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General Exalted Thread

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GeneralChaos said:
Yes, but.

On a Doylist level, Anchors serve to make you go out and get to adventuring. On a Watsonian level, if invoking Ligier's name to get a fraction of his power can burn an city to radioactive ash, then he needs to be able to.

And if he can, then why is an Anchor required for your Enlightenment 10 Slayer to burn a city into radioactive dust? He's on the same level of enlightenment, he's got a hell of a lot of power himself. Why can't he?
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Once again, you are ignoring the fact that the sorcerer is not a passive participant, and they are in fact pumping a huge number of motes into Total Annihilation. Your argument is as exactly as facile as saying that people should be able to spam canon!Total Annihilation just by building one's self into a rage and whispering the lost name of Ligier, because that's all the spell description text says the sorcerer needs to do (ignoring its 65m, 3wp cost).

You don't get to cry "Watsonian" when you're ignoring the in-setting logic in favour of your straw figure.

So, no, you are not just "invoking Ligier's name". You're tearing a hole in reality and drawing a fraction of the giant green sun that dwells at the heart of Malfeas through your magic. Or you're drawing on the tiny ember he granted you when you signed your pact with him, and feeding it vast amounts of fuel. Or perhaps the fact that the two of you hate the same person enough to be Allies means your natures are akin, and so letting your mutual hate flow into the essence makes it burn green.

As for why Ligier can burn cities-sized regions in Malfeas to slag when he focusses his wrath on them... that's because he's a giant sun as well as a man. Are you a giant burning green sun at the heart of the demon city? [1]

No. No, you are not. Just like Munaxes can make entire towns fall into her depths, because she's a giant chasm while Exalts are not.

Yes. Ligier can do things natively of a scale that Exalts have to use sorcery to achieve [2]. Exalts can do things Ligier cannot. This is not new or novel. Complaining that not all entities have the same powers isn't going to get very far.

[1] Ligier's light when he turns his scornful gaze on Malfeas to purge an affront from the world... is environmental damage and thus no-sold by a bunch of Exalted defences. And that means that if you survive that, he then sends the Sword of the Yozis down to fight you in the middle of a firestorm, on a place where the metal buildings are melting and the entire area is irradiated by Green Sun Wasting. And then if you beat the Sword of the Yozis, he descends to fight you in person to have a kung fu fist fight.

[2] Or, you know, they can get into a similar ballpark with the max level Shintai, like the Greater Shintai of the Endless Desert which can destroy cities by making you into IMOTEHP SANDSTORM... and which is also similarly bad at fighting Exalts.
 
runeblue360 said:
Not really? I wouldn't expect an Elder to have too many of the spells in the corebook if they cost XP, whereas if it only costed training time, I'd imagine that they'd have picked up everything that would even be tangentially relevant.
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...Does 'NPCs don't use XP anyway' mean nothing to you?

Let me use an example. Say I'm the ST for a Solar game, and my players have decided that Frozen Wolf, the Mad Witch-King of the North, is a shitty dude and they'd like to murder him violently. When they confront him within his fortress of magical ice, I need to have a statblock for him so that this fight means something and they can actually interact with the game rules.

As I make this Elder Lunar's statblock, assuming spells cost XP to buy, I will go ahead and select every spell I feel like this millenia old Lunar would know. Because he's not a PC, and so the system put in place to handle PC advancement, XP, doesn't really factor in to me trying to make an appropriate encounter.

Lets see if there's any difference if spells don't cost XP.

As I make my Elder Lunar villain's statblock, I... give him every spell I feel he should have, ignoring XP because he's an NPC and so doesn't need to use it. Oh, spells don't cost XP anyway. Cool. I continue to give him the exact same spells as I would if they did.


