Tell me about Exalted

[barsoomcore]

I don't know which one I got. Um, Ruins of Rathess, it turns out. We'll see how it turns out. I mainly got it because it has some more monsters and weird stuff in it. I wanted to see what Exalted "adventure" materials look like before I try and run a game myself.

I don't know if "fan" is the right word -- I'll admit I wasn't 100% comfortable walking up to the cash register with it but I don't have any beef with sexual content at all. And it is a lovely painting, I'll give it that.

 

[Welverin]

I don't know which one I got. Um, Ruins of Rathess, it turns out. We'll see how it turns out. I mainly got it because it has some more monsters and weird stuff in it. I wanted to see what Exalted "adventure" materials look like before I try and run a game myself.

Ooo, Dragon Kings are nifty. There's more on them in the Player's Guide, which makes them fully playable.

Exalted is rather lite on actual adventure content, just the two things I mentioned early. Mostly it's setting books like RoR, Houses of the Bull God, etc., which are interspersed with adventure seeds, or what ever they call them.

Here's a link to The Tomb of 5 Corners, which I mentioned earlier. It's a combo of quickstart rules and a short adventure. It's not zipped, so be careful if you're like me and don't like pdf's loading up in your browser.

 

[maddman75]

I think there's not much adventure material for Exalted because it would a very difficult game to write one for. Starting characters are incredibly powerful - when you have PCs that can defeat armies, conquer kingdoms, and found religions all before breakfast its kind of hard to make a pre-written scenario. Its more suitable for a player driven kind of campaign, because the characters are so tough they almost require it. There's also a wide variation in power levels. If your characters boost up on the social and prescence charms, then powerful enemies are going to wipe them out. If they make combat monsters, they'll be ill suited for a deep web of political machinations. There's much less insurance in D&D - its perfectly possible to make an Exalt that will get chewed up and spit out in a fairly average fight. Its also possible to make one that can take on an army by himself.

The general guidelines I got on RPGnet was to try and spread the charms out, about half for combat and half for other, unless they were mean to be a combat machine. And defensive charms that let you defeat armies alone, not offensive ones.

 

[cignus_pfaccari]

So, how *does* one run Exalted, anyway?

And, for that matter, has anyone figured out the Fair Folk book?

Brad

 

[maddman75]

So, how *does* one run Exalted, anyway?

And, for that matter, has anyone figured out the Fair Folk book?

Brad

Well, I'm going to put them in a smaller city that is strategically placed, and put in place a Sidereal, the guild, some Dragonblooded nobles, and several other factions with mutually exclusive goals. Then I'm going to toss in an approaching army of the undead, and the PCs and see what happens.

I actually run D&D that way too - I don't like saying 'okay guys, here's tonight's adventure!' Rather I'll give them some things going on and they can decide who they want to get involved with and what the consequences of that will be. Or not. Usually they end up killing, stealing from, or screwing over someone important and hilarity ensues. Though I don't suspect my group will every top Piratecat's Group from the archived story hour - they were sent as emissaries to a neighboring kingdom, with the king telling them "try not to kill anyone important." The first day, they killed the mayor of the town. In public. With a glowing, talking magic sword. And a chain lightning. And a couple of flame strikes. And a creeping doom.

 

[ThoughtBubble]

So, how *does* one run Exalted, anyway?

Maddman has it right. Flesh out a locale, some people, and a few events. Drop in the PC's. Watch things explode. It's not even worth trying to stop them, roll with the punches, roll with the punches.

And here's the most useful thing I've got to help with that rolling. Here's what I use as generic NPC guidelines:

The average person rolls 2 dice for most things. People familiar with something roll 3. 4 dice are for things they've trained in and are good at (someone doing what they're employed to do). 5 or 6 dice are for things people natrually talented and good at. And above that, you're getting into individuals of particular note. Figure equipment mods adds 1-3 or so.

It's very useful when I need an impromptu ninja attack. Or the party picks a fight for the heck of it. Or any time I'm just caught off guard and they're dealing with people I'm not ready for.

 

[Testament]

Awesome game, but a nightmare to run. Charms can quickly make a GM's head explode.

Download the charm cards, and print off the charms your character uses. That helps. A lot.

 

[maddman75]

Awesome game, but a nightmare to run. Charms can quickly make a GM's head explode.

Download the charm cards, and print off the charms your character uses. That helps. A lot.

Yeah, if you're thinking that D&D is too complicated so you're going to run Exalted instead you're trading one headache for another. But I would say that Exalted > High Level or Epic D&D.

 

[Darkness]

There's much less insurance in D&D - its perfectly possible to make an Exalt that will get chewed up and spit out in a fairly average fight. Its also possible to make one that can take on an army by himself.

The first sentence in this quote is missing a 'than,' right?

 

[ThoughtBubble]

Yeah, if you're thinking that D&D is too complicated so you're going to run Exalted instead you're trading one headache for another. But I would say that Exalted > High Level or Epic D&D.

Yeah. It gets nightmarish some times. I try to pre-compute as much as I can beforehand. Will the enemy be using a weapon? Have a 3x5 index card with the stats on it (totaled with the exalted's abilities), at a 1,2 and 3 action split. I have variable charms written at two levels, a little, and all out. I make broad assumptions in the name of fakery. "Hm... I forgot defensive charms on this guy. Let's say he can raise his soak by 5 for 10 essence and one will. I think that's about right."

The best way to make it easier on yourself is to get a good sandbox going, and lots of mooks of one or two types. Mooks don't use charms, they die easy, they're easy to make up,
and it leaves most of the complexity in learning the system and in the players' hands. From there, when you get big named enemies, give them one defensive trick, one offensive trick, one other trick, and call it good.

Oh, two other notes. I pine for the CR system. Every time I set up, I wish there was something I could use to replace guesswork on what's too tough. And second: Exalted vs Exalted combat takes forever. In our last one, the lone enemy exalt took a good hour or so to get through.

Exalted'll get crazy if you let it.