General Exalted Thread

[Side Item]

Bullshit. No one said that, and it's not true.

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The sentence right before the one you quoted is me saying that when I read statements like "stuff turned out by Solar artisans and their assistants would be built to the most exacting standards" and "Solars with a more utilitarian bent though? Would insist on designs that are more rugged, both for themselves, and their retainers" and (from a post I didn't quote because it wasn't on the same page) "It seems to be more about the workmanship than the design goals" they suggest that only the non-exacting/non-utilitarian would make artifacts that require maintenance.

At no point did I mean that those words were actually said, and I apologize if I imply that. But, if your conception of FA artifact making is that maintenance/upkeep would only be involved if you knew about how to make items imperishable but didn't care to reach that standard/didn't care about the lost utility/didn't put in the necessary workmanship, that to me implies some measure of laziness and/or foolishness since you were then deliberately choosing to make them perishable (in the same way that if I know a home cooked meal will be a de factor better choice for me than Arbys, but still choose Arbys, it's probably due to laziness and/or foolishness).

I admit that I might be misreading/misinterpreting uju32's point. From how I've been reading things, there's disagreement over how maintenance heavy the FA should be/was, with uju32 saying that it's not likely to be maintenance heavy because the Solars were geniuses with access to the best tools, so they'd more likely consciously choose the non-maintenance version of Artifacts. My main disagreement is based around what I perceive to be the suggested continuum of that, that everything can be built in either perishable or imperishable forms, since I've usually played in games/read the setting to assume that the FA had Artifacts that only make sense in the context of 'maintenance' that the FA provided.

Apologies again if I've misread or appeared to put words into somebody's mouth.

 

[Revlid]

@Side Item pretty much has the right of it here.

It's made clear through mechanics and fluff text that First Age Solar artisans could make wondrous artifacts that would never decay or break or corrupt or exhaust themselves. Given that the base setting is one in which Bronze Age tribes pick through the decayed, broken, corrupted and exhausted bones of a lost and wondrous world, this is clearly an issue with the depiction of First Age Solar artisans rather than anything else.

Something like 3/4 of the screentime given to the titular mech in Evangelion is it sitting in a pod bay being expensively repaired, refueled or maintained. Similar notes apply to other mech anime. Unfortunately, we remember the ass-kicking and forget the ass-patching, which isn't something a setting that strives for "realism" in that sense can really afford.

Exalted should not really be a setting where one guy finds a three thousand-year-old attack helicopter, remembers how to use it through past life convenience, and promptly takes to the skies without ever having to worry about fuel, ammunition or maintenance. Ideally, it should be a setting where one guy inherits an ancient sword with an impractically long, straight blade, made of some impossibly hard metal, and remembers through past life convenience that it was once the wing of a great sycamore-craft that bore him through the sky.

At most, it should be a setting where one guy finds aforesaid helicopter and promptly bends the course of an entire nation around producing metal and fuel refined enough to repair and make semi-effective use of it, while his artisans construct strange and inferior craft of bamboo and bound elementals that accompany it as an honour-guard.

Bullshit. No one said that, and it's not true.

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I think you're missing the thrust of what's actually being said.

 

[greensun]

Ideally, it should be a setting where one guy inherits an ancient sword with an impractically long, straight blade, made of some impossibly hard metal, and remembers through past life convenience that it was once the wing of a great sycamore-craft that bore him through the sky.

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I actually had some fun with something like that.

Bascially, my friends Dawn Caste had this blade about the size of his arm that he had found in the blasted ruins of a First Age city, when he found it was only the blade with the hilt end shatter. Once he reforged it, he had a vision.

He was a pilot of a majestic warstrider the size of a aprtment block with a blade that could cleave through mountains and reduce armies to bloody bits. He had the tip of it.

 

[samdamandias]

Exalted should not really be a setting where one guy finds a three thousand-year-old attack helicopter, remembers how to use it through past life convenience, and promptly takes to the skies without ever having to worry about fuel, ammunition or maintenance.

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Well to be fair, my circle only got about an hour or two of high speed flight out of that (which is remarkable, the first age built really well) before something went CLANG and engines numbers two and three caught on fire, engine four flat-out died, and the starboard tail fin nearly ripped itself off. We meat up with our sidereal benefactor who happened to have a group of highly skilled artisans and smiths with him and they told us it would take at least a year to make it airworthy. Not "Solar Deliberative Strike Cruiser" airworthy but "Halsanti-style it's probably not going to explode and kill you all" airworthy.

