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General Exalted Thread

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Eukie said:
If the vast majority of 2E players bought supposedly unique and special wondrous weapons and treated them as +5 Swords of Cutting, what makes it so that 3E players will buy supposedly unique and special wondrous weapons and not treat them as Volcano Cutter Clone 15?
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The fact that even if two characters get the exact same sword, they can wind up manifesting radically different powers from it. So, for instance, if a Dragonblood is wielding Volcano Cutter, and then another Dragonblood shanks him and takes it, the two can manifest radically different powers from it; it's part of the reason why the tree is arranged the way it is, and why it's so big (and the devs have confirmed that those are only example charms; if you really want to, you can pretty much keep buying Evocations as long as you've got XP to spend).

What are you basing this on? It seems that all Holden has said about Evocations is that they're a bunch of special Charms slapped together in a special Charm Tree tied to an object. Unless I've missed something vital, there's no link between which Charms are slapped onto a Daiklaive and the fluff history of the weapon, or your own character arc.
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There's a bunch of posts on the Onyx Path forums. I think the thread's like 60+ pages long.

Except in the sense that, should you want to, you can totally make some stuff up about it to make the weapon sound special and important. Just like you could in 2E. Which nobody did.
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I dunno; a bunch of players just say "I found it in the tomb of my last incarnation" as an explanation for how they got their artifacts, which in itself opens it up to a lot of backstory by tying it to the legend of a God-King of the previous Age. Additionally, there was that sidebar in MoEP: Dragonbloods that talks about how every daiklave has a backstory.
 
nick012000 said:
I dunno; a bunch of players just say "I found it in the tomb of my last incarnation" as an explanation for how they got their artifacts, which in itself opens it up to a lot of backstory by tying it to the legend of a God-King of the previous Age. Additionally, there was that sidebar in MoEP: Dragonbloods that talks about how every daiklave has a backstory.
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There is a huge difference between a 3 sentence long backstory that is never talked about again, and an actual unique idea for your weapon.
 
horngeek said:
Personally, I'd say that at a certain point you can't really blame 'all weapons are treated the same by players' as the fault of a system.
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You can however blame it on the system that treats the weapons inconsistently. When they claim that artifacts are rare masterpieces that can be a mortal smiths masterpiece or a rarely recovered and often degraded remnant of the past... yet also describe entire regiments and armies equipped with these so called 'ancient relics and masterpieces'.

The system really needs a third tier between 'equipment' and 'relic'
 
Walker of the Yellow Path said:
Are there any Homebrew charms that let Abyssals sire lesser vampires? I've been working on one myself, but I want to see what others do.
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Don't need a charm, let alone a homebrewed one. Just reach Essence 4, and start boinking to make yourself some Half-Caste offspring. Alternately, if you want something faster, use the mirror of the Solar Lore charm that gives people Awakened Essence and Solar charms, for a rather hefty committed mote cost.
 
nick012000 said:
What the hell are you on about? You're speaking English, but your words make no sense. Evocations are cool
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This is a subjective opinion. You think so, okay, whoopee for you. But not everyone feels the same way. Some people - myself included - are bored to tears by the relentless pushing of "YOUR LEGEND AND HEROISM MUST BE BASED ON A SPESHUL SNOWFLAKE WEAPON OF SPESHULNESS AND LOOK YOU CAN BUY LOTS OF CHARMS FOR IT WHEEEE", and would actually rather not have all their power tied up in something that can be lost, stolen or broken in half. And however much you say this, it does not change the fact that the setting is described as having thousands of Artifacts, if not tens of thousands. Again, look at the Realm. Are you seriously trying to tell me that when there are ten thousand "unique items with powers based on their histories and power", they still all feel just as special and unique?

Because here's the thing about Excalibur and Kusanagi and so on.

They're fucking rare.

They're genuinely unique; there are only a handful, if any, artefacts in their home settings that even come close to them. Your example of Servants in the Nasuverse (urgh); there are seven of them and that's it. There aren't thousands to tens of thousands of the bloody things.

