Exalted
| Exalted | ||
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| RPG published by White Wolf |
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| Rule System | Modified Storyteller System | |
| Authors | Geoffrey C. Grabowski, John Mørke, Holden Shearer, Robert Vance, Eric Minton | |
| First Publication | 2001 (1st edition) 2006 (2nd edition) 2013 (3rd edition) |
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Exalted is a role-playing game by White Wolf, Inc. currently gearing up for its third edition. It is well known for its epic scale, as far as story and mechanics, and allowing the players to participate in (and cause) epic events rather than simply being bystanders. Compare Legends of the Wulin
Brief Summary
Exalted is a game where one of your main antagonists is Death, Creator of the Underworld. Except there's several of him, probably six or seven. Oh, and he's got 13 dread henchmen, one of whom was probably you at some point in time. Also, Hell has a personal grudge against you this time.
Did I mention Magical America/China regularly trains and sends ninja-monks out for you personally? Ninjas specially trained in asskicking? Which, if they won't work, they keep giant colorcoded gundams and suit of power armor as backups.
Oh, and the Transformers have united under Unicron (who has robo-AIDS), and are invading because they have a shortage of souls.
The Jedi have corrupted Heaven and usurped your rightful place as the Masters of Everything - but nobody can remember them.
Your ex-wife just dropped by, and she's a two thousand year old shapechanging maneating monster now, interested in maybe going on a date next Thursday.
Your best friend from your last life -and while growing up- now seeks to cover all the lands of Middle Earth in darkness, if he can just find this damn ring.
Your God has the world's biggest crackhabit, and needs some serious rehab.
And the best thing is, in theory, you think you can fix everything!
Welcome to Creation, kid! Hope you've got enough Essence!
Backstory
Here's a history of the setting of Exalted, which may answer a bunch of questions and put things into perspective all at once.
Once upon a time, in the formless twisting chaos of the Wyld, there appeared the Primordials. The Primordials are impossibly vast alien beings with multiple souls. Imagine if Cthulhu was the size of Asia and you could meet and hold conversations with his major organs, which had separate identities, and you kinda get the idea.
“The formless chaos that spawned us sucks,” said the Primordials. “Let's build someplace cool to live, rather than hang out here!”
And so they did. They made Creation, and nailed it down with the Elemental Poles of Earth, Fire, Air, Water, and Heart Wood.
“This place isn't going to maintain itself,” said the Primordials. “Let's make a bunch of servants to run the place for us! We'll give them intelligence, free will, and hopes and dreams, and then keep them as slaves for eternity! It'll be great!” And so they made the gods. Some gods, such as the Unconquered Sun, Luna, and the Maidens, were built to be exceedingly cool and do lots; others were built to do stuff like make sure individual shrubs grew properly.
“Huzzah!” said the Primordials. “We have people to do the dirty work of running the place for us! Let's spend half our time playing the impossibly awesome Games of Divinity, and the other half screwing with the lives of our lessers!” And so they did.
“This sucks,” said the gods, after moving the Elemental Pole of Fire back into place for 700th time after one of the Primordials went on a drinking binge and knocked it loose, causing untold thousands of deaths and nearly causing Creation to fall back into the Wyld. “We should kill those assholes and take their stuff.”
“Ha ha!” said the Primordials. “You can't kill us! When we built you, we programmed you so you could never attack us! Suck it!”
Making of the Exalted
So the Unconquered Sun, who is the God of Awesome, came up with a plan. “Let's take those little mortal humans down there and give them incredible power. Then we can have them kill the Primordials, and then we can get at their Games of Divinity and play them ourselves!” So they developed Exaltations, which are sort of like an additional component to the human soul that lets you do magic and super kung fu. Then they picked out the coolest people in Creation and instilled these Essence Shards in them.
“Are you planning on using those Exalted mortals to kill my asshole brothers and sister and take their stuff?” asked Autochthon, who was just about the only Primordial on the side of the gods, because most of the time it was his stuff that the other Primordials were breaking when they ran amok. Plus they made fun of him all the time.
“Um... no,” said the gods.
“Gee, that's too bad. I was gonna hook them up with ultimate weapons of Primordial-slaying destruction, but since you're not rebelling and all...”
“Oh, in that case, yes. Yes, we are.”
Meanwhile, Luna, goddess of the moon, managed to sweet-talk her Primordial hippy sugar mama Gaia into not fighting during the rebellion. “I'll do that thing with my tongue,” Luna promised.
“We have granted you the power to be totally awesome!” said the gods to their Exalted. “Now, go kill those Primordial assholes!”
“Aww, isn't that cute,” said the Primordials. “Those little humans think they can OH SHIT THEY'RE STABBING ME OW OW OW!” Half of them died.
