General Exalted Discussion XVII: Edition of Cascading Years

[HalfTangible]

1) You don't speak for the incarnae, halftangible.

Thank you, Captain Obvious, for ruining the fun

2) Judging classes of beings rather than individuals is part of the problem.

The great curse is still a thing >.> As is reincarnation. This isn't a class of beings thing, this is 'you're literally handing this power over to the exact same people'. And yeah, you could argue that they'd have different mortal components, but the original 300 Solars all went bad, indicating that whatever the problem is, it's with their Exaltation.

The fact that Sol hasn't just up and destroyed the things altogether (or handed them to Autobot) shows more restraint than I'd have under these circumstances >.>

3) Primordials weren't and aren't better, the whole problem with creation remains the might makes right narrative and the primordials were the first incarnation of that, but the gods and exalted had a chance to make things better and blew it. And have proceeded to repeatedly blow it since.

Then why did you propose handing the godspear over to people who f#@$ed it up even harder than Sol Invictus?

4) No amount of hypothetical genius makes up for consistently poor results, and no plan that works as intended is stupid. Sol's leadership of creation to me looks like an unbroken string of failures (creation has broken how many times and how many different ways under his watch, starting with the 3 spheres cataclysm moving on through time of cascading years, operation wyld hand, the chaos surrounding the usurpation, the contagion, the balorian crusade, the steady deterioration of knowledge, technology, and the permanent loss of a number of unique entities like the dragon kings) and now we've got anti-creation exalts and incarnae level beings unbound by treaty like the deathlords going at it hammer and tongs things seem unlikely to get better under his nominal and usually absent leadership, and given his past history when he does intervene I don't feel particularly better about the idea of him taking a more active role.

Considering that he hasn't actually been in charge of Creation at any point during that timeline since he handed rulership over to the Exalts (and for a significant portion of it was deliberately turning his face away) I have to wonder what you're talking about

Also, unless exalted back-lore has gotten way more interesting since I last checked, I've faced down things way more horrifying than anything Sol has. Without the benefits of invulnerability, more to my chagrin.

I don't question a high-essence Solar's ability to steal Sol's power, I question whether or not handing it over to him is a good idea. Because as bad as Creation has gone, AFAIK, Sol's never used the godspear on a small country as target practice.

[Sith_Happens]

GREETINGS PUNY MORTAL SUBJECTS, IT HAS COME TO MY ATTENTION THAT THIS THREAD HAS PARTAKEN IN THE IMITATION OF CERTAIN GREATER BEINGS OF CREATION. POINT ME TO THE ONE WHO SOUGHT TO EXCLUDE THE GREATEST BEING IN ALL CREATION FROM THESE PROCEEDINGS AND YOU SHALL BE GRANTED ADVANCE WARNING BEFORE THE CONTINENT ON WHICH THEY SIT IS SMOTE WITH RIGHTEOUS FLAME. An offering to the all-caps filter.

[HalfTangible]

*points at golentan*

[Rater202]

GREETINGS PUNY MORTAL SUBJECTS, IT HAS COME TO MY ATTENTION THAT THIS THREAD HAS PARTAKEN IN THE IMITATION OF CERTAIN GREATER BEINGS OF CREATION. POINT ME TO THE ONE WHO SOUGHT TO EXCLUDE THE GREATEST BEING IN ALL CREATION FROM THESE PROCEEDINGS AND YOU SHALL BE GRANTED ADVANCE WARNING BEFORE THE CONTINENT ON WHICH THEY SIT IS SMOTE WITH RIGHTEOUS FLAME. An offering to the all-caps filter.

[Cannibal-Devil-Tiger] How did you get out of my Throne?[/cannibal-Devil-Tiger]

[Recaiden]

The fact that Sol hasn't just up and destroyed the things altogether (or handed them to Autobot) shows more restraint than I'd have under these circumstances >.>

You say that as if he could.

[HalfTangible]

You say that as if he could.

... Good point.

"The fact that he doesn't kill every Solar asap," etc etc.

[Lord Raziere]

The fact that Sol hasn't just up and destroyed the things altogether (or handed them to Autobot) shows more restraint than I'd have under these circumstances >.>

......Creation As managed by Autochthon:
"Haha! In my infinite brilliance, the answers are obvious! First we build more Adamant Castes! Their job is to work closely with the Sidereal Exalted to monitor all Exalts! Including the Sidereal Exalted. Oversight will of course, also be Adamant Castes!

