Theo Anders and the Black Exaltation[Worm/Exalted][Hiatus]

[burningclaw2]

So should we pump some points into Survival so as to get the Environment Immnunities?

 

[SwiftRosenthal]

So should we pump some points into Survival so as to get the Environment Immnunities?

Click to shrink...

I edited in opinions. Basically, the really shiny aspect of those charms is the ability to no-sell Lung's fire, Fog's breaker state, Bonesaw's airborne plagues, Behemoth's kill aura, etc. SESS can do that anywhere, but SSL explicitly cannot. In any campaign outside the Underworld, the only advantage the Abyssal versions have is that they're only two charms instead of three. If we can find a tutor who knows the Solar versions, that's great. If we do a lot of stuff in the Underworld, that's a tangible reason to take WDI or SSL. Otherwise, we can ignore them and take the Solar versions after Redemption.

 

[Tsotate]

MWI by itself only provides the full benefit of ERP in the Underworld, and works as HSMS everywhere else. SESS no-sells everything up to Behemoth's kill aura, but SSL is explicitly weaker than its mirror.

Click to shrink...

Maelstrom-Weathering Indifference isn't quite Eloquent Example Inspiration level of nerfed relative to its mirror, but it's down there.

Come to think of it, it might even be worse (for us). It has two listed states:

• How it functions in Creation
• How it functions in the Underworld

We're in neither Creation nor the Underworld, so it may well just do nothing at all.

 

[SwiftRosenthal]

Maelstrom-Weathering Indifference isn't quite Eloquent Example Inspiration level of nerfed relative to its mirror, but it's down there.

Come to think of it, it might even be worse (for us). It has two listed states:

• How it functions in Creation
• How it functions in the Underworld

We're in neither Creation nor the Underworld, so it may well just do nothing at all.

Click to shrink...

Technically, Spectral charms treat shadowlands and the Labyrinth the same as the Underworld, so all we'd need to do to get MWI and SSL to work properly is turn Brockton Bay into a shadowland. This is a terrible idea for so many reasons, unless we want to go full evil-Abyssal. (I've made my opinion on which direction I want to go very clear.)

 

[Tsotate]

Skitzyfrenic, how do Charms which have Underworld/Creation splits treat the Wormverse? Does it count as Creation?

 

[Skitzyfrenic]

I mean, my dad spoke over 30 languages and in Exalted terms he would barely qualify for two dots in Linguistics.

Click to shrink...

I believe you. But I'm sure he was gifted with languages, and older by the time he really started picking them up. And was he fluent in all 30?

TDP could feasibly never speak any of those languages out loud. Also English, Chinese, French, Spanish, Hindi. Five languages that will allow you to communicate with the vast majority of the world's population. Toss in Arabic and you can talk with a majority of the rest. Its only when you start breaking down into dialects that we start approaching crazy numbers of languages. Just using the Official version of those languages will facilitate enough communication in most countries. Toss in Russian and most of Eastern Europe now can understand you, or direct you to someone who understands.

7 languages. And thats being the absolute most pragmatic. Giving him access to hundreds or possibly thousands of languages? Not only unnecessary, but I don't think I could write it to even come into play. Its superfluous. If we get far enough I'll homebrew a 'closer to the first language/long dead speaker's understanding' ling charm or something, that will convert languages up the tree so he can change German/English into Indo-European and speak all major Indo-European languages.

Skitzyfrenic, how do Charms which have Underworld/Creation splits treat the Wormverse? Does it count as Creation?

Click to shrink...

It doesn't count as a shadowland or the underworld. Does that answer the question well enough?

 

[Skitzyfrenic]

Anyone who
can bring himself to attack the deathknight suffers a -2
internal penalty and suffers a number of dice of unsoakable
lethal damage equal to the Abyssal's Essence for
his presumption.

Click to shrink...

Biigoh and I think Anasurimbor This is the tail end of Heart Stopping Mien. I read it as 'anyone who has resisted the fear effects of Dread Lord's Demeanor is about to get fucked.' I'm going to have it give people heart-attacks! Yay! They can be saved, even if they have 3 health levels, they can still survive if medical attention is received soon enough. If 3WP is spent to resist for a scene, it won't cause any damage.

