- Location
- The sixth circle of Hell (second on weekends)
- Pronouns
- She/Her
How would sealing bargains or having diplomatic immunity help with impersonating a Sidereal?
General Exalted Thread
I think he ment charmshare, as in the Eclipse will learn a Sidereal Charm or two beforehand and use those to help sell the impersonation.
Eclipse anima can't copy Sidereal Charms in 3e, and Aleph and ES got rid of that part of the power entirely.
I am aware of that, I answered why Graypairofsocks may have suggested it in the first place and Tau1809 did not specify if he was using 2E or 3E.
- Location
- The sixth circle of Hell (second on weekends)
- Pronouns
- She/Her
... yes. I am aware of that. I was subtly implying that Eclipsoid Charmshare is toxic garbage that should be ignored completely for what it does to the game balance on both a mechanical and thematic level.
(Perhaps a bit too subtly, it seems.)
Graypairofsocks
What is Grammar?
- Location
- earth
I think there was a charm that could get around that.
Yeah, I meant Charmshare and assumed it was 2/2.5 edition.
As to Aleph and ES removing charmshare:
Most people will tend to use the default rules when playing a game. It's a safer to assume that any specific houserule is not being used, especially when it is a major change.
All right. I'll even play your game, if you're willing to let the toxic, awful, mechanically unsound elements of the Eclipse anima into play:
- Eclipses require a Sidereal to teach them their Charms. And it has to be explicit tuition - it can't just be "I watch a Sidereal and steal his powers". Where did you get the explicit tuition, given you're trying to infiltrate Heaven to get taught by a Sidereal in the first place?
- Eclipses pay a substantial mote surcharge on the use of Sidereal Charms. How are you avoiding using peripheral motes when they test you by forcing you to mote-tap youself, especially when - I note - you've already got lots of your personal pool tied up in stealth charms to hide your nature?
- How are you hiding the use of your Solar Charms from the Sidereals checking you out, when they have an AESS-alike which makes Charms and a broad description of what they do Obvious to them, and plenty of time to scrutinise you?
- Where are you getting the magical amounts of XP to pay for the full Charmset of a starting Sidereal, when it costs you 16 XP per Charm to learn?
- And finally - and here's the kicker - Sidereals know about Eclipses. They know what you can do. In fact, they know what you can do better than you do. Isn't it an awfully silly assumption to make that Sidereals don't know that "they're using our Charms" is a faliable test in a world where you permit the stupid bit of the RAW Eclipse anima to exist?
And none of this even stops the test of the "spend motes on Excellencies until you're flaring at the 16m level, if you use any other Charms we'll assume you're a liar" method for testing what you are, which has the advantage of both proving who you are and also mote-tapping you if you're lying. Because you don't have the Sidereal anima power, bucko.
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Graypairofsocks
What is Grammar?
- Location
- earth
I'm going off of a hunch here, but it kind of sounds as if Earthscorpion doesn't like the Eclipse Caste Anima power.
The pithy attempt at a dismissal doesn't exactly stop the fact that he's right on all counts.
Graypairofsocks
What is Grammar?
- Location
- earth
1:
Here are two possible solutions or Explanations (they carry their own issues though).
You have a sidereal ally, but he doesn't know sidereal marital arts (for whatever reason). The question from this is "why is he risking his ass trying to help you infiltrate yu-shuan?"
Use the "Past Life" Merit and "Mentor" Background as one. If a past life knew Sidereal charms, you might be able to learn it from their memories.
This one may be a bit wonky on the mechanical side, and it uses stuff from "Scroll of Heroes".
2:
You can get around the visual problem in specific with the "Disguise of the New face" spell. It has an indefinite duration and disguises the visuals of your anima banner.
3:
The answer is "Don't use Solar Charms". However this doesn't cover sorcery, which you will need to disguise yourself. It's a patchwork solution at best.
While I am pretty sure there are ways around being detected by that, I don't remember them and I think they required a roll off at best.
This one is the biggest problem.
4:
Your statement was in regards to one charm, not an entire tree.
There is a difference between a starting sidereal, and one who has recently exalted. The latter will know less charms. It might be easier to pass your self off as the latter.
5:
So why would they be using the "use a sidereal charm" test then? What else would they use instead or in addition? (if it is a method you haven't already covered).
Note that "use a sidereal charm test" still would cover most possible infiltrators.
There are only 60 Eclipse type exalts (Note that I am assuming castes are evenly distributed). There are 540 other celestial exalts, and (unless I am forgetting something) they don't really have a way to use sidereal charms.
So how do you know that I didn't think of that stuff.
My post was the same sort of post as yours. You made a post which was a lot like a 1 liner, and which didn't cover any problem of just asking someone to use 1 charm to prove their identity. Don't complain about it when someone responds with a 1 liner to that.
You can get around the visual problem with the "Disguise of the New face" spell. It has an indefinite duration.