“Don't kill us!” said the other half.
“Now you have to be our slaves for forever, ha ha ha!” said the gods, and then sewed them all up inside the butt of the head Primordial, Malfeas. (Malfeas got turned inside-out and sewn into his own butt.)
“You guys suck,” said the Primordials to the Exalted. “We hereby curse you so that you'll all turn into assholes someday!”
“Whatever,” said the Exalted.
“Well, now that that's over,” said the Unconquered Sun, who had since declared himself King of All Cosmos, “Let's go play the Games of Divinity all day! You folks we Exalted, you guys can run the world. Make sure none of our lamer siblings start acting stupid. Make sure I get plenty of prayers coming my way. Other than that, have fun!”
“Hey, I feel kinda guilty for helping kill my brothers and sisters and enslaving the rest,” said Autochthon. “I'm going to leave Creation to go brood for a few thousand years.”
“Have fun!” said the gods.
So the Exalted – particularly the Solars – ran the world. Having been cool to begin with and then granted badassitude by the God of Awesome, they proceeded to do all sorts of cool stuff, like build magical cities out of glass, make mountains float, and breed dinosaurs who pissed heroin. YES, SERIOUSLY. THIS IS SOMETHING THAT HAPPENS IN EXALTED.
The Usurpation and the Immaculate Order
Eventually, though, the Solars got bored and jaded and full of themselves. “We killed the Primordials and made all this cool stuff. Everything we do must therefore be right. Let's run amok!” And so they did.
“This sucks,” said the Sidereals, whose job it is to make sure that the Loom of Fate, which is sort of the engine that runs Creation, doesn't crash. “At the rate they're going, they're gonna wreck Creation. Let's kill them and take their stuff!”
“Hey, we need your help,” the Sidereals said to the Dragon-Blooded, who were the least powerful but most numerous of the Exalted, who acted as lieutenants and aides and local governors and such. Secretaries, too. “Your asshole Solar bosses are gonna wreck the world. Can you help us kill them?”
“Figures they'd end up doing something like that. Sure, we'll help,” said the Dragon-Blooded.
“Come to our big dinner banquet!” said the Dragon-Blooded to the Solars. Then, when the Solars arrived, the Sidreals blew the place up, and trapped the Solar's Essence Shards in a magic cage so that no more Solars could be created.
“Yay it worked! Now we'll erase all evidence of our existence and run the world from behind the scenes, while the Dragon-Blooded can do the dirty work!” said the Sidereals, proving themselves to be the only people in the setting with basic pattern recognition.
Meanwhile, the ghosts of the dead Primordials caught 13 of the dead Solar's ghosts on the way down into the Underworld. “Work for us,” they said, “and we'll give you incredible power, like what you had when you were alive!”
“What's the catch?” asked the ex-Solar ghosts.
“Well, you have to be our slaves and try to make everything, everywhere, die forever.”
“Deal! Let's get cracking!” And so were the Deathlords were created, super-powerful ghosts who want the world to die.
Back in Creation, the Dragon-Blooded had a conundrum.
"Hey, what the hell, guys?" The people said. "Those Solar and Lunar guys were fucking awesome! Why the hell did you kill them?"
"Um..." The Dragon-Blooded said as they came up with a solution. Eventually, one of them said, "...Because they were DEMONS possessing mortals! Yeah, that's the trick!" And so the Immaculate Order was invented, a religion that almost everyone in the Realm follows, which paints all Celestial Exalted as evil "Anathema", demons that possess awesome people and turn them into cunning evil monsters. Wyld Hunts, groups of bored Dragon-Blooded, are sent out to kill Celestials and keep the status quo all status quo-y.
The Great Contagion and the Balorian Crusade
So while the Dragon-Blooded were doing a fairly good (although not nearly as impressive as the Solars) job of running Creation, the Deathlords were building a doomsday plague.
“Taste the bitter poison mixed from the ashes of our hopes and the tears of betrayal in the dark pit of our tortured souls!” said the Deathlords, presumably while wearing too much eyeliner, and unleashed their doomsday plague into Creation.
“This sucks,” said 90% of the living beings in the world, and died. Including plants.
“Hey,” said the Deathlords to the Fair Folk, who lived in the Wyld outside of Creation and didn't like the idea of a place that didn't just change according to their thoughts. “Just about everyone in there's dead now. If you went in, ate the souls of the survivors, and tore the place down, no one could stop you!”
“Thanks for the heads up!” said the Fair Folk, and promptly invaded in force.
“This is bad,” said one of the surviving Dragon-Blooded to her friends. “Fortunately, I just remembered that there's a sealed-off control center for an ultimate magical doomsday weapon that the Solars made for defending Creation against exactly this sort of thing. Let's go on an epic world-saving quest to get in there!”
