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Nessus: Dec 22, 2003; After a Speaker vote, you may be entitled to a valuable coupon or voucher!

Ferrinus posted:

It's actually much tighter than in past editions. For instance, in 2E, Solars could literally fly. In 3E, they can't fly - they can just leap up to fight someone, and only fall back down when they're done fighting. In 2E, Solars could elect to just never get sick again - in 3E, Solars can never get sick with the same disase again. And so on.

The reason stuff like Words-As-Workshop Method and that one "dodge sideways through Time" charm stick out to me is that they don't seem quite like Solar magic. They do in raw game-mechanical effect, but they should really be described as OOC retcons rather than IC retcons or raw conjurations - or, at least, Words-As-Workshop should require a little background in sorcery or Wyld-Shaping, just like Dual Magnus does.

*slams index cards describing as many as three or four out of seven hundred charms down on the table in disgust* look at these!! look at them!!! what's even left, i ask you? what's even left??

Well, how many different dice-fucker charms do we need, though

Like I wasn't sure of the breakdown but all these fiddly little mods sound like they would be real impactful if you had a play assistant program but in practice will likely be forgotten or remembered in a retroactive "oh wait no -- I forgot I had that 6-again! Ugh... Can I roll those? Or are we--"

# ? Feb 13, 2015 01:48

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# ? May 28, 2024 14:17

Ferrinus: Jun 19, 2003; i'm finding this quite easy, i guess in part because i'm a fast type but also because i have a coherent mental model of the world

I was talking about the alleged theft of thematic territory. Hell, even the charms that feel like they creep out of the Solar bailiwick only do so in terms of their special effects - even when a Solar dodges into a parallel timeline, they're dodging damage they took. It takes Sidereal magic to literally dodge responsibility, having ever been somewhere at all, a city's geographical location, etc.

It should be noted that some of the dice bonus charms are actually so major as to practically constitute a new ability. Like, Adamantine Fists of Battle is just a honking big damage bonus, technically, but it's the explosive capstone kind that lets you splatter people you used to only beat up. Brawl is pretty heavy on dice treats compared to Archery, but they're generally divided up by activity - like, there'll be three-ish Charms that boost grapples, three more than boost straight-up attacks, three more that boosts Clashes...

# ? Feb 13, 2015 01:57

Attorney at Funk: Jun 3, 2008; ...the person who says honestly that he despairs is closer to being cured than all those who are not regarded as despairing by themselves or others.

Ferrinus posted:

It should be noted that some of the dice bonus charms are actually so major as to practically constitute a new ability.

I'm not sure it should.

# ? Feb 13, 2015 01:59

Kenlon: Jun 27, 2003; Digitus Impudicus

Kaza42 posted:

Dice/Mixed/New
Athletics 12/2/17

Let's take a closer look at this, and I'll use Athletics as an example.

Looking at Roadie's snazzy Cham cascades, Athletics is made up of a set of subtrees with limited interlinking, rather than being a large tree with a relatively linear path to a capstone.

-----------------------------------------------------
The shortest sub-tree is the Standing in Impossible Places tree so I'll start there.

Feather Foot Style: Classic wuxia, letting the Solar run or stand on liquids.
Spider Foot Style: Going a step further, it lets the Solar stand or run on sheer walls or ceilings.

Want to be Spiderman?Just takes two charms, both of them new abilities.

Continuing from right to left on the image, we come to the Strength subtree.

Increasing Strength Exercise:It does what it says on the tin, costing motes or initiative () to raise strength for a scene. From here, there are several singleton charms and one extended line.

The extended line is as follows:

Thunder�s Might: Reroll failures on a feat of strength.
Power Suffusing Form Technique: Adds (strength) non-charm dice to a feat of strength.
Legion Aurochs Method: Half cost for the Athletics excellency for feats of strength.
Aegis of Unstoppable Force: Lower the difficulty of feats of strength by two.

On the one hand, all of these are 'dice tricks'. On the other hand, if you want to be able to wield a redwood as your primary weapon, this subtree will let you do that. A Str 5 Solar, with all these charms up, is raw strength incarnate. Which is pretty drat cool. Even a limited investment, say Increasing Strength Exercise and Thunder's Might, still puts benchpressing a rhino or throwing an ox into the realm of reasonable.

