Tonight, I apologized because I'm sticking to the experience plan I laid out for myself last month. The apology was because my character is very much combat-focused, and combat balance is difficult because of the massive disparity between her (with what will soon be a DV of 14 before penalties, when she can go full sunshine mode) and the rest of the circle.
So, the ST is now trying to figure out how to deal with this. My recommendation was to make the combat a secondary objective, with the primary objective being something where the fact that I can go toe-to-toe with Second Circle Demons doesn't mean that anything of an equivalent Essence is likely to lose (because Candles is really fucking good at combat - it was 90% of her life for basically the first couple decades); things like capture missions, chasing down a target, defending a point, escort quests. His idea was basically throwing drugs at me, and his initial idea was basically a powder version of chalcanth (basically, target inhales the powder, get high, and act kind of like the demon they inhaled lensed through their personality). So, we spent some time brain-storming how to use various demons.
Neomah would make someone want to get paid to practice a trade (Candles would perform or teach*).
Teodozjia would probably make them lean towards religious extremism and enforcing their religious views on others (Candles, being not terribly devout, would probably be more influenced by their defilement of opposing religions, and be more inclined to flaunt her name and nature).
Sesseljae would probably result in excessive consumption of alcohol (or other edible tainted/corrupted substances), and possibly lots of hugs to make sure friends/allies are okay.
Angyalkae would cause a strong, almost obsessive urge to play music. Constantly.
Gilmyne would be like angyalkae, except with dancing.
Tomescu would result in less long-term planning. Living in the moment, not worrying about consequences.
Agatae would make Candles want to give lots of people piggy-back rides.
Marottes would make the consumer into an aggressive interior decorator ("Candles, you need permission to go into someone's house and redecorate." "THEY GAVE ME PERMISSION WHEN THEY DECORATED WRONG!"). Well, aggressive anything decorator, really; changing things to fit their personal sense of aesthetics.
Erymanthoi are unlikely to be used, because then the murderblender starts stabbing (and possibly eating) her problems.
* Would Intelligence 3, Lore 3, and Occult 5 be enough to earn a PhD? I want to know if I can justify calling Candles "Dr. Murderblender".
It would, however, suck immesely if you never got to simply beat the shit out of something ever again just because you are a combat optimized character.
It's the age old problem of hitting the necessary level to throw the spell fireball and every single enemy you meet afterwards having fire resistance 30.
It would, however, suck immesely if you never got to simply beat the shit out of something ever again just because you are a combat optimized character.
It's the age old problem of hitting the necessary level to throw the spell fireball and every single enemy you meet afterwards having fire resistance 30.
My suggestion wasn't to remove combat, but to make it so "kill everything" isn't the victory condition (and make the victory condition something that isn't centered on my ass-kicking ability) because otherwise making a challenge for Candles involves pumping enemies up to a point that the rest of the circle shouldn't be expected to deal with.
@Tahu1809 isn't going to stop feeding me things to beat up, he's just getting frustrated because he's having trouble challenging me (and that's only getting worse as time passes; I still haven't picked up Infinite Melee Mastery, because then I'd have an effective base dice pool of 25 dice on attacks before I start burning motes - compared to like 15 dice for the others) and seeking solutions.
Hmm what works better with Black Claw style in 3e?
Crane or Dreaming Pearl Courtsan?
I mean if it wasn't for the Martial Arts Tax I'd likely get all three eventually but with it I'm still having trouble justifying even a second one *brainstorming a hypothetical character for Autos game even though the other guy already got the slot*
General cap of (Attribute), but with the 4th Augmentation port over as is (it has a different name now, as most of the other Augmentations are gone). I was worried about the static dice boost, but then I realized Solars get things like Harmonious Presence Meditation at Essence 1 (+3 dice to social actions, indefinitely, plus a mote reduction on social charms). With things like that around, I'm not to worried about balance, though I'm going to need to make sure no other scenelong+ static dice boosters creep in, and to keep the mote costs for charms higher then Solars.
I'd go with Dreaming Pearl Courtesan: you can use the Intimacies you inflict via Black Claw to tank their Resolve for some Dreaming Pearl Courtesan Charms. You can also combine the Charm sets Evasion boosters, while Crane is Parry based. You can further add in Dodge Charms, which helps trigger the special activation rules for both forms. I also like the mix of 'I'm totally the good guy' from Black Claw and the 'beautiful but deadly courtier' from Dreaming Pearl Courtesan.