So your average PRT trooper will clutch his/her chest and fall to the ground, stiff as a board, because they made their rolls. Armsmaster is going to go 'pfft, weak-ass PRT agents, lemme show you how its done,' spend 3wp and give TDP a challenge, completely not getting a heart attack, but still losing. Its going to baffle the fuck out of everyone.

 

[Skitzyfrenic]

Well, since nothings happen in a while, gonna close the vote.

Vote Tally : Theo Anders and the Black Exaltation[Worm/Exalted] | Page 21 | Questionable Questing
##### NetTally 1.1.6

[X] Shoot her a quick email from your smartphone to open a dialogue
No. of Votes: 12
Marthis
1986ctcel
Biigoh
Biofan09
dasstan
Drak4806
Kerfirou
Lon
SerbobIV
skaro
SwiftRosenthal
Tsotate

[X] Purchase:
-[X] Lore ●●○○○ -> ●●●●● (-15 XP)
-[X] Linguistics ●○○○○ -> ●●●○○ (-4 XP)
--[X] Language: Chinese
--[X] Language: Japanese
No. of Votes: 4
Biofan09
1986ctcel
dasstan
SwiftRosenthal

[X] Call her right now and ask if she has a dress
No. of Votes: 2
evildice
Anasurimbor

[X] Purchase:
-[X] Lore ●●○○○ -> ●●●●● (-15 XP)
No. of Votes: 2
Tsotate
SerbobIV
[X] Purchases
-[X] Spend 4 XP to get Stamina 2
No. of Votes: 1
Biigoh

[X] Shoot her a quick email from your smartphone to open a dialogue
-[X] "So tell me cutey how do you think we can help one another? Beyond the obvious of course. <Image>"
No. of Votes: 1
Larekko12

[X] Purchases
-[X] Spend 4 XP to get Stamina 2
-[X] Spend 3 Xp to get Sabah Native Language Family. Arabic i think?
No. of Votes: 1
Larekko12

[X] Purchase:
-[X] Lore ●●○○○ -> ●●●○○ (-3 XP)
No. of Votes: 1
Anasurimbor

Total No. of Voters: 15

So, you sent a quick e-mail off to the mysterious Lisa. You will be telling her that you were very pleased to meet her, but you are unsure as to the meaning of the rest her note. You also purchase lore 5 and ling 3 (Chinese, Japanese) Remember not voting for XP purchases is abstaining, not a default vote of [X] Bank. I know I pointed that out earlier.

So the next snip will be tomorrow night, you'll see what you wrote, and maybe some back and forth. We will also get our suit and speak with the new and shiny Sabah. And find out what her deal is. After we've completed the sub-arc of Sabah we shall fast forward to the party and the real stuff starts.

Remember folks, Dean Stansfield is an asshole, Victoria Dallon is a hot bitch, and we are the most handsome man on the fucking planet. Amy Dallon may or may not approve. On the party I will be posting a who's who in TDP's old Theo's eyes of who's supposed to show up.

 

[Biofan09]

Amy Dallon may or may not approve

Click to shrink...

uh...guys? I think "Operation: Make Amy Our Dark Princess" may have hit a snag. Namely, IIRC, her sexuality isn't compatible.

 

[Marthis]

That's what charms are for. And social combat.

 

[Skitzyfrenic]

uh...guys? I think "Operation: Make Amy Our Dark Princess" may have hit a snag. Namely, IIRC, her sexuality isn't compatible.

Click to shrink...

I didn't say what she was or was not approving of. There might even be a little bit of both!

 

[burningclaw2]

We are an Exalted with 5 Dots of Appearance, we make straight men gay, and lesbians straight just by breathing!

A tiny thing such as wrong gender is nothing to us!

 

[Biigoh]

Actually... you have to space the willpower spending over 3 actions/sets of attacks over numerous ticks.

