Difference between revisions of "Thus Spake Zaraborgstrom/TranscendentHatchetOfFate"

Latest revision as of 20:16, 12 June 2010

rebeccaborgstrom - 11/18/2003 17:32:25

For a PC, there's an escape hatch: since fate planning changes all the time, and since demons and others mess regularly with the tapestry of fate, you can escape your destiny by . . . well, escaping your destiny.

Imagine that you're shown: YOU WILL BE KILLED BY YOUR FIRSTBORN DAUGHTER.

There's really nothing you can do about this, per se. You can't say "I won't have kids." If you do, then you're inviting fate to show you why you're going to have a kid. Anything from already having a daughter (say, a Sidereal Exalt you've forgotten about) to falling in love *hard* with someone who'll die unless they have a child to someone casting a spell that buds a clone off of you. It's considered rude to make a female PC pregnant without the player's consent, but there are so many other possibilities for an enterprising Storyteller! (Including, er, getting the player's consent.)

Similarly, you can't have a kid and then say "Now I kill this child." Greek legends show you what kind of thing happens here. You may even find yourself in Limit Break during childbirth, and heaven only knows what'll happen then.

What *can* happen, however, is that when the child shows up fifteen years later to kill you for some reason or other, you have a chance to survive, just due to the way fate changes over time. The miniscule odds of survival jump by an order of magnitude if you're an Essence channeler, by another if you're a PC, and by a third if other people are trying to help. You get all three, and you're back up to the default level for something intended to be a serious horrible but beatable challenge in the game.

Rebecca

Rebecca Borgstrom:

The Charm says that "the character simply states what is preordained."

It also says that "the player chooses a fate . . . he finds dramatically interesting."

So there is no Charm in the book that gives a Sidereal character the power to name any fate he wants.

There is only a Charm that allows a Sidereal's player to name any fate he wants, subject to Storyteller veto.

This is specifically so that, when you encounter Acrisius, and he is mouthing off and defying the celestial order, and you show him your palm, instead of:

ACRISIUS: Ha! I laugh at all the gods!
PLAYER: Eat Transcendent Hatchet! What's the worst thing that's going to happen to him?
STORYTELLER: Um, he's going to get gout and lose one leg. I don't know. I didn't expect you'd Transcendent Hatchet him.
SIDEREAL: *displays palm* ACRISIUS! This is your doom! You shall get gout!

You instead have the Sidereal going, all groovy,

ACRISIUS: Ha! I laugh at all the gods!
SIDEREAL: *shows palm*
ACRISIUS: *pales*
SIDEREAL: Hear me, Acrisius! You say that your house can rival the gods? It cannot even stand on its foundations. Your daughter's belly swells with the child Perseus; and he shall murder you in twenty years' time.

It's 5am. It's not great art. But it's still better than the Greek tragedy about gout.

If you can't use the Charm without forcing the Storyteller to veto you constantly because you're using the player-determined special effects as the Charm's primary combat effect, don't take that Charm! It's no more or less problematic than declaring HGD no matter what happens to you, such as, "The merchant is charging you a full talent for the shipment. You think it might be a bit overpri---"

"HGD!"

"No, that's not how you use---"

"HGD! I won't hear your lies, Storyteller! They can't penetrate my HEAVENLY GUARDIAN DEFENSE!"

"Okaaaay."

I recognize that in some games it's really hard to separate IC and OOC motives, because the ideas that will *occur* to you for great fates are always going to be "this will be great for the PCs" or "this will suck for us, but it's cool." And that's okay. I mean, specifically okay. But . . . honestly, one reason fate is cool because of the fate ninjas who show up and tell people like Acrisius just *why* he is doomed, and even if the characters don't get to control that coolness, the players should.

There are, incidentally, cases where 'the fate I show you is you dying from a heart attack because I showed you the fate of you dying with a heart attack and the shock was too much' is perfectly dramatically appropriate.

For, you know, the kind of person for whom it's perfectly reasonable that that's preordained, barring someone stopping it. You know. Valor 1 Essence 1 mortals. Extras. And such.

I mean, sure, pulling a fast one with this Charm on a newbie, tired, inattentive, or trusting Storyteller is easier than for HGD. Unintentional misuse is also easy. If that is the substance of your complaint, I would accept its merit.

