* AccidentalInnuendo: Anys Syn is named after real-world author [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anais_Nin Anais Nin]]; her name is not intended to be a joke about sex or headache medicine.
* BrokenBase:
** The Ink Monkeys, a group of Exalted writers who continued Second Edition during a lull in publishing by posting (official) supplements online on the Exalted website. While the official forums adored them, the larger fanbase was markedly split.
** And then there are the ''[[GreyAndGrayMorality deliberately]]'' ambiguous bits. Vision of Bronze, anyone?
** Too many things to list! The Daystar, The Shining Answer, Samsara, Legends of the Titans, Lumina, Shrikes, Halta & Linowan, etc.
** Michael Goodwin leaving caused more than a few fans to rage (and fueled speculation as to why).
** Lunars are perhaps the ultimate case of this. Not because people don't like them, but because no two fans can agree ''why'' they like them, and get into huge Internet knife fights over which traits should be emphasised. On any given day, if you go to the Exalted forum on the White Wolf site, you will most likely find at least one Lunar-related FlameWar, possibly several. By and large, this has eased off after 3e's ''Fangs at the Gate'', with most of the fandom satisfied with its take on Lunars (''most'' - this is Exalted fandom, after all).
** Infernals, if the White Wolf forums are anything to go by, are either the best or the worst thing to happen to Exalted. The dislike probably isn't helped by the fact that Infernals were released fairly late into the 2e line and as such proceeded to have a stranglehold on the game books after release (To the point that Abyssals, the other "antagonist" splat present since 1st Edition, were subject to OutOfFocus).
** The reveal that third edition would have new Exalt types. Plural. The fanbase immediately split into "hell yeah more Exalts" and "no this is a bad idea" factions.
** And whether or not the 3E Abyssals Charm preview endorsed/railroaded the player into rape. Opinions varied from "The devs are misogynistic bastards ruining our game!" to, "These are Charms from the ''Deathlords,'' what did you expect?" to, "Who the hell cares?" to, "Why is Solar brainwashing and [[DeliberateValuesDissonance canon sex slavery]] acceptable, but not this?" to, "The Charmset is perfectly fine, you're imagining things," to, "The Abyssals are ''supposed'' to be evil (itself the cause of a BrokenBase)" to, "No one is being forced to use it, what's the problem?" to, "My God, people, shut up. The whining about this is poisoning the forums," to... [[LongList you get the idea]].
*** Bonus drama with Website/SomethingAwful negatively reviewing the series and its usage of sexy outfits, sexual themes, and even SA as shock value, ''especially against a child'' and using it as an unavoidable plot point. Is Exalted inherently for misogynist manchildren, or are people missing the point that evil comes in many forms? Some have taken it upon themselves to purge their games of the sex stuff, ''especially'' the Ebon Dragon stuff.
** The massive success of the [[https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/200664283/deluxe-exalted-3rd-edition 3rd edition Kickstarter campaign]] resulted in the book's length doubling, with some sections being rewritten entirely, which pushed back the release date by over two years. This lead to dissent among some of the fans. It's of note that in reaction to this, subsequent 3rd edition Kickstarters have the additional material in a companion book instead.
** Fans who want a dark, secretive bronze age setting versus fans who want cool {{Magitek}} and a chance to punch Eldritch Abominations in the face. Fans who want a chance to be true heroes and save the world versus fans who want a deep sense of doom and tragedy over it all. Fans who enjoy playing out cultures with [[DeliberateValuesDissonance strange and archaic moral codes]] versus fans who think that's just a shallow excuse to wallow in juvenile shock value. The list goes on. ''Exalted'' is a hotly debated game.
* CargoShip: The April Fool's Day sourcebook Scroll of Swallowed Darkness mentions an artifact invented to allow a Solar to seduce a mountain. Not the [[OurSpiritsAreDifferent spirit]] of the mountain, the actual ''mountain''. Thousands died in the eruption at the, er... climax.
* ComplainingAboutThingsYouHaventPaidFor: People who quit the game over Ink Monkeys content, which was released for free online.