 

[SwiftRosenthal]

According to the fluff, The Lover counts some Solars and Dragonbloods among her thralls. If we're allowed to visit her palace, we should be able to snag at least one tutor - though the chances of any of them turning against The Lover are nil and the chance of redeeming a Deathlord is essentially, "Go ahead and try. It would make for an epic quest."

...Actually, fuck it. Here's what MOEP Abyssals has on our liege. This is important enough for people who don't know Exalted that I'm posting it in its entirety.

THE LOVER CLAD IN THE RAIMENT OF TEARS
Other Names: She Who Must Be Obeyed
Most Deathlords view the Lover Clad in the Raiment of Tears as a whore and a dilettante, though one not quite as incompetent as Eye and Seven Despairs. Only the Bodhisattva does not share that view, for he remembers the Lover from their living days. Remembers her and fears her. For the Lover, when she bore a different name and served the Unconquered Sun, ventured into the Labyrinth before any of the other future Deathlords even knew what it was. She knew secret spells and words of power and how to make a man die for her love. She knew the price of every man's soul, and the Bodhisattva fears that she knows these things still. The Bodhisattva keeps his own counsel, however, and hopes a distance of 8,000 miles suffices to keep him out of her web, while suspecting that she already has agents within his court.

The Lover carefully crafts her illusion of inconsequentiality. In her citadel, the Fortress of Crimson Ice, her subjects while away their time in carnal delights. The most skilled lovers (living or dead) earn the supreme reward of pleasuring their mistress. While her lovers include the living and the dead, only the dead ever leave her chambers, for the Deathlord is an… exuberant lovemaker. Now and then, she trifles at destroying a petty kingdom or a legion on the march. Her critics wonder whether she will ever do anything important to further the Neverborn's goals.

Those critics are fools. When she lived, the Lover pursued every form of pleasure the decadent Solar Exalted could devise. Eventually, she realized that pleasure bore diminishing returns. Every pleasure palls in time, and the hedonist becomes so jaded that the continued pursuit of pleasure becomes pointless. With this epiphany, the Solar realized the futility of her own millennia-long existence. She contemplated suicide before the Dragon-Blooded did her the favor of ending her life for her.

Among all the Deathlords, only the Lover does not seek revenge on Creation for her betrayal and murder. Quite the contrary, she feels grateful that the Dragon-Blooded ended her banal excuse for a life, and she hopes to honor their heroism by returning the favor. Convinced of the utter pointlessness of human existence, the Lover spreads ultimate pleasure among her followers because she knows from bitter experience that when pleasure ends, nothing of any value remains. A surfeit of pleasure leads inevitably to despair, and the only answer to despair is Oblivion. The sheer absurdity of suggestions that joy can be found in duty, helping others or other sacrifices of self drives her into a killing rage.

In nearly all her forms, the Lover is a woman of sensual beauty. She has developed an improved version of the Mutable Form power intrinsic to all Deathlords. At a cost of seven motes and one Willpower, the Lover can intuitively assume a form that represents a particular onlooker's ideal sexual partner. For 10 motes and one Willpower, she can use the aforementioned ability in the presence of multiple people, with each onlooker seeing her in an ideal form. In either case, the Lover gains a +5 bonus to all social actions against affected onlookers.

THE LOVER'S DOMAIN
The Lover resides in a small shadowland called the Vale of Dust and Shadows, located in the Kingdom of Gradafes about 600 miles southeast of Crystal. This small Northeastern nation covers less than 1,000 square miles. The farmers and goat-herders of Gadafes provide meat and other foodstuffs to the Lover's court (for the benefit of her living visitors) in exchange for protection from barbarians and other outside enemies. The most prominent of such enemies are the region's Tear Eater barbarian tribes. The Tear Eaters posed a perennial threat to Gradafes until the Lover met with their tribal leaders and won them to her cause. These tribes now worship their ancestors, many of whom continue on as the freeze-dried Greater Dead who oversee Tear Eaters society. They, in turn, worship the Deathlord who taught them how to rule beyond death.

