Keychain of Creation IV: The Lore Thing

[Maximum Zersk]

So you're saying that the Sidereals's main weapon is surprise?

Nobody expects the Usurpation!

[Coidzor]

Why do the Sidereals care if anyone remembers they did it anyway?

I haven't found any explanation for this other than that they don't want anyone to know they exist.

[Yuki Akuma]

If people knew that they did it, they'd get censured so hard their next two Exaltations would be feeling it.

(And if the Immaculates ever found out their entire religion was being controlled by a shadowy force of Anathema... I think they'd snap.)

[kamikasei]

If people knew that they did it, they'd get censured so hard their next two Exaltations would be feeling it.

People do know they did it, though, don't they? They just can't prove they did it. But even if they could, how would they censure the Sidereals when the Usurpation was supported (wasn't it?) by the most important Celestial deities? Is it a case of the Incarnae having reluctantly assented but being happy to scapegoat the Sidereals anyway if given the excuse, to alleviate their own guilt and regret?

[Gaius]

People do know they did it, though, don't they? They just can't prove they did it.

Right.

But even if they could, how would they censure the Sidereals when the Usurpation was supported (wasn't it?) by the most important Celestial deities? Is it a case of the Incarnae having reluctantly assented but being happy to scapegoat the Sidereals anyway if given the excuse, to alleviate their own guilt and regret?

I could be wrong, but I don't recall reading anything about the Incarnae commenting on the Usurpation, much less tacitly approving of it. I always got the impression that the Sidereals acted entirely, or almost entirely, on their own for that one. It's seemed one of the strongest signals of their hubris in canon. If that's what happened, they'd definitely be in for one hell of a censuring if they didn't try hiding the evidence as hard as they did.

[kamikasei]

I could be wrong, but I don't recall reading anything about the Incarnae commenting on the Usurpation, much less tacitly approving of it.

Thinking about it, the impression I have to that effect comes from some comment about Sol having to suppress his Compassion to let the Usurpation go ahead. That comment was posted here, I think, or in a discussion of Sol himself rather than anything directly relevant to the Usurpation, so it's hardly authorative. If my impression was mistaken and the Incarnae were surprised by the Usurpation, well, yeah, it makes sense that the Sidereals wouldn't want hard evidence left available of their complicity.

[Ignition]

So who can censure these Sidereals? Aren't they just a society of reality warpers and fate manipulators? Couldn't they just say "Ooops, we 'lost', wink wink nudge nudge, the paperwork that proves we had anything to do with that thing that never happened. Friend Computer The Usurpation is your friend, there is no mind control citizen, have a nice day."

[kamikasei]

So who can censure these Sidereals? Aren't they just a society of reality warpers and fate manipulators?

Two points:

- The Sidereals are horribly overstretched. They're 100 out of 700 original Celestial Exalted who were supposed to run Creation. They've decided that not only are they going to go from being advisors and administrators to rulers and decision-makers, but they're going to do so via a ten-layer-deep Escher print flowchart set of plots, which tends to multiply workloads. They do rely on the rest of the Celestial bureaucracy to get anything done, and can't simply flatly refuse to play ball.

- Yes, they're reality warpers and fate manipulators. They did managed to make all the evidence of their crime disappear, after all. It's simply that they didn't just roll Manipulation+Bureaucracy with a dose of Excellencies and say it was accomplished. They had to have a way of actually doing it. That way was the Mask.

[Ignition]

So, you're telling me the Sidereals are less like the Spanish Inquisition, and more like The Riddler? It's not enough that they win, they have to have their win be so subtle and clever that it's not only not even look like a win unless they want you to know, but also that nothing ever changed and no one, not even the gods, can prove it? Man, that's messed up.

I guess though, if their plans are so complex, they've already kinda shot themselves in the foot by having to maintain their hilarious web of lies, and in so doing, making them ineffectual against doing anything else

[Coidzor]

Wait, the celestial bureaucracy would care?

[kamikasei]

As I understand it, it goes like this. The Sidereals are subject to the Great Curse, just like Solars and Lunars. For Solars, it manifests as terrible, inhuman excess. For Lunars, it manifests as animalistic madness. For Sidereals, it manifests as hubris. And at least for Sidereals, it gets worse the more of them are gathered together.

