Exalted

[marsh garden]

although idr what snake's clash looks like, i'm pretty sure it also costs wp

okay yeah 1wp

and it's the best clash in the game i'm pretty sure

[buoyant summit]

It was and has already been very much changed lmao

Type: Reflexive
Keywords: Clash, Perilous, Withering-only
Duration: Instant
Prerequisite Charms: Unbreakable Fascination Kata
All bear witness to the puissant might of the Dragon Reed’s holder; wielder and player both. When an enemy who has resisted the influence of Unbreakable Fascination Kata by spending Willpower attacks Dragon Reed’s wielder or one of their allies within close range, they may reflexively make a withering Clash attack against the attacker, gaining Initiative up to a maximum of (Essence/2).```

[marsh garden]

oh infernals has a fuckbusted one, i see

"regular solar melee clash except you can make it withering get fucked"

[marsh garden]

ahhhh, right, i wasn't even thinking about the initiative part of it

that also makes sense

i think 8m might be overcompensating on mote costs tho

[buoyant summit]

Yeah I was thinking 6 tbh

[marsh garden]

i can't think of any clashes over ~5-6m outside of the infinite fucksplosion from CMOS

no wait

that one's also 5m

[tulip folio]

I do appreciate it being 'withering: Someone's getting fucked'.

Not just 'I am gunna hit harder'

Makes it very funny the one time the dice don't like you wan you just get fucking cleaved in half by a Sid.

[marsh garden]

?

oh yeah

the negative tie part still carries over

what a ridiculous clash

meanwhile, i'm also struggling hard on the last two evos for an artifact

closing shit out is hard lmao

unrelated

i just realized that life-annihilating castigation is even sillier than i thought it was

fucking 12x (13x???) withering damage multiplier

that's some genuine horseshit

[wise ocean]

from where?

[marsh garden]

crippling injuries doubling your base wound penalty

[buoyant summit]

🦉Finishing the Wood Dragon sword has made me want to make swords for the other dragon styles <XD

[wise ocean]

no, I mean "which charm is LAC again"

[marsh garden]

ohhh

abyssal brawl, withering attack that deals WP+1x post-soak

and also explodes them with pyreflame

here it is

[wise ocean]

ah

[marsh garden]

and then the capstone is your base WP = 5

so if you just have the machine that turns crippling injuries into craft projects

and double your base wound penalty

every time someone nugs you for 3 decisive in a fight you whip out the 11x withering button

why are crippling injuries like this

[wise ocean]

to be fair it's e4 solaroid brawl

[bleak hazel]

This one calcs off their wound penalty, so you do need to hurt them first

[velvet raft]

Dark Messiah's Wrath gets around that

(And there are other related tricks, like Pain Beyond Endurance)

[tulip folio]

I know it's Abyssal Brawl now but man I kinda wish Dark Messiah Style was still available as a martial art. Unlike a lot of the 'X Hero Style' it had it's own flair and tricks I'd love to still have available.

Like Illustrative Overkill Technique

[bleak hazel]

Evidently I should actually look at Abyssal Brawl to see if it's playable (once you remove Heaven Thunder Hammer as usual anyway)

[tulip folio]

I had a lot of fun in 2e with a Sid who's martial art were Dark Messiah and First Pulse.

It was very funny to go 'Time for a Mortal Kombat Fatality that drains everyone's willpower!'

[velvet raft]

Abyssal Brawl is extremely cool but I'm not convinced it's significantly less jacked than Solar Brawl

[tulip folio]

Yeah. It's in that annoying area of 'So good that even if I want to do a grabby hands abyssal I keep looking to other martial arts instead'

If that makes sense?

[velvet raft]

There's also just not a ton of grappling in it

[tulip folio]

That's fair. A lot of the grappling is in Resistance.

[velvet raft]

You mean the chains stuff? Or did I look right through generalist grapple charms?

[tulip folio]

Nah, I mean the chains stuff. They've got a few charms to improve chains grappling.

Which is why I keep wanting to do that Resistance Apocalyptic Abyssal and like...not go 'full invincible' but instead go down the 'I'm here to Hellraiser this stuff up'

[velvet raft]

It is still really good for a grappler, the small number of charms cover one's bases for the most part

But some combination of bear + mantis + falcon is probably more of a pure grapple monster

I don't know if it's a better grapple monster

[bleak hazel]

Never mind this is just Solar Brawl again

Funny as it would be to hit the capstone with a turn off your charm effect and watch their wound penalty go back down

[velvet raft]

Like Titan-Murdering Grasp exists and is absurd mote efficiency

[tulip folio]

Christ

3m for just 'win grapples forever'

[velvet raft]

Yes

Hm, what about that prerequisite charm, surely it can't be

[bleak hazel]

There are about five charms in that set that amount to "if they hit you, die instantly", and since it's Solar Brawl it also has Heaven Thunder Hammer to turn totally innocuous minor decisives into instant death after the attack roll

[velvet raft]

"Okay but it's just rounds of control (lol) surely the Abyssal can't do anything that catastrophic other than savaging att

So yeah, if I want to play a pure grappler abyssal, I'm going with the somehwo more moderate combo of bear + mantis + falcon + centipede

Oh hey you know how centipede has a charm that lets you counter-grapple?

[tulip folio]

Bear: "I have an auto-crash effect. I'm the good guy here!"

[tulip folio]

Abyssals have a better, meaner one?

[velvet raft]

They have one that's a general-purpose counterattack and is better

Dark Messiah's Wrath is also effectively a form charm that can be activated reflexively

[tulip folio]

...man, I'm no longer feeling quite so bad about the counter-grapple I put on First Pulse.

[velvet raft]

It's a shame because I really like Abyssal Brawl's focus on wound penalties (someone's)

[tulip folio]

Street Shifts Underfoot
Cost: 3m, 1wp; Mins: Martial Arts 4, Essence 2
Type: Reflexive
Keywords: Clash, Dual, Terrestrial, Mastery
Duration: Instant
Prerequisite Charms: Heels on Cobblestone Echo, Blood-Spattered Streets
One of the best things a back-alley warrior can do when attacked from surprise is to whip the attacker out of hiding, especially when she can toss him into a circle of her friends. 

This Charm allows the Martial Artist to make a reflexive Clash with a Grapple Gambit against an incoming Unexpected Attack, Gambit, Savage or Slam. Successfully clashing a Savage or Slam immediately escapes an ongoing grapple, allowing her a chance to establish her own.

Terrestrial: This counts as the Martial Artist's attack action.

Mastery: The martial artist can reflexively move one zone towards the attacker before attempting the gambit, allowing them to grapple targets attacking with some ranged weapons.

'I hear you're trying to Dirty Fight Me. I'm the Dirty Fighting Style, I drag you down to my level and beat you with experience!'

(And even then letting you clash unexpected attacks is very powerful considering how bullshit ambushes are)

[velvet raft]

Yeah that seems fine to me

[tulip folio]

...actually, mind if I get your thoughts on a Key?

[velvet raft]

Sure

[tulip folio]

Overawing Confidence
Cost: 5m; Mins: Dexterity 3, Essence 1
Type: Supplemental
Keywords: Withering-only
Duration: Instant
Prerequisite Charms: Some basic attack boosters
The Wanderer redoubles her assault, crushing her foes confidence with her sheer superiority. 

This supplements a withering attack, doubling 9s on the damage roll. A character crashed this way also loses a point of temporary willpower.

Keys:

Dance Upon The Blade's Edge(Essence 2): The Wanderer can instead double 8s on the damage roll. If she does, the attack does not grant any Initiative save for the single Initiative for landing a successful withering attack. 

The 'More offence, less payoff' key. Letting you voluntarily up the damage over the base charm in exchange for tanking your own init gain.

[velvet raft]

I think that's fair

As it is that's a 10% damage increase, which might net you a crash or might not

[tulip folio]

Yeah, the intent was it wasn't supposed to be an Always Use but more of a 'If I think 1-2 more points of init can push a crash, I can sacrafice gaining any of my own', it that makes sense?

[tulip folio]

...could add a second key that lets you use Dance Upon the Blade's Edge after rolling damage at a higher essence or at additional cost.

[tulip folio]

Plundering Talons
Cost: 4m; Mins: Strength 5, Essence 3
Type: Reflexive
Keywords: Decisive-only
Duration: Instant
Prerequisite Charms: Gilt-Tip Claws
The Dragon freely claims what she desires, taking from those who cannot oppose her rampant greed. She claims money, followers and souls, even as the world itself bows at her feet.

The Wanderer can use this Charm after a decisive damage roll, letting her forgo levels of damage to inflict one of the effects below. She must deal at least one level of damage. Against grappled enemies, she can expend two rounds of grapple control in place of one level of damage.

-Miser's Pain (2+ levels): The victim loses one dot of Resources, plus a dot for each additional level of damage sacrificed. This is a Shaping(Fate) effect.
-Shephard's Loss (2+ levels): The victim is loses one dot of Cult, plus a dot for each additional level of damage sacrificed. This is a Shaping(Fate) effect.
-Prince's Agony (2+ levels): The victim is loses one dot of Backing, plus a dot for each additional level of damage sacrificed. This is a Shaping(Fate) effect.
-City-Swallowing Grin (3 levels): The victim finds himself overwhelmed by the dragon's presence, losing (Essence) Initiative. He gains a minor tie of Fear or Fascination for the Wanderer, or increases an existing minor such tie to Major. The victim can pay 1 willpower to avoid gaining the tie but not to avoid the initiative loss. This is a Psyche Effect.
-Majestic Gravity (3 Levels): The victim falls prone. The difficulty for the victim to Rise from Prone is increased by 3.

Characters with Exalted healing may make a (Charisma + Bureaucracy) roll at difficulty (Essence) each week to recover a dot of Resources, Cult or Backing lost this way.

Keys:

Stolen Hoard: The Wanderer gains dots of Resources, Cult and Backing lost this way until the end of the story, if the stolen dots are higher than her own.

Ended up expanding this from a key into a Full Charm.

Not 100% sure on the 'beating the background dots out of you' being a shaping effect. On one hand: It likely should thematically. On the other hand: Sacrificing 7 levels of damage to make the guy explode all his sonic rings out across the ground only to have it Instantly Negated by 'My Shaping Defence isn't shit' would be pretty unfun.

[velvet raft]

Abyssal names are really not my area of expertise

Tragically, I cannot name this moonshadow troublemaker, "Excessively Florid Midboss"

[tulip folio]

Hahahah

Why not?

[velvet raft]

It is slightly too silly

[prisma sun]

Adversary of Abundant Speech

[velvet raft]

Perhaps Here With The Chains will nickname him Excessively Florid Something-or-other

When they meet

But for the moment I need to ponder.

[marsh garden]

i think that's literally an alch name actually

[velvet raft]

Excessively Righteous Blossom

[marsh garden]

oh right yeah

we love it

[limpid badge]

Abyssals names easy as fuck <has severe neurotoxicity buildup

Moonshadow midboss, yah? Basic competencies?