Next, we convert everyone to the worship of the Unconquered Sun. Or me. With a single god for everyone to worship, surely any and all religious conflicts will be solved.

Next, we build a better reincarnation system and while Calibration is happening we quickly replace the current one with Lethe 2.0. This will require at least five Twilight Castes and a Sidereal of each Maiden to pull off in time. The result will be that all ghosts will reincarnate perfectly and automatically, even the Primordials! No more Underworld.

Dealing with the Wyld is a simple matter of rebuilding all the defenses the Solars made during the First Age.

As for the rest of gods, a nice conversion to my new design will be of help to keep them from being corrupt.

As for the Abyssals and the Infernals, we must capture them. So that I may study for them for science.

On the Exalts in general, all Solars should be taught to behave like an Orichalcum Caste, Dragon-Blooded should stop trying to be kings and be taught to be soldiers again, and Lunars should monitor and assassinate mortals who are screwing things up. The Sidereals are fine.

Lastly we incorporate into the religion constant dogma to discourage any form of demon-summoning or deals with demons, and stamp out all Yozi cults as heresy."


Truly he provides much better solutions to Creations problems

[golentan]

Dogma, Faith, and Tools?

NOBODY EXPECTS the adamant inquisiton. Our chief weapon is surprise...surprise and fear...fear and surprise.... our two weapons are fear and surprise...and ruthless efficiency.... Our three weapons are fear, surprise, and ruthless efficiency...and an almost fanatical devotion to the Great Maker.... Our four...no... amongst our weapons.... amongst our weaponry...are such elements as fear, surprise.... I'll come in again.

Nobody expects the Adamant Inquisition! Amongst our weaponry are such diverse elements as fear, surprise, ruthless efficiency, and an almost fanatical devotion to the Great Maker, and nice naked-cape uniforms - oh damn! I can't say it, you'll have to say it.

[TimeWizard]

As the designated Yozi Advocate, I want to point out that the Primordials in fact did a really good job with creation and everything before Solar Upstart Mc4hands got too big for his glorious golden britches.

The Primordials introduced the concepts of reality as we know them, they built an renewable, self sufficient, perpetual essence generating world and everything was just money. Then the lesser Wyld things wanted to break in but the Primordials had already rewarded themselves by inventing Fun and Games (Jade Palace) so they made sentient divine Roombas (Incarnae) to sort out the Fae and generally make calibrations as need be. The smarmy jerks even included sex, chocolate, and whatever that weird chess game thing is for mortals so that they (unimportant cosmic specs, beneath even ants to us) might have a little reprieve from their toil after the Primordials willed them into existence in the first place. All good so far, right? Great chain of being and all that.

So what happened? Glorious Solar Jerkwad (Praise the Sun!) decided the system was broken and so he did the stuff to make the Exalted and yadda yadda yadda, So that he could hang out at the big kids table and leave the system exactly the same as it was, except he delegated responsibility to fallible mortals with no checks or balances.

That's not a hero. That's a coup d'paradis.

[HalfTangible]

As the designated Yozi Advocate, I want to point out that the Primordials in fact did a really good job with creation and everything before Solar Upstart Mc4hands got too big for his glorious golden britches. The Primordials introduced the concepts of reality as we know them, they built an renewable, self sufficient, perpetual essence generating world and everything was just money. Then the lesser Wyld things wanted to break in but the Primordials invented Fun and Games so they made sentient divine Roombas to sort out the Fae and generally make calibrations as need be. The smarmy jerks even included sex, chocolate, and whatever that weird chess game thing is for mortals so that they (unimportant cosmic specs, beneath even ants to us) might have a little reprieve from their toil after the Primordials willed them into existence in the first place. So what happened? Glorious Solar Jerkwad (Praise the Sun!) decided the system was broken and so he did the stuff to make the Exalted and yadda yadda yadda, So that he could hang out at the big kids table and leave the system exactly the same as it was.

That's not a hero. That's a coup d'paradis.

There is literally a Primordial called 'The River of All Torments'. They specifically set about enslaving everything in existence and destroyed all that they so much as sat near for too long and expected everything else to clean up their mess. When the Principle of Hierarchy found out she wasn't going to rule anymore she broke her bones to unleash the three spheres cataclysm out of spite. The fact that the Primordials could go away and Creation could continue on as normal is testament to how little they did.

