General Exalted Thread

[Lealope]

You may decide that your response is to say "fuck this" and draw your daiklave, because she didn't do anything like request that you disarm before she makes this statement. You do this, and she will happily throw down with you to show you what being a god queen means in this age of sorrows. Her apemen guards will throw themselves on you in waves. Her bound demons will materialize from thin air and set upon you. The foundations of the city that once was the greatest seat of learning in the first age will quake and tremble at the magic unleashed.

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Oh, now I get it. Deep down, she knows she's too far gone and desperately wishes for an end to her life. Because of this, she acts out in the most comically evil ways possible to inspire some enterprising circle of Exalts to finally put an end to her wretched existence.

Because I can't see anyone who's attached to living be willing to take stupid, pointless risks like that.

A large fraction (majority?) of powerful people you will run into - and probably negotiate with at some point - own chattel slaves or otherwise directly facilitate chattel slavery. Often the most vicious, brutal sort.

Your character is going to make a deal with Hitler.

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Chattel slavery is one thing. It's awful and honestly causes a hell of a lot more suffering than mandating occasional baby eating over negotiations. But it's a human kind of awful, not a ridiculous caricature of a person. I can engage with that properly, whether it be via horror, outrage or whatever else. I don't have to deal with the overwhelming disgust that I'd feel towards Raksi's complete lack of class or taste.

 

[Unbanshee]

So this has been something that has been bothering me for a bit: Why did I do this, again?

Seriously, what hooks exist that would give me cause to seek out Raksi at all, instead of just sweeping her into the corner along with Sir-Not-Appearing-In-This-Campaign? I legit cannot remember any plot hooks she is involved in besides the Book of Three Circles, which is pretty much only relevant to those trying to initiate into the Adamant Circle.

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Fuck if i know? That all depends on the game you're in! It's not like she's out running around doing shit outside her lair. I assume that if your character approaches her for some reason, then there's some reason for them to do so?

That's a pretty ridiculous thing to say tbh, she isn't a crisis point. She's not some grand, dramatic, challenge. She's the most crass and easily refuted kind of evil.

"Be Hitler," says the demon on the hero's shoulder, our hero contemplates this. Wrestling with his own moral code, his hard won virtue.

"No," says our brave hero, "I won't be Hitler".

The demon shriekss in terror as its defeated. Temptation vanquished. Phew, what a tense toss up that was. Thought for a second they were really gonna be Hitler.

It's kinda faintly (bleakly?) funny how a lot of the arguments for how this all is totally myth appropriate and in character and hey you're the one who sought her out and she's just doing something she already likes can be Trivially reapplied to shit like "hey what if instead of baby eating she just sexually assaults a dude at her table as a diplomatic power move." I mean that's pretty in theme for ancient gods too.

And then going "well obviously it might not work for you but I think it poses a very morally complex challenge if Rakshi's getting her Weinstein on in the middle of negotiations, and the players should face the consequences if they try to stop her"

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Man, what even is the point of playing a morally upstanding righteous hero if there's not big fuckin monsters out there for you to turn away from their dark ways? What is the point of playing someone who is forced to choose between their ideals and the grim realities of "sometimes people need to compromise with the devil". There's a SHIT TON of potential drama in rakshi's behavior if you want to engage with it, and if you just want to raise a righteous army of tiger warriors and root out this vile pit of depravity that you find morally reprehensible then you can just do that instead of sitting down and listening to her monologue at you over a cooling baby on a plate of greens.

 

[Unbanshee]

Oh, now I get it. Deep down, she knows she's too far gone and desperately wishes for an end to her life. Because of this, she acts out in the most comically evil ways possible to inspire some enterprising circle of Exalts to finally put an end to her wretched existence.

Because I can't see anyone who's attached to living be willing to take stupid, pointless risks like that.

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oh come off it. She's like 800 fuckin years old, and has more personal power than like maybe six individual people in Creation at any one time. She's not going to throw her weight around by keeping you waiting in the lobby for a couple hours just to make a point of how much more power she has than you. You aren't a peer to her, you're a supplicant and this is the way she makes that point.

And she isn't taking a stupid risk unless she, for some reason, decides to meet with you alone. She has armies of beastmen thralls, mortal cultist and fangs of bound demons on hand to protect her.

