Exalted

[lament owl]

At least if I’m reading it correctly

[bleak hazel]

no, that's in the misc charms section like normal

her sword just has a decisive booster

a really good one

[lament owl]

Ah yea

[bleak hazel]

I think her main limit is that she has a really effort-intensive combat style

she's got casting, fighting, flying and social going on, she has to keep paying motes to maintain them and none of her charms are exactly cheap

if she can seriously leverage all her stuff against you you are going to melt though

especially with nephwracks, which are themselves really good controllers and will play keepaway for their boss

[prisma sun]

I think shes still surprisingly tanky with how much withering defense she gets

Also her danger scales with how good of a deathknight body guard you give her

Like exponentially so

[lament owl]

Her and like, a well built combat Dusk or Day caste

[bleak hazel]

you need really good withering offense yeah

something like fusion combo or Red Revel

[prisma sun]

She gets like

Depending on her own withering attacks

Like 20+ initiative per turn

If you dont combo her specifically down like in a turn or two she just decisive Sorcery aoes you and party wipes

[tulip folio]

Overall she's not as scary as FAFFL in 'you walk into a boss arena' sense but I think I'd overall be more scared of her as she can toss more at the party before the fight even starts.

God forbid your PCs like to banter with NPCs before swords are drawn

[bleak hazel]

yeah she's definitely more powerful in an all-round sense

[velvet raft]

I think it would be fun if she had been a Serenities Sid in life

[bleak hazel]

I think she's if anything one of the most Solar deathlords

she is very straight up with her peerless witch-queen gimmick

[velvet raft]

It's just how much her writeup makes her out as obsessed with love, to the point that it's kind of funny

[tulip folio]

It's a bit sad she has none of her former 'I'm one of the best martial artists in the deathlords' but the new version of her is very fun still.

I stand by my headcannon for the lover is she was an Auroran/Hearteater

[fierce star]

My headcanon for her is that she was a Zenith-caste solar in life and was never actually a leader in anything. She didn't invent the fighting styels she's mastered, she picked htem up later. She wasn't part of the black nadir concordant, she learned necromancy from them.

[velvet raft]

The Lover tests individuals by putting them in extreme circumstances designed to strain the bonds of their love. Each individual test the Lover devises is but one argument in a long thesis to prove the ultimate futility of love, and it is only half-written. To whom she’s trying to prove this point is a mystery few would dare try unravel.
Like this cracks me up

[fierce star]

She has mastered a thousand things and made none of them.

[bleak hazel]

we already have Prince and Bishop as kung fu deathlords, I think this works

[lament owl]

Also

If she is for whatever reason she is on your turf

Her demiurgic art would make her like, basically impossible to actually fight if she just walks into a major city

At least if you care about the lives of the people in the major city

[bleak hazel]

also she has fucking VOID CIRCLE

[fierce star]

I do like the auroral-lover idea

[lament owl]

She has a dead man’s switch with a 9 mile radius

[velvet raft]

Oh I'm not saying her statblock should be different

[fierce star]

it's my secondary headcanon for games where aurorals are canon

[velvet raft]

I like the statblock

She could've been a melee sid or whatever

[tulip folio]

It feels very set up for this scenario. XD

[velvet raft]

She's hilariously obsessed with love in a way that reminds me of the Serenities scriptures, I guess

At the very least I feel like she's gotta have a thing about Venus

[lament owl]

Having Void Circle Necromancy Celestial Circle Sorcery is a comical amount of spellcasting

[tulip folio]

...encountering the lover and finding she's still got the 'you're married to your maiden' ring would be very funny.

[bleak hazel]

according to the fellow who writes all the big boss fights for Onyx Path this is her boss theme

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hScsR7Lm_M4

[velvet raft]

(And again, tbc I'm just talking flavor-wise here)

[tulip folio]

Also: Man Loveless Intimacies are incredibly broad.

[velvet raft]

That's a rad boss theme

[prisma sun]

Also

If you dont have integrity 5

She just shoves the mirror in your face

[bleak hazel]

Spiteful Demon Ward is extremely mean and is going to seriously mote tax anyone trying to get her in CQC

it's the only one on there other than the capstone and giga kiting that I went "ah, this might be Trouble" at upon reading

also I find it cute that the two things I immediately reach for to fight the ice queen who hates love are a) superheated justice punches and b) the SMA based on intimacy

[tulip folio]

I do feel like Spiteful Demon Ward's counterattack should be Psyche.

[bleak hazel]

tell me that this isn't the perfect move to deal with a flying, kiting socialite

[prisma sun]

Well it does only work once before she goes "oh, killing you"

[lament owl]

I do really like she can also enter phase 2 if you start wearing her down socially

I can imagine you breaking through on the defining intimacy and her going “Shut Up! SHUT UP!!!”
Ripping her chest open and leveling whatever city she is in

[prisma sun]

And her phase 2 is obviously

https://youtu.be/Bb_-bGLLhn0?si=TRdCcDiVfpEizV-X

[bleak hazel]

yeah but then you stick to her for the duration of the fight so she can't fly off and kite you

[tulip folio]

Heheheheheh

[prisma sun]

How do you do that when she has double the movement?

[bleak hazel]

it's what Eternal Infatuation Dance does

As long as the martial artist does not voluntarily move away from the individual whom she activated Eternal Infatuation Dance to approach, she may stay within one yard of him at all times, regardless of his movement rate or any exotic movement abilities employed.

[prisma sun]

Ah but

[bleak hazel]

it sticks you to someone so you can do the bit from the Sukuna/Mahoraga fight where they're just standing in midair pummeling each other

[prisma sun]

Make someone look in the mirror

Hard counter

[bleak hazel]

I don't think those interact

[tulip folio]

You can look in a mirror while moving, as far as I'm aware

[prisma sun]

You can but you also gain an obsession with looking deeper into it, and it sounds like you get drawn towards it

[bleak hazel]

yeah, but the mirror is next to her, because it gets in your way in melee, and Demon Ward doesn't do the obsession contest of wills thing

it's just a counter

[prisma sun]

Wait i thoughtt it was just like, sitting there

fuck you mean it's 6 feet tall and just hovering

[bleak hazel]

This six-foot-tall oval of silvered ebony hovers at the Lover’s side, following her every move.

ominous mirror is ominous

also you better spend those motes on penalty negation because that's -6 to hit her at close range if you don't get countered

Sid Melee go

[prisma sun]

Also consider that in a story context there's no way you're coming into this fight with full motes

[tulip folio]

Larceny Primordial Infernal feels really useful vs the Lover.

Drifting Wind Avarice + Treasure-Seizing Tempest = 'No more mirror for the rest of the fight'

[bleak hazel]

greensid hit the mood lighting please

Resolve Yes

[fierce star]

Infernal hits the devil body that says 'you can't weaken my major and defining intimacies and can't use emotions to hit me with ANY social influence. Logically, fuck off.' looks like a fun way to deal with th eLover's bullshit

[bleak hazel]

I think my ideal approach here is something like "Sapphire Veil gapcloser (if it still exists), immediate Speared Boar Struggle, ruthless horrific wreath beatdown" because she's not actually that good at grappling and getting her in a clinch bypasses all those hit penalties

but really bring a circle, this is extremely not a duel

Restrain fucks her over too since she needs to keep casting to keep her defences up

she's a very dynamic boss, there's a lot of moving parts to interact with

unlike, say, FAFL

who just stands there going "fuck this, fuck that, fuck you, especially you" and smashing people with their mega sword, and the interesting challenge is how to deal with the basic but horrifyingly powerful offense

[fierce star]

I think what I'm most scared about honestly is the fact that she's implied to have Size Large battlegroups of nephwracks and champion ghosts. Like dealing with battlegroups isn't necessarily hard, but when it's battlegroups of those levels of Might

on top of her, on top of a deathknight

who may have their own escort

[prisma sun]

And you consider that you're probably fighting your way up into her lair

so mooks aplenty to wear you down

[bleak hazel]

nephwracks are not really battlegroupable

[prisma sun]

Hey Misc

[bleak hazel]

but a couple of them is quite enough

they're pretty swole

yeah?

[prisma sun]

Now she has two initative tracks

"Crash me big boy, just try and crash me"

[bleak hazel]

she can use that when she goes down as well, which makes it way harder to see the ult come out and then just put 9 levels into her now-depleted health track

[prisma sun]

"TRY AND MELEE ME"

[tulip folio]

Anti-Lover Strategem: Hug

[prisma sun]

Lover has 3 fuckin phases

[bleak hazel]

new strongest deathlord, Elsa

[prisma sun]

LET IT GO

LET IT GO

[tulip folio]

Quiet Oblivion!

[prisma sun]

YOUR LOVE WILL BE LOST TO THE SNOW

[bleak hazel]

she also definitely has Thus Ends All Flame

[prisma sun]

Does it say which spells she has?