[velvet raft]

Works for Walker In Darkness, good at leadership/social/bureaucracy stuff, area of specialization is getting state actors to hire the Company of Martial Sinners in a variety of unwise ways that advance the Walker's aims

[limpid badge]

Start very simple Prodigal Son Adorned With Burial Shroud

[velvet raft]

A tempter, first and foremost

Has had a ... run of bad luck

Recently

Or maybe not a run of bad luck but like

[wise ocean]

Bearer of Gilded Cups Swathed in Midnight

[velvet raft]

They were the Abyssal in this set of events

This was extremely humiliating for him and although he hasn't actually lost the Walker's favor I think he's kind of convinced that he has to regain his honor

[limpid badge]

Prince of The Shadows Voice

[velvet raft]

Ooh, I like it

Prince of the Shadow's Voice

Thank you!

[limpid badge]

would u like to know the stupid joke here

[velvet raft]

Sure

[limpid badge]

https://youtu.be/uMlRpN8ANrU?si=VvBF3yzH7btedG8V

[velvet raft]

OH MY GOD

That’s great

[limpid badge]

Who knows what evil lurks in the hearts of men?

[velvet raft]

The shadow knows!

[limpid badge]

Exactlyyy

[velvet raft]

As this catalyzes in my mind, I think what is going to happen is that as our heroes influence things and their city becomes increasingly well-known for hosting several prominent anathema, the temptation to hire the Company is going to mount

[buoyant summit]

"I MUST CAPTURE THE SIDEREAL"

[velvet raft]

This is of course a terrible idea but somebody is going to unwisely hire the Company of Martial Sinners in all of this

[buoyant summit]

https://giphy.com/gifs/cartoon-avatar-hOBvQDpdO2brq

[velvet raft]

He doesn’t actually know it was her, but she will recognize him

[buoyant summit]

...

Not me realizing how well Zuko fits as an outcaste just now...

[velvet raft]

I do like that the Walker’s schtick is frequently just bringing out the absolute worst and most apocalyptic tendencies in war

[buoyant summit]

We do wish the elemental bolt attack stuff had more

there there

If that makes sense

Especially in the wake of AtLA it feels like a slam dunk

[limpid badge]

this is why my Bloody Hand is with him. what with her Black Blade

[buoyant summit]

We know that's why it's called the Black Blade and this is likely the intent

But ofw Blue Oyster Cult

"IN A HOUSE"

"THE HOUSE OF HELL"

[bleak hazel]

EBA does have a selection of big badda boom charms after it in the tree

Hard to say As In The Beginning isn't bending large enough

[buoyant summit]

Oh we've misheard that lyric for five years

The lyric is apparently 'and it howls, it howls like hell'

[velvet raft]

I'm unfamiliar with this song

[buoyant summit]

Black Blade

By Blue Oyster Cult

[velvet raft]

Gotcha

[buoyant summit]

Which is a song written by Michael Moorcock

One of several

by BOC

Because they liked each other's work so much

[limpid badge]

about Elric

[buoyant summit]

We are more partial to Veteran of the Psychic Wars or Vengeance

[limpid badge]

BHs major inspo

[buoyant summit]

Ye

[limpid badge]

She Is An Elric

[buoyant summit]

Well we thought gk might be able to get to the Elric part on his own

[velvet raft]

I know this makes me lax as an Alita fan, but the only BOC song I'd previously heard was Don't Fear The Reaper

[wise ocean]

War is many things. Most practically and relevantly, it is the finest method Creation has yet devised of ritualizing and guaranteeing mass death. As such, I believe it has many trappings which have been placed upon it, but at its heart, it is death - alike decorating a mortuary feature with the various trinkets and baubles one appends to a burial shroud. This, too, is natural. There is nothing wrong with longing for a pretty death, beyond those inherent in longing at all, or various exception taken to the flaws of vanity - but it will always be wrong to long for a deathless war.

[buoyant summit]

Given Moorcock isn't exactly an unknown name for this server or especially this chat

[limpid badge]

she’s sooooooo

[velvet raft]

I know of Moorcock's work but I have not read it myself

[limpid badge]

bees keeps making fun of me for how many BoC refs there are in the Auric Range it’s good

[buoyant summit]

Blaidd the Half Wolf and Crona are the only hints I see on here of like 'can potentially be talked down' but I bet the reason Blaidd is up here is the monkey's paw of 'is as loyal as a well-trained hound' and Crona is 'as loyal as a well-trained, beaten hound'

[limpid badge]

No Blaidd is there bc her voice is His if he started voice training

[buoyant summit]

You have a skill for making tragic characters who probably still can't/shouldn't be reasoned with to the point it makes us uncomfortable, which we mean as a compliment

[limpid badge]

Crona is there for Funny Reasons

[buoyant summit]

Fair

also oh no that's hot

[wise ocean]

Graves is probably second only to Koi in terms of characters who have an immediate, very strong Voice in my repertoire, which is kind of funny because he's text-based and I only occasionally read some bits aloud for practice

though Patrick is also iconic but in a different way because his voice is all in the speaking (very strong Southern accent)

[buoyant summit]

Am I...

wrong for seeing a glimmer of our favorite Brazilian samurai in Graves suddenly?

[wise ocean]

I think you could squint and see a little Sam in there, but it's not intentional

[buoyant summit]

Oh, for sure

[buoyant summit]

He can (and should) hit Fel with 'you deny your weapon its purpose' tho

[limpid badge]

She’s welsh it’s soooo stupid hot

[buoyant summit]

Felmaian Bloody Hand toxic yuri when

How good is Graves at sussing people out?

[wise ocean]

"That is how I intend to make you ready," he says. "You hold an oath, a weapon, a slave, a master, a dreaming-thing. If you looked inside of it, however, what would you find? Beneath the eye, what wellsprings of power await to be drawn from? The enemies that will seek to drag you down and kill you - yes, they are weaker in the sword-law, still further from actualization, but many of them have progressed their bonds. Made them strong. Found these secret arts."

[...]

"Ask your blade a *question* without words. Form the memory in your mind: the shedding of blood, the moment of death. The act of severing. Ask it how you may perfect that blow. How the hunt may be refined."

normal man

[buoyant summit]

Is this advice for BH lmao

[wise ocean]

yep

[wise ocean]

he doesn't really do people, he's a guided missile

[velvet raft]

Hao would be the worst narrative matchup for Graves because once he understood what Graves was going on about he would rapidly run out of time for the guy

[buoyant summit]

Could he feasibly see Fel and realize she is denying her weapon (what she thinks is) its purpose? XD

(While she takes pride in being a Shieldbearer, there are times she wishes she was an Endings, a sword of the Fellowship, instead)

(She does not have a healthy conception of her ability to commit violence, constrained by the structure of the Bureau)

(||FUCK I WISH I COULD ROVE CREATION AND TAKE A SWORD TO THE BLACKHEARTED AND UNRIGHTEOUS WITHOUT CONSEQUENCE||)

(No, that's not how the Division of Endings, works, but the grass is always greener)

[velvet raft]

Robin could be tempted to engage with him intellectually, Here With The Chains and Graves were already established, Red Evening Sky would have some choice thoughts that wouldn't get all the way to being words, but I think Hao would just find his philosophy to be exhaustingly petty

He might suck it up and try to maneuver Graves in one way or another, but

[fierce star]

Pondering if the permanent upgrade to the hearing-enhancing ifnernal awareness charm is actually worth it compared to the 6m commitment, given it's going to be a willpower suck.

or turns you into nothing but a violent whirlwind of silence

the willpower resit is maximum 1/session

jesus.

[wise ocean]

depends on your permanent WP

[velvet raft]

Which one, Hateful Wretched Noise?

[fierce star]

yeah

the problem is you have to silence anything yelling or louder by an means necessary

and ou can only resist that 1/session

(and even then it's a -1 penalty to all yoru rolls until the source goes away)

if it was 1 wp per session to resist it entirely, but my by reading it's 1 wp to ignore a single source of it, 1/session

[velvet raft]

I think Let Silence Fall is probably not worth it, no

But it'll depend on how you operate

[fierce star]

I wonder what would be a more comparable penalty to 'you starve to death faster' that's still thematically adjoranian

then again, that one's less of an issue because murder is meat exists

[wise ocean]

why can't you just be normal. you're not the main character of life

then kill me about it. yeah. thought so

deeply exhausting individual (said in the same tone of voice as someone speaking about a favored rag doll)

[fierce star]

I suppose I can just go with the smell/taste one active all the time for free, and then touch with 6m committed. I don't need super-hearing to overcome blindness with those two probably?

[limpid badge]

"Oh yes. The Blade is a gift, given unto this sinner by the dread ancestors. Thou art a sorcerer. This sinner is a murderer. Do we not posses such wonderful tools?"
here’s how BH is doing btw

[dense verge]

i'll have you know im going YEAH YEAH YEAH at them

[limpid badge]

Thank uuuu

[dense verge]

<-huge mark for BÖC

[fierce star]

Do you think taking a lore specialization for 'mind-hand manipulation' would be too gamey?

[velvet raft]

No

If Melee (swords) is fair game, lore (mind-hand manipulation) is fair game, imo

[fierce star]

entirely fair

also man I feel like the infernal anima powers are just... really specific. I'm making a mind-hand manipulation specialist but she's not really a 'bind demons' or 'social' character (she prefers to hire demons like a normal person), so I worry I wouldn't get much use out of the ascendant or horizon powers. I like Azimuth's the best for her, but that would limit her to essence 1 avaliability for MHM.

the 'detect a supernatural preson's abilities' one for horizon is nice

[velvet raft]

Yeah, they get less anima in return for Demon Body

I'm not a fan of that trade, personally, but eh

[buoyant summit]

iirc teeeeeeechnically the example specialty is melee (daiklaves) but like

That's still broader than 'specific charm'

[fierce star]

It's not even the less anima, it's the specificity of it tbh

like a horizon that has no itnerest in binding demons is losing out on a quarter of what makes them a horizon instead of any other caste

[velvet raft]

Tragically not unique to infernals

A twilight who doesn't want to play Pokemon master with elementals is similarly down an anima power

[fierce star]

that's fair

[velvet raft]

I think it's more of an issue with solaroids than others

[fierce star]

I suppose I've just been spoiled by lunars/sidereals/alchemicals

yeah

[velvet raft]

Alchs all get a combat power, a social power, and a third misc power. Lunars get interesting on-topic powers, as do sids

[fierce star]

liek the most specific lunar one is the changing moon boost to stealtha nd disguise, but it's also packaged wtih a general purpose guile booster, which is alway shandy

[velvet raft]

Nadir powers have pretty broad applicability IIRC

[fierce star]

yeah; nadir, azimuth are pretty broad, and penumbra's just eclipse minus eclipse charms so that's always pretty applicable

[buoyant summit]

minus eclipse charms???

[fierce star]

yeah the !eclipse doesn't get eclipse charms by default, they have to take a charm for that

[velvet raft]

Yeah, but Infernals have other ways of accessing th-

Beat me to it

[fierce star]

I think it's in bureaucracy? Lemme check

[velvet raft]

I think there might be more than one

[fierce star]

lesse, there's one in craft

[velvet raft]

Occult, maybe?

Even solars have something like that in occult

[fierce star]

craft and occult

[buoyant summit]

what the fuck?