You are going to have to watch Pearlescent Filigree Defense though, as it locks out Black Claw charms by virtue of being armor.
My suggestion wasn't to remove combat, but to make it so "kill everything" isn't the victory condition (and make the victory condition something that isn't centered on my ass-kicking ability) because otherwise making a challenge for Candles involves pumping enemies up to a point that the rest of the circle shouldn't be expected to deal with.
You have combat rolls not be 'do I kill everyone in the room' (Because you're going to. And you're going to do it with style) but 'do I kill everyone in this meeting hall before any given one of them can reach an alarm bell' or 'Can I disarm every enemy in this corridor before any of my allies get injured' and stuff like that. Absurdly high difficulties for similarly hilarious feats of combat skill.
Well, there will probably be a ton of houserules to reduce the martial arts tax. Simple stuff like making MA one ability across styles, but unlocking each style with a merit or such.
Let's see, Black Claw is exclusively unarmed and incompatible with armor. That already makes DPC problematic - Elegant Weapon Repertoire works by turning normal stuff into weapons, and Pearlescent Filigree Defense provides armor. So Dreaming Pearl Courtesan makes an exceedingly poor combination
Torn Lotus Defense provides counterattacks, albeit social ones. That makes the free counterattacks provided by Crane Form redundant, but the form is still useful since it makes Full Defense cheaper to use. It does combine very well with Empowering Justice Redirection - you enhance your (Manipulation + Presence) roll, and once you do withering damage you can increase it past your (Manipulation). They attacked you, after all!
Black Claw Form enhances Evasion, while Crossed Wings Denial and Fluttering Cry of Warning enhance your parry. So there is some redundancy here, and having Dodge-charms is generally a good idea for a martial artist so I wouldn't skip on investing into Dodge.
Feather-Stirred Arrow Deflection actually gives your Torn Lotus Defense much greater range - you can now make counterattacks against ranged attacks. Or direct them at people other than those who attacked you.
Mournful Cranes Cry works off decisive counterattacks, which is incompatible with Torn Lotus Defense. So you'll have to be in Crane-form to benefit from it. The same goes for Wisdom of the Celestial Crane.
Black Claw and Crane Style produce different types of intimacies - but ones that can complement each other. You can build love out of respect and vice versa. That actually makes for a great combo if used right, since you can lower the enemies resolve quite a bit that way.
I see three options here:
Invest two points into Martial Arts (Crane Style) and get Empowering Justice Redirection. It's not too much of an investment, just four XP for the ability (ideally, you buy the first dot with BP and the second with XP) and one charm. A charm which provides a great benefit to one of your most common techniques, so this s a pretty good investment.
But your Crane Style up to 5 points, costing an extra 24 XP. Then buy Fluttering Cry of Warning, Crane Form, Crossed Wings Denial and Feather-Stirred Arrow Deflection, four charm purchases.
Fluttering Cry of Warning is only useful if you defend another - but that is an action that befits the Black Claw style, especially if you do the whole "mutual feelings" thing some of them do (heretics, all of them). Crane Form can be useful to make decisive counterattacks, something Black Claw lacks. Crossed Wings Denial is not that useful sadly, but can be useful in conjunction with the former two charms. Feather-Stirred Arrow Deflection once again enhances your main schtick, so it's good.
And since you are already at Crane Style 5 and are past the less-useful charms, you might as well go all the way in.
Wings Spread to Sky provides useful mobility and can enhance decisive attacks. Humbling Enlightenment Commentary enhances decisive attacks, and can probably be phrased to fit Black Claw Style ("your aggression only shows your impatience" or such). Kindly Sifus Quill does not work with Heart-Ripping Claw (one is bashing, the other aggravated), but can ironically be used to weaken the enemy before ripping out his heart. Mournful Cranes Wing is once again mostly useful for defense, maybe use it to throw away opponents that attack your defended loved ones. Wisdom of the Celestial Crane is of course mutually exclusive with Heart-Ripping claw, but it's nice to have choices like this.