Rebecca

Chosen Of Luna

But, my problem is the part of the charm that says that nothing the victim does can change their fate. That unless the bureau changes its plans or creatures outside of fate interfere, it will come to pass, no matter what. This is the part of the charm that bothers me the most. It just doesn't fit with what the rest of the book tells us about fate.

Rebecca Borgstrom:

Yes, Chosen of Luna, it is much more strongly worded than any other fate effect in the book.

There's a couple of reasons for that, but mostly it's that "this is your inevitable fate, unless you use Essence or a stunt sometime before it comes to pass" felt impossibly lame. ^_^

It's still set up on the knowledge that "some god, creature outside of fate, or Loom issue deriving from the use of Essence somehow affects you" is all but a given---that, in practice, any time the dice and game events diverge from prophecy, it's because someone did something somewhere, and when they don't, things happen because the Sidereals knew they would all along.

In short, that it only actually comes true if the group as a whole thinks it should, with some rare exceptions both ways.

But, yah, even though it has the exact same game effect as "it's just a fate, changeable as any other," it's terrifyingly powerful in its implications, and I am mildly guilty about that side of things. ^_^

Rebecca

Chosen Of Luna

Thanks, Rebecca, for taking the time to reply.

I do admit that I am still somewhat confused at to what the power scope of this charm is meant to be.

If the Sidereal is just showing someone what destiny already has in store for them, then isn't that implying that destiny is always an omnipotent force (save for outside interference)?

If so, then why is it that essence users are said to be able to alter fate?

I always pictured it kind of like people are floating down a steam on logs. If you just go with the flow, the river will take you where it will. But, if you paddle really hard, at the right time, you might be able to stear yourself a different course.

Of course, an essence user has a bigger paddle and a stronger arm, giving him greater sway over his course and direction in life. Some essence users get so powerful in their ability to paddle that they barely notice the river at all. And to make matters more complicated, individuals can link their rafts together, paddle together, making their control over their own fates even more likely.

The Sidereals and Gods are what influence the flow and currents of the river, but its the individuals who choose whether or not to paddle. And depending on how strong they are, how strong the current is against them, depends on whether someone is able to alter their fate or not. A Solar, Lunar, DB, mortal, etc paddles on his log. A Sidereal, on the other hand, attempts to adjust the course of the river.

The Sidereals can attempt to predict how things will turn out by watching the position of the logs and calculating how they will probably travel, taking into account the water currents. But they aren't always correct because they might underestimate a person's ability to change their own course, which can also affect others.

The Sidereals can even attempt to adjust the flow, strength, and direction of the currents, attempting to move fate the way they desire (modifying target nubers). But even a strong nudge doesn't guarantee that the river can overpower the roawboat, only makes it more likely. A Sidereal may even want to help someone stear the course they have chosen to take, and alters the currents to assist him. But still, there is no guarantee the individual will succeed.

And then of course, there's the creatures outside of fate who aren't even on the river at all, but instead fly above it. Fate doesn't even know they are there at all, though they can still swoop down and mess things up. But even though they can interfere with fate very easily, it's inconcievable to me to think that they are the only ones who can.

A Sidereal might decide to make a farmer's crops flourish, so he lowers the TN of his agriculture rolls. But this wouldn't really matter if the farmer decides to quit his profession and move to a different town. Then the Sidereal arranges for events to occur to discourage the farmer from leaving. He makes it more likely he will fall in love with one of the girls in town. He might make the rest of the town's people view him somewhat more favorably, making them more nice to him. He could have an avalanche on the main road block his passage. But in the end, if the farmer is stubborn enough, he might just manage to get away.

This is how I view fate manipulation. It's subtle. It's nudging. That's a far cry from a Sidereal simply stating that the farmer will stay in town and have a good harvest, and the farmer midlessly obeying. There's nothing subtle about that. That's omnipotence. And omnipotence isn't fun.

So which perspective of fate is correct? Do people have somepower over their lives (small or great as it may be), or is everyone who is unfortunate not to be a Sidereal, Greater God or Creature Outside of Fate merely swept up in the stream and helpless to act against it?

Perhaps I misunderstood just how powerful destiny is meant to be in this game. I had always been more comfortable with it being something that isn't set in stone, and that what my characters accomplish is a little more meaningful then "just what the Sidereals and their planning commities had intended all along."