Then we have the three singletons:

Armor-Eating Strike: Ignore (strength) points of hardness when making a decisive attack.
Ten Ox Meditation: Converts successes on an attempt to lift or carry something to points of Strength (only for the purpose for meeting the minimums for a particular feat).
Thunderbolt Attack Prana: Allows a decisive attack out to short range, doubling damage after it is rolled, requires the root charm from the next subtree.

Two excellent combat charms here, plus an enhancement for lifting/carrying that opens up a charm in the next tree over.
-----------------------------------------------------

Then we have the Jumping subtree. It has two singletons that depend on the root charms of the neighboring trees, and one extended tree.

Monkey Leap Technique: Move a range band without a roll.

The extended tree is all about jumping to a ludicrous extent.

Soaring Crane Leap: Allows fall control, letting the Solar drop two range bands without damage, or to fall only a single range band while also moving horizontally. Combines with other movement charms for extended horizontal movement.
Unbound Eagle Approach: Enhances Soaring Crane Leap to allow horizontal movement without losing height.
Mountain-Crossing Leap Technique: Moves three range bands an action, remaining active until the Solar stops.
Eagle-Wing Style: Allows movement upwards to attack a target, flying up to two range bands, then one per turn afterwards.

If you want aerial combat or movement to be a major thing for your character, this tree gives that option, but for just moving or leaping onto rooftops/over walls, it's overkill.

The other singleton is:

Foe-Vaulting Method: Costs initiative instead of motes, allows the Solar to leap over an opponent with a lower initiative and make a surprise attack at their back.

This subtree overall gives access to a couple nice combat charms, and the ability to invest into a unique method of vertical movement.
-----------------------------------------------------

Next would be the Balance tree, if it was a tree. But there's only one charm plus the two that depend on the neighboring trees.

Graceful Crane Stance: It may be the only charm here, but it's a big one - the Solar can balance on anything, with no chance of breaking it or falling, without a roll.

The shared charm is:

Leaping Tiger Attack: Lets the Solar close on an enemy and attack from up to medium range in an instant, with enhanced damage. Does not actually require the Solar and his opponent to stand there for a few seconds before one of them crumples to the ground, but it's a good idea.

-----------------------------------------------------

I'm going to have to break this into two posts, as I've hit the limit on the number of formatting tags the forum can handle in one.

# ? Feb 13, 2015 06:05

Kenlon: Jun 27, 2003; Digitus Impudicus

[Continued from above]

Next is the Speed tree. It has two subtrees that come together to a pinnacle, and a singleton that unlocks a pinnacle charm for the Jumping tree/

Lightning Speed: Allows the reroll of all 5's and 6's on a Rush action until no 5's or 6's appear. I do not much like this sort of dice gimmick, but it's undeniably a big advantage in chasing an enemy down.

The singleton is:

Onrush Burst Method: A permanent charm that gives three motes for Athletics charms (lasting until the next turn) any time the Solar successfully Rushes an enemy.

Unlocked by having that charm plus Eagle-Wing Style from Jumping:

Bonfire Anima Wings: When his anima is at bonfire level while using Eagle-Wing Style, the Solar's attacks gain the benefits of Onrush Burst Method, gaining motes to pay for Athletics charms - nicely paying for the cost of staying aloft while dueling in the sky.

The next subtree is about raw movement speed.

Winning Stride Discipline: Gain motes for Athletics charms or Initiative every time you beat your opponent in a test of speed.
Arete-Driven Marathon Stride: When falling behind in a test of speed, every 10 the opponent rolls adds a success to the Solar's total. Also applies to Rush actions.
Hurricane Spirit Speed: Pay one Initiative per success in a test of speed or Rush action.

Next is about extended movement:

Racing Hare Method: Hour long charm allowing the movement of up to three range bands per turn. Upon joining battle, slows to only one per turn, but gets two successes on 9's and gets a point of Initiative for every 10 on Rush actions.
Demon-Wasting Rush: Lets the Solar perform a Rush from medium range, if successful, also moves the Solar one range band closer to the target each turn for the next two turns, on top of normal movement. Not so easy to get away from someone using this.

Racing Hare Method and Arete-Driven Marathon Stride together lead into the pinnacle charms for this subtree:

Godspeed Steps: Allows a rush out to three range bands away, allowing an attack with no flurry penalty after. It's pretty much zwee fighting.
One Extra Step: Once per scene, take a second movement action on your turn.
Living Wind Approach: Once per scene, automatically succeed at a Rush, or win a test of speed by one more success than your opponent.

