One thing that always bugged me about Exalted was the number of inherent, natural abilities that the Exalted had that, to even know they had, you had to dig through the depths of the book to find. Things like stopping your own bleeding, soaking lethal damage with stamina (whatever that actually means from a role-play sense), resistance to diseases, things like that.
As part of the ongoing effort to make the game easier to pick up (which itself may be pointless because Exalted has reached a level of popularity where most people who would be interested in it already know it but don't discourage me too much), when a player decides what king of Exalt they will play, I have written out a short list of the supernatural abilities they get for that. I call these Exaltation Powers, and the intent is to have them be the building blocks that Charms grow out of, much like how Knacks and Shapeshifting did for Lunars, a system I found to be quite elegant.
Here then, is my first-pass on the Solar Exalted. Note that this is for being any Solar Exalt, not for having a specific Caste. Castes also have Exaltation powers, but I'll explain some of those in a bit.
Solar Exaltation Powers:
Fortitude of Heaven: Solar Exalted are immune to nonmagical diseases, aging, infection and blood loss. Solar Exalted heal rapidly, and will recover from minor injuries overnight, severe injuries in a few days and from death’s door in a week.
Solar Anima: The character has an Anima Banner which they may ignite at will. It fades at the end of the scene, or after fifteen minutes. While ignited, the character’s divine power and Exalted nature is unmistakable to any who look on them.
Puissance of the Sun: Solar Exalted may take Improbable Stunts while their Anima Banner is ignited.
Limit Break: One of your Resonant Virtues is Flawed by the Great Curse. Determine what happens when this limit breaks and the conditions that cause it. It should be self-destructive, harmful to the character’s motivation or the things they care about. Solar Limits usually involve either taking the virtue too far, twisting it in some way, or reversing one’s attachment to it completely. You gain limit whenever you act against your Flawed Virtue or your Limit Condition occurs. You may also choose to gain Limit to throw off supernatural mental effects.
Yes, that is a dramatically improved rate of healing, because I felt the original-game charm "Body-Mending Meditation" was too good to not take, and therefore that I would just assume every Solar had it. I said a lot about Limit Breaks, which could probably stand to be more concise, and requires some understanding of the Virtue System, so I'll work on the wording there, but I think I hit the points that describe the benefits and detriments (mostly detriments) of having a Limit Break.
While it's more unfinished, because Lunars will be project #3 after Solars and Dragon-Blooded, here's an early version of their Exaltation Powers:
Lunar Exaltation Powers:
Fortitude of the Wild: Lunar Exalted are immune to natural diseases, aging, infection and blood loss, and they heal rapidly, and will recover from minor injuries overnight, severe injuries in a few days and from death’s door in a week.
Lunar Anima: The character has an Anima Banner which they may ignite at will. It fades at the end of the scene, or after fifteen minutes. While ignited, the character’s moon-graced power and Exalted nature is unmistakable to any who look on them.
Mutable Form: All Lunar Exalted have two True Forms: their human form and a Totem Animal form, and changing between them can be performed reflexively. Lunar Exalted may also take the form of any animal or mortal human they have hunted, slain and consumed alone, changing to these forms requires a moment’s concentration. Lunars revert to one of their True Forms of their choice when their Anima Banner is ignited and may not shapeshift to any others while it remains ignited.
Limit Break: One of your Resonant Virtues is inherently Flawed by the Great Curse. Determine what happens when this limit breaks and the conditions that cause it. It should self-destructive, harmful to the character’s motivation or the things they care about. Lunar Limits usually involve an atavistic regression to instincts, an animalistic corruption of Virtuous behavior. You gain Limit when you act against your Flawed Virtue or when your Limit Condition occurs. You may also voluntarily gain Limit to shake off supernatural mental effects.
While Fortitude of Heaven and Fortitude of the Wild are essentially identical, I prefer having them listed for a character who selects the Exalted type of their choice so that they can be written down in a place where players will remember even these most innate of powers.
For Caste powers, I wanted to provide, in addition to the traditional Anima Powers, an ability which reflected the old Caste Abilities, which were thrown out when the Skill system changed. The Solar Castes therefore all have two powers granted by their Caste, a 'Glory power', which is the Anima Power, and one named for their '___ of Heaven' sobriquet which grants them extra power in the area their Exaltation was designed to shine. A couple castes have additional abilities based on the unique 'extra effects' of certain Anima Powers. Here are the Caste Exaltation Powers as written so far:
Dawn Caste:
Glory of the Dawn: When the Dawn Caste’s anima banner is ignited, they appear mighty and terrifying. All characters of lower Essence opposing them them suffer -1 to all combat Skills unless Valor is their Resonant Virtue.
