Sorcery Edition
>What is Exalted?
An epic high-flying role-playing game about reborn god-heroes in a world that turned on them.
Start here: http://theonyxpath.com/category/worlds/exalted/

>That sounds cool, how can I get into it?
Read the 3e core book (link below). For mechanics of the old edition, play this tutorial:http://mengtzu.github.io/exalted/sakuya.html
It’ll get you familiar with most of the mechanics.

>Gosh that was fun. How do I find a group?
Roll20 and the Game Finder General here on /tg/. good luck

>Resources for Third Edition
>3E Core and Splats
https://www.mediafire.com/folder/b54o6teut3fx6/Exalted_3e

>Errata for Third Edition
https://docs.google.com/document/d/1n3ooTmopm3CBxW5jwPp1761xsaIccea-5XIhVM_PQEc/edit

>Other Ex3 Resources
https://pastebin.com/fG1mLMdu

>Resources for Older Editions
https://pastebin.com/BXSGuFdQ

>Collection of Exalted Hacks
https://pastebin.com/gtZnycJs

>Stuff that might be interesting
https://forum.rpg.net/index.php?threads/the-exalted-thread-with-no-original-ideas.317216/

Last thread: >>95954580
Thread Question: What's your favorite spell and why?

>>96020354 (OP)
>What's your favorite spell and why?
Excluding summoning spells and ones that will actually see play, probably Mists of Eventide and that one that turns your hand into a vampiric mouth if you pick it as a control spell.

Special mentions to Wings of the Archon of course, for giving me the power to dimension shift and Unity of the Closed Fist for being insanely broken. But they're both Solar tier so are super niche despite being narratively amazing.

>>96020468
>Mists of Eventide and that one that turns your hand into a vampiric mouth if you pick it as a control spell.
I wonder why.

>>96020354 (OP)
>What's your favorite spell and why?
Curse of Slavish Humility. I find the idea of someone needing to glaze me even as they're trying to kill me to be hilarious.

>>96020952
kek

>>96020354 (OP)
>What's your favorite spell and why?
I like the Rain of Spiders because it works wells as set up for other abilities.
https://youtu.be/4aGfKjzYSeU?si=pd69Dcjn9zYuerhX

>>96021850

>>96020354 (OP)
If I was to get back into Exalted what’s the best edition? The newest one?

>>96022045
Essence if you want a compilation, ExWoD or ExCofD if you want a less shit engine.

>>96020354 (OP)
to whomsoever updates, final versions of Tomb of Memory and Deeds Yet Undone are on g0f1l3
/d/Bn1OZL

>>96022045
The newest is still 3e. It's slated to be done with all of the past Exalted plus Exigents in the next year or two.

(Personally, I can't quite believe it's been ten years this fall already, at least for the backers. Seems like it wasn't that long ago that the pdf leak was getting passed around here.)

>>96020354 (OP)

>What's your favorite spell and why?

Birth of Sanity's Sorrow because I actually got to cast it once.

>>96022504
ESTUANS INTERIS
IRA VEHEMENTI
SEPHIROTH

>>96022045
>If I was to get back into Exalted what’s the best edition? The newest one?
Essence, which is both the newest one and enough alike 2e that you won't feel uncomfortable.

>>96020354 (OP)
>What's your favorite spell and why?
The Spy Who Walks in Darkness, because I'm an utter coward with a strong desire for telepresence, scrying, and being a spooky shadow in the corner offering cryptic advice.

Are there any charms or spells in the book that are astral projection in the sense that you can use spells or charms from afar? Other than the ones where it's like you can use Awareness Charms from afar.

>>96023121
>Are there any charms or spells in the book that are astral projection in the sense that you can use spells or charms from afar? Other than the ones where it's like you can use Awareness Charms from afar.
The Spy Who Walks in Darkness (any version other than the Book of Three Circles), Ghost Crystal Shard (the 1e variant allows spellcasting, the 2e variant doesn't), Sorcerer's Irresistible Puppetry (1e/2e), Links Born of Tumult (1e/2e), Slumber of the Wandering Shade (Essence), and Let Slip the Chains (Essence).

>>96023121
Oh, and Charms. Hm. There aren't many charms that really work well for it, but Border of Kaleidoscope Logic Form and Reliant Soul Infiltration are close. Ant-And-Starfish Trick (2e variant) sort of works. Broken-Tile Organ Condition / Jigsaw Organ Condition can detach organs which could be used to scry (dislocate an eye) and cast line-of-sight or Touch keyworded effects through. Sneaking a finger into someone's pocket would be a pretty funny way to Touch them with all the other esoteric Citrine Poxes of Creation Style effects.

It's not something that easily fits into most native charmsets.

>>96020354 (OP)
I’d sure like to fuck her, if you know what I mean hehe ;)

>>96023171
>if you know what I mean
Not really, could you expand on your point?

>>96022388
Thanks

>Still no Abyssals complete posted
Why?

>>96023121
Abyssals have the ultimate spying charm, Piercing Gaze of the Unmaker.

>>96026435
It was posted a while back bro

Tie between Summoning the Azure Chariot and Death of Obsidian Butterflies.

Both of them just drill in how grandiose and bizarre even the weakest sorcery is in Exalted. Your basic attack magic is a massive claymore with shrapnel made of obsidian butterflies. Your basic travel magic summons horses that probably just finished a shift in a Tanith Lee novel to carry your sky chariot around.

Honorable mention to Magma Kraken. It's a kraken made out of lava, how can you not love it?

>>96027150
Incomparable Body Arsenal > Magma Kraken

>>96026435
it's not available to the public yet
unless you mean the backer pdf, inwhich case>>96026882

>>96020354 (OP)
Did the mountain of the spider ling have another name before the lunar showed up? And the mountain range west of whitewall are the black crag ountains, yes?

>>96028202
Fucking keyboard eating my words again

>>96020468
>Excluding summoning spells and ones that will actually see play
Why would Mists of Eventide and Demon Maw not see play?

Would a Necromancy spell that sends the target into torpor be unusual?

>>96028293
>Why would Mists of Eventide and Demon Maw not see play?
You misinterpreted anon. Those aren't excluded, therefore the anon does think they will see play. The special mentions are the ones that got excluded.

>Exalted Essence with 2e's weeaboo art direction
Finally, the perfect Edition for noobs.

>>96029208
>Would a Necromancy spell that sends the target into torpor be unusual?
Only in that incapacitating someone is a powerful effect, so put it behind saves and/or other limiting measures.

>>96029865
The limitation would be how the target would need to be painted so they would need to be retained, sleeping or willing. Besides that I was thinking if it should be a Void Circle to affect any kind of creature and bar non Abyssals from reaching it.

>>96029895
>The limitation would be how the target would need to be painted so they would need to be retained, sleeping or willing.
It's certainly a strong limitation.

>Besides that I was thinking if it should be a Void Circle to affect any kind of creature and bar non Abyssals from reaching it.
I would make it Labyrinth Circle with the painting limitation if it's anything like your pic, because there are large classes of creature it won't be able to effect - specifically, any spirits that are natively intangible would be diegetically immune because going into torpor would release their Materialize effect, so they'd lose the paint. Also, some characters like Yozi would be too big to feasibly paint up in their more easily accessed bodies (basically, you can't cast it on Malfeas by pointing the spell at a wall while in Malfeas).

The closest spell I'd compare it to with this kind of effect and limit is Eternal Crystalline Encasement, a second circle sorcery spell which time locks a target with a day-long ritual. This has upsides (you can interact with the torporous subject) and downsides (time being stopped does more than stasis people) that put it on roughly the same level.

>>96029976
>>96029895
On second thought, the spirit immunity doesn't make as much sense as I had previously thought and wouldn't be necessary to make it balanced at 2nd circle.

A third circle variant that came to me would be to consider letting it also put regions into torpor (doing things like locking people inside into comas, making rivers slow and turgid, halting plant growth) if you can paint the whole way around it.

Martial Arts will forever be garbage until they do more than give you Charms that are shittier than native ones for a grossly inflated price tag.

>>96031372
>Martial Arts will forever be garbage until they do more than give you Charms that are shittier than native ones for a grossly inflated price tag.
Martial arts are cheaper than native charms because they don't cost experience that you would have been using for native charms. The opportunity cost analysis is better; ergo, they are cheaper.

>>96031728
>cheaper
>after paying a disgusting Merit tax
>after paying a skill dot tax
>all that before you can uby the Charms themselves
>cheaper
lolno

>>96031782
>lolno
This is a bit like saying monopoly train stations cost more than a model train set, because they cost 200$ each and the train set is only half that.

Except you pay for monopoly stations with monopoly money, which you seem to fail to understand. Splat xp is not worth much.

>>96031818
There's so many better ways to spend your splat XP.
>you could buy additional Attribute/Ability dots to make your native Charms stronger (and unlock further Charms)
>you could buy Evocations
>you could buy Sorcery stuff
>you could buy Merits
Martial Arts is just a bad investment. I get it if you want to invest in it for RP reasons, but don't piss on me and tell me it's raining. It's bad.

>>96029993
>A third circle variant that came to me would be to consider letting it also put regions into torpor (doing things like locking people inside into comas, making rivers slow and turgid, halting plant growth) if you can paint the whole way around it.
I see where that is coming from, the idea behind the spell in and out of universe is that an Abyssal tried to give their patrons something close to oblivion by forcing them into dreamless sleep. A part of me wanted to make a joke out of this by having the writing be a poem so bland it sends those who come into contact with it into a coma. The length of the poem would be same, so even if you are targeting a behemoth, you would only need about two meters2 to write.

>>>96017979
Thank you for explaining that. I think I will follow your suggestions here and focus on experimenting with Essence as it is first.

>>96031372
I like the martial arts in Essence because they are supplemental to the Close Combat charms rather than being inexplicably siloed off from native combat charms.

>>96033433
You, I like you. Tell me more please.

>>96033500
The way it works in Essence is that you can use martial arts so long as you meet the form weapon requirements, which is solely based on weapon tags: if you're doing Crane Style, for example, you need to wield something with at least one of the following tags: Disarming, Shield, or Natural. In order to learn a MA, you need to also have dots in abilities that supplement the martial art, such as Stealth for Ebon Shadow or Physique for Mantis. Finally, you get a base benefit for learning the first charm of a MA; usually this takes the form of giving your unarmed attacks access to tags beyond Natural or to count as a heavier weapon.

Otherwise, there's no restrictions to comboing charms from Martial Arts and Universal/Exalt-specific combat charms beyond the hard rule that you can't use more than one charm per combat step.

Does anyone here have any experience with using or playing the Sovereigns?

>>96035151
Nah I hate the dollar store wakandans

>>96035165
kek but why?

>>96035174
I heavily dislike afro-futurism and black alt history its just sad to see.

>>96035224
I agree with you but how is that tied to the Steven Universe looking mother fuckers?

>>96035262
he saw a depiction of black people not crawling in the dirt and became butt bothered

>>96035262
Well we have to talk about what clearly served as inspiration for them black panther and in turn that it was inspired by afro futurism.
Sovereigns and their kingdom is wakanda and black panther inspired powers fused with the realm.
And what's even funnier is that what inspired exalted was already present in exalted with the wives of anlath and his kingdom in the south.
So it's not even original in exalted.
And look at them they look hideous their style is just what if medieval with those African patterns and color purple?
Not even different colors to represent different kinds of gems.