-----------------------------------------------------

And finally, there's one charm that requires charms from the middle of several subtrees (Arete-Driven Marathon Stride, Ten Ox Meditation, Unbound Eagle Approach):

Triumph-Forged God-Body: 9's count as two successes on every athletics roll.

-----------------------------------------------------

So, what I we see from all this? Athletics, at least, is pretty well designed. It's broader than it is tall, and almost all the directly combat affecting charms are low down in the tree (Leaping Tiger, Foe-Vaulting, Thunderbolt Attack, Armor-Eating) and low Essence, but if you want to be really, really, absurdly strong, or absurdly fast, or be able to fight midair for as long as you want, you have options to dive down the tree into that specific thing as your Essence rises.
There are quite a few charms that do fiddly things with dice, but they seem to largely be split between the various subtrees, so there are only three or four of them to track unless you fill out all of Athletics.

I'm probably going to do a breakdown of another tree or two, but may skip posting it to the thread unless there's interest. :spergin:

Kenlon fucked around with this message at 06:09 on Feb 13, 2015

# ? Feb 13, 2015 06:05

slut chan: Nov 30, 2006

There's interest. That was very informative and appreciated.

# ? Feb 13, 2015 06:12

Kenlon: Jun 27, 2003; Digitus Impudicus

Any requests for what tree I take apart next, then?

# ? Feb 13, 2015 06:35

pospysyl: Nov 10, 2012

Please let it be Bureaucracy, the thread favorite!

Also, that was super informative! Thanks!

# ? Feb 13, 2015 06:36

drunkencarp: Feb 14, 2012

Bureaucracy!

E: ^^^^ may be ironic but I am in deadly earnest!

# ? Feb 13, 2015 06:38

theironjef: Aug 11, 2009; The archmage of unexpected stinks.

So is the restriction to Graceful Crane Stance that you can't move around with it? Otherwise it's strictly better than Feather Foot Style, right? Balance on anything doesn't seem to "but not liquids" after it.

# ? Feb 13, 2015 06:47

Bedlamdan: Apr 25, 2008

theironjef posted:

So is the restriction to Graceful Crane Stance that you can't move around with it? Otherwise it's strictly better than Feather Foot Style, right? Balance on anything doesn't seem to "but not liquids" after it.

Graceful Crane Stance lets you move around as well, but it does specify only solid objects in its description. Meanwhile Feather Foot Style includes liquid surfaces like the ocean in its description, and also lets you run across dangerous surfaces without taking any damage. So a Solar with Feather Foot Style can run across a stream of lava if they want, or a bunch of burning coals, or whatever.

# ? Feb 13, 2015 06:55

Kenlon: Jun 27, 2003; Digitus Impudicus

I may not be able to get to it until tomorrow, but Bureaucracy will be next. (Though the lack of a proper large-scale system is going to make me very sad.)

# ? Feb 13, 2015 07:14

Bouquet: Jul 14, 2001

Here is an auto-calculating Google Sheets Exalted 3e Character Sheet. To use it just make a copy for yourself and start filling things in. Type on lines, select from drop downs where there is a little arrow.

It is smart enough to use the trick of making the 7 dots in an 8/7/6 Attribute distribution into your Tertiary to save a Bonus Point. It will highlight Caste abilities when you select your Caste unless you turn that option off. You do have to tell it how many BP you spent on Spells/Evocations yourself. I started making it calculate how much XP and training time the things you are buying would cost but gave up partway through because I am tired of it for now. It's not too hard to figure out that you should spend BP on 5ing Attributes if you want to minimize future time/xp expenditure, though. If someone wants to do character creation using a pool of xp or a pool of training time you can finish that bit off yourself or come ask me later.

If anyone has other feature requests or finds any bugs let me know. Feel free to steal/modify/share elsewhere/etc. If you are super gung ho and want to edit the master, find me on #allunderheaven.

# ? Feb 13, 2015 08:51

Roadie: Jun 30, 2013

Kenlon posted:

I may not be able to get to it until tomorrow, but Bureaucracy will be next. (Though the lack of a proper large-scale system is going to make me very sad.)

It would be interesting to see your analysis of Presence.

# ? Feb 13, 2015 09:29

PurpleXVI: Oct 30, 2011; Spewing insults, pissing off all your neighbors, betraying your allies, backing out of treaties and accords, and generally screwing over the global environment?
ALL PART OF MY BRILLIANT STRATEGY!