Evocations seem very much like they're just going to be the Martial Arts Styles of 3e. Big long bloated disconnected Charm Trees that suck up a bunch of the dev's attention because they're the "pets" of one of the editors, where homebrewed ones are almost always either terribly mechanically written (cough Cobra Style cough) or badly fluffed, or both, and which are relentlessly pushed in your face repeatedly and endlessly, even if you have no fucking interest in them whatsoever. Oh, and either each one is going to need three to eight different Charm trees for different types of Exalt, or the setting is going to snap like a twig when a Dragonblood gets their hands on an Artifact built for a Solar and starts using Evocations balanced against Native Solar Charms.
Sucal said:
The system really needs a third tier between 'equipment' and 'relic'
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Hence, "lesser artifacts".
nick012000 said:
Don't need a charm, let alone a homebrewed one. Just reach Essence 4, and start boinking to make yourself some Half-Caste offspring. Alternately, if you want something faster, use the mirror of the Solar Lore charm that gives people Awakened Essence and Solar charms, for a rather hefty committed mote cost.
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The only people who should be able to use Solar Charms - especially given that Taboo-Inflicting Diatribe is Essence fucking 2, and can be used to mindscrew a kingdom into handing itself over with little to no effort - are Solars. If Enlightened mortals learn Charms, it should be Spirit Charms or nothing. (Or TMAs, if you feel you have to torture yourself by using the martial arts system as it currently stands in 2e.)
 
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nick012000 said:
Don't need a charm, let alone a homebrewed one. Just reach Essence 4, and start boinking to make yourself some Half-Caste offspring. Alternately, if you want something faster, use the mirror of the Solar Lore charm that gives people Awakened Essence and Solar charms, for a rather hefty committed mote cost.
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Spawning a child does not a vampire make. Plus, that's boring, and takes too long to get a horde of vampire thralls for my Abyssal antagonist to use. And the Solar Mirror drains motes instead of granting them.
 
Walker of the Yellow Path said:
Spawning a child does not a vampire make. Plus, that's boring, and takes too long to get a horde of vampire thralls for my Abyssal antagonist to use. And the Solar Mirror drains motes instead of granting them.
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I would say that a necromancy spell which turns someone into a corporeal undead creature which is better than a zombie is the way to go. Make it so that the "vampires" cannot themselves make any more vampires (because exponential progressions break any game ever written), and do not under any circumstances give them Abyssal charms and it should be passable.

Effectively, what you would have is a spell that makes a minion, so it needs to be balanced against demon summoning. It is not hard to be balanced compared to Summon Demon of the First Circle, which is so crazy good that it makes Sorcery worth picking up by itself.

Something else that might work is a charm like Hardened Killer Training Technique with a stronger effect on each target but a limit to the total number of people who can benefit from it at a given time.
 
horngeek said:
Personally, I'd say that at a certain point you can't really blame 'all weapons are treated the same by players' as the fault of a system.
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Honestly? I blame the fact that artifacts in 2nd (and possibly in 1st and 3rd) were really mishandled. I mean, Daiklaves were made in routine batches in the First age. They're about as rare and special as a car, and while you can get cars that are rare and special...they're very much the exception, rather than the norm. Nevermind that in 2nd making a daiklave different from other ones was a pain in the ass. Now granted, the Developers are trying to change that last part, but that part is only a part of the problem, and not the biggest one. Again, to draw an analogy to cars, there's the base model, and then you can add a bunch of special features to the care. That doesn't mean that the cars are suddenly really unique and special things(and get treated accordingly). Even then, for most people, cars are just that: cars. There are some who do view them differently, but those are the norm.
 
Drakeneisen said:
I would say that a necromancy spell which turns someone into a corporeal undead creature which is better than a zombie is the way to go. Make it so that the "vampires" cannot themselves make any more vampires (because exponential progressions break any game ever written), and do not under any circumstances give them Abyssal charms and it should be passable.
Effectively, what you would have is a spell that makes a minion, so it needs to be balanced against demon summoning. It is not hard to be balanced compared to Summon Demon of the First Circle, which is so crazy good that it makes Sorcery worth picking up by itself.
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It's actually pretty simple to balance. It's a Shadowlands circle Necromancy spell which, as part of the ritual, involves you murdering someone in a ritualistic manner, feeding them blood, and then they rise with their hun and po bound into the dead body (and sometimes the po tries to take over and FEED KILL SLEEP REPEAT [1]). They're not alive; they're a hun wearing their own body as a skin with their po crammed in too.

