I thought that they were the Hidden Bad Guyz in the edition. What gives? Do I sense another FatR rant?
Anatomy of Failed Design: Exalted
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Lago PARANOIA
- Invincible Overlord
- Posts: 10555
- Joined: Thu Sep 25, 2008 3:00 am
Wait, the Sidereals are the good guys?
I thought that they were the Hidden Bad Guyz in the edition. What gives? Do I sense another FatR rant?
I thought that they were the Hidden Bad Guyz in the edition. What gives? Do I sense another FatR rant?
Josh Kablack wrote:Your freedom to make rulings up on the fly is in direct conflict with my freedom to interact with an internally consistent narrative. Your freedom to run/play a game without needing to understand a complex rule system is in direct conflict with my freedom to play a character whose abilities and flaws function as I intended within that ruleset. Your freedom to add and change rules in the middle of the game is in direct conflict with my ability to understand that rules system before I decided whether or not to join your game.
In short, your entire post is dismissive of not merely my intelligence, but my agency. And I don't mean agency as a player within one of your games, I mean my agency as a person. You do not want me to be informed when I make the fundamental decisions of deciding whether to join your game or buying your rules system.
Depends.
They aren't nice, given that they're pretty much evenly divided between killing off the PCs on general principle and mindfucking the PCs to do their dirty work... but at the same time, they aren't the legions of the dead rising from the underworld to destroy all of existence forever, nor are they horrible wicked demons hell-bent on madness-fueled vengeance demanding that all life suffer eternal torment. Good and evil in Exalted is a matter of degrees.
They aren't nice, given that they're pretty much evenly divided between killing off the PCs on general principle and mindfucking the PCs to do their dirty work... but at the same time, they aren't the legions of the dead rising from the underworld to destroy all of existence forever, nor are they horrible wicked demons hell-bent on madness-fueled vengeance demanding that all life suffer eternal torment. Good and evil in Exalted is a matter of degrees.
Yes, in 2E Siddiers are painfully obvious Black Hats, who are outright stated to be wrong and curse-driven in their decision to gank Solars.
This does not make wiping them out in such a way any less of a problem.
First, this means pissing upon any Siddie PCs, by wiping out their support structure and whatever, and also demonstrating again, that their splat is shit. But as 2E pissed upon them so much already, that anyone who ever preferred to play a Sidereal likely stopped following the gameline long ago, anyway, this is more of a sympthom than a problem.
Second, from the story viewpoint, being defeated this cheaply and by the enemy that is, frankly, second rate, makes Siddies shit, and indirectly also makes their enemies shit for not being able to overthrow them. Therefore this move is basically WW making a huge dump on every Exalt in the setting that is not Demon Empress and her goons.
It also robs PCs of their chance to kick Siddies' asses themselves, however slim this chance was from the mechanical standpoints.
Third, from the metagame viewpoint, it is painfully obvious that the whole move was meant to build the street cred of Demon Empress' and Yozi, so they are no longer a second-rate threat. Except, allowing the villain to easily steamroll an established local asskicker is the most cheap, unimaginative, cliched way of buiding the cred for a newcomer villain in existence. Tvtropes have a pretty huge page for this trope (Worf Effect).
Fourth, from the setting consistency viewpoint, if Demon Empress and her goons can just waltz in and slaughter the most potent force of the Creation's defenders, the world is fucked. Consider, that the only semi-plausible explanation for "why Deathords just don't go and kill everyone, if, by most conservative readings of their writeups imaginable, they can easily slaughter the world" was "because they wait until Kejack and his buddies, who have even more overpowered kung-fu, keel over from old age".
EDIT: If you wanted to make the forces of Hell the main threat, it would have made so much more sense to make elder Siddies and most of Deathlords finally getting in a straight-up fight, with both sides ended dead or functionally disabled and the Demon Empress using it to make her move, maybe mopping up Siddie survivors if you want her to raid Heaven this much. In fact, such event is probably a prerequisite for any long-running campaign that is supposed to make sense, if GM is not willing to outright reject all canonical stances on elder NPCs.
This does not make wiping them out in such a way any less of a problem.
First, this means pissing upon any Siddie PCs, by wiping out their support structure and whatever, and also demonstrating again, that their splat is shit. But as 2E pissed upon them so much already, that anyone who ever preferred to play a Sidereal likely stopped following the gameline long ago, anyway, this is more of a sympthom than a problem.
Second, from the story viewpoint, being defeated this cheaply and by the enemy that is, frankly, second rate, makes Siddies shit, and indirectly also makes their enemies shit for not being able to overthrow them. Therefore this move is basically WW making a huge dump on every Exalt in the setting that is not Demon Empress and her goons.
It also robs PCs of their chance to kick Siddies' asses themselves, however slim this chance was from the mechanical standpoints.
Third, from the metagame viewpoint, it is painfully obvious that the whole move was meant to build the street cred of Demon Empress' and Yozi, so they are no longer a second-rate threat. Except, allowing the villain to easily steamroll an established local asskicker is the most cheap, unimaginative, cliched way of buiding the cred for a newcomer villain in existence. Tvtropes have a pretty huge page for this trope (Worf Effect).
Fourth, from the setting consistency viewpoint, if Demon Empress and her goons can just waltz in and slaughter the most potent force of the Creation's defenders, the world is fucked. Consider, that the only semi-plausible explanation for "why Deathords just don't go and kill everyone, if, by most conservative readings of their writeups imaginable, they can easily slaughter the world" was "because they wait until Kejack and his buddies, who have even more overpowered kung-fu, keel over from old age".
EDIT: If you wanted to make the forces of Hell the main threat, it would have made so much more sense to make elder Siddies and most of Deathlords finally getting in a straight-up fight, with both sides ended dead or functionally disabled and the Demon Empress using it to make her move, maybe mopping up Siddie survivors if you want her to raid Heaven this much. In fact, such event is probably a prerequisite for any long-running campaign that is supposed to make sense, if GM is not willing to outright reject all canonical stances on elder NPCs.
Last edited by FatR on Wed Aug 04, 2010 9:12 am, edited 3 times in total.
Adding in an orchestrated war between Abyssals and Sidereals with the Yozi resurgence coming in to mop up would've been a masterstroke: pruning high-powered NPCs, destroying a good dozen+ of Creation's the-world-ends-tomorrow threats and plots, and giving the PCs a freer place to romp in.
But, that's basically admitting your setting fluff and NPCs are shit and you're resetting everything, rather than hamfistedly Worf Effecting your chosen plot onto center stage.
In the end, anyone that storms Heaven and collectively kicks the ass of the Sidereals has already fucking won. I'll have to read the arc now, since I cannot imagine how "PCs then save the day!" can possibly, reasonably fit in under those circumstances.
But, that's basically admitting your setting fluff and NPCs are shit and you're resetting everything, rather than hamfistedly Worf Effecting your chosen plot onto center stage.
In the end, anyone that storms Heaven and collectively kicks the ass of the Sidereals has already fucking won. I'll have to read the arc now, since I cannot imagine how "PCs then save the day!" can possibly, reasonably fit in under those circumstances.
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DeadlyReed
- Journeyman
- Posts: 111
- Joined: Wed Oct 22, 2008 3:42 am
2E seriously pisses on any player who doesn't want to play a Solar or someone who worships the ground they walk on and RotSE continues that trend. 1E was a lot more friendly to more player character types.
Last edited by DeadlyReed on Thu Aug 05, 2010 1:15 am, edited 1 time in total.