Or does she just generally have whatever a ST wants

[bleak hazel]

no, but no way she doesn't have it, it's right on her themes

she may not have BOSS

she has BOSS if the PCs beat her too quick, I think

[prisma sun]

What the fuck is a sapphire circle

[bleak hazel]

celestial

[fierce star]

Celestial

[lament owl]

Dragon blooded term for celestial I think

[bleak hazel]

emerald, sapphire, adamant are the alt names

[tulip folio]

Becuase there's no way the DB would call top tier sorcery 'Solar' 😛

[prisma sun]

Man Void Circle has like 5 "kill a city" spells

[bleak hazel]

Interestingly she can only use her medusa shield passive with sorcerous motes

so she has apocalypse casting power or slightly less insane spells but with extra tank

Magma Kraken at E9 is still completely fucking insane though

[velvet raft]

God I love Magma Kraken

Wish it had a better control effect

[fierce star]

it's just so like

heavy metal

[velvet raft]

As in a control effect with a clear effect as opposed to just "you can do fire stunts I guess"

[fierce star]

I can see a heavy metal album entitled 'Rolf McSqueeze And The Champions Of Allthang Fight The Evil Magma Kraken In Davy Jones' Hotbox' or some shit

[wise ocean]

realistically against a party she's going to be using the extra tank, since she needs it to prevent getting onslaught penalty witheringed to death and she doesn't need the extra casting power if she has the Helpful Dusk Caste Bodyguard to deal damage too

quite tempted by vbos here (says vbos man) because wound penalties will at least start helping with those gigantic dice pools

[fierce star]

VBOS man suggests VBOS for fight where VBOS might be helpful in some matter

(VBOS man is right)

[wise ocean]

where are hit penalty negators usually located, perception?

[bleak hazel]

Sid Melee

otherwise you're looking for highly specific stuff like Infernal Athletics "ignore strong wind penalties"

on an unrelated note, she's wearing orichalcum

weighting slightly more towards ex-Solar

[wise ocean]

indeed, I spotted that as well

ah, yeah, orichalcum, not soulsteel. solar and mad about it

[wise ocean]

muttering terrible foulness under my breath as I full excellency every single dice roll knowing my mote pool will last me three rounds and I need to land four to six giga decisives

[bleak hazel]

this was also my response

since even giga mote efficiency sid needs to spend 1m per 1 point of penalty negation, up to (Perception)

and Demiurgic Art turns off Heroic Essence Replenishment unless you have a defining intimacy of FIGHT

[wise ocean]

on the bright side even blade vbos will hit her and will kill her, but I think the mote pool efficiency problem and the health gate really put her in that raidboss tier

[bleak hazel]

The same is true of most conversations she has outside of combat, as her special interest of corruption and bringing others to ruin tends to dominate her priorities. the phrasing on this is very funny for some reason

[wise ocean]

final verdict I think is "not that scary (for her Essence) in just punching you, very scary when you realize you have a hard-stop time limit"

so the full Circle is mandatory

[prisma sun]

You have a time limit and she has 3 phases

[wise ocean]

y u p.

you also can't really take more than chip from her bodyguard or Demiurgic Art kills you with AoE, so you need to be spending on defense too

kind of funny to think of the ideal Lover fight setup being three rounds of all-out combat where it all comes out to about 54 seconds

[bleak hazel]

Nephwracks, by the way, also all casters

so you're just being bombarded with bullshit constantly

tougher than her, too

[prisma sun]

All of which can be Raise Skeletons

[tulip folio]

Which you know, combos very meanly with her superform doubling NM generation.

[tulip folio]

As it means all her minions are doubling the rate of magic

[wise ocean]

honestly "summon skeletons" can be a debuff to her at this level of Fighting

[bleak hazel]

the upside is that their dice rolls on sorcerous attacks are quite bad, but you're still burning juice on block unblockable, dodging enviromental hazards or boosting resolve

[wise ocean]

past a certain point in White Reaper you see battlegroups and your eyes light up

[bleak hazel]

Clinging Shadow Miasma also makes it near-impossible to close with the Lover because everything is difficult terrain

Dawn of Dead Stars burns a few more motes off you

[wise ocean]

tbf the nephwrack is 1-2shottable at this level of Fighting

it's just ticking down your time and mote limit to do so

[bleak hazel]

only if you want to burn serious juice on it

[prisma sun]

She can also make at least 4 sources with a 5+ Lethal damage environmental hazard

[bleak hazel]

17 soak, 10 hardness, 19 damage to kill

[tulip folio]

...what dice values do NPCs use for attack spells? Just their general 'sorcery' pool?

[bleak hazel]

I believe so

I know my go-to Exalt OC is a Chosen of Battles so maybe this is playing against type, but it may be useful to commit violence against the Lover more than once

(at the very least all those abyssals need to die before you go fight her)

[tulip folio]

...silly pondering: Loveless are a valid ghost target for Ghost Deputy.

[bleak hazel]

they're pretty good at it too

decently fighty as they're just Mortwrights and don't have to burn juice on remat

[tulip folio]

They also bring the nice benefit of being pretty useful for social and infiltration scenes.

Which Morts are...not generally.

My only sadness with Loveless is I was just working on a Fae that sorta plays in a similar area, being based on Baobhan Sidhe. XD

Oh well, I guess I'll double down on 'The Baobhan Sidhe are assassin Fae'

[wise ocean]

loveless are actually an exceptionally good target for my necrosid to summon

they look just like people, so they're very good for spywork

[wise ocean]

part of the problem, I should think, would be "living through the escape and being able to come back and do it again"

[bleak hazel]

yeah, have a yellow greater sign or a fully loaded sorceror with TWD ready

ideally you only fight her once you're ready to try and pop the ult

since after she does that she has to go mend her broken heart and is pretty useless for a good while

[wise ocean]

yellow thrown would actually be quite powerful for this fight, I think

[bleak hazel]

very

you get to pull her into the mosh pit

[wise ocean]

she can't kite away, they do huge damage against creatures of darkness, and if something goes catastrophically wrong in melee they can zoop everyone out

rare perfect sid circle full use case?

[bleak hazel]

there are honestly not many things you can't solve with a perfect circle of high essence sids, but yes

[wise ocean]

endings medicine blows up adds, battles and journeys fight her, secrets and serenities on social defense

[bleak hazel]

Red/Yellow/Purple is like the ideal bossing trio anyway

defence, overwhelming, -2TN to damage rolls against doomoids, movement and then yellow can use thrown to set up the other two

her adds are mostly un-explodable

but a couple of TN-dropped charisma attacks against resolve wouldn't hurt

[prisma sun]

I think at that point you would also just want to summon an elemental dragon for help

Also to be fair to Falafle

https://i.imgur.com/BkyF5JQ.png

Forsaken doesn't duel

they WILL just beat your ass

If two envirronmental hazards overlap

how does that work

[bleak hazel]

roll against both separately, I believe

[prisma sun]

Then yeah

I think most people die to Phase 3 of Lover just as a matter of damage

[bleak hazel]

yeah, you need a very lucky setup to run her out of juice before she's summoned like a magma kraken, a jackal and 1d3 diff 5-6 terrain hazards

without big sorcery she probably can't actually kill a maxed out fighty exalt very easily but she doesn't want to

[buoyant summit]

🐲 The ST that's running the Abyssal pbp my headmate Corinne is in is going to start running an Infgame with the same group and I'm gonna play in that one, and I am so sad someone called Ascendant a while ago because we don't want to play the Eclipsoid caste in both games but it's going to be a Grand Theft Yeddim style game and Performance Primordial looks so fun

[bleak hazel]

(and she very much has big sorcery)

but eclipses are objectively the best solaroids

oath go brrr

[buoyant summit]

We know but like

meh

you know?

Want

D i f f e r e n t

We also all seem to want to do the 'rock & roll' part of the

'sex, drugs, rock & roll' phrase lmao

So we may literally be making a band

[velvet raft]

Yeah, this strikes me as the thing. The Lover is immensely powerful but she’s maybe less terrifying as a political actor because (a) she spends her time fucking around and (b) she lacks the force of armies that falafel commands

[bleak hazel]

she is quite literally distracted from her job by her hyperfixation

still, as someone who has made some fairly optimised combat builds I would rather fight any of the giant smashy bosses any day, adds or no adds

she is maximally configured to be really fucking annoying

(as she should be)

I think 1v1 you can take her purely because her charms are all pretty expensive and if she can't excellency she can't really fight, but it's going to need too much specialist kit for most builds even at E5, so get the squad and do the climactic teamfight like you should anyway

[velvet raft]

XD

Unrelated: in hopes that I become a Sid, my mortalgame character has 8 willpower (upgraded to 10 at exaltation)

I think all of my other mortal XP is going to go into attributes >_>

[buoyant summit]

🐲I decided to go Penumbra which means we are the circle Eclipse in both games <XD

We thought one of us was already a Penumbra but no she's a Horizon

I kind of want to take Cerulean Lute on this character since it's a defensive style that lets me hook shit into not attacking, which would let me perform or gather sorcerous motes instead

But it's also

Very flavorfully passive

And I am playing

TED's little Johnny Silverhand

[bleak hazel]

Swaying Grass Dance and SVN are both exceptional Performance styles for Mastery-level exalts, too

[fierce star]

there is this little devil on my shoulder as I build thi sinfernal that's whispering 'ID, I know you want mind hand manipulation, but consider: god-kicking stiletto boots with bladed heels. Kill them with the big steppy. They'll beg for it. You'll beg for it. Come on. Infernal brawl is bonkers. Big steppy. Do it.'

