General Exalted Thread

[Aleph]

It's that time again! We close up the third doc with Kerisgame 60, in which Keris investigates smashable things in Saata, decides that she really likes it in not!Roanapur, finds a kindred spirit and blood-sister in the process of getting one of the six blue sea masters on-side, and sadly finds out that Aiko is a horrible evil devil-child.

... like, in more ways than the obvious. I mean. In temperament.

Bah, you know what I mean.

So, extras:

EarthScorpion: Keris has so much to learn about babies.
Aleph: so unfair
Aleph: Though I think the highlight of that session was "... shit. She wants me to swear a blood oath. Uh. Fuck, Scar-Writ Saga Shield means I probably can't draw blood with her knife."

"DAMN YOU MALFEAS"​

"HOW DARE YOU MAKE ME SO SWOLE"​

EarthScorpion: Nah, Keris would just have to aim and work it in.
Aleph: Oh, sure, that would be pretty.
EarthScorpion: Accidentally bend the other person's knife a bit.
Aleph: *snrrk*

Keris: "... well this is embarrassing."​

Keris: "I can probably repair it?"​

EarthScorpion: And heh. Keris has just chosen to ally with the hotheaded ambitious one
Aleph: Naturally. Pale Branch is a tiny cute-looking woman with big ambitions who always has at least two knives to hand and has little respect for tradition or How Things Have Always Been Done.
Aleph: They are, in a way, kindred spirits.
EarthScorpion: also
EarthScorpion: apparently both colourblind
EarthScorpion: and wear sheer fabrics
Aleph: You mean colourbest.
EarthScorpion: ... oh gods. The local fashion for pirate lords is just going to encourage Keris.
EarthScorpion: Also, oh, Keris. It's not even your baby which is interrupting your romantic life with your girlfriend.
EarthScorpion: is very unfair
Aleph: so very very unfair : (
...
Aleph: But man, I hadn't realised just how fucking absurd her range is. 2000 miles a day.
EarthScorpion: She now realises that if she sets up base in Saata, Sasi is just a day's travel away for a long weekend every month.
Aleph:
EarthScorpion: ... no, Keris, don't side with Testolagh when he starts suggesting that Aiko might want to spend summers with him when she's older.
Aleph: Keris: "Yes! Yes, that is a great idea! Wonderful, even!"
EarthScorpion: Heh. Keris manages that speed, too, with her new hips, breasts and baby bulge slowing her down. And all that hair.
EarthScorpion: ... keris you are really not very hydrodynamic
Aleph: The hair is actually surprisingly hydrodynamic. It sort of streams back and forms a sleek shape around her.
EarthScorpion: Well, yes, true, she squids with it. Like Rathan does.
Aleph:
...
EarthScorpion: ... sigh. Oh, Haneyl. For some reason, you have decided that spices and chillis and things like that are basically the perfect food flavouring.
Aleph: "Some reason".
EarthScorpion: ... because they're plants. That taste hot.
Aleph: : P
...
EarthScorpion: Heh. Keris never thought she'd be taking over a Realm satrapy from within, acting all sneaky and subtle and stuff.
EarthScorpion: ... in fact, she's basically taking over a local bit of the local !Guild.
Aleph: Oh, Keris. Heh. I suspect one of the things Sasi rather likes about Keris as an occultist is the way that she usually has a project going and is fairly free about sketching ideas down on things. It makes for very entertaining games of "guess what she's working on here".

Sasi: 'Hmm. Well, from the sketch it's obviously armour, but those look like notes on elemental breeds? And... ah, that's an upside-down list of the tumbaga-making process.'​