You have combat rolls not be 'do I kill everyone in the room' (Because you're going to. And you're going to do it with style) but 'do I kill everyone in this meeting hall before any given one of them can reach an alarm bell' or 'Can I disarm every enemy in this corridor before any of my allies get injured' and stuff like that. Absurdly high difficulties for similarly hilarious feats of combat skill.
My Meleeist was completely uninjured and had like 60% of his motes left by combat end. The Brawler was similiarly uninjured. The Twilight and the Night are laid out for days as they recover from their horrific injuries and are badly traumatized to boot.
So, it occurs to me that one of the bigger complaints out of Exalted 3rd Edition was 'I have no idea what these modifiers do to dice pools'. So lets go over that.
These are mostly going to focus on average number of successes, since around the 10 dice level failure starts becomes statistically improbable to the point it might as well not exist (though not impossible: I have rolled 2 successes on 18 dice. The RNG really hated me that day) and even below that your going to get at least one success most of the time unless you are literally rolling only one die.
For simplicities sake, I'm going to keep most of the math spoilered, and most of the stuff will be simplified down: these are meant for being able to make a quick glance at a pool and know what roughly to expect, not to be accurate to two significant figures.
Alright, the basic math for average number of successes in Exalted is add the number of successes a given face of the ten sided dice gives to the number of successes that all the other sides of the dice give, divided by the number of faces. So 7, 8, and 9 give 1 success each, so add all three together for a total of 3, and then 10 gives 2, so add that in for a total of 5. Divide by 10 because this is a ten sided dice. Tends to look like:
([1+1+1+2]/10)*Dice pool = Average Successes
Most long term Exalted/White Wolf fans who care about probability are already familiar with it, its nothing new.
Doubles
Doubles are one of the more persistent introductions to 3e, so far as dice mechanics go. Basically, if you see the term double x, double everything after that number for successes. Double 9s mean 9s and 10s are doubled, Double 8s 8s, 9s and 10s, etc. Double 10s applies to all rolls but Decisive damage by default, so its not used much as a term. Watch out for it on Decisive-only charms though.
Math wise, it takes one of the 1s from the basic equation ([1+1+1+2]/10) that represent the successes on the 9s or 8s, and makes it a 2. Ergo, calculation now looks like 1+1+2+2= 6/10, for 60% of a given pool turning up successes on double 9s.
Generally speaking, these increase the number of successes you roll, not how likely you are to roll a success in the first place. Ergo, they're not so great on smaller pools where there is a significant question of if your going to succeed on a given roll. On larger pools, where the question isn't so much if you will succeed but by how much, these can increase the amount of successes you have significantly.
Rules of Thumb
Double 9s: 60%
Double 8s: 70%
Double 7s: 80%
Re-roll till a Number Fails to Appear
Another fairly common effect in 3e, at least Solars. Its actually pretty rare outside of them, though this may just be a side effect of other books not being written yet. I have my own theory, but I'll wait till I'm done with all the mechanics to explain that.
What happens probability wise is that rerolling till a number no longer appears effectively reduces your dice by a face: rerolling dice till 6s no longer appears is effectively rolling a d9. Ergo, for the probability calculations you no longer divide by 10, but by 9: ([1+1+1+2]/9). If you are rerolling out two numbers, it would be ([1+1+1+2]/8).
These tend to be better for smaller pools, as they do increase your chances of rolling a success in the first place as opposed to amplifying successes like Doubles. It also nets you less successes on average then an equivalent Doubles level, so watch out.
A note on the Rules of Thumb here: one or two number rolled out of a roll are fairly common, but three is outright rare to the point that I'm not sure where it happens. Four, I'm pretty sure does not happen, but included for completeness sake. Anything more is right out. (And before anyone mentions it, Fate-Shifting Solar Arte is getting its own section, because it is weird.)
Rules of Thumb
One Number: 55% (Actually 55.5%)
Two Numbers: 60% (Actually 62.5%)
Three Numbers: 70% (Actually 71.4%)
Four Numbers: 80% (Actually 83.3%)
Exploding Dice (Rerolling Successes)
There are few varieties here: some are capped by how many dice you rolled (rerolling failures) others are not. Averages wise, we don't care to much. Basically all of these trigger off 10s, which simplifies thing a fair bit, thankfully.