Also, two Primordials AGREED to turn against the other Primordials. So it clearly wasn't just a 'i wanna play the Games' thing.

[Exthalion]

so they made sentient divine Roombas (Incarnae)

It cannot be argued strongly enough that the emphasized word makes them guilty of extreme morally significant crimes.

[Lord Raziere]

eh.

even before inventing the whole "sentient life" thing and doing horrible things to them, the Primordials kind of gave up on finding whatever enlightenment thing they were searching for to basically make their own little private paradise so that they can revel in debauchery for all eternity. which just so happened to include inflicting suffering on those below them.

its just that their boredom-induced hedonism was 1000 times larger than the Solars boredom induced hedonism when they decided to just go "screw it, lets just enjoy ourselves" which just so happened to inflict suffering on those below them.

and now the Dragon-Blooded, who rebel in debauchery in their Scarlet Empire and what not, doing whatever they like as per their pleasure....inflict suffering on those below them.

.......so yeah. for some reason hedonism seems to be the root of all evil in Exalted. because every time someone had to overthrow another dude to save the world, the dude that needed overthrowing was enjoying themselves waaaaaaay too much. just a pattern I'm seeing.

[golentan]

It cannot be argued strongly enough that the emphasized word makes them guilty of extreme morally significant crimes.

Depends. I killed a billion living beings capable of learning today. I took some alcohol see, and swabbed around my sink. Boom, billion bacteria dead, minimum, just from the sponge.

Humans, and gods, object to primordial actions because they consider their soul and their sapience to matter.

Primordials seem to consider those to be the minimalist building blocks of their existence: A soul is little more to a primordial than a cell is to a human, and just like humans don't care about the millions of cells of their own they slay through the normal metabolic processes of existence, primordials don't seem to care about the millions of demons that perish in much the same way, let alone smaller, weaker cells (bacteria/humans).

I get that, as humans, it is human nature for most people to root for and side with the humans. The question remains to me whether sapience is a meaningful distinction for primordials in a way that makes their actions morally indefensible in an abstract sense, or if Auto-kun is just a weird creepy kid who was way too into his petri dishes and decided to fling Ebola in the faces of his companions while screaming "THESE ARE PEOPLE DAMMIT" from the perspective of the primordials.

Also, halftangible why is "River of All Torments" automatically evil? If I name my dog "Necreon, the slayer of children," that doesn't make him automatically evil, even if he is slaying children. Damn children, they keep trying to steal my cereal from me, and this is something I object to.

Granted, the children in this hypothetical are young ants.

[Lord Raziere]

that is fascinating Golentan, but this line of discussion pretty much walks down the same path of arguing that mortals are not real people because they have a destiny in the Loom of Fate.

namely, its something that makes the game go all wonky because its making humanity- the people that eventually Exalt and become the protagonists of the game- into nothing important, when the entire point is that humanity is Something Important. sure, maybe from the Primordials perspective it is like that, but it isn't really something worth considering as having moral weight. its just their opinion of humanity, and while everyone is free to express their opinion, that doesn't mean everyone is allowed to act on that opinion with impunity, and I don't see how the Primordials are any exception just because they are bigger people than us. just because some people are bigger than others doesn't mean the smaller people stop being people, the difference between your example and Exalted is that bacteria aren't people, they don't learn, they mutate.

[golentan]

that is fascinating Golentan, but this line of discussion pretty much walks down the same path of arguing that mortals are not real people because they have a destiny in the Loom of Fate.

namely, its something that makes the game go all wonky because its making humanity- the people that eventually Exalt and become the protagonists of the game- into nothing important, when the entire point is that humanity is Something Important. sure, maybe from the Primordials perspective it is like that, but it isn't really something worth considering as having moral weight. its just their opinion of humanity, and while everyone is free to express their opinion, that doesn't mean everyone is allowed to act on that opinion with impunity, and I don't see how the Primordials are any exception just because they are bigger people than us. just because some people are bigger than others doesn't mean the smaller people stop being people, the difference between your example and Exalted is that bacteria aren't people, they don't learn, they mutate.

Bacteria actually do LEARN, one of the definition traits of living things is that it displays differing response to continued stimulus. Bacteria that are repeatedly poked or exposed to a toxic chemical that they can detect will start avoiding the thing that is irritating them, for example. If a chemical or temperature gradient follows another at the same time each day, bacteria will begin physiological change to accommodate it BEFORE the change hits in anticipation (as for example a bacterial colony that will defend itself against the noonday sun by encysting shortly after dawn). It's simple learning, but it's learning.