Dust and Shadows is one of the smallest shadowlands to serve as a Deathlord's primary domain, but it suits the Lover's tastes. Up until the Contagion, the area held an isolated monastery dedicated to a Shogunate-era precursor to the Immaculate Order. These monks practiced rigorous celibacy as well as other ascetic disciplines. Their remarkable faith and piety somehow gave the monks and the people of the tiny nation an exceptional immunity to the Great Contagion, much to the Deathlords' surprise. Finding this unacceptable, the Lover personally traveled to the monastery in the guise of a beautiful (and seemingly virginal) young refugee seeking shelter for the night. Once inside, she seduced every monk in the monastery, male and female. As the sun rose over the monastery's walls, the first symptoms of the Great Contagion appeared among the fallen monks and the people they protected. The Lover remained even after the monks had all died. After amusing herself by stirring all their ghosts into a frenzy of magically induced sexual excitement, she severed each of their arms at the shoulder and watched their fumbling attempts to couple.

After the debacle of the Contagion and the Fair Folk Invasion, the Lover returned to the Vale. She built her citadel, the Fortress of Crimson Ice, on the ruins of the old monastery. Over time, the living Gradafesi returned as well, rebuilding the towns near the fortress and swearing allegiance to the Lover. The Kingdom of Gradafes consists of cold steppes, but the strange, unwholesome animals and plants indigenous to the Underworld flourished in the Lover's domain. In the Contagion's aftermath, even such unappealing fare was better than starvation. Besides, while the Lover's domain was cold and frightening, the Deathlord herself had a beauty that haunted the souls of the living. The Lover soon subjugated the entire nation without a single armed conflict.

From a distance, the Fortress of Crimson Ice appears as a pale miasma of red and purple, growing more distinct as the visitor approaches. Eventually, it coalesces into a series of red-crystal parapets and fortifications around a turreted central tower. Translucent ghosts float around the fortress as if begging entrance. As one finally grows near, the sounds of never-ending festivals and orgies seep from the fortress. Thousands of servants, living and dead, reside within the Fortress of Crimson Ice. The Lover binds them to two commandments. First, they must obey the Lover in all things; second, when she has no orders for them, they must engage in any and every form of hedonistic decadence they can imagine.

Most of these servants are broken things, burnt out by decades or even centuries of sex, gluttony, drugs and perversion. No longer able to experience any true pleasure, they perform orgiastic rites by rote, hoping for some new instruction from their mistress to break the monotony. Failing that, they pray for Oblivion. Those servants who have not yet experienced such transcendent ecstasy alternate between mindless gibbering at the sensations they endure and growing dread at the possibility of becoming like their jaded fellows. A few of the fortress's denizens have gone utterly mad from their existence. Some now emulate their mistress (even dressing like her, regardless of gender), while others find that they can still experience the pleasure of a brutal kill well executed.

Some of the armless ghost-monks still remain. They continue their orgy as best they can. Sometimes they beg visitors to help them. Over the centuries, the Lover has added other ghosts she trapped in perpetual lust and then maimed in various ways, producing a pathetically pornographic freak show as an adjunct to her court.

THE LOVER'S PANOPLY
The Lover carries a soulsteel blade called the Siren in Avern—not even a daiklave, but a thin, translucent rapier—but it is only superficially a combat weapon. The Siren in Avern has the traits of a reaper daiklave except as follows: Damage (special), Defense +5. On a successful hit, the blade inflicts no damage. Instead, roll (extra successes + the wielder's Charisma + wielder's permanent Essence) against the target's Dodge MDV. Each threshold success causes the target to lose one point of temporary Willpower. Furthermore, anytime the wielder successfully parries an attack with the Siren in Avern, the attacker's player must roll Compassion and score no successes. With even one success, the attacker must break off the fight and cannot initiate any further attacks against the wielder for the rest of the scene. Overcoming this Compulsion effect costs five Willpower points. It ends automatically if the wielder of the blade attacks the character again. If the Compassion roll produces five or more successes, the character instantly falls in love with the wielder for a year and a day. He cannot attack her and cannot apply Dodge MDV to her social attacks. Solars can break this bond before the time limit ends but only after expending 10 Willpower points.

