Anatomy of Failed Design: Exalted

[souran]

He has some good points, but he is also just wrong on a lot of the rules for mass combat.

Two people in seperate units of mooks that square off AUTOMATICALLY take damage (no rolls no nothing) in a purely statistical relationship to their combat stats.

AOE attacks going all the way back to mail and steel hurt every layer of your surrounding troops. That made aoe attacks even better than before.

The part that pisses him off is that the game assumes that exalts fight exalts when the units touch. This means that yes you can get a complete miss. On the other hand, just choosing to fight somebody who is using fighitng you as a unit cuases a loss of health boxes. You can't take a defense against these boxes either, (at least in mail and steel you couldn't, I think exalted 2e has some war charms that don't make people fighting in units hedgehogs)

There is lots of stuff in mail and steel/exalted mass combat to not like. However, the idea of having the players WEAR their units is the ONLY really novel idea from the whole set of rules. It keeps the focus on the players.

The accompanying rules suck, hard core, but I think his rage is a bit misdirected.

[Orion]

Dunno about FatR, but for me Mass Combat produces situations where a Solar, who is normally immune to extras, can suddenly be threatened by those very same extras when they stand closer to each other.

This is a feature, not a bug. First off, you're not *threatened* by them as long as you have your perfect defenses. Second, plenty of Wushu films depict the heroes as essentially untouchable by normal men, but unable or unwilling to personally butcher armies. Consider Hero: They were able to deflect the volleys of arrows launched by the army, but they didn't go out and kill the entire army.

[souran]

Dunno about FatR, but for me Mass Combat produces situations where a Solar, who is normally immune to extras, can suddenly be threatened by those very same extras when they stand closer to each other.

This is a feature, not a bug. First off, you're not *threatened* by them as long as you have your perfect defenses. Second, plenty of Wushu films depict the heroes as essentially untouchable by normal men, but unable or unwilling to personally butcher armies. Consider Hero: They were able to deflect the volleys of arrows launched by the army, but they didn't go out and kill the entire army.

Ok, something must have changed. I never used the 2e rules for mass combat (they looked almost identical),

but in mail and steel in the players guide the extras scored automatic hits and automatic damage while in war mode. That damage was not charm stoppable. Even perfect defenses couldn't stop it because it was usually not directed at the exalt but the "layers" of extras they had around.

However, that made it actually SUCK to be solo, (the only thing worse is being a second hero in a unit lead by another exalt. You die when they die but can use your attacks) That damage was not avoidable. However, eveybody is saying perfects protect you (and your cohorts) form this damage. I didn't think that was the case.

[Orion]

What's so great about the setting that's worth saving, anyway?

--The limited number of PC-level dudes
--The Great Curse
--classes defined by purpose rather than by method
--classes integrated in a believable fashion

that's about it.

[Silent Wayfarer]

Dunno about FatR, but for me Mass Combat produces situations where a Solar, who is normally immune to extras, can suddenly be threatened by those very same extras when they stand closer to each other.

This is a feature, not a bug. First off, you're not *threatened* by them as long as you have your perfect defenses. Second, plenty of Wushu films depict the heroes as essentially untouchable by normal men, but unable or unwilling to personally butcher armies. Consider Hero: They were able to deflect the volleys of arrows launched by the army, but they didn't go out and kill the entire army.

In Hero, Broken Sword and his bitch went out and fucking slaughtered their way through the Imperial Guard before kicking the Emperor's ass.

Also, in 2e, it is still possible to be totally fucking untouchable by mooks (no DV reduction for attacks (Fivefold Bulwark Stance) + immunity to coordinated / onslaught attacks (Flow Like Blood) + combat mobility (Monkey Leap Technique)) without touching perfect defenses. Yet the mass combat system suddenly makes 500 shit-covered peasants hero-level threats when they come at him in a rough mob, when individually he'd slaughter them with about as much effort as breathing.

[Silent Wayfarer]

We love that guy. He's like a giant breath of fresh air in the system-waffle culture of White Wolf. There are a lot of people who rally around him, now, because frankly Exalted is mechanically complex enough to attract people who think like Denners.

Jon Chung is basically the less funny and evocative version of Frank Trollman. He doesn't make shit up because he can't be bothered to.

[FatR]

Oh, and I found tonight that I still have the link to this gem:
http://forum.rpg.net/showthread.php?t=319122

Just to share a laugh.

[Lago PARANOIA]

Exalted presents the eponimous Exalted with no moral obligations or conditions whatsofuckingever. It is not merely elitist. By now, authors are increasingly blatantly getting off to the idea of superhuman nobility trampling muggles forever and ever, and muggles loving them for it. Even if they are smart enough to avoid saying this directly.

