MartialArtsRelay/AboveTheEarth

The Seventeenth Theme is Above the Earth.

This is a Terrestrial Martial Art with seven Charms. It's an inversion of Jade Mountain Style, in that its Charms cannot work to their full potency when the user is touching the ground.

The style weapons for this Martial Art are claws, clawed boots, hook swords, khatars, and staves. This style is incompatible with armor.

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Raiton's Descending Claw - IanPrice, who initially forgot to take credit for his charm.

Cost: 3m
Minimums: Martial Arts 2, Essence 2
Type: Simple
Keywords: Combo-OK, Obvious
Duration: Instant
Prerequisite Charms: none

This charm begins with a leap into the air, allowing the martial artist to travel twice as far as normal with the leap. At the end of the leap, a Martial Arts attack may be delivered with a bonus to raw damage equal to the number of yards traveled through the air. Thus, if the distance to the target is 9 yards, this charm will add up to 9 dice of bonus damage. The maximum bonus damage from this charm is the Martial Arts score of the Exalt using it (including applicable specialties).

The Ground Takes My Wings Away - willows

Cost: 3m (2m)

Duration: Special

Type: Reflexive

Keywords: Combo-OK, Obvious, Stackable

Minima: 3/2

Prereq. Charms: Raiton's Descending Claw

The earth is a cruel companion, and its chill heart dampens and deadens the limbs of those who live too close to it.

When the character's DV refreshes, if he hasn't touched the ground since the last time his DV refreshed, he may activate this Charm, reducing his soak by 2B/2L and gaining one dot of Dexterity. The second and subsequent activations of this Charm cost 2 motes rather than 3. If he touches the ground, he immediately loses the Dexterity this Charm produces and decommits its Essence, but his soak does not recover until refresh.

In the case of insufficient soak, the martial artist may commit Health Levels instead, one level per Charm activation. Committed Health Levels behave as levels of lethal damage, but recover instantly when the Charm is deactivated.

Leaf Blows Away - FlowsLikeBits

Cost: 4m

Duration: Instant

Type: Reflexive(Step 9)

Keywords: Obvious, Combo-Ok, Counter-attack

Minima: 2/2

Prereq. Charms: None

Like a leaf in the wind, the Martial Artist may be blown backward by an attack. She may not activate this charm if she is touching the ground, for, like the leaf, instead of being moved, she would be smashed against it.

Provided the Martial Artists is not touching the ground, she may activate this charm in step 9 of combat resolution. Like the leaf, she does not have to actually be hit by the attack to active this charm, the breeze of a miss is sufficient.

This causes her to automatically take knockback(as page 153), except that she moves 1 yard per damage die, rather than 1 yard per three dice. Also, like the leaf, she does not have total control of her flight, both the attacker and the martial artist nominate a point she could be knocked to, and she lands midway between them. The attacker nominates a destination first. This is a form of hopping-defence, and is also considered a counterattack, so it may not be used against counter attacks.

Dance Upon Blood Drops - VioletCrazyGirl

Cost: 4m

Duration: Instant

Type: Reflexive

Keywords: Obvious, Combo-Ok

Minima: 3/2

Prereq. Charms: Leaf Blows Away

Moving with a dancer's sinuous grace, the martial artist flies from enemy to enemy, her blade leaving thin traceries of blood in the air.

The martial artist may invoke this Charm after a successful martial arts attack. Doing so allows her to make another attack against a different opponent two ticks later. Note that this does not refresh her DV or her Charm selection; the DV penalties from repeated attacks stack. The enemy must be within her effective Dexterity in yards. She remains in the air as she moves and attacks, sliding off walls and dancing on her enemies' blades.

The dance cannot begin upon the ground, and this Charm cannot be invoked if the martial artist is currently touching it.

Dancing Humming Bird Form - Madoka

Cost: 5m

Duration: Scene

Type: Simple

Keywords: Obvious

Minima: 3/3

Prereq. Charms: Dance Upon Blood Drops, The Ground Takes My Wings Away

Through this form, the Terrestrial moves as if she was the air itself. Graceful, light and lithe are her movements. While in this stance, the Terrestrial's body flows and moves as a flag in the wind. It is very difficult to strike such a being. Increase her ddv by half her martial arts. As air floats on top of air, so too can the martial artists in this form. The Terrestrial floats about an inch off the ground. They still have their full movement rate. Once every other action the Terrestrial still has to touch the ground. If they find other means to stay afloat, so be it. To be so light and nimble requires a sacrifice. When in this form, subtract half the user's martial arts value from her damage pools.