In essence, I find your... I guess complaint, conpletely nonsensical. Whether or not spells have an XP cost does not in anyway effect how many spells an Elder (or any other NPC) would have. Because NPCs don't use XP anyway, and are instead made by the Storyteller to fulfill a role. If your ST decides to build an NPC on XP, good for him, it's not the default assumption. If your ST decides Frozen Wolf the Mad Witch King of the North knows every possible variant of every spell ever published, whether or not you would have an insane XP price tag to get that capability isn't going to stop your ST.
 
Azrael said:
In essence, I find your... I guess complaint, conpletely nonsensical. Whether or not spells have an XP cost does not in anyway effect how many spells an Elder (or any other NPC) would have. Because NPCs don't use XP anyway, and are instead made by the Storyteller to fulfill a role. If your ST decides to build an NPC on XP, good for him, it's not the default assumption. If your ST decides Frozen Wolf the Mad Witch King of the North knows every possible variant of every spell ever published, whether or not you would have an insane XP price tag to get that capability isn't going to stop your ST.
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I think I've failed to communicate a few implicit assumptions I play games with about suspension of disbelief and verisimilitude and such. Most of the time, I assume a level-ish playing field between the party and antagonists. Of course, NPCs are usually not as competent in terms of time to ability as PCs because the default assumption is that the latter are inherently exceptional, even amongst the heights of the Exalted.

There's no real problem if they have literally every spell ever printed because a lifespan measured in millenia makes it 100% plausible. There's only problems when they lack a Philospher-King's ransom in spells. I find it significantly harder to believe that they wouldn't put aside the time necessary to learn every spell that could conceivably be useful for them even when that wouldn't serve the best interests of the story, when spells don't cost arbitrary currencies that would limit such things and instead only require investments of time.
 
runeblue360 said:
I think I've failed to communicate a few implicit assumptions I play games with about suspension of disbelief and verisimilitude and such. Most of the time, I assume a level-ish playing field between the party and antagonists. Of course, NPCs are usually not as competent in terms of time to ability as PCs because the default assumption is that the latter are inherently exceptional, even amongst the heights of the Exalted.

There's no real problem if they have literally every spell ever printed because a lifespan measured in millenia makes it 100% plausible. There's only problems when they lack a Philospher-King's ransom in spells. I find it significantly harder to believe that they wouldn't put aside the time necessary to learn every spell that could conceivably be useful for them even when that wouldn't serve the best interests of the story, when spells don't cost arbitrary currencies that would limit such things and instead only require investments of time.
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There are two real solutions to this. First, while the assumption that you can always advance is a convenient one, there probably should be a point where you have to make a choice regarding xp, where either you can maintain your current abilities or learn new ones in exchange. Not a low cap by any means, but one that means Elder's aren't omni-competent. And while spells in a model don't cost XP, they should probably fall under the same idea.

Second, and more critical, people aren't hyper efficient robots always seeking out edges. Even for those who want the edges, constantly seeking that will wear them down eventually, leading to diminishing returns. Not to mention that, while they do cost time, there are other costs involved. To create spells you generally have to go out and do stuff, which takes time from other activities that you could be doing.
 
runeblue360 said:
There's no real problem if they have literally every spell ever printed because a lifespan measured in millenia makes it 100% plausible. There's only problems when they lack a Philospher-King's ransom in spells. I find it significantly harder to believe that they wouldn't put aside the time necessary to learn every spell that could conceivably be useful for them even when that wouldn't serve the best interests of the story, when spells don't cost arbitrary currencies that would limit such things and instead only require investments of time.
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...Yeah, I don't get your complaint, because again, this is already the case. NPCs do not use XP, they are characters made by the Storyteller and possess whatever capabilities the ST gives them. You're basically saying you think every (non-PC at least) Exalt with a lifespan of a few hundred years should have 5 in every trait, every Charm in their splat list, and every spell. Because none of that costs an NPC any XP, as they do not have XP.

Like, of course most NPCs will be made with an eye to not having them roll over the PCs. But a stronger or weaker foe is an option. As is a character who, for entirely personal reasons, never sees a need to learn every single spell. Even if they had the time and nothing better to do, which is itself kind of a massive assumption.