“OK!” they agreed. Yes and they walked to the ore of dawn the next part of Xavier's Field.
And so they went. On the way, they came across a shitton of Lunars fighting the Fair Folk.
"Oh shit, Anathema! Let's fight!" One said. The Lunars rolled their eyes and kept fighting.
Another one said to them, "Hey, if you cover us, we can stop this whole thing, and then we'll pretend we never met you and keep feeding Creation the cock-and-bull-story about you being demons!"
"Deal." The Lunars said. And they bought the Dragon-Blooded time to get to the Imperial Manse.
Most of them died trying to get past the defenses, but eventually, two Dragon-Blooded finally made it to the control panel.
“Please insert soul to activate this device,” said the control panel.
“What does that mean?” asked one, and then the other shoved her into the soul-extraction device.
And so this unnamed Dragon-Blooded, through an act of supreme badassness, gained access to Creation's greatest magical weapons systems and used them to blow up the Fair Folk.
“I hereby declare myself the Scarlet Empress and ruler of the world,” she said.
“Nuh uh!” said some, until she blew them up. This brought lots more people over to her side, and thus was born the Realm, which is the major power in the world today.
Still, some said, “You were just a lieutenant who got lucky and stumbled across some doomsday weapons. We still have some doomsday weapons of our own, and we'll fight back!” The Scarlet Empress wanted to blow them up too, but a lot of her weapons didn't reach and she was kind of afraid of a Mutually Assured Destruction scenario, so, despite the occasional invasion attempt, they remained independent.
And so things went for over 750 years, until fairly recently, when the Scarlet Empress just up and disappeared. Having named no successor, the entire Realm is now leaderless and gearing up for civil war to see who's gonna be the next one of the Scarlet Throne. Right now, they've got this spineless bureaucrat warming the seat, but this guy is a total pussy who's basically being manipulated by whichever member of the shogunate is feeling power-hungry today. If you've seen Scrubs, imagine Ted with twenty-something Kelsos to suck up to.
Meanwhile, the Yozi discovered where the Sidereals has stashed their cage full of Solar shards. They told the Neverborn -the ghosts of their brothers and sister who said Solars killed- tantalizing them with the idea of the power of the tools that destroyed them. “Hey, we can warp those and use them to create our own invincible deathknights!” The deathlords pointed out. "We'll tell you where it is, just give us a third of what you find!" the Yozi promised, planning to reap the benefits if the plan succeeded and covering their asses if it didn't. “Deal, let's go get that cage!” Unfortunately for them (and fortunately for everyone else), half the Essence Shards got loose. Now, once again, there are Solar Exalted.
And that's where the game begins.
Important Elements
Exalted
Solar Exalted
The Solar's main themes are 'excellence' and 'rulership'. Solar Exalted were created by the Unconquered Sun, King of the Gods, to lead the other Exalted, and to rule the world. Most of their low-level powers are normal human abilities turned up to 11, like simply being impossibly good at sneaking, or fighting, or persuasion. Their high-power abilities are normal human abilities turned up to OVER NINE THOUSAAAAND!!! A mortal blacksmith can make a sword using iron and a hammer and forge--a Solar craftsman can take a heap of hematite, and wring a sword out of it with their bare hands, and it'll be a masterfully made one, too. A mortal can survive, at least for a little while, in a hostile environment, like a raging snowstorm. A Solar with the right Charms can survive being at the bottom of the ocean, or inside an erupting volcano. A mortal can use a sword to parry a sword-strike. A Solar can parry an angry Primordial hitting them with a mountain range. And so on. Solars also excel at inspiring and persuading others. Or, to be less polite, only the Fair Folk come anywhere close to their skill at jerking people around.
Lunar Exalted
Lunar Exalts are the chosen of Luna. After the Terrestrials murdered all the Solars, they then moved on to their second in command Lunar servants. Fortunately for the children of the moon, they had always been good with stealth and survival in the wilderness, unfortunately for them the Dragon Bloods were a very organized and driven genocidal force. The Lunars had no choice but to move into the borderlands between the Wyld and Creation and try to plan their resistance in secret. However the Wyld is not a nice place and the borderlands can mutate even Exalted with its touch. Thus three things have happened: The Lunars have taken to ritually tattooing themselves with moonsilver, the normal 5 caste system has been simplified into the Full Moon, No Moon, and Changing Moon castes, and almost all of them have acquired bestial traits either through their devotion to Luna or the Wyld mutations. Ergo Lunar Exalts are a race of furry demigods. But one should always remember what power the Exalted wield, telling a lion-man of the Full Moon to "yiff in hell" is almost always a horrible idea as he can rip you and thousands like you to pieces without even trying. Yet it is still totally worth it.