God, that's hot. I did a backflip in happiness at reading this. Got any examples of authors/fans doing this?

[FatR]

Exalted presents the eponimous Exalted with no moral obligations or conditions whatsofuckingever. It is not merely elitist. By now, authors are increasingly blatantly getting off to the idea of superhuman nobility trampling muggles forever and ever, and muggles loving them for it. Even if they are smart enough to avoid saying this directly.

God, that's hot. I did a backflip in happiness at reading this. Got any examples of authors/fans doing this?

I'm really too lazy to comb books, never mind threads, where they dance around this. As I said, they are smart enough to avoid saying such things directly. But when you have things like Solar ghosts instantly going right back to being white hats, due to not being affected by the Great Curse posthumously (note that the Great Curse is not mind control or Dark Side, it only weakens inhibitions against acting on already-present urges), and ghosts of their enemies - who, it should be noted, immediately before that accepted dying in droves for every ganked Solar, just to rid the world of them - instantly accepted them as their leaders and kings once again, you can't help but get this vibe. The example is from 2E Underworld book, if you care.


EDIT: Oh, and I did I mention that in Exalted lingering ghosts, despite basically being just humans with the new needs and limitations*, are supposed to be really fucking fixated on the thoughts and emotions that dominated their mindsets at the moment of their deaths?

*Or not. See the link above, people there say everything that must be said about Exalted consistency and lack thereof funnier than I can.

[souran]

Exalted presents the eponimous Exalted with no moral obligations or conditions whatsofuckingever. It is not merely elitist. By now, authors are increasingly blatantly getting off to the idea of superhuman nobility trampling muggles forever and ever, and muggles loving them for it. Even if they are smart enough to avoid saying this directly.

God, that's hot. I did a backflip in happiness at reading this. Got any examples of authors/fans doing this?

Um, how about a shit ton of literature written in the 90's and the last decade.

Lets start with novels where wizars are just "better people"

1) Terry "Human Themes" Goodkind (SOT) = His whole series revolves around the fact that wizard people have been born better than other people, only he then took a big hit out of the ayn rand bong and decided that because they are better they shouldn't have to demean themselves by actually being in any way moral. So this one wizard makes everybody worship him, runs around and avoids neccessary responsibilties, KICK A LITTLE GIRL IN THE FACE SO THAT SHE BITS OFF HER TOUNGE, murders innocent people, leaves people to die just because, and oh yeah he is the good guy.

2) Robert Jordan (WOT)-> His whole series revolves around people who have almost certaintly lived before, and wizard people who are born with magic that makes them awesome and everybody else just a statistic.

Seriuosly, this is insulting ubermench stuff on multiple levels. First you have to be born into the "not sucking and irrelevant" part of society. Second, even amoung that group UNLESS YOU WERE A HERO IN A PAST LIFE you are still probably more hinderence than asset.

3) Jim Butcher (Dresden Files) -> Wizards are born with magic and even then only 1 in 100 people born with magic has enough magic to care about. Although this is then basically contradicted by the fact that memebers of the order of the blackened denarius are said to have learned magic because they have lived forever.

4) Lev Grossman (The Magicians) -> The fastest selling fantasy book of last year is basically all about how wizard people who are better than everybody else cannot find happiness becasue they are better than everybody else.

5) Frank Herbert/Brain Herbert/Anderson -> Dune. In this you don't just get patricain people and plebean people, you get a messhia (not messhia figure, but just a real living god) who can sort out who doesn't have to go toe the gulag across the whole universe.

6) The Jedi -> Either you have "medicloreans" (I hate you george lucas), or you live in Han Solo's universe.

There are of course, plenty of other cases of novels basically rallying to ubermench theory because hey its easy to make your main character special if they are in some totally unatainable group by birth.

It is actually possible to write fantasy stories without pulling this sort of crap too. Joe Abercrombie (The First law trilogy) George RR Martin, Bakker (The Prince of Nothing) [Note this is espeically interesting because you have a character who exhibits all the typical characteristics of the uberpeople messehia character but who has been trained to know he isn't one and how to manipulate people into believing he is one]

I honestly want to write a fantasy story were everybody believes that magic is dying out and that there are few wizards than ever before, that the magic in the blood is drying up and it turns out that its all bullshit put put there by old wizards who are afraid of change to the status quo and that anybody really willing to set there mind to it could become one.