>>96035332
>He says to a fan of exalted.
Do you forget that two of the classic Solar iconics are black people?
Hell I got mad that Jade was made ugly on purpose in 3e to make her "look more black".
That's why I dislike sovereigns they are transparent race based pandering on a game that is already build with immense diversity it just so happen that the only racially exclusive kind of exalted happen to be black.
It makes me roll my eyes.

>>96035469
>>96035406
having more than one type of black person around isn't pandering, and thinking they should all of them have to look the same as the ones they've shown before isn't staying true to exalted any more than i am

>>96035490
>having more than one type of black person around isn't pandering
Ok now where did I say that?
Hell one of my complains is that the sovereings are pulling from already threated ground if anything it is a repetition showing the same kind of black people.
Also if anything sovereings are putting black people into the box as they are the wakandan exalted made to appeal to them or more likely what others think that they want.
Now tell me if this doesn't seem like pandering:
>A wholly black kind of exalted
>All of them are rich kings and queens
>They have a super advanced civilization surrounded by northern barbarians
>Aesthetic inspired by afro futurism
>Powers inspired by black panther the most popular black superhero

The question actually is can you even pander harder than this?

>>96035490
Some times, 3e!Harmonious Jade looks like a racist caricature.
Specially compared to CB: Night's depiction.

>>96035469
I don't think Jade was made purposefully ugly; I just think everyone looks like dogshit with the new art studio.

>>96035543
You forgot the part where they profaned the corpse of an Incarna without any consequences.

>>96035650
My theories are, or it was to bury Jade and prop up the new night caste, or another overcorrection against 2e.

>>96035691
>My theories are, or it was to bury Jade and prop up the new night caste, or another overcorrection against 2e.
I'm not sure the developers are submitting art notes that say "make this character an uggo", I think its that the new artists are the cheapest people Onyx Path's leadership could get.

>>96035406
>>96035469
Missing shit like this is why I skim the lore.

>>96035406
>Sovereigns and their kingdom is wakanda and black panther inspired powers fused with the realm.
I'm not seeing it. There's nothing very isolationist about Uluiru and Black Panther's skill set is more like a stealthy Full Moon's than the flashy and socially-focused Sovereigns. I suppose its richer than its peers, but it doesn't seem like its that much better of a place to live than the Realm's closest satrapy in Fajad.

>>96035469
>That's why I dislike sovereigns they are transparent race based pandering on a game that is already build with immense diversity it just so happen that the only racially exclusive kind of exalted happen to be black.
Fair. Is their kit any good?

>>96035708
Bro look at this the artists here knows how to draw.

>>96035691
>My theories are, or it was to bury Jade and prop up the new night caste, or another overcorrection against 2e.
You are correct about overcorrection this was done as a reaction to some people saying she didn't actually look black.

>>96035543
Not sure they're "exclusively black" either. One of them on the cover of AT8D seems to be much more light-skinned than the other.

>>96035806
>Bro look at this the artists here knows how to draw.
Looks bad all around to me, anon.

>>96035818
Yeah just ignore the beautiful woman besides jade.

>>96035827
Doesn't look very good to me.

>>96035406
Not seeing Wakanda in its inspirations list in Essence.

>>96035880
Meh I seriously doubt they will just say that they are inspired by African alt history or other stuff like that.
It would be too transparent this kind of stuff is done with a thin veneer to hide behind.

>>96035835
Sure dude close your eyes.
I'm sure it will do you good.

>>96035880
>In the prologue to the DC Comics adaptation of Nine Princes in Amber, Zelazny describes how the initial inspiration for the Amber series came from two abstract sources: the surreal, shifting sensation of an experience he had walking through Baltimore, and his longstanding fascination with decks of cards, particularly Tarot.

>As he wandered Baltimore's unfamiliar streets, each turn seemed to reveal a different place, mood, or time — this experience became the seed of the concept of "walking through Shadow," a central mechanism in the Amber universe by which characters move through infinite alternate realities. At the same time, Zelazny had been intrigued by the symbolic and narrative possibilities of cards — an interest that evolved into the powerful, mystical Trump deck used by the royal family of Amber to communicate and travel across realms.

>Zelazny likened the writing of the first novel to a Shadow walk itself: he discovered the world of Amber bit by bit, not inventing it wholesale but uncovering it as if it already existed, hidden just beyond the veil of ordinary perception.
Weird.

>>96036012
Hiding it from who and why? They're all liberals/leftists.

>>96020354 (OP)
What's the best way to design homebrew sorcery spells?

>>96035691
>You forgot the part where they profaned the corpse of an Incarna without any consequences.
Beg your fucking pardon?

>>96036308
Find a concept and cross reference.

>>96036410
>Beg your fucking pardon?
The Sovereigns patron used Aurora's corpse as the main ingredient for their source of Exaltation or something along those lines.

>>96035691
>>96036441
now you're just lying
1. the corpse was already profaned, that's how he died
2. it's just his blood
3. they suffered consequences because their exaltations are fucked up

>>96036478
Oh yeah Cantana was simping for Aurora and killed himself to make her a gift despite the fact she was dead since the primordial war.

>>96036441
>Find a concept and cross reference.
Do you have any examples of this?

>>96036478
NTA but you are right they just bathe in his blood(cum) as seen in this drawing >>96035406

Imo that makes them even bigger gary stues.
I do wonder does that mean they are not even technically exigents but full on celestial exalted?

>>96035815
>One of them
Can you post the drawing?
That might be a token non-Black to avoid them being labeled as the ethnocentrism exalted

>>96036478
>3. they suffered consequences because their exaltations are fucked up
Isn't it just limit track?

>>96036569
>Do you have any examples of this?
Lets say want to want to have a spell that causes an Earthquake, you take a look at what spells have a similar scale and modify something like Atrocious Fire Transformation.

>>96036639
>I do wonder does that mean they are not even technically exigents but full on celestial exalted?
They are supossed to be knock off Dragon Bloods using an N/A artifact to reproduce.

>>96032020
You are absolutely right, anon. >>96031728 >>96031818 is a fucking retard. Martial arts isn’t cheaper just because you can use bonus xp for it instead of normal xp. The costs are the same and there are so very many better ways to be spending that xp, especially because martial arts by and large with a few exceptions are not very efficient in terms of power compared to the xp you spend for them once the merit and dots taxes are added. In fact, with those added they are one of the least efficient ways to spend xp.

That anon’s posts reek of no-games posting. In all my years playing this game I have never been in or ran a game where the bonus to regular xp ratio didn’t end up around a 50% average, and never more than 60% . You don’t get fucking limitless amounts of this shit to spend and there are a lot of things that can use it. But no, somehow motherfucker is gonna be spending 120+ bonus xp on a martial art like it’s nothing because that’s just peak efficiency or something. This is what happens when most of the actual players and homebrewers left the thread and now it’s mostly populated by people who will never play the game, they just want to argue about it.

One of the bigger compliments I can give Essence is that it does Martial Arts in a way that actually makes sense and feels like an extension of combat prowess instead of a weird sidegrade.

>>96036970
>One of the bigger compliments I can give Essence is that it does Martial Arts in a way that actually makes sense and feels like an extension of combat prowess instead of a weird sidegrade.
Massive waste of potential nonetheless, but still a step in a better direction.

>>96036978
>Massive waste of potential nonetheless, but still a step in a better direction.
Honestly, my entire opinion of Essence can be summed up as two steps forward/two steps back. For everything one thing they get right they either create a problem somewhere else or only half-heartedly implement the fix so as to leave it still shit. Even the one thing that everyone agrees is an improvement in the Venture system is just a copy of the Universal Project System homebrew that is a the better part of a decade old at this point. Not that I expect many here to remember that homebrew’s existence even though the creator used to hang around here. Hell, I’d post the pdf if it were still allowed. And really, all the UPS did was recognize what all of us did early on in 3E: the the sorcerous working system was actually well made and could be applied to almost any kind of long term project roll with a little finagling.

>>96037036
>Hell, I’d post the pdf if it were still allowed.
Why would it not be allowed?

>>96037045
>Why would it not be allowed?
The hack week was because of a virus.pdf doc ya dingus

>>96035490
having an entire black civilization of exalts in the FAR NORTH is pandering and was explicitly written for pandering reasons.

...it also doesn't help they're in a mini realm retread situation, since they not only had an equivalent of the scarlet empress but now she's missing and there's gonna be a civil war.

>>96035880
writers usually lie about this shit. the guy who wrote about the Spiral pretends he got the idea from the Black Spiral Dancers(lol) not Uzumaki.

>has an entire epstein's island where people go missing
What's her problem

>>96037036
>And really, all the UPS did was recognize what all of us did early on in 3E: the the sorcerous working system was actually well made and could be applied to almost any kind of long term project roll with a little finagling.
Sorcerous workings run on pretty close to the same system all extended actions do in 3e. Ventures don't work on anything even vaguely similar to that.

I think Exalted would be healthier if it had better art. The current shitty art mill westoid art styles it uses at the moment gatekeep the wrong sort of crowd. Anime style or even just appealing western style art would gatekeep the correct sort of people.

The current art chaff they have at the moment have zero way of making a fattie, an ugly, an oldie, a whitie, a darkie or anyone look cool.

>>96038802
It is hilariously ironic that Exalted started with a more anime influenced art style back when it was only for weebs and losers only to transition to a shitty western slop style just as anime was becoming the most popular style out there. At this point the game would be better served by going back to it in 4E and calling it returning to it's roots or something. Nah who am I kidding, there is no way the current devs would allow an appealing art style that tends towards attractive characters.

>>96020354 (OP)
What would be the best way to handle an Exigent with abilities focused around sorcery, especially in regards to what those abilities are besides maybe an increase in Essence efficiency when a certain Charm(s) is active and they’re casting spells? And besides the gods of schools of sorcery, are there any gods that make sense as the one(s) to use the Exigence to make such an Exalt?

>>96038970
>What would be the best way to handle an Exigent with abilities focused around sorcery, especially in regards to what those abilities are besides maybe an increase in Essence efficiency when a certain Charm(s) is active and they’re casting spells?
One thing that would be really cool is to give them charms that build on multiple spells as prerequisites. Their fully native charms can just be the three tiers of sorcery, with perhaps some limit on solar circle sorcery, and some of the sorcery-enhancers that are necessary for a good sorcerer in whichever edition they're in like being able to flurry sorcery actions or generic dicetrick #23. Then the meat of their charms is in effects that go between spells to bridge the gaps and create mechanics where they have thematic synergy but ordinarily would lack practical synergy, or making native-charms-that-are-spells that mix two spells together for a new effect.

>Impenetrable Sphere of Water + Unslakeable Thirst of the Devil-Maw combining to create a vortex attack that sucks people into a waterball that hovers over your hand
>Cirrus Skiff / Cloud Trapeze + Beckon That Which Stirs the Sky / Rain of Doom letting you ride a storm over people
>that plus a charm that only works while Lightning Spider is active to drop thunderbolts on people under your cloud
>Malediction of the Distorted Compass + Dragon of Smoke and Flame to curse people to be completely lost unless they follow the dragon which goes where you tell it to
>Flight of Separation + Flight of the Brilliant Raptor to burst into a bird or birds and fly away on wings of fire that set everything ablaze wherever you go
>Sculpted Seafoam Eidolon + Shadows of the Ancient Past to make realistic illusions of past events
>Corrupted Words except it lets any of your other curse-alike effects - like, say, Curse of Slavish Humility making them shout your praises - happen instead of the worm vomit when they try to breach silence
Probably not demon summoning though.

