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I think we've established by now that I'm not quite a fan of Exegesis and the potential shennigans that it leads to. I honestly don't believe that there should be any overlap between crafting xp and actual experience at all, since the reward for being an excellent crafter in this edition is having plenty of awesome things that you've crafted (especially since you don't need to pay xp for story merits such as artifacts you've made in play). At the same time though, I admit that I am a fan of the way that Tireless Learner Method works, in that if you've put the time and effort into teaching a number of people you may actually come out ahead on experience wise but even then your rewarded in having plenty of trained loyal staff to do the tasks required of them.

At the same time though I think both charms have a bit of square peg round holes problem to them. Why does it cost the user XP to train someone in lore or occult while making Tiger Warriors and Sea Devils do not unless you feel like giving them additional almost supernatural abilities. If it didn't require them experience to do that teaching and training, then there wouldn't be any need for potentially abusive charms that can almost make it better then adventuring to do so.

Minor quibble, but it should be noted that the series for Flowing Mind Prana/Tireless Learner Method don't just apply to Lore and Occult, but are omni-applicable. They can increase any Attribute or Ability, and even teach charms with the right expansions.
 
Minor quibble, but it should be noted that the series for Flowing Mind Prana/Tireless Learner Method don't just apply to Lore and Occult, but are omni-applicable. They can increase any Attribute or Ability, and even teach charms with the right expansions.

Yeah, I know. I was going to expand upon that but figured you'd know already. It definitely makes them as a charm more useful (and is a basis for a character in that game), just not sure about the design where you need to go deep into the tree before they start becoming something more then a tax. I kind of prefer the way that Survivals training charms are set out, even if I'm tempted to use both on the same beasts.
 
Yeah, I know. I was going to expand upon that but figured you'd know already. It definitely makes them as a charm more useful (and is a basis for a character in that game), just not sure about the design where you need to go deep into the tree before they start becoming something more then a tax. I kind of prefer the way that Survivals training charms are set out, even if I'm tempted to use both on the same beasts.

Combining survival, Ride, and Lore will basically get you the strongest, smartest, and most dangerous Pokemon!
 
I'll admit, Craft is questionable. It functions but it's inelegant and difficult to work with. Even so, it's still better than what we got than 2E though, and it's still a decent system even if the emphasis is placed firmly on wringing as many successes out of as few dice as possible.

It is better than Exalted 2E, but I don't think it's a decent system.

The Martial Arts divide is fine, really, because they are worth the investment they require. Pound for pound, Single Point Shining in the Void is superior to conventional Solar Melee, especially when we factor in Mastery.

'Take this merit that does nothing for you so you can get good stuff' is not a good way to do that. It's a practice that's been consistently condemned in RPG design for good reason. "MA is just that good" is an argument for increased costs/barriers to entry, but is not an argument for those barriers to entry being literal experience sinks. "Buy a thing so you can buy things that actually do stuff" is just ugh.

The skill curve has most of the ability reqs at 5, but during charmbuy at Chargen the max your ability scores are at are 3, and you will more than know that you need abilities at 5 to get the rest of the charms further down the list.

3 unless you spend BP unless we're looking at different versions of the book. In addition, Abilities are on an exponential scale for experience use again, meaning it's more efficient to raise Abilities you know you want to 5 instead of raising them later. The top-heavy charms exacerbate this, as there's significant incentive to hit Ability 5 in a few Abilities to maximize your early charm-purchasing potential.

In addition, raising an ability from 3 to 5 with BP is incredibly efficient. It's 2 points for Caste/Favored and 4 for non-Caste/Favored. The Exp cost for this is 12 (Caste/Favored) or 14 (Non-Caste/Favored). This is 6:1 conversion for buying a Caste Ability and 3.5:1 for Non-Caste.

Buying Charms, Evocations and the like, meanwhile, trades at 2:1. (4/5 BP, 8/10 Exp, depending.)