[buoyant summit]

SVN is what I ended up going with for the flesh-melting chords vibes

[buoyant summit]

Update

I have decided not to go with Martial Arts

At all

Instead

I am doing Infernal War

[fierce star]

Nice

[marsh garden]

infernal war is pretty sick

4x game time

[buoyant summit]

lol

More

'terrifying acid-rock dragon warlord' but

Yeah

And to compensate for physical tertiary we are going hard into unusual hide and Resistance

[marsh garden]

oh, i was mostly thinking of the capstone

where you demat

[bleak hazel]

after spending a surprisingly long time pondering the Lover I am now really interested to see how Bishop comes out

[buoyant summit]

That honestly doesn't seem this girl's vibe

[bleak hazel]

because either Bishop or Heron is going to be flat-out the killiest deathlord, and my bet is on the guy with Void Circle and a fully loaded SMA

[buoyant summit]

She's Johnny Silverhand

She has a mob of riled up groupie cultists spurred on by her haunting, mind-flaying acid rock melodies

[bleak hazel]

Silver Prince stats would also be nice but he's one of the least personally fighty ones so it's rather less necessary

[marsh garden]

i struggle to imagine how they'd stat up the heron, since half of her gimmick is being an assassin but like

high-end stealth suites are bullshit

so she can't be good at it

[bleak hazel]

also I can't believe that of all the megabosses in this game the one I struggle to fight the most with my usual build is the Lover because she isn't melee

fucking ghosts

[marsh garden]

i imagine you'd struggle more with one that isn't an EoF, yeah?

[bleak hazel]

I suppose if I can get a greensid to press ult on E5 Rival he can just ignore the mirror counters and keep on swinging and that might do it

but he doesn't really have a way to pin her down because Simple schmovement messes with his build so I think she just leaves him in the dirt and spams sorcery until he dies

[bleak hazel]

eh, not really, none of my Sid stuff is really specialised at murdering Enemies of Fate in particular

[marsh garden]

ah

[bleak hazel]

it's not a major theme of Melee and those bits of Brawl aren't Versatile

Horrific Wreath is great at doomoid bosses though

[prisma sun]

It would be very handy for the game

If walker and mask had stats

[marsh garden]

for your server or just in general? because i can imagine both

[prisma sun]

Sever

Server

[wise ocean]

sketched out e5 necrosid for lover purposes, he makes a surprisingly good go of it

she just can't reach him at Extreme

I was hoping that full stats spec sid excellency dispel would work better for counter-necromancy, but once her ult pops you might as well not bother rolling

that said, beforehand you can get some amusing upsets

golden janissary thrown is also gigantic damage

[bleak hazel]

I haven't put her in the lab yet

for that matter I need to do Sunderdome and properly document it now I have some entrants

[wise ocean]

it's a bit difficult to lab her properly but I just gave her summon jackal, make building into labyrinth, magma phoenix, obsidian butterflies, isob, and every void circle spell

[bleak hazel]

she hard counters Rival because he literally can't reach her and keep his game plan going unless he wants to use all Decisive counters, and for bluesid I'd want to have Sapphire Veil for the chase, so none of mine are interesting matchups there unless they have friends with reach

[wise ocean]

yeah, you either stay out of range of the infinite environmental hazard zone because she can't close if you have Extreme hitting, or you need the circle

it's pure cheese but very good cheddar

[bleak hazel]

using Wisdom of the Celestial Crane to get one free crash per fight is a pretty good trick if you do have the circle backing you up

but that would require a third form that let me fight at Medium and that is not on the list of things Rival uses for FAFL and Ligier E5, which means I cannot make the omni-bossing build

[prisma sun]

Do you guys rule that Boulders as Pebbles Approach works on throwing allies

[marsh garden]

crashing the lover once just instagibs her, right?

[bleak hazel]

what's that, Lunars?

[marsh garden]

because her damage gate is perilous

[prisma sun]

No

[bleak hazel]

ah yes it's Lunars, no you cannot chuck people with that

[prisma sun]

You have to kill her twice

[bleak hazel]

very specific ranged attack extender

you would need something else that lets you yeet people as an attack that you could then buff with that

[prisma sun]

Also her gaining initiative from motes is not perilous

[marsh garden]

she doesn't gain initiative from motes, she just replaces losing it

[prisma sun]

See theres rules for throwing ENEMIES but not ALLIES

[wise ocean]

she doesn't gain init from- yeah

[prisma sun]

She also gets initiative from motes

With the ice spear

[marsh garden]

no? unless i missed something

she gains motes from initiative

[bleak hazel]

what it does do is let you hit her with an absurd giga counterattack that does a huge chunk of damage, which is great if you actually have followup but if it's just one sid on their own they don't

[marsh garden]

when she uses her special flurry charm

[bleak hazel]

specifically this clause

which is bullshit

get on the floor, FAFL

[prisma sun]

God wr have been talking about killing Lover all day

I was trying to find the link

[bleak hazel]

she's a fun boss fight

[prisma sun]

And its so buried

[marsh garden]

but yeah i think crashing her kills her

[wise ocean]

we will continue to do so until someone successfully kills her

[marsh garden]

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

[wise ocean]

to be fair the aforementioned build can but it's, well

cheese

[marsh garden]

i believe you're thinking of this charm

[wise ocean]

even if it's extremely funny to think of kiting the kiter

[marsh garden]

which gives her smotes based on initiative

[bleak hazel]

she also has a lot of health considering she's probably one of the squishier deathlords

so you can't just crash her and go "free kill"

she has more than enough tools to fight from crash

[marsh garden]

and this is witch-queen supremacy's wording, which doesn't let her use her health gate in crash

[marsh garden]

what the fuck

why does this clause exist

[bleak hazel]

it is one of two places where Crane gets a little too enthusiastic

[marsh garden]

has core considered making powers that don't trivially ignore every aspect of the system

[bleak hazel]

(in this case on the E4 1/scene capstone that can only be used as part of a decisive counter to a decisive attack, which is way better than most Core whoopsies)

[prisma sun]

Yeah okay fair thats my b

But

[wise ocean]

if I was building a Team it'd be a righteous devil stylist to crash her over and over and then vbos even blade to deliver the kill

[tulip folio]

It's one of very few auto-crashes I'm aware of. Bear has the other one but bear also requires you do a super telegraphed finishing move for it.

[prisma sun]

She does have access to the phase 3 charm with void circle

[wise ocean]

the two of those could do it, either solaroids for motes or sids for greater signs

[marsh garden]

yeah, she can have BOSS

[wise ocean]

no reason not to give her it if we're being serious, yeah

[bleak hazel]

honestly "can you kill something with two E5 combat exalts" is rarely a question I bother with because the answer is usually "yes, obviously"

[marsh garden]

at which point she'd get the ability to demiurgic art

[bleak hazel]

solo kill with a build that isn't a horrible mutant single point/brawl monster, now that's a challenge

[wise ocean]

nah, I don't think they need to be e5 if you have two, which is the interesting part

righteous devil hits full power pretty early and is there for ignore all soak autocrashing, and vbos+even blade is just there to deliver two giga decisives once she's crashed

[marsh garden]

i mean yeah i imagine three-ish properly built e3s can kill anything in the game

[prisma sun]

Its very easy for you to make a character that can kill a deathlord but you probably arent bringing that character to 99% of games

[bleak hazel]

yeah, there is just some fun to be had in trying to pare it down to the minimum required levels of bullshit

Lover just has so many different tricks that it becomes rather tricky compared to FAFL, who is terrifying but generally sticks to beating you with a large chunk of metal in various different ways

[wise ocean]

I think at E3 our brave duo of lovers (because come on, of course if it's two exalts throwing down with the Lover they're a couple) probably do need to be solaroids just for being able to excellency their defensive stats

unfortunate but that's how it is for a 3x essence gap

[prisma sun]

How does Lover counter the Sid marriage charm

[bleak hazel]

the combat polycule or the maiden wedding ring?

[marsh garden]

i don't think she does

[prisma sun]

Theres two???

[bleak hazel]

you know it

[wise ocean]

"can't be weakened or altered" does seem rather definitive

[bleak hazel]

Lover's Oath is exceptional because it lets noncombat sid link to combat sid and dump their entire mote pool through 40 combat charms if it really matters

marry a very lazy Lunar and go "hey dear can I borrow some juice" as you set off to punch Ligier to death

five days later your wife goes bonfire while randomly chilling on the MoonCouch

actually Alch Spouse is probably best here, isn't it

[wise ocean]

unfortunately not useful for the prospective e3 lovers because both of them are spending a lot of motes on killing or defending, but useful in the abstract case of the actual fight as intended

[bleak hazel]

since you can shunt cripplings and they can just get in the vat

yeah, linking to a fellow combatant who is also going to be in the shit is less handy

[tulip folio]

Marry an Ori Alch. The Ori alch regains motes when she upholds intimacy of 'my wife' and clearly eating a crippling injury for their wife is upholding it.

[bleak hazel]

still has its perks

so we have determined that Robot GF is mechanically optimal, which you'd think you'd guess from the name

excellent, glad Exalted Chat is working as normal

[wise ocean]

there has got to be some kind of art already of epic and adorable lesbian couple evil and intimidating Lover

[bleak hazel]

there is, it's a published artifact

[marsh garden]

well, it's most optimal to stack lover's oath five times

[bleak hazel]

it did not go well for the lesbians

[marsh garden]

all with ori alchs

and just never pay a cost yourself again

[wise ocean]

requisitioning every single alchemical in autocthonia for saving the world purposes

[marsh garden]

...can your lovers pay lover's oath's mote cost?

just daisy chaining infinite wives

[fierce star]

... you know, it doens't have to be romantic

[bleak hazel]

the actual limit is that you need all those Definings

you cannot have 99 defining ties

[fierce star]

maybe my secrets sid should take enough Linguistics for this and then piss off her coworkers by swearing a family oath with her dad

[bleak hazel]

without serious giga bullshit magic

[marsh garden]

that's pretty funny

[bleak hazel]

my proposal to meld the entire Sidereal host into one battle polycule keeps being shot down by BlueDiv

[marsh garden]

the most scandalous fucking thing that's happened in Heaven in years

[bleak hazel]

the fivefold polycule can channel at least 3.2 kilomotes and ~500 willpower through any one of their members when required, producing an entity capable of throwing down with a Yozi in terms of raw motonics

clearly this is the future of Heavenly weaponstech

/2e

[prisma sun]

Anys Syn with 9999 mote pool

[bleak hazel]

might be a fun gimmick for the Sids in an Exalted Modern game to be fair, makes them actual Matrix agents

[wise ocean]

you can if you speedrun upholding them

99 minutes/day is doable

[marsh garden]

it would be neat if deebs got an equivalent of lover's oath for their hearths

[bleak hazel]

they should absolutely have better Hearth tech than they do

[marsh garden]

i don't think heirs gave em anything like that, at least

[fierce star]

wait there's a limit on the number of intimacies you can have?