>>96038970
>And besides the gods of schools of sorcery, are there any gods that make sense as the one(s) to use the Exigence to make such an Exalt?
There are explicitly no gods of sorcery. My understanding is that this includes gods of the schools of sorcery. See picrel, which also has the god I'd pick: Saruvanis, who was a God-Blooded sorcerer in ancient times running about the mean streets of Yu Shan with his gang of friends until he became a real god at the end of his lifespan and organised into a real mystic fraternity investigating the nature of sorcery.

>>96036970
>That anon’s posts reek of no-games posting. In all my years playing this game I have never been in or ran a game where the bonus to regular xp ratio didn’t end up around a 50% average, and never more than 60% .
Never seen it drop below 80% unless the Storyteller was being really anal. 5:4 per session is normal in 3e.

>You don’t get fucking limitless amounts of this shit to spend and there are a lot of things that can use it.
No, but you do choose one at the start of the game and go with it. Yes, it costs a lot and it's near-impossible to take Martial Arts and something else, but everything costs a lot and it's a huge sunk cost to invest into an artifact or sorcery too. The starting investment in Martial Arts is higher but the payoff is charms that are cheaper than evocations and actually do something meaningful in combat unlike spells or random-ass non combat abilities/attributes.

>But no, somehow motherfucker is gonna be spending 120+ bonus xp on a martial art like it’s nothing because that’s just peak efficiency or something
It's obviously not peak efficiency, because that is taking native combat charms and killing everything. It's only ever good for people who have a non-combat plan for their non-splat xp they are really invested in and don't want to diverge into combat abilities for, or for Dragonblooded since their native combat charms are trash-tier. Someone who really wants to play social, basically. Martial Arts wins by being more approachable than artifacts and not competing with native combat charms, not by being better than either.

Also, please stop pretending it's actually going to cost 120 xp. You buy the merit with your free merit dots and the ability with free ability allocation and 2bp.

>>96037591
1. they explicitly migrated there after being chased out by fair folk
2. she's not missing, she's dead

>>96038802
>.
>The current art chaff they have at the moment have zero way of making a fattie, an ugly, an oldie, a whitie, a darkie or anyone look cool
You could have just said "humans, humanoids and animals", of 3e art, only objects like warstriders or monsters look acceptable to good.

>>96038848
I think they fell to the realism meme, and "desired to be taken serious" so they also removed thaumaturgy and Solar lifting is bound to the rules of physics.

Despite its decline in quality, Naruto was still popular, NUNS4 sold a lot, and Attack on Titan governed social networks, so it wasn't a case of anime losing popularity or influence.

>>96039276
NTA
They got chased off all the way from the south?
That's retarded and therefore a poor excuse.
Maybe they wanted cool exalted associated to the Aurora borealis but realized that would mean making a practically white only exaltation so they moved black people there to make it "diverse".

>>96039237
>or for Dragonblooded since their native combat charms are trash-tier
*laughs in Melee Excellency*

>>96039418
They could have used the southern lights instead

>>96039180
Here’s a thought, what if the god of a school of sorcery (any suggestions on what those might be like, BTW), created said Exigent as part of a plan to find a way to BECOME the god of sorcery itself?

Can a Solar, using only War charms, commanding several battlegroups of demons and elementals, defeat a circle combat specced DBs?

>>96039483
with some ambushes sure

>>96039483
yes.
>several battlegroups
the action economy alone would fuck even combat specced E5 immaculate grandmasters.

>>96039436
I suppose so, but the borealis is associated with tundras, so they thought it would look weird in the south, which is at best tropical and at worst becomes a sea of flames.

>>96039541
I think an aurora australis keying into the Uluiru were they to be in the south is pretty cool and original.

>>96039573
>is pretty cool and original
I do agree, but for whatever reason they didn't do it.

>>96039276
True even it does hit most of the same story beats.

>>96039483
Yes and no. The Order action is a bit silly and it's implications are vast. Battlegroup area attacks are a very all-or-nothing thing that can accidentally kill an entire circle, but while Orders mean their accuracy is very high their damage often falls behind, and as NPCs they don't have a minimum damage/Overwhelming rating, and they will thus be hard countered by Soak.

In a circle of five Dragonblood shikari practicing each of the five Dragon styles, Air solos, Earth solos, Fire dies, Water dies, and Wood dies. The Air Stylist stays out of close range and in the air and if the elementals/dragonblood don't have a ranged attack this makes them invincible, because being battlegrouped strips you of all your special stats and replaces them with Might. This means battlegroups cannot fly even if they are composed of flying mobs, and that blood ape battlegroups cannot use their shout attacks to deal with ranged foes. Earth Dragon has Soak and simply reduces all their damage to 0. The others have no hard counter, so sometimes they will simply be attacked with twenty successes, have the groups highroll damage, and die.

Notably, a warmaster is worst in a straight fight. Order buffs a battlegroup's ability to perform any action at all, so War will make you a jack-of-all-trades type character by default. Order doesn't require line of sight or have range requirements, so it's entirely valid to be an Intelligence-based warmaster sitting in a tent ten miles away letting your messengers get your orders to the front-lines twenty minutes delayed, stunting that you predicted the whole thing and are seventeen parallel dimensions ahead. Enough dickery with this in mind kind can beat quite a lot.

>>96039724
>so it's entirely valid to be an Intelligence-based warmaster sitting in a tent ten miles away letting your messengers get your orders to the front-lines twenty minutes delayed, stunting that you predicted the whole thing and are seventeen parallel dimensions ahead.
"My knowledge of war is so perfect that I fought the battle in my mind in advance, left perfect orders behind and left to face the next foe". New favorite Stratagem discovered.

>>96039774
Stratagem system needs to be reworked though.

>>96039579
White Wolf has a lot of blind spots, like a cat with food; once they are on a track, you need a great deal of force to make them rethink about it, even then, once you look away, they will return to scratch the doors of the closet.

>>96039774
https://youtube.com/shorts/rZZ2KQw-DqA?si=9b0cE_Jxz73ICMWK

Lmao I remember when I accused the devs of being a bunch of obvious libtard commies Holden confirmed Grabowsky did no work for 3e he was just paid to have his name in the book.
>Why would the writers lie about anything
Lmao anon eating up classic corpo lies.

>>96037596
Didn't it also have overly specific references to Uzumaki beyond just the spiral theme?

>>96041662
I think some of the bane deformities came from one of its stories but I'm not sure.

>>96037596
>>96041662
Maybe they simply are told that they can't name non-feminist approved or anime sources of inspiration?

>>96039724
>This means battlegroups cannot fly even if they are composed of flying mobs
Wait what? Supernatural powers get replaced by Might, but if they just have wings / can float then surely they can still fly.

>>96042080
>>96041972
Weird since there was another blatant reference to Junji Ito in Sidereals (the numinous statues are based on "the hole")

>>96037596
Its on you to prove there's a Wakanda/Black Panther connection and the only thing I can really see is that its a rich city with black people in it. I recall Wakanda being something like a quasi-tribal sort of set up and it being the most advanced country in the world from the handful of times its come up in comics I've read, and neither is true for Uluiru. Likewise, Black Panther's power set is not similar to the Sovereigns. If you have deeper insights into both, please post them, but I'm starting to think you don't really read comics or even watched that MCU film about the guy and you just threw it out there in your argument against the Sovereigns and didn't really think it through.

>>96039418
Groups of people moves all around during the Great Contagion, sometimes using some magical relics, sometimes being guided by magical beings, sometimes just setting sail. I suppose you're going to blow a gasket at the sample character from 1e's core being a red-haired black dude from the Scavenger Lands with a real-world Georgian name?

(The only outrageous thing about Tengiz Ksnis was the cheesiness of being triple-specced in Melee for "Weapons that he made", but that's early Exalted and specializations for you.)

>>96042576
You are barking at the wrong tree.
There is a clear connection between wakanda and Ilulu first black panther came out in 2018 the kickstarter for exigents in 2022 so the dates fit perfectly.
Second ofcourse the details won't be 1 to 1 but isn't it weird that there is suddenly a new very stereotypical black only city state after wakanda made black futurism mainstream?
Also the main power of Black Panther is his indestructible suit made out of a magical material say like indestructible gemstones?
It is clear that Ilulu is an attemp to ride the coat tail of Black Panther.

>>96042609
Literally no one cares the scavenger lands are the big melting pot of creation slaves from all of the world move through it.
But sure act retarded and close your eyes to the all black exalted group with their etno city state in the north of all places.
That's several steps more difficult to believe than a random redheaded black dude in a place full of all kinds of people.

>>96042649

Massive migrations of people from thousands of miles West, and you're going to get assblasted from one that can occur hugging the coast of the Inland Sea? Possibly starting from said Scavenger Lands? How do you think they even got to the Scavenger Lands in the first place?

There's plenty of things to be mad at 3e about, but this isn't one of them. I'd be taking them to task for still not detailing a list of things that's done with Occult but doesn't count as thaumaturgy. Or the handling of thaumaturgy in general. Or the Craft system. People with dark skin in the North? People can do some pretty crazy migrations if they think that the world is ending (twice even, they could have passed by space-warping sections of the Wyld while running away from the Fair Folk of the Balorian Crusade).

>>96041662
>>96042126
Since I don't really like playing this thread's favorite game of Chinese whispers a la Discord, I looked it up and Minton says he came up with the concept of Aiun (isles torn asunder/corruptive spiral force), but there's two major caveats here. He didn't actually write up Aiun beyond a general concept (leaving it to a different writer) and that he personally was inspired by the Black Spiral from Werewolf the Apocalypse, which is also a corrupting mutative force with a spiral motif. I can definitely see the freelancer they hired being a big fan of Uzumaki, but I can't really see why Minton would bother lying when half of Exalted is ripped off from some other property.
>>96042649
>Also the main power of Black Panther is his indestructible suit made out of a magical material say like indestructible gemstones
That's like saying all artifact armor is inspired by Black Panther because its all indestructible. Also, no, I think Black Panther's suit supplements his baseline powers, which were granted by a special herbal concoction and give him peak human capabilities (like Captain America).

>>96042692
>There's plenty of things to be mad at 3e about, but this isn't one of them.
Agreed that there is plenty of dumb things.
But is it not valid to be mad about transparent racial pandering?
All the exalted can be of any skin tone except the kings and queens of Ilulu the exalted that bathe in the blood of Aurora they all dress in purple and gold with stereotypical african clothing patterns.
get real.

>>96042697
That is the weakest point I make being honest but still the inspiration is clear.

>>96042754
To add to this this extends to my hatred for all the exigents that have a character attached to them like Janest.
No you are not playing a straw maiden you are playing my OC donnut steel JANEST isn't she super cool?
Let me waste pages upon pages for charms unique to her!
The way they implemented exigents is a complete botch.

>>96042754
>get real

In Exalted? Are you sure? It does mean being crushed under the weight of your own weapon and suit of armor.