* CompleteMonster: The second edition version of [[EldritchAbomination The Dowager of the Irreverent Vulgate in Unrent Veils]] is one of the thirteen Deathlords ghosts, and easily the most vile of the bunch. She hunts people as a hobby, but her real wickedness comes into play with her two pet projects. First is her OrphanageOfFear; she abducts the entire populace of a village, kills everyone over the age of nine, and raises the children in homes furnished with soulsteel made from the children's families. She also takes this opportunity to create the Shoat of the Mire, a psychologically-tortured little girl given the Black Exaltation of a [[PersonOfMassDestruction Dusk]]. But the Dowager's greatest work is the single most catastrophic event in Creation's history, [[PlagueMaster the Great Contagion]]. Having discovered this virus in the [[ArtifactOfDoom Well of Udr]], the Dowager unleashed it upon Creation, where it killed 90% of all living things. The Dowager is the cruelest and most vicious of the Deathlords; she would be Creation's most notorious murderer, if only her role in the Great Contagion were well-known in Creation. Her end goal is to find the opposite of Creation in the Well of Udr, and bring the two worlds together into a matter-antimatter cataclysm.
* CrazyIsCool:
** The premise of the game.
** The basic schtick of no small number of the characters therein, as well. In a specific character, Adorjan. Yes, she's an AxeCrazy {{Yandere}}, but she loves running ''so much'' that she does it ''instead of sleeping''. And the Infernals she powers can do so too. Really, the Infernals in general can become this, since most of their charms involve doing fairly mundane things in insane and alien ways. For example, what does an Infernal of the Ebon Dragon do when he wants to hurt someone? He warps the core of his being in such a way that his entire life becomes devoted to hurting that person, until such time as that person is dead. At higher Essence, he can become the target's EvilTwin, as well.
*** And 2e Infernals who survive long enough begin to turn in Primordials.
* CreatorBacklash: ''Scroll of the Monk'' and the much-reviled Void Avatar Prana for Ink Monkey Dean Shomshak.
* CreepyAwesome:
** The Infernals are the Exalted of the Yozis, whose Charms can warp their minds and bodies, and are slowly turning into Primordials, yet are still loved by the fans. (3e goes for having them emulate the Yozis rather than become Primordials, but they still have the signature creepy effects.)
** The Abyssals are this as well, albeit to a lesser degree.
* DemonicSpiders: Anuhles, [[{{Pun}} ahaha]]. Seriously though, the Demon Spiders can be this for mortals. Exalts, on the other hand, tend to view them as minor inconveniences.
* DesignatedHero: Due to the Great Curse's effect on their First Age incarnations, many of the Solar Exalted are seen and depicted as this, as they became so jaded and perverse that their "heroic" designation came largely from what they fought against: [[TheUndead Undead]] {{Omnicidal Maniac}}s, {{Demon Lords|AndArchdevils}}, and {{Eldritch Abomination}}s from beyond Creation. This is largely why the Dragon-Blooded [[TakeAThirdOption Took a Third Option]] and deposed them, although they now have kind of a DecadentCourt thing going on, too. That said, depictions in this light can go too far, given repeated emphasis that Second Age Solars will largely not commit the same mistakes their previous incarnations made.
* DesignatedVillain: Due to their particular patrons, the Abyssals and Infernals are by default on the side of the setting's antagonists, but they can still try (and succeed) to be good, moral people. There is a lot of room to interpret them as sympathetic (if not necessarily nice) people forced into the service of terrible forces, with very nice aesthetics. It helps that they can simply [[BadPowersGoodPeople use their rather unpleasant powers]] [[PayEvilUntoEvil against terrible people instead of innocents]].
* EnsembleDarkhorse: While most of the Exalted have a lot of love, during 2e, Infernals in particular had the largest amount of homebrew material dedicated to them, thanks to the thematic structure of Yozi charms and to the general conceit that they can redeem themselves or even become nascent Primordials themselves. To some extent the same applies to their Yozi patrons.
* FanNickname:
** Chejop Kejak: "Ketchup Carjack"
** The First and Forsaken Lion is more commonly referred to as the [=FaFL=].
** The Primordial She Who Lives in Her Name is almost universally referred to by her acronym, [=SWLiHN=]; one of the authors even bemoaned having to use her full name when writing ''Infernals'', since it wasted so much wordcount. And of course, many just call her [[http://www.urbandictionary.com/define.php?term=swillin Swillin']].
** Gazellecarp: The capstone charm of the Dreaming Pearl Courtesan Style transforms your character into a serpentine chimera whose features include a head like a gazelle foal and multiple carp fins down the sides.