Consider Lookshy, which is able to produce First Age dropships. Well, they can if they're willing to channel the entirety of their funding and resources for their navy into a single ship for a period of between five and ten years. But wooden warships? If they're anything like Venice's arsenaloti they can churn out a galleon trireme in a day. Heck, reportedly the arsenaloti once built a warship in a single hour. But either way, Lookshy would run out of crew before it could run out of ships.

 

[Aleph]

The engineer, for whom tinkering is more a pleasure than a chore, would be fine with something that requires lots of maintenance and tweaking.
Other Solars with a more utilitarian bent though?
Would insist on designs that are more rugged, both for themselves, and their retainers.

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Why? They have a Creation-wide infrastructure to use at their whim. They can afford - easily - to have people trained and employed for the sole purpose of maintaining their stuff while they're napping or asleep or not using it or whatever. They don't need to do it. Their retainers don't need to do it. They live in the lap of luxury, they take for granted that they have access to enormous amounts of infrastructure. And unless you want to make the statement that Maintenance means nothing whatsoever - which is a stupid, stupid statement - then taking it as a flaw means that they can make better equipment for a cost that means nothing to them, but presents a problem for you after their society has collapsed.

You're also missing the basic point, which is that High First Age stuff should require fucktonnes of maintenance and be an utter bitch to fuel and need constant attention to keep it in working order precisely so as to deny it to players who do not invest heavily in it. Because these sorts of things are unheard of wonders of a lost age, and they are phenomenally powerful, and there is a price attached to that. And that price is that upkeep is a bitch, yo.

If you want a nice easy Artifact that doesn't need fuelling or maintaining or adjusting or repairing, get something from the Age of Sorrows. Or the Shogunate, if you're willing to do some upkeep but not prohibitive amounts. First Age tech is not easy. It is not simple. You don't get to have it at no cost, because one of the big, running themes of Exalted is that infrastructure is important and you are expected and encouraged to go build an empire, because doing so is useful. It lets you do things that you cannot do otherwise. And one of those things is "support higher tech".

 

[greensun]

trireme

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The fact that Exalted makes the Realm and Lookshy use trriremes still makes me inordinatly angry. Why are the Realm and Lookshy using such a terrible type of ship, especially out in the West? When the Junk is not only more in theme for the Realm, but also much cooler looking and practical for a world spanning empire or the Shoguntte remant that is Lookshy.

 

[notanautomaton]

The fact that Exalted makes the Realm and Lookshy use trriremes still makes me inordinatly angry. Why are the Realm and Lookshy using such a terrible type of ship, especially out in the West? When the Junk is not only more in theme for the Realm, but also much cooler looking and practical for a world spanning empire or the Shoguntte remant that is Lookshy.

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"Because muh bronze age." -Developers, probably.

 

[Cosar]

The fact that Exalted makes the Realm and Lookshy use trriremes still makes me inordinatly angry. Why are the Realm and Lookshy using such a terrible type of ship, especially out in the West? When the Junk is not only more in theme for the Realm, but also much cooler looking and practical for a world spanning empire or the Shoguntte remant that is Lookshy.

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Actually, I think you could argue that for Lookshy an oared vessel could make actual sense, as you're fighting in a limited area around the coast. Hell, it would even make sense for the Realm to use something like them when dealing with Lookshy. Oared vessels do have some advantages over wind-powered ships, after all. Having the Realm use them exclusively is silly.

 

[Sucal]

The fact that Exalted makes the Realm and Lookshy use trriremes still makes me inordinatly angry. Why are the Realm and Lookshy using such a terrible type of ship, especially out in the West? When the Junk is not only more in theme for the Realm, but also much cooler looking and practical for a world spanning empire or the Shoguntte remant that is Lookshy.

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This is a very old rant that I've made in this thread about half a dozen times, usually in connection to a game that appears to have died from confusion lock.

 

[greensun]

Actually, I think you could argue that for Lookshy an oared vessel could make actual sense, as you're fighting in a limited area around the coast. Hell, it would even make sense for the Realm to use something like them when dealing with Lookshy. Oared vessels do have some advantages over wind-powered ships, after all. Having the Realm use them exclusively is silly.

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Sure, for river patrols, but if they're going to war with anyone who's gotten beyond greek style naval warfare, they'd use Junk or artifact ships from the low first age. Just think about it, a massive junk made out of essence treated wood and black jade sailing arcoss the Western seas with sails with threads of blue jade from the pole of air sown into it so that it catches the wind better anything mortals could create, with Concussive Essence artiliery mounted on the side that shatter any thing else on the sea.

