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Berkshire Hunts posted:Finally, they give us the bad rules we think we want You're welcome.
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Aug 11, 2023 14:38
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Dave Brookshaw posted:I sound like I'm down on the book much more than I am, but I'm in the position where I'm just starting a new Exalted game and my players are already complaining about Crafting and Projects in the core. I think I'll use.. Several of the optional mechanics? Maybe? I do turn out to be firmly a "Creation as a Cost" Storyteller by the book's reckoning, so having constant "here's a tweak to this if your jam lies thatward" bits throughout seems useful. That's about what I expected. I do like the sound of some of the optional rules, but I'm not sure I'd be willing to give 3e another shot considering the other stuff that makes it an incredible pain in the rear end to run and play in (mainly that combat can take ages, motes are so fiddly as a resource, etc). People here seem to not like Essence all that much because of the reduced combat complexity but it feels so refreshing after I spent years playing Exalted and going through session-long fights that take the wind out of the campaign.
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Aug 11, 2023 20:09
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Whirling posted:That's about what I expected. I do like the sound of some of the optional rules, but I'm not sure I'd be willing to give 3e another shot considering the other stuff that makes it an incredible pain in the rear end to run and play in (mainly that combat can take ages, motes are so fiddly as a resource, etc). People here seem to not like Essence all that much because of the reduced combat complexity but it feels so refreshing after I spent years playing Exalted and going through session-long fights that take the wind out of the campaign.  My impression is people here seem to mostly not like essence because it doesn't reduce combat complexity ENOUGH
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Aug 11, 2023 21:18
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And also that many of the complexity reductions they DID make are totally orthogonals to the ones they should've, like making abstract "force/finesse/fortitude" attributes instead of regular "mental/physical/social". I'll always maintain that Essence has some good stuff in it, though, namely the general Ventures system and the fleshed-out options for allocating overflow successes on social rolls.
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Aug 11, 2023 21:30
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reignonyourparade posted:
I think they're both right, which is part of why the reaction was so tepid: Essence removes enough stuff that the complexity is no longer as satisfying as the real Exalted can be when it works well, but it's not actually simple.
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Aug 11, 2023 21:47
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reignonyourparade posted:
Its mostly the reduction of how many charm options you get per turn plus the fact that the combat has actual steps for resolving an attack. From my 3e experience, a lot of time goes into tallying up every little bonus you can possibly get from every attack/defense charm, plus having to reroll stuff that the obligatory dice bot wasn't programmed to do like only rerolling (Essence) 1s. Also, I honestly can't think of a time that 3e combat has ever really coalesced into feeling particularly great. I've had fun moments in it, but I feel like these are mostly just due to turns of luck or buying a funny combat charm, and the combat itself radically breaks down the more actors are in it since it encourages mobbing one weak target for initiative and then immediately using that to slaughter the harder targets that are unlucky enough to have one of the two limited use perfect defenses in the game. Basing their combat system after a 1v1 fighting game really was not a great idea. Whirling fucked around with this message at 22:00 on Aug 11, 2023 |
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Aug 11, 2023 21:50
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Rand Brittain posted:I think they're both right, which is part of why the reaction was so tepid: Essence removes enough stuff that the complexity is no longer as satisfying as the real Exalted can be when it works well, but it's not actually simple.  It also doesn't do anything that would actually take advantage of reduced complexity and being able to strategically strip out the more difficult-to-mechanically-handle abilities, like either rebuild the rules to be able to use (large) grid battlemaps or turn movement into something that you don't need to specifically track at all. Roadie fucked around with this message at 22:13 on Aug 11, 2023 |
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Aug 11, 2023 22:11
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On the other hand, Essence was the only way I could ever convince any of my friends to play exalted. Nobody wanted to try and learn that complex of a new system, but Essence was just about in their comfort zone.