And I'm not saying human lives don't matter, I'm saying they don't matter from the perspective of the primordials, which is different. It's holding them retroactively guilty for a crime they had no reason to suspect existed.

I'm all aboard the "overthrow the primordials" bandwagon from my perspective, but I don't think it's fair to hold them to standards they couldn't comprehend in any meaningful way. You get rid of them because they're dangerous to you, not because they're evil. They're dangerous and they sow the seeds of the death of people I like through their passage through the world alone, they crush civilizations without noticing that there was something there, and they sometimes annihilate souls rather than simply killing them? Yeah, get them afore they get us. But I don't hold it against them. I don't hold bacteria's attempts to kill me against them, and I don't hold humanity's attempts to kill the primordials against them, but I also take antibiotics if I get super sick, and if the primordials had won the war, well, maybe not so bad in the long run and maybe they start asking themselves the difficult questions about their relationship with even minor created life? It's a relative position. I like relative positions: They are hard to comprehend but they usually lead me to good places. And I don't feel anger towards the primordials for the sins of existing or creating humanity, when it comes down to it.

Except the Ebon Dragon. Screw That Guy.

[Exthalion]

Isn't it a bit of a cop out to grant Primordials absolution from their scale. If anything it would make them more culpable because they should be able to understand the ramifications of their actions better. The Demons in a Primordial's soul hierarchy are not particularly transapient. In fact, Second Circles are not meaningfully different from humans mentally. There are also not very many of them. Malfeas, the Titan with the largest soul hierarchy, never had more than 168 of them. Now, if the Titans grants that the ideas, feelings, opinions, etc. of these beings matter, they have no in-kind excuse for not applying the same to any other being of similar sapience.

If you were to attempt to argue that moral worth is some sort of emergent property of being in a soul hierarchy, you still devalue all the things important to those beings. For example, suppose Ligier wants everyone to worship him and happens to be a crafter and so is gratified by works of artifice. So he has a soul who weaves voices into cloth. None of what that soul cares about, including weaving voices into cloth actually matters. Why? because the filthy man animals can care about the exact same things in exactly the same way. (Some of them could even manage the trick with the right artifacts or sorcery). Even if Ligier conceptualizes things in some fundamentally inhuman way (hint: he doesn't) none of what he actually cares about can matter because it will never rise up to the scale of important things. (Before you come back with bacteria wanting to survive and humans wanting to survive, remember that humans assign moral responsibility based on mental complexity as well as moral worth. So we have a moral duty not to be cruel which you are not ascribing to the Titans.)

There is also the fact that they did not actually treat the Incarnae as roombas. They treated them like their actual children. Sol was as the son of the Holy Tyrant, treated as equal to his very heart. Gaia loved and still loves Luna and this is never treated as her enjoying a sex doll. Luna is a slightly special case because she has so many other moons she can engage with most of a titan at the same time, but Luna is not a different class of moral agent so the analogy still holds. If humans can presume to judge the Incarnae, they most certainly can presume to judge the Titans. They did, and found them wanting. The Primordials didn't make wind up toys when they made the Incarnea, they made things they would consider to be gods.



Incidentally, I rather enjoy this sort of discussion and don't mean to come off as dismissive. Please feel free to take my feeble arguments behind the shed and put them out of their misery.

[HalfTangible]

Also, halftangible why is "River of All Torments" automatically evil?

IS THIS A SERIOUS QUESTION?! O_o

(also, a Primordial's name is a huge part of who/what they are.)

[golentan]

Oh, I totally feel free to judge the titans, but the titans aren't the only victims of the actions of the exalted.

There are dozens of species which were driven to extinction in the first age. There are countless millions of morally non-repugnant demons condemned to hell because they lost, or if they're super lucky to be literal sex slaves in some cynis bordello until the patrons get bored by the novelty. There are the mortals who were enslaved in the first age, numbering in the hundreds of millions. In terms of personal body count of humanity, given that we know Sol Invictus has a fondness for still beating hearts from time immemorial he's probably wracked up a pretty big and pretty cruel number, but despite that and his known legendary compassion people usually give him a pass and I can't think of a single plot in exalted history to dethrone him personally. And I do count 1st circles in as part of primordial biology, because they seem to be a reflexive, instinctive process that in turn serves necessary functions for the functioning of the primordial (as autochthon's exmachina maintain his gears and body, the sesseljae cleanse malfeas of poison, the Naneke serve as repositories and processors of knowledge.

