General Exalted Thread

[vicky_molokh]

The Imperial Legions share a name with the Roman Legions, and almost nothing else.

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Judging by a post slightly above ours, that's a matter of perception. The very word is certainly something very evocative of the Roman Empire.

Realm architecture tends towards Imperial Chinese with hardly any hints of Roman influence.

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A (justified) emphasis on stone architecture seems more Greco-Roman than Asian to me, and Grabowski didn't seem to correct the poster who once pointed out something Roman about the architecture (but/and pointed out that their architecture is even more advanced, just materials-limited).

Aqueducts are more of an aesthetic motif than any kind of major element, and they don't turn up much anyway - CoCD: Blessed Isle includes the word all of three times.

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Perhaps. Or perhaps not. We don't seem to talk much about wheels, yet the wheel is a major element of our technological path.

Politicking is hardly unique to Rome, and seems more evocative of Chinese Mandarins to me. The relationship between the Blessed Isle and surrounding countries is far more British Colonialism than Roman conquest.

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I thought there's a reason that 'Byzantine' became the appellative for extremely tangled and backstabby politicking . . . which seems to describe the Realm.

I do agree that British Colonialism is a significant theme, and I am not good enough at history to say whether or not it expressed in a similar enough way among non-British.

Language I don't know very well either way. Calling their religion reminiscent of ROman organisations in its structure or its role seems laughably off-base. What? The Immaculate Doctrine is incredibly rooted in eastern traditions, Immaculate Monks are basically Magical Shaolin Monks, and Rome wasn't well known for its religious doctrine anyway.

So, the Roman 'elements' of the Realm is what it calls it armies, a couple of minor aesthetic motifs, and roadbuilding. That's pretty thin grounds on which to say Rome is a major source for the Realm, which is kind of what I'm getting at.

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The religion's belief itself isn't reminiscent, but it's role is. It seems to be very much about education and enforcing social and political standards . . . that role seems more premodern Christian than ancient Asian. And IIRC people have pointed out the similarity before.

 

[Imrix]

I personally favor a system in which the Realm's flagships are quinqueremes, quadriremes are the backbone of their naval force, and triremes are the many many light attack ships that swarm around them. That way both ramming and boarding have their place, but the most important ships are the big, imposing ones with fancy decorated decks and hundreds of rowers, and the climax of a battle is often a battle fought on that deck.

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That's pretty cool! Personally I prefer a navy of junks and Zheng He style treasure ships, with maybe Cogs and Hulks thrown in for good measure, but personal preferences are personal.

Thing is, from my perspective my vision can do just the same things as yours narratively, has about as much cultural resonance (which is to say, 'not much', in my experience the Age of Sail totally dominates the public mindset's conception of naval warfare), fits the Realm's inspirations just as well if not better, makes much more sense for the setting, and as a bonus you get to have giant fekkin' treasure ships in Exalted.

So what works for your table works for your table, but why should one be in the book instead of the other?

 

[BrainInAJar]

The religion's belief itself isn't reminiscent, but it's role is. It seems to be very much about education and enforcing social and political standards . . . that role seems more premodern Christian than ancient Asian. And IIRC people have pointed out the similarity before.

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I have to reply to this because "enforcing social and political standards" was very much the role of Confucianism, with similar emphasis on the Divine Mandate of the ruler and the virtue of obeying them, and such, has a similar role in Realm Culture.

That this awards someone in their next life is something lifted from other eastern religions, but it's real-world inspiration seems very clear.

 

[pheonix89]

I don't get why certain people fixate on keeping the triremes. Yes, it's in the books. It's also mindbogglingly dumb. In addition to all the other points made regarding the actual performance of triremes and than magic can't explain it away, it basically requires claiming that a Dragonblood or Solar with 5s in all the relevant stats and excellencies is actually WORSE at ship design than IRL mortals who probably didn't have 5s and certainly didn't have excellencies.

 

[EarthScorpion]

Also, correct me if I'm wrong, but don't Dragonblooded have access to cannon equivalents?

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Well, they have access to something better than early cannons just by being Dragonblooded.

It's called "Elemental Bolt Attack", aka "fuck you, I learned the fire version and now your ship is on fire. Have fun". Optionally you can also learn the earth version and just hole them below the waterline by tossing a rock at them.

