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Bitter Flower Style

This Style is made of equal parts sadness and exultation-in-beauty; its Charms are meant to inspire awe and defeat hope in the same motion.

Out in the world of the writers and players, this is intended to play very differently than a traditional Art; its various triggered effects and arbitrary Combos are intended to evoke the feeling of a video game.

Weapons and Armour

Bitter Flower Style is an unarmed and unarmoured Art.

Charms

Spring Strike

Cost: 2 motes

Duration: Instant

Type: Reflexive

Min. Martial Arts: 2

Min. Essence: 1

Prerequisite Charms: None

Moving like the rainclouds of spring, recovering faster than can be expected, the martial artist adds her Martial Arts to her next turn's initiative. This Charm can only be used once per turn. This Charm may be used supplementally, in conjunction with an attack. In this case, if the attack deals HLs of damage to the opponent, then add the number of HLs dealt to the adept's next-turn initative as well. The Martial Arts initiative bonus is available regardless of the result of the attack.

Summer Strike

Cost: 3 motes

Duration: Instant

Type: Supplemental

Min. Martial Arts: 3

Min. Essence: 1

Prerequisite Charms: Spring Strike

Sunlight passes unhindered through the scattered clouds of summer! In the same way, the unarmed Martial Arts attack the adept makes deals piercing damage.

Autumn Strike

Cost: 5 motes

Duration: Instant

Type: Supplemental

Min. Martial Arts: 4

Min. Essence: 2

Prerequisite Charms: Summer Strike

Reaching out with the crying sorrow of the season where all things come to a close, the adept pulls her opponent's heartstrings. In addition to inflicting physical injury, she may transfer one of the opponent's Virtue dots to another of his Virtues. It is possible to exceed the natural maximum in this manner! Transferred Virtues flow back at a rate of one point per day; heroic victims are able to force themselves back into their own personalities by engaging in activities that satisfy their Nature. Instead of gaining Willpower points, they may reset Virtues. Transferring Virtues does not have any effect on Essence pools, but it may make spiritual Charms impossible to use.

Mango Flower Gesture

Cost: 2 motes

Duration: Instant

Type: Supplemental

Min. Martial Arts: 3

Min. Essence: 2

Prerequisite Charms: Spring Strike

Many forbidden trysts are held beneath the flowering branches of the mango tree, which is said to be privy to secrets of the heart. In the same way, the Mango-Blossom Gesture unlocks the things hidden in a warrior's mind. With a successful unarmed Martial Arts attack, the martial artist learns something that his opponent would prefer he not know. Generally, this is a tactical weakness of his, but with a difficulty 3 Perception + Compassion roll, the adept can extract something deeper, like a repressed romantic longing. For the purposes of Charms of this Style only, regard this Preception roll as an unarmed Martial Arts attack.

Trampled Flower Heart Movement

Cost: 4 motes

Duration: Instant

Type: Reflexive

Min. Martial Arts: 4

Min. Essence: 2

Prerequisite Charms: Mango Flower Gesture

Tumbling to the earth, the adept's helpless gesture arouses pity in her enemies. The difficulty of the next attack against her is increased by the attacker's Compassion. This need not be a motion of martial combat; the Charm is just as efficacious against character assassination and refutations of arguments.

An opponent can spend 1 Willpower Point to escape the effect of this Charm; in this case, the outflowing of sympathy affects the next attack after the one the opponent makes.