So one Sidereal on his own is prone to making plans for accomplishing his goals indirectly which are too complicated and assume he can keep an unrealistic number of balls in the air at once. Two Sidereals collaborating come up with septuple-bluffs that make most conspiracy theories sound unimaginative. And when the prophecies of Gold and Bronze came down, and they were faced with an unprecedented crisis, they had a big meeting to figure out what to do.

So, yeah.

Wait, the celestial bureaucracy would care?

Why wouldn't they? The Usurpation was a pretty big deal. It caused a lot of problems.

[Yuki Akuma]

Basically, the Sidereals have a tendency to make very bad decisions, which, being Celestial Exalts, they promptly execute with extreme competence.

Their manifestation of the Great Curse is in many ways even more dangerous than the Solars'.

And yes, the Celestial Bureaucracy would care. The Usurpation was illegal. Not only did it involve murdering over three hundred Celestial Exalted and aggravated assault against a high-ranking Celestial deity, it also went completely against the Unconquered Sun's Creation Ruling Mandate.

The Unconquered Sun did not approve of the Usurpation. He ignored it, because he was already sick of the Solars. (Specifically, he was annoyed by the Hierophant.)

[Drascin]

Wait, the celestial bureaucracy would care?

Given how the Sidereal manual goes at a pretty good length about how a big part of why the Sids are so overstretched and drowning in paperwork is that half the bureaucracy hates their guts still for the Usurpation, and want to make the Sids' lifes as hard as they humanlygodly can by using every nasty office trick on them, and that there's a pretty clear implication that the only reason they weren't kicked from the Bureau and all but exterminated was the fact that no one could prove they did it... yeah, chances are it would

[golentan]

Basically, the Sidereals have a tendency to make very bad decisions, which, being Celestial Exalts, they promptly execute with extreme competence.

Their manifestation of the Great Curse is in many ways even more dangerous than the Solars'.

I've heard them described as the anti-bureaucrats: in large committees bureaucrats tend to come up with pretty good ideas with bad implementation methods. Whereas sidereals... well, 90% of everything is acceptable casualties. So, here's the plan...

[Ignition]

What kind and level-headed people these Sidereals sound like! I would totally let them speak with my hypothetical daughter for long periods of time, unsupervised, because of how kind and level-headed they sound!

And yet, I get the implication from the Exalted core book I just bought, as well as from the comic, that everyone in Creation is some level of jerk or another. Are the Sidereals the biggest ones, or is every faction full of gigantic, self-serving wankers?

[Weimann]

There are many good examples in every faction, yes. Seldom will you find anyone objectively good (or evil for that matter). Okay, maybe with allowances for the Deathlords and /or Yozis, but (admittedly weak) cases can be made for them too.

[Kyeudo]

Are the Sidereals the biggest ones, or is every faction full of gigantic, self-serving wankers?

There are genuine good guys. Lytek keeps trying to find an answer to the Great Curse, Chejop Kejack was trying to reform the Realm into a democracy instead of a feudal shogunate before the Contagion killed everyone, some of the Lunar Elders (Rain Deathflyer and the transgender snake chick) are trying to build nations with fairly high-minded ideals like equality and tolerance, and the Roseblack fairly honestly wants to do what is best for the Realm (which makes her a big target for those who want power for power's sake). Moray Darktide serves Skullstone only because he's bought into the Silver Prince's propaganda. And the list goes on.

The problem is such that there are lots of people trying to do stuff thats all at odds with each other, there are some people doing all they can to screw everything up, and some are just grabbing for any power that comes their way.

[Xelloss]

No they don't. Secret never died.

She came close, but she never actually stopped living for even a second.

In French the word is ambiguous enough to encompass the loss of life and the time shortly before, so my analogy was apparently lost in the translation.

About Misho's memories, it seems that he doesn't remember anything before his present Exaltation, which is very similar to the effects of an Artefact of one of the old games of Nephilpal : the Solar that built it in this game transfered a perfect copy of himself that burnt the Exaltation host, effectively cloning himself after his death. This wouldn't totally surprize me from Misho as he is one of the oldest Solar that existed, outliving the normal age limit by many years.