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Aug 11, 2023 22:19
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Yeah, the target market for Essence seems to be people who wanted to play Exalted but refused to get involved with its system. I really can't see anybody reading Essence and falling in love with the setting the way they might have done with Exalted 1e.
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Aug 11, 2023 22:52
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Rand Brittain posted:Yeah, the target market for Essence seems to be people who wanted to play Exalted but refused to get involved with its system. I really can't see anybody reading Essence and falling in love with the setting the way they might have done with Exalted 1e. Well, again, a certain subset of those people, because there are very much still people for whom the essence setup is still too much.
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Aug 11, 2023 23:07
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Something about the tone of Essence really left a bad taste in my mouth, but I couldn’t quite place it. Fortunately 1e and Godbound still exist. I don’t think I have any interest in what Crucible has to offer, but I’m still looking forward to 2028 when A8D comes out, assuming there isn’t another palace coup on the development team. The Realm was great!
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Aug 11, 2023 23:40
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Ferrinus posted:Hmm, simplified movement, flat XP costs, simplified crafting, and generic projects all sound interesting. I haven't heard good things about the various "how to play" essays but I also don't need them anyway. FWIW I also came out of it feeling like I wanted way less narrative essays and way more optional rules. I did get a big belly laugh out of the book tut-tutting at players for using the words prana and atemi out of context too much, though. Like, fully agreed, but this is coming from you, Exalted? Dave Brookshaw posted:
Same  I guess the QC advice kind of sort of helps ish, but like, not really.
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Aug 12, 2023 09:23
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For me, Essence turned out to be in the.. What's the opposite of a sweet spot? Where it's too complicated to get any of the setting flavour across in a book its size, and too simplified to have any flavour enforced by its mechanics, with the result of turning Creation into a bland, everyone's a modern western hero, mush.
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Aug 12, 2023 11:10
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Dave Brookshaw posted:For me, Essence turned out to be in the.. What's the opposite of a sweet spot? Where it's too complicated to get any of the setting flavour across in a book its size, and too simplified to have any flavour enforced by its mechanics, with the result of turning Creation into a bland, everyone's a modern western hero, mush. Uncanny valley?
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Aug 12, 2023 14:49
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Essence's flavor being so dissonent from 3E is one of the oddest things about it.
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Aug 12, 2023 15:21
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I think it's a one-step-obscured disagreement over the extent to which the return of the Solars is the mainspring of the setting.
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Aug 12, 2023 15:29
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Infernals are now genericized solaroids without the cool Yozi charms that formed the core of what made them interesting in the first place, which has kind of taken some of the wind out of the sails for me when it comes to Essence.
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Aug 12, 2023 17:24
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Essence comes across as a d&d book, with exalted splats as character classes. Godawful presentation.
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Aug 12, 2023 17:46
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I am kind of unsure what infernals are meant to be when abyssals are right there, now.
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Aug 12, 2023 18:05
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LatwPIAT posted:Infernals are now genericized solaroids without the cool Yozi charms that formed the core of what made them interesting in the first place, which has kind of taken some of the wind out of the sails for me when it comes to Essence. I mean, the Infernals part was what finally told me that Essence was a disaster (on top of the layout, which is unforgiveable but possibly only to me). Whoever wrote that should never have been writing for Exalted, and whoever passed it shouldn't be developing for Exalted. When something like that shows up in print, it's a sign that there's nobody at the rudder.
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Aug 12, 2023 18:05
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spectralent posted:I am kind of unsure what infernals are meant to be when abyssals are right there, now. You see, while Abyssals are the dark mirrors of the Solar Exalted, Infernals are their twisted reflections. -something ACTUALLY said in either one of the older TG Exalted threads or ad copy for the game itself, I am not making this up
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Aug 12, 2023 18:10
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Essence Infernals use the word "anarchist" a lot to describe them but anarchists are terrible nuisances who reject the immortal science of Marxism, which makes me dislike them on principle.