Sword of Heaven: Dawn Caste Solars win ties during Conflicts involving combat or war.
Zenith Caste:
Glory of the Zenith: When a Zenith Caste’s anima banner is ignited, they are empowered with holy light. All extra Creatures of Darkness must flee before them or be burned away, greater Creatures of Darkness suffer -1 to the rating of all Complications they make in conflicts opposing the Zenith Caste.
Hammer of Heaven: Zenith Caste Solars win ties during Conflicts involving their physical, mental or spiritual fortitude or in conflicts involving overt social influence.
Fallen But Unconquered: Zenith Caste Solars may, while their animas are on display, burn the bodies of the fallen with holy fire, preventing the corpse from rising as undead or the spirit from becoming a hungry ghost.
Twilight Caste:
Glory of the Twilight: When a Twilight Caste’s Anima Banner is ignited, they become able to see flows and pools of essence. While they cannot see a character’s essence score directly, they can identify and, with knowledge and skill, analyze Artifacts, Spirits, Sorcery and active Charms that are not masked by other magic, or were not designed with subtlety in mind.
Arrow of Heaven: Twilight Caste Solars win ties in conflicts of knowledge, craftsmanship, sorcerous skill, investigation, research or learning.
Night Caste:
Glory of the Night: When Night Caste’s Anima Banner is Ignited, they may choose to have it completely mask their identity.
Dagger of Heaven: Night Caste Solars win ties in Conflicts of stealth, movement, spatial perception, criminal activities and avoidance of danger.
A Subtle Brilliance: When a Night Caste Solar spends a point of Essence they may declare it is not readily apparent, unless the point they are spending is their last point of Essence. This will not make a supernatural effect appear less supernatural.
Eclipse Caste:
Glory of the Eclipse: When an Eclipse Caste is party to an oath sanctified by the grasping of hands, the Eclipse may sanctify the Oath if their Anima Banner is ignited, or they may reflexively ignite it when they sanctify the oath. They must either be one of the parties shaking hands or must touch the hands of those making the oath to sanctify it. Oathbreakers will have a modified Skill of 0 for a number of critical Conflicts they are part of equal to the Eclipse’s Essence at the time of sanctification. These critical botches will appear to be caused by bad luck.
Quill of Heaven: Eclipse Caste Solars win ties in Conflicts of social perception, travel, subtle social influence and organization.
Divine Ambassador: Any party traveling with an Eclipse Caste Solar on legitimate business must be treated by the proper laws of hospitality by any Demons, Gods, Elementals or Fair Folk. The laws of hospitality include nonagression, providing food and lodging and ensuring safety. They are nullified if any hostile action is taken by the Eclipse or their party.
So let's talk about these briefly. I'm actually pretty content with the Dawn Caste, though the mechanical crunch of just 'Opponents with lower essence take -1 to Combat stats and I win ties' is pretty brutal, but since it only really works on people the Dawn should be better than anyway, I don't think it's too far. While I like the way Glory of the Zenith works (basically, Creatures of Darkness take extra damage and have trouble opposing you) I'm not happy with how I currently have "Hammer of Heaven" worded, I want to create a distinction between the Zenith's overt majesty and social 'force' compared to the Eclipse's subtlety but I'm not quite sure how to describe that distinction clearly.
Readers who recall the original Twilight Anima Power will notice that I have gone for a slightly different one instead. Not only was the old 'magic shield' exceptionally powerful at higher Essence ratings, but it is essentially meaningless with the new Conflict System, so I've given them a lesser form of Essence Sight instead. This feels more Twilight-y and will likely provide them more reason to raise their Banner in times when it might be a complication to do so. The same readers who noticed the Twilight change will also probably note that the Night Caste Anima Power lost the ability to mask passage, this is because that particular effect never really made sense to me, in addition to being very mechanical. If you want to know where it went, consider it to have been folded into Dagger of Heaven.
Today was a pretty crunchy update, talking a bit about what the reworked game will actually look like on character sheets. Tomorrow we'll do some example Conflicts and maybe try to put together a starting character. Thanks for reading, feel free to leave questions or comments below!
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