White Jasmine Flower Fist

Cost: 5 motes

Duration: Instant

Type: Supplemental

Min. Martial Arts: 4

Min. Essence: 2

Prerequisite Charms: Spring Strike

The scent of jasmine can be used to distract as well as decieve. With this mudra, the martial artist makes the target remember fragrant springs of his youth. This Charm supplements an unarmed Martial Arts attack. If it is successful,she may sacrifice any number of dice from its raw damage pool; this creates a reflexive secondary attack with Accuracy equal to twice the number of dice sacrificed. We refer to this attack as the "Jasmine attack". Consider this a subsidiary effect of the primary attack; it cannot be blocked or dodged, but an effect that perfectly avoids the damage of the prime will avoid the deleterious effects of the Jasmine attack as well. Each success on the Jasmine attack represents 1 turn of entrancement. During each turn of entrancement, the target must spend at least 1 action in contemplation of lost love. When the number of actions spend in contemplation equals the number of successes, the Jasmine effect is ended. While entranced, non-contemplation actions taken in a turn may never exceed (by any means) the number of entranced actions taken. The target can opt to spend more than 1 extrancement action in a turn, reducing the total number of turns by 1 for each additional action, but only if he makes the maximum allowable number of non-entrancement actions. This effect is able to contravene the effects of Extra Actions Charms; the victim may explicitly use an extra action as an entrancement action.

In situations where the target's life is not threatened, each turn of entrancement expands to fill a full minute, and the afflicted may not take multiple simultaneous entrancement actions. He is able to assess threats to his life intelligently, however.

Jasmine Incense Movement

Cost: 5 motes

Duration: Instant

Type: Reflexive

Min. Martial Arts: 4

Min. Essence: 3

Prerequisite Charms: White Jasmine Flower Fist

As she retreats, a cloud of fragrant dust rises from the adept's footsteps, confusing her opponents. She vanishes, and the next person wishing to attack her must devote a dice action to a standard-difficulty Wits + Awareness roll in order to locate her. This reveals the adept's location if the subsequent attack is hand-to-hand and rolls at least 1 success. If the attack is ranged or rolls zero successes, then she remains concealed. For the purposes of defensive Charms in this Style, consider the Wits + Awareness location roll an attack.

Offended Inflorescence Stance

Cost: 7 motes (1 Willpower)

Duration: One Scene

Type: Supplemental

Min. Martial Arts: 5

Min. Essence: 3

Prerequisite Charms: Trampled Flower Heart Movement, Jasmine Incense Movement

The adept puts on the upset expression of a rare lotus whose lake is being overrun by weedy papyri, collapsing into this Stance as she performs a Martial Arts action. This subtle vegetal hauteur puts a biting edge on her attacks; whenever an opponent suffers HL damage from one of her attacks or wards it away with a perfect defence, he loses credibility in the eyes of others, and must succeed at an Appearance + Presence roll at a difficulty of the martial artist's Essence, or recieve a -1 penalty to the next (adept's Martial Arts) Social rolls he makes during the scene. In addition, the adept adds 1 die to Martial Arts attacks against opponents for each temporary Virtue dot they have. (Temporary Virtue dots can be acquired through the effects of certain Charms.) The adept cannot add more than her Dexterity + Martial Arts to an attack in this manner.

This Charm instantly ends if the adept adopts the Unassailably Germinating Stance. The first time it is activated in a scene, it costs an additional 1 Willpower. This Charm can be reflexively ended whenever the adept takes a Martial Arts action.

Rose-Flower Fist

Cost: 2 motes

Duration: Instant

Type: Supplemental

Min. Martial Arts: 3

Min. Essence: 1

Prerequisite Charms: Spring Strike

A vine festooned with thorns makes an effective whip! The unarmed Martial Arts attack enhanced by this Charm is particularly painful; if the attack deals at least 1 HL, for as many turns as the adept's Essence, double the victim's wound penalty.

Rose-Among-Irises Defence

Cost: 3 motes

Duration: Instant

Type: Supplemental

Min. Martial Arts: 4

Min. Essence: 2

Prerequisite Charms: Rose-Flower Fist

The rose understands that the best way to be safe among the weak is to be dangerously strong! The martial artist understands this as well, and puts on a threatening front; she may roll her Appearance + Conviction in conjunction with making an unarmed Martial Arts attack. Her opponents must put on a similar show of valor before they resume the attack; any opponent may roll Appearance as a dice action. Until they accumulate as many successes as the adept, it is unthinkable to attack her; no enemy with Virtues who witnessed the adept's display will do so. Virtueless opponents may attack normally.