(This efficiency exists elsewhere. 4:1 exchange for Willpower, for example, 4:1 to buy the fifth dot of a Primary/Secondary Attribute, 3:1 to buy the fourth dot of same, 5.3:1 for the fifth dot of a Tertiary attribute, 4:1 to buy the fourth)

You are massively incentivized to buy some of your Caste/Favored Abilities to 5 instead of raising them with experience which, once again, turns chargen into a game you can 'lose', entering the game at an effective experience disadvantage.

They're called Evocations and I'd really like to know what the problems are.

The way Innate works and the way they tie to artifacts has negative incentives and penalizes you massively for plots wherein your artifact is stolen/unavailable. It also disincentivizes using new weapons that you've forged or found.

I will admit that I'm terrible at names.

Homebrew is sometimes less about compensating for difficulties and more about matching to your personal preferences: see also the people who tried desperately to get Fighters worth a damn in 3E while everyone else insisted that this is how it's meant to be.

...Getting fighters worth a damn was about trying to fix a broken system, I think you might want an example about variant magic systems instead?

As for Hundred Faced Stranger, much like differences over the Doombot charm, that's just, like, your opinion man.

Yes, and your opinion on the matter is wrong. :p

(More seriously, you asked for everything I didn't like. I think it has pretty shitty incentives and does not, to me, fit the Solar theme of human excellence. As such I don't like it and don't think it should stick around. Same with Doombot.)

It's really only bloat when the Charms in question are purposeless filler. Charm bloat is caused BY having a few too-big Charms that swallow too much design space, resulting in all the remaining Charms being irrelevant trash that nobody wants to take.

The absurd amount of situational dice adders (Or effective dice adders, in the form of reroll cascades and stuff) certainly counts as Charm bloat. They could have, without issue, been folded into fewer charms, or been simplified into a smaller set with a less annoying to read probability curve. I support simplification, as it makes it easier for new blood to join the game, and helps keep new people involved once they do join. It also makes it easier to balance shit and do mathematical analysis.

I'm posting the DnD stuff in the DnD thread to make sure we don't derail. I'll quote you there when the post's up, so you'll get an alert. (I've folded in the thing about the contractors there, but can edit it in here if you'd like)
 
Oh the Scaling XP Costs is a major gripe I have with 3e, most certainly. But it's an issue I have with most White Wolf/OPP games in general so I deigned not to mention it. Whenever I use a WW game I just give a flat cost table. Doesn't -solve- the problem but it does reduce it by a fair bit, but with Essence being tied to XP spent I may have to adjust my usual numbers to prevent some unintended power creep.
 
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...I'm actually going to raise my hand and say that I don't mind a disincentive for switching weapons. In the myth cycles that Exalted is inspired by, heroes are often associated with very specific weapons.

Yes, but many Heroes had other lesser weapons as well, ones they often wielded with as much potency as their main ones.

King Arthur had Excalibur sure, but at other times he had the Sword in the Stone, his spear Rhongomiant and the dagger Carnwennan which is said to have allowed him to become invisible. Oh and his shield Wynebgwrthucher, but then Welsh as a language amuses me. And who can forget mighty Clarent, a ceremonial sword used to knight people and ended up being used to kill him.
 
It is better than Exalted 2E, but I don't think it's a decent system.

Agreed. Probably on both counts. I don't like how it handles craft all that much, but in total the system is quite good. At least, IMO.

'Take this merit that does nothing for you so you can get good stuff' is not a good way to do that. It's a practice that's been consistently condemned in RPG design for good reason. "MA is just that good" is an argument for increased costs/barriers to entry, but is not an argument for those barriers to entry being literal experience sinks. "Buy a thing so you can buy things that actually do stuff" is just ugh.


XP or a four dot merit at chargen, and let's be real here, who even wants Merits like Giant when all it gets you is an extra -0?

3 unless you spend BP unless we're looking at different versions of the book.

Not quite: in chargen you buy your charms BEFORE you spend bp, so at least initially you're limited only to the starter charms that are ranked from ability 1-3.

In addition, Abilities are on an exponential scale for experience use again, meaning it's more efficient to raise Abilities you know you want to 5 instead of raising them later. The top-heavy charms exacerbate this, as there's significant incentive to hit Ability 5 in a few Abilities to maximize your early charm-purchasing potential.