>>96042870
>Are you sure? It does mean being crushed under the weight of your own weapon and suit of armor.
3e loves its realism that's why solars can't have leverange charms you see.. anime and puls are cringe and sexist.

>>96042882
Get sober and then get back to me.

>>96042842
They need someone to display in the art for said powers. And so they have one. Not necessarily the one that you have to use, though more than one Field Guardian might sacrifice themselves to get more than one Straw Maiden.

Serious, complaining about OCs in an Exalted thread of all places, even if they're officially published? Where do you think we are?

>>96042943
>Not necessarily the one that you have to use, though more than one Field Guardian might sacrifice themselves to get more than one Straw Maiden.
You really have no idea what you are talking about.
Janest is not an example of a staw maiden she is the straw maiden eben if another field god fires an exaltation it will birth a different exigency with different power to janest.
That's what my whole problem is those charms are only for Janest.

>even if they're officially published? Where do you think we are?
Again retarded.
The problem with exigets is that they are mostly selling you specific characters not generic exaltations to create a character with.
I don't give a fuck about anyone's OC.
But imagine if there were only 5 Solar exaltations and each one was cannonically tied to each one of the classic iconics so there is no creating your own dawn or zenith solar you HAVE to play as Dace or Panther there is no other option.

>>96042697
>but I can't really see why Minton would bother lying when half of Exalted is ripped off from some other property.
Maybe it is because of the disappointment from the fanbase, the association with Ito killed their hype.

>>96042754
Sovereigns are based on the royal family of Amber, specially the megalomania

>>96042692
Personally, I'm fine with dark-skinned people in the North, but I'd just prefer something like...I dunno, water-benders and their associated ethnicity in Avatar: the Last Airbender. Just, "people in the Northwest are typically like that", preferably with blue eyes and maybe blue hair -actually a reasonable and in-setting plausible thing in Exalted - coupled with dark skin to make for a bit more exotic whole, rather than just having people of Uluiru and just Uluiru be so different from Northerners in generals.

>>96042697
>but I can't really see why Minton would bother lying when half of Exalted is ripped off from some other property.
Especially considering that an OPP writer being inspired by Werewolf isn't exactly far-fetched.

>>96042943
>They need someone to display in the art for said powers. And so they have one.
There better ways of doing it, and Janest is notorious bad because, contrary of Pakpao, she is an Exalt of herself.

>>96043035
>Personally, I'm fine with dark-skinned people in the North,
nta
agreed but also nothe that not all dark skinned people are black from what I remember the wather tribe people are based on the inuit not africans.
Africans and indians just magically appeared in the world of avatar after Korra in the comics.

>>96043069
>agreed but also nothe that not all dark skinned people are black from what I remember the wather tribe people are based on the inuit not africans
Sure, that's fair, though kind of tangential to my point. My point is more just that a single black nation that also happens to have a dynasty of Exigents is more ham-fistedly pandering than just declaring that people west of that big mountain range in the North tend to have a dark skin in general, or whatever. It's kind of like that one black elf in Amazon's Rings of Powers show - that dude being literally the one black elf just underlined the inclusion of a token black elf being lazy pandering, while just having elves be represented by actors of various ethnicities would've been just a thing, a more-or-less valid artistic choice for that particular adaptation. Similarly, if Uluiru was surrounded by people who were actually kind of similar to Uluiru save for lacking Exalts of their own, the whole thing would feel more natural to me.

>>96042983
Yeah, they wrote that all Evocations should be unique, too, but then they had to backpedal on that for practicality reasons, making Evocations into a first come, first served basis, or having to share them more extensively between wielders. They'd have to backpedal on pretty much anything involving limited numbers of slots for heroes or weapons and the difficulty of making Charms; if not now, certainly if they ever touch on it again!

>>96043107
Sure I was just adding that it would be better to represent dark skinned people that are natives to cold climates rather than just plop south Africans in as the default dark skinned representatives.

>>96043154
Sure, sure, that's fair. I kind of feel like representation of minorities being kind of America-centric, that is. minorities that are relevant in America get representation and everyone else can get fucked, is a general trend and ultimately just a continuation of the the kind of cultural imperialism, for the lack of better term, that's been going on for several decades. Seeing actual Inuit-inspired cultures would be a lot more interesting that another "A internal US idpol issues being projected into everything" episode. I mean, I'm of the opinion that representation of different groups of people in fiction is a perfectly valid and even important thing to consider, but there are good ways and bad ways to go about it, and in a lot of cases it's handled in an extremely clumsy and, to repeat myself, in an extremely America-centric way.

>>96043206
Lol I did type at the end of my reply something about using south Africans as the default black skinned repressentatives like Americans always do.
But I ended up deleting that part, yeah I agree a hundred percent.

>>96043147
It is weird how they couldn't be bothered to write a charm builder. You would think they would have a methodology after writing a thousand of the damned things.

>>96043147
While I appreciate the intention behind having all artifacts be unique...
It was a big mistake in the future I hope they find a sort of middle road where there can be mass produced artifacts with generic powers and some rare, truly unique ones.

>>96036015
Not OP but really, it sucks.

>>96044104
>making artifacts is more of an art than a craft.
T. Holdorke in a long lost podcast.

>>96044131
Technically, we get one riding on the other. Gunzosha armor can be basic, or it can get you to some Artifact N/A hilarity, but it always has the default starter Evocations. Autochthonians did much the same with the chainsaw daiklaves and totally not lightsabers.

>>96044104
The problem is that we all know the basics (Efficiency is 1m/die at best, withering damage is cheapt but decisive isn't, etc), but going off the map is inherently, well, going off the map. I don't know if there is a good guide for it even after homebrewing for 24 years next month.

(Boy did my first efforts suck. Always how it goes, really.)

>>96044104
They have a charm lego set but not Evocations to the best of my knowledge.
>>96044256
True, but if the developers want people to come up with things at their tables, some guidelines would ease the process.

>>96044497
>The problem is that we all know the basics (Efficiency is 1m/die at best, withering damage is cheapt but decisive isn't, etc), but going off the map is inherently, well, going off the map.
Fair.

>>96042093
Supernatural merits and powers get folded up into Might. This would mean Wings get Might'd.

>>96044747
So birds can only fly on their own, the moment they become a flock they lose the ability to fly? That seems a bit nonsensical

>>96045154
>So birds can only fly on their own, the moment they become a flock they lose the ability to fly?
Yes. Similarly, gods are normally able to materialize to fight people in the material realm, but as soon as they're battlegrouped they lose the ability to do so.

>That seems a bit nonsensical
Yes. Blame 3e, not me. It's fixed for Essence.

>>96044747
is wings really a supernatural merit?

I wish there was a charm where you could temporarily invoke your Lunar territory, like having a banner flying or something. A lot of the Territory support is kind of meh otherwise.

>>96045692
Just pull a Dolia and homebrew one, like my friend did for Heart-Eaters.

Pay 10 motes and one WP to temporary claim a area or building of X size as a Lair/Territory, the effect last for N hours or as long as the Exalt is inside of it.

>>96039724
>>96044747
>>96045154
>>96045167
Oh my god, you fucking retards. No this idiot's explanation is not how battlegroups work (see pic related). A battlegroups stat block is the fucking stat block of the average combatant. If you are fighting a group of flying creatures, then yes, they fucking fly because the statblock of the entire battlegroup will be based on the flying creatures. Size, Drill and Might only add to values on the existing stat block you fucking morons. I swear to god none of you in this thread actually play this game. The whole reason Essence gets glazed so much here is because almost no one here has actually read the goddamn base rules of the game that they are fighting over. You are fucking idiots and none of you play this game. If you did, then I wouldn’t be the one having to call this out over a day after it was posted.

>>96045911
Battlegroups can't use Charms.

>>96046018
Flight isn't a charm when it's native to stat block you dumb motherfucker. It's either unlisted or if listed it's a merit.

>>96046050
The last anon you're replying to is talking about God's using Dematerialize. I don't really care what the rest of your melty is about, I was just correcting you.

>>96045911
You forgot to include the actually important part, which was Might. I admit that I was exaggerating when I said that birds couldn't fly, but Wings is a supernatural merit used to represent things like beastfolk and wyld mutations, which are included in the examples for Might 1. Might does replace other supernatural qualities, which does mean that battle groups of flying beastmen can't fly.

>https://forum.theonyxpath.com/forum/main-category/exalted/1069023-ask-the-devs/page25#post1071570
It's not Core RAW that Might as an abstraction tool replaces supernatural qualities as far as I remember, it was developer comments like the above.

>>96046086
You aren't correcting shit. Why don't you go ahead and search the text to find where in the rules of battlegroups it says they can't use charms. You won't find it because it doesn't exist. Battle groups operate on exception based rules, which is to say that the book calls out that they operate exactly like the normal stat block that they are created from except for the specific exceptions they call out. Losing charms is not one of those exceptions. In fact, they even go so far as to call out that a battle group can explicitly take any action that would normally be available to the stat block unless it is specifically one of those carved out exceptions. This means that so long as the charm would be available to the entirety of the battle group (like say, a battle group of the same spirit stat block, for example)
They are explicitly allowed to use those charms as defined by the rules written in the book. You are not only incorrect, you are confidently so. And when I pointed out that you were incorrect you attempted to double down on another incorrect point. Ergo, I call you a retard. If you don't want to be called a retard just don't be one. Resist you first impulse after you furiously search the book for something to support you point and don't find it and don't try to double down again. Just go "dang i learned something new today." It's alright, that info is one of the mostly commonly spread bits of misinformation about 3E out there. Or do exactly what I expect you to and attempt to double down again.

>>96046647
>Why don't you go ahead and search the text to find where in the rules of battlegroups it says they can't use charms. You won't find it because it doesn't exist
>>96046566

>>96020354 (OP)
What are the best books to look at for information on the Heptagram/what do we know about it, like what the god of it is like?

And are there any other major schools of sorcery in Creation, or at least any homebrew ones?

>>96047564
>What are the best books to look at for information on the Heptagram/what do we know about it, like what the god of it is like
Aspect book wood, it focuses on Bagwei

Where game

>>96049685
Try the discord? Or get your IRL group really high and play the Exalted intro video to hype them up

>>96049732
One thing that I always found weird, is that the video implies that Solars gained their Exaltations afterwards, after they began to rule the world.

Are there any rules for building underworld locations? Think something along the lines of Valhalla, where your spirit can die and is resurrected every dawn.

>>96050089
There was lots of early installment weirdness all over the place. It might have been a thing during earlier development, for all we know. Now, it just seems to be there because it kind of sounds inspiring.

>>96050802
That probably falls under the purview of Sorcerous (Necromantic) Workings. Perhaps even if you're not properly using sorcery or necromancy as an initiate of said practice; if you're good with underworld geomancy, it might even be an effect of a demesne or manse.

>>96039104
>with perhaps some limit on solar circle sorcery,
What kind of limit are you thinking here? And why no summoning?

>>96046566
Wow Anon, I have actually learned something new today, so I’ll have to thank you for that interesting tidbit with Vance’s comments about charms. Of course it’s still fucking stupid on account of leading to the exact problem with spirits being unable to materialize/dematerialize that was being discussed. So since Vance didn’t even work on battlegroup rules in the 3E core and also since this ruling of his actually creates problems where they didn’t exist before while solving nothing putting it right on par with Crawford’s infamous invisibility ruling I’m inclined to ignore it in practice. Still, you have given me new information to consider and I thank you for it. So I shall put on the appropriate hat at this time.

