So stepping away from the 3e debate redux part infinity...
I was thinking about Martial Arts. Specifically how it would be best to represent Martial Arts in Exalted. There are a number of factors which interact with Martial Arts and why I like them and why they are extremely problematic for the gameline. I will cover these in brief.
Pros:
* Martial arts are universal, this means creating a Martial Art expands the combat options for most splats rather than just one. This is good because it means that a crafted martial art is useful in most games and can be used by most antagonists.
* Martial arts are self contained fighting styles. This makes it easier to stat up combatants by adding a martial arts style since it makes that combatants fighting style instantly predefined.
* Martial arts are aesthetically pleasing. There are certain types of people who like playing up the wuxia/anime inspirations of Exalted, who like talking about Poetically Titled Combat Style and who find the idea of martial arts being this thing you can find dojos for in every part of the setting including hell, the underworld and the steampunk-communist-dystopia-dyson sphere really entertaining. They like the idea of dedicated tournaments for martial arts all over Creation and beyond.
Cons:
* Martial arts are universal. This means that they increase charmshare which means that they must be balanced not only within the style, and the style within the set of all martial arts but also the style within the set of all martial arts and all other charms everywhere ever. This is, to say the least, a lot of work that is really not worth doing.
* Martial arts are complex. Even the simplest style often has eight Charms, often divided across 4 ranks of Ability requirements and 2 or 3 Essence levels meaning that learning and developing a single style is often a major investment of character resources. Their utility is often obfuscated between in-style synergy effects that are not spelled out explicitly and require system mastery to grok. These factors disincentivize players from investing in them rather than the low hanging fruit of basic in-splat combat Charms with straightforward effect. The only reason to get them is because:
* They are too powerful and create single ability builds. Martial arts often grant access to higher tier combat powers that the splat normally can't access (mortals, dragonblooded, Sidereals) or grant access to effects outside the purview of Martial Arts and that step on other abilities toes such as bonuses to Dodge, Soak, movement speed and modes of movement and in the most egregious cases social and intellectual skills.
So how do you preserve the Pros and ditch the Cons? One way would be to use
@EarthScorpion's Style system. Which if your goal is a rules lite approach, I would recommend. This is unsatisfactory to me for much the same reason moving Exalted over to FATE or replacing Charms with FATE-esque Aspects would be. I want Martial Arts to be a unique mechanical widget that you can balance with the other unique mechanical widgets of the game without introducing to much in the way of "argue with the GM that of course my Auspicious Legalist Courtier style applies when trying to bargain for the cost of caravan supplies because I can quote The Essential Implications of the Six Houses of Thought." I don't like 'justify this mechanical widget through argument with the GM mechanics' because it gives an unfair advantage to people who are more creative, flexible and charismatic in the real world.
So I was left looking for a way to incorporate Martial Arts in the game without being too handwavey and without being as complex as multi-Charm Styles. I decided that having Martial Arts be Charms is Right Out. There is simply no way of creating an easy-to-balance system when I have five to ten Charms per style that have to be balanced with all other styles and then with all other Charms everywhere ever. Combonotorial Hell is the term coined to describe this for a reason. Further, I realized as I was leafing through Martial Arts styles that I like that in most cases the styles were often filled with useless cruft and waste of wordcount Charms. Many styles, because they have to be self-contained Charm based combat styles, often spend a lot of their wordcount reinventing the wheel over and over. There are a ridiculous number of "this Charm gives you a bonus to parry, or this Charm gives you a bonus to attack" Charms that, frankly, are not required. The really interesting components of most Styles consist of at most three cool effects. These effects were often scattered into clumps of Charms that build off of or amplify each other but had to be broken down into smaller Charm-sized units for balance; after all you can't buy an entire combat style for 8xp so you have to hide the good effects behind five or six 8xp sized speedbumps. You couldn't even make these speedbumps basic charmtech since the nature of Styles meant that you could not count on every user having access to, say, First Martial Arts Excellency or Fire and Stones Strike or Words of Power. You had to include speedbumps in every. Single. Style.