If so, then I must say that Solars, being nothing but helpless dupes, really have no power whatsoever at all. And considering that, I have no idea why the Incarna would be even the least bit concerned with a potential Solar coup de tat. The Unconquered Sun could just sic the Maidens on them and ensure that they would fail.

Rebecca Borgstrom:

Don't panic. ^_^

Fate is just causality. It's just the rules Creation has for determining what happens next.

That's all.

There's no river. There's no force. There's just a bunch of gods saying, "If this happens, do this. If that happens, do that to keep it on course. If *that* happens, do *that* to keep it on course."

And the spiders set target numbers or adjust dice pools by a little bit. Because they can.

The purpose of all this? To keep *two different things from happening next*.

To make sure that you don't swing your sword at someone and both hit and not hit them. With consequences for each.

That's pretty much it. If something is fated to happen, it means that looking at how you act (generally) in your life, you're going to wind up there.

Normally, if the farmer is going to move, then that's his fate. If he's not going to move, then *not* moving is his fate. If a Sidereal tries to push him into staying, and he moves anyway, that's pretty much his fate. The pattern spiders know how stubborn the farmer is. If they didn't, then when he breaks with his fate and moves, the pattern spiders won't know, and they'll keep on weaving him in the old place. Everyone will interact with him in the old village while *he* goes off somewhere else, and then fate's screwed up, because the pattern spiders aren't strong enough to *stop* him from interacting with people elsewhere.

This doesn't mean that the Sidereal predictions are always right. On the other hand, please remember that the pattern spiders being pretty good judges of character is why the world doesn't explode.

If your fate is to meet your doom in Gem, then part of what that means is that you're going to go there voluntarily. Not because you're forced to by the power of fate. But because, when the pattern spiders look at the Storyteller's notes and your known character motivation, it seems pretty likely that that's where you're going to end up.

And if you don't, well, enh. "Departmental vision changes and meddling of creatures outside of fate."

Thinking of fate as something you fight is silly. You can't fight it because that doesn't make sense. You change your fate the same way you do anything else in the game---by taking action to ensure that the things you want to have happen happen, and that the things you don't want to have happen, don't.

Transcendent Hatchet of Fate---and astrology that changes target numbers, and talking to the gods in the Department, and all of these things---are just actions that the Sidereals can take.

Transcendent Hatchet of Fate shows the target a destiny more difficult to evade than a typical fate---specifically, a destiny that doesn't change just because the target knows about it now. That's because it's a Charm, and Charms break the normal rules. Solars' Charms do too. ^_^

In short: planning fate is not so much steering the world around like a bunch of puppets, as herding cats through an obstacle course inside a freight train with no brakes. With a supercomputer and a bunch of muppets giving you helpful advice.

Chosen Of Luna

So . . .

I guess I mean, the point of "you can't evade this" is that it's an outright sucky Charm if the response to "you will be swept up in the destruction of Gem" is to say "oh, man, I was going to go to Gem, but now I think I won't."

It becomes Transcendent Hatchet of Liberation. The top-tier Charm representing the most ruthless expression of fate out there---becomes mostly useful for letting people know in advance what not to do.

"Thanks, Mr. Sidereal! Bye!"

And then you walk straight away from Gem and fall into the Soul-Torturing Thousand-Agonies Pit and the Sidereal looks really silly for showing you how you get destroyed in Gem and totally missing that whole Thousand Agonies thing.

So: something bad is probably going to happen to any given character at some point. Why not have the player of a Sidereal, with the entire Lore tree mastered, who is standing there with a bunch of committed motes invested in being ready to preach a terrible prophecy of doom, be the one to break the news? Why not let the person playing that Sidereal, the local representative of fate in this corner of Creation, *make up* the news?

It's doing the target a favor, really, because they know more about impending events than they did!

Rebecca Borgstrom:

Quote: If the spiders know before hand whether you hit or miss (and if they are the ones who determine that)

The spiders determine whether you hit or miss in the same way that the rules of Exalted do. That is, you roll 10 successes, the defender rolls 3, the spiders determine that you hit.

You're thinking that the spiders determine what you roll. But they don't.

Look on your character sheet. You'll see a set of Traits. Those are part of your Essence pattern. That's all stuff the spiders have to deal with. They can't overrule it. And because the rules define what those Traits mean in terms of a series of dice rolls, those dice rolls are also part of your Essence pattern---they're not things the spiders control.