 

[ichypa]

A large fraction (majority?) of powerful people you will run into - and probably negotiate with at some point - own chattel slaves or otherwise directly facilitate chattel slavery. Often the most vicious, brutal sort.

Your character is going to make a deal with Hitler.

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Yes, but chattel slavery is a significant part of the setting with logical roots in Creation's history and is both interesting and complex to tackle as an issue. The drug and slave trade gets its own book, because it is equal parts horrific and lucrative, not just to your character but to the rest of Creation as well. Maybe it isn't complicated as a moral dilemma -- slavery is bad, m'kay -- but how you then go about confronting the issue is enough to build a story around in its own right.

Raksi eating babies is as interesting and complex as the choice of 1) Stab her, or 2) don't. How thrilling.

Fuck if i know? That all depends on the game you're in! It's not like she's out running around doing shit outside her lair. I assume that if your character approaches her for some reason, then there's some reason for them to do so?

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So, I don't approach her at all, then? Because that was what I was scratching my head over; unless I'm a Solar trying to get one of the few sources of knowledge on Solar Circle spells, I don't really have a reason to approach her.

There's a SHIT TON of potential drama in rakshi's behavior if you want to engage with it

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Sure, but none of that drama requires her to eat babies, whether because she enjoys it or as a diplomatic power move. At least, none of the drama that I would find worth engaging with Raksi to participate in.

 

[Cosar]

If you enjoy eating people and want to intimidate someone then you don't eat a harmless infant.
You bite their fingers off, one by one.

It's pathetic because they stooped to picking on a helpless target rather than actually trying to intimidate you.

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The word used is intimidate, not torture. It's a hugely exaggerated and heinous form of what LBJ did when he had politicians meet him while he was on the toilet, or the various posturing that you see in some types of negotiation, not whatever Bauer does in 24. The point isn't to say that she wants to eat you. Her standards are twisted because she's an insane Lunar Elder, but they are twisted in the "she doesn't view mortals as entirely people". But you're exalted (presumably a Solar/Lunar/Sidereal/Abyssal/Infernal), you're people. She's highlighting that her norms are different than yours, and that she has the power in this negotiation. It's to knock you off balance, not necessarily make you afraid for your life.

So this has been something that has been bothering me for a bit: Why did I do this, again?

Seriously, what hooks exist that would give me cause to seek out Raksi at all, instead of just sweeping her into the corner along with Sir-Not-Appearing-In-This-Campaign? I legit cannot remember any plot hooks she is involved in besides the Book of Three Circles, which is pretty much only relevant to those trying to initiate into the Adamant Circle.

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She's an eldar Lunar and is sitting on one of the great first age centers of learning in canon. So, that right there gives two big things: knowledge or the power/connections that come from being an Old Lunar who has sole access to something other people are going to want. The fact that she controls the area around the city isn't meaningless either. If you're running from the Realm, Sidereals, other Lunars, a circle of Solars, Deathlords, etc. then Raksi is a potential place you can retreat to.

Oh, and she's a master Celestial sorceress who's not involved with Heaven, which is important given the times involved in inventing a spell from scratch.

 

[Lealope]

oh come off it. She's like 800 fuckin years old, and has more personal power than like maybe six individual people in Creation at any one time. She's not going to throw her weight around by keeping you waiting in the lobby for a couple hours just to make a point of how much more power she has than you. You aren't a peer to her, you're a supplicant and this is the way she makes that point.

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Man, you're right. What was I thinking trying to challenge an Elder Exalt with my band of five, relatively young heroes? She's probably got a dicepool of twenty in everything important, and that's before any magic.

And she isn't taking a stupid risk unless she, for some reason, decides to meet with you alone. She has armies of beastmen thralls, mortal cultist and fangs of bound demons on hand to protect her.

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Most of these guys aren't going to be super relevant in a fight between experienced Celestials.

 

[Kaiya]

Man, you're right. What was I thinking trying to challenge an Elder Exalt with my band of five, relatively young heroes? She's probably got an dicepool of twenty in everything important, and that's before any magic.



Most of these guys aren't going to be super relevant in a fight between experienced Celestials.

