General Exalted Discussion: There's a God for that! Except for Sorcery, of course.

[Mattarias, King.]

Like I said, whooole 'nother can of worms.

[Tavar]

One problem with Greek Mythology is that so many tales got merged together incompletely over the years. That's one reason Zeus is such a playboy; each individual king of the gods of each individual mythology was merged into one, but keep all the women.

There are many, many other inconsistencies throughout the stories..

[Mattarias, King.]

One problem with Greek Mythology is that so many tales got merged together incompletely over the years. That's one reason Zeus is such a playboy; each individual king of the gods of each individual mythology was merged into one, but keep all the women.

There are many, many other inconsistencies throughout the stories..

Agreed. I can't help but feel many tales from/about the first age might get similarly jumbled as well, non?

[Yuki Akuma]

I remember a myth where he did. and yes I know he is a half-god! that was the point I was making.

Atlas never held up the earth. You're thinking of Atlas Shrugged, where the author gets it completely wrong.

And why did you feel the need to make the same point as me while phrasing it as if I claimed he was mortal?

Agreed. I can't help but feel many tales from/about the first age might get similarly jumbled as well, non?

...Not sure what that has to do with anything, but... non. There are far better records, for a start.

Now, pre-war Creation... yeah, stories about that time period are likely to be murky. But 2,000 years ago? That's no time at all.

[Lord Raziere]

One problem with Greek Mythology is that so many tales got merged together incompletely over the years. That's one reason Zeus is such a playboy; each individual king of the gods of each individual mythology was merged into one, but keep all the women.

There are many, many other inconsistencies throughout the stories..

well, then I remember it being that Hera got mad Herakles for some reason, made go do a bunch of challenges, one of them involved something that Atlas could do so he was like "hey, if you do this thing, I'll totally hold up the world for you man." and Atlas was call like "cool." and was thinking SUCKER!
Atlas then went and did the thing came back and told him he could keep holding up the world for all he cared, cause he is going free dude but then Herakles tricked him back into holding up the world.

Then Herakles did a bunch of challenges after that, but that is what I remember the most.

[Yuki Akuma]

Hera made Herakles go mad because he was the illegitimate bastard child of her husband, and he went on the Ordeals to atone for killing his wife and children.

Then he had to go do some more because some guy was a jerk.

[horngeek]

Guys, someone mind answering Keinnicht? I dunno how to answer, myself.

[The Rose Dragon]

Also, could we not delve too deeply into real-world mythology? Don't want to get this thread locked, after all.

[Tavar]

Note that Hera was the instigator in Herakles's madness. Just like pretty much every other bastard child Zeus had.

Really, Greek Mythology seems to fit Solars like a glove.

@Keinnicht;
Well, depends on the solars, but if it's really mortal extra's I'd probably just let them describe slaughtering/scattering them.

You might try looking in one of the games running down in the PBP section. I'd suggest mine, but it might die due to players not posting. If you do, you could post question in the OOC thread. If it's not my game, you'll want to PM the organizer first, as a simple courtesy.

[Mattarias, King.]

Sorry for sparking the myth discussion. I guess my god-name isn't such a misnomer anyways, eh? "The Spark that Ignites All War".

I thought I'd post this here, although I could start a new thread if it's disrupting conversation. Either way, here's my thing:

I've always thought Exalted sounded sweet, and wanted to play/run it. Could someone give me an idea of how a game generally goes? How on earth do you handle mass combat between three or four solars and a swarm of mooks? How complicated is the game to run/play?

From what I've experienced (That is to say, in a decently sized, mixed group lacking real Solars), it tends to go "roleplay, roleplay, roleplay, SUDDENLY, BATTLES!, fight, fight, fight, roleplay a bit more, wrap up." It's not terribly complicated once you get the rules down, really. Especially if you have some handy cheat-sheets like my group does. Just roll a bunch of d10s, 7+ is good, 10s are awesome, 1s suck.