The Lover also possesses the Mirror of Darkness and Lightning, a one-foot-wide, 11-sided mirror of polished obsidian and soulsteel that floats obediently at the Lover's side. A demon sorcerer forged the Mirror long ago but was overcome by his own creation and trapped within for all eternity. Those who look into the Mirror without the Lover's permission suffer the same fate. Eleven arms of black lightning snatch them up and pull them in, and the ever-hungry demon devours them within seconds. Only perfect defenses can protect against these lightning arms. Those whom the Lover permits to look into the Mirror can resist being imprisoned and devoured if their players successfully roll (Wits + Occult + Conviction), at a difficulty of 4. Characters whose players succeed on this roll completely replenish their Essence pools and regain any spent Willpower.

The Lover also owns many other artifacts and devices. Her flirtatious and vapid exterior conceals a superb command of magic and arcane science. She is second only to the Dowager in necromancy, and she follows close behind the Walker in Darkness and the First and Forsaken Lion in her application of magitech and necrotech. Even in those areas, however, the Lover favors misdirection. She has produced only one warstrider so far, a soulsteel noble warstrider known as the Hateful Devourer of Love. Her rivals laughed to learn that a clumsy deathknight allowed Lookshy to capture it. Yet the Lover allowed the prize to fall into Lookshy's hand, for it carries the doom of that nation within its coils and pulleys.

THE LOVER'S COMBAT TACTICS
The Lover utterly eschews combat, believing that only one who can resist her charms deserves the honor of killing her. Thus far, however, she has never met anyone strongwilled enough to even draw a sword against her. Even when she does enter combat, she does so only for the purpose of using the Siren in Avern to make her attackers fall in love with her. Already, a number of Solar Exalted have shared her bed and sworn their devotion to her. Some of them she even allows to live, withholding the final bliss she grants to so many others.

Misdirection and obfuscation are the Lover's true weapons. Already, she has laid the foundation of Lookshy's destruction without anyone else knowing about it. Her deathknights move silently among the Tear Eaters, reinforcing the barbarians' loyalty to her. They use Hardened Killer Training Style to transform them into ruthless killing machines that will soon become a match for the Bull of the North and his pitiful Icewalkers.

The Lover Clad in the Raiment of Tears is far from helpless in a fight, though. During her living days, she mastered the Snake Style and Ebon Shadow Style of supernatural martial arts. She oversaw the creation of Laughing Wounds Style as well, which enables its practitioner to draw strength from both the pain he receives and the pain he inflicts.

SERVANTS OF THE LOVER
The Lover Clad in the Raiment of Tears has many Abyssal followers. Indeed, she was the first Deathlord to Exalt an Abyssal. Exalted into the Midnight Caste, the Martyr to the Last Rest (sometimes known as the Shadow of the Ash Arrow) remains high among her favorites and serves as her chief emissary to the Tear Eaters tribes. The cunning Day Caste Exquisite Pain, having successfully placed a viper near the heart of Lookshy, now turns his attention to the Linowan Nation and its great shadowland, the Fields of Woe. The Lover's most beloved servant is the mysterious Melkin Fool in Red who oversees the Circus Moribund, a macabre traveling carnival that wanders the Northeast introducing innocent villagers to the wonders of forbidden pleasure and the majesty of death.

The Lover's reach extends far from the Northeast, though. Some of her deathknights infiltrate the Scarlet Empire, where they fan the flames of discontent among the Great Houses and push them toward civil war. She even has a spy in the court of the Bodhisattva Anointed by Dark Water. The pious and chaste Knight of Ghosts and Shadows who so recently swore allegiance to the Bodhisattva is a deception, a false personality inserted into one of her most loyal servants. Without knowing his own reasons for acting, the Knight now seeks instruction from the Bodhisattva into the deeper mysteries of necromancy, while regularly reporting his discoveries in his dreams. Another deathknight, the Prince of Shadows dwells in Kirighast, disguised as a humble mortal savant. From that perch, he spies on the Lover's enemies even as he seduces Solar Exalted and others to his mistress's cause.