Pretty much yes. Do note, that now we have the official writeup for Ketchup Carjack. And while he doesn't have the SMA style that makes people absolutely invulnerable, allows to create armies of clones as strong as themselves, and just fucking win any confict of their choice, period*, he has all of the others. Which makes him vastly harder to beat than Elminster and his entire girlfriend posse. Within the power level that PCs can likely reach in the game, of course.mean_liar wrote: In the end, anyone that storms Heaven and collectively kicks the ass of the Sidereals has already fucking won.
How the fuck PCs are supposed to deal with people who can beat him and beat him easily is beyond me. And in the actual book, AFAIK, while events developed somewhat different the Demon Empess and her bodyguards still wasted him and his handpicked strike team (yes, that wasn't even a surprise attack on her part!), while her goons demolished the gathering of the rest of Sidereals in Heaven.
*Yes, they have martial arts this broken in 2E.
EDIT: While Demon Empress supposedly has an artifact that loads her to the gills with Yozi Charms, which are low-Celestial level and might give her an advantage agaist someone who uses crap-ass 2E Sidereal perfect defenses, these Charms are Ebon Dragon's Charms. Therefore she has either his innate perfect with its huge "Hit Here For MASSIVE DAMAGE" weakness or prohibitely expensive/useless perfects she could obtain naturally. By useless, I mean "not working against Bad Touch Charms". And Kejak's Bad Touch Charms will turn you into a goldfish without save.
But you know, if they actually boosted her so that she conceivably win this, that's even worse, because in such case PCs and the world are beyond screwed.
Last edited by FatR on Thu Aug 05, 2010 10:38 pm, edited 1 time in total.
I mentioned that before, but this is worth repeating. This hatred towards non-Solars has no sign of dying down, considering, for example, that the current errata to the Dragon-Blooded Charms is basically a tremendous pile of nerfs, even though their charmset was completely inadequate to begin with (most importantly, in the "Perfect or Die" gameplay it did not really offer the first option), that there are recent new spells or whatever, that shaft Sidereals further, according to Jon Chung's words, and that writers just basically openly say on the forums that Abyssal and Infernal Charms are intended to be shitty, compared to Solar Charms (not that it wasn't noticeable without that). Even though Abyssals and Infernals are fucking Team Evil, and you would think, that it is in the best interest of the gameline to make the work of building genuinely powerful PC-level villains easier.DeadlyReed wrote:2E seriously pisses on any player who doesn't want to play a Solar or someone who worships the ground they walk on and RotSE continues that trend. 1E was a lot more friendly to more player character types.
Last edited by FatR on Fri Aug 06, 2010 8:02 am, edited 2 times in total.
8. Epilogue (Maybe). Exalted I'm too lazy to write.
And yet, despite my endless rage and constant disappointment, my mind returns to Exalted again and again. Truly said, that the opposite of love is not hate, but indifference. I guess I'm just enchanted by glowing battle auras, gigantic swords, wanking on my characters' awesomeness, factions each of whom has a viable point, crazy-ass magical weirdness, empires of elemental-powered supersoldiers, heroes that rise above their station and challenge destiny, ridiculously over the top action, fantasy world wars; all that stuff that early Exalted promised, and partially still promises, but mostly failed to deliver, either at all, or in an engaging fashion. Plus, you cannot help but to see promise in the game where haracters live on a flat world floating in the sea of chaos; the necromantically powered champion of the dead is the genuinely nicest guy among the example characters in the corebook; and demon princes have multiple souls which are separate people in their own right, and often are fairly cool fellows to hang around, save for their plans to roast humanity on a spit in revenge for the past wrongs.
Anyway, I need some positiveness in my life, so here's the rough outline of the changes I would have liked to implement to Exalted.
0) The design goal should be to make following factions playable in the boundaries of the vanilla playstyle: Solars, Abyssals, Lunars, Dragon-Blooded, Sidereals, Infernals and Fae. Autobots I don't generally care about, so screw them, maybe they can serve as antagonists that assimilate people into the machine hivemind, or maybe as renegade NPCs (because that Autochtonian elder from Keychain of Creation was totally awesome).
The design goal should be to make PCs parties that consists of any combination of the default playable splats both mechanically viable and having enough roleplaying reasons to work together without stretching suspension of disbelief or inventing world-ending threats of pure evil to band together against. Fluff-wise all of the playable splats should provide factions that actual players can sympathize with, without doing extreme mental gymnastics. Killfuck Soulshitter factions also can and will exist, particularly amongst darker splats, but no playable splats that support only them. And no playable splats that are automatically virtuous rulers or advisors, or other caste-based shit. Castes suck in general and doubly so if they are both divinely-ordained and ingrained in the mechanics of the gameword. They have no place in a world that is not grimdark, and I don't want grimdark.
This will require significant changes in splat descriptions and schticks, the way Exaltations work and mechanical power level of the splats, which will be outlined below.
Yet these changes should be made. In my opinion, making other splats into, basically, the supporting cast for Solars (particularly obvious in 2E) might have boosted the popularity in the short term, by making power-tripping as Solars somewhat easier, but hurt the game in the long term (as now the probability of Exalted failing to survive into a 3rd Edition is around 98%, only idiots and WW shills can pretend that everything is all right with their gameline model). When you know that later splats just cannot offer PCs that can adventure with the members of the default splat as equals (okay, Lunars in 2E sometimes can, but they too will fall behind as EXP levels grow), this automatically removes most of the crunch reasons to buy them. Similarly, making certain splats objectively bad and wrong (or EVIL!) reduced their potential player base, because the great majority of players prefers to play characters one can see at least as anti-heroes without squinting too hard (and similarly, badasses tend to sell better than chumps).
Pre-empting possible counterarguments, Essence levels should serve to regulate the power level of the game, instead of splats, and while many people like to play the underdog, they generally do so on the assumption that the underdog will be able to win in the end anyway, and in RPG terms this means having sufficient tools to win, because few people like to win through plot devices. As far as I can tell, once 2E made the power gap between Dragonbloods and Solars really all-encompassing and unsurmountable, the once-vocal fanbase of the former mostly evaporated from the forums, leaving just a few people that ran pure DB games because they didn't like the crazyness of Celestial power level.
0.5)As the game is supposed to be about PCs, elder Exalted (and equivalent beings) should mostly cease to exist, as a concept. They mostly serve no puspose what but to counter whatever changes to the setting PCs try to implement and to provide the GM with sticks to railroad PCs. Also, existence of a significant number of 1500+ years old Exalted, that generally fail to change the status quo despite their efforts, raises many uncomfortable questions about the true position of the Exalted in the setting, that can only be avoided by making the newly-appeared splats the only competent ones from both mechanical and story positions. So, all Exalts should have the normal lifespan of no more 200-300 years. A few PCs that are absolutely indispensable for the setting, such as Scarlet Empress and old Kejak, will be explaned by plotdevice means of life extension (so you can kneecap Carjack by shutting down the manse that produces his heathstone of immortality, instead of battling him head-on), or actually being a role, instead of a person, assumed by a succession of magically potent people throughout the history.
Deathlords, in their turn, will be reduced to simple ancient ghosts of variable power level, instead of ancient Exalts on steroids they are now. They'll grow in number accordingly, to still be a threat, when and if they get their shit together. Powerful demons simply will be toned down or built in such a way, that they are capable of ridiculous feats within their "portfolios" but not really good in anything else. Gods and elementals can mostly stay as they are, with a few nerfs to Incarnae and other top dogs.