** [[http://meluran.deviantart.com/art/DEMETHEMANIA-comic-53379022 DEMETHEMANIA]]: Demetheus, a big, burly Dawn Caste fighter. In his back story, he wrestled giant lions with his bare hands and won; thus a badass was born. He was also visibly inspired by The Rock.
** The signature Malefactor, wearer of the rather ''interesting'' take on a nun's habit, is referred to alternately as Hellnun or Bondage Nun. ([[AllThereInTheManual Her real name is Sulumor, by the way.]])
** "Her Redness" and "Big Red" for the Scarlet Empress.
** The Primordial Ramethus, who attacked in the Aftershock War (having optimized itself for combat), is frequently referred to (even by the game's freelance writers on the White Wolf forums) as Chungira, named after Jon Chung, who posts a lot about Exalted optimization.
** Even after receiving both a pre-ascension name (Sol Incarnate) and title of address (Ignis Divine, his equivalent of 'your majesty'), a large portion of the fan-base still prefers to call the Unconquered Sun "Sol Invictus." Even John Mørke admitted to wanting to use the term, in spite of being forbidden from canonizing it (in ''Glories of the Most High: the Unconquered Sun''). Some who favor it do so because a Latin name would help Sol fit in better with all the other Incarnae... others cite that as an excellent reason not to use it. The Sun does, after all, stand apart from the Moon and stars.
*** The Unconquered Sun is also occasionally called "Conky."
** The complete loser of a Primordial known as The Ebon Dragon sometimes has his name shortened to TED.
** After the agonizing delays for the Third Edition books, fans started calling the series Exalted: the Waiting.
* FanonDiscontinuity:
** Void Avatar Prana and some of the Solar Charms in ''Dreams of the First Age''. Mention them on the White Wolf forum and people will claim they were never written. Errata either fixed them or [[CanonDiscontinuity nuked them outright]] (sometimes in fashion of replacing them with an entirely different Charm under the same name.)
** Lunars were always social engineers and manipulators trying to create an alternate system of government after the fall of the Solar Deliberative. They were never rampaging barbarian anarchists that were ported wholesale over from ''TabletopGame/WerewolfTheApocalypse''. No sir.
** No, no, no; the Silver Pact have always been sponsors of guerrilla resistance and rival powers to the Sidereal/Terrestrial hegemony that followed the Usurpation, chiseling away at the Shogunate and then the Scarlet Dynasty as quickly and quietly as they could given their circumstances. Some of them hang out with barbarians, some of them make societies, but neither of them are really more than means to the end of wearing down a civilization that can't make more of its limited supply of superweapons and crippling attempts to swallow other nations and cultures. Also, there is ''no such thing'' as a "barbarian", there are cultures who happen to be opposed to the Realm and may not be as technically advanced as they are due to circumstances.
** ''Scroll of Heroes'' was not ported to 2E purely at the behest of one particular freelancer who is completely ignorant of how Exaltation is implied to work in previous books, and the Merits and Flaws are not completely broken.
** ''Scroll of the Monk'' for 2E is an example of what happens when a writer [[OldShame isn't experienced with the rules]]. There's some disagreement as to what extent, though; some regard the entire book as FanonDisContinuity, while others find that the Terrestrial Martial Arts and some of the Celestial Martial Arts are perfectly playable. It is all but universally agreed that the Sidereal Martial Arts cannot be used as written, however.
** Some fans treat the Ink Monkeys Articles as non-canon, despite numerous affirmations that they are.
** ''Dreams of the First Age'' triggered an explosion so bad that several people were calling for the line developer and his NumberTwo to be lynched. The damage was eventually contained, but this was one of the main reasons [[PromotedFanboy Errata Team Prime]] was formed.
** The setting and storytelling chapters of Infernals 2e has this in spades. People hated certain passages and felt they tainted the entire chapter. The setting chapters in particular-- while the storytelling chapter isn't usually viewed too badly, chapters 1 through 4 contained such things as mandatory Primordial sex sessions and open statements that all Infernals were inhuman monsters who saw nothing wrong with solving disputes through sex sessions with Lilun, which really didn't go down very well.
** Errata Team Prime gets this treatment every now and again, especially with more sweeping changes like the Fair Folk Charms.
* FanWank: Since the Exalted developers specifically avoid any sort of metaplot, any discussion of setting on Message Boards at least toes this line, if not devolving into circle jerks, often with opposing sides.
* FridgeHorror: Chejop Kejak, leader of the Bronze Faction, can theoretically perform a martial arts combo capable of killing (or at least attacking) every living being with ease.