EarthScorpion: Sasi is actually incredibly proud of Keris there. She just doesn't say it because that would be honest, straightforward and heartfelt. But when they first met, Keris was a barely literate and half-feral street rat. Now she's Sasi's student in sorcery, an accomplished occultist, and wonderful artist.
Aleph: Oh, Keris. She really has blossomed.
...
EarthScorpion: Oh, Rounen. You were made a szelkerub, so this high-speed riding Cissidy around stirs something within you that you once were.
Aleph:
EarthScorpion: Huh. You know, it's interesting that the sziromkeruby basically do have Haneyl's aspects in balance.
Aleph: Part shy storyteller, part forest cat, part angry flamewars. Hee. Rounen has found that his flame-spit attack isn't actually instantly extinguished on contact with water, and is working on developing a method of using it to catch close-to-the-surface fish.
Aleph: ... he may also be trying to mimic Keris's spear use and get a means of spear-fishing working.
Aleph: (Cissidy is obligingly helping by taking him low over shoals.)
EarthScorpion: And adult Haneyl will sometimes give herself in full to the games of all the adult forms, letting one part of her nature dominate as a form of catharsis and a way of de-stressing. Sometimes the princess runs naked and blood through the woods with the hungry ones, killing and eating anything she comes across. Sometimes she burns sections of forest to ash as she dances with the dreamers and then sleeps for days afterwards.
EarthScorpion: Heh, that's basically her "acts of villainy" to reduce her Limit.
Aleph: ... hee. You know what else is going to be fun? When he's grown up, Rounen being Keris's bladed poet aide, and then there's, like, an ambush or something and she's like "welp, time for fun" and he can sigh and close up his head into a flower-helm and quickly throw some hardwood armour on before following her out and murderin' things.
Aleph: Oh, Rounen. He will love Saata.
Aleph: SO MUCH MORE INTERESTING
Aleph: SO MANY PEOPLE
Aleph: SO MANY STORIES
Aleph: He will run around stalking people and writing down filler episodes about them (and Keris will skim-read them for anything useful).
EarthScorpion: Or summon another sziromkerub to process them for her.

Rathan: "Mama! Why are you only using Haneyl's stupid friends!"​

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[Bursting Eagerness Soul]

Would ditching all those themes make it possible for Lunars to remain Lunars in anything but name? Because a 'barbarian' leaning and the theme of mystical bonds and being second-best seem like the iconic things about them, the first things that people recall about them when someone brings up/asks about Lunars. That and animal/shapeshifting themes. So if giving them a Starship Troopers amount of fluff change, why retain the old brand?

(I still like the idea of a region where Fate does not go, though! It's a cool out-of-whole-cloth addition. Personally, I'd want to see a heavily Wyld-tainted-but-in-a-harmless-way lean in that.)

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I will point you squarely at TAW.

 

[Cosar]

Pretty much. The main reason the Realm is still holding Faxai are 1) religious (the Caul is a hugely important pilgrimage site to Dynasts), and 2) if the Lunars controlled the Caul in full they might be able to launch a straight-up invasion of the Blessed Isle.

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So the Realm's not really supposed to be a Hegemon this edition, is it? That's disappointing.

 

[Omicron]

So the Realm's not really supposed to be a Hegemon this edition, is it? That's disappointing.

Click to shrink...

Depends what you mean by 'hegemon.' There is no place in Creation that is beyond the influence of the Realm; even those that are not either ruled by it, subservient to it or bleeding themselves fighting it still feel the impact of its actions. That does not mean the Realm has perfect control over the world, or that it wins every battle, and it doesn't mean there are no threats to its power.

In particular, note that the Realm started losing its cities when the Empress disappeared. That doesn't mean that her disappearance somehow magic'd her soldiers into nonexistence - it's the same as everywhere else; the Houses are taking apart the assets that were under the personal authority of the Empress and the Imperial bureaucracy for their own use. Likely some Dynasts had other uses for the soldiers of the Caul, uses that seemed more practical or pressing, and they moved out their troops, and then they lost the cities.

 

[Mutton]

I will point you squarely at TAW.

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Can you summarize it? I glanced through it long ago but it didn't stick

 

[TheLastOne]

These are considered annoying because:
a) they obfuscate the probability curve to casual inspection but not to a determined player who is half decent with statistics and has access to a computer, which is less than useful.
Some people like them because:
a) they are bad at estimating probability / do not do this anyway, and consider the loss of ability to make snap judgements about likelihood of success vs resources expended if you don't pre-calculate with a dice sim to be a non-problem

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I think you are being to weak on the second statement.

There are people who think that knowing the exact probability curve, the ability to break things down exactly and precisely that way on the fly, is undesirable during a game. That doing so breaks immersion, and that you should be able to sort of say "This is easy"/"This is hard" but not "I have an 86% chance of success"/"I have a 20% chance of success." That thinking "I need to use a little magic to make this more certain"/"I need to really push myself"/"I need to go all out hold nothing back" is more desirable then saying "buying another die gives me 3% greater chance of success."