[fierce star]

craft requires you to sacrifice a demon or other supernaturla creature while making an artifact and their eclipse charms turn into evocaitons

occult is just 'learn them for 3 commited motes each, releasing the mmotes when you learn the cahrmw ith xp'

both are demon-only until you get a upgrade (a key for the craft one, another charm for the occult one)

[velvet raft]

IIRC the occult one is the same as solars except that solars can't learn them permanently off of it

I think

[fierce star]

no they can

[velvet raft]

Ah, okay

So it's just the same

[fierce star]

OR, WAIT

sorry caps

no it looks like they can't

[velvet raft]

Aha

[fierce star]

it also looks like you can just pick whatever and don't need them to get them from anything

wereas the infernal one explicitly requires you to be taught them still

[velvet raft]

It's vague with Gloaming Eye, since it does use the word "taught"

But then, core, vague and weird?

I'm shocked

[fierce star]

natural language design can die in a fire

I'd pay money for a core rewrite that doesn't even like

change anything

just seperates out the fluff from the rules like a sane fucking rulebook

leave the sick bones just let me understand the disease

[velvet raft]

I'm genuinely tempted to do something like that, plus maybe like

Toning down charms in cases where Abyssals got toned-down mirrors

[fierce star]

not a bad idea

[marsh garden]

the abyssal one can learn permanently, so i assume the solar one is meant to as well

and the wording is just dogshit

[fierce star]

yay, core book

[wise ocean]

is there an actual use case for "10m reset all combat and movement charms"

because jesus that's expensive, and its use case would be after you already blew your 30-50m combo

[fierce star]

combat can go long

I don't see it get used every combat, but i've seen it be used to good effect one to three times in a story,e asily

[wise ocean]

📝 fair enough

also: speaking of horizon powers, is the best use for horizon power still to grab a blood ape for your squishy sorcerer or is there something else relevant

[fierce star]

Depends on what you need. You might not be squishy, in which case you might be better off with something that offers more utility

actually, hold

no it only lets you do a specific task binding, not a general year and a day binding

so it's definitely utility stuff

[wise ocean]

damn, I had hoped that'd work on "defend me so I don't get owned by the first wyld hunt guy to roll a high enough join battle"

dead power 😔

[fierce star]

the big thing is the task-binding requires it to be at ask that has a specific end point

so like

'bodyguard me for this journey' works

'hang around until you die instead of me' doesn't

[coral wraith]

yeh

[buoyant summit]

Are the Immaculate styles well kept secrets?

[limpid badge]

I don’t think so given they are regularly taught to monks and wyld hunters

Some of the stuff past form? Probably?

[prisma sun]

Monks are like the main guys people know

The general existence is not a secret but theres probably secrets about the styles specifically

[buoyant summit]

I ask because I kinda wanna see what I can do with a Lunar that knows one of them lmao

[coral wraith]

You could easily be a Lunar thats an ex-shikari, ex-monk, etc. or just learnt it from an underground source

[buoyant summit]

true

There is a shahan-ya who's a former Immaculate who seems to fit the bill

Though we forget her name, which is doubly a shame because we think she should have been the iconic Full Moon instead of Tegama

Shadow-Rending Razor

[tulip folio]

Perception: Soothsay
Creation has no end of prophets and diviners, sorting the tangled webs of fate for the golden path. They leverage great power to topple and support empires…but prophecy is not without its flaws. Enemies of Fate and Exalts both test the strings with each movement, making it more difficult to predict. Understandably, as such creatures themselves, the Wanderer does not leverage the art of soothsaying to predict the most likely event…but the most dramatic.

Soothsay is the art of predicting and shaping the future not based on fate but upon narrative and dramatic convention. It makes thousand-to-one odds consistent not because they are probable but because no writer would write such odds without understanding that they must be defied. It predicts the courtship of doomed lovers and the intersection of foes within a city of a million people for it understands the world would be a much more boring place if only the probable happened.

The Wanderer invokes the art of Infusion to step into the role of storyteller, helping shape the narrative around her into more interesting paths. It allows her to defy long odds and invoke convention over probability. A wise wanderer however keeps an important fact in mind, lest this power go to their head: Very few things are more narratively satisfying than one certain of their victory being cast down.

Does this seem distinct from how other 'Oh I am such a smart predictor of things' work for other exalts? Soothsay is designed to come at things from a very different direction than say, Sidereals.

[bleak hazel]

New Agents stuff, book itself still in art direction hell

May Blossom is back

A consort stands beside the throne; when the prince judges, the wandering of his eyes tells petitioners the verdict is hers. A sorceress introduces herself to the court and promises the satrap life eternal; when infighting tears them apart, no one can remember her name. A young noblewoman prostrates herself before the fae lord, claiming only he can help regain her lost titles; he is slain by his lieutenant to win the heart of a woman he never knew. All these and more are May Blossom, Chosen of Secrets.

Born into a patrician family, May Blossom led a charmed mortal life. Through its sway within the Ministry of Weights and Measures, her family profited through corruption that favored their patrons, House Nellens. While Blossom attended the Spiral Academy, the Mays finally reached too far and invited criminal investigations. House Nellens could have saved them, but left them to take the fall for their shared crimes instead.

May Blossom returned to a gutted home, shunned by those in high society she once considered friends. Vengeful fury filled her; she gathered proof of Nellens' involvement, and when she was about to reveal what she had learned of Nellens' own complicity in a mocking salon performance, her own emerald-eyed reflection spoke and asked her, "Would you still care if they had gotten away with it?"

Since Exalting, May Blossom has made the secrets of the powerful her concern. In destiny's service she unearths, exploits, and reveals them, reveling in the luxury, intrigue and power plays of high society. To Blossom, the powerful are all given to depravity and hypocrisy, and must have their worst excesses policed; herself, naturally, not at all excluded. Through sorcery, seduction and guile, she weaves intelligence networks of people beholden to her, twisting them around her fingers across Creation.

Those that truly offend the Oracle's sensibilities are subjected to her wickedly ironic justice, mission targets or no — an embezzling minister is hypnotized into giving away his money and becoming a pauper; a cheating courtier's wife returns home a day early to catch him in the act, a mysterious beauty on her arm.

Fellow Sidereals are not spared her judgment. Blossom regards the Bronze Faction as architects of atrocity, and her own Gold Faction as short-sighted imbeciles elevated only by her challenging their every plan for reshaping Creation with inexhaustible contrarianism. She especially antagonizes Ayesha Ura, her beloved former teacher; the two argue constantly, yet they never seem to get angry, and somehow Blossom ends up assisting her with the Cult of the Illuminated despite her disdain for the concept.

May Blossom is a stunning beauty clad in elaborate, figure-hugging robes. Charming, haughty, and sharp-tongued, she's as brilliant as she is cynical. She takes it upon herself to test the character of young Sidereals, luring them with the promise of a good time before exposing them to the ugliest sides of their work. Those that amuse her, the Oracles takes as students in earnest, acting as a companionable if critical mentor.

[coral wraith]

on one hand

https://tenor.com/view/yakuza-gif-18148683

one the other: yay more previews

[tulip folio]

Fellow Sidereals are not spared her judgment. Blossom regards the Bronze Faction as architects of atrocity, and her own Gold Faction as short-sighted imbeciles elevated only by her challenging their every plan for reshaping Creation with inexhaustible contrarianism.

May Blossom: "Everyone is stupid but me." Clueless

[bleak hazel]

Her 2e chapter fiction was her repeatedly seducing this poor apprentice who couldn't pierce Arcane Fate for toffee and then eventually turning him into a dragon

She is very much of a type

although I'm not sure she has the dragon button any longer because that would make her an E5 elder and I don't think she's that juiced

[coral wraith]

wait did she use Riding the Dragon on him?

the Ride prayer charm?

[tulip folio]

...now I'm pondering what May Blossom would think of some of the Sids I've made. Glacier Jade is just disgustingly idealistic and uncynical because to be cynical would mean the Lover Clad In Raiment of Tears Wins and she hates her ass 😛

[bleak hazel]

Yes

[coral wraith]

when i'm in a comitting atrocities contest and my opponent is May Blossom:

horrific lmao

[tulip folio]

Methinks she likes Sid Socialize

[coral wraith]

im putting it on the table now, Grinning Mask doesn't like her at all

[tulip folio]

I get the feeling that Jade would think she's an asshole but in like...a cordial way. She's not going to start shit but she also thinks she's up her own ass.

[bleak hazel]

Personally I like May Blossom a lot, she's a great contrast with Chejop

[tulip folio]

Oh, I like her out of character a lot

I just also think she's someone it's very hard to like in person after a while 😛

[bleak hazel]

The great ascetic, the utilitarian who is elbow deep in blood and can justify all of it with good reasoning, totally dedicated to his vision, versus the young meddler who is far more personally affable and uses her power basically on a whim

oh yeah, Rival a) thinks she's really hot and b) cannot stand her for longer than twenty minutes

[coral wraith]

yup

[bleak hazel]

My bluesid would probably get on quite well with her though

[tulip folio]

Does this read okay?

[velvet raft]

Robin would spend any amount of time in May Blossom's presence making fun of her

[velvet raft]

Red Evening Sky would not super care but about May Blossom but I think May Blossom would find Red Evening Sky to be a source of irritation

[fierce star]

As you might have guessed, I'm a sucker for 'i am going to predict the future, not to make it safe, but to make it interesting', so I like it!

[velvet raft]

Looks pretty good

[fierce star]

what the hell is with infernal resistance

I make a resistance primordial build, pick like six charms I like, go 'surely I am making good use of my primordial choice' nope, wrong, fuck off, they're all E1

what is with this bounty of low hanging evil fruit

[velvet raft]

Infernals have most of their higher-essence charms as keys

But also they just have way less bloat

The Infernal charm list is Actually Well-Built

[fierce star]

it makes primordial much less of a build defining choice, lol

also quick rules question:

enjoying the best of both armors’ traits and applying this Charm’s benefits to her armor```
Does this mean if I'm wearing heavy armor bu tmy VLE armor is light, I get +11 soak, Hardness 10, and 0 mobility penalty?

[velvet raft]

Treating primordial as Essence+1 with Infernals feels quite good, yeah

Yes

Abyssals can do the same thing

So can Lunars

I am of the opinion that that this also works with silken armor

[fierce star]

that's neat

I do not have the spare build space for martial arts, but

[wise ocean]

simply have nearly 30 soak at e1 with primordial on melee, bottom text

[fierce star]

So I'm looking at two potential builds for this character and I'd like people's opinions on which set seems more... good? Viable? Fun?
The base idea is 'primarily a combatant, nerd secondary' using mind-hand manipulation as their primary combat focus.

Lore Primordial Horizon:
Lore:
Essence-Dissecting Understanding
Mind-Hand Manipulation
    Precision Thought-Force Exercise
    Tool-Transcending Constructs
    Focused Psyche Projection
    Speciman Retrieval Method
Principle-Invoking Onslaught
Demon-Scholar Erudition

Awareness:
Six-Demon Senses
All-Hunger Rapacity
    Insatiable Horror Gourmand
Orbit Soul Proxemics

Occult:
Terrestrial-Circle Sorcery (ISOB Control)
Demon of the First Circle

Resistance:
Murder Is Meat

Is the first build, and...