These are a bit more complicated then the others. They trigger off 10s, causing another dice to be rolled. Therefore, from a probabilities calculation stand point, you re-add the calculation for averages to the number of successes for a ten. For example: ([1+1+1+{2+([1+1+1+2]/10})/10. You could hypothetically nest that again, like so ([1+1+1+{2+([1+1+1+{2+([1+1+1+2]/10}]/10})/10, all the way to infinity, but given this is about rules of thumb and not accuracy, I feel safe in nesting it once and saying anything beyond that is basically adding decimals you don't need.
Rules of Thumb
For those that really don't care about math to much, take your modifier (50% or whatever), divide it by 10, and add it back to the modifier. Ergo, a standard roll where you generally get 50% of your roll will probably give you 55% of your roll. This one is simple enough that its not really worth listing out all the permutations.
Combining Stuff
Or where things get complicated. Generally speaking, there isn't to much high level combinations: your not generally rerolling two numbers while on Double 7s and the dice are exploding. Unless you are using Craft, which I covered before and separately for a reason.
If you have the basic grasp of how the prior stuff works, this isn't to complex. If your for example combining Double 9s with one number rerolled till gone, then the formula is as for double 9s (1+1+2+2) divided by the altered dice (9). All together: (1+1+2+2)/9=0.66666666666... rounded to 67%, or 2/3s of your roll. If you want to factor in exploding dice, 67/10 = 6.7+67 = 73.7, rounded to 74%.
But for those that just want rules of thumb, have no fear, they are here:
Rules of Thumb Single Dice Rerolled
Double 9s: 67% -> 70%
Double 8s: 78% -> 80%
Double 7s: 88% -> 90%
And I'm just going to stop there, because anything more is silly and melts the dice curve. Generally speaking, your not getting better then a single rerolled die with double 9s, and Craft is the only place I know of where you can get Double 7s with two dice rerolled (and you need it, given how many successes craft demands).
Other Strangeness: TN reduction
Or as most people know it, the Sidereals favorite trick. This sets the number you need to roll to get a success to one lower then normal: 6s now give successes in addition to the usual numbers.
Add another 1 into the formula for each new number that can be counted as a success. Setting the TN to 5 would add two, for example: 1+1+1+1+1+2/10 for 70% of your roll.
Functionally this gives the improved chances of succeeding on the roll that rerolling till a number fails to appear gives, along with a similar averages curve to Doubles rules. Dirty cheating Sidereals, getting the best of both worlds.
Rules of Thumb
Target Number 6: 60%
Target Number 5: 70%
Target Number 4: 80%
Fate-Shifting Solar Arte
And then there is this guy that I need to do its own section for. Right: Fate-Shifting Solar Arte doesn't melt the dice curve so much as it renders it into slag. It works by you picking a non-success number (1, 2, 3, etc) and treating it as a 10. In short, it combines the best of Target Number reduction and the Doubles rule. And you can apply it to any action, once per day. At E4 or with Larceny Supernal, you can do it to two numbers. This costs 1wp.
As TN reduction, except with a 2 instead of a 1 for each number made a success.
Rules of Thumb
1 Number: 70%
2 Numbers: 90%
Given this can, explicitly, affect any action, you can combine it basically any of the above dice altering affects to get an average roll of more successes then you rolled. Given this also affect things like Sorcery Workings and Craft, which are meticulously internally balanced within their own ability Charmsets but do not account for this one, I feel no hesitation in saying this Charm breaks the game. Even if you limit it to 'only' reflexive or combat actions, cutting out the success building systems like Craft and Workings, its still in effect a once per day pseudo perfect effect, which 3e mostly seems to be veering away from, and the few effect like it are very expensive. Personally, I'm hoping they cut this charm, because its way to much of a 'I Win' button even with the once per day mechanics.
Reroll X Number of Failed Dice
And because I really don't want to finish on a 'this Charm is broken, avoid' note, I just want to talk about these. Probabilities wise, they're pretty simple: they use the same calculations as the main pool usually, albeit usually a bit smaller. What makes these interesting is their usually either rider effects or trigger after the roll is made. In the latter case, in certain contexts that makes them very useful indeed, especially with the number of charms that key off the number of 1s or 2s rolled: these represent an opportunity to get rid of those. It makes assessing those from a probabilistic stand point a bit tricky. Overall, context and activating the right charms/taking the right actions at the right times matter almost as much in 3e as probabilities, though the RNG laughs at both.