Therefor, there are people who consider it an active virtue to raise the cost of calculating the probability curve, and like that dice tricks make the game more spiky and unpredictable.

 

[Cosar]

Depends what you mean by 'hegemon.' There is no place in Creation that is beyond the influence of the Realm; even those that are not either ruled by it, subservient to it or bleeding themselves fighting it still feel the impact of its actions. That does not mean the Realm has perfect control over the world, or that it wins every battle, and it doesn't mean there are no threats to its power.

In particular, note that the Realm started losing its cities when the Empress disappeared. That doesn't mean that her disappearance somehow magic'd her soldiers into nonexistence - it's the same as everywhere else; the Houses are taking apart the assets that were under the personal authority of the Empress and the Imperial bureaucracy for their own use. Likely some Dynasts had other uses for the soldiers of the Caul, uses that seemed more practical or pressing, and they moved out their troops, and then they lost the cities.

Click to shrink...

Given that one of the descriptions up thread was this:

Also most of the Lunar Domains are doing quite well, due to fairly recent events. Once the Caul was dominated completely by the Realm, now they barely hang on, the Mountain of the Spider King is draining 3 great houses of more and more lives and treasure every year, all the while expanding his own territory.

The Lunars aren't locked in an unending battle against a stubborn foe who doesn't lose ground and who hasn't changed in the last 700 years, they're winning. In every single 3e writeup of a Silver Pact domain* there's a line about how the Realm is shrinking, they're not just taking losses, they're taking heavier and heaver losses every year, losing more and more territory every year, and they're not taking any back. For an empire, this is unquestionably a death sentence and Lunars are the executioner.

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I feel that any meaning of hegemon is rather inappropriate. Especially if it's core territories could be under threat from external invasion if one city is lost an ocean away. Which doesn't really make sense if the houses are pulling troops to the Blessed Isle. That would, logically, make the isle more resistant to attack, not less.

Well except in bizzaro-world, where apparently hegemon is synonymous with Baen Villian.

 

[Kuciwalker]

I think you are being to weak on the second statement.

There are people who think that knowing the exact probability curve, the ability to break things down exactly and precisely that way on the fly, is undesirable during a game. That doing so breaks immersion, and that you should be able to sort of say "This is easy"/"This is hard" but not "I have an 86% chance of success"/"I have a 20% chance of success." That thinking "I need to use a little magic to make this more certain"/"I need to really push myself"/"I need to go all out hold nothing back" is more desirable then saying "buying another die gives me 3% greater chance of success."

Therefor, there are people who consider it an active virtue to raise the cost of calculating the probability curve, and like that dice tricks make the game more spiky and unpredictable.

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Yeah the problem is people like me are just going to do the math anyway because seriously, it's not that hard.

 

[Omicron]

Given that one of the descriptions up thread was this:


I feel that any meaning of hegemon is rather inappropriate. Especially if it's core territories could be under threat from external invasion if one city is lost an ocean away. Which doesn't really make sense if the houses are pulling troops to the Blessed Isle. That would, logically, make the isle more resistant to attack, not less.

Well except in bizzaro-world, where apparently hegemon is synonymous with Baen Villian.

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The Houses aren't pulling troops to the Blessed Isle, they are pulling troops to their own immediate interests.

The shrine-cities of the Caul are of religious importance and also have something to do with Terrestrial purity, so they're of import to the Realm as a whole. Any individual House, however, probably cares more about protecting a given satrapy that belongs to them, provides them with calculable revenue, but has just had a Solar warlord pop up next to it.

The Realm is threatened - Thorns is lost, the Solar Exalted have come back, and so on. But being threatened doesn't make it much less of a terrifying serpent choking the world. When House Cathak pulls its troops from the Caul, the Lunars conquer its cities, but these troops come for you.

 

[vicky_molokh]

I will point you squarely at TAW.

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I understand that TAW is considered awesome, but as far as I understand it can never ascend to the status of canon, nor probably be used as inspiration for the next edition of Lunars anymore.

I think you are being to weak on the second statement.

There are people who think that knowing the exact probability curve, the ability to break things down exactly and precisely that way on the fly, is undesirable during a game. That doing so breaks immersion, and that you should be able to sort of say "This is easy"/"This is hard" but not "I have an 86% chance of success"/"I have a 20% chance of success." That thinking "I need to use a little magic to make this more certain"/"I need to really push myself"/"I need to go all out hold nothing back" is more desirable then saying "buying another die gives me 3% greater chance of success."