Meanwhile, the competence of younger Exalted should be buffed. Mechanics should state unequivocally that everything that needs to be done in the setting can be done within the equivalent of the old Essence 2-5 range. Oh and - as I already noted above when talking about Essence levels - Charms should have distinct (far more distinct than now) levels of powers, corresponding to each Essence rating, so that the GM can simply decide on how epic his game will be by choosing appropriate starting and maximal Essence `rating.
1)Certain key things in the setting should be left for the GM to define or only be presented as an array of options, allowing the GM to adjust tone of the setting and the general direction of the plotline. In case of the latter, the game should not clearly pick one of these options as true. In particular:
- I'd like to see everything that was before and during the initial salvos of the Primordial War as essentially unknowable, due to use of powers that warped time, casualty, magical constants of the universe and erased whole concepts from existence during these salvos. Such arrangement will allow arguments in-setting about who was truly responsible for all bad shit that happened to the world without definitive answers. This is required because of the sheer scale of destruction and genocide of the Primordial War: actually justifying such ocean of blood requires the Primordials to pretty much be be utterly evil from the beginning. And if they weren't, then the black hat falls on the rebels' collective head.
- I'd like to see no definite statements about the reason why Celestial Incarnae seem to not give a fuck about the world anymore. Possible options should include "They really are that evil and callous", "They are caught in the Primordials' booby trap aka Games of Divinity", "Games of Divinity allow the victor something awesome, like ability to reshape the reality itself, so either each of them thinks he/she will instantly set all things staight and create a Paradise upon winningm, and/or they are corrupted by the promise of absolute power and do not trust any their peers to use it benevolently", "Neverborn/Primordials successfuly cursed shit out of the Incarna at the moment of their deaths/mutilation after surrendering, so the Incarna don't have real power to intervene and only serve as figureheads of Heaven".
- I'd like to keep "Was the Usurpation justified?" an open question, which requires a change in the options present before Sidereals. As I want less grimdark and more doing the impossible in my Exalted, this will automatically make the lower-risk, lower-reward option, picked by Sidereals, the wrong one. The Bronze Faction needs to have an actual, workable plan of utopia of their own, such as Dragonbloodization of the entire humanity, which was shot down, or - as an option - significantly set back, by the Great Contagion and other interventions of things that are outside Fate.
- And of course there should be multiple options for the fate of Scarlet Empress. And "Demon Empress" variant should not very high on the list of option, because even though he was pushed as the only realy canonical option since 1E DB books, it only become more inane since then (the more ways of infinitely extending one's lifespan were introduced to the setting, and the more tendency to play safe was established as the defining trait of the Empress' character, the less likely her deal with the devil for immortality was). "Being dead and gone", though, should be fairly high on that list. (As a side note, my own working idea of her fate is way more complicated and flattering, but that's because I like her characters, and it seems that most people don't, by this point.)
So, I'm too tired to write more right now, but if anyone cares, I'll write about my vision of various splats and whatever random stuff will come to my head later.
And yet, despite my endless rage and constant disappointment, my mind returns to Exalted again and again. Truly said, that the opposite of love is not hate, but indifference. I guess I'm just enchanted by glowing battle auras, gigantic swords, wanking on my characters' awesomeness, factions each of whom has a viable point, crazy-ass magical weirdness, empires of elemental-powered supersoldiers, heroes that rise above their station and challenge destiny, ridiculously over the top action, fantasy world wars; all that stuff that early Exalted promised, and partially still promises, but mostly failed to deliver, either at all, or in an engaging fashion. Plus, you cannot help but to see promise in the game where haracters live on a flat world floating in the sea of chaos; the necromantically powered champion of the dead is the genuinely nicest guy among the example characters in the corebook; and demon princes have multiple souls which are separate people in their own right, and often are fairly cool fellows to hang around, save for their plans to roast humanity on a spit in revenge for the past wrongs.
Anyway, I need some positiveness in my life, so here's the rough outline of the changes I would have liked to implement to Exalted.
0) The design goal should be to make following factions playable in the boundaries of the vanilla playstyle: Solars, Abyssals, Lunars, Dragon-Blooded, Sidereals, Infernals and Fae. Autobots I don't generally care about, so screw them, maybe they can serve as antagonists that assimilate people into the machine hivemind, or maybe as renegade NPCs (because that Autochtonian elder from Keychain of Creation was totally awesome).
The design goal should be to make PCs parties that consists of any combination of the default playable splats both mechanically viable and having enough roleplaying reasons to work together without stretching suspension of disbelief or inventing world-ending threats of pure evil to band together against. Fluff-wise all of the playable splats should provide factions that actual players can sympathize with, without doing extreme mental gymnastics. Killfuck Soulshitter factions also can and will exist, particularly amongst darker splats, but no playable splats that support only them. And no playable splats that are automatically virtuous rulers or advisors, or other caste-based shit. Castes suck in general and doubly so if they are both divinely-ordained and ingrained in the mechanics of the gameword. They have no place in a world that is not grimdark, and I don't want grimdark.
This will require significant changes in splat descriptions and schticks, the way Exaltations work and mechanical power level of the splats, which will be outlined below.
Yet these changes should be made. In my opinion, making other splats into, basically, the supporting cast for Solars (particularly obvious in 2E) might have boosted the popularity in the short term, by making power-tripping as Solars somewhat easier, but hurt the game in the long term (as now the probability of Exalted failing to survive into a 3rd Edition is around 98%, only idiots and WW shills can pretend that everything is all right with their gameline model). When you know that later splats just cannot offer PCs that can adventure with the members of the default splat as equals (okay, Lunars in 2E sometimes can, but they too will fall behind as EXP levels grow), this automatically removes most of the crunch reasons to buy them. Similarly, making certain splats objectively bad and wrong (or EVIL!) reduced their potential player base, because the great majority of players prefers to play characters one can see at least as anti-heroes without squinting too hard (and similarly, badasses tend to sell better than chumps).
Pre-empting possible counterarguments, Essence levels should serve to regulate the power level of the game, instead of splats, and while many people like to play the underdog, they generally do so on the assumption that the underdog will be able to win in the end anyway, and in RPG terms this means having sufficient tools to win, because few people like to win through plot devices. As far as I can tell, once 2E made the power gap between Dragonbloods and Solars really all-encompassing and unsurmountable, the once-vocal fanbase of the former mostly evaporated from the forums, leaving just a few people that ran pure DB games because they didn't like the crazyness of Celestial power level.
0.5)As the game is supposed to be about PCs, elder Exalted (and equivalent beings) should mostly cease to exist, as a concept. They mostly serve no puspose what but to counter whatever changes to the setting PCs try to implement and to provide the GM with sticks to railroad PCs. Also, existence of a significant number of 1500+ years old Exalted, that generally fail to change the status quo despite their efforts, raises many uncomfortable questions about the true position of the Exalted in the setting, that can only be avoided by making the newly-appeared splats the only competent ones from both mechanical and story positions. So, all Exalts should have the normal lifespan of no more 200-300 years. A few PCs that are absolutely indispensable for the setting, such as Scarlet Empress and old Kejak, will be explaned by plotdevice means of life extension (so you can kneecap Carjack by shutting down the manse that produces his heathstone of immortality, instead of battling him head-on), or actually being a role, instead of a person, assumed by a succession of magically potent people throughout the history.
