Artifacts/Clenchedfistofthedragon

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Clenched Fist of the Dragons Might (level 3). </b>

• • • Speed +6, Acc +4, Dam +4, Def +1, Rate 6 (not including 5MM bonus)

• • • Damage +8

• • • Enemies armour soak reduced by 4

• • • Dex +1

• • • Grants user Raging Anvil Onslaught at usual activation cost

This is a short Daiklave, made out of Red Jade, it is one of a pair of items made as a one off gift to Cathak Rae Eldmar/CathakRae by his parents for aquiring knowledge of the Fire Dragon Style Immaculate martial art. The commitment cost is 3 motes. It must be weilded with its twin - Adamant Heart Guard in order for the charm granted by the sword to function.

Comments:

How exactly is this level 3?

The stats added up easily exceed a grand daiklaive, and it also has other powers. What's the commitment cost? Something astronomical I would hope?
-- Darloth

Well I made them as per the rules in the S&S book, this was my first attempt at using them. According to that the artifact should have 2 level 3 powers, or a level 3 could be broken down into 2 level 2, 1 level 2 and 2 level 1, or 6 level 1 powers . So The +8 to damage is a level 3 power, the -4 soak is prob over powered but i like the feel of it, the Dex +1 is a level 1 power and I upped the stats a little. I alloud the charm power as it can only be used if both blades are dual weilded by a fire dragon M.A. user. and they have to pay the essence cost to activate it as per the standard rules. yeah maybe slightly O.T.T but its not too bad i didn't think, how would you suggest altering the blades powers?. Eldmar

Well, since I claim to know the S&S artifact creation rules inside and out, and since I made some comments about it in the Adamant Heartguard section, I figure I'll use the less cluttered space of this artifact to do a short discussion on commit costs and power level. Since what you're describing is something with multiple level 3 powers, that's a Power 4 artifact, which clearly notes that "The artifact can duplicate...three Essence 3 charms, as above". Most people (including myself) interpret this to mean that a Power 4 artifact has three times the goodies of a Power 3 artifact. So we continue, and divide up those powers (using a notation I'm familiar with from my own work, where each indent of a bullet represents a step in the power scale)

• • • • Power 4: Traded for Three Power 3's
    • Damage + 8
    • Soak -4
    • Power 3 traded for three power 2's
  • Raging Anvil Onslaught (I think it's an Essence 2 charm, but didn't look)
  • Roughly four points of stats over the base sword, none of which may be allocated to damage (damage has already hit the ceiling of 8)
  • Trade power 2 for three power 1's
• +1 Dex
• Roughly +2 to base sword stats
• Roughly +2 to base sword stats. This, plus the above stat boosts, may not push more than one thing up by more than +4, and the other two stats boosted may not be boosted by more than +2 each

One of the tricks to remember is that while the S&S rules have geometric power progression, with each level 3 times as awesome as the last, the ceilings of effect don't go up that way - they go up by a factor of 2. That means that while you can trade a power 5 for nine power 3's, and thus each of your nine attributes can get a +4, you can't use those nine "+4 attribute" purchases to add 36 to a single attribute - that would break the ceiling of +16 to a single attribute that follows from the progression. Why? Because a single +16 to your Dex is, by and large, more game impacting than a simple +4 to all attributes, which only helps out a little in a lot of areas. I only say this so that people understand that you can't use the +4 to stats, and the two +2 to stats, to increase accurcy by +8. After all, that would be cheating.

Now then, we've got a clearly power 4 artifact here, which has limited use (level 3 bonus), and I'll be generous and say it has only a level 2 game impact. It has some script immunity as well, let's say level 3, so it's not lost too easily. That's a sum of 4+3+2+3 = 12 points of goodness. Continuing on, we remember that a power 4 artifact has a base commit of 20 motes. Next, we calculate drawback. The base drawback for our artifact is 4. Since we're min-maxing a bit, we'll assume that's all from "Component Drawback", because we're purchasing at character creation, and don't have to worry about slaying Ligier for this thing. At the same time, we've only got 3 script immunity, so if it should become damaged, or we need to make a new one, it's going to be supremely difficult. That gives us an artifact rating of 3 overall, and a 20m commit cost. So far, we're on the same track as the man [Eldmar] here. Only thing Eldmar missed was the 20m commit cost, for this single artifact. Suddenly, it goes from "wholly overpowered" to "why would you want to waste 20m on this thing?". That's the trick with S&S rules. You've got to follow the minimum commit rule. Sure, if you were building this in-game, you could spend an extra three years or so, and with a 170 extra crafting successes, get the commit down to three. But hey - just like your character didn't have to slay Ligier, neither did the Artificer who made this have to spend an extra three years reducing the commit cost. The trick is that with S&S, the high base commit cost will often act as a preventative measure to characters purchasing artifacts that have Power over about 3. (base attunement 10). This really pulls artifacts back in line with existing things, like Daiklaves, due to the whole geometric progression thing - after all, a Power 3 artifact is only one-third as good as a power 4. What this does is allows you to purchase world-shattering Power 5 artifacts if you want, but you'll pay 25m to attune them. If you really want a good Power 5 artifact, build it yourself. That way you can make all the craft rolls you need to bring the commit cost down to 1m, and be golden. - GregLink

• highly impressed with your knowledge of the S&S rules ok I missed the minimum commit cost for the artifacts... how did that slip past me? ah Well I guess it would really upset him now if I told him he had to commit 20 motes to each blade. Eldmar

Well, there are two fixes, if you'd want them. If you don't, hey, it's your game, and if things are both fun and heroic the way they are, keep them that way! If you do want to change them though, I point out the following. - The way I statted it out, he's got 3 script immunity, and 4 component drawback. That means that if, for some reason, there should be an enemy plotting to damage those swords, that the only way (in my head) to repair them is to use some of the original components. Suddently, he has a problem - his low script immunity artifact has been damaged (another thing ST's rarely exploit) and to fix it, he'll need the purest of metal, from the top of the elemental pole of earth. That's about a 100 mile climb, in the middle of the realm, through Jadeborn territory. Or, you know, he could fix it with a lesser metal, which would repair it, but increase the commit cost. Again, though, I say loudly - if your game is going well, for the love of Pete, don't change it. I'm a firm believer in the theory that goes like this: In Exalted, you never ask the question "Is it overpowered". You instead ask the question "How can I make this part of a really awesome action movie". If a man has a golden gun, by all means, make a plot around it. Make a plot about how everyone wants those swords. Make a plot about how an Essence 7 Fire Immaculate believes those swords are his right and priveledge. I'm just saying. - GregLink

I like what you are saying, I think i will leave it as it is for now, but in the event that they become damaged or broken, getting them repaired will give me a whole new story to write..... hmmm Eldmar