Now, and here's the thing: ALL OF THESE BEINGS MATTER. None of them matters more or less to me in the moral calculus of how I would act personally if dropped in the exalted world with the power to kick over some sandcastles. I don't give the humans up in creation more weight morally than the first circle demons, and I try not to judge someone more or less based on their power. But I also try to judge people by their own standards and the standards to which they were raised. Exalted suffers from a serious, probably terminal case of might makes right: Humans won, so demon slavery is okay. I also stand by the principle that life is better than death is better than soul annihilation, and kindness is better than indifference is better than cruelty.

Ebon dragon is bottom of the barrel, lowest of the low. Deathlords are absolutely disgusting. BUT, and it's a big but, I don't want to give Sol or any of the exalted a pass because they win and they happen to look like people I know. I find the treatment of the primordials to be reprehensible, even though I feel that humans and gods were perfectly reasonable in their revolution, and even as I find the judgement of the primordials based on moral codes they had no reason to subscribe to nor experience of to be silly.

Humans won, so they get to set the rules. I find the rules they set pretty reprehensible, both in the first age and in the modern age. ShinyShiny got to be head of Yu Shan and the celestial bureaucracy as he demanded to be, so the fact heaven is imploding under the bloat of its own corruption while he plays a game with his buddies and ignores it means I don't trust him with his own shoelaces particularly. Primordials invented life, they had the responsibility to safeguard it and understand it (and they were REALLY stupid to listen to the ebon dragon), so the fact they didn't and it stabbed them in the face is just sort of ironic and probably just desserts.

I CONDEMN THE WHOLE OF CREATION. And if I were there, and had the raw power required to seize the reigns from the current holders... I wouldn't. Or rather, I would, but then I'd walk away from them: These toys are too dangerous for you, because you have consistently shown yourself to critically fail at simple pattern recognition. I'm gonna go stomp on the Last and Loved Lolcat's head for a while, DON'T touch any WMDs while I'm out.

[TimeWizard]

My mission to sow discord amongst the supporters of the Great Heresy (You Jerks) is working. A few observations:

Primordials do not display human-like emotions. Humans are a blend of Primordial Concepts. The distinction is important here, because while humans can have Bravery, Wanderlust, and Pathos they can't have Sverry nor Jinlai. What are Sverry and Jinlai? Nothing. Because there was no primordial to make that concept. They are the Bob Ross and the Paint, and creation is the Canvas. Even the Incarnae are just brushes. We are the happy little trees.

Someone brought up "Human Lives" thing. Getting a bit biased aren't we? Humans, the Alpha and the Omega. Invented the Cheeseburger. I get it. We're cool. No wait, we aren't cool. We're mean and conflicted and we take any opportunity to attack and steal and just be huge jerks about everything. So what a few hundred thousand of you die, you can't win every time kids! We gave you the rule book, if you die terribly just sit out a bit and you'll get another turn soon. Seriously, give your brothers and sisters a chance to play "I'm the petty tyrant now", you're turn will come up in a few hundred lifetimes. Be a good sport and when it's your turn everyone will play nice for you. Yeesh, kids. Always crying when they get tagged out.

Now the "Sentience Issue". Psssh, "Issue". If we, I mean "They", the Primordials, of which I am not one, wanted a Creation full of trees and mountains and bubbly rivers only then that's what w... They would have built. But you can't live on Spinach alone, so they built humans to dream and animals to inhabit the wilds and fish and everything. Seriously, have you seen some of the underwater volcano microcosms? Some of their best work. I like the little crabs Kimberry made, it's that attention to detail you just don't see much. Anyway, Humans. Yeah, Rituals and Prayer are important to the gods. And the Gods are important to keeping Creation in balanced. Outside of creation is Literal Chaos. You think "up is down" is confusing? Try "Up is forever, down is unbridled loathing of the color green". The Primordials hated being there so much they made creation, and they made the gods to keep creation well oiled, and the Humans to pray to the gods, and the fish and stuff for the humans to eat. (Sidenote, I never hear anyone complain about the genocide that is fishing, but the second you guys start dying its all "The horror the horror". Hypocrites- you know you come back! Fish don't. )

And don't get me started on "Gaia and Autocthon aren't traitors" tomfoolery. Gaia wants to ride Luna so hard she went along with the stupid scheme and Autocthon wanted a chance to make shiny new toys. That's it. For that, and for Sunny McJerk to get his hands on the Xbox controller.