REsistance-Primordial Azimuth
Lore:
Essence-Dissecting Understanding
Mind-Hand Manipulation
    Precision Thought-Force Exercise
    Tool-Transcending Constructs
Demon-Scholar Erudition

Awareness:
Six-Demon Senses
All-Hunger Rapacity
    Insatiable Horror Gourmand
Orbit Soul Proxemics

Resistance:
Hardened Demon Flesh
By Pain Reforged
    By Agony Empowered
Murder Is Meat
Scar-WRit Saga Shield x2

Is the second.

[wise ocean]

#1, isob control effectively provides you all the benefits from resistance there

the hat trick is combining isob control with all the insane e1 resistance pulls

[fierce star]

My first in-game purchase with the second one would be TCS (whereas my first purchases on the first one would be some HDF and SWSS.)

[wise ocean]

I think if you're going for primary mind-hand combat suite (and presumably later flying guillotine) then you're going to want #1 so you have principle-invoking onslaught up from go (I assume that's the "make unblockable, undodgeable, or giga damage" charm?)

[fierce star]

yeah, it is

I think I Like the idea of primordial resistance but man all this stuff is just so low hanging lol

[velvet raft]

... alright, if I do this, I'm going to try to do this like a librarian

Phase 1: Accessioning
1.A Identify charms that have nerfed Abyssal mirrors
1.B Identify charms that have non-nerfed Abyssal mirrors
1.C Identify broken charms, with unclear rules text (1.C.i) or literally do not work (1.C.ii)
1.D Identify charms that suck because they (i) ignore rules that they should probably reference, (ii) render conflict resolution entirely moot, (iii) are too strong
1.E Identify where 1.B and 1.D have overlap

Phase 2: Duplication
2.A Replicate nerfed Abyssal mirrors (1.A) where possible

Phase 3: Function
3.A Rework charms with unclear rules text (1.C.i)
3.B Rework charms that literally do not work (1.C.ii)

Phase 4: Rewrites
4.A Rework charms that ignore rules that they should probably reference (1.D.i)
4.B Rework charms that render conflict resolution entirely moot (1.D.ii)
4.C Address charms that are too strong (1.D.iii)

Phase 5: Mirroring
5.A Address overlapping charms that suck (1.E)

Big if

[wise ocean]

👀

Good luck, start with Solar Stealth

[fierce star]

big if but you have my spiritual and emotional support

[velvet raft]

Absolutely fuckin' not

:P

[fierce star]

man if I wasn't so intent on playing a blind character I could drop some of the awareness charms and get both resistance BS and ISOB...

[velvet raft]

I'm not sure what would be manageable to start with, but Stealth definitely isn't it -_-

[fierce star]

I'd probably just go in book order

[velvet raft]

Sail is going last

But yeah, tbh probably start with archery

Ugh, if I actually want to do this I'm gonna need to go over to my desktop and use a multiple screen setup

[bleak hazel]

I've seen a very good full conceptual rework of Solar Stealth, but that went rather further than just minimum distance movement to functionality

[velvet raft]

Yeah, I do not want to even think about just rewriting the charm lists

[fierce star]

Hmm, actually

I could drop demon-scholar erudition on the resistance build for now (all it does is better-than-excellency dice and reroll 9s for my mind smacks, which is good but not like, striclty necessary) and use the saved charm slot to pick up TCS for ISOB

[wise ocean]

double 9s on attacks is Good but ISOB mind-hand is just so busted it's hard not to want it

[dense verge]

local smug vizier does not like being called on own bullshit

[fierce star]

if I did that I would have...

nine soak, butt-ass naked

more if I get soakrock

but man all my characters lately have been getting soakrock

15 soak with ISOB up

[wise ocean]

and then heavy artifact, gg

[fierce star]

who needs evasion am I right

"this attack is unparryable" joke son you i'm into that shit

[wise ocean]

genuinely the approach I took for my isob MH sorceress

[velvet raft]

... jfc, can I give y'all an example of how badly written core charms are

[wise ocean]

shoot

[velvet raft]

Compare Trance of Unhesitating Speed (Core 256) with Deadly Feathered Maelstrom (Abyssals 151)

They're almost identical charms, with one small nerf in DFM

But the language of DFM is better almost to the point of comedy

... when intimacies add numerical values, it's +2/+3/+4, right?

[fierce star]

2/3/4 yeah

[wise ocean]

yep

[fierce star]

also jesus christ

the differences

It tells my to my understanding of ToUS that I'm not even sure what the nerf is

[velvet raft]

DFM requires an aim action at medium range

Just not one for each target

ToUS just voids the need entirely

[fierce star]

no? It has 'she doesn't need to aim to attack enemies at medium range' in it for DFM

or am I misinterpreting

[velvet raft]

Oh, no, you're right, I misread that

[fierce star]

ok

REsistance-Primordial Azimuth
Lore:
Essence-Dissecting Understanding
Mind-Hand Manipulation
    Precision Thought-Force Exercise
    Tool-Transcending Constructs

Awareness:
Six-Demon Senses
All-Hunger Rapacity
    Insatiable Horror Gourmand
Orbit Soul Proxemics

Resistance:
Hardened Demon Flesh
By Pain Reforged
    By Agony Empowered
Murder Is Meat
Scar-WRit Saga Shield x2

Occult:
Terrestrial Circle Sorcery (ISOB)

?

[velvet raft]

Seems reasonable

No Integrity is my only question

[bleak hazel]

I am always reluctant to get lots of scar-writ saga shields

It seems very expensive past the first unless you're specifically going for an unarmoured build like Toad

[fierce star]

I'm eventually going to need 5

and I'd like invulnerable wounding futility fairly quickly I think?

[bleak hazel]

It's so good but the prereqs are so mean

[fierce star]

also IIRC once you hit 20+ soak your GM is legally allowed to hit you with hammers

so I'll be happy with a 'mere' 16 soak with ISOB naked at E1

before soak rock

not sure if I'm getting soak rock or not

because I'm still gonna hit 20+ soak in a couple essence anyway

I am tempted to try for MA to get some more defensive options, but at the same time it's a big investment for something that' snot gonna be my primary combat thing

[fierce star]

no yeah I think i'm happy with this charm setup. Need to figure out a good sorcery tradition. I usually default to tutored by mara for infernals but that doesn't feel right, I think

Efficacious demon dancing, maybe

or hell-fruit crucible since I am leaning a little metagaosian

[marsh garden]

i don't know your goober, but may i make a suggestion

[fierce star]

I can explain her to you if you'd like, lol

[marsh garden]

i am always open to hearing about exalted pcs

[fierce star]

so: Liangxiao is an Azimuth-caste infernal. As a mortal, she was the daughter of a high-ranking member of Wu Jian's criminal underground; a gangster, merchant, and Exigent of the god of hopeless addiction. He was not a good person. He would be the first person to tell you he was not a good person. But he tried his best to be a good father to his daughter. She wanted for nothing, and he tried to instill in her a sense of justice and fairness, telling her that he did not want her to grow up to be like him. He wanted her to be better, not wrapped up in organized crime and opium dens and enthralled to a forbidden god.

One day, she woke up in the family manor to screaming. A rival of her father's, an exigent of a god of medicine and recover, had found out where he lived and had called in favors to attack his home. She does not know if he died there or not; but the rival captured her and took her to his home and clinic, where he sequestered her for years in a cell. He was kind enough; but thought Liangxiao rotted, and while he could not bring himself to kill her, decided it would be best if she was made unable to harm others, to spare her from inflicting her father's poisons on people. So he took her sight, and he took her arms, but he fed her, and taught her, and treated her like any honored prisoner would be treated.

Until one day, a demon heard her prayers, and helped her escape, and wrapped her in an embrace she had not felt in years, and she was reborn a Green Sun Prince. She has spent time learning about herself and her powers in Hell, and has made herself known to the Althing, and developed her powers and her connections such that she is ready to re-enter creation.

She seeks to do two things: To be the girl her father knew she was capable of being, a kind and gracious soul, a just and caring woman. And to find him again, for in her heart of hearts she knows he is still alive (even though her mind knows that he probably isn't). To find him again and to be a family once more; this time, she will be the one to protect him from the horrors of the world.

She bears no grudge against heaven; she understands it was just politics, just business. But she does bear a grudge against the exigent who maimed her.

I really like the idea of someone who has been horribly maimed and has every reason to be a horrible person in response to life's unfairness, and just... chooses not to.

(I should have integrity charms too but, alas! only 15 slots.)

Thematically she could have learned sorcery before or after exaltation

[tulip folio]

Sweet. Wanted to make sure it had a different vibe than Sids as A) Role protection for existing exalts is good B) I wanted them to not really be doing it the 'right' way. Rather than carefully tending to fate they just take a pen and scrawl 'And then a guy comes through the door with a gun' messily on reality or such. XD

[marsh garden]

since we don't have em atm, what do you imagine this splat's relationship to gets would be?

this and some of their other charms sound very getimian-esque, especially with the Internal Alchemy thing they've both got going on, so do you think this is like. a distinct origin of Exaltation but with the same power source/conditions?

or more of a convergent evolution thing?

[tulip folio]

I'll admit, I'd not thought about it much. XD

[marsh garden]

probably should eventually, what with the hefty overlap, but eh

no need rn

since they won't be out for another 40 million years

[tulip folio]

I mean, I don't think they're that overlapping? most of the wanderer stuff is just 'classic fey things'.

[marsh garden]

oh, i thought you'd talked about a youxia and internal alchemy theming

[fierce star]

They have a little bit of internal alchemy but it's like. Moon rabbit stuff.

It's very specifically thousand year pills and immortality elixirs

[tulip folio]

It's designed to be very 'I WILL DRINK MERCURY BECAUSE IT GIVES IMMORTALITY' and everyone else going 'Wait, no, that will just kill you' and it somehow works.

They're about turning mythological cures into real ones

[marsh garden]

gotcha, i thought gets' whole "reject your reality and substitute it with my own" shtick was more like that

[tulip folio]

It's tricky as 'Your reality sucks, let me write my own' is basicly how exalted fae have always worked

So I'm not sure how the exalted devs plan to seperate Gets from Raksha there.

[bleak hazel]

who exalted these guys of yours anyway

[fierce star]

The difference is between going 'there is one very specific reality I am writing twoards' and 'man this is boring, what's the most interesting thing we could change over to', I think

[bleak hazel]

I know there's already 2.5 splats that are exalted by Some Random Guy We Made Up so it doesn't matter that much

but I admit I do think Ketu and the Dark Mother are slight cop-outs in that department

[marsh garden]

who's the dark mother?

and who'd she exalt

[fierce star]

Liminals

[bleak hazel]

"incredibly powerful entity that pulled the secret of exaltation out of their arses and do nothing but exalt people" in both cases

[marsh garden]

ahhhh

[bleak hazel]

TDM is apparently some kind of powerful pre-neverborn underworld goddess thing

but that's literally all we know and she exists entirely to justify why Liminals exist

Ketu is a nebulous non-fae non-hannya non-primordial deep wyld entity that learned about humans by listening to our dreams, and exalts dream-souled

(somehow)

again, doesn't seem to do anything except make exalts

[coral wraith]

dream souled?