Sidereal Exalted
The Sidereals are the Chosen of the Maidens. To cover up their role in the Usurpation they broke the universe a little, and now everyone keeps forgetting that they exist. If they want to be remembered, they can use Resplendent Destinies, but then people remember the Destiny and not the person. If a certain Destiny is inconvenient or widely hated, the Sidereal can drop it and use another. In other words, Sidereals are anonymous 4chan users, and Resplendent Destinies are tripcodes.
They are also more crazy, but less powerful, when fighting than the Solar exalted. A battle with a Sidereal can result in you turning into a mountain, your opponent turning into a river, and then the two of you doing battle with the concept of love as a weapon. Sidereal Martial Arts are the pinnacle of kung-fu, and instead of emulating facets of Creation, they make Creation a facet of the Martial Art. This lets them punch people so hard they turn into ducks. Sidereals are also the only Exalts capable of manipulating the Loom of Fate directly, and are tasked with making sure it doesn't break down.
Abyssal Exalted
By twisting the Solar Exalted Essences in a Monstrance of Celestial Portion, the Neverborn managed to create the Abyssal Exalted. Abyssal Exalted don't suffer from the Great Curse, but instead suffer if they act too nice to people. They are also kept on a short leash, since the dead Primordials aren't exactly pleased with the Exalted. Generally an Abyssal has two choices in life, be the grand villain or attempt to redeem themselves. Both suck for obvious reasons.
Abyssal Exalted charms are largely mirrors of Solar Charms with a darker aspect. As a general thing, where the Solar Exalted gain bonuses, the Abyssal Exalted force penalties on their foes. Their magical material is Soulsteel, the forged souls of ghosts who live in constant pain (and moan and stuff too). They generally fall into one of a few categories; Emo dicks, giggling psychotic mass murderers, devoid of all redeeming qualities, and option A, hold the dickery. There is a part of their soul that is still a Solar and it keeps reminding them of all the bad shit they do, and lots of them use it to be even more emo.
Fortunately, if they run into their Lunar Bondmate, they don't HAVE to suffer if they act too nice to him/her/it and/or those around him/her/it, and if they DO get to the "redemption" stage (BIIIIIG if), they don't have to worry about that pesky Great Curse anymore.
Terrestrial Exalted
Terrestrials, also known as Dragon-Blooded, have a fitting name. They are the Exalts of the Five Elemental Dragons, souls of the Primordial Gaia. This gives them the ability to kill stuff with fire or their personal equivalent.
Since Terrestrials are the current bosses in Creation (with some secret aid from the Sidereals), their empire is the biggest single nation in the world and their state religion proclaims them to officially be the Best Thing Ever, they can freely go around and strut their stuff without being decried as Anathema, a term they invented themselves so that no other Exalts could strut their stuff. This in turn has a tendency to cause them to be enormous assholes. Also, when they use their magic a lot, they are liable to start burning or cause storms or other stuff that's less than safe for innocent bystanders.
The Terrestrials are soldiers. Like, all of them. They lean towards hierarchy, and even if not all of them fight, all of them could, and probably would if they were asked, contribute to a war effort. And the Realm is pretty much always at war in some area. Funny how that turns out.
Terrestrials take strength in numbers, and since their Exaltation is the only one that is inherited (Dragon-Blooded, remember?), family is very important to them. From this follows that the production of new family is also very important to them, so if a Terrestrial isn't trying to kill you, he's probably trying to sleep with you.
Alchemical Exalted
Basically robots. They work for Autochthon, also called The Great Maker, who is one of the last free primordials and has a bunch of people living in cities built inside of him. He's got Primordial robot cancer that's called Gremlin Syndrome, The setting is half "Void tainted"(no relation to the Underworld) or infected by Gremlin Syndrome, and the other half varies between Steampunk to Cyberpunk. As Alchemicals get more powerful, they get more and more like giant, inhuman robots until they turn into living cities.
Alchemicals are the only Exalted who require a soul that has demonstrated heroics worthy of Exaltation in many past lives. Given what's required to become one. Aside from that, then it could be worth noticing that Autochthon, being the guy who invented Exaltation, essentially made alchemicals as prototypes for all the other Exaltations. Orichalcum Alchemicals for Solars, Moonsilver for Lunars and so on. Even Abyssal Exalted are covered by the Soulsteel Caste, making you wonder if he anticipated death-themed Exaltations... Retconned in Second Edition, Abyssals weren't planned for and resonate with both Orichalcum and Soulsteel, but the question remains for what Autocthon planned to do with them, as well as Adamant Alchemicals that do not fit anywhere, and the later Infernal Exalted don't match any Alchemicals either. On the other hand, said Infernals resonate with ALL of the Alchemical Castes - whether it's because they're proto-Primordials or SCIENCE!/MAGIC!/EXALTED! is up for debate.