(that's before we get into how unfair sorcerers are)

 

[Scia]

Hello, just registered here and I have a question about Lunars; I've heard that Grabowski's original concept about them were about being the Princes of the Wyld returning to overtake Creation (Explaining why they have so little importance in it's history); Is there more information about said vision, and if so, where?

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Making of Exalted, The (Artbook) - White Wolf | Exalted First Edition | Exalted | DriveThruRPG.com

if I remember it right that is the earliest part that talks about that detail.

And the Realm does not have inate third age canons, they have Flamethrowers big enough to hit half the ship thanks to firedust canons from the south. And then you add in stuff that you have to spond motes, not money on.

 

[Bursting Eagerness Soul]

Frankly, I'll take boarding over ramming any day. It's just more interesting.

Unless it's some supership just cruising through another ship to show how awesome it is. Then it's okay with me.

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Kerisgame has a hodgepodge of different ship types used across Creation, but most of the Realm navy is junks, yes. Keris, ironically, actually is going to mostly fight by ramming, but that's because she cheats by having a High First Age ship hull that can, even though it was designed as a pleasure yacht, pretty much just drive straight through most Third Age ships and then turn around and wait while she dives down and picks up all the treasure.

She may ask Ligier to put a big spike on the front, just to make the point.

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THIS. THIS IS WHAT I MEANT. HELL YES!

 

[Aleph]

THIS. THIS IS WHAT I MEANT. HELL YES!

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She's still going to be pretty wary of taking it near Dragonblooded-captained Shogunate-level Realm superships, though. Because it might be High First Age, but, uh... it's still fundamentally a pleasure yacht at the core.

 

[Nervaqus987]

Because the Blessed Isle is - brace yourself for this, now - an island

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This is pretty much pure nitpicking on my part, but uh, isn't the Blessed Isle somewhere between the size of Australia and North America?

I'm not sure it's exactly appropriate to call it an island.

 

[beowolf]

She's still going to be pretty wary of taking it near Dragonblooded-captained Shogunate-level Realm superships, though. Because it might be High First Age, but, uh... it's still fundamentally a pleasure yacht at the core.

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So, uh, would a comparison between a modern personal yacht and, say, a Victorian-era warship be a reasonable way of modeling that?
Edit:Actually, no. Given who it belonged to, would making it a personally owned cruise ship be a better analogy?

 

[Imrix]

This is pretty much pure nitpicking on my part, but uh, isn't the Blessed Isle somewhere between the size of Australia and North America?

I'm not sure it's exactly appropriate to call it an island.

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Look the Empress called it the Blessed Isle and nobody wanted to argue with the lady who had her finger on the Big Red (Jade) Button just because she had some kooky ideas about geographic terminology.

 

[vicky_molokh]

This is pretty much pure nitpicking on my part, but uh, isn't the Blessed Isle somewhere between the size of Australia and North America?

I'm not sure it's exactly appropriate to call it an island.

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If the primary superpower of the world, and the only carrier of a world-spanning WMD, wants to call itself an island, then you really shouldn't talk about your doubts regarding the appropriateness of calling it an island.

 

[Kuciwalker]

This is pretty much pure nitpicking on my part, but uh, isn't the Blessed Isle somewhere between the size of Australia and North America?

I'm not sure it's exactly appropriate to call it an island.

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Both comparisons speak favorably to the idea that naval power is really, really important to the Realm.

 

[sebsmith]

The main thing about trireme as the standard warship is that it creates a model in which naval warfare is done through ramming rather than boarding. They're pretty much the last moment in history where that holds true; quadriremes and quinqueremes had a crew of marines for boarding. So it's a choice of what you want the naval battles of Creation to look like.

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This reminds me of some concerns my group has about 3e sail rules in our westerly set game. On the way to visit my storyteller in the hospital we discussed our problems, which are apparently great enough that replacing the sail system with something else is appealing. I apologize in advance if I screwed up their complaints, this isn't the section of the rules I've been spending most of my time on.

First, the minimal participation of players other than the captain. This includes both that the rules completely abstract away any abilities of note that other players can bring. For instance, my Archer supernal dawn sniping off enemy crew members in one of our previous sessions was an apparently completely ad hoc rule inclusion. Similarly, a sorcerer party member was surprised by how little they did. (As I understand, at no mote cost to themselves, they doubled damage by their mere presence.) Worse, the rules don't model swarms of sharks or large aquatic lunars participation in naval combat, both of which are already facets of our story.

