ways, but I think it comes down to how we look at the very beginning. The Primordial War:
1) Do you see it as a war where individual Solars (never any other Exalt) took out Primordials in a war spanning a single exalted lifetime?
2) Do you see the war as a period of preparation lasting hundreds of years where the Exalts were given powerful artifacts by the Highest and trained in secret by the most knowledgeable War gods. Do you see this as but a first step and that for a long time the Exalts had no idea how to slay what could not be slain. The war went on for centuries without the Yozi truly understanding that they were under attack, seeing the assaults on their World-Bodies as the sacrificial death-throws of lemmings. That the Exalted, all stripes, attacked the Primordials in waves, crashing and dying by the score - in singular battles that lasted centuries as shards found new hosts and those hosts found their way back to fill the gap in the line? Do you see the war against the Primordials as something that was the wearing away, over time, something Unkillable by something that would rise again and again - human will?
Certainly, I see no point to the former - it lessens the setting.
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- Location
- Brittany, France
- Pronouns
- He/Him
Actually I think the Primordial War is better if it lasted not "a single Exalted lifetime" but only a few years to a few month.
Zeus didn't spend a thousand years working his way up to Mount Olympus before spending a century bringing down Cronos. The Primordials were cosmic tyrants, creators of the world, grand and majestic; but when the Exalted rose up against them, they died. There was death, tragedy, epic battles, defeats, but none of these requires the war to be an abyss of time. If you look at the defeat of Adrian, it is a story that could have easily taken mere days to unfold. The Primordials do not have to be a match for the Exalted, because their relative "power levels" are largely irrelevant to the modern setting. The battle did not have to be a precarious balance that could have been tilted either way, because this story isn't about the Primordials. It's about the birth of the Exalted, and their first and epic deed, which need not be the greatest. They would go on to have other, greater adventures.
I can understand the other way, and appreciate the motives other people have for deciding otherwise. But "it lessens the setting" is not one such argument. What lessens the setting is making the defeat of the Primordials such a grand epic that nothing that came after could be compared to it; making it a deed that spanned countless lifetimes and was almost lost rises the Primordials but lessens everything that came afterwards - the actual history and people of Creation, their fights and hopes and dreams, what they made of the world.
Some people like that; they like having a Creation that was forever lessened by the defeat of its makers, Exalted who would never find such an epic test of their skill as this first war, a world that peaked in its infancy and would never again see such heights of prowess and tragedy. I can understand that even if I don't agree with it. But arguing that making the first battle of the Exalted their greatest, their first opponents their most terrible, the length of the war such that it dwarfs entire eras of Creation's actual history - arguing that this doesn't lessen the rest of the setting, that I can't see.
- Location
- Gladstone, OR
Most of my post is focused on the idea of charm design for playability, not the setting conceits and themes you're addressing. Essentially, if you are writing a Charm, it should hook into an explicit or implicit mechanic and modify it. Obviously not all charms need to be slaved to printed rules, however. The primary late-line/early 3e issue is that most printed Charms have become subsystems, instead of an expandable foundation that everything sits on.
Note that I am not actually making a judgement as to say PDs are good or bad design, just that their design goal is to compress an 'impossible' into the wholly possible realm of the exalted combat rules.
- Location
- England
Doesn't that apply in the present setting by default though?
The exalted host has been greatly lessened after the usurpation, and never faced a challenge that required as much effort as the primordial war during its golden age.
Every action after that had the host divided, there support from most high diminished by the loss of Gaia and Autochthon, and never really pressed them to the point of annihilation. Even the treats they face in the 3rd age would have been nothing to the Incarnae at the height of primordial rule, or the united host of the first age.
You can still have grand epics about saving creation, but the idea that any threat that a single circle can deal with, without regaining all the support they needed to succeed against the primordials, would be a greater threat is kind of stretching it.
Greater challenge due to strained resources sure, but greater absolute treat, not so much.
- Location
- Brittany, France
- Pronouns
- He/Him
Oh, modern Creation is lessened compared to what came before. It has post-apocalyptic aspects and shades of the Dying Earth and you're supposed to look at the past ages in awe.