Therefor, there are people who consider it an active virtue to raise the cost of calculating the probability curve, and like that dice tricks make the game more spiky and unpredictable.

Click to shrink...

I can confirm that such people exist. I first encountered such an argument in defence of WoD's Dice-vs-Difficulty-and-count-successes mechanics (for those who came to word through Exalted: Difficulty in the original meaning, i.e. target number on the dice). And yes, these people tend to not be the ones who roll out a spreadsheet that calculates the probabilities of the aforementioned overengineered dice system in a reasonable amount of time, and these people don't realize that the number-crunchers like us will tend to only get annoyed and crunch the numbers, to some extent out of principle.

 

[Cosar]

Can you summarize it? I glanced through it long ago but it didn't stick

Click to shrink...

Terrifying Argent Witches is a Lunar rebuild that makes gives Lunars Dionysian qualities in contrast to Solar's Apollian ones. It favors Luna being a God of chaos and trickery, with this aspect being significantly more prominent in Lunars. This involves both rewriting their charmset and abilities as well as their place in Creation's history.

TAW are about as strong as a Solar in personal scale while playing to the themes of their charms, but generally weaker outside of that. This is intended to both give players some obvious optimization paths, as well as give opponents methods to weaken them.

The Realm is threatened - Thorns is lost, the Solar Exalted have come back, and so on. But being threatened doesn't make it much less of a terrifying serpent choking the world. When House Cathak pulls its troops from the Caul, the Lunars conquer its cities, but these troops come for you.

Click to shrink...

No, what makes it a less terrifying serpent choking the world is apparently when most of the descriptions of the resistance have the Realm losing. Like I quoted above, but I'll do again because you apparently ignored it:

the Mountain of the Spider King is draining 3 great houses of more and more lives and treasure every year, all the while expanding his own territory.

The Lunars aren't locked in an unending battle against a stubborn foe who doesn't lose ground and who hasn't changed in the last 700 years, they're winning.

Click to shrink...

I mean, ok, so the Realm is pulling troops to go to other locations. But it's still losing in those locations. As well as the place it doesn't focus. And it's core territories could soon be under direct attack. In fact, apparently it's losing overall. So, yeah, explain to me again how this merits the term 'hegemon' without restoring to the same logic found in baen books.

 

[Omicron]

Terrifying Argent Witches is a Lunar rebuild that makes gives Lunars Dionysian qualities in contrast to Solar's Apollian ones. It favors Luna being a God of chaos and trickery, with this aspect being significantly more prominent in Lunars. This involves both rewriting their charmset and abilities as well as their place in Creation's history.

TAW are about as strong as a Solar in personal scale while playing to the themes of their charms, but generally weaker outside of that. This is intended to both give players some obvious optimization paths, as well as give opponents methods to weaken them.


No, what makes it a less terrifying serpent choking the world is apparently when most of the descriptions of the resistance have the Realm losing. Like I quoted above, but I'll do again because you apparently ignored it:


I mean, ok, so the Realm is pulling troops to go to other locations. But it's still losing in those locations. As well as the place it doesn't focus. And it's core territories could soon be under direct attack. In fact, apparently it's losing overall. So, yeah, explain to me again how this merits the term 'hegemon' without restoring to the same logic found in baen books.

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You're basically just trying to angle that conversation so that whatever answer you receive you can either say "so the Realm isn't powerful, we were lied to all along!" or "so Lunars suck again!" but like, i'm not a complete moron

The book gives you three locations in which Lunars hold power, plus the Caul; presumably there are others. It also gives you a shitton more places where the Realm is powerful or influential, and places where its power is contested by people other than Lunars. The Realm is powerful, it is the single most powerful polity in the world, its actions impact Creation on a global (planar?) scale.

But many threats are rising and there are many places where it fights tooth and nail to hold control of this or that satrapy, and it has growing internal tensions even on its home turf due to the Houses eyeing the Scarlet Throne.

None of this is contradictory, none of this makes the Realm impotent.

Frankly, I don't care to justify the word of the use 'hegemon,' since you brought up that word in the first place. The Realm has hegemony, in the common sense of the term - it is predominant over other factions of the setting. It is also opposed by many, many such factions, and cannot direct its full power everywhere at once. It has hegemony like Athens had hegemony, but on a wider scale.