Next, the rule system's preference for pre-Alexandrian Successor state naval combat. While this might be cool, the system also includes charms which replicate the advances which obsoleted said naval paradigm in both craft and sail. Thus, you won't actually get such combat if you invest significantly in either better ship construction or better ship piloting. Worse, while the rules make it easy for you to overthrow the old paradigm, they, as I understand, aren't particularly well suited to modeling the new paradigm that follows.

Lastly, the rules provide little for our Twilight crafter to interact with. He's already expressed interest in building an artifact four or five warship modeled on metal hulled designs. While this is virtually un-proccessable by the current rules, the rules provide minimal hooks to hang even just better weapons on.

 

[pheonix89]

Which reminds me of an inherent issue with designing rules for exalted. It's very hard to make a ruleset that can cope with extremely wide ranges of power, but an exalted ruleset has to be able to cope with everything from Solars and 3CDs (primordials should be strictly plot devices) to mortals. Which means that a naval combat ruleset has to be able to handle junks or triremes (because someone probably uses them) crewed by mortals going at it and then not fall apart when a solar archer shows up and starts dishing out rapidfire headshots to the enemy crews or a sorcerer just blows ships away with spells or an infernal suddenly changes the genre to sea monster fight.

And balancing that is kind of tough, seeing as a sorcerer with DoOB logically should basically auto-win vs anything with a wooden hull, anything with sails, or anything with vital stations exposed barring enemy charmtech to defend. Presuming he can get in range and get off the spell anyway.

Pretty obvious that they failed badly at coming up with a system, though. No rules for sniping? No rules beyond a dice trick for large-scale AoE attacks? No rules for aquatic monster attacks? I mean, there's no need for specific rules for solar sniping, sorcery, sharks, or lunar shapeshifting, just make generalized rules to plug precision fire, wide-area magical attacks, and sea creatures into the naval combat setup with the precise results depending on what's used. There, you've also got single-target sorcery, DB AoE elemental attacks, demon summoning and shintais covered. But that would require elegant, plug-and-play design instead of dice tricks, and that's not how 3E rolls. Or the rest of exalted, but they didn't have nearly as much wasted time and pagecount.

 

[MJ12 Commando]

Which reminds me of an inherent issue with designing rules for exalted. It's very hard to make a ruleset that can cope with extremely wide ranges of power, but an exalted ruleset has to be able to cope with everything from Solars and 3CDs (primordials should be strictly plot devices) to mortals. Which means that a naval combat ruleset has to be able to handle junks or triremes (because someone probably uses them) crewed by mortals going at it and then not fall apart when a solar archer shows up and starts dishing out rapidfire headshots to the enemy crews or a sorcerer just blows ships away with spells or an infernal suddenly changes the genre to sea monster fight.

And balancing that is kind of tough, seeing as a sorcerer with DoOB logically should basically auto-win vs anything with a wooden hull, anything with sails, or anything with vital stations exposed barring enemy charmtech to defend. Presuming he can get in range and get off the spell anyway.

Pretty obvious that they failed badly at coming up with a system, though. No rules for sniping? No rules beyond a dice trick for large-scale AoE attacks? No rules for aquatic monster attacks? I mean, there's no need for specific rules for solar sniping, sorcery, sharks, or lunar shapeshifting, just make generalized rules to plug precision fire, wide-area magical attacks, and sea creatures into the naval combat setup with the precise results depending on what's used. There, you've also got single-target sorcery, DB AoE elemental attacks, demon summoning and shintais covered. But that would require elegant, plug-and-play design instead of dice tricks, and that's not how 3E rolls. Or the rest of exalted, but they didn't have nearly as much wasted time and pagecount.

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I'm wondering again if it wouldn't have been better to take a step up in the abstraction scale and make the default 'unit' twenty mans instead of one dude and have the 'one on one fight' system be the vague abstraction. I think it'd make it easier to work with if your default combat rules were considering things like 'area of effect attacks' (super deadly, probably require magic or ridiculous toughness to survive) rather than having the mass combat system, which is the way that a lot of foes become actual threats, being effectively a tacked-on system.

