General Exalted Discussion XVI: Chej Kejak, Pokegod Trainer!

[Exthalion]

Uh, wasn't the map already the size of multiple Earth maps? With significantly less ocean? How could you possibly need to make it even bigger?:smallconfused

This is what PoH said:

In the Age of Sorrows, the surface of Creation (including oceans) is roughly 120 million square miles. More than a fifth of that is ocean, however, so the available land mass is actually somewhere around 95 million square miles.

The Earth, on the other hand, has about 197 million square miles of surface, but only 57 million square miles of land surface.

In the First Age, the surfaces of Creation were even bigger, and in prehistory they might have been immensely bigger.

By volume, Creation may or may not be an infinitely tall pillar. Earth has a volume of roughly one quintillion cubic kilometers.

So, Creation has about twice the land surface of Earth, though its total surface is smaller.

Then there's outliers, like Heaven which exactly duplicates the size of the Blessed Isle, the Underworld which duplicates the size of Creation, and Hell and Cecelyne which may both be abstractly large. Of course, at that point you might start adding the surface areas of caves that humans have explored on Earth, or the Moon's surface area, to even out the comparisons.

[Morty]

I can't see anything about the Solar Bond being reduced to politics and matrimony on the "What We Know" wiki. All it says there is that it'll be revised and made more nuanced.

[Recaiden]

It was big, but it was treated like it was small. Hopefully this even bigger map gives the writers more of a sense of the immense scales Creation presents.

[Rater202]

I can't see anything about the Solar Bond being reduced to politics and matrimony on the "What We Know" wiki. All it says there is that it'll be revised and made more nuanced.

It's right here

Blackwingedheaven:

So, are Solars and Lunars no longer paired Exaltations since their numbers are different?

Lea:

I think we’re going back to the 1e standard of “In the First Age, diplomatic marriages between Solars and Lunars were common, and these sometimeso-to-often blossomed into meaningful relationships, so you can have a lost romance with your ancient spouse or his/her modern reincarnation if you dig on that sort of thing.”

[Morty]

Yeah, so that's one of the writers talking about what they might do with a splat that's still a ways out from being released. Hardly grounds for lamenting the loss of anything.

[Eric Minton]

Uh, wasn't the map already the size of multiple Earth maps? With significantly less ocean? How could you possibly need to make it even bigger?

Here's an overlay map, using the 3e map teaser, that Ian Watson posted last September:

[ChaosArchon]

Alright well personally I'll just say in any games I ST that they have the whole soul bound thing, but are equal partners in the bond. Dunno I kind of liked the fact that for each Solar, there was a Lunar right beside him.

[Recaiden]

The current thing is +100 Lunars. I like the idea that for each Solar or Sidereal, there will be a Lunar beside them.
And it ruins one of the more annoying aspects of Nocturnals. And it opens us up to charms that work differently based on whether your mate is a Sidereal or a Solar.

[ChaosArchon]

Wait Siddies get their own moonaifus now... I approve of this development

[Lord Raziere]

Wait Siddies get their own moonaifus now... I approve of this development

Yea, now we can get love spy action between them, and have their long history of war between each other filled with betrayals and distrust that makes them constantly suspicious of one another, and makes the Usurpation more interesting, and keeps the Lunars from being Solar-Biased, and it means more Lunars in Yu-Shan. really makes things more interesting.

[Drascin]

Wait Siddies get their own moonaifus now... I approve of this development

This of course has to be tempered with the fact that "Eaten by Lunar" remains the leading cause of death for Sidereal Exalted, according to a comment a dev made in the forums.

[ChaosArchon]

This of course has to be tempered with the fact that "Eaten by Lunar" remains the leading cause of death for Sidereal Exalted, according to a comment a dev made in the forums.

It's just a love bite obviously

[Sith_Happens]

This of course has to be tempered with the fact that "Eaten by Lunar" remains the leading cause of death for Sidereal Exalted, according to a comment a dev made in the forums.

No one said marrying someone who can turn into a spider was safe.

[Mewtarthio]

This of course has to be tempered with the fact that "Eaten by Lunar" remains the leading cause of death for Sidereal Exalted, according to a comment a dev made in the forums.

"Worth. It."
~Famous Last Words

[TimeWizard]

The setting is not optimistic, but the premise is. Just like real life.

Damn. I didn't know the Dev's had Insight excellencies.

[HalfTangible]

Wait Siddies get their own moonaifus now... I approve of this development

I'm not so sure I do. How does the idea of Lunar Anathema work now? Did the Siddies decide they had to kill off all of their own partners, too? Because if so it helps explain how the Lunars got away (some of those 100 sid-bound lunars had to have been told ahead of time, after all) but it makes the sudden decision to mark them all as demons incredibly confusing. Like, do Sid lunars have something that makes them look different from Sol lunars? Do the Lunars get more character options depending on which they are? Well okay, yeah, probably, but how much of that comes from being a Lunar and... like, do the Tattoos only need to be given to Solar-bound Lunars because they were the only ones who fled into the Wyld, while the Sid-lunars stayed in Yu-Shan? How does the Lunar host operate now with 100 of their number bonded with the enemy? You can't exactly work well with 1/4th of your small number untrustworthy.