Unlike many of her peers, the Lover does not favor one caste over another or even have preferred roles for the different castes. An individualist herself, the Lover looks for strong-willed and passionate individuals and lets the Black Exaltation simply augment what is already there. In addition to her deathknights, the Lover is also served by several Solar and Dragon-Blooded Exalted who have fallen before her beauty and libido. She has not yet tamed a Lunar or seduced a Sidereal, but she remains game for anything.

SERIES IDEAS
More than any other Deathlord, the Lover seeks a political means to destroy Creation—guiding humanity to exterminate itself. Her deathknights all love her to an obsessive degree. Each believes that he can win her favor if only he can devise a sufficiently elegant way to kill large numbers of people. For example, Exquisite Pain himself came up with the idea of creating a powerful but cursed artifact for the sole purpose of allowing a rival nation to capture it and destroy themselves. Although the Lover regularly sends out entire circles, whether as diplomatic envoys or as subversives and saboteurs, she finds that Abyssal circles often stymie themselves with infighting, as each Exalt wants to claim all the glory… and her love. Accordingly, the Lover uses the Sworn Brothers' Oath spell to bind groups of Abyssals into temporary loyalty to one another. She also dispels this artificial oathbond immediately before debriefing the circle so that they will be more forthright and honest about each other's failures.

Story hooks for Abyssals in the service of the Lover include the following:

Guiding the Tear Eaters: The Lunar Exalted in the Northeast grow concerned about the Lover's close ties to the Tear Eaters. Some of them consider a move into Tear Eater territory. To defend against a Lunar assault, the Abyssals must obtain reliable intelligence on Lunar activity and then figure out how to thwart it. An added bonus might be bringing a young Lunar back to the Fortress of Crimson Ice for the Lover's amusement. Alternatively, perhaps the Tear Eaters grow strong enough to challenge the Bull of the North. They only need Abyssal generals to lead them into battle.

The Circus Moribund: Abyssals assigned to the Circus Moribund act as undercover operatives under the leadership of the Melkin Fool in Red. (Or, perhaps, they fill in for her while the Melkin Fool is busy with some other assignment.) Their travels with the strange carnival mask their efforts to spy on Northeastern cities and spread the absurdity of life and the love of death among the people they encounter. But the Circus starts to get a reputation, and even the Wyld Hunt might show up to take in a show.

The Death of Lookshy: The Lover decides it's time to give her contemptuous rival Deathlords a shock by conquering one of the great nations in Creation. Although she finds military conflict tedious and unimaginative, she will suffer through the boredom of a military campaign rather than tolerate further insults. Accordingly, the Lover activates the doom concealed within the Hateful Devourer of Lover. A large shadowland soon covers Lookshy, leaving its sizable First Age infrastructure ripe for conquest. Now, all she needs to do is mop up any resistance from the remnants of Lookshy's military, pacify its ghosts and consolidate her control before the Mask of Winters can move in. The characters are just the deathknights for the job. See The Books of Sorcery, Vol. 1—Wonders of the First Age, p. 158, for more information about the Hateful Devourer of Love.

Click to shrink...

 

[Skitzyfrenic]

Actually... you have to space the willpower spending over 3 actions/sets of attacks over numerous ticks.

Click to shrink...

Yes, I just shortened up for the statement. It might end up being willpower roll = heart attack, spending a willpower point = maybe some pain in your chest until 3 wp spent.

It would just be AWESOME, not awesome(Like it would be in a TT game), for practically everyone who attacked TDP to just keel over and die. And would probably mandate some sort of indirect kill order, or a volunteer to press the button to kill TDP.

 

[Anasurimbor]

Actually... you have to space the willpower spending over 3 actions/sets of attacks over numerous ticks.

Click to shrink...

Where are you getting this from? It doesn't say that in the charm at all.

 

[Biigoh]

Where are you getting this from? It doesn't say that in the charm at all.

Click to shrink...

Basically, you can only spend 1 willpower at a time in the charm...

 

[Anasurimbor]

Basically, you can only spend 1 willpower at a time in the charm...

Click to shrink...