Infernal Exalted
The result of the Yozi's deal with the Neverborn to steal them some Solar exaltations, the Infernal Exalts are tasked with turning Creation into Hell so that the Yozi can escape their prison. This is easier said than done because, like their Abyssal cousins, literally every other faction in existence thinks this is a terrible idea. Infernal charms are actually their Yozi's charms, and thus follow strict thematic grouping. When an Infernal develops a custom charm their Yozi learns it as well, which allows individual Infernals to change their Yozi over time. They are also slowly becoming Yozis in their own right over time, though they have the potential to be far more awesome Primordials than the original Primordials ever were.
Infernal Exalted is a collective term used to refer to two types; Akuma and Green Sun Princes. Akuma are the result of the classic Faustian bargain, selling their soul and free will for unstoppable power. Green Sun Princes get the same powers, except they still have the option of flipping the bird at this whole Reclamation thing and running off to get coked out of their minds, and since Akuma don't have free will you'll usually be playing as the latter.
Some people will try to tell you that if you try to play an Infernal who is also a fundamentally decent character, you are doing it wrong. Those people are idiots. No one says you have to put heroes in an elaborate death trap, explain your plans to them at length, and then leave with a hearty evil laugh to bleed off Torment. The head of a major crime syndicate works just as well. Additionally, the potential to become an Über-primordial means that slipping the leash and gaining 'redemption' places you in the position of absolute power. You can become Armageddon, destroyer of all, Genesis, creator of worlds, or Über Gaia, mother/father/progenitor of everything. Dickhead, dispassionate weeder, or eternally-loving-and-benevolent Cthulu, those monikers become meaningless when you can make your soul/imagination a REALITY IN OF ITESLF.
Liminal Exalted
We don't know much about these ones. They've gotten scattered mentions in the second-to-last book of second edition, have some sort of interest in body parts, and are tied to the lands of the dead. They're also called "Chernozem", chosen of the black earth. Their Aspects apparently include Blood, Marrow, Flesh, Breath and Soil. They are on a quest to retain their Humanity.
And we're going to keep on waiting, since a new edition just got announced and it'll probably be years before they receive an official sourcebook.
Based on tentative things released with the Kickstarter, Liminals are the result of people trying to use rituals to bring back the dead (something impossible in Exalted). The Underworld meets the conductor of the ritual halfway and instead creates a whole new soul inside the corpse, which is the Exalt. Liminal Exalts are tasked with keeping restless spirits bound and down. They can collect and replace body parts to modify their skills, taking the legs of a legendary dancer, the arm of a swordsman, or the tongue of a master storyteller and making these abilities their own. Additionally, as long as a Liminal's brain is intact and they can access most of their original body's matter, they can recover from any injury.
Getimian Exalted
Apparently at some point a Sidereal looked up from his endless paperwork, realized saving the fundaments of reality every day was something that just wasn't going to end, and said WELL FUCK THAT and wandered off. He then proceeded to--in ascending order of badassitude, and perhaps sequentially--quit his job, declare war on heaven, and then recruit an entire type of Exalted to help, and they now regard him as their collective boss. They have some sort of crazy internal alchemy and have a miniature version of the machine that keeps reality running inside each one, thanks to colonies of pattern spiders that live in their spines. Drow, eat your hearts out.
And like the Liminals, that's about all we know until their hardback comes out.
Exigents
Discount Exalted. Basically, every god has the capacity to carve out some of their own power and then give it to a mortal as a permanent upgrade. This would probably result in all humanity being Exalted in short order given how literally every blade of grass has a god and everyone wants their own action figure, were it not for the Law of Dimishment-if you're going to make something that's going to be great and perhaps eternal, you have to permanently give it some of your own power. Hell, the first time the Sun set was when he made the Solars, and that was just stamping his name on the things Autocthon already made! This is often more than what lesser gods can take and what greater gods, being dicks, are willing to give up, hence why they're saved for emergencies. Once that happens though, they each get a custom Charmset, for a personal style of kicking ass.
And you guessed it, that's all we're gonna know until the hardback.
Gods
Creations of the Primordials. The Gods were meant to maintain Creation while their masters played the Games of Divinity. That didn't turn out so good.
Celestial Incarnae
These are the strongest deities in the setting by dint of their celestial nature, and led the other Gods into rebellion against the Primordials. They don't do much now except rubber stamp paperwork and maybe say hi to new Exalts every now and then, being utterly addicted to the Games of Divinity.