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They are in Third Edition. The battlegroup of ape men, battlegroup of demons, and then a Second Circle Demon bound as her bodyguard. When Second Circles are, pound for pound, as strong or stronger than most Solars in their area of focus. Armies aren't dismissable anymore. I wouldn't back the Solar Circle against Raksi.

 

[ichypa]

She's an eldar Lunar and is sitting on one of the great first age centers of learning in canon. So, that right there gives two big things: knowledge or the power/connections that come from being an Old Lunar who has sole access to something other people are going to want. The fact that she controls the area around the city isn't meaningless either.

Oh, and she's a master Celestial sorceress who's not involved with Heaven, which is important given the times involved in inventing a spell from scratch.

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Except, you know, I could get most of that from the Gold Faction Sidereal I know who has access to the archives of Heaven, or for the Celestial Sorcerer thing, any other No Moon with a decent amount of experience or sufficiently high-ranking and well-connected gods.

Yeah, those plot hooks aren't things only Raksi can give me, I can go elsewhere (probably why TAW Raksi was so focused on that not happening); which is why I specified that the Book of Three Circles would only be especially relevant to someone looking into Solar Circle Sorcery. Anything less than that and there will be a double, if not triple, digit number of other beings capable of instructing or collaborating with your character.

 

[Kaiya]

Except, you know, I could get most of that from the Gold Faction Sidereal I know who has access to the archives of Heaven, or for the Celestial Sorcerer thing, any other No Moon with a decent amount of experience or sufficiently high-ranking and well-connected gods.

Yeah, those plot hooks aren't things only Raksi can give me, I can go elsewhere (probably why TAW Raksi was so focused on that not happening); which is why I specified that the Book of Three Circles would only be especially relevant to someone looking into Solar Circle Sorcery. Anything less than that and there will be a double, if not triple, digit number of other beings capable of instructing or collaborating with your character.

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Gold Faction Sidreals with unrestricted access to Heaven's libraries aren't exactly a dime a dozen. Like...it's weird that you'd just...assume you'd have access to that? Ditto a Celestial god with Sapphire Sorcery, or Elder Lunar who isn't Raksi.

 

[Unbanshee]

So, I don't approach her at all, then? Because that was what I was scratching my head over; unless I'm a Solar trying to get one of the few sources of knowledge on Solar Circle spells, I don't really have a reason to approach her.

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You might have a reason to approach her if you have lands that border her territory, or you are dealing with one of her neighbors who want to break away. I'm not STing your game. If you aren't nearby, then of course there's no reason to seek her out if you don't give a flip about her secrets or behavior. Just like no one in the west really cares what Lookshy is doing, and no one in Gem gives a thought to the horrible monster underneath that one city in the north. If your game is in An Teng, you have An Teng problems, not East problems.

Sure, but none of that drama requires her to eat babies, whether because she enjoys it or as a diplomatic power move. At least, none of the drama that I would find worth engaging with Raksi to participate in.

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To me, this argument feels like if you were saying "Sure, but none of the drama surrounding the Guild needs to involve the drug trade or slavery". A story with Raksi involves her cult of beings so devoted to her that she can demand they give her their children to feed to her guests. If you don't like it, do something about it IC. It's a mountain to climb.

Man, you're right. What was I thinking trying to challenge an Elder Exalt with my band of five, relatively young heroes? She's probably got an dicepool of twenty in everything important, and that's before any magic.

Most of these guys aren't going to be super relevant in a fight between Celestials.

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Raksi is an End Boss Encounter. If your ST lets you roll over her without taking into account her resources, then there's no challenge in overthrowing her wicked rule over her degenerate black realm in the heart of a jungle. Don't give me this facetious argument that people should stay in their weight class or the big scary elders will stomp them. Ketchup Carjack is not gonna engage your circle in a one on five duel. Liger is not gonna bend over to get fucked just because your dawn has essence 5. The realm's legions won't just melt away because you're the newest badass in town. PCs are supposed to punch up above their weight class, because punching down lacks dramatic tension.

 

[Imrix]

I don't really like getting into 2E vs 3E arguments and honestly don't care. That said, I'm sorry but that sounds super, duper dumb. I'm sitting here and just genuinely... I don't even know anymore.