[bleak hazel]

no, but if you attempt to walk around with fifteen different things that you would be devoted enough to to die for on the spot the ST is heavily encouraged to smack you

[fierce star]

oh ok

I was worried it was in like

the rules for some linguistics charm in the core book or something

[coral wraith]

they are called defining intimacies for a reason :p

[wise ocean]

all you need are three defining intimacies

I love fighting. I love my wife. I love being alive.

handles everything

[marsh garden]

that sounds like a set the GM should also smack you for

[bleak hazel]

I believe the heavy encouragement to smack you is in the core book somewhere but it's not an actual hard limit

[fierce star]

I don't think I've ever gone past two definings

[wise ocean]

are you saying goku isn't a valid exalted character, topple?

[marsh garden]

yes, goku is lame and cringe and we should follow the story of chiaotzu instead

[tulip folio]

God, she's such a failgirl.

She lost

They overcame all her actual 'this is about love' challenges.

They were just Insufficiently Resistant To Her Angrily Stabbing Them Afterwards.

[prisma sun]

Well she did challenge them to a not get stabbed contest

So she did win that one

[buoyant summit]

How bad of an idea is summong a Fulope (the singing glass demons that graft to your spine) to possess you on purpose

[coral wraith]

that's fine, you have full control over it

[prisma sun]

Summoning demons is fine

They love it and cant do anything about it

Unless you fuck up

[buoyant summit]

Occult 5 sorcerer acid-rocker who's Primordial Performance seems like she'd proooooobably not fuck up summoning a demon who Likes To Sing All The Time

1CD shouldn't be my control tho, right?

Cuz no control benefit?

[marsh garden]

unless you want it as your control specifically to avoid distinguishing marks

[wise ocean]

yep

[marsh garden]

which is both useful tech and can probably be important for the aesthetic for some folks

[buoyant summit]

hhhnnnnggghhh

[marsh garden]

but yes it's "suboptimal" for a full-flash caster to take a summon spell as their control

[bleak hazel]

Specifically, summoning demons can go wrong if their strange peculiarities are not properly managed, they don't think like humans. Also it's literal slavery.

but they will be genuinely loyal to you and act with no malice towards their summoner if properly bound

(because the Surrender Oaths compel them to act in this way)

[buoyant summit]

Well, a fulope's peculiarities seem to mostly just be this character's peculiarities/peculiarities she thinks it'd be fun to indulge in

[marsh garden]

type matchups are often beneficial

[buoyant summit]

i.e. singing and trouncing people at singing

[marsh garden]

blood apes won't be an onerous summon if you don't give a shit about feeding them slave-corpses and also like to hit things in the face

[buoyant summit]

Because this character's modus operandi is to be a hellish acid-rocker and exhort her cult to beat the shit out of people and fuck their girlfriends

[prisma sun]

Or if you hate cats

Or if you hate children

[marsh garden]

damn, sex-and-violence-and-sexual-violence infernal is definitely an uh, evocative and provocative aesthetic

i immediately snap to a vision of green spiky mohawks

[bleak hazel]

green spiky mohawks on a blood ape, of course

[marsh garden]

they need them too, aye

[buoyant summit]

Oh, nonono

You think too small

Green fire mohawk

[fierce star]

my infernal pirate has a blood ape first mate who dresses like a stereotypical pirate... of the 'female eye candy' variety. And her quartermaster is a neomah office lady.

[marsh garden]

is the blood ape's outfit sized appropriately or bulging at the seams

[fierce star]

Definitely bulging

[marsh garden]

excellent

godspeed, soldier

hmm

i request a vibe check on a character name

alas, the hearteater i was being tempted with didn't end up getting okayed with all the players, but i will still be getting into a new game as a lunar

and i want an abyssal mate as an ally, but i'm kind of waffling on whether their sobriquet's a bit too baroque

The Tower Swathed in Unctuous Airs of Self-Absolving Sorrow

[prisma sun]

A little too long

The Tower Swathed In Sorrow seems to get the point across while hitting the upper limit on length imo

[marsh garden]

[prisma sun]

I do think "the tower" is a really good name though

[marsh garden]

i was looking at benny and hoping i could get away with it

not so many words but so many syllables

[prisma sun]

Benny doesnt even get away with it to me

[marsh garden]

wow, how could you say this

[prisma sun]

Theres a certain invisible line you cross where if an Abyssal tells me their name im just going "yeah right buddy cmon"

[marsh garden]

lmao

i have a fondness for benny and the prince resplendent

[bleak hazel]

I feel if you start finding the need to find a spot to breathe mid-name it's too long

[marsh garden]

i didn't find that need 😭

but fair enough, three strikes and yer out

[bleak hazel]

sometimes it can still be too long anyway but I've never heard a good one that went like eight-plus words

[marsh garden]

i just want to call my dipshit necromancer buddy The Tower

[fierce star]

I like the long name

but I'm a sucker for overly long and flowery abyssal names pushed to the point of comedy

[bleak hazel]

oh no I can manage that one but it's getting there

[buoyant summit]

I forget, do Infernals also do the title-name thing?

Where they reject their mortal names

[marsh garden]

"eye-rollingly florid" is one of my favorite things about the dowager and lover's names

[bleak hazel]

no

[marsh garden]

no

infernals can pick new names like assholes

[fierce star]

I think my greatest one was "The Terror Of All That Man Holds Dear Made Exultant In The Deaths Of The Beloved Of Life And Cast Into The Infinite Shadows Of Immortal Despair"

[marsh garden]

that's pretty fun

[fierce star]

also barely doable in one breath for me!

[marsh garden]

genuinely just shouting a poem at people

[buoyant summit]

What would an acid-rocker dragon sex cult leader name herself...

[fierce star]

(I have the lung capacity of a tuba player)

[marsh garden]

i have to take a breath at "of immortal despair"

[buoyant summit]

Cuz she is enough of an asshole to do it

[fierce star]

(because I used to be a tuba player)

[buoyant summit]

Hmmm

[marsh garden]

The Evil That Men Do

[buoyant summit]

Songbird-Serpent Sings of Man's Evils

[bleak hazel]

I used to play alto sax myself but that was a while ago

[bleak hazel]

the hyphenation doesn't scan right to me

[buoyant summit]

Meant to kinda gesture to dragons being theorized as a cross of serpent and bird of prey

I get it tho

[marsh garden]

i think my only complaint there is the double use of "songbird" and "sing"

[wise ocean]

Serpent-Songbird, maybe

and yeah, I'd use a synonym for Sing

[buoyant summit]

Perhaps a specific bird?

There's a version of this name she isn't self aware enough to pick which would be funny

Loon-Serpent Sings of Man's Evils

Loon as in

loony

and the Loon, with its mournful cry

[marsh garden]

i like the idea of putting Hymn(s) in there somewhere

[buoyant summit]

oh god am I making the Joker?

[marsh garden]

you're green and funni and a testament to the folly of man

you're the jonkler if he was a woman and a sex pest i think

[buoyant summit]

While I get the idea of going with Hymns because she plays music and leads a cult

[marsh garden]

and like, actually good at something

[buoyant summit]

She doesn't really play hymns?

wait even worse this is gamzee

[prisma sun]

I mean infernals dont need a sobriquet

[buoyant summit]

They don't but

[marsh garden]

yeah but rhi wants to name herself something self-righteous i think

[buoyant summit]

It's Cool Though

[marsh garden]

or self-aggrandizing, rather

[buoyant summit]

And exactly the thing a 20-something failed upward draconic acid-rocker who now leads a sex cult in Hell would do

[marsh garden]

if you're not oozing linguistic autofellatio, you're not playing johnny silverhand right

he's so high on his own supply

[buoyant summit]

What is the equivalent of blowing a backpack nuke in Arasaka tower?

[marsh garden]

lmao

[buoyant summit]

Blowing up the Guild offices in Nexus?

[marsh garden]

...summoning ligier/casting Total Annihilation in the Imperial City/heart of Nexus

[buoyant summit]

I feel like summoning Ligier is almost certainly going to end in the summoner's death

Though

That is what happened in the Tower, not counting

Mikoshi bullshit

[marsh garden]

i was thinking that it's about the same level of I Can Tech It suicidal bullshit, yeah

and hey! you are an infernal with a devil-body, decent odds you can in fact fucking tech it

[bleak hazel]

the Guild is not a big enough deal to be Arasaka Tower

[fierce star]

the problem is the guild isn't really centralized enough to be arasaka tower

[bleak hazel]

I think taking out a major manse in a Realm satrapy

[fierce star]

they are still a very big deal but they're very like

low key about it unless you Know

[bleak hazel]

or a Lunar one or wherever

big geomantic kaboom

[fierce star]

anyway it's blowing up Gem

[marsh garden]

lmao

[buoyant summit]

"What the fuck, why did Berit's manse suddenly become a pillar of green light?"