[Agrippa]

At least in the Dresden Files wizards are held and hold themselves to the same moral standards as normal humans, if not higher. Except for the Nickelheads and certain higher ranking members of the White Council I'm looking at you Arthur Langtry). In fact one of the important concepts behind the Dresden Files is that with great power comes great responsibility, the responsibility to protect the innocent and enrich and improve the lives of others. A responsibility that the White Council for the most part in the series has failed to do. And at least the badass normals can be really badass. But yeah, Exalted does have quite a few problems.

[Mask_De_H]

blah blah blah

u mad?

[souran]

blah blah blah

u mad?

Look, maybe this tirade belongs on the "A song of Ice and Fire" boards, but really Lago asked for examples of how our society is busy jacking off to Nazi propaganda.

I know its escapist, but does every epic fantasy story have to to get its core plot elements straight from "the iron dream"

Really, the whole theres only 100 people in the world who are worth shit and the rest of everybody might as well be cattle or worse should be insulting to every red blooded american.

[Korwin]

It is actually possible to write fantasy stories without pulling this sort of crap too. Joe Abercrombie (The First law trilogy) George RR Martin, Bakker (The Prince of Nothing) [Note this is espeically interesting because you have a character who exhibits all the typical characteristics of the uberpeople messehia character but who has been trained to know he isn't one and how to manipulate people into believing he is one]

Are you serious?
The main char is the product of an breeding programm who sees all the normal people as children, think 100 steps ahead. He has the best magic evar...

He is trained to know that he is not an ubermensch? If you mean he is trained to feel no emotion (or maybe trained to controll his emotions 100%), I would agree. But thats not the same.

[FatR]

blah blah blah

u mad?

Look, maybe this tirade belongs on the "A song of Ice and Fire" boards, but really Lago asked for examples of how our society is busy jacking off to Nazi propaganda.

"A Song of Ice and Fire" is more guilty than at least some of your entries (didn't read them all). Targariens > lesser nobles. No matter what they do. Pretty much because they have power by birthright. And no one even fucking cares about commoners, who live under same families of feudal lords they lived thousands of years ago. In fact, despite the action being set in the period of civil wars, social upheavals and shit, there is just one viewpoint character that wasn't born to nobility.

EDIT: And the local icon of self-made man (still born a noble, mind you, just from a very minor line)? The closest equivalent of Big Bad, who faciliates most of the horrible things that happened in the books, pretty much for personal gain.

[mean_liar]

Really, the whole theres only 100 people in the world who are worth shit and the rest of everybody might as well be cattle or worse should be insulting to every red blooded american.

It IS a good way to explain why the PC's actions matter and why some other off-screen PC hasn't already done XYZ a decade ago.

[souran]

Are you serious?

The main char is the product of an breeding programm who sees all the normal people as children, think 100 steps ahead. He has the best magic evar...

This is seriously just training that ANYBODY could get. Infact the Dunyain think that more people SHOULD get it. There methods let them exploit other people. They know this. They specifically DO NOT believe that this is an inhereted power, or that it makes them better than other people. The fact that Kehellus is hardly a good person by the moral standards set by the non dunyain he manipulates is irrelevant.

His powers are the result of actions that any of the settings other characters could replicate if they decided to do so.

He is trained to know that he is not an ubermensch? If you mean he is trained to feel no emotion (or maybe trained to controll his emotions 100%), I would agree. But thats not the same.

Again, the Dunyain are trained are the philisophical stand ins for pure logic. Like vulcan ninjas. Kehllus knows that he can manipulate people, and that in order to achieve his ends that he MUST manipulate people. However, he does not believe that his ability to do so makes him a superior being. Infact, the whole premise of the Judging eye is that by the standards of the Dunyain once Kehellus actually starts believing he IS the prophesied messiah figure of the inner seas that he has become CRAZY.

"A Song of Ice and Fire" is more guilty than at least some of your entries (didn't read them all). Targariens > lesser nobles. No matter what they do. Pretty much because they have power by birthright. And no one even fucking cares about commoners, who live under same families of feudal lords they lived thousands of years ago. In fact, despite the action being set in the period of civil wars, social upheavals and shit, there is just one viewpoint character that wasn't born to nobility.

ASOIAF is a story about a civil war in a period similar to the war of the roses. Yes, most of the characters are of noble background. However, the story is not about how those people deserve to rule because they are nobles and are therefore better people. If anything, most of the people chasing the thrown show how incredebly screwed up people raised from birth to chase power at all costs would be. Additionally, the more that a character proclaims that they have divine right or some other calling that sets them above others the more grisly fate that character usually ends up with.