Deathlords, in their turn, will be reduced to simple ancient ghosts of variable power level, instead of ancient Exalts on steroids they are now. They'll grow in number accordingly, to still be a threat, when and if they get their shit together. Powerful demons simply will be toned down or built in such a way, that they are capable of ridiculous feats within their "portfolios" but not really good in anything else. Gods and elementals can mostly stay as they are, with a few nerfs to Incarnae and other top dogs.
Meanwhile, the competence of younger Exalted should be buffed. Mechanics should state unequivocally that everything that needs to be done in the setting can be done within the equivalent of the old Essence 2-5 range. Oh and - as I already noted above when talking about Essence levels - Charms should have distinct (far more distinct than now) levels of powers, corresponding to each Essence rating, so that the GM can simply decide on how epic his game will be by choosing appropriate starting and maximal Essence `rating.
1)Certain key things in the setting should be left for the GM to define or only be presented as an array of options, allowing the GM to adjust tone of the setting and the general direction of the plotline. In case of the latter, the game should not clearly pick one of these options as true. In particular:
- I'd like to see everything that was before and during the initial salvos of the Primordial War as essentially unknowable, due to use of powers that warped time, casualty, magical constants of the universe and erased whole concepts from existence during these salvos. Such arrangement will allow arguments in-setting about who was truly responsible for all bad shit that happened to the world without definitive answers. This is required because of the sheer scale of destruction and genocide of the Primordial War: actually justifying such ocean of blood requires the Primordials to pretty much be be utterly evil from the beginning. And if they weren't, then the black hat falls on the rebels' collective head.
- I'd like to see no definite statements about the reason why Celestial Incarnae seem to not give a fuck about the world anymore. Possible options should include "They really are that evil and callous", "They are caught in the Primordials' booby trap aka Games of Divinity", "Games of Divinity allow the victor something awesome, like ability to reshape the reality itself, so either each of them thinks he/she will instantly set all things staight and create a Paradise upon winningm, and/or they are corrupted by the promise of absolute power and do not trust any their peers to use it benevolently", "Neverborn/Primordials successfuly cursed shit out of the Incarna at the moment of their deaths/mutilation after surrendering, so the Incarna don't have real power to intervene and only serve as figureheads of Heaven".
- I'd like to keep "Was the Usurpation justified?" an open question, which requires a change in the options present before Sidereals. As I want less grimdark and more doing the impossible in my Exalted, this will automatically make the lower-risk, lower-reward option, picked by Sidereals, the wrong one. The Bronze Faction needs to have an actual, workable plan of utopia of their own, such as Dragonbloodization of the entire humanity, which was shot down, or - as an option - significantly set back, by the Great Contagion and other interventions of things that are outside Fate.
- And of course there should be multiple options for the fate of Scarlet Empress. And "Demon Empress" variant should not very high on the list of option, because even though he was pushed as the only realy canonical option since 1E DB books, it only become more inane since then (the more ways of infinitely extending one's lifespan were introduced to the setting, and the more tendency to play safe was established as the defining trait of the Empress' character, the less likely her deal with the devil for immortality was). "Being dead and gone", though, should be fairly high on that list. (As a side note, my own working idea of her fate is way more complicated and flattering, but that's because I like her characters, and it seems that most people don't, by this point.)
So, I'm too tired to write more right now, but if anyone cares, I'll write about my vision of various splats and whatever random stuff will come to my head later.
Last edited by FatR on Tue Aug 17, 2010 6:46 am, edited 2 times in total.
Exalted has a philosophical problem: the world described there really requires Integral Tradition philosophy in the style of baron Evola. And open propaganda for Evola and Integral Tradition can be a slight PR problem.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Julius_Evola
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Traditionalist_School
http://rosenoire.org/
Exalted clearly describes the final phase of Kali Yuga, which should end with the restoration of the Hierarchy. At the same time, it must problematize, "bracket" and subvert the integral worldview enough to keep in the bounds of the political correctness.
For that reason I think that Essence should be moved nearer its origin, the Iranian concept of Khvarenah.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Khvarenah
Khvarenah, "glory" or "uncreated light", although generally connected with king, saints and heroes, is NOT purely hereditary, but universally accessible. It is gained by victories and truth, and lost by lies and defeats (As Darius learned to his sorrow after losing to Alexander).
Kaveh eg was a blacksmith who led the revolution against the corrupt three-headed dragon-emperor, Azi Dahaka.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zahhak#The ... ahh.C4.81k
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kaveh
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shahnameh
http://classics.mit.edu/Ferdowsi/kings.html
The game should describe the current regime as corrupt and oppressive, but should offer a range of revolutionary factions, without prejudicing which of them is correct and should win. At least one faction should aim at destruction of the world, as irreparably corrupt - and it should be described as sympathetically and plausibly as possible (from inside), without hiding its destructive effects (from outside).
PS. And factions in the gameworld should not be equivalent to power sources. As in Frank's version of world of darkness, any type of character should be able to join any faction - although there should be typical combinations.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Julius_Evola
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Traditionalist_School
http://rosenoire.org/
Exalted clearly describes the final phase of Kali Yuga, which should end with the restoration of the Hierarchy. At the same time, it must problematize, "bracket" and subvert the integral worldview enough to keep in the bounds of the political correctness.
For that reason I think that Essence should be moved nearer its origin, the Iranian concept of Khvarenah.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Khvarenah
Khvarenah, "glory" or "uncreated light", although generally connected with king, saints and heroes, is NOT purely hereditary, but universally accessible. It is gained by victories and truth, and lost by lies and defeats (As Darius learned to his sorrow after losing to Alexander).
Kaveh eg was a blacksmith who led the revolution against the corrupt three-headed dragon-emperor, Azi Dahaka.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zahhak#The ... ahh.C4.81k
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kaveh
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shahnameh
http://classics.mit.edu/Ferdowsi/kings.html
The game should describe the current regime as corrupt and oppressive, but should offer a range of revolutionary factions, without prejudicing which of them is correct and should win. At least one faction should aim at destruction of the world, as irreparably corrupt - and it should be described as sympathetically and plausibly as possible (from inside), without hiding its destructive effects (from outside).
PS. And factions in the gameworld should not be equivalent to power sources. As in Frank's version of world of darkness, any type of character should be able to join any faction - although there should be typical combinations.
Last edited by baduin on Sat Aug 07, 2010 10:45 pm, edited 1 time in total.
"Omnes vulnerant, ultima necat."
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Lago PARANOIA
- Invincible Overlord
- Posts: 10555
- Joined: Thu Sep 25, 2008 3:00 am
Sounds like an opportunity for another rant, FatR.FatR wrote: - I'd like to see no definite statements about the reason why Celestial Incarnae seem to not give a fuck about the world anymore. Possible options should include "They really are that evil and callous"
You haven't even touched the issues of the gods and religion yet... even though this is a major sticking point of many other campaign settings.
Considering how wonderfully awesome the rants against Dragonlance gods can get, I'm expecting something ten times as epic for Exalted.
Josh Kablack wrote:Your freedom to make rulings up on the fly is in direct conflict with my freedom to interact with an internally consistent narrative. Your freedom to run/play a game without needing to understand a complex rule system is in direct conflict with my freedom to play a character whose abilities and flaws function as I intended within that ruleset. Your freedom to add and change rules in the middle of the game is in direct conflict with my ability to understand that rules system before I decided whether or not to join your game.
In short, your entire post is dismissive of not merely my intelligence, but my agency. And I don't mean agency as a player within one of your games, I mean my agency as a person. You do not want me to be informed when I make the fundamental decisions of deciding whether to join your game or buying your rules system.