[marsh garden]

fuck

you're right

it's blowing up Gem

[buoyant summit]

https://giphy.com/gifs/fire-terminator-hot-take-3o6ozh46EbuWRYAcSY

[marsh garden]

actually wait rhi you said you're performance primordial right

[buoyant summit]

Indeed

[marsh garden]

on ???

[buoyant summit]

On?

On what?

[marsh garden]

the girl whose name you're still toying with

[buoyant summit]

Yes

[marsh garden]

i just dunno her name lmao

[buoyant summit]

Ah, got it

Fair lol

[marsh garden]

is this more for the influence side or for like

suspension of prosaic reality

or battle anthem

i don't remember what all's juiced in infernal performance

[fierce star]

i've literally run games in the northeast of creation, literally the entire opposite side of it, and had news of Gem's explosion filter to the PCs at some point

you can't not blow up gem

it's a legal requirement

[buoyant summit]

I forget what suspension of prosaic reality does

[marsh garden]

i love that it's also an explosion

always an explosion

[buoyant summit]

The purpose it will most often consistently serve is likely battle anthem

In that

This is an Infernals game

We are going to fight things

My personal combat prowess is dogshit, I have demons and a battlegroup for that

[marsh garden]

uhhhh, i don't remember either

it just has a cool-ass name

i think it's telling lies lmao

[buoyant summit]

It is

She's too self-unaware to pull this

The charm would fail simply because she would assert this false version of events as correct

Even before its effects were wrought

[fierce star]

hmm what if my MHM infernal takes brawl and has blade-heeled boots that aren't an artifact

just for the Aesthetic (TM)

[marsh garden]

oh! sable revelery summons is literally just what you want there

i forgot about that charm

"come to me and be free, my chudlings"

instill a principle of "I am drawn to the dark."

that's gotta be a zinger

[buoyant summit]

And hit em with the JoJo and make them approach you

And your BG

:3

[marsh garden]

infernal performance has killer names

i love Let the Doomed Dance

[buoyant summit]

Battle-Anthem of the Infernal Exalted just

Feels like recognizing these are the Heavy Metal Magazine Exalts

As a name

[marsh garden]

heh

actually it's because there's a Battle Anthem of the Solar Exalted

[wise ocean]

(Manipulation + Occult) opposing his (Stamina +
Resistance). On success, pyreworms mass and burrow
harmlessly into his skin, tunneling inward to wrap
themselves around his heart. When he uses an Intimacy
based on passionate emotions to bolster his Resolve or
in a Decision Point, he must either pay one Willpower
or suffer (necromancer’s Essence/2, rounded up) dice
of lethal damage, ignoring Hardness.```
does
does the lover *have* passionate emotions or is it Really Mad About Love (Dispassionate)

[tulip folio]

I like Battle Anthem of the Alchemical exalted the most. In part because Alchs get a whole jukebox of options, not just one.

[marsh garden]

i think it's one of the only big solar charms that infernals get a version of and abyssals don't

at least in name, that is

i'm pretty sure abyssals do have a battle anthem it's just not called battle anthem unlike literally everyone else's

[tulip folio]

Ghost Love Score

[buoyant summit]

OH COME ON

[tulip folio]

Wait no, that's a Nightwish Song

[buoyant summit]

DX>

[marsh garden]

and then these dumb little fucks, that can't call it a battle anthem

[bleak hazel]

The Siddies also have a whole repertoire but only Mars' song is the battle anthem

[marsh garden]

yeah, sids and alchs have their own special boy powers that battle anthem is stapled to

but at least they have a battle anthem

abyssals just have to be prissy assholes about it, which is fucking incredible

big fan of purplesids' Requiem for the Foretold Dead

none of the others really pop for me, but that one goes hard

Dancing Maiden Tarantella gets ups for being a tarantella, which slap

[tulip folio]

I like the Alch one on a mechanical level as you can really tell it was designed to be really good for mortals

It's a nice fluff/mechanics interlink

[marsh garden]

yeah, juicing the attack bonus when you cast Many Dudes Approach

[tulip folio]

Battle Anthem of the Alchemical Exalted (6xp): Allies add a non-Charm die on attack rolls, which is
converted to a non-Charm success if their attack benefits from an ally’s distract gambit or if their target
has a −3 onslaught penalty or higher. If they take a defend other action, they gain +1 non-Charm Parry for
purposes of defending their ward. Allied battle groups increase the attack roll bonus to (Essence) nonCharm dice, and also add that many dice on rout checks.

[marsh garden]

makes it great for bgs or mobs

[tulip folio]

'Hey, welcome to 500 dudes with crossbows town'

[marsh garden]

Thousand Work Shifts Ballad is my favorite of theirs, though

because it's just the fuckass warframe song

[tulip folio]

I keep being really tempted for Perfected Harmony Amplifier for RiRi as Alchs can get Reflexive Army Leading.

So she could sing and lead battlegroups at once

[marsh garden]

"hi my name is Unlimited Overtime Georg, please start vibing to We All Lift Together while you spend the next 500 hours at the long day factory"

[tulip folio]

At which point I think RiRi would just Become A Macross.

[marsh garden]

i understand that it's not in any way the point of exalted, but i think high-essence exalts should get to have huge splashy permanent transformations (again)

[prisma sun]

Ftr largely if you summon a third circle correctly they cant kill you

Even Ligier

[marsh garden]

alchs get to be gundams and then cities

[tulip folio]

Strife-Soothing Harmony is more situational but very handy.

It's basicly a Mini Greater Sign of Venus.

[marsh garden]

i want deebs to just turn into dragons (while still being, y'know, deebs)

[tulip folio]

By going 'Hey, who wants Everyone To Suck At Fighting?'

[marsh garden]

Medium Sign of Venus

[prisma sun]

SAAAME

Make em the dragon children from warhammer

[tulip folio]

I'd also accept like 'Forming their element up into a warstrider-sized form with them at the core' 😛

[marsh garden]

like cmon, it would be so fucking cool for an E8 deeb to just scratch their skin off, shed their flesh, and take to the sky as a giant fucking (western or eastern) dragon

and then just cosmic suplex a bitch as a dragon in earth dragon style

[tulip folio]

Also: Funny thing - Dungeons the Dragoning 7th Edition literally had that as the Dragonblooded Capstone, becoming a dragon 😛

[prisma sun]

https://youtu.be/033FWxL22A0?si=rS7QjbG-A-NWratN

This should be deebs!

[marsh garden]

i want abyssals to get the walker's shadowland aura, lunars to slowly and permanently have their baseline shape become a fucked up monster version of their spirit shape, and have their human form be basically a second spirit shape they take

i want everyone to get wacky with it

[tulip folio]

Also working more on that Fae.

[marsh garden]

let me spread death with my every step, make a devil-body permanent, turn a sid into a living constellation

[bleak hazel]

I wish I had a 3e version of Octarine Angles because the capstone turned you into a fucked up lovecraftian siddie extrusion of a soul packaged up into your pocket dimension between the stars

cut skin while shaving and there's a sky speckled with foreign constellations underneath

[marsh garden]

yeah that slaps

[prisma sun]

I do think its fine that e6+ isnt playable

Ftr

Because e5 is barely playable already

[bleak hazel]

oh old Elder Charms were dumb and busted

[marsh garden]

oh same, i just want the idea of high-essence to be Becoming Eldritch

as a fundamental statement

[bleak hazel]

but I feel there should be at least one E5 SMA capstone that's a fucked up Permanent

[tulip folio]

Gazellecarp(But Moreso)

[bleak hazel]

Gazellecarp is fucked up (bad game design)

Octarine Angles is fucked up (sweet)

[prisma sun]

I do want Deebs in general to be good

[marsh garden]

oh, i like that they're devil-prince users

[prisma sun]

I am always happy when they are cooler

[marsh garden]

on top of having the sid/lunar mutilate

[tulip folio]

Yeah, it's not the exact same charms but they play in the same area. Redcaps are murderous little fae who are the incarnation of how fear eats away at you.

They're not a single scream, they're ongoing, devouring fear that leaves nothing left in the end.

If that makes sense?

[fierce star]

is Browbeat supposed to start with an unsupported 'if' statement?

[tulip folio]

Whoops, nope!

[fierce star]

👍 also I lvoe them

[wise ocean]

If I have five ox-bodies, does that count as five Resistance charms towards an "Any 10 Resistance charms"?

or just 1

[bleak hazel]

five

[wise ocean]

oh, perfect

here I go committing ten billion motes again

[tulip folio]

Redcap
Parents throughout creation tell their children the stories of Hobgoblins, of the horrible creatures formed from the nightmares of children that lurk in the shadows. They talk about how if they do not behave, these monsters will chase them down and gobble them up. Every word of this is true.

Even compared to their kin however, Redcaps are cruel creatures. They savour the pain of fear and agony dragged out. A single scream is but an entrée, watching a mind crack and shatter under sustained pressure is a banquet. The taste of a soul that has burned its every principle in the face of the growing flame of terror is delicious beyond belief.

Younger, less experienced Redcaps might play the role of serial killer, hunting mortals over the course of nights to tenderize their meal but on the edges of creation, some can be seen in the courts of kings or merchant princes. These grizzled Redcaps understand that cruelty and terror are not foreign to society but instead approved if leveraged correctly. They act as chefs, executioners or bounty hunters, getting their kicks in ways that the rulers of society not only allow but actively celebrate them for.