[bleak hazel]

one of the apocryphal exalts

(hence 2.5 splats, two real splats and one noncanon one)

[coral wraith]

o

[marsh garden]

ketu would probably go hard if It existed

[bleak hazel]

deebs also have patrons that are basically only there to explain why they exist but they aren't actually active, since the blood of the dragons kind of works on its own

I find it a bit inelegant to make up irrelevant superpowered entities to justify a new splat, I much prefer the Exigent type deal there, but it's not an actual problem

[marsh garden]

i'm annoyed that the elemental dragons have nothing

tdm i can get, because her book doesn't exist

[tulip folio]

The intended backstory for them: They're unfinished exaltations that never got finished before Autocthon left, with them abandoned in one of his many workshops. They were lost to the wyld when the balorian crusade ate Most of Creation. They soaked up wyld energy, which 'finished' them.

So they're in an awkward state stuck between Creation and the Wyld but not fully one or the other.

[marsh garden]

and ketu i can get, because it doesn't exist

[prisma sun]

As long as things generally fit into classifications that already exist I dont really mind

I enjoy fallen Incarnae and Primordials and what not

[bleak hazel]

Liminals in general are just aggressively unobjectionable, with their only real fluff problem as is being that it's quite easy to look at them and go "why do you exist again?"

so I'm interested to see where their book goes with that

[prisma sun]

Do Limenals predate abyssals

[marsh garden]

they exist to make more ivory circle spells

[prisma sun]

Actually what DID make them

[marsh garden]

the dark mother

[prisma sun]

From Beast?????

[marsh garden]

mentioned a bit up, and why they were brought up in the first place

from Essence apparently lmao

and yeah aiui they've been around for a long time in lore

as an immune system reaction

[bleak hazel]

A nebulous and currently basically loreless underworld thing of apparent incredible power that we know nothing else about other than it was old enough to learn how to exalt things by just kind of watching the Shogunate deebs die

so yes considerably older than Abyssals in universe

[prisma sun]

I do enjoy the Underworld having things

You put that this tbh back

[bleak hazel]

out of universe they were a footnote in one 2e book and then became a real thing in 3e

[prisma sun]

Ain't asking twice.......

[marsh garden]

oh? they were mentioned in 2e?

[bleak hazel]

I also like the underworld having things but the tbh was purely because it keeps automatically sticking them in random things when I misinput on phone discord

[tulip folio]

And now I'm worrying that the wanderer one is too 'generic'. XD

[marsh garden]

news to me, i thought everything about liminals and gets was new to Essence/3e

[bleak hazel]

very silly feature

Liminals were like one footnote in one book

[fierce star]

liminals mostly come from like

[bleak hazel]

can't remember which one

[marsh garden]

that's more than i thought tho

i assume gets weren't even that, and are purely Ess?

[fierce star]

so in ex2 dragonblooded could laern necromancy or sorcery, but the former was very rare and there were in-universe theories these 'underworld terrestrials' were some sort of unique thing, not true dragonblooded

associated with the underworld elmeents of pyre-flame, grave dirt, etc

[bleak hazel]

Gets are entirely a random thing the first 3e devs pulled out of nowhere and everyone else kind of had to roll with because they are technically Kickstarter promises

[marsh garden]

i think that underworld deebs having their own necrofucked elements is cool ngl

[bleak hazel]

all the 3e original splats H&H proposed that weren't KS promises got demoted to apocryphal when the Devs changed

[marsh garden]

i've heard that they do exist in essence tho yh?

or at least umbrals do?

[bleak hazel]

Originally the bad 3e devs planned to add two "foil splats" to both Sids and Lunars so that there could be triangles like Solar/Abyssal/Infernal

which just sounds like unholy clutter

[marsh garden]

oh lmao, is that what the apocryphals were supposed to be?

[bleak hazel]

Yeah, mostly

[marsh garden]

i guess dream-souled and hearteaters as lunar?

[bleak hazel]

I do not know and I do not remotely care

[marsh garden]

lol

[fierce star]

I believe so yeah

[marsh garden]

damn

[chilly sluice]

ye

[bleak hazel]

I believe DS and Gets were the nega sids

[fierce star]

but like. I don't want to come off groggy, but I do miss when Neat PC Optiosn OF Various Power Levels didn't have to be specifically Exalted

[chilly sluice]

Dreamsouled and Gets are for Sids, and Hearteaters and Umbrals for Lunars yes

[marsh garden]

you've got a strong distaste for either essence or the apocs i see

[fierce star]

scroll of heroes and graceful wicked masques existed. They sucked! but they existed.

[marsh garden]

i want dragon kings it's true

[bleak hazel]

Gets of course are extremely obviously Backwards Sids, DS are just generally not good for fate

[chilly sluice]

I like Hearteaters a lot personally
but they are also pretty awkward in that they aren't super playable in most parties

[marsh garden]

yeah i'm a huge fan of HEs and umbrals

but HEs are uh

[fierce star]

I like hearteaters as an extension of fucking loving sovereigns and finding aurora heartbreakingly tragic

[marsh garden]

the closest thing in Exalted to ontologically evil i think?

[bleak hazel]

Hearteaters are all right, the other two are just wastes of space and parsimony in writing IMO

[chilly sluice]

Umbrals I'm kinda whatever on
and Dreamsouled are also sorta eh to me

[marsh garden]

and do so in a gigasquicky way

[bleak hazel]

This game has so many splats that need spotlight and wordcount already

[marsh garden]

that i imagine makes it a nightmare for everyone

[fierce star]

Umbrals I like as this, like... view into what the Soulsteel Exalted were supposed to be.

[bleak hazel]

adding more feels like it needs more justification than "I had a neat idea"

[fierce star]

what the soulsteel aclehmicals were prototyping for.

but other than that

gestures vaguely

[marsh garden]

but HEs being the I'm Ontologically Evil splat is part of what appeals

[fierce star]

we really didn't need 'em

[marsh garden]

they seem super cool in a truly putrid way

[chilly sluice]

my view on Umbral is mostly that all Celestials already have a dark side, it came free with your Limit

[fierce star]

basically a whole lot of ex3 is overpromised by the original devs, so the current devs desperately had to try to deliver

[bleak hazel]

Also Essence sucks and I am not afraid to say it

[marsh garden]

i just like the aesthetic lol

[chilly sluice]

I mean that's fair

[marsh garden]

and that their powers are Dissociation Magic Go

[bleak hazel]

Yeah, I feel that if Gets/Lims hadn't been Kickstarter rewards then they would also be apocs right now and we'd be on to non splat books

[fierce star]

instead of thinsplats.

[bleak hazel]

They might be big splats, we don't know

[marsh garden]

i would totally want to lean into the "i can't be me right now, please do this" part of umbrals

[fierce star]

like that's how you can tell they really wouldn't be doing them if they didn't have--oh, I thought it was confirmed they were gonna be thinsplats

[marsh garden]

it's saucy and fun

[fierce star]

my bad

[bleak hazel]

I'm honestly hoping for thin because it'll mean we see them faster

[chilly sluice]

I really hope Gets get a full book tbh

[marsh garden]

samesies

[chilly sluice]

doing less would be doing them a disservice IMO

[bleak hazel]

and then maybe we can get an actual manse book or something

[marsh garden]

esp. because they're also gonna have a huge pile of SMAs

which would take up way too much space if they were skinny

[prisma sun]

I still think they should have just made infernals the lunar dichotomy

[fierce star]

like I don't necessarily want to point to ex2's pace of books because white wolf was a book factory and those freelancers got paid shit for pennies

[bleak hazel]

I make no bones about my general distaste for Gets so to the thinsplat mines with them

[fierce star]

but man the difference in book pacing

[marsh garden]

yeah that would fucking rule

it would be weirder to justify though

because there's no convenient lunar juice in gay baby jail to steal

[bleak hazel]

It would be neat but yeah fiddly in lore

Infernals also have this huge reservoir of people who love 'em so it's hard to adjust that kind of stuff much

[marsh garden]

i imagine they could futz it pretty easily with "when the solars were getting hoovered it took a lot of lunar mates too"

[bleak hazel]

Cannot stress enough that 2e was basically the Solar and Infernal Edition

[marsh garden]

yeah, i can tell

[prisma sun]

Its unfortunate but I think the retcon makes things make a lot more sense

[marsh garden]

infernals have that gigantic pile of special boy powers

[bleak hazel]

and that was with the need to rip two chapters off the front of infernalbook

[marsh garden]

and i think half of that's new to 3e

[bleak hazel]

They are slightly writer's pets but they're at least fun because of it

[tulip folio]

...who are the 3e Infernal Iconics? I can't recall them for some reason.

[prisma sun]

They arent out yet so we dont know, I think

[bleak hazel]

Five literally whos, like the Abyssals

Hopefully they'll be cooler once we see their art

[chilly sluice]

The Abyssal iconics are so sauceless

[fierce star]

oh uh

there was barbarian in a kilt

sky pirate

manosque cyan

hellnun

and crab arm

[prisma sun]

Every iconic is a literally who tbhwufam

[bleak hazel]

Those are the 2e iconics

[marsh garden]

i don't know any iconics lol

[fierce star]

oh wait

[marsh garden]

from any splat

[fierce star]

yeah I misread

every 3e icnonic is a literal who yeah

[bleak hazel]

New ones now that haven't got drip yet

[marsh garden]

so they're all literally whos to me

[fierce star]

except for lunars

I don't remember their names but they're all bangers

[marsh garden]

including lunars

[tulip folio]

I liked the big scottish Slayer.

[marsh garden]

i don't know any names or designs

[tulip folio]

He was a dumbfuck in a fun way.

[chilly sluice]

The Sid ones are okay I think

[dense verge]

i know literally no iconic 3es except maybe the ones on the cover of lunar and sid book

[bleak hazel]

The old Sid iconics were great, as are the new Deeb iconics

[fierce star]

oh shit yeah, the new deeb iconics

yeah they're great, I love how they're actually like. Legitimately a--fuck, it's not brotherhood anyway

[bleak hazel]

The rest are whatever apart from Volfer who is an endearing jobber

[fierce star]

hearth!

Volfer did declare that his junk was perosnally approved by Mnemon

[marsh garden]

oh the deeb iconics are all in the same hearth? good good, that makes sense

[fierce star]

so he gets points for aura

[marsh garden]

sorry what lmao

[fierce star]

yeah it's a chapter fiction in core

[marsh garden]

incredible

[fierce star]

for the Charms chapter, with accompanying art

[chilly sluice]

Is that the one where he beats up that Deeb?