>>96046566
That being said, even if we accept Vance’s words at face value, then the only thing lost in battlegrouping a stat block are the charms it possesses. If you read the section on might you posted, you will note that it specifically does not take away any supernatural features or merits that the statblock in question would otherwise possess. In fact, we can assume it doesn’t based on the following passages within the Battlegroups section:

>There are only four differences between a solo character’s traits and those of a battle group: battle groups have three special values that individual heroes don’t (Size, Drill, and Might), and instead of a Health Track, they have a Magnitude Track.
Note that the one time a part of the statblock is outright replaced it is specifically called out.
>To keep things straightforward, fighting a battle group in most ways resembles fighting an ordinary character with its traits inflated a bit by Size, Drill, and possibly Might. There are a few key differences, detailed below:
Note again, it only talks about how traits are inflated by the three stats, not replaced. And then we get into the second part of that more.
>Taking Actions: Battle Groups may take most of the same actions as normal characters. Notably, they can’t take grapple actions.
This is why I find Vance’s ruling asinine. They went out of their way to say the one action that Battlegroups can’t take and specifically stated that otherwise it’s all the same as fighting an individual.
>Battle Groups and Movement: Battle groups use the same movement system as individual heroes, but they take up a lot more space than a single person does.
Again, no distinction is made of differences to the stock movement of the statblock versus a battlegroup version.

>>96046566
Now since Battlegroups works on exceptions based rules as clarified multiple times in their section of text, we know that any function their individual statblock can do is open to them unless otherwise stated. And state they do, multiple times. So it’s cannot be continuous missteps here. It is intended functionality.

I think that you are seeing things the way that you do because you seem to have a very different idea about how the merit system functions than what I understand as it is written in the book. At the top of the merits section we see the following:
>Merits are special features that add distinction to characters.
Slightly further down we see this:
>These allow players to purchase a low or high rating as appropriate—and often to raise low ratings over time during play.
And then this:
>All Merits can be purchased with Merit points or bonus points during character creation. After character creation, Merits fall into three categories, governing how they may (or may not) be obtained during play.
>These Merits are generally available to any character.
The reason I am putting these up here is because they all illustrate the same thing: Merits as they exist within the system are almost entirely player-facing. They are there for the player’s and storyteller’s benefit in order to easily track things. This is an important distinction because what is listed as a supernatural merit is only supernatural when put on to a player character because all player characters are humans. This is made clear here when talking about supernatural merits:

>>96046566
>These Merits are primarily presented to represent the warping power of the Wyld, and to aid Storytellers in putting together beastfolk, Wyld mutants, or similar characters. Characters can only begin play with supernatural Merits with explicit permission from the Storyteller.
They are a system abstraction only used when modifying a statblock outside of its normal behavior. To go back to the bird example, a Garda bird or Agata does not have the Flying supernatural merit, but we know they fly because both statblocks have a flying dice pool. There is nothing supernatural about a bird or wasp flying unless you subscribe to the idea that #birdsarentreal. If we are to believe that supernatural features disappear when a statblock is battlegrouped, then the winged beastmen would lose their flight, but a battlegroup of agata wouldn’t? This is inconsistent both by rules and logic, and since there is no evidence within the rules to assume this is the case as the only inconsistency introduced at all is from Vance’s retarded statement about charms, we should assume that supernatural features are not replaced by might. Anyway, that’s my two cents, but if you have some info somewhere that I’ve missed, then I’d be happy to see it.

>>96051638
>What kind of limit are you thinking here?
Putting a limit on solar circle sorcery like only casting third circle sorcery once per story, or saying they can only be cast when you invoke your initiation into the third circle, or something like that, isn't absolutely necessary. What it does do is fit things into the setting a little better, which could be very relevant if you wanted this to be the kind of Exigent that can spread to others a little bit or a reincarnation of an Exigent of Sorcery that has already been running around before. If this is a completely one-off Exigent then unlimited Solar Circle access is completely fine.

>And why no summoning?
Rather than a preclusion against demon summoning, it was more that building spells off it is probably less good. Summoning spells are kind of unique one-offs built more on ancient oaths than anything in the spell itself, and being able to interfere with those has implications that go far beyond just being good at sorcery. Further, there's the fact that Solars already did it in 2e with their charm that built off demon summoning to allow them to summon 2CD/3CD at any time of the year. They're also just really really strong and you wanted to make an Exigent of Sorcery rather than an Exigent of Demonology. Building charms off demon summoning in general or elemental summoning in general are going to have more variable applications that most other spells simply because the roster they can conjure up are so big - though, building on a summoning for a specific demon, less so.

Really, it's personal opinion, flavor limitations, and what I would do, not something you would necessarily need to take into account.

When are they redoing Solar Charms?

Also, why the fuck are they doing photos of larpers in Exalted? That shit is cringe, keep it to oWoD

>>96052585
>When are they redoing Solar Charms?
It's already been done for 3e with sandact's rewrite. They aren't allowed to errata, so the official rewrite would be Exalted Essence or Demake depending on whether you consider OPP or Holden more official, or the nonexistent 4e if neither.

>>96052585
Never. They're too greedy to even make an errata.

>Exigents: The Mary Sues of Mary Sues

>release a Make-Your-Own-Exalted book
>doesn't actually have any guidelines to Make-Your-Own-Exalted
What did Onyx Path mean by this?

>>96052840
It's actually harder using guidelines than just sort of eyeballing it. I've made a lot of QE homebrew before, and sometimes it'll take me longer to convert a charm than to make a charm just because you need to fit within guidelines.

Most Exalted editions don't have that restriction, so it's easier...Individually. Holistically I think it's still harder to do charms without a guideline, because like 3e or not, the devs DO pay a keen eye to the sort of combinations players can get up to and where abouts they should be capped for certain things.

Another factor is that Solar charms didn't have guidelines, DB charms didn't have guidelines and likely Lunars didn't have as well. When I say no guidelines, I don't mean they literally asspulled everything, I mean there was no neat list of 1 to 5 with formulas and such for what min and max an Exalt can get up to. Making guidelines after the fact wouldn't have been reflective of the previous charms.

I don't think stronger guidelines were impossible, to be fair, and it's pretty clear they kind of needed more detail on dice probabilities laid out in Exigents more than they already did, but I can understand why they didn't want to overcommit to creating rules they didn't or won't abide by.

...realistically though each Exalted should have had 5 - 10 pages about advice for creating charms and explaining themes. I'm pretty sure most people would appreciate that over two artifacts being cut.

>>96052937
>It's actually harder using guidelines than just sort of eyeballing it.
It's easier to be balanced with guidelines.

>>96053151
That is true

Since this is the sorcery thread, I figure I might as well ask for other opinions on a thought experiment I went through a few weeks ago, because our version of Limit Break is that you must actively go out and cause a problem on purpose.

What's the most disruptive and problematic you can be with Terrestrial Circle Sorcery and a week or two to work? We were in the Lap and the worst I could work out was using Rivers of Blood to turn their sewers red and kill the fields.

>>96020354 (OP)
How do you feel about how Sorcery has changed between Editions, especially how it now works in 3e? What are the pros and cons of the changes to it in 3e?

>>96054109
1e and 2e have few but meaningful differences, mostly in that 2e's shape sorcery makes it much less good in combat than 1e's with the way it takes you out of combat and with the tick vs round structure. It's not great for combat either way but in 2e it's basically suicide to start shaping. The big changes come with 3e and Essence.

3e's approach is almost all upsides over 1e/2e when it comes to the systems of sorcery itself - using different motes so that it doesn't compete, speed being tied to skill rather than flat casting times, a lot of unique flavor that goes into making sorcerers different from each other and fill different niches of spellcaster that would've had to be mostly a thaumaturgy thing previously, etc - and it's main flaws I can think of are that it's watered down it's spells and has almost none of the utility magic sorcery was once known for, that workings (specifically going beyond your circle) raises questions about why Dragonblood and Celestials are so far behind in the Age of Sorrows, and finally that some would prefer the more unified identity behind sorcery that was attached to the five trials and academies and made the lore behind Exalted deeper, with the new lore/mechanics intentionally leaving open any amount of ambiguity such that sorcerers can be anything, anywhere. Generally it's an improvement, though.

Essence's differences over 3e mostly come in two forms. One is that you typically start the scene at max Will, so sorcerers are kind of a quickshot build in combat that takes a while to recharge, rather than in 1e/2e/3e typically being slow and ponderous without certain shaping rituals or supporting artifacts. The other difference is that it's chock full of utility spells, and that the spells aren't watered down at all like they are in 3e, though some of them have been... it's hard to describe, but JRPG-ified is how I'll try. Simpler aesthetics, lots more generic colorful energy balls and beams.

Do you think it is setting appropriate for E5 Athletics + Thrown Solars to lift up a mountain, like say Ben Nevis, and throw it? Or is that too out of scope of for even Solars?

I was discussing this with a friend who said it might be a hassle as an ST to just have to take into account a Solar can throw a mountain at a Realm city, and any city that is not the Imperial City likely has no defense against it.

But even so, I still think that Athletics should get cool shit like that, and it's basically possible with Craft + Athletics if you just make a mundane item reinforced with Craft Charms that offers leverage over a mountain so you can throw it. Outside of things like "how much damage WOULD a mountain do anyway", what balance considerations would make it less obnoxious to deal with?


My position is that Solars should be able to do it, but I admit the books haven't given many individual Solar lifting feats that are close to that, without going into the territory of Dragon Coil Technique versus massive opponents.

>>96054240
>Do you think it is setting appropriate for E5 Athletics + Thrown Solars to lift up a mountain, like say Ben Nevis, and throw it? Or is that too out of scope of for even Solars?
As yourself, "does a mythological hero accomplish this feat in their story?". If the answer is yes, then yes, a Solar should be able to do it. If not, ask yourself why you're playing a game that bills itself as being about epic mythological heroes when it doesn't deliver on that premise.

>>96054185
Why do you think that they made the more negative changes in 3e? And have you seen any good homebrews that fix the issues?

>>96054240
>Do you think it is setting appropriate for E5 Athletics + Thrown Solars to lift up a mountain, like say Ben Nevis, and throw it? Or is that too out of scope of for even Solars?
Put simply, yes, it shouldn't be viable at Essence 5. Not because it should be out of scope for Solars but because once you're throwing a mountain there stops being any way to go bigger or better without getting truly ludicrous, simply because 'mountain' is our biggest big thing outside continents, which really should be out of scope for everyone to do anything more than slowly glide around (see: Malfeas) because letting anybody who can do otherwise into the setting crushes the relevancy of anything in Creation immediately.

It shouldn't be possible at Essence 5. It should be possible for a sufficiently buff elder, and it should be possible to counter at Essence 5 or prior.