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Jon Chung
=][=
I think it's time for the oft-repeated charmshare lecture, since for some reason it never seems to stick.
You familiar with the basic principle that if you're building something out of a lot of little interacting interlocking bits, and you want to make sure that no method of putting those little interacting bits together forms a critical mass which proceeds to explode with holy atomic fire due to unforeseen consequences of their interaction, you generally care quite a lot about the size of the pile of bits you're checking, right? Because you've actually got to check those bits, and it's an absolute fact of life that this gets exponentially harder as the size of the bits pile increases.
Like, let's say I have 50 bits in my soon-to-be-released factory product, and if I don't put them together in all the various ways I have to put them together to check for nuclear explosions before I push it out the door, and there exists the chance of nuclear explosions in the first place, I'm pretty much assured of getting some of that holy Cherenkov radiation out of my ill-advised actions. Especially if most of my bits do special snowflake unique things, as opposed to adding +1 modifiers to some number somewhere. Particularly if anything involves multiplication of numbers, granting of whole new capabilities, action economy stupidity, resource curve fucking and so on and so forth. Note, here, what Charms do. Special snowflakes are more reactive than +1 modifiers.
Without charmshare, we have a number of buckets equal to the number of splats, because you can't buy some other splat's Charms. If you are a Solar, all you get to pick bits from is the Solar bucket. This means the poor suffering developer trying to make sure an arbitrary group's game ideally doesn't detonate in a blaze of holy nuclear glory only needs to check how Solar bits combine with other Solar bits. Assuming we want to prevent our atomic detonation scenario, do you think developer dude is going to have an easier time if you take all the buckets (something like what, nine of them at this point) and dump them into a single pool for him to have fun with?
No, right? He's probably going to tell you to go die in a fire, because you made his job exponentially more difficult. See how this relates to people who want to make bits?
You familiar with the basic principle that if you're building something out of a lot of little interacting interlocking bits, and you want to make sure that no method of putting those little interacting bits together forms a critical mass which proceeds to explode with holy atomic fire due to unforeseen consequences of their interaction, you generally care quite a lot about the size of the pile of bits you're checking, right? Because you've actually got to check those bits, and it's an absolute fact of life that this gets exponentially harder as the size of the bits pile increases.
Like, let's say I have 50 bits in my soon-to-be-released factory product, and if I don't put them together in all the various ways I have to put them together to check for nuclear explosions before I push it out the door, and there exists the chance of nuclear explosions in the first place, I'm pretty much assured of getting some of that holy Cherenkov radiation out of my ill-advised actions. Especially if most of my bits do special snowflake unique things, as opposed to adding +1 modifiers to some number somewhere. Particularly if anything involves multiplication of numbers, granting of whole new capabilities, action economy stupidity, resource curve fucking and so on and so forth. Note, here, what Charms do. Special snowflakes are more reactive than +1 modifiers.
Without charmshare, we have a number of buckets equal to the number of splats, because you can't buy some other splat's Charms. If you are a Solar, all you get to pick bits from is the Solar bucket. This means the poor suffering developer trying to make sure an arbitrary group's game ideally doesn't detonate in a blaze of holy nuclear glory only needs to check how Solar bits combine with other Solar bits. Assuming we want to prevent our atomic detonation scenario, do you think developer dude is going to have an easier time if you take all the buckets (something like what, nine of them at this point) and dump them into a single pool for him to have fun with?
No, right? He's probably going to tell you to go die in a fire, because you made his job exponentially more difficult. See how this relates to people who want to make bits?
Graypairofsocks
What is Grammar?
- Location
- earth
I'm probably somewhat familiar with that principle.
Stuff that is somewhat like that is one of the reasons caster class in D&D can be so broken, and what made "pun-pun" possible.
Stuff that is somewhat like that is one of the reasons caster class in D&D can be so broken, and what made "pun-pun" possible.
Jon Chung
=][=
And now you know why everybody who has in-depth knowledge about how Exalted works from trying to make homebrew charms that don't cause atomic detonations probably hates charmshare and wishes it had never existed.
Your plan is to disguise yourself as a Sidereal using a Terrestrial Circle Spell.
- Just having an anima banner which appears to be a Sidereal one doesn't actually give you the Sidereal anima - or prevent the Solar anima powers from activating.
- "Oh huh," the Sidereal says, looking at the new recruit and using their AESS-alike. "I wonder why our new recruit is using Disguise of the New Face."
- Three words. Emerald Circle Countermagic.
If I was a Solar who wanted to, say, steal an ancient relic from the Department of Serenity, I wouldn't be fool enough to disguise myself as a Sidereal. I'd go disguise as a low-ranking god to scout the place out, then use Solar Stealth to fade into the background as I amble around the place carrying a broom sweeping. Then, once I'd found where the artefact was, I'd start using Solar social Charms to compromise some of the gods who work in the surrounding area, setting them up as Manchurian candidates and making them obtain the necessary access passes for me. Then comes the Solar Stealth assisted heist, and the likely dramatic chase scene as Celestial Lions object to the theft - but fortunately my allies have ensured that I have a canalboat waiting for me, and I jump onboard. The Celestial Lions chase it down, surrounding it - and then find that I was never onboard. Twenty miles away, I sit in a cafe in Heaven disguised as a completely different god, and order wine, the stolen artefact hidden in Elsewhere.