Your problem seems to lie in the assumption that every NPC is a rational-bot sitting in a library learning spells and doing literally nothing else.
 
Shyft said:
You yourself are pointing this out with regard to 'learn sorcery with complications' or 'learn a Charm'. A lot of what ES is trying to do is prevent 'Box of Scraps' gameplay, where the sorcerer or crafter or god-king can turtle in his place of power and not engage the rest of the world.
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What if instead of requiring these anchors to cast a spell at all, using anchors granted benefits? Say you could cast the spell as-written by yourself, but having Ligier donate some fire, or having the compliance of the local terrestrial court of gods could reduce costs, improve output and make a better mousetrap? That way the people who are interested in optimizing would be incentivized to pursue this, while the ones who aren't really interested don't get cut out of a huge chunk of gameplay.

ManusDomine said:
But like, if you don't want connections to the world, and you don't want to go through effort to do your Thing as a sorcerer then uh, I guess the Anchor system just isn't for you?
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I guess it really isn't, at least not as it stands. I feel that this whole system of relying on external aids, making pacts and digging up ancient artifacts works really well for a non-exalted thaumaturge or sorcerer-wannabe who wants to pull off a moment of power, but in my mind an Exalt ought to be able to form sorcery personally with their own internal power.
 
Cosar said:
There are two real solutions to this. First, while the assumption that you can always advance is a convenient one, there probably should be a point where you have to make a choice regarding xp, where either you can maintain your current abilities or learn new ones in exchange. Not a low cap by any means, but one that means Elder's aren't omni-competent. And while spells in a model don't cost XP, they should probably fall under the same idea.
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That works, sure.

Cosar said:
Second, and more critical, people aren't hyper efficient robots always seeking out edges. Even for those who want the edges, constantly seeking that will wear them down eventually, leading to diminishing returns. Not to mention that, while they do cost time, there are other costs involved. To create spells you generally have to go out and do stuff, which takes time from other activities that you could be doing.
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They don't have to be auto-optimising robots when they've got decades and centuries of life to learn with. Experience adds up over time, y'know?

Azrael said:
...Yeah, I don't get your complaint, because again, this is already the case. NPCs do not use XP, they are characters made by the Storyteller and possess whatever capabilities the ST gives them. You're basically saying you think every (non-PC at least) Exalt with a lifespan of a few hundred years should have 5 in every trait, every Charm in their splat list, and every spell. Because none of that costs an NPC any XP, as they do not have XP.

Like, of course most NPCs will be made with an eye to not having them roll over the PCs. But a stronger or weaker foe is an option. As is a character who, for entirely personal reasons, never sees a need to learn every single spell. Even if they had the time and nothing better to do, which is itself kind of a massive assumption.

Your problem seems to lie in the assumption that every NPC is a rational-bot sitting in a library learning spells and doing literally nothing else.
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It appears I am incapable of communicating my point to you in a way that would lead to productive discussion. My apologies for that.
 
runeblue360 said:
They don't have to be auto-optimising robots when they've got decades and centuries of life to learn with. Experience adds up over time, y'know?
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The point is that getting those experiences requires them to prioritize them. You have to make an active choice to learn those spells and gain the anchors that work with them (or modify the spell accordingly). And to do that instead of improving/keeping up your other anchors (just about everything except stuff like Artifact do come with the assumption that you need to do stuff for upkeep). Or anything else that you might want to do. This is what I was getting at, so the response that experiences pile up doesn't really address anything.
 
Cosar said:
The point is that getting those experiences requires them to prioritize them. You have to make an active choice to learn those spells and gain the anchors that work with them (or modify the spell accordingly). And to do that instead of improving/keeping up your other anchors (just about everything except stuff like Artifact do come with the assumption that you need to do stuff for upkeep). Or anything else that you might want to do. This is what I was getting at, so the response that experiences pile up doesn't really address anything.
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Ah, I see. What I meant was even if they only dedicate a small proportion of their time to self-improvement, it adds up over decades. It only requires them not to spend zero time whatsoever on getting an edge on their rivals, something that I would consider a natural activity for any Exalt given how deadly Creation is.
 