Kenlon posted:

Any requests for what tree I take apart next, then?

I'd say Larceny, it's the only tree that was particularly interesting to me when I poked through the charms.

# ? Feb 13, 2015 13:28

Transient People: Dec 22, 2011; "When a man thinketh on anything whatsoever, his next thought after is not altogether so casual as it seems to be. Not every thought to every thought succeeds indifferently."
- Thomas Hobbes, Leviathan

Thirding Bureaucracy, with a secondary vote for War. It's amazing how seemingly simple it is and yet how well it works when it comes to making you an undefeatable general and generally capable of swinging a battlegroup around like a D&D 4e Lazylord.

# ? Feb 13, 2015 13:55

Ham Equity: Apr 16, 2013; The first thing we do, let's kill all the cars.; Grimey Drawer

Weirdly, Ride.

The tree is huge, and I'd love to see a breakdown.

# ? Feb 13, 2015 20:51

bartkusa: Sep 25, 2005; Air, Fire, Earth, Hope

Thanatosian posted:

Weirdly, Ride.

The tree is huge, and I'd love to see a breakdown.

Seconded.

I'd love to know more about Socialize and Larceny, too.

# ? Feb 13, 2015 21:54

Nessus: Dec 22, 2003; After a Speaker vote, you may be entitled to a valuable coupon or voucher!

Whichever ability lets me tame a hellpig or a dinosaur and ride it. I realize that this may cross multiple skills, unlike being a Maker(tm).

# ? Feb 13, 2015 22:15

Thesaurasaurus: Feb 15, 2010; "Send in Boxbot!"

Survival and Ride are what you're looking for, Nessus. Also, being a Maker^TM effectively DOES require multiple skills - beyond the Lore and Occult ancillary requirements for artifact or manse crafting, you need Craft (Artifacts) or Craft (Geomancy), respectively - and also an appropriate mundane Craft, such as Craft (Weaponsmithing) or Craft (Architecture) or Craft (Basket-Weaving) because, you guessed it! Every single Craft specialty is now its own, separately-rated skill, just like a certain other Third Edition! :suicide:

# ? Feb 13, 2015 22:27

LimitedReagent: Oct 5, 2008

I realized today after reading Kenlon's wonderful writeup of Athletics what's so off-putting to me about Craft being multiple skills: In a very fundamental way it works the opposite of everything else. Athletics as an Ability is very general. You can use it to jump, run, lift things, rush in combat, and more. The Charms are more specialized. You have branches for each of those specialties. So your dots give you general skill and your Charms focus on exactly what your character would be awesome at.

3e Performance (despite sex Charms) is way better designed than 2e if just because the Charms are specialized. In 2e, most the Performance Charms were really general and pretty boring. In 3e you've got some omni-applicable and utility ones but most are split into some basic categories of specialization. For the most part it makes Performance feel a lot more flavorful.

So now look at Craft. Because you have to buy dots in specific crafting disciplines, your skill is specialized. The Charms, however, work on whatever discipline you've chosen, so are very general. And overall pretty boring. Just imagine if it was the opposite, and Craft was omni-applicable and the Charms were split into a few omni-applicable and utility things up specialized branches for everything else. I dunno, like a branch for architecture and large-scale building, a branch for cooking and gardening/farming, a branch for precision and clockwork, one for weapons/shields/armor, whatever. Just like Athletics, the branches could've crossed a little when appropriate, had unique capstones.

# ? Feb 13, 2015 23:48

Transient People: Dec 22, 2011; "When a man thinketh on anything whatsoever, his next thought after is not altogether so casual as it seems to be. Not every thought to every thought succeeds indifferently."
- Thomas Hobbes, Leviathan

Yeah. Craft works pretty much contra natura in Ex3. Performance has exactly one charm for most specialties that is 'you get a strong dice trick', and everything afterward is new and innovative - Dancing gets you fat defense bonuses, Music gets you subtle manipulations and a rock 'n roll battle theme, and so on and so forth. That's good design. Craft's design is pretty poo poo.

# ? Feb 14, 2015 00:05

theironjef: Aug 11, 2009; The archmage of unexpected stinks.