You catching the theme of this yet? Primordials did and made everything. All of it. Sol's job was to protect creation against the Wyld, and Luna was supposed to help him. Gods kept everything running, and Humans powered gods. Now? Half the Primordials are eternally suffering through torments in dimensions mortals can't even fathom, and the other half live inside the body of their leader. And how is life better for humans? What did the "common man" get out of all this?

Not a damn thing.

[golentan]

Creating a thing doesn't give you final rights to it. Certainly not when it's a living thing.

Halftangible: Yes it is an honest question. River of All Torments was the boundary between existence and the things that wanted to unmake it as thoroughly as could be envisioned at the time, for countless ages. She saved untold existences, not even lives, existences from hostile abominations.

She's a complicated creature, for sure, and a terrifying one, but why is "Terrifying" the same as "Evil?" A tiger is terrifying. A man with a gun is terrifying. Solars are terrifying. If I could explain to you my history without you dismissing me as crazy, I'm terrifying. The world in general is brimming with terrifying things, many of them evil, many of them amoral, and many of them moral. I stand by my earlier descriptions: Primordials as a whole don't seem to my eyes to be evil, simply DANGEROUS and UNCONCERNED with their subjects. That is reason enough to vote to depose them, I see no need to vilify them.

Except the Ebon Dragon. But I think he wants to be vilified, and since I want to shove my fist down his throat and beat him to death with his own tonsils, I feel like a mutually beneficial arrangement is to be found there.

[The_Snark]

Primordials did and made everything. All of it.

... and they could have done a much, much better job. Making a world is a big responsibility, and they flubbed it.

Because if the Primordials get to take credit for Bravery, Wanderlust, Pathos, and all of that, then they also have to accept responsibility for all the negative emotions and concepts too: Suffering, Cruelty, Despair, Helplessness, Ennui...

The Primordials aren't Bob Ross, they're Hieronymus Bosch.

[Lord Raziere]

Um.... list of things common man got:
1. They got freedom from Primordials constantly causing cataclysms just for kicks and giggles.

2. They got freedom from people who constantly cutting out their hearts for the sun god.

3. some of them got to live in Autochthonia, and they seem to be doing relatively well for people living for generations over 5000 years in an inhospitable environment of pure machinery.

4. They got the Guild, and it seems to be doing pretty well for itself considering that its an organization consisting entirely of mortal merchants, and is providing trade for everyone all across Creation

5. they got ancestor cults. course, views vary on whether thats a good thing or not, but hey, there has to be some benefits to worshipping your ancestor ghosts.

6. they got to be more numerous than everyone else

7. they get a million-to-one chance to potentially Exalt and become one of the power players and hopefully correct the system since its all breaking down. A part of the design of Exaltation I think, is that its self-correcting. the person who Exalts and becomes an oppressor eventually does things that make the oppressed do something heroic that gets them an Exaltation to be able to fight back, and we are seeing this play out in Creation even today.

[HalfTangible]

Um.... list of things common man got:

Also: Most of the things that the common man lost since the first age were ultimately because of the Great Curse and/or the Neverborn.

[Sith_Happens]

Also: Most of the things that the common man lost since the first age were ultimately because of the Great Curse and/or the Neverborn.

Aha, I knew Autobot was forgetting something in Raziere's post earlier:

"TOP PRIORITY ITEM: Debug Exalted psychology. Nature of errors currently unknown, will require thorough review of all code."

[Recaiden]

There is literally a Primordial called 'The River of All Torments'. They specifically set about enslaving everything in existence and destroyed all that they so much as sat near for too long and expected everything else to clean up their mess. When the Principle of Hierarchy found out she wasn't going to rule anymore she broke her bones to unleash the three spheres cataclysm out of spite. The fact that the Primordials could go away and Creation could continue on as normal is testament to how little they did.

Also, two Primordials AGREED to turn against the other Primordials. So it clearly wasn't just a 'i wanna play the Games' thing.

There's literally a Primordial called 'The River of All Torments', yes, and they were one of the most clearly Good beings before creation. Existence depended on them; creation would not exist without them. A primordial's name is a reflection of what they are, not a causal piece.

