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General Exalted Thread

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Omicron said:
In certain cultures of the Far East it is customary for youth who have brought irredeemable shame to their families and childless old men who have no one to support them to go out into the endless forest and hang themselves from a tree. With their bodies never to be found, their community can pretend that they have simply gone away to find a better life. But of late a new heresy is born, which claims that those who so die inadvertently dedicate their deaths as sacrifices to the Bone-White Stag, a god of death and the trees, and that their souls enter his court to live as his servants. Some foolish or hopeless have even taken their lives with intent to find a life in death in the court of a great deity, one better that they had before.
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Really? Isn't that a surefire recipe for hungry ghosts eating your face? I'm not sure I can buy that a practice so obviously maladaptive exists at all, let alone is so widespread.
 
So!

I have decided, in a fit of whimsy and mad ambition, that I am tired of just waiting around for someone else to run a 3e game for me to indulge my need for drama and hubris. I have therefore chosen to run my own, called Children of the Sun, on this very forum.

I am therefore currently looking for players. The game is set in the Scavenger Lands, and is centred around an ancient and poorly maintained manse which makes the land for miles around perfectly fertile and blessed with ideal weather patterns. As such, basically everyone wants it and is willing to bribe/manipulate/stab the guys who currently have it.

If you're interested in that sort of thing, head on over and take a look.
 
Vanigo said:
Really? Isn't that a surefire recipe for hungry ghosts eating your face? I'm not sure I can buy that a practice so obviously maladaptive exists at all, let alone is so widespread.
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The hungry ghosts generally never find them, assuming they arise in the first place.

The sea of trees is very deep, and when people go into it to die, they go far - and if it's farther from a human settlement than the hungry ghost can walk in a single night, then the hungry ghost can't do anything.

(some actually don't make it far enough to hang themselves, and get eaten by angry beasts instead)
 
EarthScorpion said:
I also suspect rivers that leave more ghosts are going to be proportionately bigger. Rivers of "Murdered By Your Best Friend With A Knife To The Back" are probably going to be swifter and stronger than Rivers of "Passed Away In Your Sleep Surrounded By Your Loving Family".
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Hmmm. Would it be easier for a ghost to get Baptized in a river that thematically fits with their death, or would it twist them less, or something?
 
Vanigo said:
Really? Isn't that a surefire recipe for hungry ghosts eating your face? I'm not sure I can buy that a practice so obviously maladaptive exists at all, let alone is so widespread.
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IIRC, hungry ghosts happen when your body isn't treated to the standards of what your culture expects - if you commit suicide with the intent of it being a sky burial, knowing full well that you will be devoured by the carrion birds, your po isn't gonna go gettin' pissed off. Also, I don't think every unburied body produces a hungry ghost.
 
Jon Chung said:
First: Lol. Yes. "Good at setting concepts" does not in any way translate to "Good at writing a ruleset".

Second: You do realize that you're skipping over the entire, utterly terrible Chambers/2E era, right?
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First: the idea/praise of Borgstromantic System-Crafting Genius is not something I came up with by reading the Exalted books - it's something that I noticed in the Exalted community/-ies.
Second: I suppose I could've/should've listed that too. But . . . was there actually much system work conducted in the Chambers era? Or were the 'system heavy lifting' jobs mostly performed during the Core era and the Ink Monkey era (including the point at which Monkeys wrote and Chambers rubber-stamped, IIRC?*)?

* == Perhaps I'm misremembering.
 
vicky_molokh said:
First: the idea/praise of Borgstromantic System-Crafting Genius is not something I came up with by reading the Exalted books - it's something that I noticed in the Exalted community/-ies.
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RSB is good at making systems tell you something about the setting: mechanics as evocative and interesting story content. This is an entirely separate skill to, let's say, the one you need to create a gameable empire-running simulation that can be run smoothly and quickly on human meatware at the table with no technological aids.

So there isn't an empire-running simulation subsystem. Instead, your GM has to wing it while keeping the "gritty and brutal plus shining divine heroes" theme in mind while assigning likely outcomes/consequences to your player actions.

vicky_molokh said:
Second: I suppose I could've/should've listed that too. But . . . was there actually much system work conducted in the Chambers era? Or were the 'system heavy lifting' jobs mostly performed during the Core era and the Ink Monkey era (including the point at which Monkeys wrote and Chambers rubber-stamped, IIRC?*)?
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Man, that is totally irrelevant. Your quote implies that the early 1E team handed over control to Holden and skips the entire intervening period, because you assign the relatively high opinion held towards the early 1E team to the team which passed control to the 3E team. That's flat incorrect, and I know you know this, so what's with the dishonesty?
 
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Jon Chung said:
RSB is good at making systems tell you something about the setting: mechanics as evocative and interesting story content. This is an entirely separate skill to, let's say, the one you need to create a gameable empire-running simulation that can be run smoothly and quickly on human meatware at the table with no technological aids.

So there isn't an empire-running simulation subsystem. Instead, your GM has to wing it while keeping the "gritty and brutal plus shining divine heroes" theme in mind while assigning likely outcomes/consequences to your player actions.
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Oh well, I guess I was wrong to consider answering "what happens to the kingdom" to be a part of generating interesting story content through game mechanics.