Transient People posted:

Yeah. Craft works pretty much contra natura in Ex3. Performance has exactly one charm for most specialties that is 'you get a strong dice trick', and everything afterward is new and innovative - Dancing gets you fat defense bonuses, Music gets you subtle manipulations and a rock 'n roll battle theme, and so on and so forth. That's good design. Craft's design is pretty poo poo.

I'm pretty sure my group will just houserule it like we always have, each dot in the ability equals one type of crafting, and if you run out, specialties do the same thing.

# ? Feb 14, 2015 00:07

Nessus: Dec 22, 2003; After a Speaker vote, you may be entitled to a valuable coupon or voucher!

Transient People posted:

Yeah. Craft works pretty much contra natura in Ex3. Performance has exactly one charm for most specialties that is 'you get a strong dice trick', and everything afterward is new and innovative - Dancing gets you fat defense bonuses, Music gets you subtle manipulations and a rock 'n roll battle theme, and so on and so forth. That's good design. Craft's design is pretty poo poo.

doesn't matter, ~~had sex~~ built sword

# ? Feb 14, 2015 00:08

Bedlamdan: Apr 25, 2008

theironjef posted:

I'm pretty sure my group will just houserule it like we always have, each dot in the ability equals one type of crafting, and if you run out, specialties do the same thing.

My suggestion during the playtest period was to have one generic craft stat, a free Craft specialty representing a starting field, and then if you wanted to expand your expertise just buy Specialty: Armorsmithing or Specialty: Ships or whatever to get your Craft Stat to apply to those.

They didn't go for it but I still think my idea was a good one.

# ? Feb 14, 2015 00:14

theironjef: Aug 11, 2009; The archmage of unexpected stinks.

Another question for people that have the leak, are there any charms tagged for Eclipses in this book to look at? And is there a list of the groups whose charms they can eventually borrow? I know they mentioned spirits, what about fair folk?

# ? Feb 14, 2015 00:23

Zereth: Jul 9, 2003

theironjef posted:

I'm pretty sure my group will just houserule it like we always have, each dot in the ability equals one type of crafting, and if you run out, specialties do the same thing.

If I end up playing I'm going to push for a combination of that and going back to the "Fire/Earth/Air/Water/Wood are the base categories and cover everything that isn't inherently magical in and of itself like Genesis or Fate".

# ? Feb 14, 2015 00:26

Attorney at Funk: Jun 3, 2008; ...the person who says honestly that he despairs is closer to being cured than all those who are not regarded as despairing by themselves or others.

theironjef posted:

Another question for people that have the leak, are there any charms tagged for Eclipses in this book to look at? And is there a list of the groups whose charms they can eventually borrow? I know they mentioned spirits, what about fair folk?

Yes and yes.

quote:

The Eclipse represents all the subtle movements of Essence under Heaven, the strange and self-referencing powers that stir when night merges with day. Eclipses can learn the Charms of spirits, Fair Folk and similar supernatural beings which have the Eclipse keyword for eight experience points each.

And there's a few Eclipse-tagged Charms in the Antagonist chapter.

# ? Feb 14, 2015 00:34

Bedlamdan: Apr 25, 2008

theironjef posted:

Another question for people that have the leak, are there any charms tagged for Eclipses in this book to look at? And is there a list of the groups whose charms they can eventually borrow? I know they mentioned spirits, what about fair folk?

Eclipses were described as being able to learn some charms from Ghosts, Spirits, and Fae, though the latter don't have anything for Eclipses in the Corebook and there are only a handful so far in the Core. There are things like Ancestor Ghosts teaching Eclipses how to curse people with nightmares, denying them willpower from rest and making them fearful and paranoid, or Market Gods giving them a charm that lets them cast illusions on objects to make them appear more fine and valuable than they really are.

Eclipses don't get anything like Principle of Motion or Measure the Wind, though those are also in the books.

# ? Feb 14, 2015 00:35

Attorney at Funk: Jun 3, 2008; ...the person who says honestly that he despairs is closer to being cured than all those who are not regarded as despairing by themselves or others.

Notably, the neomah's sexiness-buffing charm has the Eclipse tag. The first Eclipse to find that out probably got a Seth Rogen movie made about them.

# ? Feb 14, 2015 00:36

Mexcillent: Dec 6, 2008

seriously id advocate just getting rid of the whole crafts poo poo show and discouraging anyone from being a stick in the mud killjoy who spends an action game making robots

# ? Feb 14, 2015 01:15

PurpleXVI: Oct 30, 2011; Spewing insults, pissing off all your neighbors, betraying your allies, backing out of treaties and accords, and generally screwing over the global environment?
ALL PART OF MY BRILLIANT STRATEGY!