I just... Like that to be looking at the past ages. Not the Primordial War alone.
I don't want "X is from the Primordial era" to be a shorthand for "it's cooler than anything else." I like for the First Age, the Age of Dreams, to have been a curve upwards of increasingly amazing achievements and challenges. I want the Exalted's greatest works, in their singular glory, to outshine that of the Primordial (who still get to have forged an entire world, a deed even the Exalted didn't replicate, so it's not like that makes them chumps either).
A Solar Exalt should look at what her past life has wrought, and weep at how much has been lost by this Age of Sorrows. She should look at what her Past Life had done, and shudder at the terror brought about by the decadence of the Exalted. In neither case should the shadow of "but the Primordials had done greater things, and been more terrible yet" be cast over these visions.
azoicennead
Overly-Affectionate Zombie Squad
- Pronouns
- He/They
Alright, first of all, fuck the idea that Gurren Lagann as a whole is "silly". It's exaggerated and not always serious (and, sometimes, silly), yes, but I'd like to meet someone who so thoroughly misunderstands "silly" that they genuinely think episodes 8 and 9 are silly.
Seriously, in a later episode, a character tries to kill themselves - as in, puts a fucking gun against their head and is about to pull the trigger.
The fake protagonist Kamina dies in episode 8, and his adopted brother Simon (and, to a lesser degree, the rest of the main crew) spends most of episode 9 depressed as fuck.
After the timeskip, Rossiu (the guy who replaced Kamina as a partner-pilot for Simon) sentences Simon to death for trumped up charges, and later goes back to the underground village he grew up in to kill himself.
Oh, I should probably mention that in Adai village, where Rossiu grew up, they had a strict population limit, and whenever they exceeded that limit they would exile people (which was a delayed death sentence) until they were under it again.
After the timeskip, Rossiu (the guy who replaced Kamina as a partner-pilot for Simon) sentences Simon to death for trumped up charges, and later goes back to the underground village he grew up in to kill himself.
Oh, I should probably mention that in Adai village, where Rossiu grew up, they had a strict population limit, and whenever they exceeded that limit they would exile people (which was a delayed death sentence) until they were under it again.
Real fucking silly, right?
Now, on to the meat of your point.
Perfect effects are not silly, nor are they tools of lazy STs or players. They are to enable the imitation of classical heroes, such as Heracles, Odysseus, Achilles, Roland, and their peers.
These are all incredibly exceptional characters within their settings.
Princess Mononoke is about a dude who is different because he has a curse that makes him super strong and a different attitude than the rest of the cast. He's not incredibly charismatic, or skilled, or whatever. It's not the story of an Exalt. It's the story of a mortal interacting with spirits.
Frankly, I don't see any reason why perfect effects can't jive with the setting of Conan, though part of that may be lack of familiarity. You'd have to explain that to me.
- Location
- England
Fair enough.
I always interpreted the height of each age as different focuses
A primordial wouldn't care about something like the Order-conferring trade pattern, because improving creations stability from the wyld via mortal commerce would seem overly convoluted.
In the same way most exalts would care about the spread a particular breed of flower over creation, but it may really concern the primordial who put that idea up during creations design, or had a third circle based around horticulture.
Both ages should have meant something big was lost, just the first age loss should be more relatable to human characters
Revlid
blob of bugs
- Location
- England
Not that it impacts on the substance of your point in the slightest, but given Zeus and Cronos' first interaction was the latter attempting to devour the former as a newborn infant, it's hard to say that Zeus' war against his father didn't last a lifetime. Certainly, by the point he'd actually overthrown him, the Titanomachy had been his entire life up to that point.
I'd rather like to know if there are many myths dealing with a "young Zeus" learning and growing in power and gathering allies before he first climbed Olympus to confront his gluttonous king. I've only ever encountered one or two, most dealing with his disposition as an infant, but it seems a fascinating gap.
Touch of Sepia
Artisan of the Vital Tincture
- Location
- Connecticut
My point is not about when was cooler or even about lessening. It's about humanity.