Tons of mooks tend to REALLY bog down a game, in my experience. Though it's likely easier with Dawn castes, where you can just flare your anima and scare the fight right out of 'em. I reccomend stronger opponents, not more.

[horngeek]

If it's not my game, you'll want to PM the organizer first, as a simple courtesy.

Huh? Not that you can't, but the threads are free to all to read.

Anyway, search for 'God-kings of Lotus' for a good game on this website.

[Yuki Akuma]

No one handles mass combat. The mass combat rules are stupid.

[Arcanoi]

Mass Combat should generally be handled in the following two ways, depending on one explicit factor.

Q: Is the Opposing Army lead by an opponent of sufficient Essence to threaten the PCs?

Y: AWESOME! You now have an awesome background of a calamitous battle for your duel/skirmish against the opposing Exalt(s)/Gods/Raksha/Whathaveyou.

N: AWESOME! You now have an awesome background of a calamitous battle for your roleplaying!

[Jokasti]

Horngeek:

You might try looking in one of the games running down in the PBP section. I'd suggest mine, but it might die due to players not posting. If you do, you could post question in the OOC thread. If it's not my game, you'll want to PM the organizer first, as a simple courtesy.

I believe this is what Tavar meant when he refered to asking permission: before posting in an OoC thread that you are not a player in. I could also be completely wrong.

[Tavar]

Nope, that's pretty much what I meant. If he really wants answers, he's probably going to have questions after reading a PbP thread.

[Kyeudo]

No one handles mass combat. The mass combat rules are stupid.

I handled Mass Combat by completely rewriting the rules to ditch all of the extra make-work of converting character traits into unit stats and the "Army as Pants" system. Probably overkill, but now an Abyssal leading a horde of zombies against a unit of Lookshyan Gunzosha led by a sworn brotherhood of Terrestrial Exalts actually results in horrific casualties for the zombie horde.

[golentan]

I deal with it by reducing a lot of the MAD and crazy derived statistics. Once you've reduced some of the nonsense, it's no clunkier than anything else in exalted. Which is to say, clunky. But awesome.

[Reynard]

I handled Mass Combat by completely rewriting the rules to ditch all of the extra make-work of converting character traits into unit stats and the "Army as Pants" system. Probably overkill, but now an Abyssal leading a horde of zombies against a unit of Lookshyan Gunzosha led by a sworn brotherhood of Terrestrial Exalts actually results in horrific casualties for the zombie horde.

I deal with it by reducing a lot of the MAD and crazy derived statistics. Once you've reduced some of the nonsense, it's no clunkier than anything else in exalted. Which is to say, clunky. But awesome.

I handle it (as a Player), by preparing massive kill-combos that only really work effectively against Mortals, and then killing huge swathes of them in the open seconds of the army coming into sight.

As an ST, I handle it by remembering that nearly everyone's unit-leading War charms suck, and not bothering with it unless I have no other option.

[golentan]

Hrmm... I've been going back and forth on this, particularly because I've never played (much less run) a high essence game. If I were to run an infernal ascension game, any advice on how to handle the timeline (since it would have to take place over hundreds of years), and would anyone be interested?

[Reynard]

Hrmm... I've been going back and forth on this, particularly because I've never played (much less run) a high essence game. If I were to run an infernal ascension game, any advice on how to handle the timeline (since it would have to take place over hundreds of years), and would anyone be interested?

How you handle it really depends. For one, you need a reason for the Infernals to be left alone for so long. I think one of the endings in RoTSE has the Yozi kill all of them and seal the Shards again, so there's that to deal with.

Mostly, the problems come when they start picking up Essence AFTER starting with their Heretical charms. Their Yozi are going to be pretty pissed about it, so that makes long time-skips had to justify as they should be under near-constant threat.

Aside from that, you have to contend with lots and lots of homebrew, and all the problems that come along with high-essence combat.