Also the ASOIAF hosts a board with an excellent literature discussion area which was why this all might be more appropriate there.

[FatR]

ASOIAF is a story about a civil war in a period similar to the war of the roses. Yes, most of the characters are of noble background. However, the story is not about how those people deserve to rule because they are nobles and are therefore better people. If anything, most of the people chasing the thrown show how incredebly screwed up people raised from birth to chase power at all costs would be. Additionally, the more that a character proclaims that they have divine right or some other calling that sets them above others the more grisly fate that character usually ends up with.

All but one of the viewpoint characters are of noble background. All but, IIRC, three, are from the highest tier of nobility. All of the Stark children and above all, our little dragon princess, are fairly blatantly given a calling that sets them above others, by powers that be (they still can fuck things up, thanks to overall grimdarkness of the world, but the fact doesn't change). On top of having bluest of bloods, you know.

[Starmaker]

In ASoIaF, there are heroes (the tragically misunderstood who murder, rape and poison but still are heroic because they're so cuuute) and villains (who do the same but have no redeeming traits whatsoever). The only neutral character by far is the sorcerer woman, and that's only because we don't know shit about her.

The multiple viewpoint system just shows how "zomg tragic" the whole situation is when the good guys fight and the bad guys profit. Plus, it's convenient when the author needs to establish a character as evil and pull a Shyamalan afterwards. Case in point: Littlefinger (the self-made man character). He's good. True story, it's in the book where he kills Snape with rosebud.

[FatR]

Now, ASoIaF isn't the best thing since the sliced bread, but you're unfair to it. The characters actually are fairly believable for their world setup, and the author does not try to excuse the crap many of them pull. So far. I'm quite afraid of the obviously looming "Return of Targariens".

[souran]

Wow Starmaker.

You realize that novels are not like rpgs or politics or other "really serious" things on the internetz

You are allowed to actually like more than one book or author at a time. ASOIAF my occasionally be really grim and its always really bloody but thats why that story is cool. It basically started the most current round of grimdark literature.

Anyway, all those novels up there that I pointed out as having messaianic and neitzechean themes are books I have read. Hell most of them are books I even LIKE.

As long as you are not a goodkind Randdroid its all just opion when it comes to novels anyway.

Also FatR your mixing "people who have power" for "people who are better than other people"

While certain ASOIAF characters may have a belief in their own superiority and it may even stem from their birth, it isn't supported as a part of their natural reality. Just by being a noble person does not endow them with any capability at all. They defiantly don't make better judgements than other people, and ASOIAF is basically about the political judgements that the characters make. For instance, the way the tygereans originally conquered the west was with dragons. It wasn't because they were noble, they just had power in the form invincible weapons. That didn't make them or their line better people, it just made them victorious.

Compare this to say Harry Potter. No matter how much a muggle might want to cast magic. No matter how much they study, how much effort they put into it, how much desire they have they cannot even cast the simplest of spells.

Wizards ARE uber people and the stock position of team good guys is that they are hiding mostly so that muggles can stay safe from magic and so that they don't get burned at the stake.

While its a fairly tame example because the wizards generally think that non magic people are not just dumb cattle to be used to suit their ends (except for team evil) it does repeatedly seperate people into magical and non magical and the non magical are defaintly lesser.

Its this exclusionary element, the when a story makes its hero more special not by virtue of his choices, but instead by placing him in a group with high selective memebership that is overused. Additionally, there is a Morally repugnant element to such a choice that most people do not consider to deeply.

[Starmaker]

Wow Starmaker.
(...)
You are allowed to actually like more than one book or author at a time. ASOIAF my occasionally be really grim and its always really bloody but thats why that story is cool. It basically started the most current round of grimdark literature.

What. I didn't say that the story wasn't cool. It's a story set in a dark age that doesn't shit on contemporary morals, which by itself makes it [awesome]. Plus the whole starting a new subgenre business, plus the good writing.

Books are by definition more interesting than daily life, fantasy adventure books by an extra order of magnitude so. Thus, any fiction book carries a message that its imaginary world is somehow better than reality. That's what is bad about Harry Potter. Wizards are the main characters, better than everyone else, and the (sane) readers mostly think "Wow that would be totally awesome if it was true." That's the reason for popularity of Harry Potter (or of Night Watch for that matter).

David Brin[/url]]Anyway, when it comes to portraying human destiny, where would you rather live, assuming you'll be a normal citizen and no demigod?

ASoIaF stamps that obligatory message in the dirt - there are no (sane) people who'd like to live in its world as a noble or as a commoner - and it's interesting to read. That's fucking awesome.

