General Exalted Discussion XVI: Chej Kejak, Pokegod Trainer!

[HalfTangible]

I'm talking about the song, which is what you said you hated. And go on, take a look at TV shows. How many can you name that actually sing the song as-is? Of course they sue TV shows that sing the song.

Yes. I hate the song because the phrase 'happy birthday' was said to me every single day for like 4 years and the entire song is built around that stupid phrase.

Also, they're not unidentified: you're identifying them.

I can't identify them.

It's true they aren't completely insurmountable but they are very dangerous. Far more than any mortal animal. Not least because a fae can just fave their hand and bam, tyrant lizard.

Okay, are they threats that require Exalted or not? If so, then I don't see why the Lunars can't have them as their enemies and if not I don't see why they were considered a threat that requires its own book.

[TheCountAlucard]

You know, the notion of something not being a threat to something else based solely on its "supernatural weight class" is one of the things being jettisoned to make room for the new edition. So it might help for you to break free of that mindset before it gets your characters killed in any Ex3 games you play in.

Mortals can threaten Fair Folk. Fair Folk can threaten Lunars. Mortals can threaten Lunars. Lunars can threaten the Princes of Hell and the Deathlords.

[HalfTangible]

You know, the notion of something not being a threat to something else based solely on its "supernatural weight class" is one of the things being jettisoned to make room for the new edition. So it might help for you to break free of that mindset before it gets your characters killed in any Ex3 games you play in.

Mortals can threaten Fair Folk. Fair Folk can threaten Lunars. Mortals can threaten Lunars. Lunars can threaten the Princes of Hell and the Deathlords.

Ill be sure to remember that thing I already knew in 2020 when it comes out.

'In General' is not the same as 'every instance'.

[Rater202]

Ill be sure to remember that thing I already knew in 2015 when it comes out.

'In General' is not the same as 'every instance'.

I have no idea what happened to this conversation.

[SaurOps]

Okay, are they threats that require Exalted or not? If so, then I don't see why the Lunars can't have them as their enemies and if not I don't see why they were considered a threat that requires its own book.

Individual Fair Folk are challenges for Exalted, but their strength is weird, so you'll also get god-blooded that can take them on, and elementals are also also likely to fight them. Pretty much anything can and will, and such beings are more numerous than the Exalted. Additionally, as far as Dragon-Blooded go, just the outcastes that are unaffiliated with any power are more numerous than Lunars. They also do a pretty good job of whooping up on raksha behind when the time comes to do so. Lookshy also hates raksha, and obviously, the Realm doesn't let them slide.

As an entire thing in aggregate, Fair Folk aren't threatening Creation, and don't need to be fought group to group in an apocalyptic battle. That already happened; it was when the Empress used the Sword of Creation to kill their best and brightest - according to the Ink Monkeys article, it was as bad to the raksha as the Great Contagion had been to the living of Creation. And for the survivors, the greeting on retreat back into the Wyld was with hannya that started eating them. As far as shaped Creation is concerned, the Fair Folk are sort of a self-correcting problem, since they're effectively eating each other down to nothing where they aren't just throwing in the towel and trying to live with mortals in some capacity. Groups of raksha, even the [Insert Gemstone Name Here] Courts, are not world-invading armies. They are bandit gangs and petty kingdoms of aliens that still hold on to fragile ambitions. They're so fragile, in fact, that one of the courts is well known in history for having gone too far and ended up annihilated in a reprisal attack.

So, all things considered, Fair Folk aren't really anyone's specific enemy, except for Abyssals, who have Charms specifically for ending the fragile hopes of the remaining Fair Folk. And so the Lunars, by and large, need not concern themselves with the raksha when the Realm is busy shaking down the Threshold to make more palaces for the Dragon-Blooded, to say nothing of what Dynasts get up to when they're actually in the Threshold, far from prying eyes.

[HalfTangible]

I have no idea what happened to this conversation.

A tangent off of a discussion of Lunars that ended up forming into its own discussion regarding the Fair Folk.

[golentan]

Any Lunars argument that hinges on one Lunar being able to churn out 25,000 children in a year is a terrible Lunars argument.

Says you!

[HalfTangible]

Says you!

What about 'Lunars are raging sex machines', 'Lunars almost never don't die in childbirth' or 'Lunars can reproduce very quickly'?

All of those things are supported by the ability to have 25,000 kids.

[golentan]

That's what I'm saying. I like those arguments!