 

[Dark Abstraction]

This, on the other hand, has serious potential. I've got an exam on Tuesday, but afterwards if you like I'd be happy to pick over this with you and help improve the language, maybe add some more potential. I've got a thread I saved from the old White Wolf boards where people talked ideas of uniquely Lunar technology that might be useful.

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I'd love to work with you on that, yeah! I thought that up and wrote it out over the course of an hour or two, so it's certainly got a lot of room for development.

 

[Cosar]

You're basically just trying to angle that conversation so that whatever answer you receive you can either say "so the Realm isn't powerful, we were lied to all along!" or "so Lunars suck again!" but like, i'm not a complete moron

The book gives you three locations in which Lunars hold power, plus the Caul; presumably there are others. It also gives you a shitton more places where the Realm is powerful or influential, and places where its power is contested by people other than Lunars. The Realm is powerful, it is the single most powerful polity in the world, its actions impact Creation on a global (planar?) scale.

But many threats are rising and there are many places where it fights tooth and nail to hold control of this or that satrapy, and it has growing internal tensions even on its home turf due to the Houses eyeing the Scarlet Throne.

None of this is contradictory, none of this makes the Realm impotent.

Frankly, I don't care to justify the word of the use 'hegemon,' since you brought up that word in the first place. The Realm has hegemony, in the common sense of the term - it is predominant over other factions of the setting. It is also opposed by many, many such factions, and cannot direct its full power everywhere at once. It has hegemony like Athens had hegemony, but on a wider scale.

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Uh...no, I'm not. I'm operating under the assumption that information provided that hasn't been contradicted is accurate. Especially when it's been brought up a couple times in the current conversation and hasn't been contradicted yet. If you feel what I'm using as evidence is incorrect, counter it. Throwing around insults doesn't actually make your argument stronger. In fact, it rather makes your arguments seem less true, as you don't seem to care about the premises my argument is based on.

As for your last paragraph, I'm really not even sure what you're getting at here. You seem to be accusing me of trying to twist the debate based on changing terms...except that I started the discussion, based on the term hegemon. If you don't want to have this discussion, fine, but don't pretend that I was somehow twisting the debate. Your attempt to change the term under discussion bears more resemblance to that.

 

[Alexander89]

Writing Yozi Charms turned out unexpectedly difficult, but maybe not. Anyway, I finally have a start for the Oramus Charmset that resonates somehow so I would like to hear your opinions:

ORAMUS MYTHOS EXULTANT
Cost: —; Mins: Essence 3; Type: Permanent
Keywords: None
Duration: Permanent
Prerequisite Charms: First Oramus Excellency

The glory of Oramus is not for lesser minds to behold. One character who perceived the stunt in action suffers a Shaping effect imposing a derangement-based negative mutation worth a number of points equal or lesser than the stunt's rating.

SENSE BEYOND SENSIBILITY
Cost: —; Mins: Essence 2; Type: Permanent
Keywords: None
Duration: Permanent
Prerequisites: None

The mind of Oramus follows no logic that beings confused by mere paradox can follow. Upon learning this Charm The Infernal gains the following effects:

-All Derangements are Obvious to her senses, being able to tell their contexts and origins.
-Social attacks against characters with Derangements reduce the MDV of their target by the Derangement's mutation point total rating.
-Finally, the warlock's opened mind and its leaps of logic are hard for limited beings to follow: she adds her Essence rating to all Read Motivation actions taken against her, but she also suffers an external penalty of (Essence) to all efforts to explain her motives or the reasons for her actions.

[Name still undecided]
Cost: 5m; Mins: Essence 2; Type: Simple
Keywords: Combo-OK, Obvious, Sorcerous
Duration: Indefinite
Prerequisites: None

Only Oramus defines the boundaries of his own existence. The Infernal becomes immune against all Shaping effects that originate from the environment. Furthermore, while moving through a Wyld zone of any intensity the warlock's essence begins to assert itself over unreality: while standing still the area within (her Essence) yards is slowly converted into stable reality, as if using the Solar Charm Wyld-Shaping Technique, over (10 - Essence) hours. Normally the converted area follows the themes of First Oramus Excellency, but if the Infernal knows the First Excellency of another Yozi, a land-shaping charm such as Holy Land Infliction or if she has developed her own personal mythos through heresy then the new terrain shifts to match these themes instead. Should she know multiple such charms all the themes are represented. When the warlock leaves the affected area slowly reverts back to its original chaotic state over (Essence) hours or when dispelled by Emerald Circle Countermagic.