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runeblue360 said:
Mm, that seems like it would result in Elders being able to pull pretty much any spell they'd want straight out of their ass, given their centuries long lifespans and all. Not sure if that's a positive or negative in your book.
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Elders can and do already do that anyway with both Charms and Spells. I mean have you looked at the character profiles in the Dreams of the First age books?

What this does is give the Circle a meaningful way to seek out and destroy the Elders places of power, weakening the tired old monster before they ever have to face him directly. Just as Sorcerers are mechanically incentivized to build up backgrounds, so too are the Elders weakened if those backgrounds are taken away. Annihilate his cult to remove his instant armor, invade his lands to remove the authority that binds his demons, steal his artifact to turn his butterflies against him.

Under the ES system,Elders are incentivized to use this Anchor System to increase their own power after a certain point, since they don't have the same godlike charms and stats of 2e Canon.
 
runeblue360 said:
Ah, I see. What I meant was even if they only dedicate a small proportion of their time to self-improvement, it adds up over decades. It only requires them not to spend zero time whatsoever on getting an edge on their rivals, something that I would consider a natural activity for any Exalt given how deadly Creation is.
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And yet what I said still applies. With the added bonus of you really misrepresenting what's going on. Because while the time spent training for a new spell is nothing over the course of a decade, in the present that means spending 8 hrs a day for weeks on an activity ( more if, as is likely, that in a system were learning spells costs no xp the time needed to learn them goes up). That's a non-negligble amount of time spent on the activity. It's not something that is easy to squeeze into any given day. Especially if you have other things that demand your attention. I mean, if I had a rival who was taking weeks off to go learn some spell that might give a potential advantage at some point, I could use that time to mess with the stuff he already has. Weaken his kingdom, his allies, that sort of thing.

Essentially, the issue of Elders constantly seeking to secure their position against other Elders can actually help prevent the scenario you're attributing to it.
 
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Sucal said:
Under the ES system,Elders are incentivized to use this Anchor System to increase their own power after a certain point, since they don't have the same godlike charms and stats of 2e Canon.
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I'm afraid I don't follow. I think you've missed a bit of context here; I was responding to @ManusDomine's suggestion that the XP cost for spells be removed. I'm not sure you took a criticism of the Anchor system as a whole from that.

Cosar said:
And yet what I said still applies. With the added bonus of you really misrepresenting what's going on. Because while the time spent training for a new spell is nothing over the course of a decade, in the present that means spending 8 hrs a day for weeks on an activity ( more if, as is likely, that in a system were learning spells costs no xp the time needed to learn them goes up). That's a non-negligble amount of time spent on the activity. It's not something that is easy to squeeze into any given day. Especially if you have other things that demand your attention. I mean, if I had a rival who was taking weeks off to go learn some spell that might give a potential advantage at some point, I could use that time to mess with the stuff he already has. Weaken his kingdom, his allies, that sort of thing.
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I don't particularly think this holds true. Downtime exists and there are lulls in which only minor skirmishes occur between periods of outright war. And sure, it's a non-negligible amount of time but it's hardly a death knell for other activity. People can work a nine to five while still having time for self-improvement and that's without the superhuman determination of an Exalt or anywhere near their autonomy and control over their circumstances.

And it's no different to something like building up a kingdom, which Exalts have plenty of time to do, regardless of rival intervention. Both Total Anihilation and an army of Tiger Warriors represent ways in which your kingdom can destroy a polity. It's simply a difference of whether you invest your time into personal, political or temporal power.
 
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So there's been a lot of critique thrown @EarthScorpion 's way, and I do have a 'last thought' i'd like to contribute. Hopefully it helps.

One fundamental 'thing' about the perception of play, of what is 'valuable' is how it feels at-table or on-screen.