[Hiro Protagonest]

So... Lunar pregnancy lasts four or five days?

Or if only half of them got pregnant at a time (under the assumption that mortals aren't involved and it's only Lunars), it would have to be two days...

[HalfTangible]

So... Lunar pregnancy lasts four or five days?

Or if only half of them got pregnant at a time (under the assumption that mortals aren't involved and it's only Lunars), it would have to be two days...

Check again - part of the plan was to gain the heart's blood of a creature with a ludicrous reproduction rate and make beastmen out of them.

25,000 rabbit ninjas, anyone?

[SaurOps]

Check again - part of the plan was to gain the heart's blood of a creature with a ludicrous reproduction rate and make beastmen out of them.

25,000 rabbit ninjas, anyone?

In order to beget beastmen, it would have to be quite a large rabbit. You can't produce beastmen with anything smaller than human, and it usually takes an animal a good deal larger than average human size. It's on page 70-71 of Exalted: the Lunars, though, so you might not have read it. And while being in said book would normally disqualify a source, that and the 1st edition player's guide are among the few places that producing beastmen is actually discussed, and when converted over to Scroll of Heroes, everything was basically copy-pasted, only without the page reference to E:tL. You're also not going to get nearly as many beastmen even in the event of a litter, what with spiking the process with slower-reproducing human biology.

Also, if you do build up that many prior to the disappearance of the Empress, the odds of her scratching an itchy trigger finger goes up dramatically. You don't want to push the Dynasty so far that it chooses Complete Destruction. You just want them to get threatened enough that they send in some wonder of the past so that it gets mired and becomes unusable.

[Lanaya]

There's a knack that lets you take on the form of oversized animals, so human-sized rabbits are a possibility.

Edit: Maybe not. You can double the rabbit's size, and you can Emperor Ox it, but there's no knack to just make it human-sized. That's certainly appropriate territory for a custom knack, though.

[Exthalion]

Guys, you need to go with ant and termite beastmen. That way you can have thousands of offspring that gestate independently of you and giant hive-cities to mock the Solar empire-builders with.

[golentan]

Guys, you need to go with ant and termite beastmen. That way you can have thousands of offspring that gestate independently of you and giant hive-cities to mock the Solar empire-builders with.

I thought that's what I was arguing for...

[HalfTangible]

Guys, you need to go with ant and termite beastmen. That way you can have thousands of offspring that gestate independently of you and giant hive-cities to mock the Solar empire-builders with.

There's only one member of an ant hive capable of reproducing, and making beastmen requires that someone f#@$ it.

Who would f$#@ an ant?!

[DoomHat]

Man, the more I read here the lamer Exalted sounds in practice.

I've never been able to play a game, but I own an old broken spine copy of the 2nd Ed core rules that I've been totting round more or less since it came out.
From that I got the impression the core question of the setting was "Do you want a better world, or just a safer one?"

You task is impossible for mortal kind. Your task is impossible for the Gods. The best and only viable strategy to contain the horror and chaos is to just shave off all the excess, regardless of the wonders that will be lost along the way. No matter how powerful you might be, or become, you'd have to be some kind of idiot to think you can do any better than that.

So strap on your dunce cap, pick up your daiklave, and lets get to work.

To me, part of the appeal, in keeping with the theme of manifold super epicness, was that each of the major 'Badguys' individually represent an oncoming End of Days. Demons, Ghosts, and Faeries are all simultaneous, equal, and distinct problems.
---

But I guess I can't be too put off by that. I always felt core mechanics really badly failed to match up with the tone and inspirations.
Probably the biggest one being the Essene resource mechanic. In pretty much every anime and Japanese Fighting or Brawling game ever, the "Power Bar" starts at Zero and goes up over the course of the fight.

That way things can build up to a climatic Super Move. As opposed to being able to just go nova at the first opportunity, or worse, penny pinching all the awesome stuff for fear you'll need to have it saved up to go nova on the next thing you may or may not meet.

Imagine a Dynasty Warriors game where you started each stage with 4 full Musou bars, but lacked the ability gain any more. Does that sound as lame to you as it does to me? Because that's Exalted.

[golentan]

There's only one member of an ant hive capable of reproducing, and making beastmen requires that someone f#@$ it.

Who would f$#@ an ant?!

Well, we'd have to have dinner and conversation first.

[HalfTangible]

Man, the more I read here the lamer Exalted sounds in practice.