* GameBreaker:
** Some authors don't seem to even try maintaining some mechanical balance when they write cool powers for Exalted. Some authors don't possess the necessary skill for it, but soldier on anyway. Some authors deliberately do not try, stating that the demigod status of the Exalted gives them carte blanche to wield unbalanced divine power. However, Exalted was created as a TCG-like roleplaying game - thus necessitating a careful and intricate balance for powers and effects -- and the latter two attitudes can and have lead to a BrokenBase.
** There are various examples, but the most extreme and infamous is probably ''The Mirror Does Not Lie'' from the Obsidian Shards of Infinity Style. This technique, in exchange for a low one-time cost per scene, will allow a martial artist to automatically redirect any attacks against their person to any other target (and have it look like the attacker was attacking that target all along) as long as ''anyone'' (not just the martial artist, but anyone at all) can see the attack coming. On top of that, the technique (like all Sidereal martial arts) is massively secret, so the chances of anyone knowing even that extremely narrow limitation is essentially nil.
** Black Mirror Shintai, an Ebon Dragon Charm in the Infernals hardback, has a TakeThat at Obsidian Shards of Infinity Style, calling it the closest any mortal has ever come to duplicating the Ebon Dragon's "principle of antagonistic cheating." Many have noted the irony that one of the Obsidian Shards charms is named Shattering the Balance.
** Zeal from ''Dreams of the First Age'', which was an attempt to break the game by breaking perfect defenses. It didn't succeed (and the errata clarified this for all to see) but it still caused a legendary degree of backlash. Nearly all [=STs=] banned it before the errata came out, replacing it with a very different Charm.
** Ebon Lightning Prana. Because it's a great idea to have an auto-initiative, auto-surprise, and damage multiplier in the same Charm.
** Certain Charms, Martial Arts Styles, and concepts from the Ink Monkeys.
*** Stocked reflexive attacks (or shrikes), which can utterly demolish the balance of the combat system of the game.
*** Lightspeed Body Dynamics, which can make characters invincible by letting them regain resources whenever someone attacks them and misses, unless you're up against an opponent who never misses... which would be just as broken. In fact, it was so bad, the writers removed it altogether!
*** The Martial Keyword, whose purpose was to make multiple combat styles less of an XP-sink, can easily become a game breaker and remove a layer of choice for the sake of convenience (which has its merits).
*** Ivory Pestle Style and Cobra Styles, which are just much stronger than Martial Arts of their levels should be. Their Charms compare favorably to Charms that are supposed to be much much stronger than them. Both of ''those'' were removed.
** The Twilight Caste ability was widely noted to be far and away the best anima power around in 2nd Edition, since it granted heavy DamageReduction--intended primarily to avoid a caste of [[SquishyWizard Squishy Wizards]]--for free. In comparison, the caste actually meant to be warriors, Dawn, received a far weaker defense boost that only worked on relatively weak creatures. It was nerfed, and of 2.5, removed completely. Whether or not the new SeeThruSpecs version is a bit too ''weak''...
** Character creation. It uses flat costs, while advancement has each dot in a trait (except backgrounds) cost more than the last. If, during chargen, Dace buys his primary attributes at 5/5/1 and the Maiden of the Mirthless Smile buys 3/5/3, it will cost Dace 40xp to get to 5/5/5 while the Maiden will pay 56. Advancement in Exalted goes at 4-6xp per session, and that this is just one set of traits where this can happen - there are still two other sets of attributes, plus abilities, plus Charms, where careful investment can leave [[Manga/DragonBall one player as Goku while]] [[CantCatchUp another is left to be]] [[OvershadowedByAwesome Krillin]]. For the fan response, see ScrappyMechanic below.
** Rune of Singular Hate, a Solar Circle sorcery spell, could be seen as this. Once cast, the target rolls the values of his Attributes, Virtues, Abilities, Essence and Willpower one at a time. Each success allows the target to keep one dot of that trait. However, the drawback is that the caster loses one dot from every Attribute, Virtue and Ability he has, and that it can only be cast once by a sorcerer. But when used against extremely powerful targets, such as behemoths, Deathlords or elder Exalts, it will weaken them to the point that all but the weakest group of player characters can take them on.
