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General Exalted Thread

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I went looking for the fanfic RemoteScholar mentioned. Didn't find it; instead, I found a bunch of who-would-win stuff featuring Exalted.

It's downright amazing how this game melts the brains of the people who discuss that kind of thing. I've seen plenty of crossover fictional fight threads, but few as dumb as the ones featuring this game.
 
grommile said:
My gut reaction is to mostly blame perfect defences for that.
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Perfects are pretty much entirely to blame for that, because in 1E and 2E, past a certain point, numbers stop mattering. (That other settings get away with similar levels of conceptual Boolean may be part of the salt, but IIRC Exalted is one of the few settings actively banned from VS on SB and SV.)

At the high end, how much damage does an Exalt do? Not enough to shatter planets or cleave stars, but "However much it takes to kill whatever I'm attacking, plus one."

I think I might even have an exasperated spiel about how not only is it possible to go around PDs, but intended and desirable, rather than going through them, around here somewhere.
 
Perfects were definitely part of it, but I think a bigger problem might've been that Exalted isn't a story.

Many vs-debaters seem to prize "feats" above all else; they don't really take any description of a character seriously, they judge characters by what they've been shown doing. But of course nobody in Exalted has been shown doing much of anything; backstories are short on specific actions, and pretty much every narrative piece of any length is explicitly not canon. Since nobody's keen to accept feats from individual tables of gamers, that leaves Exalted more or less non-existent from a feats-centric perspective.

Oddly, this makes some people kind of angry. One memorable phrase, from a moderator of Spacebattles, was that Exalted is "clearly a walking No-Limits-Fallacy and thus has no right to be debated". I'm not sure exactly what's up with that.

I suspect that similar problems would arise for other RPGs. Probably not to quite the same extent though.
 
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I have made the mistake of getting involved in Versus debates featuring the Exalted before. It's not a good road to go down.

And yeah I'd pin the issue as largely one of feats and calcs. The versus debate mentality depends entirely on quantifying everything down into raw numbers, and then comparing those numbers against one another. That Perfect Defences block everything is not considered valid, one must quantify what the strongest attack within the Exalted setting is and then set that as the maximum they can defend against. A character capable of altering reality within a mile of their location must automatically lose to a character who can alter reality within ten miles of their location. A character claiming that his lightning blasts deliver the heat of a hundred suns must be taken literally, even though the bolts strike concrete and leave vague scorch marks rather than clouds of searing vapour.

This is the mindset that leads you to questions such as "Why can't you guys tell us what the tensile strength of orichalcum is" and "ok so how large is the Green Sun of Malfeas exactly".

Exalted, with its perfect defences and keyword-based charms and uncountable damage and five-days-to-cross deserts just... doesn't really work all that well in such a context.

This offends some people.
 
Maugan Ra said:
I have made the mistake of getting involved in Versus debates featuring the Exalted before. It's not a good road to go down.

And yeah I'd pin the issue as largely one of feats and calcs. The versus debate mentality depends entirely on quantifying everything down into raw numbers, and then comparing those numbers against one another. That Perfect Defences block everything is not considered valid, one must quantify what the strongest attack within the Exalted setting is and then set that as the maximum they can defend against. A character capable of altering reality within a mile of their location must automatically lose to a character who can alter reality within ten miles of their location. A character claiming that his lightning blasts deliver the heat of a hundred suns must be taken literally, even though the bolts strike concrete and leave vague scorch marks rather than clouds of searing vapour.

This is the mindset that leads you to questions such as "Why can't you guys tell us what the tensile strength of orichalcum is" and "ok so how large is the Green Sun of Malfeas exactly".

Exalted, with its perfect defences and keyword-based charms and uncountable damage and five-days-to-cross deserts just... doesn't really work all that well in such a context.