[bleak hazel]

That's the endearing part, the jobber part is getting wrecked by a warstrider and then an abyssal and having a shit build

[fierce star]

yeah, allie

also

[marsh garden]

all of them have shit builds

[fierce star]

exalted iconics
having shit builds
name a more iconic duo

[bleak hazel]

No his is especially bad

[chilly sluice]

As is the fate of iconics

[bleak hazel]

Dex 3 dawn

[fierce star]

dex 3 dawn

[marsh garden]

lmao

[fierce star]

:excalibur:

god damnit I keep forgetting I cancelled nitro

[marsh garden]

my dusk is dex 1 which means i'm winning

[fierce star]

see dusks hav eattribute swaps

[bleak hazel]

Iron Siaka will fuck you up, she's a real deal

Otherwise eh

But volfer really sucks

[marsh garden]

i'm confused, is volfer a deeb?

i thought they were but then you said dawn

[tulip folio]

God, how bad a dawn do you need to be to get wrecked by a guy who has a specific rule saying it's terrible at hitting you? XD

[bleak hazel]

Also all the Abyssal iconics from both editions are casually outdone by Seven Degreed Physician, Benignant Annihilator and Bleeding Lily

[prisma sun]

Volfer is the dawn iconic

[marsh garden]

seven degreed physician is an incredible pun

[chilly sluice]

Solar

[bleak hazel]

All of whom are non iconics and have infinitely more aura

[tulip folio]

Anni has the benefit of being just so charmingly Dusk.

She's such a complete fucking meathead.

[marsh garden]

she's the ultimate meathead and i love her

ah nice same choice of word

it's the only fitting one to use

[prisma sun]

I just never really read the prose between chapters

In any white wolf adjacent property

[marsh garden]

she's just a fucking jock

[chilly sluice]

Some of it is neat

[marsh garden]

she loves hitting people with a stick

and that's it

[fierce star]

SDP was the iconic daybreak in 2e

[bleak hazel]

I admit the 2e comics felt like better setting filler

[tulip folio]

She's roams around, cracking open bears and starting fights.

[fierce star]

also yeah I love the interchapter fiction/comics in white wofl works, they really help sell the feel of the setting

[prisma sun]

They definitely were long enough to force you to read them

[marsh garden]

and she's got some funny dumbass intimacies

[bleak hazel]

Most chapter fiction is whatever but Volfer is fun and the iconic Deebs have a whole wyld hunt written up that I really enjoyed

[tulip folio]

I also find it very funny that she's also very clearly a joke about how her deathlord was characterized in 2e.

[bleak hazel]

I'd read a novel about this edition's deeb circle

[marsh garden]

"'Tis better to be feared than loved" get the fuck outta here benny we know you don't read

[chilly sluice]

Walker I assume?

[marsh garden]

ye

[tulip folio]

Where in 2e he basicly couldn't comprehend people being good at things outside their caste and thus tended to just throw people at problems based entirely on caste rather than getting how they worked as people.

[marsh garden]

Walker keeps trying to get her to diversify

and stop being a huge meathead

[tulip folio]

And now he's dealing with Dusky McDuskface

Who is that person

[bleak hazel]

I wish discord would stop making me accidentally put everywhere because it means I can't use it to actually agree

[marsh garden]

lmao

[fierce star]

god the ex3 deathlords are so much better

[marsh garden]

i love that she's got 5 influence and 5 appearance so you know exactly what her fucking stats are

[bleak hazel]

Oh yeah so he was. Could not tell you the rest of them if I tried.

[tulip folio]

'4/4 dots go in app, that's my tertiary done'

[fierce star]

uhhh

chain tits for the dawn

dusk, whatever

the poet guy for the moonshadow

the day caste kept flirting with harmonious jade iirc

[marsh garden]

chain tits is an interesting appellation

i assume she wore chains and nothing else

[fierce star]

her only clothing was chains over her tits

yes

[bleak hazel]

Am I missing a pun or is it just "doctors have lots of letters after their names"

[marsh garden]

if this wasn't coming from "catgirl slave-wife lunars" 2e, i would say based

[bleak hazel]

She didn't breast that boobily honestly

Not compared to Harmonious Jade or Hellnun

[tulip folio]

Also: God, I know you're dead but have some colour there you miserable pile of elrics.

[bleak hazel]

Also I love physician's pose and face here, he's the only one having fun

[marsh garden]

i watched some shitty...cop? i think show as a kid that said you could always get a doctor for the seventh degree (of drug possession)

[limpid badge]

okay but they're perfect actually.

[velvet raft]

For a second I read this as addressing God, who you know is dead, but

[bleak hazel]

"Miserable pile of elrics" is a good phrase for Abyssals

[fierce star]

maybe I'm thinking of a different, non-iconic dusk who was chaintits

[marsh garden]

i fucking love that one of them is doing "think fast chucklenuts"

[fierce star]

oh wait no I was thinking of the iconic midnight

who is much more clothed in that splash art than in other art

[prisma sun]

I love exalted randomly having elves

[tulip folio]

Exalted has like...4(?) types of elves, depending on who you ask. XD

[marsh garden]

TIL that abyssals have mandatory elf ears according to 2e

[fierce star]

it comes with the vampire fangs

vampires are a type of elf

[bleak hazel]

Also sometimes someone just has pointy ears because fantasy art

[marsh garden]

TRVE

[tulip folio]

Jadeborn, Raksha, Abyssal Vampire Ears etc.

[bleak hazel]

Black Ice Shadow, the ghostblooded Sid reckoner who is the most edgy iconic in the entire game, gets elf ears free with his drow outfit

[marsh garden]

and ghost blood, i assume

[bleak hazel]

He's fun, I eagerly await his rules

[fierce star]

god I love black ice shadow

[marsh garden]

i guess ghosts are just elves in exalted

[fierce star]

he is my second favorite canon sid

[bleak hazel]

He would have been so bad if they hadn't played him 100% seriously but they did so it's great

[fierce star]

(my favorite is iron siaka)

('because If I beat the shit out of all the evil people, that makes everything serene, right?')

[bleak hazel]

I think a lot of non iconics are in front for me but BIS is probably my favourite iconic

[fierce star]

(impeccable logic, no notes)

[bleak hazel]

Podium is definitely BIS, Iron Siaka and Shep

[limpid badge]

i have a soft spot for panther but that's because i just make him Sting (Wrestler) [90s] in my head

[bleak hazel]

Of the iconic Solars I think I have to give it to Volfer but I admit I can't remember the 2e solar iconics actually doing tons

they were mostly just Around a lot

[prisma sun]

Anys Syn is my favorite sid but I think Ledall might win out

[bleak hazel]

and Dace steadily evolved larger pauldrons until they were Astartes grade

[limpid badge]

panther mostly gets the shit kicked out of him as memory serves

or punches big

[bleak hazel]

He had a fun exaltation

no heroics or anything, he was just living it up as a rich gladiator and then went outside and thought "is this really all life's for" and Sol went "I don't know, have a magic fusion reactor soul and find out about it"

so he's very literally Pro Wrestler Exalt

[fierce star]

this may just be because my brain's resident evil pilled right now

but what canon exalt is most likely to have 'x gon give it to ya' as their entrance theme

[bleak hazel]

Demethus and maybe Ludall if he's feeling silly, although maybe that's just me carrying over the listed inspiration

Most of the traditional Big Guys in Exalted are too serious

[fierce star]

legit

[prisma sun]

I think Infernals and Sids

Oh you meant individuals

[fierce star]

yeah

[prisma sun]

Weirdly theres no real Canon Big Guys

The giant merit exists

And yet I cant think of a single exalt with it

[bleak hazel]

Strength of Many is big but he's big because he's a minotaur

Demethus, maybe Panther, otherwise everyone is basically normal size

I'm making Sid Kingpin and he's got the giant merit, I think it's way more common on PCs

[tulip folio]

I wish it wasn't quite so expensive

It's priced for mortals more than exalts

[bleak hazel]

(well, half Kingpin half Rubinsky)

[prisma sun]

I think its priced fairly if you arent a very socially connected character

[wise ocean]

volfer having the entire segment in arms of the chosen (?) where he 1v1s a Warstrider and the pilot's reaction is this guy is a total freak! wow! I don't respect him at all! was incredibly funny

[marsh garden]

just finished (i hope) an artifact i'd like some eyes on, anyone willing to give it a look?

[fierce star]

i'm back and forth with some things but might as well post it, i'll look when I can

[prisma sun]

Ya go for it

[marsh garden]

yippee

https://docs.google.com/document/d/1KjoM-OIqQ2L-txOwKNFYjRHk12QGHitexi1UHffQMN8/edit

[prisma sun]

That first charm is

A lot

[marsh garden]

probably

i jumbled essence core ignition around, and that one's probably already too packed

probably gotta split the benefits up into two or three charms, but i was waiting on the verdict

well, not three, but probably steal the penalties part for something else

[prisma sun]

I think this would unequivocally be the best "just grab at character creation" artifact ever

[marsh garden]

yyyeaah, fair, i'll have to strip that for parts

ECI is pretty zonked, but i forgot that half of it is all disarm-related bullshit

got a little too lost in the sauce

[fierce star]

yeah, I'd split the first evocation into--actually

nothing says evocations can't have keys

make some of it base and then split the rest off itno 1-2 keys for higher essence?

[marsh garden]

solid point

[prisma sun]

I would also always suggest making the repurchase be a required storybeat

Like "you kill a kraken defending an intimacy"

[marsh garden]

that's super cute, but at that point i'd probably want to make it a full charm to make the description less cramped

[tulip folio]

ECI is fun

[wise ocean]

first evocation should be two, yeah

[marsh garden]

i think i know the shape of the three-ish charms the two grab bags are going to be, so are there any issues with the others y'all are seeing?

[wise ocean]

resonant water the reef is kind of crazy for an e2 charm

RSW also needs to specify whether it's which one is longer or which one is shorter (it's shorter, but you need to make that clear)

[marsh garden]

gotcha, thanks

do you have any charms you can think of that i can steal the wording from?

because none of the ones i'm familiar with specify

[wise ocean]

... weird, I specify on instinct because Clarity

might be something in core which states a default

[marsh garden]

yeah i don't think i've seen any that specify, i think it's just an automatic assumed "if a condition is met" clause

i think it's because Exalted has some that are "whichever's longer" and they use and

instead of or

[marsh garden]

i'm not super sold on that one, should i just cut it entirely?

[buoyant summit]

Ash an Alchemical confirmed

[tulip folio]

One Thousand and One Tales
Cost: 3m; Mins: Charisma 3, Essence 1
Type: Reflexive
Keywords: None
Duration: Instant
Prerequisite Charms: Terrestrial Circle Sorcery
A mortal may spend decades mastering a single sorcerous work but the Wanderer collects stories of wonder, bringing the fragments of untold mastery to full blossom with flair.

The Wanderer exchanges knowledge of a spell she knows with one she she doesn’t know of the same circle, although she must still meet its prerequisites and cannot exchange her Control Spells.

Reset: Once per story.

Keys:

Endless Nights Repetition (Charisma 5) At the start of a story, this charm can be used any number of times for no cost without resetting.

Scheherazade's Mastery(Charisma 5, Essence 2): The Wanderer may exchange her control spell for another spell of the same circle. If she does, the newly gained spell becomes her new control spell.

Wanderer Sorcery Charm!

[velvet raft]

Mortalgame session 2 today

Very excite

[fierce star]

OH that charm is spicy

I love that shit

[velvet raft]

Oh my god folks

I FOUND IT

A description of how immaterial works that isn't inferred from a charm!

I found it in the Tomb of Dreams adventure

[chilly sluice]

damn

[velvet raft]

One of my fellow players mentioned that Tomb of Dreams is actually really good for looking up game rules

Since it has most of the information from core, but is much better formatted and written

[fierce star]

...

what act of morkery...