Ok, So What does Any of this Mean?
One of things I've noticed is people seem a bit unsure of what a given dice alteration is representing. in 2e, it was pretty straight forward: more dice meant you were better at it, and TN manipulation typically meant Fate fuckery. So what do these new and strange dice manipulations represent?
What follows is my opinions on it. I might be wrong or completely off base, but hey, best way to figure that out is to let other people look at those assumptions.
Doubles: Doubles amplify prowess. They don't give you a better chance at succeeding, but they make the successes you have more. Ergo, this is a kind of brute force approach: superhuman strength or speed, the blessing of a War God to strike faster and harder, inhuman intelligence connects what you know together better.
Rerolls: These make you better by making you less likely to fail. So, I tend to see these as a kind of supernatural skill: not the raw power approach of doubles, but being just that good. It fairly obvious why Solars have so many of these under this model, or why the DBs have something similar in their Excellency for their in the pinch moments.
Exploding Dice: Exploding dice are mainly well known for allowing people to, with a lot of luck, spike way higher then they would normally. So these are a sort of, 'beyond the limit' or 'boundless power' type effects. Again, with Solars its not hard to see the why its there.
Well, that went on for a bit. Hope this is useful to people.
It's a good analysis. Have you taken a look at "roll a straight" and what that does for your pools?
Here's an interesting side effect: the more dice tricks you have, the more you actively don't want bonus successes on your roll. Consider Excellent Strike: reroll 1s, add a bonus success. "Reroll 1s" nets you an extra 1/18 of a success per die, for .5555 successes/die on average - so two dice are worth, on average , 1.111 successes. But! Every auto-success you add to your pool lowers your maximum Excellency boost by two dice - in other words, it adds 1 success, but prevents you from adding dice worth 1.111 successes. If you somehow added a full five bonus successes, that'd be a more than a half-success on average you'd be giving up. (The effect is obviously much more pronounced on, say, a double-7s roll, where two dice are worth 1.6 successes on average.)
Now, if that bonus success is highly discounted and you weren't going to be able to pay for a full Excellency anyway, there's no problem here - but if you're making, say, a Decisive attack where you want top-end output and don't care about the price, this could matter.
with the primary objective being something where the fact that I can go toe-to-toe with Second Circle Demons doesn't mean that anything of an equivalent Essence is likely to lose
Remind me, how's Candles set up as far as Athletics charms go? And does she have a surprise negator or awareness excellency?*
From what I can tell, Candles doesn't seem like she'd do super well outside of a straight fight. But the fights should give all of us a chance to be awesome. What shouldn't happen is the dawn declaring Join Battle and the rest of the circle taking a tea break. Just like how when it comes time to infiltrate a place, the Night is going to be best at it, but that shouldn't leave the rest of the circle standing around doing nothing, nor should the Twilight handle all the magical stuff or the Zenith/Eclipse all the social stuff.
Heck, have Candles go through the piles of mooks while Serpent goes after high-value targets and Lotus locks down the exits.
*Indoors, at close range, Candles would flatten Serpent. With room to disengage and maneuver, Serpent probably wins more often because surprise attacks and the ability to reestablish stealth in combat are huge advantages.
Why do it quietly? While I'd argue it is far from perfect, it is one of the most coherant portrayls of the Lunar Exalted that I've actually seen. It gives them unique and intresting powers, it has them doing something other than sitting on the edge of Creation with their thumbs up their collective arses. The last of which I will agree that 3E has been striving to correct, if their contension of Caul are anything to go by.
First Excellency (got used for the first time while you were eating dinner last night), Lightning Speeds, Monkey Leap Technique, and Graceful Crane Stance. If I get 3 months to bring my own Essence up to 4 soon, I'll be picking up more in the not terribly distant future. Surprise negator has been there since chargen, as has Third Awareness.
And I think the rest of your post is pretty accurate, but Candles can safely ignore things that are actual threats to Serpent and Silent. When trying to create a combat scenario where all three are challenged and relevant, that makes things... difficult. Admittedly, the weaknesses in our defenses are pretty different (Candles is only really vulnerable to very accurate attacks [even moreso after our next bit of training time], whereas Silent is vulnerable to very high damage attacks; Serpent's best defense so far seems to have been stealth and being out of range).