The fact that Creation went on without them is a testament to how much they did to make it self-sufficient.

To be fair, they could have done it better. If they had listened to ShWLiHN and removed free will? Much more coherent Creation. If they had listened to Isidoros and not implemented Fate? None of this Sidereal nonsense, no foothold to start the war, and no way to duck responsibility through the reincarnation argument. If they had just made it better like Alveua talks about, maybe turned down the ambition dial a little on their creations, what would we have? (not much of a game)

Isn't it a bit of a cop out to grant Primordials absolution from their scale. If anything it would make them more culpable because they should be able to understand the ramifications of their actions better. The Demons in a Primordial's soul hierarchy are not particularly transapient. In fact, Second Circles are not meaningfully different from humans mentally. There are also not very many of them. Malfeas, the Titan with the largest soul hierarchy, never had more than 168 of them. Now, if the Titans grants that the ideas, feelings, opinions, etc. of these beings matter, they have no in-kind excuse for not applying the same to any other being of similar sapience.

I don't think it is. I also don't think the Titans understand or value their souls, except incidentally. Malfeas does. not. care. about a general demon, even one of his own third circles. He cares about Ligier only as it reinforces his self-hate. It is up to Ligier, Jacint, Lypothymie, etc. to assign morality, to care about humanity (or not).

Also: Most of the things that the common man lost since the first age were ultimately because of the Great Curse and/or the Neverborn.

They could have happened without the Great Curse. It doesn't lead the exalted to anything they aren't already capable of.

[HalfTangible]

There's literally a Primordial called 'The River of All Torments', yes, and they were one of the most clearly Good beings before creation. Existence depended on them; creation would not exist without them. A primordial's name is a reflection of what they are, not a causal piece.

Yes, that is what I said. And its name indicates that it was a river of literal torture.

The fact that Creation went on without them is a testament to how much they did to make it self-sufficient.

The gods' entire job was to clean up the messes that the Primordials made.

To be fair, they could have done it better. If they had listened to ShWLiHN and removed free will? Much more coherent Creation. If they had listened to Isidoros and not implemented Fate? None of this Sidereal nonsense, no foothold to start the war, and no way to duck responsibility through the reincarnation argument. If they had just made it better like Alveua talks about, maybe turned down the ambition dial a little on their creations, what would we have? (not much of a game)

I'm not complaining about it from a meta standpoint - Exalted has an amazing setting. I'm just assigning blame

They could have happened without the Great Curse. It doesn't lead the exalted to anything they aren't already capable of.

"Yeah I pushed him, but he could have fallen off of the bridge anyway, officer" :P

'Capable of' and 'will do' are two totally different things.

[golentan]

Counterpoint: We wouldn't have the Neverborn or the great curse if the exalted hadn't decided that Murder was the best solution to their political problems.

Also, a river of torture seems like it has a pretty simple solution: Don't go swimming. I can't find references to Adrian that Was doing anything particularly awful to beings not trying to cross her to unmake reality through any form of malice. Adrian would throw temper tantrums and break things when not at the Games of Divinity, but again, not sure that any of the primordials even NOTICED mortals which might be caught up in the resulting cataclysm at the time.

Also, yes, the gods were designed to clean up the primordial's messes. That's the point of building a self sustaining dynamic system: you build something that maintains and grows it, and the primordials appear to work best in soul-stuff rather than mechanical devices with the exception of Autochthon. So it makes sense they made souls to do tasks: that's how they do their own internal immune systems, and creation is based on Gaia's metaphysics and so looks a lot like a primordial in a couple of structural elements (such as gods and elementals, flows of essence between elemental regions, and what have you).

[HalfTangible]

Counterpoint: We wouldn't have the Neverborn or the great curse if the exalted hadn't decided that Murder was the best solution to their political problems.

One, Sol was the one who planned out the initial attacks against the Primordials, not the Exalts. And possibly Autocthon, Gaia and the other Celestials.

Two, they were right.

Three, see B below.

Adrian would throw temper tantrums and break things when not at the Games of Divinity, but again, not sure that any of the primordials even NOTICED mortals which might be caught up in the resulting cataclysm at the time.

A) And that makes it better how?
B) Doesn't that ruin your earlier implication that there was a non-violent solution that they could've reached?