 

[Irked]

This is a superior option when you're talking about Solar charms. Remember, the design space for Solar Charms is incredibly broad, because it covers everything humans can be good at and then some. The 17 3E War Charms don't serve to proscribe what Solar War can do, they just serve as examples to push you in the right direction.

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Hm. Though that may not be true in 3e - as an easy example, Brawl's lack of a general-case accuracy boost a la Excellent Strike is proscriptive, I think, because Brawl is balanced around the assumption that you're hitting hard, but with less fine control, than Melee.

(I don't disagree with your point in general, just thinking that through.)

 

[MJ12 Commando]

Hm. Though that may not be true in 3e - as an easy example, Brawl's lack of a general-case accuracy boost a la Excellent Strike is proscriptive, I think, because Brawl is balanced around the assumption that you're hitting hard, but with less fine control, than Melee.

(I don't disagree with your point in general, just thinking that through.)

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That's because 3E has attempted to differentiate all the different fightan' abilities while keeping them balanced with each other, while on the counterpoint there isn't War and Tactics and Special Operations which all need to be balanced between each other and also different.

 

[notanautomaton]

Hm. Though that may not be true in 3e - as an easy example, Brawl's lack of a general-case accuracy boost a la Excellent Strike is proscriptive, I think, because Brawl is balanced around the assumption that you're hitting hard, but with less fine control, than Melee.

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But nothing stops someone from writing Brawl homebrew that's a copy-paste of Excellent Strike. It's prefectly allowable as per the rules, and it's the sort of thing that a new group with little system mastery could miss. Because the devs didn't make those things explicit, in order to 'preserve mystery' or some bull.

 

[Anasurimbor]

But nothing stops someone from writing Brawl homebrew that's a copy-paste of Excellent Strike. It's prefectly allowable as per the rules, and it's the sort of thing that a new group with little system mastery could miss. Because the devs didn't make those things explicit, in order to 'preserve mystery' or some bull.

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While potentially problematic, it's unlikely to break their game. Now, copy-pasting it back into Melee as Excellent Strike II-V might.

And as much as I would absolutely love to have a detailed guide on balanced charm tree creation, along with extensive design notes on the Solar charmset, the core book is probably not the best place to put it.

 

[zorb42]

While potentially problematic, it's unlikely to break their game. Now, copy-pasting it back into Melee as Excellent Strike II-V might.

And as much as I would absolutely love to have a detailed guide on balanced charm tree creation, along with extensive design notes on the Solar charmset, the core book is probably not the best place to put it.

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Isn't this something dumb idea exalted number 1(the ones made by lesser gods and not Incarnae- The name is once more weak and I cannot remember it) should offer in their corebook?

 

[Imrix]

And as much as I would absolutely love to have a detailed guide on balanced charm tree creation, along with extensive design notes on the Solar charmset, the core book is probably not the best place to put it.

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If they're going to leave so much of the mechanics up to the players in their 650+ page rulebook, I'd say the corebook is exactly the place for that.

 

[Dif]

If they're going to leave so much of the mechanics up to the players in their 650+ page rulebook, I'd say the corebook is exactly the place for that.

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I daresay, it might actually be an objectively superior option to printing like 300 more minor variants of prior Charms which could have easily been duplicated by such a system as examples of how said system operates and the intended functions underlying combat gameplay and mapping into it some kind of overall structure for Charm-usage in combat which doesn't revolve around the "grab a big bunch of them and pray it works out properly ingame through a series of wild guesses" method they seem to be demanding.

My god, that almost sounds like a game which wants you to play it correctly the first time, rather than waste everyone's time trying to feel out every single thing and stumbling over every possible mechanical hurdle on the way to the finish line.

 

[EarthScorpion]

Anyway? You know what time it is?

Yes. Adorjan time! The most ~fun~ time of day.