It's not just me, right? I can't be the only one that's sitting here, looking at that and wondering why they'd do that.

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It's not just you.

More the mythic inspiration, actually. If you don't want to play with monsters, you don't have to, and I won't make you. But if you want to make a deal with Baba Yaga for sorcerous knowledge, you don't get to do so on your terms in your comfort zone. If you aren't comfortable with dealing with monsters, then...don't deal with monsters? Pick a fight with her instead, its your PC, choose the story you want to engage with. Depose her and be a better ruler.

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Yeah but like... there's 'playing with the dark parts of myth', and there's 'this person eats babies at the negotiating table, purely to get a rise out of her debating opponents'. Like, there's monstrous, and then there's trying too hard. Somebody called it tacky earlier and... yeah, that's a pretty good word for it. As legacy code goes, it's like importing that necrotech monster from 2e Abyssals that was the corpse of a morbidly obese woman whose vagina had been rebuilt into a bio-cannon for explosive fetuses. Fucking why.

I get that you think the writers are trying to call on ugly myths like Baba Yaga. I don't actually believe that's what they were doing, I think it was just a thoughtless import of legacy code because John Mørke was a hack and sadly the new devs are stuck holding his bag, but for the sake of argument, let's assume it is indeed a reference to myths like Baba Yaga. Okay. You get that baby-eating is not actually a major part of those myths, right? Like, there aren't epic myths where the Witch With The Iron Teeth's prediliction for child-flesh is an important plot point or anything. It's a threat used by parents to scare kids, like saying 'don't go out at night or the bogeyman will eat you!'

And frankly, even if it was an important part of the mythology... so what? Exalted is not a game of blindly retelling ancient mythology, it is a game about interpreting those myths through a modern lens. Like, yours is the kind of argument that I would expect to see being used to justify making half the NPC's into rapists, because do you even know how many people in Greek myth were rapists? Achilles once fucked a child so hard his head popped off! But y'know, we don't include that material in the game because fucking no, dude, where do I even start with that.

If you're going to reference this kind of stuff, there are better and more tasteful ways of doing so than... this.

Honestly, I don't think it is a choice. I cannot actually imagine any game or player group that I have ever been associated with where on-screen baby eating leads to anything but immediate violence. I suppose it's theoretically possible that there's a group out there somewhere which would be hypothetically OK with actually dealing with that kind of monster in order to learn arcane secrets or secure aid for the cause or whatever... but that is really stretching the boundaries of possibility, and I'd be fucking astounded if it happened with any frequency.

If making a powerful NPC literally eat babies in front of the PCs locks them into violence 99.9% of the time, I'd actually go so far as to call that a badly written character that has no real place in official material.

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Also this, yes.

They are in Third Edition. The battlegroup of ape men, battlegroup of demons, and then a Second Circle Demon bound as her bodyguard. When Second Circles are, pound for pound, as strong or stronger than most Solars in their area of focus. Armies aren't dismissable anymore. I wouldn't back the Solar Circle against Raksi.

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Oh bullshit.

You know why armies were dismissable in 2e? Because the old Mass Combat system was a horrendous mess that output worthless results, so the entire thing was not fit for purpose. People dismissed armies because nobody wanted to use the mechanics. If you actually played it as written, armies were horrendously dangerous to lone Exalts - they had shittons of ablative health from Magnitude that required doom combo's to chew through, and wildly inflated attack and defence values from bunches of automatic successes, while the mechanics hobbled solo characters who hadn't bought up their War rating to keep pace with their skills at Actually Murdering Dudes. Battle groups in 3e are far easier for an Exalt to fight, and this is to the betterment of the game, because being a one-man army is entirely fitting for an Exalt.

 

[Shane_357]

Then don't run Baba Yaga for those characters, is my response. Don't have them meet under those circumstances, ect? Or, possibly, make it a hard enough fight/Raksi having teleport spells to turn it into a prolonged engagement with a Witch-Queen who is generally well-considered by her subjects, because violence with Elder Exalted isn't costless, whatever you feel like. I have a player or two who I can use her for, and I don't think the PC predisposition to instant overwhelming violence means you shouldn't write evil monsters into the game.