What the spiders control is a bunch of little stuff. They make things a bit easier or a bit harder. Astrological effects are pretty much the limit of what they do---

And if there is no astrological effect active, and no spider is acting as a major NPC, then you should bear in mind that the dice rolls *already include that subtle influence*. Because the rules of the game don't change just because the book gives an IC explanation for them.

Fate isn't a *new* causality. Fate is *the causality you're already used to*.

When I drink my tea, it winds up in my stomach. *That* is fate.

And . . .

Quote: If fate is, as you describe, always an element of absolute certainty (if x happens, y is the result), then how is it that there is probability in every outcome? How can anything be "likely" to occur?

The Bureau of Destiny has finite intellectual resources, and complex processes are difficult to model.

I'm not sure what you're getting at. Have you ever predicted before running a game where it might be at the end of the session? Did your players spit on you and run off, declaring that you'd destroyed their free will? Would they have done so if you were better at predicting what they were going to do?

In short, yes, the Bureau of Destiny only nudges. But it doesn't nudge the way you think. It's a lot tinier and more pervasive. You're imagining grand gestures to keep people in line, but that's not what it does---it just grinds the wheels of the world a little tiny bit in every way that the world doesn't fit the vision, and oils them in every way that does. And it works because when they start out, instead of starting with "where do we want this farmer to be," fate starts with "we have this farmer, who thinks like this. What happens?"

Fate doesn't railroad. It asks what the players are interested in and figures out what kind of game suits that.

Rebecca

Chosen Of Luna

So basically, the weave of fate is the rules that govern creation, the laws of physics and such. So am I right in understanding that rather than the spiders choosing what happens, they instead react to OUR decisions.

I guess it's kind of like the Matrix movie. The spiders are the code. They code what happens in the world in response to actions and events that occur. If you choose to knock on a door, the spiders code that it makes noise. If you jump up in the air, the spider codes gravity and intertia so you jump as high as you are supposed to and fall back down when you're supposed to.

Sidereals are like the guy sitting at the computer monitoring the matrix. They can see the code and say "blonde, brunette, redhead" They can even "hack" the world to an extent, editing a thing here, a thing there.

The other Exalted are like Morpheus and the others. They use their "essence" powers to bend some rules, break others, allowing them to do what normal mortals can't.

The creatures outside of fate would be like the rogue AI who go unseen by the system and cause all sorts of trouble.

The Maidens would be like the Architect and the Oracle. They observe the patterns in the system and work to direct its overall course.

But the free will to decide who does what is still in the hands of each and every individual. Those who are in the system are just more predictable than those who are not.

So when a person decides to drink a cup of tea, the "matrix" simulates the taste and sensation, empties the glass, and so on. This would be the pattern spider's job, to code an event into creation as it happens and make sure that it works as it's supposed to. But it is still your decision whether or not to drink the tea.

Fascinating. That makes a whole lot more sense now. I just hope I have it right.

"There is no spoon."

Rebecca Borgstrom:

I think . . .

I think we are having trouble communicating. The reason is that you think that predestination is inherently in conflict with free will, and I don't. ^_^

Hence: suppose that I have just returned from the future with a copy of your autobiography, which is reasonably honest due to the future's rigorous cadre of Truth Enforcers.

Question: do you still have free will?

I have just read your next post, incidentally, preserved in your autobiography, so I know what you will say. Use Essence if you like; it won't change it!

Rebecca

P.S. This is not an analogy for pattern spiders. It's just trying to convey a concept that I'm apparently having trouble conveying---the idea that free will has nothing to do with surprising the spiders. They're not perfect at prediction, but that's not the point.

The point is that your free will is simply this: even if the spiders don't *want* you to knock on a door, you do it, because that's who you are. This has nothing to do with whether they know you're going to or not.

(I should note: I was bad there in not strictly separating pattern spiders, who mostly make things that are, and the Bureau, which tries to shape what will be. It's really late. I'm sorry.)

Chosen Of Luna

All Essence users can affect the laws of physics. But what Sidereals do is different. Even the Wyld is composed of Essence and essence users can influence it, but it is not part of the loom of fate.

What then, does the loom of fate do? It's causality. It is not the events itself but rather the progression of events. Creation exists as matter, energy, etc. The Loom, however, is time, event and consequence. That's why there is no time in the Wyld. There are no events. No consequences, at least not as we can comprehend it.