... And aren't the lunars supposed to be the ferocious generalist to the Solar's overspecialized 'perfection'? Do the Sid-lunars build their skills a different way? I guess it'd be easier for them to get a Sidereal Sifu, but would it affect their own charms, too?

... And which of the Exalted is gonna number 200 now? =( 400, 300, 100? Come ooooooon, where's 200!

[Morty]

Once again, saying that Sidereals will have Lunar mates just like Solars do feels like an over-interpretation to me.

[HalfTangible]

Once again, saying that Sidereals will have Lunar mates just like Solars do feels like an over-interpretation to me.

Having looked at the actual statement, yeah, it is. i mean it is implied that that's the case, but it's not outright stated.

[Rater202]

Where is the implications of Sid's having mates coming from?

I do belive the Q&A said that the concept of mates as anything other than a first age political marrige was gone.

Which means no mates at all.

Even the number of Solars+Sids=Lunars is nowhere neer concrete evidence.

The response giving numbers of Celestials doesn't give any numbers for Abyssals or Infernals, both of which are still corrupted solars.

An infernals thread on the Onyx Path website had a post from a developer/writer saying that the reason for only 50 infernals was changing.

It could be that in the first age there were 400 Solars, but the Neverborn/Deathlords stole 100 and split them 50/50 with the Yozi's, who tiped them off to their existence.

[horngeek]

I don't think it's mates, at least assuming what Lea said is accurate. It's more 'well, memories of a lost romance are a thing', which means that they could (potentially) be Solar-Lunar, or Solar-Sidereal, or even Sidereal-Lunar (or even Solar-Solar! ).

But the formal part of the bond would be reduced/eliminated.

EDIT: On a site note, would anyone be up to do some character pics? I've got a... well, same character pre-Redemption and post... and I'd like to see if I could get any pics drawn of her.

[The_Snark]

I don't think it's mates, at least assuming what Lea said is accurate. It's more 'well, memories of a lost romance are a thing', which means that they could (potentially) be Solar-Lunar, or Solar-Sidereal, or even Sidereal-Lunar (or even Solar-Solar! ).

Except the non-Solars haven't been locked away for the last thousand years; they're a lot less likely to have past-life memories dating back to the First Age. I don't know how these bonds/marriages worked in 1e, so maybe I'm missing something, but it doesn't seem like the traditional Lunar bond dynamic works under this model.

[ChaosArchon]

I don't think it's mates, at least assuming what Lea said is accurate. It's more 'well, memories of a lost romance are a thing', which means that they could (potentially) be Solar-Lunar, or Solar-Sidereal, or even Sidereal-Lunar (or even Solar-Solar! ).

But the formal part of the bond would be reduced/eliminated.

I kinda wanna play a character who is a Sidereal who was in love with a Solar and they tried to run away during the Usurpation. Sounds like it would make a great backstory.

[horngeek]

Well, my immediate response to thinking that through was 'so, you could have a Sidereal-Lunar pair of Star-Crossed Lovers?'

See if you can beat Romeo and Juliet- bring peace to your warring groups, and stay alive to see it!

Also, bah. I find myself wanting to play in a game of Exalted.

Yes, I know, 3e just around the corner... but one of the ideas I really want to do is an Abyssal seeking redemption, and the Abyssals book won't be out for at LEAST a few months after 3e comes out, and 3e itself is probably still a few months away.

[Morty]

I do belive the Q&A said that the concept of mates as anything other than a first age political marrige was gone.

The Q&A said that Stephen Sheppard thinks that they're going back to the original presentation as a matter of politics and matrimony. It's not nothing, but it's not a conclusive statement, either.

[Lix Lorn]

Alright well personally I'll just say in any games I ST that they have the whole soul bound thing, but are equal partners in the bond. Dunno I kind of liked the fact that for each Solar, there was a Lunar right beside him.

Yeah, I always liked this.

The current thing is +100 Lunars. I like the idea that for each Solar or Sidereal, there will be a Lunar beside them.
And it ruins one of the more annoying aspects of Nocturnals. And it opens us up to charms that work differently based on whether your mate is a Sidereal or a Solar.

...that's pretty cool too, although I dunno that I call negating the nocturnal mates a plus.

"Worth. It."
~Famous Last Words

(snrk)

[horngeek]

Man, Nocturnals. For a while, I was pretty iffy about them... then I realised they had Doctor Who-style Regeneration.

*sold*

[Lord Raziere]

yea, now if only the Nocturnals document had chapter bookmarks, I could actually play using them, because I don't have time to scroll through the entire thing to get to the stuff I actually need, and Exalted takes too long to make any character already. I can create Anima Beyond Fantasy characters faster.

[horngeek]

...my PDF of them does have chapter bookmarks.

----

Say, would anyone be up to doing a couple of Exalted character pics?

They're of the same character, just her as an Abyssal and her as a Solar.

[TimeWizard]

Maybe I missed something. What's a Nocturnal?

[HalfTangible]

Maybe I missed something. What's a Nocturnal?

It's a fan-made form of Exalt meant to be the counter to the Sidereals in the way that Lunars are counters to the Solars. The Sidereals represent fate and destiny, Nocturnals represent freedom and will. It's a pretty popular Exalt type (though I haven't looked enough into them to determine why) and a few have suggested making them canon.