Someone did rants about the Dragonlance gods? May I see them?Lago PARANOIA wrote:Sounds like an opportunity for another rant, FatR.FatR wrote: - I'd like to see no definite statements about the reason why Celestial Incarnae seem to not give a fuck about the world anymore. Possible options should include "They really are that evil and callous"
You haven't even touched the issues of the gods and religion yet... even though this is a major sticking point of many other campaign settings.
Considering how wonderfully awesome the rants against Dragonlance gods can get, I'm expecting something ten times as epic for Exalted.
He jumps like a damned dragoon, and charges into battle fighting rather insane monsters with little more than his bare hands and rather nasty spell effects conjured up solely through knowledge and the local plantlife. He unerringly knows where his goal lies, he breathes underwater and is untroubled by space travel, seems to have no limits to his actual endurance and favors killing his enemies by driving both boots square into their skull. His agility is unmatched, and his strength legendary, able to fling about a turtle shell big enough to contain a man with enough force to barrel down a near endless path of unfortunates.
--The horror of Mario
Zak S, Zak Smith, Dndwithpornstars, Zak Sabbath. He is a terrible person and a hack at writing and art. His cultural contributions are less than Justin Bieber's, and he's a shitmuffin. Go go gadget Googlebomb!
--The horror of Mario
Zak S, Zak Smith, Dndwithpornstars, Zak Sabbath. He is a terrible person and a hack at writing and art. His cultural contributions are less than Justin Bieber's, and he's a shitmuffin. Go go gadget Googlebomb!
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Lago PARANOIA
- Invincible Overlord
- Posts: 10555
- Joined: Thu Sep 25, 2008 3:00 am
You participated in this thread like a few days ago, Maxus.http://www.tgdmb.com/viewtopic.php?t=51402
Josh Kablack wrote:Your freedom to make rulings up on the fly is in direct conflict with my freedom to interact with an internally consistent narrative. Your freedom to run/play a game without needing to understand a complex rule system is in direct conflict with my freedom to play a character whose abilities and flaws function as I intended within that ruleset. Your freedom to add and change rules in the middle of the game is in direct conflict with my ability to understand that rules system before I decided whether or not to join your game.
In short, your entire post is dismissive of not merely my intelligence, but my agency. And I don't mean agency as a player within one of your games, I mean my agency as a person. You do not want me to be informed when I make the fundamental decisions of deciding whether to join your game or buying your rules system.
You just keep feeding him Lago. You're like Exalted rage-heroin or something.Lago PARANOIA wrote:Sounds like an opportunity for another rant, FatR.FatR wrote: - I'd like to see no definite statements about the reason why Celestial Incarnae seem to not give a fuck about the world anymore. Possible options should include "They really are that evil and callous"
You haven't even touched the issues of the gods and religion yet... even though this is a major sticking point of many other campaign settings.
Considering how wonderfully awesome the rants against Dragonlance gods can get, I'm expecting something ten times as epic for Exalted.
"C'mon man, just one more hit wouldn't hurt"
FrankTrollman wrote: Halfling women, as I'm sure you are aware, combine all the "fun" parts of pedophilia without any of the disturbing, illegal, or immoral parts.
K wrote:That being said, the usefulness of airships for society is still transporting cargo because it's an option that doesn't require a powerful wizard to show up for work on time instead of blowing the day in his harem of extraplanar sex demons/angels.
Chamomile wrote: See, it's because K's belief in leaving generation of individual monsters to GMs makes him Chaotic, whereas Frank's belief in the easier usability of monsters pre-generated by game designers makes him Lawful, and clearly these philosophies are so irreconcilable as to be best represented as fundamentally opposed metaphysical forces.
Whipstitch wrote:You're on a mad quest, dude. I'd sooner bet on Zeus getting bored and letting Sisyphus put down the fucking rock.
Awh. I was hoping one snuck by me. Or was before my time. Ah, well.Lago PARANOIA wrote:
http://www.tgdmb.com/viewtopic.php?t=51402
I have a hatred for the Dragonlance cosmology which I reserve for things like...
...Eragon. And this: http://www.dandwiki.com/wiki/Elfking_A% ... .5e_NPC%29
He jumps like a damned dragoon, and charges into battle fighting rather insane monsters with little more than his bare hands and rather nasty spell effects conjured up solely through knowledge and the local plantlife. He unerringly knows where his goal lies, he breathes underwater and is untroubled by space travel, seems to have no limits to his actual endurance and favors killing his enemies by driving both boots square into their skull. His agility is unmatched, and his strength legendary, able to fling about a turtle shell big enough to contain a man with enough force to barrel down a near endless path of unfortunates.
--The horror of Mario
Zak S, Zak Smith, Dndwithpornstars, Zak Sabbath. He is a terrible person and a hack at writing and art. His cultural contributions are less than Justin Bieber's, and he's a shitmuffin. Go go gadget Googlebomb!
--The horror of Mario
Zak S, Zak Smith, Dndwithpornstars, Zak Sabbath. He is a terrible person and a hack at writing and art. His cultural contributions are less than Justin Bieber's, and he's a shitmuffin. Go go gadget Googlebomb!
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Lago PARANOIA
- Invincible Overlord
- Posts: 10555
- Joined: Thu Sep 25, 2008 3:00 am
There are scattered bits and pieces about this board detailing hate for Dragonlance cosmology.
tl;dr version:
Dragonlance cosmology makes no sense. This is because Dragonlance morality is only slightly less vile than Exalted and the cosmology is built to wank around that Balance of Good and Evil bullshit.
tl;dr version:
Dragonlance cosmology makes no sense. This is because Dragonlance morality is only slightly less vile than Exalted and the cosmology is built to wank around that Balance of Good and Evil bullshit.
Josh Kablack wrote:Your freedom to make rulings up on the fly is in direct conflict with my freedom to interact with an internally consistent narrative. Your freedom to run/play a game without needing to understand a complex rule system is in direct conflict with my freedom to play a character whose abilities and flaws function as I intended within that ruleset. Your freedom to add and change rules in the middle of the game is in direct conflict with my ability to understand that rules system before I decided whether or not to join your game.
In short, your entire post is dismissive of not merely my intelligence, but my agency. And I don't mean agency as a player within one of your games, I mean my agency as a person. You do not want me to be informed when I make the fundamental decisions of deciding whether to join your game or buying your rules system.
This is problematic (saying midly) in the original setting, where more than half of the power sources come with factions attached (you can go renegade, but in most cases the game does not really pay attention to this option). Obviously, following my stated design goals, will require splat-faction ties to be weakened somewhat.baduin wrote: PS. And factions in the gameworld should not be equivalent to power sources. As in Frank's version of world of darkness, any type of character should be able to join any faction - although there should be typical combinations.
Anyway, thanks for the interesting references and thoughts.
Actually this is quite simple. I even believe that I've already covered most of this in rant #5. Initially, the Incarnae were meant by to be utter scum. They accepted human sacrifice during the Primordial rule, they betrayed Primordials solely to take their stuff and to not work on keeping the world stable, they intentionally tried to hobble the Exalted to keep them from becoming a threat, they promoted corruprion amongst lesser gods, and they pointedly were doing jack about the horrible state of the world, even when the reality itself was under the threat of dissolution. This created an interesting situation, when Yozi and Neverborn actually had quite a legitimate grievance with gods and Exalted... except, you know, they wanted to snuff the world as payback.Lago PARANOIA wrote: Sounds like an opportunity for another rant, FatR.
