Exalted!

You know what this forum needs? An Exalted thread.

So Scroll of Heroes came out, and I was thumbing through it, and loved that they put more than just mortals in there. Also, loli flaw is hilarious.

Loli flaw?

Its called "Child", but everyone is gonna use it to make themselves lolis. In a subversion, it is actually quite a crippling flaw. I can't post it on here, but just know that you will be much weaker and bad at socializing with adults, and that's just for young. Go very young, and just don't roll the character.

Heh. Children are to Creation like mice are to a meat-grinder. Except that sometimes the mice gain superpowers and wreck the machine.

edited 26th Jul '09 6:38:53 AM by krrackknut

I'm planning on picking up the sourcebook today. It sounds really awesome, especially the martial arts. But can Solar even use most of them?

Sorry for the double post, but EXALTED IS AWESOME!! I can shoot razor-winged butterflies from my hand and then throw a razor ring that loops around a tree like five times and flies in a dinosaur's face, then returns to my hand, all of this at first level! AND I get bonuses for the looping thing!

If my memory serves, Solars can learn some of the basic martial arts styles but true mastery is reserved for Dragon Blooded and most especially Sidereal Exalted.

Nope. Martial Artists have three levels, which is called the Perfected Lotus. Mortals are the mud, which makes the structure. Terrestrial Martial Artists (Enlightened Mortals and Dragon-Blooded) form the Roots, still rooted to ground and reality, but more powerful. Celestial Martial Artists (Enlightened Dragon-Blooded and Celestial Exalted) form the Bulb. They are more powerful than the Terrestrial ones, and Celestials can learn them much easier. Sidereal Martial Arts form the Bulb of the Lotus. Only Solars and Abyssal with a Sifu, Sidereals, Lunar Akuma with a Sifu, and Solar Akuma can learn it. They break reality, such as punching people so hard they turn into little girls, turning yourself into a miniature primordial, or fighting inside dreams.

So, Sidereal>Celestial>Dragon-Blooded.

What's Sifu and what are Akuma?

Beside the point. I came up with an interesting Solar, who I nicknamed "the Valkyrie of the North". She was raised in Whitewall (forgot the name exactly), was the daughter of a revolutionary, and was sent to be one of the 24 annual sacrifices. However, she was Exalted in time for her to supernaturally trick one of the guards holding her to sacrifice himself in her place. She escaped Whitewall and, after a journey of many years, arrived in (wherever the campaign takes place, probably greater cities). Her Motivation is to convince the Dragon-Blooded to destroy Whitewall, as a city that celebrates death by Cthuloid elves is incredibly immoral. A greater Motivation would probably be to drive the Elves (or demons, etc.) from the North.

So, Zenith caste, high Compassion and Valor, low Conviction. Lots of Presence charms.

A Sifu is a teacher of Martial Arts. Sidereal ones are the best, for obvious reasons, and the only Sidereal Martial Art you can learn without a Sifu is Quicksilver Hand of Dreams, but then comes a point where your dreams make you seek one out.

Akuma are mortals and Exalted who made a deal with a demon, and gain a lot of power, but lose freedom.

Glories of the Most High came out today, here is an fucking insane tidbit.

Titan-Unleashing Clarion: Conviction: This Charm is one of the spoils inherited from the Unconquered Sun’s victory in the Primordial War. Taking a reflexive action to raise his horn to his lips and blast a world-cracking note of judgment (which costs only one mote), the Unconquered Sun sunders the demon realm and summons any jouten of a Yozi to appear before him. This Charm can also summon the Kukla or any other Greater Elemental Dragon, as well as horrors imprisoned beneath or beyond Creation since prehistory such as the legendary apocalypse god after whom the first Greater Elemental Dragon was named. Beings summoned by the Charm accept and obey any singular task the god gives to them like a successfully bound demon would, after which they return to their prison. Unlike a demon, however, such creatures cannot be told how to do a task, only what must be done. They apply their own horrid precepts to the challenge and are free to do so in any way that satisfies the letter of the command. The obvious inherent dangers have kept the Unconquered Sun from deploying this Charm in recorded history. Yet, should any of the titans unleash wrath such as the Three Spheres Cataclysm upon Creation again, the Highest of Holies will not hesitate to draw the offender into the path of the attack.

It's a really good thing his chosen don't have that.

Still, I've had the impression that Sol was a lot more proud and arrogant, and it's nice to see my view contradicted.

If you haven't already, check out The Keychain of Creation. It's basically "The Order Of The Stick, only in Exalted".

I love it now.

From the White Wolf wiki: There is no page titled "Order of the White Veil".

Mmmm....Pity. The order of the white veil and its Exalted counterpart (I think?) had so much potential for awesomeness. But it doesn't exist, and its not like there are nonexistent White Veil practioners actively mentioned in any of the books, right? rig-Hrarglglglglglglg.............

Yes, Exalted is made of epic win and awesome. Let's not forget that the signature weapon of the Alchemical Exalted martial art known as the Thousand-Wounds Gear is like Captain America's shield as designed by Ash Williams after a huge game of Warhammer 40000.

Just a random thought.

Just realised how best to sum up Fair Folk motivations.

Douglas Adams: In the beginning, the universe was created. This has made a lot of people very angry and is widely regarded as a bad move.

Then some other people decided to change the Universe round a bit and made it fairer. This annoyed people even more.

It's a cycle of people fixing the annoyance and, in the process, annoying someone else...

Been quite a while, but I always wanted to do a character, maybe Eclipse caste, with maxed out Bureaucracy. I'd call him Jadefinger.

"No, Mr. Bond-Of-The-Dead-Will, I expect you...to DIE!"

I wonder how many stunt points or motes I get for that?

I don't know, maybe I'll still thinking about Thulsa Doom's cult, a bit of..."Jade...that is power; with the flick of a pen, I can change the course of world!"

• Stock Note?

Maybe not the best place to ask this, but... which system is better, Exalted or Scion? I'm thinking of running one in the near future...

With the caveat that I'm not very well-versed in Scion at all, from what I've heard it's an awesome idea that suffers from some serious mechanical and logistical problems. For example, a typical dice pool could easily be in the high teens, meaning you roll, say, 68d10 for a single check, and other problems as well, I'm sure.

Exalted can also suffer from this problem to a degree, but less so. Instead it has other problems, particularly when it comes to battle between two Celestial Exalted. Since Celestial Exalted can practically become invulnerable at chargen, they live as long as they have motes, and motes can be regained in-battle by stunting, it becomes a defense-contest to see who conserves the motes best.

In both cases, the setting ideas are among the best in the industry, the mechanics... less so.

I've only played Exalted, but I can give a few tips that might help. Don't pit Celestial Exalts on Celestial Exalts with the intention of killing. Have Exalts fight spirits or demons or Fair Folk or behemoths, or let the battles with other Celestial Exalts be about stalling them, or getting past them, or getting a chance to talk to them.

Correct me if I'm wrong, since I haven't actually played Exalted yet, but couldn't a Storyteller reserve perfect defence Charms for bosses and offer players a chance to exploit the flaws of invulnerability?

You could, but that's got its own problems. As written, Exalted are actually kind of fragile in terms of "damage they can survive" vs. "damage they can dish out". The rules seem to assume any Celestial getting into a fight will have a(t least one) Perfect Defense.