A lot of the times, when I've played crafters, my storytellers have thrown up their hands and say 'Here you have your artifact over this vague span of downtime'. I tend to look at that with frustration, because for me I was looking forward to getting the artifact as much as having it, the reality is though that any sort of obligatory sidequest is a screentime tax.

Now, let's say there's a robust downtime system for arbitrating these kinds of things. The problem there is that they're so wide-angle, it feels impersonal and cursory; there's no challenge. Going on an off-camera quest to get the vital reagent or steal the secrets is... boring- now in ES's case he does try to make it so those types of strategic actions are 'of opportunity'.

To refocus, lets say I want to expand Inks's backgrounds to create more anchors. I can either do on-camera, 'fun' stuff like showing off for NPCs, going off on Adventures, or otherwise being a glorious golden god-king... or the ST can go 'you have two seasons, what strategic actions do you take?' and I go "I'll spend my two seasons buiding influence'.... And then I get dots of Influence. Handed to me because i spent time.

There's not a lot of game that. THere's a place for it, it should exist in Exalted's gameplay toolbox, but it's a notable consideration.

Now, the crunchier the 'downtime' system gets, the more it feels like a challenge, which makes the dots you earn feel more valuable and impressive. Too crunchy and it gets in the way of play.

Tangentially related to that, is that a lot of ES's ideas are written with an eye towards increasing pagentry, to incentivize the player creating these fantastic descriptions of how they do things instead of letting it be this largely blank game-actor in an equally sparse world.

The problem is, when you mechanize or pseudo-mechanize that, pagentry because a back-forth between player and storyteller that requires a lot of co-writing investment.

Like, take the stormgod ally concept. You can't just say your sorcerer has a stormgod ally, or has worked with a stormgod in the past? Not all campagins guarantee a rich, storied world to inhabit. Mechanics that increase that are a net positive in my end, so making it so more one-off spirits can lead to anchors is a good thing. But the ST has to work with the player, and that's not a default assumption, because a lot of people are conditioned to equate gameplay with challenge.

On that note you might've heard the phrase 'rewarded by difficulty', as advancing in a linear game experience makes it harder- usually by bigger numbers.

Lastly, more as a direct question to ES on how to approach this as a player- how do you get demonic allies and familiars without chargen background dots? Summoning them via 1cd seems to against-intent, and while you can beckon with thaumaturgy or pray, is that your actual intended approach?

Anyway, I hope this was helpful.
 
runeblue360 said:
I don't particularly think this holds true. Downtime exists and there are lulls in which only minor skirmishes occur between periods of outright war. And sure, it's a non-negligible amount of time but it's hardly a death knell for other activity. People can work a nine to five while still having time for self-improvement and that's without the superhuman determination of an Exalt or anywhere near their autonomy and control over their circumstances.

And it's no different to something like building up a kingdom, which Exalts have plenty of time to do, regardless of rival intervention. Both Total Anihilation and an army of Tiger Warriors represent ways in which your kingdom can destroy a polity. It's simply a difference of whether you invest your time into personal, political or temporal power. All of them represent ways in which you can get an edge over your rivals.
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I'm talking about downtime. You know, since that's the period of time under discussion? I'm not saying that the elders are going to be directly attacking, just that if they know that you're going to be busy they'll send minor annoyances your way in order to chip away at your power. If you're able to deal with the issues then there's no problem, but if you're spending time elsewhere, well, then you just might have an issue.

As for your second paragraph, again, no one's arguing that it's not possible to build up things. Just that past a certain point it becomes prohibitively expensive with regards to time to do so: building a nation is possible for Exalted. Building up 10 massive nations? Sure, you might be able to do that, but the nation's links to you are going to be tenuous, and easily co-opted by others, and the nations might be very unstable(depending on how you set them up). Which part of the original point that I mentioned in my post. You have to provide attention for backgrounds, and not just 'active play' attention. If you have an army of tiger warriors you need to manage them, induct new members to account for attrition, etc. If you have a nation you have to rule. That's a huge job, and one that will take time. To the point where, while you can learn spells, you're not going to be able to learn too many, especially of the upper levels. Not if you also want to be able to use all of the spells you know (and if not, well, then the problem is kinda solved). Nevermind if the time to learn is increased due to the spells now being free.
 