Except, not all writers apparently got this memo. And wanker fans that apparently found the idea of heroes who, for once, should think for yourself, instead of waiting for direction from Heaven, incomprehensible, started baaawing, that their shiny patrons cannot be such shits. And representatives of these fans or writers who were of one mind with them got to write 2E. So in 2E Celestial Incarnae SUDDENLY turned into your usual vaguely benevolent and viruous patron gods. Except, you know, even Exalted writers were unable to entirely retcon their morally bankrupt behavior, such as Unconquered Sun giving the finger to Exalted in response for a very mild offense, or the whole bunch of Incarnae continuing to be busy with Games of Divinity even when the Great Contagion dropped people by billions and fae hordes were about to end the world. If only because they couldn't have Heaven meaningfully intervene at these moments without breaking the setting. So, as usual, the results were quite schizophrenic.
And as about the religion in Exalted, it should be noted, that the only actual religion there is the Immaculate Order. Which is an artificial construct meant to make people behave. Otherwise the relationships between those gods who actually work on establishing cults and mortals are better described as protection racket. You don't pray to gods because you want to be a better person and/or to avoid going to Hell. Most often, you pray because they will wreck your shit for not empowering them with your prayers and rituals otherwise (unless you're lucky enough to live in a place where Exalted keep gods in line, and even then you still likely must participate in rituals that generate enough prayer to be distributed between gods so they won't wage war on you as a collective). Mind you, many gods like to be treated as transcedental beings. But no one above peasants is fooled.
8. Exalted I'm Too Lazy To Write (Continue)
And one more thing I forgot to add to the above: the Great Curse should either just go away or be made optional and depending on a players' goodwill. It is just a crappy idea, that is supposed to enforce the theme of mythical flawed heroes, but actually only dilutes it, by attributing their flaws to an external source, instead, of you know, human nature. (Accidentally, the existence of the Great Curse shoots down any pretenses in the area of moral commentary the setting might have. That these pretenses can be very pretentious, but there is a simple fact, that the setting explicitly says, that if not for the Great Curse, the Exalted elite would have inevitably created an utopia, and bullshit like this automatically pushes the setting into Fairyland, no matter how much boobs, gore and slavery the books contain.) Moreover, the Great Curse as written requires jumping through numerous hoops, to justify, how Exalted might fail to notice it, considering that the typical manifestation tend to involve massive loss of self-control and you don't need to be a transcedent savant to realize that something might just be wrong with your head if you have a tendency to flip out and kill people or to turn into a hysterical wreck from time to time. Finally, in my experience, lots of players chafe unti the whole mechanic, as it implies partial loss of control over their PCs. And those who don't mostly don't need extra reasons for their PCs to be dicks, anyway.
So, how about the splats?
Solars need the most change obviously, as we're supposed to discard the fucking splat-as-caste system, to give every splat their niche (instead of making Solars automatically better than anyone in all situations and other Celestials existing only because Incarnae lacked juice to just make 700 Solars), and to eliminate the elder problem. Which demolishes most of their current shticks and messes with their backstory in a huge way.
But, on the other hand this change is one of the easier ones. A lots of people already like to imagine Solars as beacons of freedom, human empowerment through personal heroism, and rewarded virtue - something they, as, I believe, I already deliberated enough in previous rants, are most emphatically NOT in the canon. So, let's make them such.
In my ideal Exalted, those who have great and potentially world-changing dreams, drives and ideals, as well as high Virtue ratings (although, mechahically, I believe existing Virtues should be discarded, because they sort of blow and two of them intersect with Willpower anyway, so make it Virtue-ratings-or-equivalents) exalt as Solars. The most common trigger for Solar Exaltation by far is braving great dangers in the pursuit of one's dream or in the defense of one's convictions. There are not set number of Solar Exaltations and everyone who qualifies gets one. Do note, that this scheme will not make Solars necessarily nice. People like Alexander the Great still will pass the Solar Exaltation test with flying colors. It will just stop shoehorning them into an inherently repulsive system.
If you want to ask how certain elements of the setting contingent on Exaltation shards work, Sidereals artificially dropped the probability of Solar Exaltations to almost nothing through a plot device of epic fate-screwing, until the joint Malfeas-Underworld infiltration team finally managed to wreck their stuff (resetting the possibility of Solar exaltations wasn't their goal, obviously, just a side effect). And Solars can tap into the memory bank of their precedessors, that exists to make them better reformators and leaders of men by allowing to learn on others' mistakes (memories of only one precedessor are chosen to avoid driving new Solars mad). There, easy as pie. As about what caused the Usurpation if Solars do not automatically become jaded practically immortal god-kings anymore, I'll cover it once we get to Sidereals, or separately, once I have thought it trough.
Mechanically, Solars should be good generalists, which means they aren't totally weak in anything, but not really great in any area, except the area of their shtick. Like in the canon, their Charms should be straightforward tools of doing stuff better. Unlike the canon, their Charms should geared towards wide and non-conditional applicability, but not also overwhelming power across the board. Their special schticks, where they are the best, should be diplomancy, and effects that influence large masses of men, making societies and organizations work better - rather than best in everything, they should be great leaders, that totally can make everything work best. Also, they probably should still have effects that burninate demons and living dead with holy light, making them good, rather than mediocre, against these particular opponents. They should not have special effects besides that, though. Laser eyebeams are OK, and a lightsaber is probably OK, but conjuring glowing armor and steeds out of nothing is probably too much. Their weakness should be lack of transformative powers that take them beyond human limits permanently or for indefinite duration and, therefore, necessity to constantly spend/commit Essence to keep their effects active.
Lunars should follow the same basic principles of Exaltation as Solars, but the conditions should be different. Lunar Exaltation won't be interested in grand goals, but rather in personal badassery and strong will to survive and persevere. It should be a relatively capricious force, not guaranteed to trigger even by the most heroic deeds, but sometimes rewarding weak and downthrodden for the most minute acts of defiance or simply descending to save people in hopeless situation. Lunars should be the most individualistic and diverse Exalted, often more interested in living their lives to the full, rather than championing one cause or another.
Mechanically, Lunars should still do shapeshifting bigtime (and much better than before, except at Essence levels deliberately set to be low-key - seriously, ignoring mechanical abstractions like perfect defenses, which interaction with actual stuff happening in the gameworld is very vague at best, only elders with unplayably high Essence levels ever have a hope of holding a candle to, say, virus!Merser from Prototype) and be the toughest general-purpose asskickers on the team. Their secondary schticks should be derived from shapeshifting and include infiltration and parts of social sphere where appearance is particularly beneficial, such as seduction. Otherwise their social powerset should be weak, and the area that is Solars' second great strength, i.e. powers that make you a great leader and affect the masses (or even benefit others in general), should be practically nonexistent for them. They should be below average in building stuff as well.
And one more thing I forgot to add to the above: the Great Curse should either just go away or be made optional and depending on a players' goodwill. It is just a crappy idea, that is supposed to enforce the theme of mythical flawed heroes, but actually only dilutes it, by attributing their flaws to an external source, instead, of you know, human nature. (Accidentally, the existence of the Great Curse shoots down any pretenses in the area of moral commentary the setting might have. That these pretenses can be very pretentious, but there is a simple fact, that the setting explicitly says, that if not for the Great Curse, the Exalted elite would have inevitably created an utopia, and bullshit like this automatically pushes the setting into Fairyland, no matter how much boobs, gore and slavery the books contain.) Moreover, the Great Curse as written requires jumping through numerous hoops, to justify, how Exalted might fail to notice it, considering that the typical manifestation tend to involve massive loss of self-control and you don't need to be a transcedent savant to realize that something might just be wrong with your head if you have a tendency to flip out and kill people or to turn into a hysterical wreck from time to time. Finally, in my experience, lots of players chafe unti the whole mechanic, as it implies partial loss of control over their PCs. And those who don't mostly don't need extra reasons for their PCs to be dicks, anyway.