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Aug 12, 2023 18:35
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Ferrinus posted:You see, while Abyssals are the dark mirrors of the Solar Exalted, Infernals are their twisted reflections. You see, while Abyssals are like negative numbers, Infernals are like imaginary numbers…
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Aug 12, 2023 18:57
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Whirling posted:Essence Infernals use the word "anarchist" a lot to describe them but anarchists are terrible nuisances who reject the immortal science of Marxism, which makes me dislike them on principle. While the science of dialectical materialism holds as true in Creation as it does everywhere else, Creation is not in a condition that will enable a revolution by the proletariat. There are minimal productive means to be seized and the bottleneck of wealth is not capital investment, but rather a small strata of highly skilled artisans.
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Aug 12, 2023 18:59
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Whirling posted:Essence Infernals use the word "anarchist" a lot to describe them but anarchists are terrible nuisances who reject the immortal science of Marxism, which makes me dislike them on principle. This actually works when you consider that the actual purpose of the Infernals is to foment color revolutions on behalf of ancient oppressors who are growing increasingly resentful of their own irrelevance. Unfortunately, it doesn't fix the problem that the whole framing is anachronistic, tacky, and clumsily-done. It's just not convincing that all or even a preponderance of people with lovely lives who suddenly gain demon powers are going to develop these specific ideological positions. I'm increasingly convinced that an "i have demonic powers" schtick should be more like martial arts styles appendable to any Exalt type than an Exalt type in and of themselves. Maybe put in a option for your Exaltation to have been corrupted from the jump such that you're tragically stuck with them and few to no normal powers to keep that angle open.
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Aug 12, 2023 19:02
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wiegieman posted:While the science of dialectical materialism holds as true in Creation as it does everywhere else, Creation is not in a condition that will enable a revolution by the proletariat. There are minimal productive means to be seized and the bottleneck of wealth is not capital investment, but rather a small strata of highly skilled artisans. Eh, yes and no. Infrastructure and resources matters an enormous amount to the people of Creation; even really-existing Randian supergenius needs to stand itself atop a pyramid of worshipers or slaves or whatever to reach the heights of its own potential, and the history of Creation is the history of working classes revolting to give rise to new, broader, personally-weaker ruling classes. A bunch of fun questions arise if you're doing socialism in Creation like, how do you fairly remunerate an Exalted laborer? But it's the underlying materialism that distinguishes Exalted as a fantasy setting either way.
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Aug 12, 2023 19:06
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Ferrinus posted:This actually works when you consider that the actual purpose of the Infernals is to foment color revolutions on behalf of ancient oppressors who are growing increasingly resentful of their own irrelevance. Unfortunately, it doesn't fix the problem that the whole framing is anachronistic, tacky, and clumsily-done. It's just not convincing that all or even a preponderance of people with lovely lives who suddenly gain demon powers are going to develop these specific ideological positions. I just don't get the general fixation the current devs have on rejecting the original vision of the Infernals in 3e, which is that they were supposed to be indulgent hedonists and rich fucks as a kind of echo of the Solars at their First Age peak, which runs into the similar problem Abyssals have of them being a little too close to Solars, but its a more interesting angle than "man from society that has just recently been reintroduced to iron tools becomes anarchist after going to Hell and getting powers from the literal embodiment of tyranny".
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Aug 12, 2023 19:07
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Ferrinus posted:I'm increasingly convinced that an "i have demonic powers" schtick should be more like martial arts styles appendable to any Exalt type than an Exalt type in and of themselves. Maybe put in a option for your Exaltation to have been corrupted from the jump such that you're tragically stuck with them and few to no normal powers to keep that angle open. A not-sure-how-much-I'm-joking idea I've had with 2e Abyssals and their mirror charms is that you could have replaced the splat's mechanics with a flaw and/or merit. Schwarzwald fucked around with this message at 19:56 on Aug 12, 2023 |
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Aug 12, 2023 19:14
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Whirling posted:I just don't get the general fixation the current devs have on rejecting the original vision of the Infernals in 3e, which is that they were supposed to be indulgent hedonists and rich fucks as a kind of echo of the Solars at their First Age peak, which runs into the similar problem Abyssals have of them being a little too close to Solars, but its a more interesting angle than "man from society that has just recently been reintroduced to iron tools becomes anarchist after going to Hell and getting powers from the literal embodiment of tyranny". Some day I am going to get my Black Rose Duelist arc of Utena inspired Infernals. Even if I have to hack it together myself.