Like I said, I don't see that at all.

MAJESTIC RADIANT PRESENCE
Cost: 7m
Mins: Presence 4, Essence 3
Type: Reflexive (Step 2)
Keywords: Obvious, Social
Duration: One scene
Prerequisite Charms: Any Presence Excellency
The Solar burns with the incandescent radiance of the Unconquered Sun. This Charm intimidates others, negating any physical or social attack made against the Solar unless the attacker's player succeeds on a reflexive resistance roll. The Solar's player chooses when purchasing this Charm whether a difficulty 1 Valor roll or a difficulty 2 Willpower roll is the appropriate form of resistance. The attacker need succeed only once per action, no matter how many attacks she makes during a flurry. This Charm's effects are a form of unnatural mental influence, and characters can spend three Willpower to resist the effects of Majestic Radiant Presence for a scene.

Click to shrink...

Are you sure you aren't thinking of a house rule or another charm or something? It's not the 1E version of Heart-Stopping Mien, either. That was arguably nasty vs. mortals(though it only hurt them if they failed the roll), but much weaker against magical beings.

 

[Larekko12]

Hard to imagine she was worse with Solar Social.

Sound like Agency death the Character. Simurgh wishes she was that good. You have a have a circle of devoted heartless bastards to tuch her.

 

[cyberswordsmen]

Basically, you can only spend 1 willpower at a time in the charm...

Click to shrink...

Can you provide a citation? Because my books don't say anything like that.


(to non-exalted experts the charm we have is a mirror of this one which means it is the exact same thing but angsty and dark)

MAJESTIC RADIANT PRESENCE Cost: 7m; Mins: Presence 4, Essence 3; Type: Reflexive (Step 2) Keywords: Obvious, Social Duration: One scene Prerequisite Charms: Any Presence Excellency

The Solar burns with the incandescent radiance of the Unconquered Sun. This Charm intimidates others, negating any physical or social attack made against the Solar unless the attacker's player succeeds on a reflexive resistance roll. The Solar's player chooses when purchasing this Charm whether a difficulty 1 Valor roll or a difficulty 2 Willpower roll is the appropriate form of resistance. The attacker need succeed only once per action, no matter how many attacks she makes during a flurry. This Charm's effects are a form of unnatural mental influence, and characters can spend three Willpower to resist the effects of Majestic Radiant Presence for a scene.

Click to shrink...

Nothing about needing to spend them one at a time. There are charms like that but they phrase it as paying 1 mote to resist it for a turn and gaining a scene-long immunity after X willpower has been spent that way.

 

[SwiftRosenthal]

Hard to imagine she was worse with Solar Social.

Sound like Agency death the Character. Simurgh wishes she was that good. You have a have a circle of devoted heartless bastards to tuch her.

Click to shrink...

Deathlords are designed to be Final Bosses for non-Abyssal campaigns and the constant threat hovering over your shoulder for renegade Abyssals. All of them are OP as shit... just not as OP as the Neverborn themselves, the Yozis, or the Incarnae. The Lover is just the one who focuses on social-fu.

 

[Biigoh]

To be honest... am too tired to hunt down citations. It's fine I won't dispute the can spend 3 willpower at once that you guys are getting from the charm. Or the general nerfing effect that you guys want.

 

[Anasurimbor]

Sound like Agency death the Character. Simurgh wishes she was that good. You have a have a circle of devoted heartless bastards to tuch her.

Click to shrink...

The thing is that Solars(or Abyssals) always have the option of utterly ignoring social influence using social perfect defenses like Elusive Dream Defense(or whatever its Abyssal mirror is). If you have a circle that decided they want to kill her, all her limitless charm is useless, except for the extent to which it has bought her allies. Similarly, she has to use real incentives to control her minions, not merely crush their minds with flowery words.

Deathlords are designed to be Final Bosses for non-Abyssal campaigns and the constant threat hovering over your shoulder for renegade Abyssals. All of them are OP as shit... just not as OP as the Neverborn themselves, the Yozis, or the Incarnae. The Lover is just the one who focuses on social-fu.