Also, yes, the gods were designed to clean up the primordial's messes. That's the point of building a self sustaining dynamic system: you build something that maintains and grows it, and the primordials appear to work best in soul-stuff rather than mechanical devices with the exception of Autochthon. So it makes sense they made souls to do tasks: that's how they do their own internal immune systems, and creation is based on Gaia's metaphysics and so looks a lot like a primordial in a couple of structural elements (such as gods and elementals, flows of essence between elemental regions, and what have you).

They're also slaves.

[golentan]

One, Sol was the one who planned out the initial attacks against the Primordials, not the Exalts. And possibly Autocthon, Gaia and the other Celestials.

Two, they were right.

Three, see B below.

A) And that makes it better how?
B) Doesn't that ruin your earlier implication that there was a non-violent solution that they could've reached?

They're also slaves.

1) Again, I have negative opinions of the Incarnae and their merry band of thieves, most notably on the subject of their long term planning.
2) Disagree. You shouldn't just argue by assertion, it gets nowhere, see how frustrating this is?
3) The exalted were able to get their attention WAY before there were deaths in the war, arguably before the war began (what with that initial phase of the incarnae going "these are my assistants, they will help me do my job better") and once you have that attention you can negotiate! There was the one solar who wrote a poem to SWLiHN so tragic that the primordial refused to take to the field for 2 centuries. I suspect that the war could have been averted or limited to means that wouldn't run the risk of annihilating creation, and given the nature of the primordials I'd worry about rendering creation uninhabitable for humanity as collateral damage alone even ignoring the unknown threat that the neverborn represented.
3a) How do you know that as of this moment, there are not millions of tiny human beings, with fully formed thoughts and dreams and speech and loves and all the things that make humans human now living in your oven. If you switch it on, millions will perish. Is it fair to blame you for genocide if you did so out of ignorance?

YES I know it's a teapot argument. The issue is that you can't hold someone culpable for murder when the perpetrator didn't know the victim was dead, or even existed in the first place. They were DANGEROUS, not evil, and that is a HUGE HONKING MORAL DIFFERENCE. It doesn't necessarily change the proper response (get them away so we can be safe), but it does change the nature of the encounter.

[HalfTangible]

1) Again, I have negative opinions of the Incarnae and their merry band of thieves, most notably on the subject of their long term planning.

And again, Great Curse is responsible for pretty much everything that went wrong.

I am of the opinion that the Great Curse only works as a game mechanic, and not a literal curse, but it does exist.[/quote]

2) Disagree. You shouldn't just argue by assertion, it gets nowhere, see how frustrating this is?

Your argument: The Primordials did not notice humans (which I find ridiculous since the Primoridals MADE humans) and thus killed them in their wake. Therefore the Primordials are not responsible for their actions. You consistently make the observation that the Primordials are simply incapable of noticing humans.

You are making the argument for me that it can't be done, why would I explain what you already know?

3) The exalted were able to get their attention WAY before there were deaths in the war, arguably before the war began (what with that initial phase of the incarnae going "these are my assistants, they will help me do my job better") and once you have that attention you can negotiate! There was the one solar who wrote a poem to SWLiHN so tragic that the primordial refused to take to the field for 2 centuries. I suspect that the war could have been averted or limited to means that wouldn't run the risk of annihilating creation, and given the nature of the primordials I'd worry about rendering creation uninhabitable for humanity as collateral damage alone even ignoring the unknown threat that the neverborn represented.

AFAIK, no one knew the Neverborn were going to happen (or even COULD happen) until they did, so no one gets saddled with the blame for THAT fiasco.

3a) How do you know that as of this moment, there are not millions of tiny human beings, with fully formed thoughts and dreams and speech and loves and all the things that make humans human now living in your oven. If you switch it on, millions will perish. Is it fair to blame you for genocide if you did so out of ignorance?

Well for one thing I never turn on my oven.

But yes. Yes it would. At the very least it'd be manslaughter.

YES I know it's a teapot argument. The issue is that you can't hold someone culpable for murder when the perpetrator didn't know the victim was dead, or even existed in the first place. They were DANGEROUS, not evil, and that is a HUGE HONKING MORAL DIFFERENCE. It doesn't necessarily change the proper response (get them away so we can be safe), but it does change the nature of the encounter.

I am of the opinion that not caring people die in your wake (and they DID know about the humans, they MADE them) is just as bad as outright killing them for sport.

The Primordials would continue harming everyone and everything around them and would definitely not stop. So they were forced to. It doesn't change jack.