** 2e Lunars had a combo based on Appearance Charms (specifically Perfect Symmetry)[[note]]a charm that allows for high Appearance scores to essentially reduce an opponent's mental defense to zero[[/note]] that turned them into rampaging social monsters. Appropriately, this acquired the FanNickname of "Pretty Kitty Revolution." (Despite the awesomeness of the name, it is ''not'' a well-liked mechanic and is no longer around for 3e.)
** 3e's backer draft (and to an extent, the final version) had the Solar Larceny Charm Fate-Shifting Solar Arete. While at first glance a mere 'dice trick' Charm, FSSA turned a fail-number into the equivalent of a 10. On ''any'' roll at all. This could turn dicey rolls into massive successes, and got even ''stronger'' with an E4 repurchase that let you choose a second number to apply the same bonus to. Essentially, the Charm made extended rolls like Wyld-shaping or Sorcerous Actions utterly trivial. The full release nerfed it into the ground, with a once-a-day no extended rolls restriction, but it still remains among the most potent dice adders in the entire book, with the advantage of applying to ''anything''.
* JerkassWoobie: [[AlternateCharacterInterpretation Whether serial killer in the making or undeserving victim]], you can't argue with the fact that Autochthon both made some dick moves (creation of the Exalted, leading to the death or imprisonment of his siblings), and had ''very good reasons'' for making dick moves (the previous act was his response to what was essentially the vivisection and murder of his firstborn son).
* MemeticMutation:
** Is the Exaltation of the Dragons, or from the Dragons?[[labelnote:Explanation]]Peleps Deled, a fundamentalist Immaculate Monk, is so set in his understanding of the Immaculate Texts that he ''killed a fellow monk'' over this issue.[[/labelnote]]
** Chejop Kejak looks a bit like Sean Connery.
** The Gods are ''VideoGame/WorldOfWarcraft'' addicts. Or crack addicts.[[labelnote:Explanation]]The Celestial Gods being addicted to the Games of Divinity.[[/labelnote]]
** The Unconquered Sun is high on Celestial Crack.
** The city of Gem is always [[DoomyDoomsOfDoom doomed.]] ALWAYS.[[labelnote:Explanation]]When First Edition "soft metaplot" materials came out, a lot of them had Gem being targeted by the Deathlords/the Locust Crusade/the Fair Folk/whomever.[[/labelnote]]
** "For the good of all Creation, Gem must be destroyed!"
** [[SuspiciouslySpecificDenial There is no such thing as the White Veil Society. It does not exist. It is not an absolutely awesome club, with the most fascinating of members, and unlimited sources of the most sweet, delicious, euphoric tea and ice cream that they use to control the Scarlet Empire. Oh, and they most certainly do not have their own top secret in-house supernatural martial arts style they use to assassinate anyone they can't control. Because that would be incredibly stupid. Nope.]]
** '''''[[Webcomic/KeychainOfCreation Dodge Charms.]]'''''
** Lyta X Peleps Deled.[[labelnote:Explanation]]Lyta is a Solar who burns Realm Dragon-Blooded to death with giant mirrors as sacrifices to the Unconquered Sun; Peleps is a Dragon-Blood, TheFundamentalist and ArrogantKungFuGuy dedicated to a belief system that wants as many Solars as possible to die right now.[[/labelnote]]
** MAGMA KRAKEN
** AVOIDANCE KATA![[labelnote:Explanation]]The name of a Sidereal charm that lets them retroactively make it so they were never present in a scene. Fans and writers for the line will sometimes use the term when editing out mistakes or otherwise making evidence of past errors disappear.[[/labelnote]]
** GLORIOUS SOLAR is getting pretty popular too, especially [[MundaneUtility with ridiculously mundane uses]] such as a [[Webcomic/KeychainOfCreation Glorious Solar [Desk]]].
** Sidereals hide in teacups.
** What the Christ are you talking about!!!?[[labelnote:Explanation]]The result of signature Zenith Caste Panther's angry black man status; to lampshade it, a fan on the official forums went through all the official comics and [[http://forum.theonyxpath.com/forum/main-category/exalted/732904-i-m-just-going-to-leave-these-vandalized-chapter-comics-here made photoshopped versions]] that replaced Panther's lines with "WHAT THE CHRIST ARE YOU TALKING ABOUT", leading to the fanbase treating him as if his entire character consists of shouting this line and punching people in the face.[[/labelnote]]
** Mask of Winters can't read.[[labelnote:Explanation]]The writer of his 2nd ed stats forgot to include a Lore ability rating. Characters without at least one dot in Lore are illiterate.[[/labelnote]]
** Sidereals punch people so hard they turn into ducks. One of the better Sidereal charms is called Duck Fate.
* MemeticTroll: The 3E version of Eye in Seven Despairs, [[LoveToHate with high praise]]. While in-universe Eye is a bit of a BrilliantButLazy InsufferableGenius, fandom takes their tendency to [[NoSenseOfPersonalSpace show up unannounced around their deathknights]], eager desire to sell prototypes on the cheap to test them, and MoodSwinger tendencies when bored to portray them as a LaughablyEvil CloudCuckooLander who is completely oblivious to how uncomfortable/maimed the people around them are.