A repurchase at Essence 3 extends this mastery over chaos to direct attacks: any Shaping attack levied against the Infernal is warped to reinforce her own existence, the original effect shifting to another that is already integral part of the Exalt's status. Also, while the Infernal is present any Shaping attack against the converted area only accelerates the transformation, removing a number of hours equal to the minimum Essence of the Charm or power used. Assume shaping effects caused by artifacts or hearthstones to have an Essence rating equal to the artifact value of the device inflicting them, and effects caused by unique powers to use the Permanent Essence of the creature inflicting them, subject to ST's interpretation in the case of beings with Essence scores well below their general power level such as some Behemoths.

A final repurchase at Essence 5 makes the transformation of the Wyld Zone permanent as a Blasphemy effect with a rating equal to the Infernal's Essence. The Blasphemy effect is triggered when the transformation is complete, the converted area now requiring Adamant Circle Countermagic to dispel.

 

[cyberswordsmen]

What purpose does the E2 version serve? It takes to long to kick in for a tactical uses and so short term an effect for strategic ones. With the upgrades it becomes useful and thematic but the original unupgraded version seems lackluster.

 

[Chloe Sullivan]

What purpose does the E2 version serve? It takes to long to kick in for a tactical uses and so short term an effect for strategic ones. With the upgrades it becomes useful and thematic but the original unupgraded version seems lackluster.

Click to shrink...

it lets you stroll through the wyld without having to worry about horrible mutations.

*groan*

Do I need to fetch the newspaper, Chloe?

Click to shrink...

No, that's padfoot's job.

 

[Dynamesmouse]

That Mythos is OP, make the derangement last a scene.

 

[Jon Chung]

I think you are being to weak on the second statement.

There are people who think that knowing the exact probability curve, the ability to break things down exactly and precisely that way on the fly, is undesirable during a game. That doing so breaks immersion, and that you should be able to sort of say "This is easy"/"This is hard" but not "I have an 86% chance of success"/"I have a 20% chance of success." That thinking "I need to use a little magic to make this more certain"/"I need to really push myself"/"I need to go all out hold nothing back" is more desirable then saying "buying another die gives me 3% greater chance of success."

Therefor, there are people who consider it an active virtue to raise the cost of calculating the probability curve, and like that dice tricks make the game more spiky and unpredictable.

Click to shrink...

As people said above: this doesn't actually work, because I (or anyone who knows basic statistics and has access to a computer) can do it anyway. Starting an arms race of overcomplex dice system vs person with a compiler is dumb, because it is impossible to win. Anyone who thinks it's possible to actually obfuscate the probabilities is using crazy moon logic: you have one session of doing so before the irritated player writes a dicebot and brings it to the next session.

e: Hell, the last game I played with funky dice mechanics, Weapons of the Gods / Legends of the Wulin, provided the probability-of-success chart in the back of the book just to save the numbercrunching fanbase some time!

 

[Revlid]

I can't help but feel that this entire conversation between @Omicron and @C.o.S.a.R is spectacularly pointless. Of course there are going to be references made to Lunars bleeding the Realm of wealth and warriors - if there weren't, we'd complain about how they weren't hyping up Lunars. This is not mutually exclusive with a sense of the Realm being world-spanning and awesomely powerful - indeed, the significance of the former rather relies on the latter. You can quibble over execution - though you probably want to start breaking out specific quotes in that case - but the principle is pretty clear.

 

[TheLastOne]

As people said above: this doesn't actually work, because I (or anyone who knows basic statistics and has access to a computer) can do it anyway. Starting an arms race of overcomplex dice system vs person with a compiler is impossible to win. Anyone who thinks it's possible to actually obfuscate the probabilities is using crazy moon logic: you have one session of doing so before the irritated player writes a dicebot and brings it to the next session.

e: Hell, the last game I played with funky dice mechanics, Weapons of the Gods / Legends of the Wulin, provided the probability-of-success chart in the back of the book just to save the numbercrunching fanbase some time!