But I think that if you can find a way for the time-skips to be largely uninterrupted, or remember that training sessions CAN be interrupted with no loss of progress (for a short while, anyway), than it shouldn't be too hard. Just don't make anyone with short lifespans prominent characters, they won't matter.

[golentan]

I was thinking Yu-Shan would be a larger threat: Setting off a blasphemy effect that immobilizes you for a couple days probably means a fight when you wake up.

Whereas the Yozis have to choose between sending normal akuma after you (not likely to work), or other GSPs (Running the risk of Hey guys, whatcha working on?)

[Reynard]

I was thinking Yu-Shan would be a larger threat: Setting off a blasphemy effect that immobilizes you for a couple days probably means a fight when you wake up.

Whereas the Yozis have to choose between sending normal akuma after you (not likely to work), or other GSPs (Running the risk of Hey guys, whatcha working on?)

Set off the Blasphemy effect while outside Fate to solve the first problem. There are a half dozen ways to get it, through artifacts, charms and manses.

The Yozi have the nigh-infinite armies of Hell at their their, quite literal, disposal, and are more than able to keep on sending the demons until you're out of motes. And they don't need to read Fate to find yer ass.

[Tavar]

The only problem then is getting the armies outside of hell. The surrender oaths mean that they just can't will it to happen, so as long as you don't do it in hell(in which case you probably deserve to die), you'll be relatively safe from them.

[golentan]

The only problem then is getting the armies outside of hell. The surrender oaths mean that they just can't will it to happen, so as long as you don't do it in hell(in which case you probably deserve to die), you'll be relatively safe from them.

This. That, and an infernal doing this who hasn't Swallowed the Scorpion deserves what's coming to them.

[Tavar]

Okay, I know the Primordials have both world-bodies and...johten? The bodies that are more creature shaped/sized. What are Gaia's, then?

[Arcanoi]

She's got a main Emerald Mother jouten that pals around Yu-Shan. The rest of them are searching for the Shining Answer in the Wyld. Her World-Body is amongst these.

[golentan]

Okay, I know the Primordials have both world-bodies and...johten? The bodies that are more creature shaped/sized. What are Gaia's, then?

Gaia's world body and all her souls are off in the wyld questing for... something. Whatever the heck the Shining Answer is. She evidently travels in the form of the comet Gnosis while doing this, and it's unclear whether Gnosis is a Kami or her actual world body.

She left a Jouten behind in yu-shan, and that's what most people know as Gaia. This state of affairs evidently leaves luna feeling... unsatisfied.

[Xefas]

Okay, I know the Primordials have both world-bodies and...johten? The bodies that are more creature shaped/sized. What are Gaia's, then?

Gaia has two known Jouten, "The Emerald Mother" and "The Jouten Often Referenced As 'Gnosis' But Is Not Actually Gnosis And Is Only Closely Related To Gnosis". The proper name for the latter is unknown.

[Rikandur Azebol]

Hrmm... I've been going back and forth on this, particularly because I've never played (much less run) a high essence game. If I were to run an infernal ascension game, any advice on how to handle the timeline (since it would have to take place over hundreds of years), and would anyone be interested?

I'm currently running a high-essence game, how to handle those ? Let the players go frenzy on average NPCs ... expect the players to create plots. Warn players thoght, that their willy nilly approach might end in their deaths. One of my players, who's a Dragon King surrounded by essence 6 exalts and other supernaturals ... decided to go Skynet for extra power.

He have clone-machine ready, and some sort of data-core wich is regularly updating his memories trough remote artifact. And he keeps as low profile as he can, too.

And, of course, I would be very interested in playing Infernal Ascension game. May even start this affair in Malfeas. Would think of something to not let Yozi go medieval on me.

[Fortuna]

The awesomest Exalt (bar, maybe, Alchemicals)? In the epicest possible Exalt story? So. Very. In.