So, how about the splats?
Solars need the most change obviously, as we're supposed to discard the fucking splat-as-caste system, to give every splat their niche (instead of making Solars automatically better than anyone in all situations and other Celestials existing only because Incarnae lacked juice to just make 700 Solars), and to eliminate the elder problem. Which demolishes most of their current shticks and messes with their backstory in a huge way.
But, on the other hand this change is one of the easier ones. A lots of people already like to imagine Solars as beacons of freedom, human empowerment through personal heroism, and rewarded virtue - something they, as, I believe, I already deliberated enough in previous rants, are most emphatically NOT in the canon. So, let's make them such.
In my ideal Exalted, those who have great and potentially world-changing dreams, drives and ideals, as well as high Virtue ratings (although, mechahically, I believe existing Virtues should be discarded, because they sort of blow and two of them intersect with Willpower anyway, so make it Virtue-ratings-or-equivalents) exalt as Solars. The most common trigger for Solar Exaltation by far is braving great dangers in the pursuit of one's dream or in the defense of one's convictions. There are not set number of Solar Exaltations and everyone who qualifies gets one. Do note, that this scheme will not make Solars necessarily nice. People like Alexander the Great still will pass the Solar Exaltation test with flying colors. It will just stop shoehorning them into an inherently repulsive system.
If you want to ask how certain elements of the setting contingent on Exaltation shards work, Sidereals artificially dropped the probability of Solar Exaltations to almost nothing through a plot device of epic fate-screwing, until the joint Malfeas-Underworld infiltration team finally managed to wreck their stuff (resetting the possibility of Solar exaltations wasn't their goal, obviously, just a side effect). And Solars can tap into the memory bank of their precedessors, that exists to make them better reformators and leaders of men by allowing to learn on others' mistakes (memories of only one precedessor are chosen to avoid driving new Solars mad). There, easy as pie. As about what caused the Usurpation if Solars do not automatically become jaded practically immortal god-kings anymore, I'll cover it once we get to Sidereals, or separately, once I have thought it trough.
Mechanically, Solars should be good generalists, which means they aren't totally weak in anything, but not really great in any area, except the area of their shtick. Like in the canon, their Charms should be straightforward tools of doing stuff better. Unlike the canon, their Charms should geared towards wide and non-conditional applicability, but not also overwhelming power across the board. Their special schticks, where they are the best, should be diplomancy, and effects that influence large masses of men, making societies and organizations work better - rather than best in everything, they should be great leaders, that totally can make everything work best. Also, they probably should still have effects that burninate demons and living dead with holy light, making them good, rather than mediocre, against these particular opponents. They should not have special effects besides that, though. Laser eyebeams are OK, and a lightsaber is probably OK, but conjuring glowing armor and steeds out of nothing is probably too much. Their weakness should be lack of transformative powers that take them beyond human limits permanently or for indefinite duration and, therefore, necessity to constantly spend/commit Essence to keep their effects active.
Lunars should follow the same basic principles of Exaltation as Solars, but the conditions should be different. Lunar Exaltation won't be interested in grand goals, but rather in personal badassery and strong will to survive and persevere. It should be a relatively capricious force, not guaranteed to trigger even by the most heroic deeds, but sometimes rewarding weak and downthrodden for the most minute acts of defiance or simply descending to save people in hopeless situation. Lunars should be the most individualistic and diverse Exalted, often more interested in living their lives to the full, rather than championing one cause or another.
Mechanically, Lunars should still do shapeshifting bigtime (and much better than before, except at Essence levels deliberately set to be low-key - seriously, ignoring mechanical abstractions like perfect defenses, which interaction with actual stuff happening in the gameworld is very vague at best, only elders with unplayably high Essence levels ever have a hope of holding a candle to, say, virus!Merser from Prototype) and be the toughest general-purpose asskickers on the team. Their secondary schticks should be derived from shapeshifting and include infiltration and parts of social sphere where appearance is particularly beneficial, such as seduction. Otherwise their social powerset should be weak, and the area that is Solars' second great strength, i.e. powers that make you a great leader and affect the masses (or even benefit others in general), should be practically nonexistent for them. They should be below average in building stuff as well.
Last edited by FatR on Tue Aug 17, 2010 8:29 am, edited 2 times in total.
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Green_eyes
- NPC
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Thanks, Green eyes, it's always good to be patted on the back 
.
Anyway...
The thematic distinction between Solars and Lunars above needs a bit of elaboration, because the canon totally fucking fails to make this distinction in a satisfactory fashion. That's the main reason why Lunars were completely reenvisioned twice, and still failed to obtain a setting niche that is both non-retarted and meaningful in the present day of the setting (and mechanically they, in both editions, must whore very narrow shticks, related to hulking out and smashing stuff, or be just like Solars, except way worse). The only reason Lunar books sold at all probably is their status as the main bait for furries in the gameline. Thankfully, in my ideal Exalted, Solars shtick is no longer "being teh bestest and shitting on niche protection", so my task is much easier. I envision Solars as diplomancers and faciliators, whom you should play if players want to be revolutionaries and reformers, out to change the world right from the gate, and Lunars as individualists, more suited to classical adventuring. Of course, in mixed parties Solars should gravitate more to being "Face" (besides bringing various mass buffs to play), while Lunars obviously will be more inclined towards "Muscle" role (although they should have enough sneaking around, trickery and minscrew tricks suited for immediate combat/adventuring needs, rather than long-term persuasion/mindscrew to create a possibility of a diverse all-Lunar or mostly-Lunar party). Looking at the larger picture, neither splat should hold dominance in the setting to the point when it matters for PCs. Sure, Solars tend to be driven to the positions of authority by their very nature, but in the world of ridiculous superpowers the strongest asskicker around warming the throne, with the best politician taking up the role of his senechal and administrator is a perfectly viable model.
So, how about Sidereals? Their idea of the Exaltation by fate is actually sound. Canon doesn't really do anything interesting with it, though. (You're a future Sidereal from birth, so in nearly all cases you are found though fate-reading and kidnapped by existing Sidereals as soon as you are born, and raised as a Sidereal from childhood.) Instead, Fate should just place Sidereal Exaltations on mortals of various ages for reasons that often aren't at all understandable to those without the ability to predict future, and sometimes even to those who have some degree of this ability. This is specifically to allow Exalted who do not want their new responsibility (because they actually liked their previous lives, and because being snatched by Exalted In Black/Heavenly Freedom Fighters because your destiny suddenly said that you have a great and terrible responsibility, related to shaping the fates of the world/keeping the whole reality from dissolution, is no fun) and "who the hell could have a bright idea of Exalting this guy?" Exalted.
Mechanically, Sidereals should be Batman Wizards, except without overwhelming power. Their Charms should be geared to arraging the fights so that their side has all advantages, debuffing the enemy, and tinkering with the plot (starting from divinations and ending with direct fate hacking). They should be the best sorcerers of the current age too (although as I envision sorcery as universally and equally accessible to every splat, this will be an organizational rather than inherent advantage). They definitely should have the weakest Charms for both direct damage and defense from being directly attacked of all Exalted. Good stealth and impersonation suite, but no instant escape Charms, like Avoidance Kata, until high Essence levels, so they actually can be forced into combat without excessive plot contrivances.