Mexcillent posted:

seriously id advocate just getting rid of the whole crafts poo poo show and discouraging anyone from being a stick in the mud killjoy who spends an action game making robots

You know, it'd actually be great if someone did make a giant badass memorable warstrider or a giant manse on treads or legs or whatever. Less so if he spent his time being a mass-production line for Daiklaves or dozens of scrub, unmemorable warstriders.

# ? Feb 14, 2015 01:27

KittyEmpress: Dec 30, 2012; Jam Buddies

Mexcillent posted:

seriously id advocate just getting rid of the whole crafts poo poo show and discouraging anyone from being a stick in the mud killjoy who spends an action game making robots

Yes, because wanting to be able to do more than stab things is clearly bad, since this is an action game, I'll just ignore the fact that every book about Exalted has discussed how the Exalted don't just stab poo poo, and build societies and golden ages, because clearly this is an action game and only action fits.

Craft exists as it does because it's very powerful. They wanted a reason to justify why a solar can make a three dot artifact but dragonblooded have trouble, and to do so they decided 'well the solar will have a hundred ways extra to get to that 300 successes needed to make their cool poo poo'. It's dumb and fiddly, but honestly actually doing some test rolls and stuff, Craft seems pretty fun and easy to do compared to 2e. You just need to have a GM who ignores or house rules a better thing than having a million different Craft ratings.

They got really close to making a goodish system, and then went 'oh nevermind lets make it poo poo'

# ? Feb 14, 2015 01:43

Zereth: Jul 9, 2003

PurpleXVI posted:

You know, it'd actually be great if someone did make a giant badass memorable warstrider or a giant manse on treads or legs or whatever. Less so if he spent his time being a mass-production line for Daiklaves or dozens of scrub, unmemorable warstriders.

I'm sorry are you dissing having a huge army of warstriders marching along side my giant war-manse on tread-legs?

The trick is getting followers/employees who can do the mass production of the lesser warstriders for you going.

# ? Feb 14, 2015 01:57

drunkencarp: Feb 14, 2012

Attorney at Funk posted:

Notably, the neomah's sexiness-buffing charm has the Eclipse tag. The first Eclipse to find that out probably got a Seth Rogen movie made about them.

Most of the described gods and demons have about one Charm tagged Eclipse and about five Charms total, each. The neomah Charm in question:

fair use quoted for purposes of criticism and review posted:

Seductive Shapechange (8m; Simple; One scene; Eclipse; Essence 1): Once a neomah has read a character�s intentions to determine their ideal sexual mate, it may use this Charm to sculpt its body into that form. Its demonic nature remains recognizable, but it may alter gender, height, build, facial features, and similar aesthetic traits. While this Charm is active, it adds +2 Appearance when making social influence rolls to seduce the character whose preferences it has tailored itself to, or that play on Intimacies of lust towards itself. This can raise the neomah�s Appearance above 5, but is not compatible with other Appearance-enhancing effects.

# ? Feb 14, 2015 02:08

Ferrinus: Jun 19, 2003; i'm finding this quite easy, i guess in part because i'm a fast type but also because i have a coherent mental model of the world

On first blush I don't actually like the division by specialty of the Performance tree. Like, there's a "okay whatever all your Charms are cross-applicable" Charm right there from the beginning. They clearly could've worked like that all along, with, at most, per-Charm qualifiers like "so long as the performance involves physical motion" or "so long as the performance involves the character's voice".

There is an early Crafts charm that lets you just buy (Essence) more Craft abilities for free (actually for crafting xp, but come on), and another early Crafts charm that lets you temporarily transform one of your Crafts abilities into a different but related one. I don't think the overall effect - that even a Twilight savant's expertise has a scope of some kind of limit, such that projects completely outside their bailiwick are things they'd have to find someone else to complete for them - is a bad thing.

# ? Feb 14, 2015 02:29

PurpleXVI: Oct 30, 2011; Spewing insults, pissing off all your neighbors, betraying your allies, backing out of treaties and accords, and generally screwing over the global environment?
ALL PART OF MY BRILLIANT STRATEGY!

Zereth posted:

I'm sorry are you dissing having a huge army of warstriders marching along side my giant war-manse on tread-legs?