* MisBlamed: Some fans blame 3e's slow production cycle on having multiple crowdfunders, suggesting that reducing them would speed production up. Crowdfunding and production are almost entirely separate, done by different people, and cutting one wouldn't free up resources for the other. (The main holdup after the change in developers has been the art, with a lot of Onyx Path products hitting art direction together and needing to be worked through, not helped by the fallout of the UsefulNotes/COVID19Pandemic.)
* MisaimedFandom: Fans that consider the Ebon Dragon to be EvilIsCool or a MagnificentBastard due to the plans he can pull off to impede others miss that the whole point of his character is [[TheDevilIsALoser that's all he can do]]. He is, no matter what he does, in the end a loser, since all he can do is deny victories to others, and has no goals beyond that.
* SugarWiki/MomentOfAwesome:
** The game rewards players for creative and over-the-top descriptive. The highest level of reward is reserved for Crowning Moments.
** On the part of the Ink Monkeys: They did a series of articles on the Daystar, following up on the successes of Glories of the Most High. For parts of the fandom, it was sheer concentrated awesome.
* MoneyDearBoy: Revealed to be the reason why the Ink Monkeys stopped making new material -- they got greenlit to actually be paid for things.
* NightmareFuel: Enough for [[NightmareFuel/{{Exalted}} its own page]].
* {{Narm}}:
** The 3E Lunars corebook, in describing Lilith's feelings towards her new husband, segues into flowery descriptions of his attractiveness that sound ridiculously out-of-place in a franchise that has never placed much emphasis on romance or physical appearance.
** One of the [[DemonLordsAndArchdevils Yozis]] is Kimbery, embodiment of toxic love and abusive relationships. She's just as terrifying as her fellows... except that the name is extremely similar to ''Kimberly'', leaving the poor GM one slight mispeak away from giving the demonic invasion of Creation a [[TomTheDarkLord disarmingly mundane feel.]]
* NoYay: Consider this: the most powerful Malfeas charms can only function within the confine of a city. Meanwhile, Alchemicals eventually turn into a city. Judging from how Primordials interact with each others, this can only mean that Malfeas is ''really'' into Autochthon. Pass the BrainBleach, please.
* PopularGameVariant: The second edition has had ''many'' rules issues that led to everything from minor tweaks to massive mechanical rewrites to get rid of the problems. For example, some groups issue XP at character creation instead of the normal point-buy or hand out bonus points instead of XP, since the character creation system has flat costs for attributes and abilities while XP-based advancement has each dot cost progressively more, leading to people who failed to optimise being left in the dust due to the higher cost of reaching the same levels as their more min-maxed peers. Others have engaged in enormous projects to rewrite the more catastrophically broken material, such as most of [[CanonDiscontinuity Scroll of]] [[OldShame the Monk]].
* ProtectionFromEditors: Second Edition had an extremely hands-off approach, the Developer concluding that the writers would have better ideas without him interfering.
* RescuedFromTheScrappyHeap:
** ''Lunars: Fangs at the Gate'' aims to do this with the elders of the Silver Pact, and seems to have done a fairly good job of redeeming Ma-Ha-Suchi from a cruel, fairly generic madman into a more noble BrokenAce who wants to rebuild the First Age as he remembers it, and making Raksi from an AxCrazy PsychopathicManchild into a [[EvilIsCool ruthlessly effective]] EvilOverlord without changing her being a ''monster.''