And sailing in formation with this flagship are dozens of other more mundane warships with thousands of Imperial Soldiers on board, ready to make someone's day a lot worse.

 

[Cosar]

Sure, for river patrols, but if they're going to war with anyone who's gotten beyond greek style naval warfare, they'd use Junk or artifact ships from the low first age. Just think about it, a massive junk made out of essence treated wood and black jade sailing arcoss the Western seas with sails with threads of blue jade from the pole of air sown into it so that it catches the wind better anything mortals could create, with Concussive Essence artiliery mounted on the side that shatter any thing else on the sea.

And sailing in formation with this flagship are dozens of other more mundane warships with thousands of Imperial Soldiers on board, ready to make someone's day a lot worse.

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Did you quote me by mistake? Because it doesn't really look like this is a reply to my post.

 

[Hazard]

Lookshy could very easily have a large trireme navy for the purpose of patrolling the Scavenger Lands, and especially the parts of the Scavenger Lands closest to Lookshy as those are fairly wide and deep waters without being prohibitively so.

 

[greensun]

Did you quote me by mistake? Because it doesn't really look like this is a reply to my post.

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Sorry, I seperated my post rather poorly, the first part of sentance about the river patrols was for you, the rest was me just ranting WW 's lack of genre awarness.

 

[azoicennead]

So if you get wounded by a [P] tagged weapon, you're shit out of luck.

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Uh... No?
Regenerating Bashing damage doesn't make Piercing damage any more dangerous than before, nor is Piercing damage somehow a problem for it.
You probably meant Lethal damage.

Well to be fair, my circle only got about an hour or two of high speed flight out of that (which is remarkable, the first age built really well) before something went CLANG and engines numbers two and three cuaght on fire, engine four flat-out died, and the starboard tail fin nearly ripped itself off. We meat up with our sidereal benefactor who happened to have a group of highly skilled artisans and smiths with him and they told us it would take at least a year to make it airworthy. Not "Solar Deliberative Strike Cruiser" airworthy but "Halsanti-style it's probably not going to explode and kill you all" airworthy.

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Don't forget that our pilot can only do so by virtue of the borderline-DID resulting from the strength of her past life's memories!

 

[Cosar]

Sorry, I seperated my post rather poorly, the first part of sentance about the river patrols was for you, the rest was me just ranting WW 's lack of genre awarness.

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Ok. Also, you realize that oared vessels were used in the Mediterranean for quite some time after ancient Greece. Even during the 1500's they were the dominant vessels in the area. Unless you're suggesting that 16th century Venice and the Ottaman empire fought in the same way as Ancient Greece I think that your first sentence is wrong.

And while your rant was evocative, oared vessels can be described in similar language, so your rant seems ill-formed.

 

[greensun]

Ok. Also, you realize that oared vessels were used in the Mediterranean for quite some time after ancient Greece. Even during the 1500's they were the dominant vessels in the area. Unless you're suggesting that 16th century Venice and the Ottaman empire fought in the same way as Ancient Greece I think that your first sentence is wrong.

And while your rant was evocative, oared vessels can be described in similar language, so your rant seems ill-formed.

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I was refering to triemeres being used as the Realms main form of naval power, especially in the bloody west, vs the idea that they're useless altogether.

 

[Cosar]

I was refering to triemeres being used as the Realms main form of naval power, especially in the bloody west, vs the idea that they're useless altogether.

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So then you weren't replying to me, and you think that the Mediterranean is a river?

 

[greensun]

So then you weren't replying to me, and you think that the Mediterranean is a river?

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Trimeres were made to hug the coast, not as sail ships to go explore the far fucking west. Or do you think that a ship that constantly got water logged would be useful that far from the coast? They had to be dragged from the fucking water and left to drain for christs sake.

Coastal and river patrols, sure! But they should not be the main stay of a Empire that extends far beyond their coast line to the trecherous waters of the West.

 

[Cosar]

Trimeres were made to hug the coast, not as sail ships to go explore the far fucking west. Or do you think that a ship that constantly got water logged would be useful that far from the coast? They had to be dragged from the fucking water and left to drain for christs sake.

Coastal and river patrols, sure! But they should not be the main stay of a Empire that extends far beyond their coast line to the trecherous waters of the West.