The trick is getting followers/employees who can do the mass production of the lesser warstriders for you going.

Well, the issue with artifacts and artifact gear in Exalted in general is kind of the same as with the Charms, for every one that does something interesting, has a noteworthy background and is memorable, you've got four or five that are just "dice adders," i.e. the same as any old sword but glowier and does more damage, it doesn't have a background, it doesn't have any noteworthy aesthetic, it doesn't open up new options besides "hit the guy EVEN HARDER." But the way the system's set up, the fact that everyone and their mom can start with a box of artifacts, etc. kind of waters down artifacts being anything noteworthy.

They aren't the lost relics of a near-forgotten golden age, or the days and weeks of hard work and research of legendary sorcerer-smiths attempting to reclaim old secrets, they're what your character got as a free bonus with his exaltation. And then eventually what the Craft character churns out a couple dozen of, so you can just drop a loving box of them on someone.

# ? Feb 14, 2015 03:07

Ferrinus: Jun 19, 2003; i'm finding this quite easy, i guess in part because i'm a fast type but also because i have a coherent mental model of the world

I think a weakness of the Crafts tree is actually an outgrowth of the fact that Crafts, unlike Bureaucracy, has a really detailed task resolution system attached to it, so Crafts gets way more powers that interact with the system but very few that actually interact with the scene you use them in. Like, for all that Craftsman Needs No Tools rubbed me the wrong way at first, it gives an artificer PC an immediate deployable trick that other PCs and NPCs can remark on and react to in the course of normal, non-downtime roleplaying. That stuff is actually really thin on the ground - you've got Art of Permanence and Crack-Mending Technique and that one power where you rapidly disassemble something, but you can't, like, smush two objects together to get a hybrid device or temporarily turn an artifact "off" by touching it or whatnot.

In general, it's a problem that there's barely any game space between "regular object" and "artifact" - you've got the ever-burning candles and nigh-unbreakable windows that some Crafts charms can make, but precious little else. It'd be nice if you had more power to make things super fast, or efficient, or effective, or otherwise amazing in ways normal people can't match without having to produce capital-a Artifacts in the process, the same way Medicine can let people heal in impossible, miraculous ways without leaving them lastingly superhuman in a way that'd demand Merit dots to be fairly accounted for.

EDIT: Craft's structural weaknesses aren't actually shared by other Abilities with robust resolution systems, because those resolution systems generally give you a lot of distinct, mutually-exclusive actions to take all of which have their own subtle/incredible upgrades. Like, Melee's got a lot of dice shenanigans, but some of those are for attacks, some are for parries, some are for guarding others, some are for counterattacks... Crafts basically features a single action, "craft", which you perform repeatedly, and to which every Craft booster can be independently applied. It would've been nice to see some kind of action-based divisions, like this charm helps if you're making a weapon, this charm helps if you're making a piece of artwork, blah blah.

Ferrinus fucked around with this message at 03:33 on Feb 14, 2015

# ? Feb 14, 2015 03:19

Zereth: Jul 9, 2003

PurpleXVI posted:

Well, the issue with artifacts and artifact gear in Exalted in general is kind of the same as with the Charms, for every one that does something interesting, has a noteworthy background and is memorable, you've got four or five that are just "dice adders," i.e. the same as any old sword but glowier and does more damage, it doesn't have a background, it doesn't have any noteworthy aesthetic, it doesn't open up new options besides "hit the guy EVEN HARDER." But the way the system's set up, the fact that everyone and their mom can start with a box of artifacts, etc. kind of waters down artifacts being anything noteworthy.

They aren't the lost relics of a near-forgotten golden age, or the days and weeks of hard work and research of legendary sorcerer-smiths attempting to reclaim old secrets, they're what your character got as a free bonus with his exaltation. And then eventually what the Craft character churns out a couple dozen of, so you can just drop a loving box of them on someone.

Well, something of a solution here is that you don't craft, say, 200/2000/whatever warstriders, you craft The <Charactername> Warstrider Legion or something, but then you get problems if you want to pull like four off to stick your Circle in and go stomp around Dragon King territory in the jungle or whatever.

# ? Feb 14, 2015 03:47

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# ? May 28, 2024 14:17

Mexcillent: Dec 6, 2008

KittyEmpress posted:

Yes, because wanting to be able to do more than stab things is clearly bad, since this is an action game

agreed

# ? Feb 14, 2015 05:03

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