Frankly, I hate the mindset that you need to only write NPCs who are comfortable to interact with. Exalted is a world of ancient mythic monsters. There should be ones who devil's deals can be made with, and who do monstrous things. If the PCs choose to always kill them, that's fine. It's still their choice, and they can reap the consequences of deposing a 1000 year old Sorceress queen.

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Although we have irreconcilable philosophical differences and all, I would love to play in one of your games. That kind of shit is the stuff I want, you know?

 

[Lealope]

They are in Third Edition. The battlegroup of ape men, battlegroup of demons, and then a Second Circle Demon bound as her bodyguard. When Second Circles are, pound for pound, as strong or stronger than most Solars in their area of focus. Armies aren't dismissable anymore. I wouldn't back the Solar Circle against Raksi.

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Dawn vs. Raksi, Twilight vs. Battlegroup (because combat Sorcery) and everyone else dogpile the Second Circle.

Raksi is an End Boss Encounter. If your ST lets you roll over her without taking into account her resources, then there's no challenge in overthrowing her wicked rule over her degenerate black realm in the heart of a jungle. Don't give me this facetious argument that people should stay in their weight class or the big scary elders will stomp them. Ketchup Carjack is not gonna engage your circle in a one on five duel. Liger is not gonna bend over to get fucked just because your dawn has essence 5. The realm's legions won't just melt away because you're the newest badass in town. PCs are supposed to punch up above their weight class, because punching down lacks dramatic tension.

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Look, dude, fundamentally, if someone is willing to roll the dice every time they get a chance, I'd expect them to come up snake eyes at some point. It's just sensible risk management. Someone who's attached to living the full lifespan of an Exalt doesn't keep playing those odds.

 

[ichypa]

Gold Faction Sidreals with unrestricted access to Heaven's libraries aren't exactly a dime a dozen. Like...it's weird that you'd just...assume you'd have access to that? Ditto a Celestial god with Sapphire Sorcery, or Elder Lunar who isn't Raksi.

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Certainly not, but they're numerous enough that your options aren't limited to just Rakshi. And where does it say that a Lunar has to be an elder to teach you Celestial Circle Sorcery?

To me, this argument feels like if you were saying "Sure, but none of the drama surrounding the Guild needs to involve the drug trade or slavery".

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tbf tbh, it doesn't. Its just extremely likely to.

A story with Raksi involves her cult of beings so devoted to her that she can demand they give her their children to feed to her guests. If you don't like it, do something about it IC. It's a mountain to climb.

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This, however? Nuh uh. To me the drama of Raksi is that she is a hero, the woman who saved the Silver Pact and is one of the greatest Sorcerous prodigies ever, who now squanders all of her brilliance and all the good she could do for Creation, he madness twisting her to obsess over slamming her head against a wall she cannot break (becoming a Solar Circle Sorcerer). Baby eating is irrelevant, her cult is irrelevant. She could be a hikkimori holed up alone in an ancient library, whose only regular contacts are young Lunars sent by their elder to go check if she's still alive, and it wouldn't change anything that I find actually interesting about her.

Raksi as mad scientist is infinitely more compelling than Raksi as cult leader, even without the baby-eating. Cults are more Leviathan's thing.

 

[samdamandias]

Chattel slavery is one thing. It's awful and honestly causes a hell of a lot more suffering than mandating occasional baby eating over negotiations. But it's a human kind of awful, not a ridiculous caricature of a person. I can engage with that properly, whether it be via horror, outrage or whatever else.

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I'm going to take a moment to talk about this. In my most recent game (and thanks to @Aranfan for running it), there was a major disagreement between two members of the circle.

One charachter, who Exalted while verbally tearing strips out of a Guild slaver caravan, viewed the Guild as Evil. She had had very bad experiences with the Guild before, and the Guild was the reason why her people lived in fear. My Night, who was sort of set up as a mob boss, agreed that in general the Guild were terrible people. But they were terrible people who paid in full, on time, and honored contracts between Guildsmen*, and so were the reason why the Night's people prospered.

The Guild's greed and rapaciousness are very human evils. They are relatable evils. You can understand why people do them even as you condemn them for it.

*My mob boss was a dues-paying member of the guild, listed as "Freelance acquisitions specialist"

And she isn't taking a stupid risk unless she, for some reason, decides to meet with you alone. She has armies of beastmen thralls, mortal cultist and fangs of bound demons on hand to protect her.