And fluff!

[fierce star]

hell yeah

I'd like a size 2 battlegroup of them

[tulip folio]

Honestly due to 'has charms' they're not the best battlegroup but they're still plenty scary.

[fierce star]

yeah I probably wouldn't deploy them as such

if you keep making enough fae maybe the 'bind fae' spell out of the Ys part of across the eight directions will be useful one day

[tulip folio]

...there's a bind fae spell?

[fierce star]

yeah, with the Ysyr sorcery tradition, page 179/180 in AT8D

notably: you can't summon fae with it

you gotta hunt the bastards down yourself

[tulip folio]

And their full statline! I made a Base Non-Raksha Fae Template to help make this a bit more functional.

https://docs.google.com/document/d/1r6H0gbWBQ9smQ_rCzPBY4B5nC5ZAMiUEv7_ONdUswQA/edit?usp=sharing

Wyld Beasts are not really 'Combat Demon' good because Principle of Motion is hard to really beat.

But still scary

[fierce star]

yeah I do still wonder why they made PoM demon only

[marsh garden]

it's not

it's just a demon-exclusive club

with rare external membership

lion-dogs in Sids have PoM

[tulip folio]

On the plus side: Not having PoM makes me a bit more willing to give them some beefy action economy charms in more specialized areas.

Like I wouldn't put Hungry Gaze or Browbeat on a Demon as they already get extra action stuff.

[marsh garden]

i'd maybe put it on a weirdo demon

since iirc the Esoteric template doesn't have PoM

[tulip folio]

Yeah

[tulip folio]

God I wish AT8D had a 'here is the mechanical stuff' index

[fierce star]

one sec

https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1E6_FjrM9JeQiVtmj2hSqN6JyJpCGbdZLNX12elvdRUk/edit?gid=1085809898#gid=1085809898 so this has stuff sourced but it's sorted by 'what it is', so like, eclipse charm, sorcery thing, spell, etc

so it's not as good as just haivng an index in the book but

[buoyant summit]

Behold, an Infernal Girltwink

Yes, she is in fact the leader of a sex cult she's turning into a diabolic anarchist terrorist army

[limpid badge]

consider if you will. the layabout prince.

[velvet raft]

cue Stronger Than You on the playlist

[tulip folio]

Banner of the Balorian Crusade (•••••)
Adamant Longfang
Prince Balor was a saint of the Wyld. He did not sup upon the souls of creation-born, nor ravage them of their dreams. He soothed tensions among his kin, granting all of them a chance to speak as equals. When agents of shaped form took wyld from its inhabitants, he was first to stand against them blade in hand. There were none who could doubt his valor, compassion, temperance or conviction.

It was this virtue that allowed him to rally the forces of the Wyld, to strike out against the injustice of the primordials. They would grant freedom from the sin of shape, to return creation to the Wyld and to those who had their homes stolen from them. At the forefront of this Crusade would stand Prince Balor himself, the Raksha saint adorned in glory and his wonderous gaze shattering the impure that it fell upon.

It was not to be, however. Those among his kin addicted to the sensation of mortal emotions betrayed him, bringing him the death of Cold Iron. The Duke of Mirrors rushed to the Prince's side, heart breaking as he aided his dying lord one last time to raise the banner...shielding a small fragment of his followers from the wrath of the Realm Defence Grid with the last of his power.

Since that time the banner has been lost within Creation, waiting for the moment another will raise it against the injustice of primordial forces.

Attunement: 5m; Type: Medium (+3 ACC, +12 DMG, +1 DEF, OVW 4)
Tags: Lethal, Melee, Piercing, Reaching
Hearthstone slot(s): 2
Era: Balorian Crusade

Special: When readied by an attuned wielder and unfurled, the Banner of the Balorian Crusade shines with ethereal glory that allows the weilder a small fragment of Balor's leadership and wisdom. This adds an automatic success on her Appearance- or Charisma-based Command actions, as well as Judge Intentions rolls. However, it impedes stealth as a glowing anima banner. Its wielder may furl the banner it as a miscellaneous action, but doing so denies her the above benefits. Unfurling it is also a miscellaneous action.

I decided to do up another artifact.

I hope the fluff reads okay? Now I'm pretty sure people in creation would disagree with this assessment but this isn't about those guys 😛

[wise ocean]

I was reading it like "wait, wasn't the Balorian Crusade the... oh"

I quite like the unreliable narrator

[tulip folio]

Yeah, it's designed to be 'None of this is Provably Wrong but it's a very Wyld-Favored Interpretation'

The intent for the evocations is very 'One and True King' + 'Army Leading'.

As Balor's story is he's the one who managed to unite the Fae under his banner through his virtue

[tulip folio]

End the Sin of Shape
Cost: 15m, 1wp (+5m, +1wp); Mins: Essence 3
Type: Simple
Keywords: Resonant
Duration: Instant
Prerequisite Charms: Several
Creation was formed without compassion or consent. Let it be unmade.

The Wielder makes Strategic Maneuver roll to enact a unique stratagem at difficulty 3. If successful, she returns the battlefield to the Wyld. This has the following effects:

• Enemy battle groups treat the entire battlefield as an environmental hazard with difficulty 4, Damage 2L/round. They suffer a single interval of this hazard immediately upon Joining Battle as they are assaulted by the resurgent Wyld. The difficulty and damage are both increased by 1 for any character that is carrying Iron.
• The Wyld consumes enemies who give into fear, providing the benefits of the Back To The Sea stratagem.
• The Battlefield becomes a Bordermarch, or Middlemarch if it was already a Bordermarch. This will not persist past the battle unless the Wielder's army wins. 
• The battle is obscured from divination and prophecy as if all combatants were enemies of fate.

Resonant: Even if the Wielder fails the Strategic Maneuver roll, she may pay a surcharge of five motes and one willpower to enact this Stratagem, though the opposing commander enacts his stratagem as well.

Reset: Once per Story

[marsh garden]

The Bishop

• The Celebrant of Blood (Daybreak)
• The Harbinger of the Ghost-Cold Wind (Moonshadow)
  The Heron
• All Clad in Tatters Came the Mountebank Knight (Day)
• The Son of Crows (Moonshadow)
• The Voice That Speaks in Silence (Midnight)
  The Dowager
• The Menhir Raised in Doleful Silence (??)
• The Shoat of the Mire (Dusk)
  The Eye
• The River Which Finds the Riven Door (Day)
• the Seven-Degreed Physician of Black Maladies (Daybreak)
  The Lion
• He Who Walks on Laughter (Dusk)
• The Melkin Fool in Red (Day)
• The Meticulous Owl (Day)
• The One Who Walks Behind You (Moonshadow)
  The Mask
• The Prince Resplendent in the Ruin of Ages (Daybreak)
• The Rightful Heir by Red Iron Rebuked (Moonshadow)
• the Seven Seasons Widow (Dusk)
  The Lover
• The Curate of the Desecrated Sacrament (??)
• The Shadow of the Ash Arrow (Moonshadow)
  The Prince
• The Drowner of Saints (Dusk)
• The Kingeater (Dusk)
• The Knight of Ghosts and Shadows (Moonshadow)
  The Walker
• Shards of Basalt (??)
• The Benignant Annihilator of Hope and Falsehood (Dusk)
• The Intinctor of the Worm’s Chalice (Dusk)
• The Mariner of the Final Shore (Daybreak)
• The Saint Unburdened by Pernicious Flesh (Midnight)
  Unknown and Rogues
• A Weeping Raiton Cast Aside (Moonshadow, ?? knight-errant)
• The Bleeding Lily Crowned in Shackles (Moonshadow; ??)
• The Gallows Bride (Day; the Mask knight-errant)
  Chapter Fiction Only
• The Knight of Broken Shadows (??; the Mask)
• The Somber Herald (??; the Mask)

for a final total of
Dusk: 7
Midnight: 2
Daybreak: 4
Day: 5
Moonshadow: 8

trying to make a list of all the canonical deathknights in 3e

does this look broadly correct?

and speaking of, big fan of All Clad in Tatters Came the Mountebank Knight

that's a fucking winner for abyssal names imo

[tulip folio]

I can't think of any it's missing.

[marsh garden]

[tulip folio]

Does this/the banner fluff look fun conceptually?

[marsh garden]

it is too late and i am too tired to manifest any coherent capacity for thought

i'd be happy to take a look later today though

[tulip folio]

That's fair!

[fierce star]

Oh that's cool. Backs to the sea is a strong strat to just pop up anywhere

[buoyant summit]

Would they hire an acid rocker and the rest of their cult to do a concert in the Lotus Feasting Hall XD

[buoyant summit]

This is based

[tulip folio]

I do really love the Alch Perfect Parry.

'Can parry unblockable. Also: Get Full Cover against an attack, perfectly defending unless the other guy can hit through full cover'

It's close to an old-school perfect defence but not quite

As it's got counters. Just not counters everyone has.

[bleak hazel]

the main awkward part about that one is that it's true 1/scene, so if the Brawl Sid or whatever keeps throwing unblockable punches you have some issues

same for the Lunar one, Heron Sheds Rain

although HSR is unusually bad for a psuedoperfect because it's attached to the entire Lunar defensive suite

[velvet raft]

Is the lunar defensive suite bad?

[tulip folio]

It is but on the upside, it's also a flurry breaker with the upgrade as you get to make it tick-long.