That is to say, conducting intel operations in Heaven involves being an experienced Solar with a wide range of skills - both HUMINT and stealth - and also involves minimising contact with Sidereals and going for the weak points, rather than the strongest possible points.
The Solar Charmset gives you the skills to be a super-spy. It does not give you the skills to make whatever plan you want work, and it can fail in the face of meaningful opposition. And "the entire intel apparatus of the Bureau of Destiny" is one of the most damn meaningful opposition you can put yourself against.
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Carrnage
Human
- Location
- New Zealand
Though it could be a vital component of an infiltration, in that you send a disposable beatstick disguised as a sidereal as a distraction. bonus points if the beatstick is a thorn in your side and doesn't know the actual plan.
Graypairofsocks
What is Grammar?
- Location
- earth
I don't think the first point is that big of an issue (at least in comparison with the others).
I pointed the second problem out in my post.
You are saying that they would probably use that to check for disguise?
I also had thought it would be easier to disguise yourself as a god, but for different reasons (and probably not in the same context).
The only reason I can remember right now is:
There are a a lot of poor and unemployed gods in Yu-Shuan (a lot more of them than sidereals), so you would not really be out of place if you disguised yourself as one.
This does limit the places you can have access too, as not everyone wants a hobo in their office.
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Sucal
The Devil’s Cut
- Location
- Bottom of the barrel
Why not just bribe one to do the theft for you.
Or half a dozen to act as distraction, with the Winner getting a chance at being the city father for your capital city.
Graypairofsocks
What is Grammar?
- Location
- earth
Disallowing stuff that is similar to multiclassing (or getting someone else's abilities) should help in reducing the amount of problematic combos you have to check for. At least in theory.
The thing is how much does it actually help in practice? How would we determine that?
A few questions probably related to that are:
How much playtesting goes on for the abilities?
How many degenerate combos does the eclipse caste anima enable, compared to ones that are from the native charm set?
Also It's worth noting there are other things that can "Mix the buckets". Any sort of ability that applies a buff to your team mates, or any sort of fusion dance type spell will also do that.
Jon Chung
=][=
Precisely. Thus: no charmshare, less problems.
Watch Bob the Eclipse pick up Principle of Motion. Note that this is a bad idea. Contemplate, for a moment, the utter stupidity of trying to make every single fucking charm in the entire fucking game not break when a Solar buys it, in conjunction with every possible combination of every other fucking charm in the entire fucking game.
White Wolf never does any decent playtesting, and many. Shitloads. Fucktons.
Yes, and therefore they should all be eradicated. Charmshare is shit. Charmshare gives you an infinity of problems unless you put in an enormous amount of work to make it not blow up your game, which is not a good use of your developer man hours.
You could use those man hours to, say, actually produce original content, as opposed to trying to make sure that one caste power of one caste of Solars doesn't produce Pun-Pun Mark 2, Electric Boogaloo. Or you could go ahead and do it regardless, in which case enjoy the Pun and your customers' attendant dissatisfaction when the GM haplessly lets their Eclipse buy some foreign charm, and finds out that he has created an abomination by mistake.
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Oh, and on top of that, you also need to handle things so Eclipses don't wind up as Best Solars through dipping into other people's Charmsets.
So no one gets to have any charms which are better than anything a Solar can do, and everything needs to be phrased so it can't stack with the Solar's charms. Or else you find that Eclipses are better crafters than Twilights because they can get everyone else's speed boosters and enhancers on top of the Solar ones.
(and the best thing is that there's not one lick of thematic justification for why it should be an Eclipse-specific thing, rather than "Nights get Charmshare because they're the ultimate infiltrators and thieves" or "Twilights get Charmshare because they're the ultimate scholars". This stands in strong contrast to the other Eclipse powers, which are super-appropriate for the diplomat and traveller caste)
A lot actually, It would give you a chance to get collaborators without as much risk and with a decent chance of them not immediately stabbing you in the back.
Graypairofsocks
What is Grammar?
- Location
- earth
The best solution is obviously to allow everyone access to non-native charms. If everything is broken, then nothing is.
I'm sorry.
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- Location
- my house
So I tried looking up Donna Haraway's essay on cyborgs but it's pretty dense and hard to follow. Any chance you could give a brief summary of what it means?
Sucal
The Devil’s Cut
- Location
- Bottom of the barrel
*wobbles hand*
I'm not sure on that honestly. On one hand, it does make the effect much more balanced, by starting off as you can only learn X, rather then 'everything but X' but on the other hand, I'm not sure if the Eclipse Anima powers are all that great in comparison to the other castes now.