Trufax, the working names for these charms were

~I Know Where You Are Senpai~
~Don't Worry, Senpai, She Won't Bother You Again~
~Did You Get My Text Message Senpai~
~Senpai Seducing Shintai~

Bound by Blood-Red Strings
(Originally by Jon Chung)
Cost: -(+1w); Mins: Essence 2; Type: Permanent
Keywords: None
Duration: Permanent
Prerequisite Charms: Tragic Love Amusement

Lovers in Creation whisper of the blue strings of Fate, with which the Maiden of Serenity lovingly binds the fate of those destined to be. This is a comforting lie. While the binding cords of love exist, they are the deep crimson of heart's blood, and it is not Venus who wields them. This Charm upgrades Tragic Love Amusement. The Infernal may commit the cost of Tragic Love Amusement in order to make the Intimacy it creates inviolate against any external influence while the commitment lasts, and grant her the ability to track her beloved wherever he may go, so long as he is on the same plane of existence. This knowledge manifests as a bloody red ribbon which only the Infernal can see.

While the commitment lasts, the Infernal receives her Compassion in bonus successes to track her love at all times, may always make a tracking roll even if no tracks exist to follow, and if she desires, she may spend 1 Willpower in order to automatically succeed at any tracking roll targeting her love with Compassion threshold successes. Should other magic contest this effect, add the Infernal's Essence in automatic successes to the rolloff.

If the Infernal knows Wind-Carried Passion, the Infernal may choose to bestow this ability upon those she targets with it by committing the cost of Tragic Love Amusement in the same way.

While Adorjan could not leave the Demon City save in dreams, the surrender oaths that protected the Solar Marus do not apply to the beloved of the Infernal Exalted. At Essence 4, this Charm may be repurchased. Doing so allows the Infernal to track their Intimacy across realms of existence, and if they choose to spend 1 Willpower to automatically succeed, they also know the method the target used to enter that realm of existence and how to follow them there.

Other Woman Identification
Cost: — ; Mins: Essence 3; Type: Permanent
Keywords: None
Duration: Permanent
Prerequisite Charms: Bound By Blood Red Strings

The breezes of Adorjan tie her heart to others with blood-red strings, and those breezes wordlessly whisper many things to her. They tell her of the infidelities of attachment committed by those she loves, and how she can free them from those ties. This charm permanently enhances its prerequisite. Whenever the Infernal makes a roll to read the emotions and displayed Intimacies of a target who she has a Tragic Love Amusement intimacy towards, she automatically succeeds as if she had rolled twice the required number of successes. She learns all Intimacies the character has displayed in the current scene, and their context as they relate to characters who are present. In addition, she now gains the capacity to channel her Compassion towards any attempt to hurt any of those Intimacies and regains a Compassion channel should she succeed; after all, she is doing it out of the maelstrom of her bountiful love.

Love-Born Sweet Fancies
Cost: 4m, 1wp, 1 comp c; Mins: Essence 3; Type: Simple (5 ticks, DV-2)
Keywords: Combo-OK, Sorcerous, Pantheon
Duration: Instant
Prerequisites: Tragic Love Amusement

Imre the jade-winged Archer Upon the Clouds releases his arrows which fall like rain upon the layers of Malfeas. They seek out those who manage to flee the instruction of the Silent Wind, sinking into hearts and minds bearing her affectionate teachings. Such is love. Upon learning this Charm, the Infernal stirs a new soul to life within them that exists to carry the messages of their heart. When she uses this charm, she weaves a dream or flight of fancy from her boundless compassion which lasts no longer than 444 seconds, targeting a character the Infernal has an intimacy towards. The contents of the dream can be used to make a social attack with a speed no longer than seven long ticks which may be enhanced with charms as normal.

This vision travels down the blood-red ties of love, travelling at forty thousand miles an hour. Once the dream has found the target character, they experience it the next time they sleep and will recall it upon waking. The context of the Intimacy the Infernal used to channel this message is made Obvious to the target, because it flavours every part of the fancy. The Infernal may not reuse this charm against a character until they have experienced the previous dream. Should the target character be within an area warded against scrying, the dream will not find them until the next time they leave a protected area.

This charm may be repurchased at Essence 4. Once the character experience the dream, a Sorcerous blessing is applied to the target. The dream recurs whenever the character sleeps, any social attack likewise repeating. Men have been driven mad, knowing that no matter how far they run they cannot escape the visions that come at night. Only one sorcerous dream may affect a character at once, and should this charm be used again the new dream will overwrite the old.