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Sure, but you can't do it casually in you head at the table, it's now complicated enough that saying you can't say off the cuff 'Use that Die trick' or 'buy four dice of excellency,' so it because a thing of feeling and intuition rather then certainty and "Cold Logic." That's enough to stop eighty percent of players.

I say this as a fan of diceless games, by the way, where there is no random numbers at all. I'm not arguing from my own position, so you don't have to convince me.

 

[DayDreamer]

Sure, but you can't do it casually in you head at the table, it's now complicated enough that saying you can't say off the cuff 'Use that Die trick' or 'buy four dice of excellency,' so it because a thing of feeling and intuition rather then certainty and "Cold Logic." That's enough to stop eighty percent of players.

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Dunno, most of the dice tricks in 3E actually have fairly predictable outputs, basically just adding a small multiplier to the normal additive calculation of expected results. Not that complicated, if you're good at math. At least in the test games of 3E my table ran before we decided not to continue, all it really seemed to do was slow the game down (even more than having a ton of charms right out of chargen all of which could potentially be used at the same time) as people tried to figure out if a given charm was worthwhile or not.

 

[Mutton]

The problem with most dice tricks is that you can use a few minutes on Google between sessions to figure out rules of thumb for dealing with them. So you don't really obfuscate the odds for anyone who wants to know them

 

[AmineHsu]

No, not anymore:

"But when the Empress vanished, her legions on the Caul were reduced, and each of the shrine cities was left with fewer defenders than ever before. When Sha'a Oka's lieutenants learned of this weakness, they erupted from their dominions with their beastmen armies and overwhelmed one city after another.
The Dynasts were finally able to dig their heels in at Faxai, the Walled City, whose port is the gateway to the West. Faxai's defenders know if the city were lost, the Anathema would have a way to launch an invasion of the Blessed Isle."

The Lunars took all the cities except for Faxai, and the Realm is currently debating whether to cut their losses and abandon their designs to control the shrine-cities.

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Hrm, the line "Others travel to the Caul even now, drawn by the tarnal silence out of the shrine cities, and their concern for the fates of those trapped by Lunar forces." made me think that Realm forces still controlled the shrines cities, just trapped in siege by the beastman armies. I... suppose it could be read otherwise but that's the strong impression I got when I read it.

 

[Pale Wolf]

I'm going to say this politely.

'Fuck the Silver Pact'
'FUCK EVERYTHING VAGUELY RELATED TO THEIR GAROU INFLUENCES'
'FUCK SOLAR SLAVE NARRATIVE'

We want a fucking Lunar Exalted Splat that can stand up as being an actual splat of exalted, rather then those poor wittle abused slaves of the solars.

Lunars should not be defined by some shitty pact that makes them into tribal savages, rather then empowered by the moon badasses that are a match for anything in the setting which isn't a Solar.

Lunars should not have to share their spotlight, or their cool things with any other fucking splat (FUCK YOU DRAGON BLOOD, GET OFF THE FUCKING CAUL)

We were promised a sweet ass Lunar Kingdom, locked away from fate and an example of the enhanced Lunar presence in the setting now that they weren't all sitting around with a stick up their ass waiting for the solars to come back.

Instead we got we got more fucking dragonblooded and even more 'MUST SMASH DA REALM' for reasons I don't quite understand.

Is the thought of an openly Lunar Kingdom ruled by his Divine Lunar presence somehow narratively toxic to the 'MUST BE SOLAR FOCUSED" gameline or something?

Fuck, the fact that the island was cut off from the loam was even a perfect example of COOL SHIT LUNARS CAN DO, by making it untargetable by the Defense Grid because REASONS.

I don't want the dragonblooded on that island.

I don't want the dragon blooded anywhere NEAR that fucking island.

I want it to be a massive ass cool thing that Lunars did for themselves for a reason that has nothing to do with the Solar Exalted, or the Dragon Blooded, Sidereals or some other stupid fucking reason thats stopped them from doing anything cool in the setting for the first two editions.

There is literally no justification the developers can make for sticking fucking dragonblooded on that island that was promised to us as a cool thing that the Lunars did in 3e as part of their enhanced setting presence, that doesn't involve 'AND THEN THE DYNASTS GOT THEIR SHIT KICKED IN' that can satisfy me.

Click to shrink...

So, this conversation has inspired me to refine a possible take on Lunars as an organization.

But For Me? It Was Tuesday.