Cosar said:
I'm not saying that the elders are going to be directly attacking, just that if they know that you're going to be busy they'll send minor annoyances your way in order to chip away at your power. If you're able to deal with the issues then there's no problem, but if you're spending time elsewhere, well, then you just might have an issue.
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If it's minor annoyances, I don't see it as a particularly major problem for an Elder given that they'd almost inevitably have systems of delegation to non-mortal lieutenants. Off hand efforts aren't going to be a serious problem and I doubt they'd manage a turn around on their plans to clear three weeks to fuck with you.

Cosar said:
As for your second paragraph, again, no one's arguing that it's not possible to build up things. Just that past a certain point it becomes prohibitively expensive with regards to time to do so: building a nation is possible for Exalted. Building up 10 massive nations? Sure, you might be able to do that, but the nation's links to you are going to be tenuous, and easily co-opted by others, and the nations might be very unstable(depending on how you set them up). Which part of the original point that I mentioned in my post. You have to provide attention for backgrounds, and not just 'active play' attention. If you have an army of tiger warriors you need to manage them, induct new members to account for attrition, etc. If you have a nation you have to rule. That's a huge job, and one that will take time. To the point where, while you can learn spells, you're not going to be able to learn too many, especially of the upper levels. Not if you also want to be able to use all of the spells you know (and if not, well, then the problem is kinda solved). Nevermind if the time to learn is increased due to the spells now being free.
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Mm. I admit, I'm starting to come around your point of view. On the other hand, I think this makes Artifacts , especially given that they don't require personal attention and are the easiest to obtain through Sorcery. Which, I guess, sure, sorcerors should barely be able to walk for the phat loot they carry with them but even then.
 
Broken25 said:
See, there is this smallish number of spells that are so incredibly good that any sorcerer will want regardless of circunstances (That is, infalible messenger, summon demon/elemental, banish demon, c. Also DOOB and invulnerable skin if you want combat magic.) Adding an aesthetic layer above this doesn't really change much.
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It doesn't? Having DOOB be, say, a bunch of crystal shards you telekinetically throw at your enemies because you developed your mind-concept-view for the spell as you saw a chunk of Pyrian crystal or metallic stars thrown at people that you learned from your ninja Sidereal friend isn't a unique method of casting that spell?

Note that this doesn't change anything mechanically but merely changes the aesthetics- it doesn't use Anchors, merely uses backgrounds to alter the way of casting (a relatively minor hack) but still provides a unique way of casting that makes each character feel unique. The metal shuriken do the same damage as normal and as any other variation of the spell, but look unique and so do change stuff.

Complaining that these are the same is as disingenuous as saying that every single fighter is the same because everybody has a weapon and armor, even when one fighter is Oberyn Martell and the other is Gregor Clegane.

I find this dismissal of aesthetics because people will want good core spells very weird, because of course people will want similar things like transport, attack, survival, talking to allies, etc. The way you show them makes it different.
 
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Maybe this was explained ages ago and I just missed it, but I'm not sure why anyone wants sorcery to be the power of privilege. Seems to me that there are easier ways, with fewer weird side-effects, to get sorcerers to act sorcerous.
 
Frankly, I'm no longer interested in free spells; @EarthScorpion has pretty much convinced me they should be costed as around 5xp per Charm, over Discord.

As for why I'm interested in Anchors, it's because it changes the game by adding actual lures to infernalism and necromancy, no doubt what @Sanctaphrax is referring to is the 3e-style of sorcery, which I think I have already exclaimed my approval of earlier in this thread; I do think I prefer Anchors however.
Accelerator said:
Sorry for the lateness, but by prestigious, what do you mean?
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Presumably, it would be a family...

With prestige! (gasp!)
 
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