In addition, raising an ability from 3 to 5 with BP is incredibly efficient. It's 2 points for Caste/Favored and 4 for non-Caste/Favored. The Exp cost for this is 12 (Caste/Favored) or 14 (Non-Caste/Favored). This is 6:1 conversion for buying a Caste Ability and 3.5:1 for Non-Caste.

Buying Charms, Evocations and the like, meanwhile, trades at 2:1. (4/5 BP, 8/10 Exp, depending.)

A bit of a math quibble, but given that one average 1 bp is roughly equivalent to 3xp in terms of what you can purchase with it, it's 1:2 for caste or 6:7 for out of caste.

(This efficiency exists elsewhere. 4:1 exchange for Willpower, for example, 4:1 to buy the fifth dot of a Primary/Secondary Attribute, 3:1 to buy the fourth dot of same, 5.3:1 for the fifth dot of a Tertiary attribute, 4:1 to buy the fourth)

I mentioned before how the BP to XP ratio isn't at a 1:1 basis, but I'd also like it noted that Willpower doesn't have a scaling cost. That's important, because in 2E you were a dummo if you didn't max out willpower considering how expensive it got afterwards.

You are massively incentivized to buy some of your Caste/Favored Abilities to 5 instead of raising them with experience which, once again, turns chargen into a game you can 'lose', entering the game at an effective experience disadvantage.

Agreed. I remember this being a problem that a lot of playtesters had issues with, but the Devs were determined to keep it out of a sense of aesthetics. I don't necessarily agree, but it seems they've angled the chargen metagame to at least give more incentive to maximize things instead of tricking the players too much. But yeah, all this could've been avoided if they just had ONLY bp or ONLY xp. Just don't blame the playtesters, the argument from a few posters earlier that they're a cult that endlessly approved of every dev decision is both gross and disingenuous.

The way Innate works and the way they tie to artifacts has negative incentives and penalizes you massively for plots wherein your artifact is stolen/unavailable. It also disincentivizes using new weapons that you've forged or found.

I will admit that I'm terrible at names.

I'd think that Innate would offset that! You get Evocation effects from other artifacts, allowing you to keep those abilities even when you pick up new artifacts. Innate gives you more reason then ever to switch your weapons around, to get a bunch of Evocation effects without crushing your mote pools under attunement.


Yes, and your opinion on the matter is wrong. :p

(More seriously, you asked for everything I didn't like. I think it has pretty shitty incentives and does not, to me, fit the Solar theme of human excellence. As such I don't like it and don't think it should stick around. Same with Doombot.)

I agree to disagree but I'm grateful for you engaging with me!

My love for Doombots is eternal​

The absurd amount of situational dice adders (Or effective dice adders, in the form of reroll cascades and stuff) certainly counts as Charm bloat. They could have, without issue, been folded into fewer charms, or been simplified into a smaller set with a less annoying to read probability curve. I support simplification, as it makes it easier for new blood to join the game, and helps keep new people involved once they do join. It also makes it easier to balance shit and do mathematical analysis.

I disagree somewhat. It's not possible to get every charm, even in a single tree. What the dice trick charms do is incentivize specialization in specific themes. Some are for grappling, some are for feats of strength, and so on. Mechanically they're useful, and outside of that encourage the building of a specialized theme rather than omni-competence in every field, which was a problem in 2E where all you needed was the perfect effects at the beginning of a charm tree and never had to bother with it again.

I'm posting the DnD stuff in the DnD thread to make sure we don't derail. I'll quote you there when the post's up, so you'll get an alert. (I've folded in the thing about the contractors there, but can edit it in here if you'd like)

Thank you! I'll meet you there, though my responses are probably gonna be a bit slow now. Again, I'm grateful you're taking the time for this. :]
 
Not quite: in chargen you buy your charms BEFORE you spend bp, so at least initially you're limited only to the starter charms that are ranked from ability 1-3.
Nope!
3E said:
Note: You're allowed to spend bonus points at any timeduring character creation. For example, if you want to buy a Charm during Step 5 but don't have a high enough Ability rating, you can go ahead and spend bonus points to bump up the Ability then and there.
 