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Aug 12, 2023 20:15
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wiegieman posted:While the science of dialectical materialism holds as true in Creation as it does everywhere else, Creation is not in a condition that will enable a revolution by the proletariat. There are minimal productive means to be seized and the bottleneck of wealth is not capital investment, but rather a small strata of highly skilled artisans.
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Aug 12, 2023 20:17
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Nessus posted:So you're saying that a capitalist revolution must replace the feudalist/imperialist model, and as such the truly Marxist thing to do in Exalted is to take over and expand the Guild in order to intensify the productive forces? And hey, the upside of accelerationism is you get to buy all the really nice things and feel good about it!
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Aug 12, 2023 20:18
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Nessus posted:So you're saying that a capitalist revolution must replace the feudalist/imperialist model, and as such the truly Marxist thing to do in Exalted is to take over and expand the Guild in order to intensify the productive forces? Ah, the Exalted Modern take on the Guild.
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Aug 12, 2023 20:19
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Hey, I did say take over. You'd obviously abolish slavery as it would interfere with the growth of the proletariat.
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Aug 12, 2023 20:26
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I love the Essence Infernals, it's perfect that the ceiling of the writers' imagination topped out at superhero Juan Guaido the thing that really soured me on Essence was probably the Excellent Strike that turned your penalties into bonuses. Just a total failure to understand why and how Solars are cool and a cheap, tacky replacement with a TV Troper's Rule of Cool. It's by and for people who never actually liked Exalted, but for all the wrong reasons not to like Exalted, who inexplicably still want to play it, and who can only propose solutions that just make it worse for no gain. That said, there's whole Discord servers of people like that, so I hope they and the game found each other and everybody in that shard of reality is happy Attorney at Funk fucked around with this message at 20:41 on Aug 12, 2023 |
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Aug 12, 2023 20:37
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Seems like a bit of an overreaction
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Aug 12, 2023 20:45
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Whirling posted:Seems like a bit of an overreaction Posters, posters, you can't exaggerate in here, this is the Exalted thread!
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Aug 12, 2023 21:37
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Nessus posted:So you're saying that a capitalist revolution must replace the feudalist/imperialist model, and as such the truly Marxist thing to do in Exalted is to take over and expand the Guild in order to intensify the productive forces? We, the exalted revolutionaries, are in a unique position to leap past the dangerous stage of bourgeois-dominated capital growth and instead democratize mystical enlightenment to all people by way a five year plan (that is, very large sorcerous workings.)
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Aug 12, 2023 22:25
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Dave Brookshaw posted:For me, Essence turned out to be in the.. What's the opposite of a sweet spot? Where it's too complicated to get any of the setting flavour across in a book its size, and too simplified to have any flavour enforced by its mechanics, with the result of turning Creation into a bland, everyone's a modern western hero, mush. Worst of both worlds
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Aug 13, 2023 02:08
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Dave Brookshaw posted:For me, Essence turned out to be in the.. What's the opposite of a sweet spot? Where it's too complicated to get any of the setting flavour across in a book its size, and too simplified to have any flavour enforced by its mechanics, with the result of turning Creation into a bland, everyone's a modern western hero, mush. I've used "sour spot" for this very phenomenon myself.
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Aug 13, 2023 03:23
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How good are the 3E rules for a two player game (one storyteller and one player)?
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Aug 13, 2023 04:31
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