Now, some fans keep saying the books have a shades of gray morality. They don't. There are the Grays (almost everyone) and the Blacks (total monsters). And the Grays are occasionally motivated by good while the Blacks are Always Evil. Blacks always eat children, Grays eat children and thatch neighbors' roofs whenever they feel like.

And it's very noticeable: Tywin Lannister, Joffrey, the Night Watch guy who carried the hand to King's Landing, the pedo, the fat merchant, the sick fuck who caught Theon, the high priest and the high maester, the guy who lured out Sansa are irredeemably evil, a "slimy unjust fucktard" tag on every one of them. Tywin Lannister is the biggest offender since he's a major character and there's nothing good about him whatsoever; the minor characters can be argued to not have enough screen time.

Again, it doesn't make ASoIaF bad. My all-time favorite books, the Pliocene Exile series, don't have a shades of gray implementation problem but take a dump on human equality.

[Korwin]

Are you serious?

The main char is the product of an breeding programm who sees all the normal people as children, think 100 steps ahead. He has the best magic evar...

This is seriously just training that ANYBODY could get. Infact the Dunyain think that more people SHOULD get it. There methods let them exploit other people. They know this. They specifically DO NOT believe that this is an inhereted power, or that it makes them better than other people. The fact that Kehellus is hardly a good person by the moral standards set by the non dunyain he manipulates is irrelevant.

The Dunyain are breeding ubermenschen.
(And in the prolog of the first book, they are killing those who are unclean [ie could learn magic] because they got contamined with the dreams.)

His powers are the result of actions that any of the settings other characters could replicate if they decided to do so.

Only if trained from the craddle up, and even this seems to be not enough (see his children - they get the manipulative powers, but not in the same weight class).
Either you need total isolation from the cattle (those who arent trained),
or his children didnt get all those dunyain genes.

Again, the Dunyain are trained are the philisophical stand ins for pure logic. Like vulcan ninjas. Kehllus knows that he can manipulate people, and that in order to achieve his ends that he MUST manipulate people. However, he does not believe that his ability to do so makes him a superior being.

Kellus describes normal humans again and again as children to him.
Or no, normal humans describe him as they themselves are to children so maybe I am confusing it.

But if I remember correctly, the first time its his description...

Doesnt matter. How do you define an ubermensch? In my definition Kellus would be one. No matter how he sees himself (or how the Dunyain see themselves).

Infact, the whole premise of the Judging eye is that by the standards of the Dunyain once Kehellus actually starts believing he IS the prophesied messiah figure of the inner seas that he has become CRAZY.

So only because a group of people (the Dunyain) see him as crazy, he is no supermen? The most powerfull mage since that on immortal...? Who can read human faces so good, it would not make a difference if he could read minds. Who can manipulate humans so good, it would not make a difference if he used Psi or Magic instead? No it would make a difference if he used Magic instead, it would be dedectable...

[FatR]

Oh and one more note. I remembered about this while combing 4E books for ideas and noticing that, apparently, there is not a single decent (in "decent sentient being" sense of the word, never cared about 4E mechanics) NPC in the whole fucking edition.

Fans of Exalted often insist that various horrible shit going on and overall grimdarkness of the setting are only there to serve as a contrast/obstacles for heroic PCs that are supposed to set things straight. This is a load of bull, even if such was the intent of the authors. If there are people, capable of playing a single light of hope in the world of selfish and vicious assholes, I know none. In fact, while there are a lot of characters who successfully challenge a horrible status quo in various media, all of them have significant support and encouragement from various "NPCs". And not only from insignificant commoners. And PCs generally have rather low threshold of disappointment in their ideals, if directly confronted with impracticality of such.

[Lago PARANOIA]

Oh and one more note. I remembered about this while combing 4E books for ideas and noticing that, apparently, there is not a single decent (in "decent sentient being" sence of the word, never cared about 4E mechanics) NPC in the whole fucking edition.

Proponents of the setting often insist that various horrible shit going on and overall grimdarkness of the setting are only there to serve as a contrast/obstacles for heroic PCs that are supposed to set things straight. This is a load of bull, even if such was the intent of the authors. If there are people, capable of playing a single light of hope in the world of selfish and vicious assholes, I know none. In fact, while there are a lot of characters who successfully challenge a horrible status quo in various media, all of them have significant support and encouragement from various "NPCs". And not only from insignificant commoners. And PCs generally have rather low threshold of disappointment in their ideals, if directly confronted with impracticality of such.

FatR, is there any way you can expand that into a bullet point/essay?

You know it gives me a woody when people do that. And you're so good at it, too.