*Indoors, at close range, Candles would flatten Serpent. With room to disengage and maneuver, Serpent probably wins more often because surprise attacks and the ability to reestablish stealth in combat are huge advantages.
She has an Occult specialty in Supernatural Etiquette already.
Side note, with Final Sunset Stance, Candles has truly earned her title of Murderblender. I dropped into the middle of a squad of 9 mortals, blocked all but one attack (arrogance and luck make a bad combo - but it bounced off, anyway), and then dropped them all in a single tick.
With a heavy stick.
They also didn't believe she could walk off a lasgun shot to the knee. Silly mortals. They don't even break my natural soak!
That's a dicepool of eight in all fields of theology and physics. If she doesn't have a PhD it's because she's not trying, and with a dicepool of 6 for the humanities and mathematics, again all fields, he'd probably hold a Bachelor's degree equivalent.
It does depend on the setting though. The title of Doctor is not appropriate in all situations.
My suggestion wasn't to remove combat, but to make it so "kill everything" isn't the victory condition (and make the victory condition something that isn't centered on my ass-kicking ability) because otherwise making a challenge for Candles involves pumping enemies up to a point that the rest of the circle shouldn't be expected to deal with.
@Tahu1809 isn't going to stop feeding me things to beat up, he's just getting frustrated because he's having trouble challenging me (and that's only getting worse as time passes; I still haven't picked up Infinite Melee Mastery, because then I'd have an effective base dice pool of 25 dice on attacks before I start burning motes - compared to like 15 dice for the others) and seeking solutions.
Come next combat Three Candles Lighting Darkness will be tripping balls, do you me? You will be so high that I will be able to throw the pre-gend stuff at you and it will be a fair fight!
Come next combat Three Candles Lighting Darkness will be tripping balls, do you me? You will be so high that I will be able to throw the pre-gend stuff at you and it will be a fair fight!
At some point, there really aren't fair fights with Solar combatants. Particularly ones that powerful. What I've seen him saying puts him at the level of 'fight multiple Exalts at once.' And if he has the poison keyword he can probably negate those poisons...
Have fun hemorrhaging motes popping a surprise negator and 3rd awareness excellency every turn. And hey, if I can reliably pull off a two-die stunt, you'd also need to spend a perfect every turn.
Of course, this assumes that Serpent fights fair-ish instead of popping stealth, doing some Larceny checks, and then threatening Candle's stash of First Age pr0n. Or insults Candle's hair. Or does something particularly stupid involving magnetic docking clamps and a certain AdMech.
But yeah, I should find a way to boost Serpent's static dicepool and DVs. On the gripping hand, one of my overdrives gives me motes for staying out of range.
That's a dicepool of eight in all fields of theology and physics. If she doesn't have a PhD it's because she's not trying, and with a dicepool of 6 for the humanities and mathematics, again all fields, he'd probably hold a Bachelor's degree equivalent.
It does depend on the setting though. The title of Doctor is not appropriate in all situations.
Dice pool of 9 for Supernatural Etiquette, actually.
Also, she's not interested in earning any formal degrees, so in-character she'll stay Candles; out-of-character, Dr. Murderblender is just a fun joke name for her.
And I'm aware that the title of Doctor wouldn't be appropriate for all settings, which is why I specifically asked about a PhD.
I need to start keeping track of people's reactions when the warrior whose descriptions of what she can do is "stab things good" starts explaining esoteric aspects of physics, with the relevant math.
Come next combat Three Candles Lighting Darkness will be tripping balls, do you me? You will be so high that I will be able to throw the pre-gend stuff at you and it will be a fair fight!
Wait, I'm going to be high enough that mortals would be physically unable to move due to the drugs?
Because for most of the pre-gened stuff, that's seriously what it would take. Looking at Kade from Return to the Tomb of 5 Corners, you could drop his pools to the minimum (his Essence, so 2 at a penalty of -6) and Candles would still be rocking 17 dice on her attacks with just reflexive scene-longs active.