Oh, and Arcane Fate (thing that makes everyone in the Creation forget about Sidereals, even if those Sidereals are in the same party as them for quite a time) will cease to exist. It serves no meaningful purpose except screwing with mixed parties. Sidereals can be semi-secret (i.e., with everyone truly important being in the know, one way or another) without it. Passing themselves for messengers of Heaven, when they cannot simply do everything stealthily or through dupes, isn't exactly hard or implausible. Because the world is full of extremely diverse divinities already.
As factions are becoming increasinly isolated from splats in my mind, I'll talk about the history of the setting when I'll be detailing them.
.Anyway...
The thematic distinction between Solars and Lunars above needs a bit of elaboration, because the canon totally fucking fails to make this distinction in a satisfactory fashion. That's the main reason why Lunars were completely reenvisioned twice, and still failed to obtain a setting niche that is both non-retarted and meaningful in the present day of the setting (and mechanically they, in both editions, must whore very narrow shticks, related to hulking out and smashing stuff, or be just like Solars, except way worse). The only reason Lunar books sold at all probably is their status as the main bait for furries in the gameline. Thankfully, in my ideal Exalted, Solars shtick is no longer "being teh bestest and shitting on niche protection", so my task is much easier. I envision Solars as diplomancers and faciliators, whom you should play if players want to be revolutionaries and reformers, out to change the world right from the gate, and Lunars as individualists, more suited to classical adventuring. Of course, in mixed parties Solars should gravitate more to being "Face" (besides bringing various mass buffs to play), while Lunars obviously will be more inclined towards "Muscle" role (although they should have enough sneaking around, trickery and minscrew tricks suited for immediate combat/adventuring needs, rather than long-term persuasion/mindscrew to create a possibility of a diverse all-Lunar or mostly-Lunar party). Looking at the larger picture, neither splat should hold dominance in the setting to the point when it matters for PCs. Sure, Solars tend to be driven to the positions of authority by their very nature, but in the world of ridiculous superpowers the strongest asskicker around warming the throne, with the best politician taking up the role of his senechal and administrator is a perfectly viable model.
So, how about Sidereals? Their idea of the Exaltation by fate is actually sound. Canon doesn't really do anything interesting with it, though. (You're a future Sidereal from birth, so in nearly all cases you are found though fate-reading and kidnapped by existing Sidereals as soon as you are born, and raised as a Sidereal from childhood.) Instead, Fate should just place Sidereal Exaltations on mortals of various ages for reasons that often aren't at all understandable to those without the ability to predict future, and sometimes even to those who have some degree of this ability. This is specifically to allow Exalted who do not want their new responsibility (because they actually liked their previous lives, and because being snatched by Exalted In Black/Heavenly Freedom Fighters because your destiny suddenly said that you have a great and terrible responsibility, related to shaping the fates of the world/keeping the whole reality from dissolution, is no fun) and "who the hell could have a bright idea of Exalting this guy?" Exalted.
Mechanically, Sidereals should be Batman Wizards, except without overwhelming power. Their Charms should be geared to arraging the fights so that their side has all advantages, debuffing the enemy, and tinkering with the plot (starting from divinations and ending with direct fate hacking). They should be the best sorcerers of the current age too (although as I envision sorcery as universally and equally accessible to every splat, this will be an organizational rather than inherent advantage). They definitely should have the weakest Charms for both direct damage and defense from being directly attacked of all Exalted. Good stealth and impersonation suite, but no instant escape Charms, like Avoidance Kata, until high Essence levels, so they actually can be forced into combat without excessive plot contrivances.
Oh, and Arcane Fate (thing that makes everyone in the Creation forget about Sidereals, even if those Sidereals are in the same party as them for quite a time) will cease to exist. It serves no meaningful purpose except screwing with mixed parties. Sidereals can be semi-secret (i.e., with everyone truly important being in the know, one way or another) without it. Passing themselves for messengers of Heaven, when they cannot simply do everything stealthily or through dupes, isn't exactly hard or implausible. Because the world is full of extremely diverse divinities already.
As factions are becoming increasinly isolated from splats in my mind, I'll talk about the history of the setting when I'll be detailing them.
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Silent Wayfarer
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Of course. The closed Charset existed to begin with because many of the 1E Sidereals Charms actually worth learning were only balanced by being useful in narrow circumstances. Or not scaling to higher Essence. Therefore it was practically incompatible with inventing new Charms. (2E Sidereal Charmset was just gimped, and, as now is admitted, gimped on purpose.) As, in my ideal game, Charmsets are supposed to be balanced against each other, there should be no need for such limitations.
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Silent Wayfarer
- Knight-Baron
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What will you do to make attack Charms worth using? The problem with Exalted combat now is ironically that offense and defense are too strong. Currently, it's frighteningly easy to ramp up your raw HL damage into "kill you in one or two hits" territory with minimal mote expenditure, but at the same time, the existence of cheap perfect defenses means that spending too many motes on your attack is just asking for the other guy to perfect it away and fuck you in your mote-depleted ass. And the sad thing is that each practically demands the existence of the other (you need perfects to avoid being splattered if you let a hit through... but then since you whiff so much in this combat model, you need to kill the guy as fast as possible when he does something stupid like leave himself without the ability to defend).FatR wrote:Of course. The closed Charset existed to begin with because many of the 1E Sidereals Charms actually worth learning were only balanced by being useful in narrow circumstances. Or not scaling to higher Essence. Therefore it was practically incompatible with inventing new Charms. (2E Sidereal Charmset was just gimped, and, as now is admitted, gimped on purpose.) As, in my ideal game, Charmsets are supposed to be balanced against each other, there should be no need for such limitations.
I suspect an overall lethality reduction is required. Make magic-using creatures far more resistant to damage than squishies, so even a simple ghost or First Circle Demon is now a scary fucker... to anyone without a six foot surfboard of magic gold or five chainsaw-sized claws of living silver on each hand. Hard to conceptualize, though. But combat has to address this point.
Last edited by Silent Wayfarer on Sun Aug 22, 2010 9:56 am, edited 2 times in total.
If your religion is worth killing for, please start with yourself.
And why not to go in the opposite direction? An Exalted SHOULD be able to defeat an opponent in one hit without rolling, if he is willing to use his full power. So, why not to have charms working automatically without any rolling?
You could get randomness by putting charms on cards. Both sides play their cards face down, and then simultaneously show them, pay the cost and read the results.
You could get randomness by putting charms on cards. Both sides play their cards face down, and then simultaneously show them, pay the cost and read the results.
"Omnes vulnerant, ultima necat."
The existing system is unsalvageable and should be redone from the ground up, so that new one bears only enough passing familiarity to the old one to make some general ideas recognizable. Its math is fucked at basic level and most of its concepts are bad. (Besides things I've already mentioned, Exalted has severe crunch overload at chargen level, which systematically scares off new players, so the target audience is basically people who got tired of DnD/WoD games. This also makes any assertions that you can avoid setting problems by starting at higher than normal levels invalid.)
I'm probably not up to the task of writing a new system. But whether this is so, or not, the first step should be defining the conceptual space in which mechanics will work.
I'm probably not up to the task of writing a new system. But whether this is so, or not, the first step should be defining the conceptual space in which mechanics will work.