Seven Nights Shintai
Cost: 12m, 1 lhl, 1 comp c; Mins: Essence 4; Type: Simple (15 ticks, DV-2)
Keywords: Combo-Basic, Form-Type
Duration: One dream (one scene)
Prerequisites: Love-Born Sweet Fancies, Bound by Blood Red Strings

Closing her eyes, a happy smile appears on the warlock's face. She smiles because she knows she will dream of her love. Her body tears apart into a cloud of blood-soaked threads which disperse on a sudden gale, leaving her empty skin behind. Upon activating this charm, the character selects one of her Tragic Love Amusement intimacies currently in the same plane of existence. The next time the target sleeps, they find themselves in a dreamscape made up of the Infernal's dream body.

The Infernal builds the dreamscape as if she had accumulated (Essence + Compassion) successes for Adorjan World-Shaping Cosmogenesis. Whenever she channels Compassion on an action within the dreamscape, she may reassign up to (Compassion) of these successes. The Infernal is both world and avatar, and possesses a body with her normal Attributes. In addition, her senses simultaneously observe from all points within the dreamscape as though using All-Encompassing Sorcerer's Sight, though she does not pay attention to all points equally thus permitting stealth.

To the target, the dreamscape is unreal. Though mote expenditures and health levels should be tracked, they are just the product of their imagination and return to their original values when they wake. Willpower and virtue channels lost in the dream are really gone, however. By contrast, the Infernal is physically in the dream and any motes they spend and damage they take are real. When the Charm ends, the Infernal reforms within her empty skin. If her skin has been destroyed, she reforms where she left it and takes 3ahl from her presently skinless condition.

The target character does not automatically realise that there is anything unnatural about the dream, though with 4 successes on a Wits + Occult roll they can realise the hellish note to the landscape. Should the character 'die' by the hand of another in the dream, they wake having lost 1wp from psychic shock and are shaken but otherwise fine. Attempted suicide, however, is not the way out - they 'wake' into another dreamscape, allowing the Infernal to reallocate the points and resetting the duration of the charm. They may escape otherwise by finding a symbolic exit within the dreamscape and spending one willpower. At least one such exit must be included, though the Infernal may hide it.

At Essence 5, this charm may be repurchased allowing it to target characters currently in different realms of existence to the Infernal. Should the Endless Desert separate the two of them, the blood soaked ribbons of the warlock form must travel across Cecelyne before it can reach their beloved. It is as yet unknown how the Silent Wind managed to slip into the dreams of the father of the Four Winds.

 

[Bursting Eagerness Soul]

This reminds me of some concerns my group has about 3e sail rules in our westerly set game. On the way to visit my storyteller in the hospital we discussed our problems, which are apparently great enough that replacing the sail system with something else is appealing. I apologize in advance if I screwed up their complaints, this isn't the section of the rules I've been spending most of my time on.

First, the minimal participation of players other than the captain. This includes both that the rules completely abstract away any abilities of note that other players can bring. For instance, my Archer supernal dawn sniping off enemy crew members in one of our previous sessions was an apparently completely ad hoc rule inclusion. Similarly, a sorcerer party member was surprised by how little they did. (As I understand, at no mote cost to themselves, they doubled damage by their mere presence.) Worse, the rules don't model swarms of sharks or large aquatic lunars participation in naval combat, both of which are already facets of our story.

Next, the rule system's preference for pre-Alexandrian Successor state naval combat. While this might be cool, the system also includes charms which replicate the advances which obsoleted said naval paradigm in both craft and sail. Thus, you won't actually get such combat if you invest significantly in either better ship construction or better ship piloting. Worse, while the rules make it easy for you to overthrow the old paradigm, they, as I understand, aren't particularly well suited to modeling the new paradigm that follows.

Lastly, the rules provide little for our Twilight crafter to interact with. He's already expressed interest in building an artifact four or five warship modeled on metal hulled designs. While this is virtually un-proccessable by the current rules, the rules provide minimal hooks to hang even just better weapons on.

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To start, I'd expand the stats for ships. Give even the most basic ship a full mortal's worth of HLs, give them actual attack stats, and in general make them analogous to a mass combat unit. That way you can take Sail and make it analogous to War. The parallels are already heavy to begin with.

This way, your sniper can be doing "magnitude" damage, as can your sorcerer. Your Sail-favored character can be your "general" and boost the ship's performance, and your crafter can make repairs, bitching weapons, cool armor, etc.