3 unless you spend BP unless we're looking at different versions of the book. In addition, Abilities are on an exponential scale for experience use again, meaning it's more efficient to raise Abilities you know you want to 5 instead of raising them later. The top-heavy charms exacerbate this, as there's significant incentive to hit Ability 5 in a few Abilities to maximize your early charm-purchasing potential.

In addition, raising an ability from 3 to 5 with BP is incredibly efficient. It's 2 points for Caste/Favored and 4 for non-Caste/Favored. The Exp cost for this is 12 (Caste/Favored) or 14 (Non-Caste/Favored). This is 6:1 conversion for buying a Caste Ability and 3.5:1 for Non-Caste.

Buying Charms, Evocations and the like, meanwhile, trades at 2:1. (4/5 BP, 8/10 Exp, depending.)

(This efficiency exists elsewhere. 4:1 exchange for Willpower, for example, 4:1 to buy the fifth dot of a Primary/Secondary Attribute, 3:1 to buy the fourth dot of same, 5.3:1 for the fifth dot of a Tertiary attribute, 4:1 to buy the fourth)

You are massively incentivized to buy some of your Caste/Favored Abilities to 5 instead of raising them with experience which, once again, turns chargen into a game you can 'lose', entering the game at an effective experience disadvantage.
I think we should consider the possibility that this was deliberate. They're certainly not trying to hide the fact that they've done so - the chargen chapter even explicitly calls out buying up your abilities as a good investment. There are a couple decent reasons I can think of why they might do this.

First, even with flat XP costs and no high-skill charms, buying abilities up to 5 at chargen would be a good idea anyway, since having big dicepools on your key abilities is very important. As such making it obvious to newbies that it's a good idea with aggressive pricing and lots of high-skill charms to drool over can actually help them avoid chargen mistakes.

Second, it's thematic. Solars are supposed to excel in the areas of their expertise, standing at the pinnacle of mortal ability even before they start exerting themselves. Giving them the ability to do so on the cheap at chargen means that solars coming out of chargen are going to excel as they should. Incentivising players to build their characters like proper solars (by making an obvious trap out of failing to do so) helps push people to keep things in-theme without feeling like a heavy-handed "this is the right way to do it".

Not quite: in chargen you buy your charms BEFORE you spend bp, so at least initially you're limited only to the starter charms that are ranked from ability 1-3.
Actually, no; you're allowed to spend BP at any time - you can buy your abilities up before you pick your starter charms. This is a bit counterintuitive, which is probably why the example solar does it, and why they take time to point out that he's done so.
Edit: Oops, ninjaed.
 
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Second, it's thematic. Solars are supposed to excel in the areas of their expertise, standing at the pinnacle of mortal ability even before they start exerting themselves. Giving them the ability to do so on the cheap at chargen means that solars coming out of chargen are going to excel as they should. Incentivising players to build their characters like proper solars (by making an obvious trap out of failing to do so) helps push people to keep things in-theme without feeling like a heavy-handed "this is the right way to do it".

This is a major reason I don't mind the prevalence of high-Ability Charms.
 
This is a major reason I don't mind the prevalence of high-Ability Charms.
I mind that several abilities have more Ability 5 charms than the entirety of Ability 1-4 charms available. Being able to grab low-level, mundane utility charms at low Ability ratings was cool.
Like Joint-Wounding Attack; for a maximum of 13 experience (Thrown Unfavored, buying Thrown 1 and a Thrown charm) you got an upgrade for all the combat abilities.
Survival 1 opened up a charm that basically lets you play fucking Snow White, friend of all animals.
Investigation 2 lets you perfectly catch falsehood.
Lore 2 let you lend motes to friends!
Linguistics 1 let you ignore hostile social attacks!

I mean, this isn't an issue that's entirely new to 3e, but the fact that several abilities completely lack charms below Ability 3, and they're so top-heavy in stacking charms, doesn't fill me with faith that there's a lot of easily available utility charms.
 