This offends some people.
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You have yet to convince me that the proper response to such anger is anything other than continuing to use Exalted to screw with the Versus community. :p
 
EarthScorpion said:
Did I write this Oramus charm entirely so you had reason to be the backing music in boss fights against powerful spirits?

No, not at all.

I also wanted to make a joke about you playing Dancing Mad.

THAT MOURNFUL DIRGE
Cost: 4m; Mins: Essence 3; Type: Simple (Speed 6, DV-2)
Keywords: Combo-OK, Symphonic
Duration: One scene
Prerequisites: Those Twirling Figures

The gylmine tell tales of the last dances of those of their kind who venture onto the Dragon's blasted heaths. They pay the piper with their lives - but ah, what beauty!

The Infernal performs a hauntingly beautiful piece, rolling (Manipulation + Performance). Her successes are compared to the permanent Essence scores of any spirits who suffer dispersal within hearing range of her. Should her successes exceed theirs, in a burst of unnatural light the slain spirit takes up a place in the Infernal's performance, lending their voice and body to her music. These phantasms are intangible and are invalid targets for any other effect that would interact with them. If the Infernal chooses to end the performance, it is up to her whether to let the spirits disperse naturally (reforming if they would do so), or dance off into the Beyond. If the latter option is chosen, this is a fate equivalent to death, as if they had been slain by Ghost Eating Technique. If the music is interrupted, the spirits must roll Willpower at a Difficulty of her Performance. On a success, they may reform - otherwise they suffer the latter fate, dancing out of existence in search of such beauty.

This charm is Simple by default, but Reflexive (DV -0) if the Infernal has Endlessly Wailing Flutist active.
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Oramus' music stuff is always fun
 
EarthScorpion said:
Did I write this Oramus charm entirely so you had reason to be the backing music in boss fights against powerful spirits?

No, not at all.

I also wanted to make a joke about you playing Dancing Mad.

THAT MOURNFUL DIRGE
Cost: 4m; Mins: Essence 3; Type: Simple (Speed 6, DV-2)
Keywords: Combo-OK, Symphonic
Duration: One scene
Prerequisites: Those Twirling Figures

The gylmine tell tales of the last dances of those of their kind who venture onto the Dragon's blasted heaths. They pay the piper with their lives - but ah, what beauty!

The Infernal performs a hauntingly beautiful piece, rolling (Manipulation + Performance). Her successes are compared to the permanent Essence scores of any spirits who suffer dispersal within hearing range of her. Should her successes exceed theirs, in a burst of unnatural light the slain spirit takes up a place in the Infernal's performance, lending their voice and body to her music. These phantasms are intangible and are invalid targets for any other effect that would interact with them. If the Infernal chooses to end the performance, it is up to her whether to let the spirits disperse naturally (reforming if they would do so), or dance off into the Beyond. If the latter option is chosen, this is a fate equivalent to death, as if they had been slain by Ghost Eating Technique. If the music is interrupted, the spirits must roll Willpower at a Difficulty of her Performance. On a success, they may reform - otherwise they suffer the latter fate, dancing out of existence in search of such beauty.

This charm is Simple by default, but Reflexive (DV -0) if the Infernal has Endlessly Wailing Flutist active.
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I know the music is pipes, but what sort of pipes? Do uillean pipes and bagpipes count?
 
Salty said:
Look, if ever there was music to drive men to madness, bladder pipes would be it.
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I don't know why people hate on bagpipes so much. They sound perfectly nice, but the way people go on about them you'd think that they were made to produce the sound of nails on a chalk board on command.

Is it just hyperbolic hate for the sake of memes?

Edit: Or does the Scotch-Irish in me somehow render me immune? :thonk:
 
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Gamerlord said:
You have yet to convince me that the proper response to such anger is anything other than continuing to use Exalted to screw with the Versus community. :p
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The proper response is to argue that the Exalted sides wins via reasoning and/or seduction.

Remember, just because the various scenarios include clauses about a side being 'bloodlusted' that's no impediment to an integrity charm and social influence!
 