[The Rose Dragon]

About Misho's memories, it seems that he doesn't remember anything before his present Exaltation, which is very similar to the effects of an Artefact of one of the old games of Nephilpal : the Solar that built it in this game transfered a perfect copy of himself that burnt the Exaltation host, effectively cloning himself after his death. This wouldn't totally surprize me from Misho as he is one of the oldest Solar that existed, outliving the normal age limit by many years.

Was the artifact named Domnica's Mantle? If it is, it is a canon artifact currently in the hands of a Dragon-blooded associated with the Sea of Mind.

[Drascin]

What kind and level-headed people these Sidereals sound like! I would totally let them speak with my hypothetical daughter for long periods of time, unsupervised, because of how kind and level-headed they sound!

And yet, I get the implication from the Exalted core book I just bought, as well as from the comic, that everyone in Creation is some level of jerk or another. Are the Sidereals the biggest ones, or is every faction full of gigantic, self-serving wankers?

It's mostly that nearly everyone of power and good intentions in Creation either is some sort of idiot, screwed by the Curse into aforementioned idiocy (see: Sids), or has infinity plus one things working against him (what with all the "good-er" guys all fighting each other).

Remember, this is White Wolf. They are incapable at the genetic level of writing non-doomed campaign settings .

[kamikasei]

What kind and level-headed people these Sidereals sound like!

Bear in mind, it's not like they just up and decided one day that the Solars just looked too damn good in their golden plate shining with the radiance of the lamp of Heaven and all that is best in the souls of mankind, and that they should totally have them betrayed and murdered for the lulz. They were faced with a hell of a tough decision with literally everything ever at stake and made an arguably bad call (and then unarguably botched the execution).

Creation doesn't have problems because too many people want to do bad things. Its problems are because the many people who want to do good things can't all agree on which or how. For that matter, many of those who do want to do bad things have pretty good reasons for it.

[Lix Lorn]

...this is going SO far over my head I'm going to end up studying the Exalted rules. Sigh. XD

[The Bushranger]

Doooooooooo eeeeeeeeeet, Lix.
Become one of us...
One of us...
One of us...


Anyway. The Usurpation in a nutshell:

Spoiler

Show

In the beginning, there were the Primordials. The Primordials created the Gods, and promtly retired to Yu-Shan (Heaven) to play the Games of Divinity. The gods were jealous about how their creators got to play while they did all the work, but they were programmed to utterly obey the Primordials, so they could do nothing.

And so they created the Exalted. In league with two traitors among the Primordials' midst (Gaia and Autochton), they made their servants strong enough to kill their hated forebears. But they also gave them free will; thus, if the Primordials ordered the Gods to make their children stop, the Exalted would refuse, and the Gods would smirk at their parents and say 'sucks to be you'.

And so the Primoridals were overthrown, tortured utterly and sadistically by the Exalted, and tossed into the Abyss, where some lie dead but dreaming (the Yozis), and others exist simply utterly insane (the Neverborn). Yet in their dying moments, the Primordials wove a mighty curse against their killers. The Great Curse.

Solars would be prone to hedonism and sadism.
Lunars animalism.
And Sidereals, hubris.
(I forget what the Terrestrials' part of the Curse is, or if there is even one for them. )

And lo, the Gods marched triumphantly into Yu-Shan, where they began playing the Games of Divinity, promptly became addicted to them, and left running Creation to the Exalted. And lo, the Great Curse worked its foul miasma, and after many years, the Solar Exalted were tyrants and despots.

The Sidereals looked down from the Celestial Bureaucracy, and were displeased. For the threads of Fate told them that Creation would face one of three fates.

First, they could do nothing, and Creation was doomed. Nobody wanted this (well, except the Yozis and the Neverborn, but they didn't have a vote).

Second, they could try to steer their Solar brethren back to the path of righteousness. There was a high liklihood that they could fail, though, in which case, Creation would be doomed. The Gold Faction of the Sidereals, however, urged this course of action.

Third, they could take the Terrestrial Exalted, the Dragon-Blooded, and set them against the Solar Exalted. It would be a bloody and terrible battle, but they would win, and Creation would be saved. (At least for the time being). The Bronze Faction supported this course of action.

The Bronze Faction won the debate, and lo, the Solar Exalted were slaughtered. Only a very few (less than ten, as I recall) escaped; the rest were slain, and their Exaltations trapped in the Jade Prison, deep under the sea, and thus begain the Second Age.

...and what happened after that, is another story.