So, the thing is, the Lunars as portrayed are just... fixated entirely on the Realm. Seeking to defeat the Dragonblooded usurpers, take revenge for the fall of the First Age, restore the glories of the past.

Why?

They were never there for any of it.

Why do they care about the First Age? The modern Lunar has their own concerns, their own interests, has never once met the Solar mate his heart purportedly burns for vengeance for and has at best dim memories of the decadence to which he was accustomed in the First Age and his unjust murder.

The Realm considers the extermination of the Anathema a holy crusade. The Lunars? They don't give a shit. Like, they'd like to not-die and all and there are probably numerous practices the Realm engages in that they dislike, but they're not ideological about any of it. The Lunars as a whole aren't engaged in any kind of grand retaking of Creation.

They've secured the Caul, they've won, as an organization - they have a place to live and rule, it's pretty comfortable overall, and the Realm can batter itself to scrap on their shores if it so pleases. Beyond that, there just isn't anything All The Lunars actually care about. You'll totally have Lunars out in the world doing things, but the Silver Pact, the totality of the Lunars, has won.

Some Lunars are satisfied with ruling a section of the Caul - it's bigger than France, there's plenty to rule (especially with whatever heights of artifice an organization of established Lunars can manage). Might even be bigger if you want it to be, there's plenty of ocean to fill with continent there. Could well be the size of the Americas.

Some Lunars just treat it as a safe home base while they pursue projects of their own in the rest of Creation - maybe they're willing to risk the Realm to get a more sizeable kingdom of their own, maybe they want to Set Their People Free, etc etc, this is probably the majority of them.

Some Lunars actually do want to shatter the Realm and claim Creation for the Lunars - this will presumably include the majority of the vengeful elders, some people who are just a little bitter about the whole 'civilization devoted to killing you personally' thing, some think the Lunars are better-qualified rulers.

Some want peace - they have no particular desire to grind Creation into dust fighting over who gets the last scrap, and would be entirely satisfied with a detente, end of holy war, and Lunars and Realm going their own way in peace (or a restoration of the Exalted Host, minus Solars).

Some fight the Realm without any interest in actually taking over - they just dislike its imperial practices (some of these because they want their own).

Probably even a few who enjoy playing the bogeyman to the Dragonblooded - Creation's defenders keeping each other sharp through constant low-level conflict so that the blade is nice and ready when threats pop in.

But fundamentally, the Lunar Host just doesn't care about the Realm in any kind of unified way.

Ask ten Lunars and you'll get twenty answers. They've secured 'basic survival' and are free to carry on their own interests, and those interests just don't really line up neatly. If all the Lunars and their subordinates worked towards any one goal, it would be the mightiest force Creation has seen since the First Age. With the Empress gone, the host as a whole could burn their way onto the Blessed Isle within a year. But they don't all have the same goal, so unless it comes to defending themselves, they're fairly fractious and all busily pursuing their own projects and ideas of how to Make Creation Great Again (or just secure its defences) with the rock-solid knowledge that the Caul is at their back and there's always a safe home and the most advanced, comfortable society in Creation for them to return to.



The problem comes from treating the Lunars as a singular thing. A singular thing of that power level would have completely reshaped the setting - not just had impacts on it, the whole thing would be upended.

But... why are we treating the Lunars as a singular thing? The Dragonblooded are focused on teamwork and thematics of unity but the Sidereals are each others bitterest enemies and the Solars have as many factions as there are Solars. And the Lunars are theoretically the most individualistic of all the Exalted!

And fundamentally the Usurpation is, to the vast majority of Lunars, a thing that happened a long time ago, to entirely different people. Modern Lunars have modern concerns, they're not stuck in the past.

So for this take, there's only one thing that all the Lunars actually agree on - 'the Realm stops killing us'. With the Caul secured? They've accomplished that goal. Possibly on Dragonblooded holy land to play with some Crusades parallels here.

Now they can all pursue their own interests as disparate individuals with the ability to go to the Caul and do politics with other Lunars to advance their personal goals.

And you can tune them pretty easily from that basis for othersplat games - you can easily convert them into an endgame threat for a Realm/Bronze game by having some Lunar warlord on the Caul manage to call together enough favours to turn a sufficiently significant fraction of the entirety of Lunar on the Blessed Isle, you can use the Caul as a place to seek out knowledge of the First Age and do politics with the fractious lords of the Caul...