For example, if I make a Melee attack, there are several factors that come into play. My strength, my skill, my channeling of essence are what determine my dice pool. That's where the laws of physics come in.

Where the Loom of Fate comes in is in the actual dice roll, determining the outcome of the event. That's why Sidereals are the only ones who can affect target numbers. The Loom determines probability, luck, and other such abstract concepts.

I hope that makes sense. This is very abstract and difficult to describe.

Let me try and put this another way. If you have a Melee of 5 and Dex of 5, when you roll to attack there are many different possible outcomes. You could roll all 1s at one extreme, or roll all 10s at the other. The most you could possibly get is 20 successes.

But that is the absolute physical limit of what such a character could accomplish at that moment. That's as lucky as he or she could be. What the pattern spiders do when they weave is determine your die roll. They do not determine the shape or composition of your sword, the weight of your swing, or other things dealing with the laws of physics.

They can't just arbitrarily decide that you get 30 successes on that roll. That wasn't possible at that moment for that indivdual. They can affect probability, make you more or less likely to succeed AT WHAT YOU CAN DO, but they can't just make something happen that's flat out impossible.

Creation determines the laws of physics. The matter and energy in creation determines the possible range of outcomes that could occur at any one moment. What the pattern spiders do is weave what actually ends up happening at that moment. But they are still limited by the conditions in creation at the time.

They don't change the laws of physics, they don't have the power to do that. Instead they determine porbability and outcomes.

Think of the Brawl charm Easily Accepted Proposition Stance. That pretty much shows you the limit of what the pattern spiders can do. They can make something happen, however unlikeley, so long as it is possible. But they cannot make something happend that couldn't possibly occur at that place and time.

They can make you miss with your sword swing, but they can't rearrange your chemical makeup.

Rebecca Borgstrom:

You're getting pretty close, Chosen of Luna.

Let me confuse you by trying again from another angle. ^_^

I think that each person is a pattern of Essence. I think that that pattern makes its own decisions and (effectively) its own die rolls.

But!

I think that when your free will says, "I wake up around dawn," that there's at least a millisecond of wiggle room. Your life, and who you are, doesn't really specify that closely---you just wake up *around* dawn.

When your free will lets you stab a Sidereal somewhere in a quarter-inch circle of torso that includes both their heart and a ring of their chain swathing, it's fair game for fate to say, "Nope, you hit the chain." It's also fair game for fate to say, "Oh, that Sidereal's been bad, let's have it tickle the heart."

You're not really any better or worse a combatant. Your will isn't changed. Just . . .

Someone has to decide whether you hit the chain or the heart. Otherwise, the Sidereal is both dead and alive.

That's fate. Things are dead, or alive. Not both at once. (Er, excepting exceptions.)

That, and the laws of physics.

Comments

Hmm. My first reaction to reading about THoF is that it looks like a plot device masquerading as a charm, and Rebecca's comments seem to bear that out. Her reply seems to be along the lines of "This is here so that the PCs and the storyteller can decide that something cool happens without worrying about things like game mechanics." Unfortunately, she appears to have paid scant attention to keeping the effect balanced, instead relying on the players not to abuse it, and the storyteller not to allow any abuse. But the whole point of having charm trees, with prerequisites and mechanics, is to define and limit the scope of a character's power, so that the game isn't continually interrupted by subjective and potentially inconsistent decisions about what they can and can't do. Free-form effects like this might be fine in an unstructured cooperative storytelling session, but not in Exalted, IMHO. --Toram

Wow. What a boring and defeatist way of looking at things.
-- CrownedSun

There's nothing boring about it, and I'd call it realistic, rather than defeatist. If you've got a storyteller and players that prefer to go without the game mechanics and don't run into any problems for it, then by all means, do so, and have fun. But part of the point of a rulebook is to provide mechanics for those not in the above category. Creating free-form powers that break the existing mechanical balance and then relying on good players to keep things from falling apart is, to me, an abdication of a game designer's responsibilities. --Toram

There are different flavors of Exalted, because there are different writers at work. GCG doesn't assign things to Rebecca when he wants them to be perfectly crunchy. That's more Neph's department. And, frankly, THoF is one Charm you'll never see used in my current game, largely because I could have predicted without even thinking about it that it would make *you* hit the ceiling.... --MF