The Unconquered Sun
The Unconquered Sun, Ingus Divine, king of kings, lord of Yu-Shan and Chief God of War, is the greatest of the gods in Exalted, he is the God of Perfection. He is usually depicted as a shining four-armed warrior bearing in each hand a symbol of the virtues he exalts: a shield for compassion, a spear for valor, a branch for temperance, and a horn for conviction. The Solar Exalted are his Chosen, and he is the chief deity of the Dragon Kings. He's actually a pretty cool guy who has to make an effort to repress being compassionate, temperate, holding to his convictions, or being valorous. What that adds up to is a god who will always protect the innocent, never back down from a challenge, and will always hold true to his convictions...Except that he's currently majorly addicted to the GoD like all the other Incarnae. He's actually SO powerful that his shadow is, in and of itself, a god. Has a specialty in 'riding' Luna and Gaia, although the girls he keeps trying to marry are the Five Maidens.
Luna
Luna is either intensely cunning or utterly mad, or perhaps both. Some say she is a Fair Folk noble. Like the Wyld, she is malleable able to take whatever form pleases her. The Lunar Exalted are her Chosen, and she is Gaia's lover (but so is just about everyone else).
The Five Maidens
Originally created to service the Loom of Fate, these Five Maidens are likely most enigmatic of the Incarnae. The Five Maidens are, together, second in power only to the Unconquered Sun and about equal to Luna. Their Chosen are the Sidereal Exalted, champions and guardians of fate.
The Five Maidens are:
- Mercury, the Maiden of Journeys
- Venus, the Maiden of Serenity
- Mars, the Maiden of Battles
- Jupiter, the Maiden of Secrets
- Saturn, the Maiden of Endings
Elementals
Elementals are terrestrial spirits devoted to ensuring a small, local purview functions properly. They are also arranged into the Elemental Courts. There are five categories of Elementals (Air, Earth, Fire, Water and Wood) and numerous subdivisions there in. While numerous, each Elemental is a unique sentient being and has its place in Fate. Most Elemental beings are noticeably drawn from Earth mythology. (e.g. dragons, thunderbirds, ifrit).
Little Gods
Little Gods are the barely-aware deities of common objects. They interact with other little gods behind the scenes and generally ensure that things work properly. For example, a lumberjack goes to fell a tree: The axe's little god informs the tree's little god that it should probably fall down now. Usually it will, and the Loom of Fate makes a note of the fact and everything continues on its merry way. Other times, the tree doesn't fall (or fall in the right direction, or falls, say, purple) and the Bureau of Destiny might dispatch a Sidereal to figure out what the problem is.
Primordials
The Primordials made Creation from the infinite possibility of the Wyld. They are beings beyond measure, and composed of many subsidiary souls. They are defined by their Third Circle souls, and most importantly by their Fetich Soul (though it might be that they define their souls). During the Primordial War, those who lost all of their Third Circle souls died and became the Neverborn, while those who survived with some intact became the Yozis.
Neverborn
Slain during the Primordial war, they fell through the fabric of Creation and left Shadowlands in their wake. As they conceived of a state of 'not being', Oblivion was born. Similarly, their unconscious thoughts created the Underworld, now more static and unchanging to fit their ideals. Like all ghosts, the Neverborn have fetters to Creation and were unable to truly fall into Oblivion. In fact, as they created the world, they have the strongest fetters of all undead. They realized that the only way to achieve their goal of true death was to destroy their fetters, all of Creation. At first, they were more fearful of the Exalted than anything and half-asleep besides the fact. When the Black Nadir Concordat intruded into their tomb-cities and stole the secrets of Necromancy, they were roused to wakefulness and incredibly angry. Though dead, the Neverborn are still incredibly powerful and command hosts of Abyssal Exalts, Deathlords, Hekatonkhires, and Spectres.
Remember Tolkien's description of Sauron's fate at the end of Lord of the Rings? That's the Neverborn. The tragedy isn't that they're "dead", because beings that huge can't actually die - the very concept of Death is beyond them since they didn't build Creation to 'handle' them dying. The tragedy is that they're so obsessed with something they've already lost that they can't look past it. They're all caught in a permanent, inescapable angst-loop, and if any of them could just sit up and notice they could abandon their forms and go back to the Wyld. But instead, they sit and spiral further into their "we got our asses handed to us and now our favorite toy is gone" drain-circling, and the psychic emanation of their collective regret has created an entire Underworld for similarly-resonant souls to live out their own miserable pathos.
Unlike the Yozi, and unlike the truly Dead, the Neverborn are simply incapable of noticing anything that might free them from their eternity of navel-gazing. They have nothing left but self-hatred, and the desire to see everything else wind up even more screwed than they were.
No wonder the Ebon Dragon likes them so much.