So Martial Arts as Charms is Not Working. This leaves me with two options; I can steal from another mechanical subsystem already int he game or I can create a new one like the aforementioned Style System. I don't want to do the latter for reasons explained plus I don't want to reinvent the wheel too much. Creating an entirely new mechanical subsystem strikes me as a shitload of work for relatively little gain. That leaves the former option; stealing from an existing subsystem. There are basically three magical ability subsystems in Exalted aside from Charms; sorcery, thaumaturgy and artifacts/crafting.
Considering thaumaturgy I decide to avoid it right away. Thaumaturgy is, frankly, too weak to consider for what I want and the methods behind it are balanced around long, expensive process for transient effects. Hacking that into a martial arts subsystem would be basically equivalent to creating a new subsystem from scratch.
Sorcery, at first, seems to be a perfect fit. First off, it has a lot of thematic similarities to Martial Arts as balanced. It breaks down into three 'levels' of power; Emerald Circle/Root of the Perfected Lotus, Sapphire Circle/Bulb of the Perfected Lotus, Adamant Circle/Flower of the Perfected Lotus. It also has a lot of self contained units of magical effects and since each Spell is self-contained it avoids reinventing the wheel and speedbumps for the most part. However in the end I don't like it. Like Charms, Spells are limited by the fact that each has to be balanced around the XP cost of a single spell. That is, no spell can be significantly better or worse than a spell of the same Circle which costs 8xp. Spells, especially the complex ones, tend to bloat out a great deal. You can spend an entire page detailing out the effects of a spell that would fit a dozen Charms. If I went with spells I would be not avoiding the complexity-bloat, I would just be hiding it behind in spell wordcount. Further, the aesthetics of Sorcery are very much a unique and interesting part of Exalted and I don't want to water it down with Yet Another Type of Sorcery This Time With Punching (also, endless jokes about "I Cast Fist").
Which leaves us with Artifacts. On the surface this seems absurd. The subsystem for creating interesting unarmed combat styles based on the subsystem for creating magical bling? Yet the more I examine the idea the more I like it. All it takes is a simple perspective shift. The goal of Martial Arts is to turn the user's body into a weapon. In this paradigm of mechanics the Martial Arts Style is
not an artifact. The
Martial Artist is the artifact. The goal of martial arts training is not to teach you a combat style, it is to transform you into a martial artist of that style. In effect you use the body of the person as a living artifact, forcefully hammering their essence and physical and mental conditioning into a tool you can use to fight. Your sifu doesn't just teach you some essence manipulation tricks, he has you undergo a grueling ritual of transcendence that reforges you. You exit the process as a different kind of being than before, one who has been sculpted into a specific kind of warrior. Martial Arts as transhuman ascendance. I like the idea.
Mechanically its very simple as well. What I want out of martial arts is a set of very simple combat bonuses and one to three unique combat tricks. This is already exactly how Artifacts work in game. They give static bonuses, and then depending on their rating give a small handful of unique combat mechanics. You essentially create the entire Style as a single Artifact, with a rating based on its utility value just like any other Artifact. At the most basic level a one or two dot Style would be the equivalent of an Artifact Weapon for Unarmed Combat; that is it would be slightly higher combat stats. For more complex Styles in the three to five dot range you would grant a handful of combat powers equivalent to what you would grant to a three to five dot artifact weapon.
This eliminates a lot of the complexity of the existing Style system. There is no need to reinvent the wheel a hundred times. You can have players fill in basic combat abilities with their native Charmset just like they would if they picked up a Daiklave or a Powerbow. It severely reduces, but does not eliminate, the combination problems. At the very least the combination problems get reduced down to the set of effects permissible for Artifacts in general and while this is a lot its significantly less than the set of effects in dozens of ten Charm+ styles (Evocations need not be mentioned). If you wanted to reduce this complexity you would have to eliminate Artifacts as well, which is probably a step too far. I also don't see many people complaining that artifacts break the game except for a rare few exceptions.
In this regard we can rethink the way we handle martial arts idea. Martial Arts training becomes the equivalent of Crafting Time with much the same effect. "A Style" becomes like "A Daiklave", while a master sifu can know the basic process of training a person in a style each result (each martial artist produced) would be different. They even have their own names.