*grin* Sounds to me like an opportunity for colusion. Let Rebecca write the setting and flavor text, and then let Neph figure out how to make it work mechanically. --Toram

There is a place in Exalted, I firmly believe, for visionary niftiness, just as there is a place for cold, hard, brutally crunchy numbers. --MF

Sure, but what if you want to play a visionary style Abyssals game, or a number-crunchy Sidereals one?  :-) --Toram

(1) Travel to an alternate universe where GCG assigned authors to fatsplats differently, or (2) do the hard work yourself. --MF

I would submit that stunts, one of the core mechanics of Exalted, are inherently subjective and potentially inconsistent. "In many cases, a character who performs a stunt can even equal the effect of some Charms." Clearly Storyteller discretion is needed to sort out what is meant by "some Charms" and what isn't. After the Storyteller has decided whether the stunt effect is even possible, then they have to assign bonus dice and potential mote/willpower regeneration based on a off-the-cuff evaluation based on such suggested criteria as "the kind of thing that makes the group go wow".

To me, it's unstructured, it's cooperative and yet it's one of Exalted's defining characteristics.

Basically what I see Rebecca as saying is, judge the whole player-submitted fate detirmination aspect of THOF the way you would a stunt (in fact, there's several other Sidereal powers like Avoidance Kata that work best IMO if you judge them like stunts). That is, on the fly decide if the proposed end result is the sort of thing that will either 'make your game more fun and exciting or it won't' and then go from there. --YuuChanClan

The core rulebook actually gives pretty solid guidelines about how to rate stunts; it devotes about a full page to the topic. Any subjectivity would be very unlikely to change the rating of a stunt by more than one die. And the potential effect of that subjective difference is pretty minor; one die and a couple points of essence. With THoF, in contrast, the subjectivity has a major effect, and few clear constraints. --Toram

The mechanics, or lack thereof, hardly seem like a meritorious way to establish the flavour of an Exalt type, and that appears to be what has happened with the Sidereals. I am all for letting people play in a collaborative style where no one brings dice cause they never get used. But the thing is, it is a lot easier to Borgstrom Exalted than it is to Neph it up. Anyone with enough aptitude to read through one of the books can Borgstrom it all, but it'll take a lot more to Neph up the Sidereals than I've got. And, to be frank, shelling out the money for the book to have the charm amount, 'free form it, sucker! You just got Borgstrommed!' isn't terribly cool. Something like this should've been in a sidebar, or something, with a heading, 'now, if you want the Sidereals to be really nasty . . .' - andrew01

On the other hand, ignoring whether your point is actually true (I think that Borgstrom mechanics are universally clear and precise in their description), it takes a lot more creativity to Borgstrom a Charm set and have it full of cool surprises, neat mechanical tricks, and stuff that emerges from Charm interactions that you didn't see at first glance, than it is to Neph something, and just take a bunch of disparate fannish elements and write up mechanics for them. - willows

Flavor is fine and all but at 30-some-odd dollars for a piece of work I'd hope that the authors could have more insight into application than "Use your discretion!" when the application of a Charm is unclear - and questions don't arrive for things that are blatant. There is a place for creativity and a place for emotionless numbers, but I can pretty much handle the first on my own. An excellent description and new and interesting mechanics are great as long as there's no issue interpreting what is meant. I can have my discretion for free - I'm paying for ideas that won't occur to me, and mechanics that come pre-made.

Preferably, in hardcovers, with a bow. ~BerserkSeraph

Dude. Your copy of Sidereals came wrapped in a bow? I'm so jealous. -szilard

There's precision of language, and there's clarity of intent. Rebecca's Charm descriptions are incredibly clear, precise and well-thought-out, but the mindset behind them requires a shift of viewpoint to encompass. Some people can't do that; others can, but don't want to, because the viewpoint from which Rebecca writes is not fun for them. It's an issue of taste. (If you wonder what my taste is, all I can say is, read my user page.) I find it to be a feature, not a bug, that Exalted contains many different styles of writing, such that any taste can probably find something tasty. --MF

I think the Borgstrom method worked fine for Fair Folk, although I may disagree with her input as to how best to play a raksha in Creation (Though I'd wager my viewpoint holds a little less weight on the subject.) (Mind you, there's more than a few Charms therein that do not strike me as 'incredibly clear, precise, or well-thought-out', but that's a topic for another day.) But what's good for the protean Goose outside of Creation is not necessarily good for the astrological Gander that is part and parcel of the Exalted line. While differences in methodology and ability structure should and do exist between the types of Exalt, their core abilities remain rather clear - for the most part, the use of Essence to temper one's own abilitites or Attributes into something more than they once were. Ultimately, the bounds of Creation require a little more depth than when dealing with the Folk.