[The Rose Dragon]

Only a very few (less than ten, as I recall) escaped...

More than 12, actually.

[The Bushranger]

Ah, thanks. My knowledge of that part of the setting isn't what it should be.
(Can only really get one book a month. Have core, Abyssals, Alchemicals and Infernals. Terrestrials is up next.)

[golentan]

Mixed up the yozis and the neverborn, but yeah.

[senrath]

Chejop Kejack

I might be wrong, but isn't Chejop more of a Well Intentioned Extremist (at best) than an actual "good guy"?

[Kyeudo]

I might be wrong, but isn't Chejop more of a Well Intentioned Extremist (at best) than an actual "good guy"?

Depends on your point of view. My practical side aligns itself with the Bronze Faction. The Gold Faction was going to risk the fate of the world on a maybe, a slim change that three hundred madmen with powers to make Superman drool would find a solution instead of turn on each other in a fit of all consuming paranoia and burn Creation to a cinder in the process.

Now, my daring side loves the Gold Faction, trying to take the higher road despite the risk, aiming to go above and beyond to secure a glorious future for Creation.

Still, Chejop Kejack had a choice before him, and he picked the one that would ensure that Creation continued onward. The specifics of the execution can be criticized more than his choice, but then it was impossible to forsee that the Yozis would make an alliance with the Neverborn to find the Jade Prison and transform half of the Solars into world-destroying abominations. They never meant to lose track of the Jade Prison, after all. Constellations don't usually break.

[Yuki Akuma]

Chejop had a pretty sucky decision - risk Creation's total destruction for a chance of it becoming better, or guarantee its partial destruction with the guarantee that it'll still be there afterwards.

He also took the obvious solution. Doesn't mean it was the right one, just that it was the most sensible.

[Morty]

Doooooooooo eeeeeeeeeet, Lix.
Become one of us...
One of us...
One of us...


Anyway. The Usurpation in a nutshell:

Spoiler

Show

In the beginning, there were the Primordials. The Primordials created the Gods, and promtly retired to Yu-Shan (Heaven) to play the Games of Divinity. The gods were jealous about how their creators got to play while they did all the work, but they were programmed to utterly obey the Primordials, so they could do nothing.

And so they created the Exalted. In league with two traitors among the Primordials' midst (Gaia and Autochton), they made their servants strong enough to kill their hated forebears. But they also gave them free will; thus, if the Primordials ordered the Gods to make their children stop, the Exalted would refuse, and the Gods would smirk at their parents and say 'sucks to be you'.

And so the Primoridals were overthrown, tortured utterly and sadistically by the Exalted, and tossed into the Abyss, where some lie dead but dreaming (the Yozis), and others exist simply utterly insane (the Neverborn). Yet in their dying moments, the Primordials wove a mighty curse against their killers. The Great Curse.

Solars would be prone to hedonism and sadism.
Lunars animalism.
And Sidereals, hubris.
(I forget what the Terrestrials' part of the Curse is, or if there is even one for them. )

And lo, the Gods marched triumphantly into Yu-Shan, where they began playing the Games of Divinity, promptly became addicted to them, and left running Creation to the Exalted. And lo, the Great Curse worked its foul miasma, and after many years, the Solar Exalted were tyrants and despots.

The Sidereals looked down from the Celestial Bureaucracy, and were displeased. For the threads of Fate told them that Creation would face one of three fates.

First, they could do nothing, and Creation was doomed. Nobody wanted this (well, except the Yozis and the Neverborn, but they didn't have a vote).

Second, they could try to steer their Solar brethren back to the path of righteousness. There was a high liklihood that they could fail, though, in which case, Creation would be doomed. The Gold Faction of the Sidereals, however, urged this course of action.

Third, they could take the Terrestrial Exalted, the Dragon-Blooded, and set them against the Solar Exalted. It would be a bloody and terrible battle, but they would win, and Creation would be saved. (At least for the time being). The Bronze Faction supported this course of action.

The Bronze Faction won the debate, and lo, the Solar Exalted were slaughtered. Only a very few (less than ten, as I recall) escaped; the rest were slain, and their Exaltations trapped in the Jade Prison, deep under the sea, and thus begain the Second Age.

...and what happened after that, is another story.

And of course, nobody asked the humans about their opinion on the matter.