Repeated applications of this Charm do not stack, but rather, they set the counter to the larger number of successes. Each turn, reduce the number of accumulated successes required by 1 as though the opponent had made a single success on an Appearance roll.

For purposes of Charms in this Style that affect unarmed Martial Arts attack pools, regard the Appearance + Conviction roll as one of these, but the adept may apply the effects of any particular Charm only to one of the two rolls associated with the attack. For instance, if Rose of Hate and Glory is attacking her nemesis Cynis Denovah Avaku, upon whom she has placed 4 temporary Virtue dots, while she is using the Offended Inflorescence Stance, then she may add 4 dice to her Appearance pool and 0 dice to her Dexterity pool. or vice versa. If she is also under the effects of a 16-mote Blade of the Battle Maiden, then she may add 12 dice to the Dexterity pool and 0 to the other, or 8 to Dexterity and 4 to the other, since that Charm specifically affects only Dexterity + Martial Arts pools.

White Chrysanthemum-Branch Gesture

Cost: 3 motes

Duration: Instant

Type: Supplemental

Min. Martial Arts: 3

Min. Essence: 3

Prerequisite Charms: Spring Strike

Arranging her fingers in the White Chrysanthemum mudra permits the adept to awaken beauty in her opponent's heart. If the unarmed Martial Arts attack this Charm supplements has at least one success that the target does not dodge, then he must spend 1 Willpower Point or gain one temporary Virtue dot, chosen at random. This does not affect his Essence pools or his ability to use Charms. Temporary Virtue dots fade at the end of the scene.

Branch-Cutting Gardener Defence

Cost: 2 motes

Duration: Instant

Type: Supplemental

Min. Martial Arts: 4

Min. Essence: 3

Prerequisite Charms: White Chrysanthemum-Branch Gesture

The Exalt makes a sweeping, circular attack that cuts a cleared space around her. This Charm supplements an unarmed Martial Arts attack; the martial artist adds successes equal to the number of successes rolled on the attack to the next parry she makes. These successes are available reflexively; if she is able to parry an attack but has no action to do so, she may use the successes independently.

Unassailably Germinating Stance

Cost: 7 motes

Duration: Instant

Type: Supplemental

Min. Martial Arts: 4

Min. Essence: 3

Prerequisite Charms: Rose-Among-Irises Defence, Branch-Cutting Gardener Defence

Like the weed whose roots cannot ever be eradicated completely, constantly producing shoots from unexpected places in the earth, the adept seems to be able to reach every place at once. It is almost as though she had unlimited numbers of arms! When she activates this Charm in conjunction with a Martial Arts action, she gains as many 'hanging' counterattacks (as per Solar Counterattack) as her Martial Arts + Valor; these function in a manner similar to the hanging parries of the Protection of Celestial Bliss. With these, she may attack any opponent she can reach when he spends a Willpower point, with her Martial Arts score plus applicable bonuses. In other words, her full offensive pool, minus Dexterity. She may only counter once per Willpower point expended. The adept may not use these hanging counterattacks while she stands in the Offended Inflorescence Stance; she may retain at one time as many counterattacks as her Martial Arts + Valor.

While the adept retains hanging counterattacks, the Essence required for this Charm remains committed, but the adept can choose to decommit the Essence and forego the reserved counters if she so chooses.