The Exalted did not defeat the Primordials because they were stronger - they won because they had indomitable will. The whole point of the exaltations is that they would rise up and find new hosts a thousand times over - what was the point of any of that if the Primordials were defeated without making use of the key design feature of the gods super weapon? The Primordials were not defeated, they surrendered, because they were weary of the fight that would never end. Weary of the very literal emotional/mental and spiritual scars they bore in the form of the deaths of their component souls.
The High First Age was not greater than the Primodial Era because they were stronger or more creative. It is greater for two reasons:
1) First and perhaps most important - the victor writes history
2) Humans are never satisfied. You could plop the bastards down at the Games of Divinity and they would crave more. They push and push and push and tear everything down and build it up again.
To this I can only retort that I specifically called out the over focus of the Solar Exalted as a flawed conceit. All the Exalted matter, the Lunars and Sidereals in particular shape the world a great deal and have simply had weak writers that were too lazy or novice to have more than one hero or axis for which the world to spin about. Personally, I don't think your past lives are that important or something to look back on over much. Some characters can have expansive past lives, but it would be a kaleidoscope of dozens of lives indistinguishable form one another in most cases. The PC is green and the idea that they know better as they look on memories of decadence or what their shard has allowed previous bearers to do is a little silly. You are your own person telling your own story - gone is the Solar Deliberative that grabs you by the hand and guides you right back into your old life with all the accouterments and titles. There is no guide, you are lost and alone and trying to figure it all out. The gods won't tell you and want to use you...and that's really where Lunars could have been very different. What must a Solar alone in the world look like compared to a Lunar with a mentor and knowledge stretching back to the beginning? The writers would have you look at the Solar and see someone more confident, more prepared and far better informed/equipt. That is foolishness as well. To point to 300 Lunars and give them 1800 years and say they are less knowledgeable, hold less magical armaments and magic, and to claim a Solar would sooner make truck with the gods?
Most players I see want to see the Solars, alone with no Lunar/Sidereal assistance, up-end all the Deathlords and solve every problem from the Lintha to the Wyld in 2-3 years. The Solar Deliberative had issues all the time when all 700 Celestials 1,000,000+ Dragonbloods and the Highest were still working together - they were the incumbent then and had a power-base. Those times are gone - the return of the Solars is not the sudden reemergence of the Solar Deliberative with all the support networks and such things. The Solars are greatly lessened as kings lacking vassal or lands. Everyone is now a rival for pieces of a broken world. Just like the Houses of the Realm with their government shattered - they do not work together other than to further themselves. Even the Lunars, who recall a time when the One World Government allowed a mostly smooth allocation of global resources, they have abandoned such impossible concepts build on the unity of a war against the world makers...and everyone does their own thing as the Thousand Streams River. The idea of the impossible power of the Solar Deliberative is really and truly dead and I'd expect it to take at least 1500 years to build something similar again *given an external event to force the hands of so many desperate and different beings of power to join hands*.
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azoicennead
Overly-Affectionate Zombie Squad
- Pronouns
- He/They
You can have the Celestial Exaltations find new hosts without the hosts dying of old age. A lot of people die in wars.
It's... kind of one of the defining features of most wars. That people die.
Don't forget the part where several of them actually died, which is rather important given that they were actually impossible to kill until the Exalted showed up.
Touch of Sepia
Artisan of the Vital Tincture
- Location
- Connecticut
Putting words in my mouth? Never said they died of old age.
azoicennead
Overly-Affectionate Zombie Squad
- Pronouns
- He/They
Maybe I was reading a bit much into your posts, but this:
combined with previous things you said seemed to heavily imply what I responded to.
I can't speak for everyone, but I'm fairly sure if there's one person, me in this case, who saw almost the exact opposite of what you say it implies and nothing that indicates your view, it can't be said to imply it heavily. It may still imply it to you, but the way I read it? It's meant to be something where every one of the Celestials died over and over, frequently in the same battle against the same 'individual', which could well last years. I still don't know about it lasting multiple centuries, but I would expect it to take at least a decade to pin down and kill any Primordial after the very first one to die, because they would almost certainly adapt to hit and run battles long before they would surrender.