Manipulating fate is all well and good, but the departure must be met with specificity up to the task - and calling it 'freedom for the ST and players to be creative' rings a little hollow to me. If I pay for a meal at a restaraunt, I don't want to have to make my own seasoning. Sure, it might make the experience a little more interactive for me, and I might have some fun with it, but I'm paying for convenience. You don't ship a car with 'the wheels....of your vast imagination!' - unfinished work is unfinished work no matter how much glitter you add to it.

I stopped buying d20 books because I could and did make better stuff on my own, why should I buy Exalted books to get told that I have a golden opportunity to do the same again? ~BerserkSeraph

It's not unfinished, any more than a rare steak is unfinished; it's just not to your taste. As far as some players are concerned--me, for instance--a Charm like Transcendent Hatchet of Fate is perfectly designed, because it acknowledges that a roleplaying game is a collaborative creative exercise. --MF

I suppose there's a point in that. In any case, 'd play Fair Folk anytime, so the idea's not entirely without merit. I'm just trying to point out that not everyone who disagrees with the style is 'too dumb for gaming', which was how I felt the discussion swaying. I'm all for diff'rent strokes and all.

Also, a roleplaying game is by definition a work of imagination. A car is not. - Setanta

Wow I'm indented far. I can imagine on my own, I expect the people who get my money to do the odious part of making the system functional. A book requires something on my part, sure, but it's no less a product than a vehicle.

Yeah, matter of taste. A Nephed up charm is like pizza with anchovies on it. I love the anchovies on my pizza. If you don't like the anchovies, you can pick those things off and eat what is left. Borgstrommed charms are like a well done steak . . . you're fucked if you like 'em rare. You could smother the bastard in sauce, but it just wouldn't change the fact that it's well done. -andrew01, who wonders if we can say 'fucked' on the wiki

Hey, are you just going to make food analogies or do you actually have something to say? - willows

I initially thought his meaning was clear. Then I thought about it. It might be that the analogy simply doesn't work. If the Charm has mechanics that that are too exacting, I can ignore them. Sure. Essentially, though, what I'm doing is houseruling them to be looser. If the Charm has mechanics that are too vague, I can houserule them to be less so. I don't necessarily see a difference. Now... that isn't to say that I like houseruling. Ideally, Charms would all be written the way I like them. Unfortunately, they aren't. (...and, for the record, I come down on the side of thinking that Borgstrom's Charms have lovely descriptions, but that the mechanics tend toward the too-vague side and are often ridiculously overpowered... and I am completely unconvinced by her arguments to the contrary.). -szilard

It's also a lot easier to ignore an existing mechanic (Play from a Neph rulebook in the Borgstrom style) than is to design a new mechanic that both fits the flavor text and is well-balanced against the rest of the game (play from a Borgstrom rulebook in the Neph style). The former takes little or no time, while the latter could take a lot of thought and careful analysis. Personally, I don't think it's too much to expect both when buying a game. --Toram

Not true. Working from a crunchy ruleset that is straightforward and "balanced" in the sense that I expect you (as a long-time Champions player) mean to a ruleset that, while remaining crunchy and well-defined, inspires visionary roleplay is at least as hard as going the other way around. For me, anyway. (I know because I've tried to do it for d20, HERO and GURPS, and inevitably have had a frustrating time and wound up giving up.) --MF

I personally like to swich off styles depending on what i'm trying to do in a session. I belive both styles (crunchy and lite) are valid in both theory, and practice. With that being said I do prefer the less rules heavy more flavor text laden books. I belive with such a rich description of the setting/powers/whatever I can infer the meaning, and the extent to which said things are supposed to reach much eaiser. Crunch heavy books while useful tend to bore most people including myself, but they are neccesary when I "really" need to know what mechanically happens to someone/something without being "unfair". So to sum up I kinda stradle the fence on this one cause I need both styles present to successfuly run a game. - Issaru
PS: THoF is a lil much IMHO, but she (Rebecca) was right in saying it's one of those things that an ST has to adjudicate everytime it is used.

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