Those are baaaaaaad examples to use. They completely locked down certain types of plots with 'screw your best liar in all Creation, I can perfectly tell when someone lies to me' abilities and the like.
The reaction to have practically no Charms at relatively low Ability ratings is a bad response to this, though. It means that 1-3 ratings are rather pointless and/or are XP sinks, given that a vast majority are 4 and 5.
 
The reaction to have practically no Charms at relatively low Ability ratings is a bad response to this, though. It means that 1-3 ratings are rather pointless and/or are XP sinks, given that a vast majority are 4 and 5.

I don't entirely disagree with you, mind. I think every Ability should have at least a couple of Charms at every level... but I have no problem with the Charm trees dramatically expanding as you get higher in the Ability.
 
Those are baaaaaaad examples to use. They completely locked down certain types of plots with 'screw your best liar in all Creation, I can perfectly tell when someone lies to me' abilities and the like.
Or give your "best liar in Creation" the ability to force a roll-off, which is basically standard for Solar "I do this perfectly" charms.
Surprisingly enough, this possibility is included in Judge's Ear Technique!

I mean, Sagacious Reading of Intent's perfect social block is pretty sketchy, but the part where you automatically know what someone hopes to gain from a social attack is still really useful.
 
So, I've been rereading over Sorcery and saw something I wanted to ask about.

When you pick up the Sorcery Initiation Charms, you also pick up a free spell of that Circle(that becomes a Control Spell) and a free Shaping Ritual.

But looking over things, there's doesn't seem to be anything saying whether or not I can buy additional Shaping Rituals outside of picking up the Initiation.

Is it just not there or am I blind?

If it isn't there, what are people's opinions on being able to grab additional Shaping Rituals and how should it be done? Pay XP for it(possibly in the form of a Sorcerous Working) or should it be roleplayed out? Should it be expensive/difficult to get or comparatively easy? Etc.
 
So, I've been rereading over Sorcery and saw something I wanted to ask about.

When you pick up the Sorcery Initiation Charms, you also pick up a free spell of that Circle(that becomes a Control Spell) and a free Shaping Ritual.

But looking over things, there's doesn't seem to be anything saying whether or not I can buy additional Shaping Rituals outside of picking up the Initiation.

Is it just not there or am I blind?

If it isn't there, what are people's opinions on being able to grab additional Shaping Rituals and how should it be done? Pay XP for it(possibly in the form of a Sorcerous Working) or should it be roleplayed out? Should it be expensive/difficult to get or comparatively easy? Etc.

Solars get a free ritual everytime they go up a level of sorcery, so a Solar Circle Sorceror will have 3. In addition, sorcerous artifacts are mentioned to be craftable in play (like the Talisman of Ten Thousand Eyes) and upon crafting one of them you get a free ritual for it. As for gaining more then that, I've been unsure of it myself... I've thought that at least one evocation for Mara's Shadow Tattoos might grant that but other then that...
 
If it isn't there, what are people's opinions on being able to grab additional Shaping Rituals and how should it be done? Pay XP for it(possibly in the form of a Sorcerous Working) or should it be roleplayed out? Should it be expensive/difficult to get or comparatively easy? Etc.
I'd say you should have to do the thing. Craft or improve the artifact, renew your pact with Mara, make a sacrifice to the Ifrit Lord that he will notice, go into the Wyld, find an ancient alchemical recipe for a new draught, etc. Not sure whether or not it should require xp.
 
So, I've been rereading over Sorcery and saw something I wanted to ask about.

When you pick up the Sorcery Initiation Charms, you also pick up a free spell of that Circle(that becomes a Control Spell) and a free Shaping Ritual.

But looking over things, there's doesn't seem to be anything saying whether or not I can buy additional Shaping Rituals outside of picking up the Initiation.
My take-away from the Sorcery chapter was that additional rituals function like "Story" Merits; if something happens in play that justifies a new shaping ritual, such as you meeting Mara and making a pact with her, you would gain that ritual as makes sense for the story, without xp cost.
 
i wonder how this works in universe? point out a tiny typo or mispronounced word and ignore what they were actually talking about?

The Charm in question allows you to discern the true purpose of any social attack, and if said purpose is hostile to you or your interests (I think) it allows you to automatically ignore it.
 
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