Click to shrink...

The Deathlord's exact personal power level is debatable, and really depends on the campaign. Don't believe the placeholder stats given in the book. They are definitely powerful end bosses though.

 

[SwiftRosenthal]

The thing is that Solars(or Abyssals) always have the option of utterly ignoring social influence using social perfect defenses like Elusive Dream Defense(or whatever its Abyssal mirror is). If you have a circle that decided they want to kill her, all her limitless charm is useless, except for the extent to which it has bought her allies. Similarly, she has to use real incentives to control her minions, not merely crush their minds with flowery words.

Click to shrink...

The standard perfect social defense for Abyssals is Lesser Horrors Scorned, which does defend against Deathlords - in the sense that it doesn't say that it doesn't. Unfortunately for us, it requires one dot of Whispers, which AFAICT we can only get by either meditating within a Neverborn or (far more convenient) asking The Lover to use Teaching Incomprehensible Truths on us.

The Deathlord's exact personal power level is debatable, and really depends on the campaign. Don't believe the placeholder stats given in the book. They are definitely powerful end bosses though.

Click to shrink...

The Abyssals book doesn't actually give specific numbers for Deathlords. It offers a range for the ST to operate within, formulas for their personal and peripheral essence pools, and a general idea of their known arcanoi (shitloads), charms (shitloads), sorcery/necromancy (shitloads), and organizational assets (you get the idea). Mask of Winters is the only one with a canon statsheet AFAIK and his is in Core.

 

[Princess Magnificent]

Also, he can't read.

 

[Biigoh]

Also, he can't read.

Click to shrink...

It is true, as per the Corebook, The Mask of Winter can't read.

I also suspect that we likely should have picked the Princess Magnificent instead of the Lover... please dun kill the tanuki, mighty death lord.

 

[SwiftRosenthal]

I also suspect that we likely should have picked the Princess Magnificent instead of the Lover... please dun kill the tanuki, mighty death lord.

Click to shrink...

Taking into account the NSFW thread and the above fluff, TDP has already hit The Lover right in the Motivation: he showed her something pleasurable that she hadn't experienced in a very long time, so long that it was a fresh experience again. If redeeming her is possible, that's the first step.

 

[Anasurimbor]

I also suspect that we likely should have picked the Princess Magnificent instead of the Lover... please dun kill the tanuki, mighty death lord.

Click to shrink...

Almost certainly, if our primary concern is Theo's well-being and not, say, our amusement. But who wants to join a loser when you could join the winning team? It's not like she would give her only Deathknight vastly more attention and direct support. That's just silly. Similarly, who cares that she wouldn't have a number of other more experienced Abyssals to hunt us down with if we displease her? Why ever would we want to do that?

 

[Skitzyfrenic]

Oh yeah the phat loot that was headed Theo's way if the Princess Magnificent had been chosen. And all the attention.

All the lewts instead of all the lewds.

There probably would have still been Lewdness but itdve been fewer women. Probably Rune, maybe one or two others. The Neverborn would have granted her request for another exaltation but no more. (She had been handed the mission from the neverborn. Going around fafl. It would have been her chance to redeem herself and stop getting punished)

The bishops campaign would have just been religious crazy everywhere. I think it would be old Johann times a hundred.

Fafl's campaign would've been killy. Straight killy.

 

[SwiftRosenthal]

Updated my wishlist to include some Solar and Infernal cross-training.

Edit: LSD is absurdly cheap compared to FID.

Larceny 1	3 XP	18 days
Larceny 2	2 XP	6 days
Larceny 3	4 XP	12 days
Larceny 4	6 XP	18 days
Larceny Excellency (any)	10 XP	2 days
Flawlessly Impenetrable Disguise	16 XP	36 days
Subtotal	41 XP	92 days
Larceny 5	8 XP	24 days
Perfect Mirror	16 XP	48 days
Total	65 XP	164 days
Loom-Snarling Deception	16 XP	12 (24) days
Difference w/o Perfect Mirror	25 XP	80 (68) days
Difference w/ Perfect Mirror	49 XP	152 (140) days