>>96054619
>Why do you think that they made the more negative changes in 3e?
Well, watering down charms is the main mechanical problem, and that's mostly because the whole system is watered down. Bringing them back up would make them stronger than native Solar effects and that kind of breaks the power scale. The Workings thing is a continuity / narrative problem and was pretty clearly made because they wanted to give the players lots of options and didn't consider how those same options being available would actually fit into the world. From their commentary afterwards they realised this quickly and asserted that sorcerous workings (particularly pushing the boundaries to go beyond the native circle) are a player-only feature. This sucks as an explanation, because 'everybody else in the world uses a different system' means you aren't really using sorcery, and it's not even an assertion that meshes with the text very well because you have things like the sidebar explaining mortal access to sorcery via merit which Exalted can't ever use, and the game is very clearly not made with the expectation of mortal PCs.

>>96054673
Sorcerous Workings were an objectively good design choice. Otherwise all you have is "totally not D & D you guys"

>>96054689
>Sorcerous Workings were an objectively good design choice. Otherwise all you have is "totally not D & D you guys"
Oh no absolutely agree, sorcerous workings are a great system in play. The problem entirely revolves around how they fit into the setting, rather than how good a concept they are, how they feel to use, or how well implemented the mechanics for them are. The way they fit into the setting is just weird and the developers have never come up with a good answer for it that fits what they do and how they work into a world where NPCs have access to them too. It's a thing where Dragonblood sorcerers can suddenly all become immortal and just... don't? And it turns out that Sidereals and Lunars can wyld shape and close shadowlands if they put in some effort, actually, but don't because it takes a while? Or make powerful and loyal creatures comparable to second circle demons, who themselves are comparable to high level celestial gods, without even going into solar circle sorcery? And some celestial gods can do it too? But it isn't the done thing because... well, fundamentally, because NPCs don't have xp to limit them, not that the developers will ever actually say it, because any of that seems like the kind of thing relevant parties would be very interested in exploiting but seem to either have a brainfart over, or otherwise aren't actually using the same system.

>>96054794
Step one, slap yourself across the face as hard as you can.
Step two, repeat until all traces of munchkinism have left your brain.
Step three, realize you now have a golden opportunity to justify any weirdness in the setting besides spirit or Sidereal meddling.

>>96054673
>It shouldn't be possible at Essence 5. It should be possible for a sufficiently buff elder, and it should be possible to counter at Essence 5 or prior.
this is where you lose me. Why should an elder get to do this stuff but not an Essence 5? You know how many Essence 5s there are?

>>96020354 (OP)
Let's talk about shaping rituals. How do you feel about them in general, which is your favorite(s) among the options (or least favorite for that matter), and how do you come up with ideas for new ones?

>>96054240
>solar can grapple mountain sized creatures
>solar cannot pick up inert mountains
Make it make sense.

>>96055343
3e Solars can't do either. There's a sidebar about this on the same page as Heaven Thunder Hammer. A sufficiently large creature is grappled in parts, the Solar does not grapple the entire Juggernaut or living manse just because they can grapple legendary sized creatures.

>>96055051
>Why should an elder get to do this stuff but not an Essence 5?
Short answer is balance and verisimilitude. Long answer is you're asking to prove a negative and actually doing it would be long and have me explain about fifty tangents by people who get butt-mad about half the shit that goes into making either part of the short answer happen.

>You know how many Essence 5s there are?
I don't know, like a couple thousand probably.

>>96055357
It's on the Dragon Coil Technique page that talks about Juggernaut grappling. The sidebar on near Heaven's Thunder Hammer is actually more favored toward you being able to do crazy shit if you have Nine Aeons Thew, including grappling Juggernaut. The limitation for Dragon Coil Technique explicitly mentions it's a question of exerting necessary force...and NAT lets you have the prerequisite force to do it
>Athletics Charms such as Nine Aeons Thew (p. 267) help with this effect. When used in conjunction with Heaven Thunder Hammer, such Charms allow the Exalt to launch gigantic foes exactly as if they were of a relative size to the Exalt. Of course, combining a number of strength-boosting Charms with Heaven Thunder Hammer may allow the Solar to blast opponents across spectacular distances, causing them to leave impact craters in thick stone sur- faces. How far an opponent can be hurled, and how much additional damage this does, is up to the Storyteller. Sto- rytellers should use the basic rules of Heaven Thunder Hammer to decide what works best for their games. The exact same principle applies to the Charm Crashing Wave Throw, though characters need the Charm Dragon Coil Technique or an acceptable activation of Athletics Charms to successfully grapple gigantic foes in the first place.

This is more talking about launching them wholesale.

>>96055409
>I don't know, like a couple thousand probably.
this is where we differ. I don't think in any edition there's ever been a time where that's been the case outside of the Grabowski stuff about how the Primordial War was won

Essence edition. Player submitted a sheet with no excellencies. Just an ox-body, shapeshifting charms, and sorcery.

Should I humiliate him OOC or just find a creative way to kill him in session 1? My usual Lunar punishment is to resurrect Desus as their mate but he has Integrity Protecting Principle and I don't know if I can cheese Essence well.

Help me teach this stickface some respect for the game, my brothers?

>>96055670
>Essence edition. Player submitted a sheet with no excellencies. Just an ox-body, shapeshifting charms, and sorcery.
That's actually pretty normal. Excellency isn't that excellent in Essence, since you can't activate it at the same time as other Step 1 charms. A bit unusual not to take a Sagacity Excellency when you're going into sorcery admittedly, but still valid if they're mostly just planning to dump their starting Will at the beginning of the scene and re-charging up isn't really their priority.

How do Deathlords view Abyssals who join the Yozis and how do Yozis view Infernals who join the deathlords?
Is it possible for Infernals to become deathknights and vice versa?

>>96056254
>How do Deathlords view Abyssals
As their cute and funny slaves

>>96056361
>The Dowager went from the Great Contagion to fielding a circle of deathknight children.
Has anyone fell off harder in Creation?

>>96052585
I've heard that the Abyssals can be taken as soft-redo guidelines toward various Solar Charms.

>>96056254
Abyssals... probably wouldn't join the Yozis, because the Yozis find them disconcerting on a level that would make them rebuff any overtures, with the possible exception of the Ebon Dragon and Oramus. And those two would still be very hands-off. This feeling likely also applies to most Infernals toward the Neverborn, since the Neverborn freak out the Yozis, and likely also their servants to some degree.

Infernals in 2e couldn't become deathknights, and in fact couldn't become Solars while alive, either. Given that 3e dispensed with Dimming of the Light, I don't think that any Solar-derivative is becoming any other variety of Solar.

>>96053886
>What's the most disruptive and problematic you can be with Terrestrial Circle Sorcery and a week or two to work?
Summon a demon

>>96056773
An Unbound Third Circle demon!

>>96020354 (OP)
Is summoning demons or elementals more useful?

>>96055081
>How do you feel about them in general
They are neat, but for the most part they don't quite click with the Chosen, like their patrons wouldn't be enough to do Sorcery so they something else to complement it.

>>96056912
They can be a problem but it does require the right demon and set up.

>>96056400
>none of the geniuses in any faction ever figured it out was that old hag
>everytime someone asks why, some smartass is like "Errrr, point me to the 'Find Out Who Did The Contagion Charm' thank you!"

>>96057345
>>none of the geniuses in any faction ever figured it out was that old hag
NTA but I think that's good.
One of the things I loved about 1e is that everyone trully feels like they are acting with zero, erroneous or imperfect information.
While in 3e it gives a weird vibe information is too widely available.

>>96057345
This is basically an issue every edition, that the Great Contagion stirred literally zilch in anyone.

>>96057548
The Great Contagion killed everyone who could have found its origin before the trail grew cold, and the Wyld Crusades trampled said trail by mutating shit into a form that could survive the plague.

>>96057345
Contrary of what that anon claims, a Lot of 1e characters knew It was her or had strong clues of.

>>96057676
>The Great Contagion killed everyone who could have found its origin
there's like multiple lunar and sidereal elders who could take a good crack at it. also many people born after it could still take a good crack at it. dowager isn't known for being a larceny obscura genius

>>96058579
By the time news reached them, they would be busy trying to keep their domains together. The Siderials are too bullshit for that to be a valid explanation, so fair.

>>96056993
Depends on what you want.

>>96059049
1e!Bagwei had a good track, and the god of health knew in full who created the contagion, whatyou claim is from 2e or 3e

>>96059179
>whatyou claim is from 2e or 3e
It is what I remember off the top of my head, odds are I missed a lot of shit.

>>96059070
>Depends on what you want.
How is that now?

>>96059733
>How is that now?
Demons have more abilities you can call upon, but elementals don't cause as much long-term backlash when things go sideways. For example, there are demons who directly cause nightmares, give your character skills or supernatural traits and most elementals can't do those things directly.

>>96020354 (OP)
hounds of the five winds, last a while, incredibly versatile.

>>96044747
was never a fan of the might mechanics.
folding principle of motion into a generic might rating is a huuuuge debuff.

>>96047564

from "the black and white treatise":
devonian sorcery: hard scientific method sorcery
salinan sorcery: open your mind MAN! sorcery
silurian sorcery: metaphoric rune based, cypher sorcery

from "manual of exalted power: the sidereal"
theonoan sorcery: math so hard spells come out on the other side.

from "manual of exalted power: the infernal"
infernal sorcery: self imposed temporary mystic psychosis that change reality to create spells, there's a diferent way for each yozi.

technically, necromancy and protocols are also "types" of sorcery.

>>96054240
You know, I get where you are coming from on this, and I think that the strongest argument against it is going to come down to the fact that this is a game and there are limitations that must be applied for the sake of allowing the game to work well as a game. >>96055409 is getting at this, but let me illustrate with a book passage and a scenario. First the passage that should answer a question you posed and illustrate where I’m going.
>Uncountable Damage: Sometimes an avalanche sweeps an entire town off the side of a mountain. Sometimes a manse is converted into a geomantic bomb. Sometimes you’re standing beneath the miraculous floating mountain Metagalapa when suddenly it falls on you. These situations produce uncountable damage—apocalyptic destruction totally out of scale with what combat resolution, environmental hazards, and Health Tracks are designed to deal with.

You see what’s in there. An explicit answer to how much damage throwing a mountain would cause. Literally perfect defense out or die. We have now created a scenario where throwing a mountain is the best solution to most forms of combat. Now let’s get into how this is going to turn into semantics and why that will matter.

>>96054240
You use Ben Nevis, but look at the mountain in question. Where does the mountain proper begin compared to the surrounding mountain range? Are we going from sea level? Are we going from where that particular peak separates from the rest? This distinction matters because it produces a vast difference in size, but also if a chuck of something larger can just be torn away from the rest and Essence will hold it together without fail we have a terrible recipe for player shenanigans.

>Storyteller: A hostile army is approaching your caravan.
>Player: Hey, remember that time that I tore up that mountain to throw at the behemoth. I wanna throw a mountain at the army.
>Storyteller: But you aren’t near a mountain at the moment.
>Player: I’m going to tear up a mountain-sized chunk from the ground and throw it.
>Storyteller: It’s ground, it’s not a solid rock you can grab.
>Player: I thought you said that essence from the charm made it so that things that would fall apart stay together when I’m doing a feat of strength.
>Storyteller: fuck

Now, I’m totally on the side of the storyteller here, but if you’ve set up the rules this way the player is perfectly right to question why this shouldn’t be an option. You have now created a scenario where the only thing stopping your player from trying to use the nuke whenever it’s possible is storyteller fiat. It’s going to get boring fast when this becomes a go-to solution for them. It’s boring for you, and the other players. You’ve potentially broken the game for everyone else in service of a single player. The obvious answer here is just talk to the player, or baring that for the socially inept, design scenarios where this isn’t a viable option. But I promise you that the player will notice this and eventually you’re going to have to explain what you’re doing. Stories don’t have to worry about this, but games absolutely do. And sometimes the fantasy has to give a bit for the health of the game.