God, now i want to see what happens if we can trick a Versus forum into quantifying the charm that shall not be named
 
Gamerlord said:
In the charmset there's a lot of mentions of 'pipes' and I was wondering what was meant by that.
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It's a reference to Azathoth from H.P. Lovecraft. Azathoth is the 'blind idiot god' who sleeps at the center of the universe, kept asleep by legions of pipers who play endlessly.

In the Oramus charmset, it's basically flavor text getting at the feel of the charms. Looking at the mechanics, you could shred out soulful powerchords on an electric guitar, play a good riff on your snare drum, or just sing really nicely and still use this charm.
 
Maugan Ra said:
The proper response is to argue that the Exalted sides wins via reasoning and/or seduction.

Remember, just because the various scenarios include clauses about a side being 'bloodlusted' that's no impediment to an integrity charm and social influence!
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I saw someone say their biggest beef with the way perfects worked in 3e was that Exalted wouldn't be good in VS debates anymore and I think that killed me and my ghost is making this post.
 
Now, since some people have been discussing Sakuragame again... here's the latest chapter, Friends and Rivals.

In which I both start preparing for war against the Realm, and actually have a conversation with a Dynast who knows what Sakura is but they have to have a civil conversation and debate anyways! :p
 
horngeek said:
Now, since some people have been discussing Sakuragame again... here's the latest chapter, Friends and Rivals.

In which I both start preparing for war against the Realm, and actually have a conversation with a Dynast who knows what Sakura is but they have to have a civil conversation and debate anyways! :p
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Always great to see more of this, and at a perfect time too since injustice caught up recently.

You've done a fantastic job of melding the two settings and I really do applaud you on that. As well as on creating interesting characters and stories.

A few questions/comments

Does Rokugan have a dragon bloods? Couldn't tell if the crab guy was that or an elemental blood

I'm assuming the shadowlanda are well, exaltedshadow lands, so what is rokugand position on hell. Do they even know it exists? Would they be willing to ally with infernals?
 
Walker of the Yellow Path said:
It's a reference to Azathoth from H.P. Lovecraft. Azathoth is the 'blind idiot god' who sleeps at the center of the universe, kept asleep by legions of pipers who play endlessly.

In the Oramus charmset, it's basically flavor text getting at the feel of the charms. Looking at the mechanics, you could shred out soulful powerchords on an electric guitar, play a good riff on your snare drum, or just sing really nicely and still use this charm.
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Yeah, I know all that, I was just wondering what ES meant by 'pipes' since there's a fucking ton of variety there.
 
Another one for my Lunar New Year hot dad collection, this time is the Dawn (who is definitely not an Abyssal, he just looks edgy and glow red like that)

 
rogthnor said:
Does Rokugan have a dragon bloods? Couldn't tell if the crab guy was that or an elemental blood

I'm assuming the shadowlanda are well, exaltedshadow lands, so what is rokugand position on hell. Do they even know it exists? Would they be willing to ally with infernals?
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Hida Kisada is Indeed an Earth Aspected Terrestrial Exalted. This is partially because the man is simply stronger than Exalted allows mortals to be. :V

Rokugan is... the situation is complicated by the fact that no one likes to talk about what the Rokugani call 'jigoku', so most of Rokugan prefers to make it the Crab's problem and pretend it doesn't exist.

(This is part of why Kisada hates the rest of Rokugan so much)

This has partially meant that @Maugan Ra and I haven't discussed this a whole lot tbh. It has come up more recently, however, and the Crab are at least aware that not everything that Rokugani call 'Oni' are from the same realm. (And yes, the Shadowlands are a *particularly* malignant shadowland)

As far as alliances with Infernal go... probably not tbh. Rokugan is remarkably xenophobic (partially due to cultural trauma from when it did open up a bit) so foreign Infernals are sol, and also suspicious of the strange so I'm not sure native Infernals would do much better.
 
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