[bleak hazel]

no, the Lunar defensive suite is really good and works with all MA

but they're worse at blocking than they are at tanking

[wise ocean]

the main concept of the lunar defensive suite is you hit me. I soak it. I gain forty health levels

[bleak hazel]

lunar perfect parry, for reference

so goddamn expensive

Flowing Body Evasion is rather better

[wise ocean]

this resets her to base initiative
oh that's bad bad

[velvet raft]

Ah, so

In the words of Piccolo

DODGE

[tulip folio]

Flowing Body also has the 'environmental stuff doesn't need this charm to be reset'

Which I feel is very good for these

[velvet raft]

“What are you doing parrying attacks, you’re a lunar”

[bleak hazel]

someday I will play my silly all-in archery/obsidian shards Siddie whose entire deal is showing up, join battling as hard as possible and then firing off a sixfold unblockable/undodgeable/ignore cover/ignore hardness/ignore defend other multiattack in one monstrous salvo

and also having no willpower ever

pew

[wise ocean]

I should build some kind of archery build, the solaroid archery trees are quite good but I keep just doing MA? MA? Where bow MA? and then not doing it

[bleak hazel]

my main gripe with this particular build is that Sid Archery is mostly a collection of weird tech

I think this build is going to go gangbusters with Crimson Panoply, which works with bows and khatars, so you go archery enlightenment/CPOV/OSOI and then you can use Obsidian Shards with both your bow and your AC hidden blade

the main downside there is that I'm not sure you really want 11 archery charms

[wise ocean]

hm. I will peer

[bleak hazel]

there are four easy good ones at E1, plus form

then you need five other ones and ideally don't want to waste time on the distract tree

Every Direction Arrow, Parallax Strafing Methodology, Strategy without Commitment, Five Seasons Approach, Several Arrows of Reason or Shooting Star Flare I think

maybe this isn't so bad

[wise ocean]

that is... an extremely weird tree

can't even combo it with monkey style because lmao bows

[bleak hazel]

Sid Archery is by far the strangest sidereal combat tree

[tulip folio]

...dammit, which exalt has '1s on damage rolls subtract'? It's not Alchs or Lunars, Infernals or Sids...

[bleak hazel]

mix of god tier stuff and extremely odd tech

[bleak hazel]

Bulwark Stance, Solars/Abyssals

the capstone on Sid Archery does let you annoy a possibly incomparable number of people though

(it also does many other things)

20.4 mile radius snowstorm if you super max out the roll, lasts an entire day

[tulip folio]

Ah, that's why I couldn't find it in Abyssals

The Abyssal one heals 1 for each 1/2 in the roll.

Instead of subtracting the damage directly

[wise ocean]

they're right next to each other. just incredible

[light olive]

Demon of the Second Circle obsessed with medicine but only deals in dead bodies. Taking them apart and putting them back together.

[bleak hazel]

I do not see the interaction here

[wise ocean]

no, as in "one is dramatically worse than the other"

[bleak hazel]

nothing wrong with Opportune Shot

nothing wrong with producing any Res 5 object whenever the fuck you want to, either

[tulip folio]

The Death of Iron
Cost: 5m; Mins: Essence 2
Type: Reflexive
Keywords: Perilous, Uniform, Resonant
Duration: Instant
Prerequisite Charms: Stuff
The final act of Prince Balor, even as his lifeblood spilled upon the land, was to defend those sworn to him.

When the Wielder, a character protected by her Defend Other or a Battle Group under her command suffers damage, 1s on the damage roll subtract successes.

Alternatively, the Wielder can use this Charm to perfectly defend herself or her charge against uncountable damage, shielding them from a falling mountain or shattering an assault from the Realm Defence Grid. This renders them immune to recurring hazards for the rest of the scene.

Reset: Each character and battle group can only be protected this way once per scene.

Resonant: If the damage is Aggravated, 1s and 2s subtract.

Literally half the protection of the the Abyssal one (Which heals 1 for each 1 or 2, not just ones) and 1/scene but you can use it on friends!

[bleak hazel]

Strange Quiver Trick is not really a combat charm, despite its pretences

although producing a gourd full of firedust and green arrowing it at things you want to blow up is handy

bullshit annoyance move go

[tulip folio]

Oh, that's a fun one.

'I'm just gunna shoot arrows like this and if you get in the way, it's your own fault'

[bleak hazel]

you can also kill people with facts and logic

the main issue I have with this tree is simply that it doesn't have a basic damage booster anywhere and everything in it costs willpower

[tulip folio]

Oh hey, one of the charms I had in mind when I was doing up that evocation. XD

[bleak hazel]

Five Seasons Approach is pretty entertaining

plonk

[tulip folio]

Sid Archery just screams 'I want a normal archery martial art to exist'.

As if gives so many Good Weird Tricks

But could really do with like the...Even Blade of Archery existing.

[wise ocean]

SAR is kind of funny with righteous devil, at least

[bleak hazel]

on one hand using it with Obsidian Shards gets you access to the doomcombo

on the other hand a lot of the range extension and battlefield control stuff in there is not of amazing use when you already have all of Sid Archery's silly nonsense

I guess A Likeness Of Absence is pretty juiced

note: does not reset you

and you can fire off unblockable Glimpse of Infinity

[tulip folio]

I hope this seems interesting btw? Trying to play with the fact that Prince Balor for all the 'His crusade Ate Most Of Creation' was literally an Archetypal Saintly Prince, putting others before himself.

[wise ocean]

yup, it's pretty straightforward

[bleak hazel]

I seem to recall the grand play of internal backstabbing from the Balorian Crusade was immediately rendered irrelevant by the deployment of strategic thaumonuclear WMDs

[fierce star]

I do think upon further reading into many missiles bow tecnique, it is sort of implying that you do have to shoot objects, not like. concepts. but then life is oen of the things you can shoot?

[bleak hazel]

which I think is itself part of the point the setting is making

[fierce star]

I really want to figure out if my old ex2 'instant heroic mortal protagonist' combo is still doable or not

[wise ocean]

surely the onslaught penalty charms lend themselves to EGOA?

[tulip folio]

Yep! His backstabbing followers were dancing on his corpse and going 'Hahah, we've won' when they immediately got nuked.

[bleak hazel]

they would also have been nuked if they had not done it, because fuck you Raksha you don't get to matter

[tulip folio]

The only survivor from ground zero was the Duke of Mirrors, the guy who was trying to save balor and raise the banner rather than been a backstabber.

[bleak hazel]

I like raksha but rubbing their face in how they aren't allowed to do things For Real makes them enjoyably mad and is also correct

[bleak hazel]

I am just not an EGOA enjoyer honestly

there's some fun stuff in there but by the time you have the game plan online the fight's over and you're out of juice

[tulip folio]

I'll admit, my interpretation is a lot more 'they backstabbed themselves out of victory by killing the only guy who had a chance to have stopped them getting nuked'. XD

More 'yeah, the fae could have ended creation but are absolute kings of fumbling the bag' than 'the game was rigged from the start'

[bleak hazel]

I have absolutely zero respect for any kind of grand bullshit fae and think he would have been crispy fried fairy like the rest of them

[wise ocean]

I think that's true for dueling but it's quite powerful in the example where you have a bunch of summoned demons / deputized ghosts / actual circlemates

[tulip folio]

Got it, Misc hates when oppressed people try to reclaim their homes taken from them (This is entirely a joke) 😛

[bleak hazel]

the defining origin of the Exalted setting was the great work of making the fae Not Matter

like how the Yozis cannot get out of their box, the fae continue to Not Matter

[tulip folio]

While I tend to have the more doylist interpretation of 'The fae Not Mattering is only because they don't have a mainline exalt associated with them'. Sorta like how the Underworld Wouldn't Matter if Abyssals didn't exist.

[prisma sun]

My read of this is you only get set to base initiative if you use initiative to add to parry

Which doesnt seem bad

[bleak hazel]

they are literally an infinite swarm of reality warpers, so the existence of The World is basically entirely because they have been rendered totally impotent unless they take on enough shape to die to things like (actually real) WMDs

[tulip folio]

But well, this is the person making a Wyld Exalt Homebrew talking about how the Wyld should get more focus. So take my comments with a grain of lembas bread.

[bleak hazel]

and "it doesn't matter how grand a story you tell about yourself, you can die as impersonally as all the other potentates did" is a theme Exalted keeps coming back to again and again and again

[bleak hazel]

this is the case, but 5m just to block unblockables and not actually get a parry bonus is steep at celestial tier, and the surcharge you pay is usually the whole price for the 1/scene big noncharm parry bonus variants of those charms

so being reset at all kind of stings

on the upside you only need to buy the charm once, unlike Siddies who pay once for foo unfooable and once for the 1/scene psuedoperfect

[tulip folio]

I'll admit, part of my vibes here is that Balor moved beyond 'telling the story' to living it. When he was actually dying, for real, from iron, he spent the last of his strength making sure there was any survivors of the RDG like the Duke of Mirrors. Which feels really fun conceptually to me. XD

He told the story of a saintly heroic prince and when it mattered...he stepped beyond telling the story and lived it, when he could have discarded the story and tried to flee like others in his army tried.

But I'm rambling

[bleak hazel]

the only difference between telling the story and being the story for a fae is when someone from Actual Creation or Actual Malfeas or whatever steps in and physically stops you writing certain bits of it, at least in my understanding

definitely cool artifact

[buoyant summit]

I should make a playlist of songs my Infernal plays...

[fierce star]

I thnk both interpretations have value, depending on the sort of story you want to tell like, out of character.

[tulip folio]

How dare you say that things about the Raksha are 'depends on the story', clearly there is some objective truth about the...wait a second...