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To paraphrase: She has an army. We have a Dawn.

But I can turn Raksi's baby-eating into something just as disturbing, but less tacky. Raksi is a several hundred year old Lunar who has gone a bit crazy, and enjoys the taste of well-cooked child-flesh. But Raksi is cognizant enough to save the baby-eating for special occasions. Calibration, one or two other major feasts, perhaps.

But hosting a group of Exalted? That's a special occasion, it calls for putting out the best and most impressive stuff, including her favorite delicacy.

There, you still have the baby-eating, you still et to have your party grapple with the moral dilemmas of dealing with her (reasons for the Circle to deal with her are left as an exercise for the ST), and she's not cartoonishly evil.

 

[ichypa]

But hosting a group of Exalted? That's a special occasion, it calls for putting out the best and most impressive stuff, including her favorite delicacy.

There, you still have the baby-eating, you still et to have your party grapple with the moral dilemmas of dealing with her (reasons for the Circle to deal with her are left as an exercise for the ST), and she's not cartoonishly evil.

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Oooo, I like that. I'm saving that one.

 

[Lealope]

But I can turn Raksi's baby-eating into something just as disturbing, but less tacky. Raksi is a several hundred year old Lunar who has gone a bit crazy, and enjoys the taste of well-cooked child-flesh. But Raksi is cognizant enough to save the baby-eating for special occasions. Calibration, one or two other major feasts, perhaps.

But hosting a group of Exalted? That's a special occasion, it calls for putting out the best and most impressive stuff, including her favorite delicacy.

There, you still have the baby-eating, you still et to have your party grapple with the moral dilemmas of dealing with her (reasons for the Circle to deal with her are left as an exercise for the ST), and she's not cartoonishly evil.

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Frankly, this is more disturbing. Her just being that far out of her fucking gourd that she genuinely thinks that she's being a generous and hospitable host by serving her favourite delicacy of baby flesh is... god damn.

I would struggle with whether or not I should kill this version because there's a lot of pity mixed in with that horror there. There could be some hope of healing that broken mind and maybe saving her. There's avenues of interaction beyond murder here.

 

[Imrix]

Alternatively, don't even try to justify actual baby-eating. If you want to keep it around, take a hacksaw to it and make something new. Maybe it's Immaculate propaganda used to villify her. Maybe it's a Janissery type deal, where her cults raid neighbouring settlements and steal the children to metaphorically devour them by moulding them into perfect servants because all they know as they grow up is tending Raksi's library, à la "Give me a child until he is seven and I will give you the man."

 

[ichypa]

Frankly, this is more disturbing. Her just being that far out of her fucking gourd that she genuinely thinks that she's being a generous and hospitable host by serving her favourite delicacy of baby flesh is... god damn.

I would struggle with whether or not I should kill this version because there's a lot of pity mixed in with that horror there. There could be some hope of healing that broken mind and maybe saving her. There's avenues of interaction beyond murder here.

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She's as tragic as she is horrific, which is exactly what I want her to be. Its just...to quote Rook:

*kisses fingers*

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I love it, and its going to be my headcanon in some form from now on.

 

[Cosar]

Except, you know, I could get most of that from the Gold Faction Sidereal I know who has access to the archives of Heaven, or for the Celestial Sorcerer thing, any other No Moon with a decent amount of experience or sufficiently high-ranking and well-connected gods.

Yeah, those plot hooks aren't things only Raksi can give me, I can go elsewhere (probably why TAW Raksi was so focused on that not happening); which is why I specified that the Book of Three Circles would only be especially relevant to someone looking into Solar Circle Sorcery. Anything less than that and there will be a double, if not triple, digit number of other beings capable of instructing or collaborating with your character.

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What kind of setting are you playing where Infernals and Abyssals are chummy with the Gold Faction (either rogue ones or not, after all the Deathlords and Yozi/Third Circles are all pretty much on Raksi's level at a minimum)? Hell, even Lunars aren't set up to be all that friendly with the gold faction in canon.