With the Reaver Daiklave, dropping his pool to the minimum would be a -9 penalty, which would still leave Candles with 14 dice in the same circumstances.
Candles is bullshit.
At some point, there really aren't fair fights with Solar combatants. Particularly ones that powerful. What I've seen him saying puts him at the level of 'fight multiple Exalts at once.' And if he has the poison keyword he can probably negate those poisons...
Depends on the type, focus, and experience of the Exalt. A few fresh Solars who didn't pour everything into combat? Probably. Multiple Immaculate Masters? Nah. A Sworn Brotherhood of middling power? Maybe.
Poison is gonna be going on the list, though I'm not sure I want to make myself completely immune to it. I might work with Tahu to make a charm and roll to use for this so that I can improve my resistance without entirely removing it from the tools he can use.
Depends on the type, focus, and experience of the Exalt. A few fresh Solars who didn't pour everything into combat? Probably. Multiple Immaculate Masters? Nah. A Sworn Brotherhood of middling power? Maybe.
I don't know about craft, but I disagree that FSSA breaks the sorcerous working system. Not for Solars, anyway, who can already reliably complete Finesse 5 Ambition 3 Solar Workings with very little chance of failure or need for extreme measures. It doesn't allow them to do anything they couldn't already. It just saves a few weeks of time, cutting the number of intervals required roughly in half.
Sure, reliably completing ambition 3 Solar Workings in 3-4 weeks is really nice, but you have to balance that against the opportunity cost of 6 Solar charms, most of which many sorcerers aren't even going to find that useful. Not to mention 19/24 XP Solar XP for Larceny 5, which is enough for up to 3 ambition 3 workings. One such working would theoretically allow the creation of a small region of accelerated time, perhaps in your workshop, which would be of use to the entire party.
Ultimately, the limitations on workings come more from the costs, both in experience and resources than the time required to actually make them. Giant orichalcum golems to squash your foes aren't exactly going to be cheap.
I don't know about craft, but I disagree that FSSA breaks the sorcerous working system. Not for Solars, anyway, who can already reliably complete Finesse 5 Ambition 3 Solar Workings with very little chance of failure or need for extreme measures. It doesn't allow them to do anything they couldn't already. It just saves a few weeks of time, cutting the number of intervals required roughly in half.
Sure, reliably completing ambition 3 Solar Workings in 3-4 weeks is really nice, but you have to balance that against the opportunity cost of 6 Solar charms, most of which many sorcerers aren't even going to find that useful. Not to mention 19/24 XP Solar XP for Larceny 5, which is enough for up to 3 ambition 3 workings. One such working would theoretically allow the creation of a small region of accelerated time, perhaps in your workshop, which would be of use to the entire party.
Ultimately, the limitations on workings come more from the costs, both in experience and resources than the time required to actually make them. Giant orichalcum golems to squash your foes aren't exactly going to be cheap.
Solars really can't do Finesse 5 Ambition 3 Solar Workings reliably. Not unless you've found some truly horrific cheese that needs pruning.
Also. Giant Orichalcum Golem isn't what you make with an Ambition 5 working. An Endbringer is something you make with that kind of working. Or something on-par with a Third Circle Demon.
Uh.. have you actually done the math? They can, and very easily. 21 base dice + 5 dice (Heaven-Turning Calculations) + 2 dice (level 1 stunt) + 1 sux (willpower) - 5 sux (finesse 5) = ~10 success per interval, giving an average time to completion of under 2 months.
Also. Giant Orichalcum Golem isn't what you make with an Ambition 5 working. An Endbringer is something you make with that kind of working. Or something on-par with a Third Circle Demon.
Which might take the aforementioned form. Orichalcum is deliciously indestructible and powerful. The basic point is such creations are going to require expensive materials or reagents or ritual components or whatever.
Uh.. have you actually done the math? They can, and very easily. 21 base dice + 5 dice (Heaven-Turning Calculations) + 2 dice (level 1 stunt) + 1 sux (willpower) - 5 sux (finesse 5) = ~10 success per interval, giving an average time to completion of under 2 months.
You don't have infinite intervals, dude. You need more than sixty successes for a project like that. 75, specifically. And that's not reliable completion, you have a good chance of failure. And honestly, if it's easy to complete a Working of that scope, something's fucked up.