XD

Hmm...vaguely pondering a charm for the artifact. Not army summoning but a weaker version of it.

[wise ocean]

cataphract Fake Army gives precedent

and synergizes with Make Bordermarch

[bleak hazel]

I think "Balor could have parried it if other fae hadn't betrayed him" is a terrible thing to put in the Omniscient Narrator Voice but is absolutely the thing every fairy involved has been saying for the next 800 years, and as such is a great foundation for a wyld artifact

[tulip folio]

Fae: "Nah, I'd Win."

[bleak hazel]

Raksha: Masters of Cope

[prisma sun]

Causality: "You can't win if losing exists"

[tulip folio]

A battlegroup of up to size <Essence> can use the traits of Elite Troops (Page 497, Exalted Core). They still maintain their own Might.

What I was pondering. You weave up weapons, armour and skill from glamour. Turning militia or hobgoblins into champions.

It's not quite 'summon a battlegroup' but lets you Tier Up your battlegroup

[bleak hazel]

I did have an idea for a "time travel" raksha artifact at one point

it doesn't actually time travel you

it just does the metaphysical equivalent of putting up a title card that says "20 years earlier" and you have a fistfight in an illusory memory pulled from the user's brain, which they get to fuck with

[tulip folio]

Hahahah

Does 'use a different set of traits for this battle' make sense/seem interesting? I wanted something ephemeral but also kinda 'a moment of heroism'-y.

[bleak hazel]

from the point of view of everyone outside the AOE everything just went black and white and film-grainy and everyone kept moving forwards at 1 second per second

[prisma sun]

https://tenor.com/view/jujutsu-kaisen-jjk-phantom-parade-jjkpp-naobito-gif-9031262844341547185

[buoyant summit]

Okay I know Blessed Dead Fools is a necromancy spell

But

It is literally a spontaneous nighttime rock band

I'm making a demonic sorcery version

XD

[tulip folio]

...eh, fuck it. To make it easier for this artifact's charms I'm inventing a useful term.

Sorta like how 'Craven Intimacies' got invented for a martial art.

[prisma sun]

@bleak hazel Would Frame style be an SMA or an artifact

[tulip folio]

Champions of Shape: Infernals, Abyssals, Alchemicals, Demons, Machine Spirits and Undead as well as any character carrying Iron.

Basicly 'shit connected directly to a primordial'

A Moment of Glory
Cost: 5m, 1wp; Mins: Essence 3
Type: Reflexive
Keywords: Stackable
Duration: One scene
Prerequisite Charms: The Death of Iron
The light of the banner spills out, forming into weapons and armour of gossamer fit for heroes.

The Wielder grants the following benefits to a non-Champion of Shape allied battle group:
• It uses the traits of Medium Cavalry or Elite Troops (Page 497, Exalted Core), chosen when this charm is used, instead of its normal ones. Battle groups with Cold Iron Bane do not lose that trait.
• It ignores Difficult Terrain and Environmental Shaping Effects.
• It gains +1 Resolve against fear-based influence.  

The Wielder can stack multiple uses of this Charm to benefit multiple battle groups. She waives this Charm’s Willpower cost for each battle group past the first.

[bleak hazel]

Honestly most Innate Techniques are sufficiently niche that they could just be an Eclipse charm/Divine Heritage

unless you get fully into the Naoya domain expansion shit

would work as an artifact though

[tulip folio]

Ruling out Demons/Machine Spirits/Undead is also Iki's sneaky way of making it trickier to get high-might battle groups here. The only summon spell that can get you them is Summon Elemental and that spell needs more love. XD

[bleak hazel]

This discussion gives me an idea for a character I haven't made yet, Crimes Deeb

Who exalted at age 20.5 after a life of being severely looked down on by his deeb classmates and has decided to Do Fraud About It

since obviously a 10 year gap in being exalted is an irreversible deficit on his part, or at least he thinks so

reflavouring Hellish Investiture as "made an ill advised deal with some fae" might be fun

[fierce star]

I like that grouping

[buoyant summit]

...I forgot Hellish Investiture existed, my Inf totally has taken it

[bleak hazel]

Characters who have already bargained away their souls or pledged themselves to grand masters, like the Abyssal Exalted, cannot learn this Merit; neither can the Infernal Exalted, whose Exaltations are already saturated with Hell’s power.

infernals are already Maximum Hell and cannot Hell harder

[prisma sun]

I wanna make Detective Deeb

Straight up never really read any Investigation tree

[bleak hazel]

hmm, do we think "gossamer printing press artifact" is a valid benefit to have here at Major

in lieu of actual mutations/shaping(Soul) defence

[tulip folio]

Gossamer would be a bit weird to come from Yozi, I think.

[bleak hazel]

reflavouring this as "pact with Raksha" for the interim

I'm not actually playing this guy yet, I'm just taking an excuse to mess around with the deeb charmset

and wyld-touched water deeb fraudster is a fun gimmick

Moist von Deebwig

[tulip folio]

Ah, that makes sense yeah

[bleak hazel]

conveniently you can get Major Investiture from a 2cd so I don't have to invent a 3cd-level fae for this random fucking deeb to have stumbled into

I wonder what happens if you come back with E5 occult charms and shove your patron into a rock for a few centuries

[tulip folio]

'You own my soul but I own you'

[bleak hazel]

some style in that, I think

and this guy's going to be a sorceror because he's basically strictly non-combat

man I'm going to be spending a lot of BP on merits

investiture + martial artist is 9 dots out the gate

he is loosely based on Alves dos Reis, one of my favourite historical fraudsters

he managed to engage in so much counterfeiting that he incidentally destroyed the government of Portugal

[buoyant summit]

Ahhhhh

[bleak hazel]

fuck what on earth do I use for Fae eclipse charms

someone had a big spreadsheet of all the eclipse charms somewhere

[marsh garden]

https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1E6_FjrM9JeQiVtmj2hSqN6JyJpCGbdZLNX12elvdRUk/edit?gid=1291380889#gid=1291380889

in The Index

this one isn't amazing but it goes hard

this one also seems super flavorful...but it's e3

[bleak hazel]

this requires me to find good ways to cheat at dice

but also hot damn

[marsh garden]

these two seem really on-theme for fae bullshit

[bleak hazel]

if I was starting this guy at a normal essence he could use his fake supernal to learn the Makarios charm

but he's a baby deeb at E1.9

[tulip folio]

Humble Travelers seems really good if you've got some mutations.

[marsh garden]

could reflavor wisdom of wanderlust to go "tell a story, don its mantle"

[bleak hazel]

probably not taking the mutations option

even if some of them would be great with White Veil

Ohanlei, maybe

[marsh garden]

roll for gossip does seem juicy

killing negative Ties is stronger, but

the gossip one seems fun

[bleak hazel]

Chamomile is worse than the celestial equivalent but you might have a deeb combo here hang on

[buoyant summit]

Man I bet Infernal Presence has some insane tech...

[bleak hazel]

the tea is really good

[marsh garden]

oh my god you spike the tea

[bleak hazel]

the ink clone is also pretty decent for a forger

just thematically

• calming tea
• ink clone
• gossip
• eclipse oath gambling
• Rebuke the Liar

[marsh garden]

peak

[buoyant summit]

So

Performance + Resistance lets you tank as an Infernal

Which

Is fucking awesome

[bleak hazel]

man white veil's good for deebs

one terrestrial tag and it's on the capstone, which is not actually that important

losing the Mastery on Blinded By Laughter kind of sucks but that's it

[tulip folio]

Oh?

[wise ocean]

white veil is in deebbook, isn't it? so stands to reason

man. speaking of deebbook MAs, I wish golden janissary was cheaper

admittedly the effects are very nice against CoDs specifically, but I wish I didn't have to pay 5m1wp or whatever it is for a withering clash I don't even gain init from

[buoyant summit]

This combined with Demon Flesh

[bleak hazel]

that's a pretty good deal honestly, even on Snake it's only slightly cheaper

withering clashes usually don't give you init

[buoyant summit]

You know what I just remembered

Absolutely nothing is stopping me from wearing heavy armor

That's just

"What if KISS wore plate armor onstage"

[spring lynx]

that'd be sick actually

[wise ocean]

ah, 5m 3i

[buoyant summit]

Her fiery mohawk becoming even larger and more fucking ridiculous as she dons her draconic helm

Like a two foot tall crest of green flame

[spring lynx]

oh no i meant kiss wearing plate on stage

[buoyant summit]

Aww...

<XD

[spring lynx]

that thing you said would probably also be sick but i have no attachment to your OCs so i can't hype myself up over it as much

i actually have this problem with fanfiction a lot of the time, too

[bleak hazel]

that's pretty fucking great honestly

Snake is "does full damage, you gain nothing, no agg clause, costs 2m 1wp"

so this is definitely a peer to that

[buoyant summit]

real

[wise ocean]

+4m adds Ovw 3 against CoDs, though, which...

14 dice + 1 autosux, sid excellency, 7 ovw, knock prone if deal damage for 9m 3i

and you get the die of agg damage because why not

7 dice of overwhelm gets you the init back

[tulip folio]

Golden Jannisary on an Endings sid is thematic and also leads to some very funny big withering whacks.

[wise ocean]

indeed, endings also gets you even more overwhelm for this - I have it on a Journeys to combo with Thrown though

since they both have spears as form weapons (and Thrown gets you even more anti-CoD bonuses)

[bleak hazel]

you don't get the init back either way, but you can at least lower enemy init by the same

[wise ocean]

ah, yeah. same principle, one supposes, the real charm is how you can just shut out some guy's big decisive