>>96061444
Well, the only reason we know that anything gets removed by might at all is the Vance comment here >>96046566. And Vance's comment only says that charms are lost, nothing else. Still shit, and I'd ignore that personally, but it's not everything either.

>>96061671
I played an Athletics Supernal in one game and we didn't go full mountain throwing but the scale of destruction I could cause with Nine Aeons Thew meant it was always an option to solve the problem at hand. Now we all had a good time and I understood whatever problem I "solved" was really just trading for another, likely bigger, problem of my own making so it was mostly just used as a threat that allowed the character to be very calm about most things because he knew he could deal with whatever was fucking with him.

This however was with a good group and I wasn't actively trying to make my ST's time hell and it still drastically warped how we played the game. Interesting once or twice, not as a main gimmick. And this was not even at the throwing mountains level.

>>96061777
That's exactly it. Such things are fun a couple of times. They make for great stories you'll share among the group for years, but if it becomes the norm then it ceases to be anything of note. Then it just becomes a constant what-if for the players and storyteller that can warp how the game unfolds. And in the good group this can work, but I always hesitate to recommend design ideas that need that kind of requirement to work.

>Dodge 5 (Supernal)
>Athletics 0
How do you explain this?

>>96061854
very lucky trips, anime style.

>>96061854
This is exactly why I combined Dodge into Athletics when I rewrote the Abilities.

>>96061671
nta but you can just say the charm only works on distinct geographical features. there's lots of charms in the game already where a feat of strength or skill is only applicable to a certain action with a certain context, and it does not automatically mean you can powerscale it to apply to other things.


also this conversation is funny because Getimians get this shit in Essence.

>>96061671
Any big obnoxious effects like this, be it for Craft, Occult or anything, I just say it's Once Per Story. Maybe with a reset condition of some sort that isn't easily gameable. That way, your brick shithouse Solar can do the fun thing but it won't completely change every combat into Mountain Nukes.

Maybe "takes a scene to do" for good measure. At that point it's inferior to Solar Circle Sorcery at that stage

>>96061854
Drunk

>>96061854
What's the character's Larceny? That has some application for misdirection.

>>96061854
You've surely seen the Matrix.

you must look like such a fucking sperg when you flare from resisting social influence

>>96063061
You look like a sperg resisting social influence with or without flaring. You look like a sperg failing a social influence roll without flaring, and like a pitifully incompetent asshole if you flare social influence and fail the roll. Not resisting social influence can easily make you look like you lack convictions or naive and easily manipulated if the stunts aren't good. The only move where every character looks smart is to play a deaf-mute character and communicate purely through charades, but if you do that then you the player are a sperg.

>>96063061
>>96063299
And that's why the best response to social influence is rolling Join Battle

What's the quick rundown on optimizing in Essence?

>>96063299
>you must look like a sperg when you explode into bonfire essence for an hour when tell your mom you aren't getting out of bed!
>"oh yeah? well you also look like a sperg when you say no!"

>>96063420
Essence favors teamwork over literally any solo build you can come up with, which is to say that a fully optimised solo PC fighter can and will die to two bad PC chumps working together pretty well. Understand this early and consider a role that works well in your circle that you could fill, and don't be afraid to say that you're willing to take the role of the chump who sits back and spams Build Power for everybody else, because that role is as vital as the others. The common roles are: Frontline (tries to take hits and dumps decisive attacks into enemies as often as possible), cheerleader (dumps Power into others), gambiter (performs gambits, usually to weaken enemies and set up for frontliner attacks), and assassin (launches the biggest possible attacks at the expense of action economy re: number of attacks). If you want to play solo, try for an assassin build, it needs the least teamplay to be functional.

In terms of build advice, Soak is quite possibly the strongest statistic and it's highly recommended to do what it takes to push it up to the cap. Strongly consider Steps when taking charms for combat, and remember that if it doesn't list a Step then it defaults to Step 1 - there are a lot of Step 1 or 2 charms and you won't be able to fit them all into a fight, and Step 3+ charms like Excellent Strike are premium. Consider the dicecaps and how they will play into your strategy - it's not worth it to stack too much, and everything that isn't explicitly your base value or non-charm does count towards the dicecap, including things you wouldn't normally expect in other editions like successes from weapon and armor values or dice from merits. Buying too many things in the same specialty can stack up and mean wasted charm slots. Strongly consider your caste values early on and understand that it will be powerful to play into almost anything that offers successes equal to your Essence, even though that power will mostly come in later in the game.

>>96063477
>you must look like a sperg when you explode into bonfire essence for an hour when tell your mom you aren't getting out of bed!
>"oh yeah? well you also look like a sperg when you say no!"
Unironically, yeah. The bonfire kid looks like a sperg arguing with their mom about getting out of bed, and the mom looks like a sperg for disregarding the fact their child has both put together a good argument and also burst into brilliant light. Both of these hypothetical people seem autistic.

>>96062512
>What's the character's Larceny?
0

>>96063313
I'm not sure if out-spergibg every other conceivable course of action can be considered the best response.

>>96065542
If you kill everyone who saw you sperg out, did it really happen?

>no time travel
>no resurrections
What was the third hard rule of the setting?

>>96065829
Immortality has a catch

>>96065592
Yes. Nara-O knows things known only by one person.

>>96065592
Yes. The 'bear shits in the woods and nobody is there to see it' metaphor only works when the thing the bear is doing AND the consequences of that action aren't perceived by anybody else. Killing a bunch of people is absolutely something that will be noticed and the spergout can be uncovered.

>>96065829
>What was the third hard rule of the setting?
You're quoting hard rules of sorcery, not the setting. There is time travel and resurrection in this setting, it's just hard and curtailed in Creation.

>>96020354 (OP)
Weekly Update
sorry i'm late, i was once again banned for being correct
>Art Direction
Alchemicals – Waiting for sketches from Navela
>Layout
>Miracles of the Divine Flame – still working…
>Press
Exigents – Quoting
Exigents Screen – At Studio 2
Sidereals – Quoting
Abyssals – Devs going through errata
Essence Novella Omnibus – Advance PDF on sale DTRPG this Wednesday!
the final version if the omnibus will probably be out before the final of abyssals, but there's always a chance. a slow week overall

>>96057295
How would you fix that then? Also, “for the most part”?

>>96059908
What are some of the best demons for each kind of task then? Also, “most” elementals?

>>96066315
not gonna post every elemental's stat block so you can see my dude. you gotta have to read a little.

in the 2nd ed corebook, the neomah demon can do so freaky flesh shit. start here.

>>96066315
Blood Apes for killing folk, Neomah for bedding folk, Agata for riding. They're your core three, but there are dozens with all sorts of niches that can work. Roll of Glorious Divinity 1 (elementals) and 2 (Demons) have a lot of options.

>>96066315
>>96066410
>Naneke for academic research
>Marottes for construction
>Heranhal for smithing
>Metody for siege warfare
>Tomescu for bodyguarding
>Baidak for making armies
>Bisclaravets for assassination
>Angyalkae for entertainment and psychological warfare

>>96065829
Can't lose your Exaltation. Mostly a failsafe to prevent DMs from fucking over players.

>>96067471
It is possible under very specific circumstances, mainly involving resurrect or transhumanism

>>96065890
>the final version if the omnibus will probably be out before the final of abyssals, but there's always a chance. a slow week overall
Surprised that "Exigents" isn't fully out

>>96067533
That's because your character is dead by that point.

>>96068291
the main book of exigents? it's commercially available and /here/ also. if you mean the print run, well, the tariff tango is fucking them on that because their print partner is/was chinese, same with sidereals

>>96067471
And because it's perhaps the most cliche dick move of all time, guaranteed to undermine any interest in the story if it rears its head.

Also, some history: Exalted was following on the heels of Aberrant, even using a lot of its system for basic traits. Aberrant, where your character was absurdly powerful BUT if you ever met Divis Mal he could, by the rules, strip away your powers and shut down your superpower Node permanently using a high-end power (minimum of 8 dots out of 10 possible, where 10 allows you to make your own universe). There were probably at least a few people at WW that this didn't sit well with.

>>96069366
>There were probably at least a few people at WW that this didn't sit well with.
It is aberrant, I heard that the fans had to threaten the writers so the high level stuff would be in PC guide, instead of the planned STG.

>>96069475
Who knows if they ever even planned a STG. There sure wasn't one that ever came out. Not for Trinity/Aeon, either.

Is appearance used for anything at all? Tthere’s absolutely zero use for appearance.
Even shit you think appearance would be used for don’t use it. Like impersonation is intelligence+larceny.

>>96061671
>>96061777
The problem with 3e's rangeband system is that ultimately, I think it creates more problems than it solves unless you're already playing with a group that 1. trusts each other and gets along, 2. understands what 3e is going for and 3. can be trusted to come up with a solution everyone agrees with.

If you can, then you can make it work by fudging specifics and handwaving things. If you can't, you end up awkwardly squinting at RAW wondering what the hell bigger than-Legendary Size and Long Range even are supposed to be.

>>96069834
>Is appearance used for anything at all?
Looking pretty/horrifying and seducing people. There are lunar charms for them, but for the most part they don't do all that much.

>>96069834
It is SUPPOSED to rule instinctual interactions, but I don't think that gets across well enough for people to use it consistently. There's a reason why this has been demoted to a merit in descendant games.

>>96066315
>How would you fix that then? Also, “for the most part”?
I would suggest having some shaping rituals that overlap more clearly or play well with the chosen and their lore. For example, a celestial-themed ritual might involve the caster looking inwards at their past lives allowing them to alter reality at the cost of their identity or autonomy as the echoes demand to be incorporated into the new self.
If this doesn't quite make sense, let me phrase it this way: I like the idea of a Fire Aspect learning to use fire in new ways from an Ifrit Lord, but a Lunar or Solar doing the same doesn't flow as naturally.

>>96070073
the hideous merit is supposed to invert these right? so why do the negative reactions start at appearance 1 rather than hideous appearance 1?

>>96070268
Hideous just changes the modifiers from admiring and desiring you to admiring and fearing you. It's an EX3 thing, too, while that text is from earlier editions; in 2e, Appearance 1 was treated as EX3 Hideous Appearance 3, and 2e Appearance 0 was treated the way that EX3 treats Hideous Appearance 5. It was kind of an ass backwards way of dealing with a problem that they had solved in Adventure! (your Appearance was toggle-able in chargen to be either looking good or being hideous, as in EX3).

>>96069834
No, it's a filler dump stat that exists solely for the 3x3 symmetry.

>>96052585
Rich is too scared some of the whales will throw a fit that their gold bound 3e core isn't relevant anymore. The best errata for Solar Charms is just going to be homebrew at this point, but then you'll encounter people in online spaces who are weirdly overly critical of said homebrew implying it could somehow be worse than what core gives Solars.