[velvet raft]

So I checked and lo-and-behold! They just explain how immaterial works at the front of the QCs section

[marsh garden]

what the fuck is that

Ex3 has adventures???

[velvet raft]

It's the quickstart module

[marsh garden]

waow

[velvet raft]

I think it's the only published adventure

But because it's the quickstart

It has the rules

[marsh garden]

today i learned!

[velvet raft]

Me too!

Like, here's most of the social rules! On one page! It's wild!

[marsh garden]

holy shit

it's a christmas miracle

[marsh garden]

could anyone give me the over/under on bone puppet dance, hound of the five winds, and distillation of artificial forms? they all seem like pretty good spells, and i'm looking to take em all at some point, but i wanted to make sure i wasn't wildly overestimating any of them

[bleak hazel]

good/good/good

Bone Puppet Dance (that acronym is a bit suspicious) can sometimes whiff if all the people worth casting it on are very swole

hounds is Many Guys Technique and as such always amazing

[marsh garden]

how does BONESHAKER™ stack up against flight of the brilliant raptor in terms of ST first-circle magic?

double resist roll and worse range but higher damage potential looks like it overall has inferior consistency but bigger spikes against applicable targets like squishy dodgebastards?

[bleak hazel]

FOTBR is a nuke that happens to have a fire hazard attached more than a targeted debuff

[marsh garden]

ah, i see

so it's Core Shit

being apocalyptically broken

[bleak hazel]

eh it's fine

not broken has fun builds

[coral wraith]

not really?

[bleak hazel]

but it's definitely FIREBALL more than DOT

[fierce star]

It is very "I didn't ask how big the room is, I said I cast fireball" coded

[marsh garden]

ah ic, i guess i misunderstood nuke

[wise ocean]

yeah, sorcery doesn't really do BROKEN AMOUNTS OF DAMAGE

unless it's to battlegroups. fuck those guys

[velvet raft]

You've still gotta roll decisive damage, yeah

[velvet raft]

Good session, will be having our first combat next week :D

[tulip folio]

Introduction to the Stone Prince
Cost: 5m, 1wp; Mins: Martial Arts 5, Essence 2
Type: Supplemental
Keywords: Decisive-Only
Duration: Instant
Prerequisite Charms: First Pulse Form
Brawlers don’t spar in dojos, and they don’t meet on fields of honor. They track down their enemies in the streets and give them lasting gifts of pain, or they are tracked down themselves. 

This supplements a Decisive attack. The stylist’s victim target may commit in advance to accepting the highest level of crippling injury possible to prevent this damage (Exalted, p. 201). If he doesn’t, the stylist adds three automatic successes on this attack's damage roll and knocks her victim prone if she deals any levels of damage, or 5 successes if her target is already prone. This doesn’t count against the once-per-story limit on taking crippling injuries, and doing so renders her victim immune to this Charm for the rest of the scene.

This Charm’s Willpower cost is waived against trivial characters, who have no choice but to take a crippling injury.

Terrestrial: A terrestrial martial artist can only use this charm as an Unexpected Attack or against a Prone target.

Back to playing with Martial Arts/Tinkering with that version of First Pulse I did up.

Introduction to the Stone Prince is perhaps it's most iconic charm, being 'Hey, I'm here to just curbstomp you until things break'

[velvet raft]

At last, my martial artist character will get to do some martial artsing

[tulip folio]

Yay

[marsh garden]

hmm, how does this stack with a sid or lunar slamming their own crippling injury charm?

no stack or 2x cripples

[marsh garden]

(also what MA do they use again?)

[velvet raft]

Centipede, although it doesn't super matter yet since mortal

[marsh garden]

slick

[tulip folio]

Yeah, mortal martial arts mostly just means 'what weapons can I use with it'. XD

[marsh garden]

yeah but like

that's gonna change

[tulip folio]

I'll admit, I don't super know the Lunar charms on that front.

[marsh garden]

basically the same as the sid one

[velvet raft]

And this is specifically a fist-fight. But yeah I love centipede style charms, hence my choice

[marsh garden]

do they need to take a crippling injury for these charms and stone prince?

[velvet raft]

Genuinely deeply slick lineup:

• mobility charm
• multi-decisive charm
• soak charm
• form
• grapple/counter-grapple charm
• penalty reduction charm
• poison charm
• merge poison w/onslaught penalties
• upgrade to the multi-decisive

[tulip folio]

My thoughts is it would be 1 crippling injury for both.

So for the Lunar it would be 'crippling or I get 3 auto-success and a chunk of extra dice'

[marsh garden]

makes sense

[tulip folio]

Which gives it a hair of skornergy if the other guy is willing to take the injury but lets a Luanr hit them with one and then the other one in the next attack

For 'Okay, now do it again'

First Pulse Form
Cost: 8m; Mins: Martial Arts 4, Essence 2
Type: Simple
Keywords: Form
Duration: One scene
Prerequisite Charms: Flagstones Meets Face, Street Shifts Underfoot
First Pulse Style prizes action and despises hesitation. It strikes fast and relentlessly, hammering the foe again and again until they are nothing but red stains upon the cobblestones.
The martial artist gains the following benefits:

-She adds (Strength) Soak.
-She ignores the initiative cost to attack with Improvised Weapons. 
-Improvised weapons she wields can be treated as any appropriate mundane melee weapon (Such as butcher's cleaver as an Improvised Axe) and gain the Balanced and Grappling tags while she wields them.
-She gains +2 defence against Unexpected Attacks, Savages and Slams, to a maximum of her normal defence. This applies even against such attacks that would treat her defence as 0.

Special Activation Rules: Whenever the martial artist wins Join Battle, she may reflexively enter this Form.

First Pulse Form is just Dirty Brawler at its core.

But a big part of that is that it's very good against other cheaters

You can't outcheat First Pulse

[fierce star]

I'm here for a good honest fistfight and if you try to fuck me I will murder you

[bleak hazel]

A fun homebrew first circle someone made ages ago and that I randomly came across

Egysok, the Lonely Crowds
Demon of the First Circle
Progeny of the Innocent Demon

An egysok has one hundred and four bodies, that in their seeming resemble hairless humans with a single short horn on their brow. It is their curse that one hundred and three of these bodies are imaginary, and can only be perceived by others of their breed. Such is their self-confidence, however, that most people do not notice that they cannot see the imagined forms and thus they treat each egysok as a mob. Only the more perceptive notice that there is only one demon present.

To watch two lonely crowds fight is an intensely strange spectacle, for their confidence in their conflict means onlookers perceive a dreadful battle going on despite the fact that they customarily position their real body near the back of the crowd, to jeer and call out moral support.

The voice of an egysok is in magnitude proportional to their imagined size, and so when they speak it is in the voice of a hundred and four men. They are clumsy and have problems coordinated their teeming horde, and often forget to move their real body. For that reason they are not particularly useful demons for physical activity, though in Malfeas they see much use for their song which is both sweet and choral and is efficacious at driving away the Silent Wind. Smarter demons cover their horn with hats or bandages, or are instructed to do so by their summoner.

Summoning: (Obscurity 2/4): Sorcerers call upon egysoks when they wish to inflate their perceived numbers. A few lonely crowds can make a small force look like a teeming army. A lonely crowd takes a point of Limit per scene it is forced to spend in a place that is not large enough for it to fit all its bodies in. An egysok can escape from hell when a demagogue calls on a crowd to rise up in riot against lawful authority; the demon joining the crowd to produce a groundswell of popular support.

[tulip folio]

Oooh, fun

[bleak hazel]

Theres a whole lineage of a third and seven second circle demons above these but these are both the most easily used and the least obvious puns of the lot

some of the puns are quite good though

[buoyant summit]

pun about the imaginary silent majority?

And social media botting?

[bleak hazel]

They're anime extras, you get one model and copy paste it a bunch of times

[buoyant summit]

AHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH

We Were Too PoliSci For It

[bleak hazel]

The third circle is "Balanodo", a stereotypically dull cookie cutter anime protagonist with horns that blend into his black spiky hair

all his second circle aspects of himself are different kinds of waifu

It's shockingly well done despite its silliness since they're all Elloge demons

[tulip folio]

I know I had a joke on a similar topic for my redo of Baidoks.

Baidak, Empty Pawns, Demons of the First Circle
Those who bargain too greedily against Sigereth and cannot pay her debts must give up the last valuable they have, themselves. She remakes them into the baidak, her honor guard, who serve her forever in the Demon City. Baidak resemble the mortals from whom they were made, but their flesh becomes yellowed ivory, stylized and inhumanly smooth, inlaid with an elaborate brazen panoply emblazoned with Sigereth’s mon. All share a uniform height and build, and they move in regimented array, more akin to clockworks than living creatures.

The most basic pawns in Sigereth’s playset, Baidak are almost archetypal soldiers. Clad in heavy armour of steel and brass, armed with polearms and bows, they are easily mistaken for mortals. This rarely lasts for sustained conversations as their lack of initiative and personality betrays the fact they are little more than tools. Raksha in particular find them particularly galling, giving them nicknames such as ‘Kiritos’.

One advantage summoners find with Baidak over many other demons is that they are bound to existence by the power of a second circle demon. This prevents their permanent destruction from all but the most powerful of foes.

Primary: Senses, Soldiering, Pretending To Be A Particularly Bland Human (Such as an Isekai Protagonist)
Secondary: Feats of Strength(Can perform strength 3 feats), Strategy, Command

[wise ocean]

But more importantly, the thing to remember about the souls of the Prince of Leeches is that while they take the form of haremettes, they are - all of them - perfectly valid and conventional Second Circle Demons in their own right.

So the thing to remember about Bittesse is that she is his Expressive Soul. She's how a harem protagonist expresses his own essential nature. And how is that?

Gotta acquire more waifus.

So she's not interested in the Prince. Why would she be? She can't waifu-ise him. But she tricks people into selling her their souls so she owns them, mind, body and soul. She wants to enslave her fellow Second Circle souls and make them love her because they're haremettes, and as an expression the harem protagonist's "they all love me", she wants them all to love her.

And she's a slaver, because the harem genre promotes a proprietary view of women. The genre says that they're things to "own" whose lives revolve around making the protagonist love them, so the soul who expresses that essential nature is a slaver whose ojou-sama laugh breaks people's will, and uses poisoned-whips that weaken the mind and force others to be subservient to her.```

incredible things are happening on that forum

[bleak hazel]

It is genuinely a pretty good introduction to demon soul hierarchies

Asarin is let down by being rather too on the nose though

[tulip folio]

Weaving Gossamer Lives
Cost: 1m, 1wp; Mins: Charisma 3, Essence 1
Type: Simple
Keywords: Stackable
Duration: Indefinite
Prerequisite Charms: None
The Wanderer calls upon her wyld power, spinning a mote of her dreams into a new being.

The Wanderer conjures an Essence 1 Creature of The Wyld that is not a Raksha, such as a Hobgoblin or Buck-Ogre. This creature has a Defining tie of Loyalty to her and speaks all languages she does.

The Wanderer can stack this Charm up to (Essence) times to create that many Wyld Creatures.

Reset: In combat, this charm can only be used once per scene.