Bitter Flower Form

Cost: 7 motes

Duration: One Scene

Type: Simple

Min. Martial Arts: 5

Min. Essence: 3

Prerequisite Charms: Offended Inflorescence Stance, Unassailably Germinating Stance, Autumn Strike

Entangling her Essence with that of the earth, the Bitter Flower master can fight with bewildering speed and flexibility. Whenever she activates a Charm of the Bitter Flower Style, she may simultaneously invoke the effects of any number of other Charms of the Style, subsuming their activations within one Charm activation, as long as the Charms collectively satisfy the following conditions:

• No Charm's name shares a word with any other Charm's name.
• All Supplemental Charms are able to affect the same type of action.
• Any Reflexive Charms may be used regardless of what actions they affect, but must still satisfy the first condition.

Add the costs of these to the cost of the original Charm. In addition, the adept can inflict and block lethal damage unarmed, without a stunt.

Dead Branches Winter Contemplation

Cost: None

Type: Special

Duration: Permanent

Min. Martial Arts: 5

Min. Essence: 4

Prerequisite Charms: Bitter Flower Form

This Charm is an expansion of the Bitter Flower Form. It gains the following effect:

• Winter Strike: When activating this Charm, the adept may choose a Virtue and pay an additional mote. This makes her attacks reinforce that Virtue! When she performs a Charm of this Style with "Strike" in the name, if the attack is successful and the target is acting against that Virtue, he loses 1 Willpower. She must choose to add to this Virtue when using Autumn Strike.

Wilted Petals Drifting Understanding

Cost: None

Type: Special

Duration: Permanent

Min. Martial Arts: 5

Min. Essence: 4

Prerequisite Charms: Bitter Flower Form

This Charm is an expansion of the Bitter Flower Form. It gains the following effect:

• Pressed-Flower Preservation Gesture: When activating this Charm, the adept may choose a Virtue and pay an additional mote. This makes her attacks resound with that Virtue's influence! When she performs a Charm of this Style with "Gesture" in the name, the maximum Attribute+Ability pool the target may parry the attack with is his rating in that Virtue. This limits standard actions, as well as the reflexive pools created by such Charms as Fivefold Bulwark Stance and Dipping Swallow Defence, but does not hinder explicitly purchased dice such as those acquired through use of the Golden Essence Block. This Charm overrides the random effect of the White Chrysanthemum-Branch Gesture, causing it to always add to the chosen Virtue.

Backward-Turning Calendar Meditation

Cost: None

Type: Special

Duration: Permanent

Min. Martial Arts: 5

Min. Essence: 4

Prerequisite Charms: Bitter Flower Form

This Charm is an expansion of the Bitter Flower Form. It gains the following effect:

• Halting Procession of Seasons Fist: When activating this Charm, the adept may pay an additional mote. This pulls her attacks through time more slowly; they become flowers that do not wilt! When she performs White Jasmine Flower Fist, she adds her Essence to the Jasmine attack pool. When she performs Rose-Flower Fist, she doubles the duration of its wound-penalty increasing effect.

Bitter White Rose-and-Mango Heart-Cutting Incense Strike

Cost: 5 motes, 1 Willpower

Duration: Instant

Type: Simple

Min. Martial Arts: 5

Min. Essence: 5

Prerequisite Charms: Dead Branches Winter Contamplation, Wilted Petals Drifting Understanding, Backward-Turning Calendar Meditation

This attack is suffused with the bitterly hopeless scent of wilted flower petals littering the rain-sodden earth. It causes the victim to lose 1 Willpower point if the attack is successful. If the victim has 0 Willpower when he suffers this fate, instead he falls in love with the adept, gaining the True Love Merit and Follower Nature with reference to her. This has all the social and behavioral implications of these traits' natural presence. Heroic beings may throw off this transformation by restoring their full complement of Willpower Points and indulging in an act that satisfies their normal Nature. Each Nature-indulging act permits a Willpower roll at standard difficulty; once the hero has accumulated as many successes as the adept's Essence, he returns to his true self.

