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Lunar Exalted: Paragons of Change

The Second Age is a time of great strife, and it is in such strife that the Lunar Exalted thrive. Once the partners and companions of the Solars, the Lunars adapted and supported their mates, serving and protecting them with their powerful Charms. Now, changed by their many trials, they stand ready to take the world by storm.

Why

This is my little attempt to change the Lunars into something that I like more in an Exalted game. I realize that the Second Edition book isn't actually out yet, but the STC, while bringing the Lunars to a reasonable power level, still hasn't suggested that they'll be noticeably changing. This makes sense, as this is a new edition, not a new planet.

Still, I prefer some of the First Edition corebook ideas of the Lunars, and this page will be devoted to creating Lunars that work the way I like my anthropomorphic creatures.

Setting Changes

In this setting, a few changes are made to the Lunars, as follows:

First, the damage done to the Lunar Essence Shards was a sacrifice made to survive the depths of the Wyld. In the First Age, there was nothing but formless Chaos beyond Creation, no borderlands that could be safely travelled. When the Lunars retreated there, they were attacked constantly by the Unshaped. In order to anchor themselves, they created the tattoos, sacrificing some of their fluidity for increased resiliency, taking more of the qualities of moonsilver into their souls. This damaged the Shard's ability to create the most fluid Castes, so these were dissolved into the other Castes in response.

Secondly, the Lunars have broken into three groups. Each has the same goals, but express these goals in a variety of ways. The three groups are:

• The Silver Pact - Raging against civilization, they seek to overthrow civilization and create a barbarian order.
• The Undercity - Protesting against decadence, they seek to overthrow aristocracy and the dynasty of inheritance.
• The Shining Way - Working diligently against stasis, they seek to constantly adapt culture into new forms and paths.

Charm Overview and Charms

Lunars have a new keyword for their Charms, 'Hybrid'. Hybrid Charms cover most of the specialized shapeshifting magics of the Lunar Exalted. Without this magic, Lunar Charms are not much stronger than those of Terrestrials, but within its bounds they surpass even the Solars.

Hybrid Charms, when purchased, usually have a variety of methods of activation. In addition, they may be comboed only with other Hybrid Charms. Any Combo of Hybrid Charms creates a Hybrid Form, a True Form of the Lunar that activates all of the Charms within it at once, using a predetermined configuration. Outside of Comboes, Hybrid Charms are normal Charms of indefinite duration. For full information on Hybrid Charms, see the Excellencies and Hybrid section.

Regular Charms will be based loosely on the hybrid Charms, but will be designed to permit Lunars to handle high-Essence combat.

[[[FrivYeti/Lunars2e/Lunars2eExcellencies]] | Second Edition Excellency Mechanics, and the Hybrid tag.]]

Hybrid Charms:
[[[FrivYeti/Lunars2e/StrengthHybrid]] | Strength]] [[[FrivYeti/Lunars2e/DexterityHybrid]] | Dexterity]] [[[FrivYeti/Lunars2e/StaminaHybrid]] | Stamina]]
[[[FrivYeti/Lunars2e/CharismaHybrid]] | Charisma]] [[[FrivYeti/Lunars2e/ManipulationHybrid]] | Manipulation]] [[[FrivYeti/Lunars2e/AppearanceHybrid]] | Appearance]]
[[[FrivYeti/Lunars2e/PerceptionHybrid]] | Perception]] [[[FrivYeti/Lunars2e/IntelligenceHybrid]] | Intelligence]] [[[FrivYeti/Lunars2e/WitsHybrid]] | Wits]]

Of course, Hybrid Charms are not the only weapon in a Lunar's arsenal. Most Lunars know a great many tricks to help control a situation, transform the world to suit them, or just escape from a bind. Lunar Charms are as follows:

[[[FrivYeti/Lunars2e/L2Strength]] | Strength]] [[[FrivYeti/Lunars2e/L2Dexterity]] | Dexterity]] [[[FrivYeti/Lunars2e/L2Stamina]] | Stamina]]
[[[FrivYeti/Lunars2e/L2Charisma]] | Charisma]] [[[FrivYeti/Lunars2e/L2Manipulation]] | Manipulation]] [[[FrivYeti/Lunars2e/L2Appearance]] | Appearance]]
[[[FrivYeti/Lunars2e/L2Perception]] | Perception]] [[[FrivYeti/Lunars2e/L2Intelligence]] | Intelligence]] [[[FrivYeti/Lunars2e/L2Wits]] | Wits]]