Yozis
Those Primordials who survived the Primordial War were shoved inside the butt of their General/King, Malfeas (who was turned inside out and shoved into his own butt!). They then swore many oaths, some known only to the Unconquered Sun, for they are engraved into the haft of the Orichalcum spear he wields. The Yozis feel nothing but anger for their betrayal and diminution at the hands of the Exalted and the Gods, and plot to return the favour. The Yozi known as the Ebon Dragon (the Primordial responsible for the concept of Opposition: he created honesty so he could be dishonest, loyalty so he could be treacherous, and virtue so he could be its antithesis. In order to talk to you he has to turn himself into exactly what you personally most despise and fear. Not a nice guy!) has been tasked by his peers to find a way to escape from their prison. An unknown number of Yozi Cults also flourish in Creation, aiming to learn demonic practices and perhaps ultimately bring the true masters of Creation back to their world.
Akumas
An Akuma is a mortal or Exalt who has been granted a measure of power by an Yozi, but essentially becomes a puppet of that Primordial. While this sounds like a horrible trade, the Yozi are very convincing and some people are incredibly power-hungry. The first Akuma was a Solar Exalted, and the Yozi eagerly seek to turn more Exalted into Akuma. The Infernal Exalted (the 50 Solar Shards altered by the Yozis) are not technically Akuma.
Demons
The lower souls of the Yozis are called Demons now. Thanks to the terms of the Yozis' surrender, they can be summoned into Creation and ordered around. This is difficult for mortal occultists, since Demons can be very willful, but prepared Exalted sorcerers usually don't have too much of a problem with this. There are specific astrological condition required. For example, the strongest ones, Third Circle Demons, can only be summoned during a five day window called Calibration once a year. First Circle Demons are numerous and interchangeable, while Second and Third Circle Demons are unique.
Primordials (Who aren't dead or imprisoned)
Autochthon
Autochthon was the Primordial who created much of the technology and industry of Creation. Including the Loom of Fate that enforces causality in creation. He was not well regarded or well-treated by his peers and resented them greatly. During the Primordial War, he sided with the Gods and helped arm their Exalted. After the War, when asked to put a geas on his Mountain Folk, he worried the Exalted would turn on him next. Gathering up his loyal followers he departed Creation for Elsewhere, sealing the way behind him with the Seal of Eight Divinities.
Gaia
Gaia sat the war out, thanks to Luna's insistence. The Five Elemental Dragons are her primary sub-souls, and some say that the demesnes of Creation are as well. She is not often spoken of, and seems to have no agenda beyond leaving most of herself behind in heaven and then running around the wyld looking for 'answers'.
Others
Dragon Kings
The Dragon Kings are large lizard-like beings of great power, resembling dinosaurs. The Dragon Kings are sworn in allegiance to the Unconquered Sun, their creator. Before the time of the Exalted, the Dragon Kings ruled Creation and the mortals who dwelt there, but as the methods of Exaltation were crafted and improved they become obsolete in the gods' eyes. Think inca and aztec style biped dinuars. The Unconquered Sun used them as powerful servants to his chosen whom they served faithfully, honoring their Exalted brethren. After the First Age ended in war and disease, few survived. Their numbers grow slowly but steadily in the Second Age, though the once great Dragon Kings remain hidden in the furthest corners of Creation. Their most powerful stronghold would be the Aztec-flavoured Rathess, an ancient home filled with a variety of powerful artifacts made by the Dragon Kings in the glory days of the First Age. There are four types of Dragon Kings, each living in a direction of Creation; the graceful flying Pterok (North), the nimble and lithe Raptok (East), the powerful and loyal Anklok (South), and the clever amphibious Mosok (West).
Fair Folk
The Fair Folk are creatures composed of raw Essence, and inhabit the Wyld – the place that exists between the ordered Creation and pure Chaos. Inhuman and beautiful beings born from chaos, they feed on the dreams and aspirations of the inhabitants of Creation in order to give them strength and form in their own intermediate realm. (In other words, they EAT PEOPLE'S SOULS.) In essence, they are the "kissing cousins" of the Primordials; their territory having been pushed back when the Primordials formed Creation. They prey upon the dreams of mortals and do a brisk trade with the Guild (a powerful economic organization in Creation) in slaves... well, the souls of slaves.
The Raksha are divided into four castes: Diplomats, who favor the Staff Grace and the virtue of Conviction; Entertainers, who favor the Cup Grace and the virtue of Compassion; Warriors, who favor the Sword Grace and the virtue of Valor, and Workers, who favor the Ring Grace and the virtue of Temperance. Noble Raksha belong to two of the four castes, favoring the graces and virtues of both. There is also a fifth Grace, the Heart Grace, which is associated with identity and the trait of Willpower. Graces are differing outlets for the use of Essence and are similar to the suits of tarot. The most powerful of the Fair Folk are the Unshaped. Unlike the Raksha, the Unshaped are unable to survive within Creation for extended periods of time, each Unshaped is actually a symbiotic cluster of Fair Folk consisting of a single "guiding intelligence" and one or more "subsidiary intelligences" with no true form.