** ''Abyssals: Sworn to the Grave'' followed up with the Deathlords, who were viewed as edgy and immature takes on villains to all being potential {{Big Bad}}s of a chronicle, and from the start of crowdfunding, the fans were quite pleased, especially with [[MadScientist Eye in Seven Despairs]], [[BloodKnight Walker in Darkness]], [[VillainWithGoodPublicity the Silver Prince]], and [[SerialKiller Black Heron]]. Eye in particular was much loved from going from a ButtMonkey stalker to a GibberingGenius with AttentionDeficitCreatorDisorder who is an endless source of plot hooks with their inventions, a hilariously hands-on approach to their deathknights, and [[BewareTheSillyOnes legitimately competent at both]].
* RootingForTheEmpire: Due in part to TooBleakStoppedCaring, there was a non-negligible amount of people who preferred to cheer for the Deathlords or the Yozis instead of the majority of the people living in Creation. Things can only get so terrible before people start to think that yes, perhaps the world would be better off sent into the Underworld, swallowed up by Oblivion, or (most commonly) reclaimed by the original creator deities, despite all their cruelty and alien whims. As best as can be figured out, this seems to have faded away in 3e.
* RunningTheAsylum: In a case of Administrivia/TropesAreNotBad, the addition of the Ink Monkeys and Errata Team Prime led to a general increase in the quality of the rules and was very well received on the White Wolf forum (seriously, saying you disliked them was FandomHeresy for a while)- but see also BrokenBase. They have their detractors, some of whom get as vehement as the fans.
* ScrappyMechanic: Most traits bought up in character creation are paid for at a flat rate, but increase in cost exponentially afterwards when bought with experience points. Sub-optimal point investment in character creation, consequently, can leave a character behind literally the equivalent of hundreds of experience points (in a game where 4 per session is the baseline rate). This has persisted through the first and second editions of the games, and despite a vocal demand from parts of the player base for a more equalized character creation and/or XP mechanic, it persists through the new third edition. The developers have opined it would be "fake equivalence" to correct it, and "[they] never really bean-counted with any of [their] characters," and [[http://forum.rpg.net/showthread.php?768985-Exalted-Why-is-Everyone-Praising-3e&p=19548177#post19548177 "[they] have a policy not to give people bad rules just because they think they want them."]]
** Quite possibly ''the'' most egregious example of this in Second Edition is Willpower. The cost for a dot of Willpower is the rating multiplied by two, so theoretically it's really cheap to increase low willpower, ''but'' you already start with five Willpower inder the 2.5 Errata. But that also means about 50% of the total cost of maxing out your Willpower is in the final three or four dots. In character creation on the other hand, it costs just five bonus points to max out your Willpower. Whilst five bonus points is a little over a quarter of your starting budget, it still means you never have to worry about spending anywhere from ''three to five sessions''' worth of experience on a ''single'' dot of Willpower. ''Incidentally'', Willpower is one of the biggest factors in determining your {{Mana}} pools, especially for Lunar Exalts.
** Though not quite as widely maligned, due to having some positive upshots, the Resources system in the first and second editions is similarly problematic. The Resources trait gives a simple zero-to-five abstract rating of a character's general wealth, meant to avoid having to do painstaking math or accounting. It does avert this, which is the upside. A character can't buy something that costs more than their Resources rating. Purchases below it are "out of pocket" expenses and don't affect the rating. A purchase equal to the rating is a significant expense, and lowers the rating by 1. However, this means that characters can purchase "insignificant" things in infinite quantities, characters with Resources 1 literally cannot buy anything at all without bankrupting themselves, and merely buying the same items in a certain order completely changes their impact on your wealth. Ex: At resources 3, buying a resources 3 item, then a resources 2 item, then a resources 1 item would drop you to resources 0. If you bought them in reverse order, despite their prices and your wealth being completely unchanged, you would only drop to resources 2. In the third edition, frequently purchasing items at your Resources level puts you into debt without actually lowering your Resources, which is left to storyteller handwaving to enforce.
** The Craft system in 3rd Edition is considered to be overly complex by some, often being compared to games like VideoGame/CookieClicker. The most important distinction in the system is between "basic" and "major" projects, which the former providing a special sort of experience point needed for the latter. This results in scenarios such as an armourer needing to forge a dozen knives to get the points needed to make a suit of armour, or a tailor needing to stitch embroidery samplers to get the points needed to cut and sew a dress. Exactly what these points represent in concrete, in-story terms is a bit abstract and nebulously defined. The Exalted do have charms that allow them to side-step this and pull superweapons out of nowhere whenever it's dramatically appropriate.
** Inverted with the practice of having visual charts/trees of charm prerequisites in the books. The third edition was supposedly written so that these would be unnecessary, so they were not used. Considering the alacrity with which the fan base took the time to re-create them, this was not the case.