They can learn Arcanoi, including po-only ones. They can learn Shadowlands Necromancy (incidentally, that's how they make more of themselves - they have to become necromancers). They can't regen essence in Creation and so have to feed off blood to do it. They take Agg from fire, and don't like sunlight - possibly can't use their Arcanoi in the sun.

Basically, cross White Wolf vampires with Warhammer Fantasy vampires and it's pretty easy.

(they will of course still be murdered en masse by Dragonblooded, because that's the fate of things which are made using first level sorcery/necromancy. Especially fire aspects)

[1] o hai thar Beast
 
I am a bit confused on this. Sidereals are fated to exalt. Yet TO exalt they have to do something badass. The problem is that they are identified at birth and are kidnapped and indoctrinated. So where and how does the badass moment come from? I can imagine the elders setting up something or the other but has this been explicitly mentioned in the books?

Another thing is can a sidereal wanabe exalt as a solar instead? Because i remember something about burning all lesser powers/exaltations though this was related to DBs. If so does the sidereal "shard" simply goes to the next person and what does the now solar's fate thread look like? Same for Abyssal and infernal exalts minus the fate thread for the last.
 
Yzarc said:
I am a bit confused on this. Sidereals are fated to exalt. Yet TO exalt they have to do something badass. The problem is that they are identified at birth and are kidnapped and indoctrinated. So where and how does the badass moment come from?
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No. Solar Exalted become Solar Exalted because they've shown great heroism or initiative (often cited as "face the impossible and overcome", and what you've called "badass"). Other types of Exalted have different criteria. Lunar Exalted have shown great survival skills. Abyssals Exalt because they died in a process that would/could have led to Solar Exaltation. Infernals Exalt because they made a huge failure that otherwise could have led to a Solar Exaltation. Sidereals Exalt because they are fated to; no other criteria are necessary to catalyse it.

That's a quick, oversimplified summary of the average cases, but in short, Sidereal Exalted don't need to have a "badass moment" to become Sidereal Exalted.
 
nick012000 said:
Additionally, there was that sidebar in MoEP: Dragonbloods that talks about how every daiklave has a backstory.
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Not to belittle daiklaves, but the same could be said of trees and rocks. A good geology book will tell you how fascinating the development and journey of a single pebble can be, and just checking the rings of a fallen tree will tell you a story even if you don't know all the marvelous details.

Reminding people that the things they interact with did not just pop into existence fully-formed for their pleasure is, of course, a good thing. It's not something that particularly applies to Artifacts over any other Background or game element, though.
 
The way I read it, Sidereal exaltations can be predicted in advance with a high degree of accuracy. No-one is ever guaranteed to Exalt, and many children abducted and trained by the Sidereals do not. The five-score fellowship can determine who is likely to exalt, but not when they will exalt, especially since Sidereal shards can sit around in Lytek's cabinet for years, while Lunar and Solar shards tend to race out as soon as they have been cleaned.

Exalting as a Sidereal still takes an impressive act. Journeys need to undertake or set somebody else off on a great journey. Secrets need to learn a great secret. Endings need to end something.* It does not need to be something amazing and beyond human ability. It just needs to be enough.

*In Mook Quest, Scarab would have earned an Endings Sidereal Exlatation when he shot an enemy officer in the head, specifically, the commander of the Seventh Legion that would go on to found Lookshy. This may have caused the Loom to BSOD temporarily.
 
Eukie said:
No. Solar Exalted become Solar Exalted because they've shown great heroism or initiative (often cited as "face the impossible and overcome", and what you've called "badass").
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Actually, this came up a while ago in a discussion about TAW Exaltation criteria. Technically, if you look at the Bull, Dace, Arianna, Swan, Panther - even Harmonious Jade - Solar Exaltations don't come after you've something amazing, they come at your time of greatest need and let you do something amazing. Exalting as a Solar allows you to overcome impossible challenges; called in the moment of a hero's greatest need of them. They choose people with the potential and drive to use their power to change the world, and grant them that power so that they can, at the point where they are most desperate for it.

Which is a bit more interesting and distinct than just "do something cool", tbh, and is a lot more meaningfully distinct from other types of Exaltation.
 
Daiklaves made with half of their construction out of a Magical Material should rare. They should be the things that the Scarlet Empress gave to exceptional generals, the things the most Elite of Lookshy's strike forces use. City states in the Scavenger Lands should wage wars over their ownership and they should be the prize that nations horde jealously.