To learn a martial art you would have to find a sifu willing to teach you, and this sifu is going to have to spend a great deal of time and resources on you. The relevant Ability for training Martial Arts is War, which limits the maximum rating in the Style you can create as normal. Thus for most sifu's in the Second Age means you are limited to a Style rating of 3 or below, finding a Sifu who can teach a rank 4 or 5 or N/A style would be... extremely unlikely (unless you are a Sidereal).Training is also an expensive process, you have to house, feed and teach your subject. They have to undergo rituals of purification, eat special diets, engage in daily drills that exclude all other actions, engaging in sparring matches, recover from injuries during training, use training equipment which breaks and wears down over time. This means you have to expend Resources on the student at the equivalent level of an artifact. Also like Artifact you would have to have access to Exotic Training Methods; just like Exotic Ingredients and in the same levels. Unlike artifacts these are unlikely to be physical things and more likely to be the aid of specific beings, exotic locales and so on. "Train on top of Mount Meru" would be a valid Exotic Training Method for Air Dragon Style, for example. "Be trained by a Sidereal Grandmaster" would be a suitable Exotic Training Method as would "Be Teaching an Essence 3+ Solar Exalt" be another. "Have Mara Aid The Training" is an Exotic Training Method for required for Black Claw Style. The possibilities are endless and, like Craft, are meant to encourage players to seek out and secure unique sources of knowledge that can only be done by adventuring. While having your Gold Faction sifu train you in the privacy of the Cult of the Illuminated safehouse may count for two exotic training methods if you want to learn a level 5 Style you're going to have to do stuff like spare with Ligier in the flensing winds of Kalmanka on the border between Cecelyne and Kimbery so you can master Infernal Monster Style. Like Craft there would be War Charms which allow you to "teach above your weight class" so to speak as well as Charms to train people faster, and so on.
Like Artifacts, a Style would not have an explicit XP cost (though GMs can charge 3xp per dot, like an Artifact if they wish). They would be purchased at character creation with Background Dots, just like Artifacts and earned just like Backgrounds, via story methods. In game we would rename Martial Arts to Brawl and move 'native' combat charms back to Brawl cascades. Of course, this raises the question of balance with artifacts. One balancing factor of artifacts is they are Stuff and Stuff can be Lost, Taken or Destroyed. For the most part, you can't lose yourself (Eminem notwithstanding) and if you are taken or destroyed the last problem you have is no access to Martial Arts. So how does Martial Arts balance with other artifacts?
Well first, Martial Arts is mostly incompatible with other artifacts. Weaker styles that only give you an upgraded combat statline can't be used with mundane or artifact weapons for the same reason you can't stack your Punch combat stats on top of your Daiklave combat stats. Martial Arts also don't give Magical Material Bonuses (except for Alchemicals?) because they are designed for flesh, not magical weapons. A Charm which upgraded your Unarmed attacks with your Magical Material Bonus would certainly be something most splats would have access to, of course (for instance, Malfeas would have one branching off Viridian Legend Exoskeleton).
Second, like most other artifacts a Martial Arts Style likely has an Attunement cost. Styles with no Attunement costs are possible, but these are likely to be extremely weak style with one or two dots designed for mortals (like Slayer Khatars, for example).
1 Unlike most Artifacts the attunement for a Martial Arts Style can never be removed. You are, in effect, investing a portion of your Essence permanently into your own body to transform it. For the most part a Martial Arts Style can't be 'removed' or 'unlearned'. The level of change required would be the equivalent of permanently maiming your body and similarly unpleasant to undergo; GMs may allow skilled surgeons to mutilate your character (leaving cool scars) or may allow inflicted Mutations to change your Essence sufficiently to justify removing a Martial Art (and its attunement cost) from your character. Exaltation is always a justification for removing Martial Arts, though it does not
have to. Even if you remove a Martial Art you can't easily 're-equip' it. The process of learning it is just as difficult the second time around, with the added problem of convincing your Sifu to spend his valuable time since you managed to so monumentally screw up you wasted all his hard work the first time around.