* {{Squick}}:
** Lillun. No, not Lilith, this is someone else. [[spoiler: The Yozis realized that the Sidereals had locked up Solar Exaltations in the Jade Prison, and that the Deathlords were using the Monstrances of Celestial Portion to create Abyssal Exaltations, so they needed something to run the 50 Solar shards they got through the spin cycle. So they made their own storage device. Out of a ''little girl'', whose body has been horribly twisted and tortured to provide a ''living'' cage for the Infernal Exaltations. That's right; the Yozis took a mortal girl, stuck her in ''Hell'', and tortured her so that they could further their plans. Although the Scarlet Empress deserves her own share of the monstrousness here: Lillun was her youngest daughter, and it was the Empress who sold her to the Yozis in the first place.]]
--->[[spoiler:"In her calmer lucid moments, Lillun seems to appreciate these simple pleasures and the company of the innocent. To date, the feeling has not proven mutual."]]
** There's also an artifact [[spoiler:made of the corpses of dead children. And it sings. This one's in the 2nd Edition Abyssals book]].
** In fact, [[spoiler:all of the Abyssals' [[{{Magitek}} necro-tech]] in Abyssals 2nd Edition.]]
** In ''Dreams of the First Age'', Volume 1, the artwork immediately before the appendix shows a (presumed) Fair Folk noble lady holding a dinner party. Only the guests are chained to the chairs. And when you look closely, you notice that [[spoiler:the main course is a ''human baby served on a salad platter'']]. The host's wearing [[spoiler:a dress made of severed hands. HANDS]].
** How the [[HalfHumanHybrid Beastmen]] [[BestialityIsDepraved are created]], at least in the first two editions. Third Edition, thankfully, gives several other more-practical options, but before that? Eugh.
* TheyChangedItNowItSucks: A few fans complain about the changes 3e makes to the setting, seeing it essentially as fanfic of the original by its developer teams (downplaying magitech, adding new Exalted, greater perceived European influence, etc.).
* TooBleakStoppedCaring: Exalted's had a lot of writers, and [[DependingOnTheWriter different writers]] have different opinions on where exactly Exalted should be on the SlidingScaleOfIdealismVersusCynicism, with [[ArmedWithCanon individual chapters often reflecting the desired tone of individual writers]], sometimes in the same book.
** 1st Edition started, from the first paragraph of the first chapter of the first book, with the idea that the world was in fact doomed in the default setting, in the manner of a Greek tragedy.
** Hoping to counter the trend, the developer's last outline at the beginning of 2nd Edition urged that SavingTheWorld is neither [[FailureIsTheOnlyOption hopeless]] nor {{p|yrrhicVictory}}ointless. This was [[WriterOnBoard not necessarily taken to heart by the writers]].
** However, some 2nd Edition publications worked hard to drive home alternative perspectives: the Incarnae are interesting and not just distant divine losers, Infernals sure are capable of [[AntiAntichrist a rebellion]], and Autochthonia presents a fascinating world in which the [[WhatMeasureIsAMook mortals]] clearly matter as more than just scenery. The newer vision set off more than one debate, and writers with strong opinions on exactly where Exalted belong on the scale nicknamed the darker trends "shitdark".
** Many of the later 2nd Edition publications, in an attempt to diversify opinion on the Incarnae and other topics, accidentally created one true way of interpreting these facts. One especially glaring example is the Daystar: while many loved it, many others hated it so much they swore off Exalted. And the writers have revealed that the Daystar will not be appearing in third edition, out of a general move to shift the cosmic stuff back and refocus attention on Creation itself.
* WinBackTheCrowd: Part of the reason the Ink Monkeys were hired, why they browsed multiple online communities--both the official White Wolf forums and elsewhere--and why some of them became the developers and writers of the third edition. As with all things, whether or not they succeed depends on the viewer. Or even the individual book or article.
* TheWoobie: Been said before, on this page even, but poor Lilun... In fact, ''many, many,'' sympathetic characters could be up here in varying amounts. Most of them are {{Jerkass Woobie}}s, such as Chejop Kejack or many [[JerkassGods gods]], but it's implied that even ''the Unconquered Sun'' has had a nervous breakdown due to a combination of stress and betrayal, and fallen into a depression which he alleviates by submerging himself in [[LotusEaterMachine the Games of Divinity]].
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