Keys:
Wyld Menagerie Mind(Charisma 5, Essence 2): The Wanderer can also conjure Essence 2 Creatures of the Wyld. She still cannot conjure Raksha.

Court-Assembling Summon(Wyld Menagerie Mind, Essence 3): The Wanderer can also conjure Raksha of an Essence she can conjure over the course of eight hours of careful shaping. Beings conjured this way do not wither and calsify in Creation, sustained by the Wanderer's nature. Raksha conjured this way may not themselves summon additional beings and may not be summoned with Wyld Crusade Banner.

Wyld Crusade Banner(Essence 3): Once per story, when the Wanderer uses this charm she may summon a Battlegroup of such creatures up to size (Essence/2, rounded up). This battlegroup has Elite Drill and Might +2. This battle group does not count towards her maximum number of Wyld creatures but she can only have a single one at a time. Using Weaving Gossamer Lives this way costs a surcharge of 2 motes per size.

Questing Beast Call(Wyld Menagerie Mind, Essence 4): Once per story, the Wanderer can conjure a Wyld Creature of Essence equal to or lower than their own over the course of eight hours of careful shaping. Conjuring a creature above Essence 2 does not count towards her maximum number of Wyld creatures but she can only have a single one at a time.

Does this look okay? Trying to hash 'I can summon fae' is tricky when Unicorns have a higher essence than Fae Cataphracts.

[tulip folio]

Hey @bleak hazel, you've done a good bit with Fae Cataphracts. What would you say are the biggest issues with them design-wise?

[wise ocean]

@tulip folio

[tulip folio]

nods

As part of the Wanderer thing, looking at redoing a chunk of Fae Stuff more in line with First or Second Circle Demons.

[marsh garden]

do alchs have a reflexive Aim charm like sids and lunars?

i don't think i've seen any on my reads through the manuscript, but

i might've just missed them

or forgotten about it

wait, right. answered my own question. motion-tracking reticule

[coral wraith]

its also insanely good since it gives double aim benefits automatically

[marsh garden]

yeah that entire early suite of perc charms seems zooted

+1 ncd on hit + 3 damage dice + ignore all penalties for 5m; reflexive double aim with a pretty damn generous no-wp clause, the phasing one that i can't remember

[tulip folio]

Messing about with a Fae creature!

Merits
Dark Appetite: Redcaps treat ties of respect, fascination, awe and love as if they were also ties of Hunger. The Redcap never violates these ties by harming their subjects for the sake of that hunger.

Monstrous Hunger: The Redcap can eat anything short of magical materials it can fit in its mouth. While it only takes a Simple Action for a Redcap to make objects like corpses and trivial animals vanish, durable materials like tempered metal may take up to an hour of chewing to be devoured. Redcaps are immune to all poisons ingested this way.

It's got a bit of a weird social defence in the merits

[tulip folio]

Primary Actions: Devour(May attempt Strength 7 Feats of Demolition)

They also have a dice pool for feats of demolition only, not general feats of strength.

[fierce star]

Oh dark appetite is fun

[tulip folio]

'Don't worry guys, I have my I'm A Good Diplomat Charm, everyone has a minor tie of Delicious Respect. Wait, what's that crossed out word?'

I'm looking at giving these guys a hard to pull off but very 'always be a bitcareful about them' charm.

[fierce star]

ooh?

[tulip folio]

Give them a 'requires a couple more hoops to jump through' version of this lunar charm.

Where they go 'hey, you look to be Crashed. What if I just Eat Your Arm'

[fierce star]

oooh

"You didn't need that arm and I am hungry."

[tulip folio]

Yeah. Though it's going to, as said, need a bit more hoops to jump through

As while these guys are E2 they're not E2 celestial exalt tier dudes 😛

[fierce star]

lol

[tulip folio]

Swallow You Whole (5m, 1wp; Supplemental; Decisive-Only; Essence 2): The Redcap becomes a flurry of hunger and rage. The target may commit in advance to accepting the highest level of crippling injury possible to prevent this damage (Exalted, p. 201). If he doesn’t, the Redcap rolls an additional die of damage for each die on the original damage roll that showed a success. This doesn’t count against the once-per-story limit on taking crippling injuries, and doing so renders her victim immune to this Charm for the rest of the scene.

This charm can only supplement Decisive attacks made as Unexpected Attacks or against characters that are either Crashed or significantly smaller than the Redcap (Such as a Tiny creature).

[bleak hazel]

rotating pattern spider touch in my mind

(not my spreadsheet but a handy one)

[velvet raft]

Are these percentages?

[bleak hazel]

yes, percentage chance of success

[tulip folio]

Setting up the Redcap's weapons. The Bite accuracy is pretty damn garbage but against a guy with a lot of penalties to his def or as a surprise attack...

[fierce star]

Give the Cleaver Thrown (Short)

[bleak hazel]

pattern spider touch is really bad against most peer opponents, damn

admittedly that's kind of the point

it's not for killing other exalts, since it's Shaping/Psyche/poison-resistable and usually like diff 9-11 against your E4 celestial peers

it's for taking giant doom monsters and going "fuck you, quack quack" rather than burning through 50 HLs or something

with a secondary niche against people like Octavian who have enough health levels that it's faster to duck them and probably don't have broad-spectrum keyword defences like Exalts do

[tulip folio]

Stares at thousand zombie titans with many health levels but fuck all non-HP defences.

[bleak hazel]

eh, min difficulty 6 and they have to be crashed first so you can't just tap 'em like you can with Sid Medicine

but it lets you shorten the fight immensely as long as you have something that works on legendary size

https://theonyxpath.com/riders-from-the-sunless-lands-preview-3-the-love-clad-in-the-raiment-of-tears/

oh here we fucking go

[tulip folio]

Oh boy

makes notes for that Anti-Lover Sid of mine

[fierce star]

i wanna steal that mirror

and have tea with it

[tulip folio]

Weight of Despair (10m, 1wp; Simple; Psyche; One scene; Essence 8): The Lover rolls her social influence pool against the Resolve of all characters within short range, converting bonus dice from Appearance into bonus successes. Characters whose Resolve is overcome are forced to their knees and become prone. To rise, they roll (Wits + Resolve) or (Strength + Athletics) at a difficulty of the Lover’s Appearance as a miscellaneous action. A character can resist the effect or rise from prone by allowing one of their Major or Defining positive Intimacies to erode by one step. Characters exposed to this effect can go into experience debt to purchase Whispers (Abyssals, p. XX). 

Yes!

The reason I'm going 'yes'

The Yun Do Not Kneel
Cost:2m, 1i; Mins: Essence 1
Type: Reflexive
Keywords: None
Duration: Instant
Prerequisite Charms: Heart of the Yun
The Lover Clad In Raiment Of Tears could not make the Yun kneel. Nothing will.

If an effect would cause the wielder to become Prone, she can use this charm to instead keep her footing. This may be used when falling to reduce the damage suffered as if she had fallen one zone less and to land on her feet. 

When the user dies, she may use this charm for free to make sure she dies standing regardless of the circumstances.

Is this is in that Sid's artifact

I accidentily pre-empted her as a boss fight.

[bleak hazel]

she's going for the penalty build! get her!

flying, kiting combat sorceror of immense power

wow she's annoying

you know what counters her kiting pretty well, if works in 3e like it does in 2e? Sapphire Veil of Passions

that's really cute

[prisma sun]

Her being able to lose motes instead of initiative seems

Fucking wild

[bleak hazel]

appearance 9, so she's going to get you with that prone AOE

[fierce star]

Alchemical With Permanent Apperance 8: "Yeah she's alright"

[prisma sun]

YEAAAAH EVERY DEATHLORD GETS DEMIURGIC ART

YEAAAAAAAAAAAAH

[bleak hazel]

the main thing here is that she is a lot less of a raid boss than FAFL

she doesn't have action econ = incoming heat

[tulip folio]

Death’s Own Beauty (15m, 1wp; Reflexive; One scene; Essence 8): The Lover makes herself a manifestation of death’s terrible allure. She gains two bonus dots of Appearance, which can raise her Appearance above seven. All characters who can die are treated as having a Minor Tie of attraction or fascination toward her, and she treats attempts to persuade characters to take actions likely to result in death as serious tasks, rather than life-changing tasks. 

HAHAHAHAHAH

'This will get me killed, that's Moderately Annoying'

[bleak hazel]

she has Hail-Shattering Practice for social

fucked up

[prisma sun]

She is meant to be fought with a fairly big entourage

But also her demiurgic art does in fact make her a raidboss

[bleak hazel]

Spiteful Demon Ward means she is definitely a penalty stacking build for personal combat

her mote pool isn't the deepest, though, only 70 after materialize

[tulip folio]

Yeah, she really wants to fight you in a place she can materialize without cost/doesn't need to materialize

[bleak hazel]

also I think she wins the instant-duration nuke radius contest with that second phase

[tulip folio]

Yeah, just 'fuck it 9 miles from me is gone'

...here's a vague pondering: How hard do the Sid Anti-Undead charms mess her and faffle up? They don't seem to have any Specific Defences against them and unlike deathknights, they're always undead.

[bleak hazel]

decent chunk of extra damage but that's mostly it

their main job is just deleting anything that even remotely looks like an add

[tulip folio]

So more for 'fuck off with those nephrack courtiers'

Than 'fuck off lover'

[bleak hazel]

that capstone just eats all your willpower, holy shit

admittedly she does that anyway

much like FAFL you probably fight her and then immediately either nuke her down or exit once she uses this because if you seriously try to fight in that mess you will die

[prisma sun]

I think sid anti undead charms mostly work in zombies and mindless undead

The ones that instantly delete at least

[bleak hazel]

yeah

you have some nice agg damage attacks that add charisma to init

but otherwise you want generic anti-enemy of fate stuff

sid brawl fucks her up

+9 damage please ma'am

[tulip folio]

Hah

[prisma sun]

Whats Lovers average shape Sorcery roll look

[bleak hazel]

14 w/ +10 from excellency, and then in capstone that improves to 19 + 10, doubling all sux

[tulip folio]

Oh and don't forget the 'double NM' aura in superform

[velvet raft]

A couple is placed in a trap only one may escape, and they must betray the other before they’re betrayed.
Well that's petty

[lament owl]

She does take a minimum of 4 decisives I think

Because of that one defensive charm she has

[tulip folio]

Shape necromancy actions by all characters award two necromantic motes per success, and the Lover’s own shape necromancy actions add five non-Charm dice. The Lover gains one Willpower at the beginning of each round, which can only be spent on necromancy spells.

[lament owl]

That prevents health levels from overflowing

[bleak hazel]

she is fragile if you can punch through Witch-Queen Supremacy because she has nothing to get her out of crash other than activating Demiurgic Art

at which point Shattering Heart Evasion and Frozen Heart Sorcery turn off

but you have to catch her first and she can fly

I think on balance I am more scared of FAFL in an actual fight but she's definitely really mean

[tulip folio]

If we ever get some of 2e's Anti-Undead Necromancy her demiurge aura might end up a bit double edged.

[prisma sun]

Oh, she also gets motes when she gains initative off her ice spear attack

[lament owl]

I also wanna point out

Her rapier appears to give her an excellency?