Jon Chung said:
Man, that is totally irrelevant. Your quote implies that the early 1E team handed over control to Holden and skips the entire intervening period, because you assign the relatively high opinion held towards the early 1E team to the team which passed control to the 3E team. That's flat incorrect, and I know you know this, so what's with the dishonesty?
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First, I admitted that I probably shouldn't've skipped over the Chambers era. Second, I didn't mean to imply stuff about 1e, but rather the Core era of 2e, back when Grabowski and Moran (and whoever else is considered to be part of the founders of Exalted) were around (I'm not sure how long that lasted past the corebook either). I know that 1e is generally praised more fluff-wise; but IIRC it's also a fact that the big names of 1e went over to early 2e too. Right?
 
vicky_molokh said:
Oh well, I guess I was wrong to consider answering "what happens to the kingdom" to be a part of generating interesting story content through game mechanics.
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This, like your other statements in this subthread, is off topic: whether an empire-running subsystem would be useful has nothing whatsoever to do with whether the Exalted 1 team could have made a decent one (or even wanted to make one), and whether RSB's ability to write evocative character mechanics is the same skill used to do this.

The answer in both cases is no.

vicky_molokh said:
First, I admitted that I probably shouldn't've skipped over the Chambers era. Second, I didn't mean to imply stuff about 1e, but rather the Core era of 2e, back when Grabowski and Moran (and whoever else is considered to be part of the founders of Exalted) were around (I'm not sure how long that lasted past the corebook either). I know that 1e is generally praised more fluff-wise; but IIRC it's also a fact that the big names of 1e went over to early 2e too. Right?
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Past the corebook, it's all Chambers' show.
 
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Went poking through the thread archives, happened across a couple of things worth linking. One's useful, the other's funny.

Irked said:
So, on account of having apparently too much free time on my hands, I've ported over the Sidereal Charmset to 3e. The same caveats apply as last time - unpolished, probably broken in places, more of an attempt to do a straight conversion than a full reimagining, etc. - and I'd still be grateful for any feedback on it.

...
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CircleTheSkies said:
1. It seems likely that Dual Magnus Prana is not going to actually be in 3rd edition. Remember what people are seeing now is not the final product. Similarly, I wouldn't be surprised if God-King's Shrike goes away to save on space or because it's decided it's no good.
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notanautomaton said:
Hmmm. Would it be easier for a ghost to get Baptized in a river that thematically fits with their death, or would it twist them less, or something?
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Rivers are dangerous. Most of the time, if a ghost falls in one, they're carried away and lost - either their corpus dissipates, the Whispers get them, or they're swept down into the Labyrinth (depending on the nature of the river, how strong it is and how deep in the Underworld it is when you fall).

Baptism requires the ghost to force themselves to survive and claw their way back upstream. They have to fight physically against the force of the River trying to drag them away (and rivers are hungry - this is symbolically a fight against death itself) and they have to fight mentally against the way that the river seeks to leave them as nothing. The ones that succeed, finding depths of willpower they probably never knew they had, wind up twisted and fused with the nature of the river, their Passions twisted, their corpus warped. The ones that fail (which is the vast majority) are just lost to the river, becoming one with the waters and swept away.

From the point of view of normal ghosts, Greater Dead are as crazy to them as normal ghosts are to humans. Their Passions are twisted, they're not their own. They're scary and powerful and monstrous. Their corpuses are usually notably inhuman, far more than a normal ghost gets. Remember, in our underworld model, every hun ghost starts at Essence/Enlightenment 1 - whether you were a Solar or a sailor. The po is the seat of power and that's what retains the Essence/Enlightenment value [1]. Hun ghosts are weak - so Greater Dead are scary motherfuckers.

So, no, honestly you'd probably be worse off if you were submerged in a river which matches your own death. After all, that death is already part of you - you're starting pre-twisted. It has all those memories of you dying that it can play off while you're carried off away.

[1] Yes, that means that the hungry ghost of a First Age Solar is basically as scary as the Solar themselves. And that's why you don't fuck with a Solar tomb.
 
Jon Chung said:
This, like your other statements in this subthread, is off topic: whether an empire-running subsystem would be useful has nothing whatsoever to do with whether the Exalted 1 team could have made a decent one (or even wanted to make one), and whether RSB's ability to write evocative character mechanics is the same skill used to do this.

The answer in both cases is no.
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I originally understood ability to write good (game system -> story) mechanics to be broader, but now I see where the line is drawn for that group of authors (i.e. not where I originally considered it to be drawn). I sit informed.

Jon Chung said:
Past the corebook, it's all Chambers' show.
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Ah.
 
Giygas said:
A silly question: is there any way of getting a hun Ghost with more than one enlightment immediately after death? Or it is simply impossible?
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By our intent, there is no way. Death is the great leveller. It doesn't matter that you were an elder exalt in life. That was power granted by the super weapon which had gone on to another host, and borne by your Po which retains it. You're just a pale mockery of the person made of memories and echoes.

Does that make you mad? Does that make you furious? Does that make you feel like you've been cheated out of power that should be yours? Does it make you rage to realise that you've been kicked down to the base of a pyramid and you're just a lowly ghost? Does the hate simmer in your gut?

And that's why many of the lords of death are former exalts; so bitter and angry at their loss of power that they sought to become the greatest dead, stealing power from the broken tombs of those who were never born. Better a maggot feeding off a titan's corpse than a lowly ghost. Better to steal the funereal garb of the memory of demon prince and hear the mad whispers of that which you murdered than live in ignominy. Better to be a slave to god monsters than a slave to once mortal ghosts.
 
EarthScorpion said:
By our intent, there is no way. Death is the great leveller. It doesn't matter that you were an elder exalt in life. That was power granted by the super weapon which had gone on to another host, and borne by your Po which retains it. You're just a pale mockery of the person made of memories and echoes.
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I assume the difference in essence flow between being alive and just being a Hun is also what knocks down Mortals that had raised there Enligthment like a thaumaturge or a martial artist?
 
Scia said:
I assume the difference in essence flow between being alive and just being a Hun is also what knocks down Mortals that had raised there Enligthment like a thaumaturge or a martial artist?
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That means the hungry ghost of such an individual will be more powerful, and may have a few themed powers. But the po is the seat of power. That's where the Enlightenment goes, no matter what it is.
 
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