Comments

That was... odd. There are a lot of things in this style that are called "attacks" and some of them seem to be resolved as attacks... but it is unclear whether they are, in fact, normal attacks (doing damage and such) in addition to whatever other effects they have. Mango-Blossom Gesture would be a good example of this. -szilard

Heh. The intention is that all these effects take place in addition to a normal, damage-dealing attack. - willows

Under Bitter Flower Form, which of the following has priority:

1. No Charm's name shares a word with any other Charm's name.
2. All Supplemental Charms are able to affect the same type of action.
3. Any Reflexive Charms may be used.

- because they cannot all be true? Can you use Spring Strike (reflexive, so yes?) and Summer Strike ('strike' is shared, so no?) together? If yes, you should probably separate out the reflexive bit and call that an exception. - s

Oh, silly me. That third condition needs to be elaborated to make sense. Fixed. - w

So... is there any particular reason you made this so pre-form heavy? I can understand wanting to keep the individual Charms less powerful (because once you get the form, you tend not to use them individually). It seems, though, that you could have stuck some of the Charms that are particularly nice in combinations after the Form without a problem... which would encourage people to learn up to the Form Charm. As it is, no one is likely to dabble in the MA. - szilard

Mostly, it is because the Charms are designed to work properly only when the form is running anyway, and I didn't see a better way to shape the tree. As it stands, I think that the early Charms have enough cool interactions that you will want to at least get the two Stances before giving up the Style; there are some ugly strategies in there that you can take advantage of that only consist of two or three subtly synergistic Charms. Look at the way the "forced" Willpower expenditures of Trampled Flower Heart Movement and White Chrysanthemum-Branch Gesture work with Unassailably Germinating Stance, for instance. - willows

In a later version of the Style, the three 'thinking about previous Charms again' Charms were added post-Form.

Okay, folks. While I'm fairly comfortable with the mechanics for these Charms, I have deep niggling doubts about their prerequisite numbers and activation costs. If someone would be so kind as to look them over, I'd be really grateful. - willows

Well willows these are my suggestions for this style. I hope it helps you out!

Summer Strike - should be higher up the tree and have a mote cost of 4 or 5 instead of 3

Autumn Strike - I'm thinking postform on this one, and it should cost a willpower. Transferring someones virtues around is a very powerful thing usually not seen outside of sidereal ma's

Let's call all the Charms of this Style post-form for balancing purposes, and see where that gets us. I'm not sure I agree with you on this Willpower cost, as the effect is quite temporary. I'll meet you in the middle with 5 motes.

Mango Flower Gesture - another to add post form. Also it needs some mechanic for the "Tactical weakness" usually found by the charm. The secondary effect should be able to be used once the form is up (again very powerful- I hit you, and now I can blackmail you)

Basically, I disagree. Mango Flower Gesture is deliberately non-mechanistic about the tactical weakness it uncovers because, basically, there are a great wealth of things that it could apply to, and I wanted to leave the Charm wide open so that it can be used to reveal things as diverse as, "this fey is Lured to protect endangered maidens" and "this Exalt does not have a persistent dodge."

Trampled Flower Heart Movement - 3Motes and a willpower (it's wicked nasty because it an all purpose defense mental,social, and physical)

In my opinion, the 'redirect to next in line' effect is a strong enough weakness that it takes this out of the Willpower realm. 4 motes.

White Jasmine Flower Fist - ??? it needs to be reworded to make it clearer, but i'm suggetsing that it cost 8motes or so or 5motes and a WP.(forcing your opponent to split actions is powerful and should be expensive)

Reworded in detail. White Jasmine Flower Fist and its related Rose-Among-Irises Defence are intended to cut away opposition from extras, while slowing down Exalted without costing them severely in terms of resources. The Jasmine effect is sort of distracting for Exalted, but a -2 to an attack pool isn't crippling by any means.

Jasmine Incense Movement - how long does it last if people keep missing the martial artist? The flavor text, and the Duration indicator don't quite mesh. Until I understand this charm a little better I can't think of a thing.

It lasts until she is found by a hand-to-hand attack.