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Actually, I think you could argue that for Lookshy an oared vessel could make actual sense, as you're fighting in a limited area around the coast. Hell, it would even make sense for the Realm to use something like them when dealing with Lookshy. Oared vessels do have some advantages over wind-powered ships, after all. Having the Realm use them exclusively is silly.

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I wasn't aware that Lookshy was considered to be part of the west. Honestly, if that's true, that sounds like a bigger problem than the boats. If Lookshy is in the west, it should be interacting with other places in the west, not the scavenger lands!

 

[greensun]

I wasn't aware that Lookshy was considered to be part of the west. Honestly, if that's true, that sounds like a bigger problem than the boats. If Lookshy is in the west, it should be interacting with other places in the west, not the scavenger lands!

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I wasn't complaining about that at all... I was giving out about the Realm mostly. Heck I even agreed with you on Lookshy using them for river patrol. But even then they would use a better design of river boat than fucking trireme.

Like a japanese Atakebune or the Korean Panokseon.

 

[Cosar]

I wasn't complaining about that at all... I was giving out about the Realm mostly. Heck I even agreed with you on Lookshy using them for river patrol. But even then they would use a better design of river boat than fucking trireme.

Like a japanese Atakebune or the Korean Panokseon.

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If you weren't complaining about that, then why was the statement that the Lookshy was in a situation where oared vessels would be useful, and by extension that the Realm could also use oared vessels in those situations, met with the statement that they weren't suitable for exploring into the west? That would only apply if Lookshy was in the west. If that is not what you meant, then please explain how you were responding to me.

As for those examples, I think the main issue is that the currently in exalted, the word trireme is used in place of 'oared vessel'. Also, those examples are from the 16th century at least. It would probably be better to compare them to 16th century European oared vessels(which is what I was talking about, though you seem to have discounted that for some unknown reason).

 

[greensun]

If you weren't complaining about that, then why was the statement that the Lookshy was in a situation where oared vessels would be useful, and by extension that the Realm could also use oared vessels in those situations, met with the statement that they weren't suitable for exploring into the west? That would only apply if Lookshy was in the west. If that is not what you meant, then please explain how you were responding to me.

As for those examples, I think the main issue is that the currently in exalted, the word trireme is used in place of 'oared vessel'. Also, those examples are from the 16th century at least. It would probably be better to compare them to 16th century European oared vessels(which is what I was talking about, though you seem to have discounted that for some unknown reason).

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As I said before, I miss seprated my reply.

Sure, for river patrols, but if they're going to war with anyone who's gotten beyond greek style naval warfare, they'd use Junk or artifact ships from the low first age

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This was what I was saying to you, the rest was just general ranting at the stupidity of the devs.

 

[Legion1771]

How big is Creation? And what kind of population does it hold? Because I've heard some insane population figures in just armies on it's own.

 

[greensun]

How big is Creation? And what kind of population does it hold? Because I've heard some insane population figures in just armies on it's own.

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Bloody massive, I've heard that the Blessed Isles, the home of the Realm, is as big as Russia.

 

[Cosar]

As I said before, I miss seprated my reply.
This was what I was saying to you, the rest was just general ranting at the stupidity of the devs.

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I did read that part. But there's also this part of the conversation, which is what I was actually referring to:

So then you weren't replying to me, and you think that the Mediterranean is a river?

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Trimeres were made to hug the coast, not as sail ships to go explore the far fucking west. Or do you think that a ship that constantly got water logged would be useful that far from the coast? They had to be dragged from the fucking water and left to drain for christs sake.

Coastal and river patrols, sure! But they should not be the main stay of a Empire that extends far beyond their coast line to the trecherous waters of the West.

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Plus there's the fact that I'm talking more about oared ships in general, as opposed to the idea of Triremes in particular(and I think it's important to note that while we have better designs for ships than triremes in our history, those designs are not from the same time period, and thus not entirely relevant). So was this a miss-separation as well? Has anything you written actually been in reply to what I said?

How big is Creation? And what kind of population does it hold? Because I've heard some insane population figures in just armies on it's own.

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It depends on the scaling. Creation generally has much more landmass than Earth even if the size estimates put it at slightly less surface area. It can also be placed as much larger than Earth.

Population-wise is less clear. I'd generally go with 1 billion being the lower bound, and 2 being the upper bound. During the First Age and Shogunate it would have been significantly more.

I did some rough calculations on the population of the Realm on the old white wolf forums, but the current Archive is painful to search through, so I don't have them.