Character Creation

[[[FrivYeti/Lunars2e/L2PactCreation]] | Creating a Silver Pact Lunar]]
[[[FrivYeti/Lunars2e/L2UnderCreation]] | Creating an Undercity Lunar]]
[[[FrivYeti/Lunars2e/L2WayCreation]] | Creating a Shining Way Lunar]]
[[[FrivYeti/Lunars2e/L2CastelessCreation]] | Creating a Casteless Lunar]]

Other Rules

[[[FrivYeti/Lunars2e/L2Songline]] | Background: Songlines]]

Comments

Hybrid Charms I like. I like a lot. "Without this magic, Lunars are not much stronger than the Terrestrials," on the other hand, gives me fits.

I'll be following this with a great deal of interest either way, however. - Hapushet

Well, if their non-Hybrid Charms were that strong, they'd be wiping the floor with everyone. The idea of this set is that the 'Hybrid' Charms are both very strong and very versatile, enough to cover for relatively weaker Instant-duration stuff. That said, I should revise that comment slightly, to read "their Charms are not much stronger than those of the Terrestrials". Lunars still have the larger Essence pools, reduced XP costs, and the like. - FrivYeti

Whooooooa. This is freaking awesome. I mean, I have often defended 1e Lunars against the people who rage about how much they suck... but I've always been slightly unhappy with them. My biggest beef was with DBT, and now this! I've seen this kind of idea a couple times, but I really like your implementation. I might try and contribute a little, if you don't mind, in comments or something, but I've got to actually get 2e first. -- OhJames

Oh also, so the advantages of creating Hybrid Forms are: Lower Essence cost, much lower Essence commitment, and one turn activation? I assume that Hybrid Charms can stack outside of Combos, but you have to pay the full Essence cost and commit the full Essence cost? -- OhJames

Thankee! And yeah, that's the way that it's designed to work. :) - FrivYeti

Very nice. I'll put some more specific comments in other places. But I like the ideas -FlowsLikeBits

This is good stuff. One thing I notice is that there are not many Social hybrid charms. Social combat should probably be devistating in the hands of the right lunar, at least against mortals. Could be a number of the generic "trick" charms for the more fluffy attributes should be social effects, maybe starting at the Terrestrial level, and increasing to the point of shaping or near-shaping (or even social attacks in normal combat time). Lunars really need a version of Undetectible Lie that isn't quite so beefy, like "Reasonable Suggestion" or something. -- Wordman

Well, 25 Physical Hybrid Charms, 23 Social Hybrid Charms. That's almost even. However... a Social speed reducer would be a neat long-term Charm effect for Hybriding. Glee! Other stuff will pop up in beefed-up non-Hybrid trees, which I will be gradually getting to. - FrivYeti

Are there really 23 social hybrid charms? I didn't see any with the "social" keyword. There are a number of them that manipulate traits that are useful in social combat, true, but at a glance I don't see any that, say, provide unnatural social attacks. Maybe I just need to read more closely. - Wordman

You know what I forgot to add to the Charm lists? Social keywords. Yeahhh. I was thinking 'Social' as opposed to 'Physical' or 'Mental'. Ima go through and fix all that up.

This is incredibly awesome. The 2e Lunars book will have to be pretty fantastic to get me to stop using these rules...DeathBySurfeit

I would love to see this system with character creation rules. Plus, the Shining Way could be an incredible foe for just any other Exalted. Something tells me they won't be amused with the return of the Solars, unlike the Undercity, which will probably welcome them (and rob the town blind while the Solars have the guards distracted...) or the Silver Pact, which will evaluate them case-by-case. - MoonSword

I ran into a problem whereby almost all of my updating was being done from work, and the next set of Charm trees needs me to have the 1e Lunars book and the 2e Storyteller Companion onhand. I've been considering just waiting for the 2e Lunars book to come out before seeing what else I need to change, but I may try to get back on-track with finishing this. Thanks for the support! - FrivYeti

Any thoughts on this, now that they've released Lunars 2e? - MoonSword

To be honest, I like the 2e Lunar Charmset so beautifully much that I don't know that I ever need to finish this; instead, I may just start converting these Charms into expansions to the existing Lunar trees. About the only thing I could think of would be Gift-keyword Social Charms, which would completely subsume my Hybrid system into the existing rules in an elegant manner. - FrivYeti