Being born from a place of fluid reality that resembles a Loony Tunes skit as much as it does creation, fair folk have difficulty functioning like "real" people. For one thing they suffer from "calcification", their natural unshaped forms are incompatible with creation's stagnant, static existence. Even when they take on a semi-real shape (as a Rakasha) they bleed essence while in creation and must feed on dreams and souls to keep themselves alive. Secondly a fair folk's emotions and virtues are entirely artificial, represented by their graces. When their phony identities break down they suffer from 'Bedlam'. This can have effects such as losing the ability to comprehend that other people aren't just figments of his imagination (conviction) or forgetting that he is capable of inflicting harm on others (valor).
Ghosts
Ever since the Neverborn's death broke the cycle of reincarnation, those who die with their business unfinished turn up as Ghosts in the Underworld. Ghosts have access to what they were buried/burned with (their grave goods) and are able to channel essence and learn ghost charms, called Arcanoi. Ghosts who settle their business can pass into Lethe as they should have and reincarnate. Those who give into the Whispers of Oblivion (usually by wandering the Labyrinth) turn into crazed Spectres intent on spreading the word of Oblivion by force. Their third option is to toss themselves into the Mouth of Oblivion and utterly cease to exist.
Deathlords
Ghosts of 13 First Age Solars who died during the Usurpation, they took the Neverborn's offer of real, ultimate power in exchange for promising to drop all of Creation into Oblivion. They are rather bitter and psychologically maladjusted from the Usurpation. Each one is pretty unique in their psychosis and plots. Some are making more headway than others. The Dowager's Great Contagion managed to kill 90% of all life in Creation, while the Mask of Winters has captured Thorns. Others have suffered rather embarrassing setbacks, and are dealt with harshly by their Neverborn masters. As may be expected, they like to fight and argue with each other a lot, which makes even some of their greatest successes a comedy of errors. The Great Contagion, as previously mentioned? Yeah, the only reason it only killed most of all life in Creation was because two other deathlords, The Eye and Seven Despairs and The First and Forsaken Lion, went out and invited the fair folk to invade Creation, which ended up uniting all of Creation against a common cause, and gave the world the strength and focus to endure the plague, plus it screwed enough with creation's reality that the plague stopped working right.
Hekatonkhires
These are ghosts of Behemoths or the Neverborn's Third Circle Souls. Occasionally the Neverborn's thoughts birth a new one. Hekatonkhires are unique and very powerful beings. Imagine undead cthulhu's zombie kidneys, as a roaming monster.
Mortals
Everyone else. Mortals are unable to channel essence and thus are at a severe disadvantage. While Exalted is largely a cinematic and epic game, it is grim and gritty for Mortals. Their only real advantage is numbers. The most prominent mortals, Humans, were created by the Primordials to provide prayer (and the subsequent ambrosia and quintessence) in Yu-Shan, and nearly all Exalted are of Human stock.
System
The basic mechanic is a modified Storyteller System. Pools of d10s are rolled; 7,8,9 count as one success, 10 counts as two successes. Successes are scaled against target numbers at a set difficulty against non PCs/NPCs. If no successes are rolled and at least one die comes up with a 1, then the roll is a botch (catastrophe ensues).
There are a few exceptions to these rules of success, however. Some Fate-based or Shaping-based effects can reduce the number needed to get a single success from a die. These won't come up unless you pull out the relevant splatbook, though.
Stunting: A way to mechanically allow players to use Rule of Cool as a game mechanic. How does it work? A player describes how their PC does an action. Depending on the degree of description, a 1 to 3 dice bonus is given to the roll. (1 dice bonus is incredibly common, 3 dice bonuses almost never given).
- +1 Bonus - Make an effort, try to do something cool. Be brief.
- +2 Bonus - Make a cool description that fleshes out the scenery a bit. Be brief.
- +3 Bonus - Make everyone at the table say you're awesome at describing things. Be brief.
Stunts can pretty much be done on any action, and don't necessarily have to follow the laws of physics. A good example of an athletics stunt would be the wallrunning in Prince of Persia games, while a combo in a fighting game might be a good example of a flurry stunt. But above all, make it short, snappy, and keep the flow of the game going.
See Also
- Errata and fan-made rules
- Blank Wikified Character Sheet
- Mystic Empyrean, a game with similarly epic-powered player characters.
External Links
- Official Exalted wiki
- Unofficial Exalted wiki, mostly 1e stuff
- List of Exalted games being run.