Well yeah. The whole reason that so many of us are looking forward to 3e is because the mechanics of 2e suck.

Especially for Lunars.

Probably the biggest one being the Essene resource mechanic... Imagine a Dynasty Warriors game where you started each stage with 4 full Musou bars, but lacked the ability gain any more. Does that sound as lame to you as it does to me? Because that's Exalted.

Well... no, it's not. Exalted lets you regain essence throughout the battle by basically being awesome. So it's more like starting with 4 full musou bars that refill when you do something cool.

Also most games that I've seen do a similar mechanic where you start out at full power and slowly fall. >.> Especially for RPGs.

Well, we'd have to have dinner and conversation first.

The only love in her life is her work.

[golentan]

The only love in her life is her work.

I admire a woman with ambition.

[Morty]

The combat model of 3e is supposedly designed around the idea of building up your momentum and advantage until you can deliver the final strike. That sounds a little closer to what DoomHat is describing.

[HalfTangible]

I admire a woman with ambition.

She has the exact same job she starts with where she does nothing but sit in place all day and have sex, a job she was born to do by her parents. That's not 'ambitious'.

The combat model of 3e is supposedly designed around the idea of building up your momentum and advantage until you can deliver the final strike. That sounds a little closer to what DoomHat is describing.

Indeed. I'm a little nervous about how that will actually end up working (in that we've heard nothing about it but the basic concept, and a parallel to Darth Vader vs Luke Skywalker) but in concept at least it sounds cool.

[Hiro Protagonest]

Imagine a Dynasty Warriors game where you started each stage with 4 full Musou bars, but lacked the ability gain any more. Does that sound as lame to you as it does to me? Because that's Exalted.

I've never played Dynasty Warriors, but the only game I know of where in combat you have a bar that you fill up is Asura's Wrath. And it's terrible.

It's also been described as basically the same as Exalted (at least pre-2.5) combat.

[Sith_Happens]

There's only one member of an ant hive capable of reproducing, and making beastmen requires that someone f#@$ it.

Who would f$#@ an ant?!

Someone who really wants to either conquer or deter the Realm, considering that's what this is about in the first place.

[golentan]

She has the exact same job she starts with where she does nothing but sit in place all day and have sex, a job she was born to do by her parents. That's not 'ambitious'.

She wants to expand her empire through her children. I want to conquer the earth with my children. My children can use siege weapons. Her children are numerous enough to dominate a logistics war with higher mammals.

Sounds like not only is she ambitious, but our ambitions and methods complement perfectly.

[HalfTangible]

Someone who really wants to either conquer or deter the Realm, considering that's what this is about in the first place.

The Lunar, sure, but she's taking the form of a giant queen ant so that she can reproduce. You need an animal and a person to make beastmen, so who's f$#@ing the queen ant the size of a human being?

She wants to expand her empire through her children. I want to conquer the earth with my children. My children can use siege weapons. Her children are numerous enough to dominate a logistics war with higher mammals.

Sounds like not only is she ambitious, but our ambitions and methods complement perfectly.

.......

*sigh*

Forget it.

[Qwertystop]

The Lunar, sure, but she's taking the form of a giant queen ant so that she can reproduce. You need an animal and a person to make beastmen, so who's f$#@ing the queen ant the size of a human being?

Another Lunar? Someone convinced or "convinced" by the Lunar?

[Turalisj]

The Lunar, sure, but she's taking the form of a giant queen ant so that she can reproduce. You need an animal and a person to make beastmen, so who's f$#@ing the queen ant the size of a human being?

That's what social combat is for.

[Rockphed]

I think that such is one of the limitations of the current method of making beastmen. If I want to make an army of beastmen, I should be able to unite some nomads under my lunar and do some ritual to them to grant them the form I desire. I shouldn't have to spend 15 years raising an army of my children.

Now, those rituals don't have to be "point charm at army", and could be more "take potential beastman into wild with you, hunt him, eat his heart and replace it with the heart of the beast you want him to take the form of." I'm surprised that there isn't a way to do that. It seems much more effective at creating a tribe of beastmen than getting people to get freaky with you while you are in animal form and waiting a generation.

Now I expect Meschlum to show up and tell us how to do it with Fae.

[golentan]

That's what social combat is for.

Also weirdos like me.

Plus, aren't there the charms in Glories of the Most High for conceiving a child of anything in your heart's library regardless of what shape you are wearing?