In other words, no, Raksi isn't your only option for sorcery. The key is that she's always an option(barring very extreme circumstances). And sometimes she is even on of the best options: yes, other Lunars can help you learn sorcery. But if you want a specific spell you either need to find someone else who knows it, find detailed notes on the spell, or invent it from scratch(which takes a really long time with infastructure). Raksi has access to one of the artifacts that lists the combined knowledge of first age sorcery, so she can pretty much always provide the notes and she's an accomplished sorcerer in her own right so she's not too unlikely to be able to help with the first category either.

So you can spend months or years hunting down another Lunar or lead on someone who might be both able to help you and willing to. Or you can make a deal.

 

[ichypa]

What kind of setting are you playing where Infernals and Abyssals are chummy with the Gold Faction (either rogue ones or not, after all the Deathlords and Yozi/Third Circles are all pretty much on Raksi's level at a minimum)? Hell, even Lunars aren't set up to be all that friendly with the gold faction in canon.

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...Yes?

In other words, no, Raksi isn't your only option for sorcery. The key is that she's always an option(barring very extreme circumstances). And sometimes she is even on of the best options: yes, other Lunars can help you learn sorcery. But if you want a specific spell you either need to find someone else who knows it, find detailed notes on the spell, or invent it from scratch(which takes a really long time with infastructure). Raksi has access to one of the artifacts that lists the combined knowledge of first age sorcery, so she can pretty much always provide the notes and she's an accomplished sorcerer in her own right so she's not too unlikely to be able to help with the first category either.

So you can spend months or years hunting down another Lunar or lead on someone who might be both able to help you and willing to. Or you can make a deal.

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Fair.

Still, it would have to be a really special set of circumstances to make a situation urgent enough that you can't spend the extra time creating the spell from scratch in the worst case, even if it means making a deal with a baby-eating monster, but not urgent enough that spending the time to learn the spell at all wouldn't be a waste of time that you could be using to search for a non-spell-based solutions.

 

[TenfoldShields]

If your ST lets you roll over her without taking into account her resources, then there's no challenge in overthrowing her wicked rule over her degenerate black realm in the heart of a jungle.

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Also yeah this is low-key (or maybe not low-key) another issue with Rakshi: "degenerate cannibal half-ape kingdom squatting in the ruins of once mighty city lost in the jungle" is ffffuuuuucking loaded when you think about it more than not at all like holy shit. I think it's been improved in 3E from my understanding, but there's only so far you can go with that legacy code tbh.

It's not...

It's honestly not great.

 

[Nervaqus987]

I get that you think the writers are trying to call on ugly myths like Baba Yaga. I don't actually believe that's what they were doing, I think it was just a thoughtless import of legacy code because John Mørke was a hack and sadly the new devs are stuck holding his bag,

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So, I'm kinda skimming stuff here and there mostly because I'm as I'm reading this argument the only thing going through my head is this.

But in any event, uh.....I don't think Morke has anything to do with this? I mean, maybe there's some stuff I'm over looking, but I ran a search for Raksi in the 3E corebook and got like two references to her, neither of which mentioned her eating babies. I searched for babies and infants in general and mostly got Neomah.

Then I checked back with Lunars 2e and there's a mention of Raksi eating babies, but as far as I can tell, Morke's name isn't on the book.

I'd check 1e, but I don't have that book.

So I guess what I'm aiming for is I get that Morke isn't exactly well liked here nor are his contributions well regarded, but how about we stick to giving him shit over stuff he's actually responsible for?

 

[Sanctaphrax]

Is SLS still involved?

Because this Raksi stuff sounds like his take.

Anyway, there's an Orwell quote that's been in my mind throughout this conversation. So I'm sharing it.

The goose-step, for instance, is one of the most horrible sights in the world, far more terrifying than a dive-bomber. It is simply an affirmation of naked power; contained in it, quite consciously and intentionally, is the vision of a boot crashing down on a face. Its ugliness is part of its essence, for what it is saying is 'Yes, I am ugly, and you daren't laugh at me', like the bully who makes faces at his victim.

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[SinisterPorpoise]

I'd check 1e, but I don't have that book.

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I do;
As far as I can tell Morke's name isn't in it.
Raksi is stated to "have a great hunger for young men and women of beauty", and that hunger apparently refers to rape as well as cannibalism, but not a single mention of babies is made.