Third, martial arts is not something you can easily 'stack' on the character. Remember that the process of training you to learn martial arts is basically turning you into an artifact human. Learning another style isn't as simple as finding another sifu willing to train you, anymore than turning your Daiklave into a Daiklave of Conquest. If you want to learn another Martial Arts Style you have two options; the first is to reforge your body into a new one suited to the new Style and loose access to the benefits of the old one. This is basically the equivalent of breaking down an Artifact for parts towards forging a new Artifact, you can even count your Style as an Exotic Training Method if the style you are learning is no more than one dot higher than your existing style (ie, if you known Style A a 4 dot style, it counts as an Exotic Training Method for Style B, a 5 dot style). In this way there are Martial Arts with different 'levels' of mastery. For example, the Dragon Styles of the Immaculate Order are broken up into five Coils of Mastery. Monks are trained in the styles in order, using their lesser mastery as an Exotic Training Method for higher mastery and gaining more advanced combat abilities as they advance. Mortal Immaculates can even learn these styles, to the first and (rarely) second coil, though the fourth and fifth coil require 'secret training methods' from disguised Sidereal masters.
The other option is to try to incorporate the two styles. This is a complex process, equivalent to building a complex magitech device with multiple functions like a suit of Ashigura Armor. Using the existing system you suffer a -1 external penalty to your War rolls to teach a Martial Art without destroying any existing one for
all the dots of Martial Arts you wish to preserve. Eg; if a person knows a 2 dot Style and a 3 dot Style you suffer a -5 success penalty on every Training roll to preserve those styles. Once you succeed all is not overwhelming power either. First you don't stack the basic combat stats of the styles on top of each other, nor do you get to pick the best of both. Instead if you know more than one Style you can choose which to adopt, called the "Form" you are using. You gain the combat statline of the Form you are using. Switching forms can be done at any time as a Speed 5/DV -1 Miscellaneous action or the equivalent of drawing a new weapon in mid-combat for whatever system you are using. You have normal access to any special abilities granted by the form you are 'in' at the time but limited access to the abilities of other Styles. You can use them, but it costs 1wp per Style per turn/action to access them in addition to normal costs. For example if you know three Styles and are in Style A's Form on your action you can spend 1wp to have access to Style B or C's special effects or 2wp to have access to Style B and C's special effects. (Some Exalts' particularly Sidereals, have native Charms which bypass this cost. Noteably NOT Dragonblooded.)
Finally if you have more than one Style at the same time you gain a dot of Practices or increase your current Practices rating by 1 for each Style beyond the first (to a maximum of 6). What is Practices? I'm glad you asked hypothetical rhetorical device! Practices is the equivalent of a Repair rating for Martial Arts. Practices are a way of 'jury-rigging' martial arts to be better than they should be by creating unstable essence pathways that require constant correction. Practices, like Repair ratings, are a thing that only came into vogue during the Shogunate when the Dragonblooded no longer had access to Celestial Sifu on a regular basis and were forced to kludge together a system for keeping their combat abilities sort of on par at great cost. Practices are a series of special exercises, meditation methods, diets and associated training regimes that must be regularly undergone to keep the Martial Artist in balance. To perform a practice you must have a minimum rating in War, Medicine and Integrity based on the Practices rating (see Wonder of the First Age, Integrity = Lore, Medicine = Occult, War = Craft) or access to a Sifu whose rating equals your Practices rating. You must also expend the listed Resources per
month. If you engaged in any combat this increase to per
week. This represents special diet, training regimes and so on you must undergo. You must spend the listed time practicing per week, or per day if you engage in any combat that day. Failure to meet these requirements means that one of your Martial Arts chosen at random by the GM ceases to function entirely and you suffer a -1 internal penalty to any combat related roll (but not mental of social rolls) until you undergo a montage of retraining to 'get back into shape' (mechanically identical to repairing a damaged artifact with your Practices - Repair rating). If you know multiple Styles this continues each increment of time you miss until you have access to no more Styles. (Note: This is fairly common for old retired Dragonblooded, while the Coils of the Dragon are designed to be Practice Free many Dragonblooded learn more than one Style in their lifetime and develop a Practices rating because of this; as a result of letting themselves 'get out of shape' this means they are less dangerous in combat than their advanced years, and Essence, would indicate... unless they are gearing up for war and go to the temple for a brief sabbatical that is.) You may also use Practices as an Exotic Training Method for a Style, in which case the Practices rating must be equal to the Style rating.
1: Yes, you can build a mortal designed martial art that drains a mortal's life force like Gunzosha Commando Armor, causing them to age twice as fast. Considering they can't 'unlearn' it this is basically halving their life no matter what so you better be fine with doing that to people. Advising them up front of the drawbacks is also up to you.