Essence gives them some new ideas I guess. Essence also adds some cool but admittedly sort of overpowered charms for Dragonblooded too.

Don't even get me started on the Getimian Charm that does what this anon is asking for free >>96054240

>>96070073
>It is SUPPOSED to rule instinctual interactions
It hard overlaps with Charisma on that front, which also rule instinctual interactions and general vibes regarding how you act.

>>96070918
>Rich is too scared some of the whales will throw a fit that their gold bound 3e core isn't relevant anymore
So issue a new one Print on Demand. They'll bitch and moan on the discord and then they'll pay up regardless

>>96070940
I genuinely think that maybe only three people will complain about it too, because the Exalted fanbase while small is very loyal. Rich doesn't think so.

and in fairness, a lot of the charms in the game going forward were based around the core rules, which'd ALSO need some errata.

>>96070961
Everyone liked the 2.5 errata and Ink Monkey stuff, its wild that they refuse to learn from the past

Need that Lookshy Dragon-Blooded pussy. Need some of that Japanese expy pussy.

>>96070979
I require Lookshy Sohei sex. It is a biological need. It can save the world.

>>96070974
>Everyone liked the 2.5 errata and Ink Monkey stuff
No, they didn't. They very much did not. 2.5 and Ink Monkey crap created huge and vocal splinter groups that despised the mainline of Exalted for years.

>>96071751
nobody cares about the mentally ill

>>96071770
Anon, this is Exalted. That's the audience.

>>96071751
>They very much did not. 2.5 and Ink Monkey crap created huge and vocal splinter groups that despised the mainline of Exalted for years.
Ironically enough, a significant part of these people, are the writers themselves

>>96070646
It exists because Vampire was the first supernatural they wrote and no one bothered to change that until NwoD became a thing.

>>96072317
I am pretty sure they needed it for ERPG, and WW's character's appearance is pretty important to their writing

>>96072571
Fair, but again, that can be a merit like Distinguished Feature or whatever it was called. Odds are that would just make them spam that merit for every NPC.

>>96072571
It's never really been important in Exalted, though. When appearance has been a relevant factor, the characters involved didn't have Appearances that would reflect the circumstances being written, even when the writing is literally right next to the statblock like with the Maiden of Darkness in Bloodstained Robes being jealous of the Maiden of the Mirthless Smile's beauty when their Appearance scores are 3 and 4. Literally the only Appearance 5 (or higher) characters in Scroll of Exalts are elder Lunars/Sidereals and the character with the highest Appearance in the book, Chejop Kejak, is commonly described as a pretty average-looking functionary (minus the martial art muscles) who could fit in as a small time merchant if he went down to the market.

>>96072317
To be fair composure has too much overlap with Willpower. On top that, the NwoD spread would fuck with the Lunars thanks to a lack of a Perception attribute.

>>96072317
Except for how Presence in CoD has been connected to Appearance, to the extent that being scarred can reduce your Presence.

>>96073817
That's Warhammer, you fucking moron.

>>96073677
>To be fair composure has too much overlap with Willpower.
NWoD willpower is composure + resolve, because of this, there's an overlap.

>On top that, the NwoD spread would fuck with the Lunars thanks to a lack of a Perception attribute
Wits took the combat functions, while other attributes took the rest.

>>96073978
IIRC in Chronicles Composure is the ability to stay calm and level-headed, while Resolve is the ability to stay focused and on-task. Put them together and you have Willpower.

>>96073978
>>96074017
Also Perception = Wits + Composure because Wits governs reflexes and attentiveness while I already covered Composure.

>>96074017
Would composure charms make sense with the Lunars?

>>96074365
Sure, what do you have in mind?

>>96071751

I was there, and it was not huge splinter groups with 2.5.
It was just one guy with a bug up his ass, that was very loud and didn't stop.
Oh, hey, there you are.

Now with how they handled dev of 3ed, yeah, the crowd started to turn. But it wasn't 2.5

a

>>96074733

>>96074726
Yes, there's a notorious generation split between 2e/1e and 3e.
The split was caused by the devs and sycophants gaslighting a lot of newfags, with stuff like "the lack of autumn was caused by a 2e editorial mistake".

>>96074749
>>96074733
????

>>96074808
>Yes, there's a notorious generation split between 2e/1e and 3e.
I joined the fandom mid-2e and can't help but miss the anime shenanigans. I prefer 3e mechanically but it just feels so muted by comparison.

Pic related is what made me check out Exalted in the first place.

>>96074827
Yes, the said lack of autumn, and creation having 2 summers is a good example.

>3e; the seasonal circles of creation doesn't make sense, so why changed it so your character can be born during autumn.
>1e; FA!Solars thought autumn was a waste of a season, so they made creation have 2 summers per year; because of this the circle of seasons is so weird.

>>96074665
Nothing in particular, I just have a hard time picturing charm concepts under that attribute.
Speaking of that, does anyone have a copy of Exalted vs Chronicles?

>>96074993
Composure is social resistance, so it could easily get social defense charms.

>>96074993
>Nothing in particular, I just have a hard time picturing charm concepts under that attribute.
Meditate and use the inner peace to purge yourself of unwelcome mental influence. Dull your emotions in battle to make you more precise at the cost of teamwork. Stay calm during a tense social exchange to avoid falling to provocations and rash decisions. Slow down your metabolism to delay the effect of drugs and poisons. Mute your emotions to confound those that try to figure you out. Be so fucking chill you smother's people's willingness to pick a fight.

>>96074365
>>96074993

Well, it's an Attribute. If you're taking a tack like >>96074096 does, it would have a lot of sensory improvement Charms like Blood on the Wind or the like. Those are pretty easy to picture for Lunars on account of how they probably involve animal ears, eyes, etc.

But! It could also involve tricks normally associated with Physical Attributes, since being unflappable could mean that injuries literally don't stay visible on you (cosmetic regeneration), or something subtler like being able to avoid nervous sweating or giving off the scent of fear. It could grow from there into scent-based reinforcement of moods, mask-like additions to natural armor that keep others from being able to read your expression or discern your face, false feature marking mimicry... one can easily underestimate how physical this sort of thing can be.

I'm reading through my 2e books out of boredom and I really get the feeling that a lot of charms in later books in the line were made because they were cool ideas for a climactic moment of a story and not as actually useful charms for a game. DotFA is basically an entire book of this. Like, Should The Sun Not Rise (Holy charms retain their effectiveness even if the UCS dies) is a cool idea for a charm, but my god, I'm sure it was useful in about three games ever in this game's entire lifespan.

>>96074726
>I was there, and it was not huge splinter groups with 2.5.
>It was just one guy with a bug up his ass, that was very loud and didn't stop.
>Oh, hey, there you are.
This is what we call gaslighting and revisionism. I personally was not playing Exalted at the time 2.5e came out, but I had read it and was in communities adjacent to it's discussion and picked up a lot of what was going on. It was absolutely not just one person. Random-ass anons like yourself were being drowned out by fans and creatives very much against ink monkeys crap.

>>96074827

>>96077840
Get rid of the fire in the third panel, it's too aggressive and might trigger someone.

>>96077213
>I wasn't there, but I heard from people who were

How easy is it to utilize 3e rules but use 2e lore?
I've been tired of being a no-gamer for years now but I just can not find any 1st or 2nd edition games anywhere. So I might as well give up and just learn 3e.
Or alternatively does anyone know where I can fucking find any games?

>>96078358
>How easy is it to utilize 3e rules but use 2e lore?
Some lore becomes completely nonfunctional (mystic societies, solar supremacy, martial arts world, etc) where its tied into mechanics directly. Some lore just loses its strong mechanical ties, like the Unconquered Sun's or raksha's Virtue-based powers. Your largest problem is going to be that by conceding to the 3e system you're also conceding to play with the 3e players who learned 3e and don't know 2e's lore or understand any of the context of what you're trying to play.

>>96078207
Since we're discussing the talk happening in the fandom rather than the actual gameplay itself, saying that I wasn't playing at the time but was in the groups that were is more like saying I was there and talking to the people involved, which is more than most of the people who were actually playing the game at the time would have been able to say. In this one specific circumstance, when it comes to looking at what games are being started and what fraction of the fanbase is playing what, being nogames is actually better than being stuck in an echo chamber at one table.

>>96078493
>being nogames is actually better

>>96078493
shut up retard

>>96078485
That fucking sucks. So there's no hope of me ever playing a proper game of exalted then? All the usual places either have 3e games only, or none at all

>>96078553
2e is genuinely practically unplayable RAW so I don't know what you were expecting.

>>96074749
Which book is this from, and do you have any more art like this please?

>>96079295
Based on filename I assume its from the exigents book

>>96074749
>>96079306
What are these Exigents the Champions OF?

>>96070206
Sounds based, do you have any other ideas about this so far?

What should the next thread topic be? Maybe necromancy? Are any of your PCs necromancers, especially non-Abyssals?

>>96079476
Favourite Deathlords, maybe? Opening image can be of any of the Deathlords. Here's The Silver Prince

>>96079510
I suggested necromancy to better tie into the topic of the current thread, but whoever makes it gets to choose I guess.

>>96079401
I think the first two are an Auroral and a Cartographer. No idea about the others.

>>96080238
Not familiar with those. But thanks anyway.

>>96080238
They are the Exigents of the "rundown" gods from the preview.
Chosen of god of the guild cant, artificial flight and a liondog associated with fertility.

>>96080501
My mistake then.

>>96080501
Where can we find said preview?

>>96078493
Please. If I ever develop the same neurodegenerative symptoms as this anon, kill me. I don't want to live like this. This is not what living looks like.

>>96074808
>Yes, there's a notorious generation split between 2e/1e and 3e.
Because they are very different mechanically and all of them are kind of shit. 1e feels underdeveloped in comparison to later editions, 2e combat system is a pain in the ass to run and 3e withering and decisive attacks are a turn off for many. It's kind of hard to get people to agree on what poison do they want.

>>96080541
The core Exigent book, originally they gave a rundown of 3 gods and 6 Exigents + 4 complete Exigents + apocryphal demos

>>96080513
They are pretty forgettable

>>96080886
>3e withering and decisive attacks are a turn off for many
You're being really reductive with a lot what of you're saying and this specifically is bunk. Yes, it turns people off but you're strongly implying it's the main thing that turned people off 3e. It's not. It's the main thing that people who still play Exalted hate about 3e because most of them have been split off into playing different games entirely. The main thing that made 3e utter shit coming out of 2e was the complete redirection from epic high-flying game about reborn god-heroes in a world that turned on them into a game intended to generate a grounded hero's narrative. It's not a specific mechanical decision, it's that the entire direction and underlying drive of the game, the part which actually drew people in, which changed.

>>96078493
The problem isn't being a no-game, but a no-read or gaslighter.

To the point the fancord had to add the "read the books" rule.

>>96081326
>You're being really reductive with a lot what of you're saying and this specifically is bunk. Yes, it turns people off but you're strongly implying it's the main thing that turned people off 3e. It's not.
It is the tip of the iceberg, similar to 1e!Lunars lack of appearance charms or 2e!Solar wank.

>>96081389
>>96081389
>>96081389
New thread

>>96081326
I was mostly talking about mechanics but the lore changes are also a spliting point even if you can highball 3e.

>>96022426
>the pdf leak
What leak?