Of course there are a lot of ''Lite' Daikalves, made with even less than 10% of a MM that are literally everywhere. Your jumped up scavenger king has one, the outcaste in Nexus has one and the forces of Lookshy field them in huge numbers. But they aren't true Artifacts, just cheap imitation or First Age plowshears.
 
Aleph said:
Oh, and either each one is going to need three to eight different Charm trees for different types of Exalt, or the setting is going to snap like a twig when a Dragonblood gets their hands on an Artifact built for a Solar and starts using Evocations balanced against Native Solar Charms.
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We have seen Volcano Cutter(Which is probably a Red Jade Daiklave), and it does have three differents tiers of evocations: it is probable that the Evocations balanced against Native Solar Charms will be in the last tier of the Orichalcum Weapons, which will be probably only accesible to Solars and maybe Infernals(If the artifact is tainted by vitriol).

Whilst we are talking about Artifacts: i remember reading about a fan created system used to rewrite the stats of the various artifacts: does anybody know where to find it? i searched in the new forum and i found that Plague of Hats created one, but it was lost when the wiki was closed, and i am pretty sure it was more recent, given that i read it on the forums in the last six months, while that was 2 edition only.
 
BobTheNinja said:
Has there been any word on when Exalted 3E will be released?
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From the last Monday Meetings;

- Exalted 3rd Edition: From Holden: Lore is (finally) wrapping up in the next couple of days, leaving only Craft and then the playtest-based combat and social cleanups. (Lore has been very challenging, as Charms are extensions of use-of-the-Ability, and Lore is both very broad and very 'passive.') Craft is the Charm set's last hurdle– we're very aware that people found playing Craft-focused characters frustrating in the last two editions, and we want it to be both fun and rewarding now, without unbalancing the setting and drowning it in artifacts. Evocations are still being written and tweaked– we're testing as we write. The rest of the book is being pulled together and pushed into editing, and Chapter Three (character creation) is receiving some minor final alterations this week based on the Phase One and Phase Two playtest feedback.
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Also, Thread about what's done.
 
Giygas said:
We have seen Volcano Cutter(Which is probably a Red Jade Daiklave), and it does have three differents tiers of evocations: it is probable that the Evocations balanced against Native Solar Charms will be in the last tier of the Orichalcum Weapons, which will be probably only accesible to Solars and maybe Infernals(If the artifact is tainted by vitriol).
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Oh good grief. Martial Arts 2.0; hogging three times as much space and being pushed twice as hard.
 
nick012000 said:
Exalted Modern is basically Guyver. The Infernals are the Zoalords (with Gorol being Archanfel), the Dragonbloods are the Zoanoids, and the Alchemicals are the Guyvers. One thing they're not big on once the fighting starts? Secrecy.
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Hey guess what? I really do not care. I give no fucks about Guyver's badly thought out masquerade that is solely there so they can set it in Modern Japan. Exalted is not Guyver, and I have no interest in treating it as such.

I care about basic verisimilitude in the setting, and when you have 50+ guys who basically need to start glowing in such a manner that they can be seen for miles, whenever they do anything with their powers, then they are not going to be a secret society after a millennia, and Exalted Moderns history is roughly five times that. Now add modern technology into the mix, and watch your attempts at secrecy implode. It make even less sense with, you know, the ongoing war against the gods. And lets not even start on what Adamant Circle Sorcery can do.

Exalted Modern shines with its basic setting information, then fails hard with 'the hidden world' stuff. It focused way to hard on making the Infernals the 'hidden villains' (despite how that does not work on so many levels) and less on making the setting make sense. I can dig hidden conspiracies, and I've worked hard to keep that intact in my game, but there is only so much blatant stupidity and making a group 'the evulz' that one can take before going 'yeah, fuck this'.

Ultimately, the masquerade is a trope there for setting magic stuff in modern Earth and still have it be modern Earth. Exalted has so much magic bullshit flying around that the masquerade has failed from day one, 'magic' IS going to be in wide use, and the Exalted, on the whole, are spectacularly bad at stealth. Yes, I could just turn my brain off and assume genre conventions, but I play Exalted so I don't have to do that on a lot of levels. So if I want the hidden Althing to make any sort of sense at all, I need to figure out why over the past 900 odd years, some Slayer has not blown the lid on the whole thing.
 
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