Offended Inflorescence Stance - Wow!! This is a post form charm if i have ever seen one. It's a scene long reflexive, and it adds to attack passively....hmmmmm.7Motes 1Willpower and 1Bashing health level. I like the effect though.

Supplemental now! The Stances should require MA actions to activate them.

Rose-Flower Fist - Nice!! This charm is actually overcosted 2 or 3 motes should be enough for this charm, and it's placement on the tree is perfect.

Rose-Among-Irises Defence - A virtually perfect defence should be a Lot more than just 3Motes!! Think about it the opponents most likely to be unaffected by this charm are not primary combatants. So IMHO this charm should have a Willpower cost and possibly a mote cost of 6 or so.

Virtually perfect defence? Stall tactic, maybe. This Charm doesn't save you from attacks that actually occur, only prevents them from happening. In other words, it doesn't have a perfect's ability to drain resources away from attackers effeciently.

White Chrysanthemum-Branch Gesture - 5Motes should be enough to power this charm it is subtle, but it has tremendous potential for abuse. Also IMHO belive that it should be a simple charm.

We'll call it 3 motes. White Chrysanthemum-Branch Gesture is designed so that it's actually useful for the target—it makes channelling more efficient, for instance, and can restore some of the damage Autumn Strike causes—until you break out the appropriate offensive Stance.

Branch-Cutting Gardener Defence - Excellent charm, but I think it needs to be recosted at 2Motes. As it needs an attack to be made in the first place it limits it's availablity, and flexiblity.

Unassailably Germinating Stance - Due to it's instant duration and non-Instant use I think the point cost should be a little higher, probably 6 or 7Motes maybe even 8. A Mote cost of 6-8 is easily "stunted" away so this shouldn't be a problem for the charms use or application. Hell free counter-attacks makes it easy to get back just stunt on your counter- attack.

Unassailably Germinating Stance is probably a little crazy with uncommitted Essence; let's change that.

Bitter Flower Form - As unusual as it is it's costed right IMHO. Nice Form! I'm thinking of using the Idea or some derivative of it in a charm tree of my own.

Bitter White Rose-and-Mango Heart-Cutting Incense Strike - Great pinnacle charm!! It needs to get a higher cost because of it's long duration, (and again uncommited motes) and it potentially disatorous outcome of it's success. So my suggestion for this charms cost is 10Motes with one commited until the subject frees himself and 1Willpower. - Issaru

I disagree again, as the Charm needs to be applied repeatedly to have any reliable effect.

Thanks for all the detailed comments! I appreciate the help. - w

No problem! IMO this is what the Wiki is all about. It's the never-ending sorcebook, and the best part is that we all get a chance to help create it! - i

What would make this tree really beautiful, imo, is if there were some secondary/tertiary bits of lower level Charms that could - in rather specific circumstances - be used to drain Willpower from a target more efficiently than the pinnacle. This could lead to great moments of synergy... and, if the circumstances were designed well, some truly lovely stunting and roleplaying opportunities. - s

I think that sounds way fun. What kinds of circumstances were you having in mind? - w

An example off the top of my head: If you use Autumn Strike to increase a Virtue that the target is currently acting against, the target must either immediately spend a Willpower point to surpress the Virtue or discontinue her action. - s

szilard, that sounds way cool. I think I'll sit down and try to come up with effects like that for all seven basic attack modes! - willows

This was the root of the three non-ultimate mastery Charms.

Ok. This style is a lot clearer after the edit. Still a lil powerful, but from what i'm getting from it, it's supposed to be up there in terms of power . After sitting down and rereading this style (post edit) I think it's pretty balanced. I tend to be kinda harsh when costing charms (bad experience with a cheese player). Nice work! glad i could help. BTW i'm so gonna steal the idea for post-form form enhancing charms (god thats a mouthfull), cause it's one hell of a good idea. - Issaru

- willows