Hurricane Force - IanPrice

Cost: 5m (1wp)
Minimums: Martial Arts 4, Essence 3
Type: Supplemental
Keywords: Combo-OK, Obvious, Stackable
Duration: Instant
Prerequisite Charms: Above the Ground Form

The wind seems gentle as a breeze, but coast-dwellers and plains folk know it can take on horrible destructive shapes as well. Hurricanes and tornadoes rip houses from their foundations and trees from their roots, and with each object so removed become more dangerous as winds dash pieces together. This Charm supplements an attack by imitating this forcefulness. So long as the character invoking this charm has not touched the ground since the last time her DV refreshed, this attack throws its initial target into another one, and both targets are affected with the same attack roll. This attack deals lethal damage.

It is possible to invoke this charm if the character started out touching the ground, but it costs a willpower to do so. Also, the damage is not lethal. However, the character will remain aloft until her next action as part of this attack, allowing the hurricane to build on itself.

Symphony of Fluttering Wings - Madoka

Cost: 6m, 1wp
Minimums: Martial Arts 5, Essence 3
Type: Simple
Keywords: Obvious
Duration: Instant Prerequisite Charms: Hurricane Force

Nothing moves as erratically and more unpredictably than a hummingbird. But a group of humming birds is even more chaotic and confusing. By using this charm, the martial artists seeks to emulate the movement and attitude of a group of humming birds. The Terrestrial is moving so fast that it looks as if he is in multiple places at once. The martial artist is able to make a coordinated attack roll, using his permanent essence as the amount of people making attacks simultaneously. There is still only 1 person attacking, but determine a dv penalty for the target based an amount of attackers equal to the permanent essence of the martial artist. Also, on the action in which this charm is activated, the Terrestrial's movement rate is doubled. The speed of this attack is also reduced by 1. Madoka

Comments

I'd probably add to "The Ground Takes My Wings Away" that you can't take your soak below zero. It need some sort of limit on how much Dex you can gain. Ess maybe? Also, since the style is incompatible with armor, the soak reduction is kinda meaningless. I do like the idea though. (This whole style would be evil on a Lunar. ) -FlowsLikeBits

I don't really believe in insulating mechanics against idiocy. Negative values of soak are meaningless; why should there be a restriction against them explicit in the Charm? - willows

I don't know that its idiocy. What if you have a soak of 2B/1L? Can you simply not use the charm? This seems less than ideal - I don't know that this tree should be dependent upon Stamina. -szilard

Interesting point! I have altered the Charm accordingly. - willows

I am intrigued by your Charm. I don't understand how it constitutes a hopping dodge however, as it lacks a dodge component. - willows

True. 'defence' it is. -FlowsLikeBits

Does Leaf Blows Away work if your opponent misses? It's not clear, since it seems to involve letting yourself get hit. - IanPrice

Fixed. It pretty much works all the time. -FlowsLikeBits

Okay, taking a stab at this. Be kind, but not, y'know, too kind. ~ VioletCrazyGirl

I like your charm. Madoka

Madoka; it's a nice inspiration behind your form Charm, but I've a few qualms - first, losing a point of strength and stamina runs into big problems; what happens if you have a practitioner whose strength or stamina is 1? Do they get crippled/killed by invoking it? Secondly, turning into pure air is a rather profound effect that isn't even seen on the celestial-level Air Dragon Form. Thirdly, and most trivially, I'd consider changing the name - 'Above The Ground', whislt a good theme, isn't a great name for a martial arts Style. Consider 'Jade Zephyr Style' or 'Soaring Roc Style', or whatever else you might come up with...DeathBySurfeit

The theme of sacrificing non-dexterity-related physical traits is an interesting direction for this style to take. Yet, it doesn't need to be the only one. I think this form should have some more limited benefit, and do away with the drawback, since it is only a Terrestrial form - leave changing your substance to Celestial forms. Allowing someone to hover off the ground constantly (or otherwise never have to touch it for some reason) is benefit enough in this style. Alternately, stick with the DV bonus, and save the constant no-ground-touchy for a later (perhaps pinnacle) charm. - IanPrice

I'm going to fall into the opposite camp, although I like Jade Zephyr Style as a name. The Dragon-Blood isn't literally becoming air; the small DV bonus and lack of immateriality means they're more 'air-ish'. As far as changing substance, that's what Jade Mountain Form does; changes your body to stone, increases Strength and Stamina and halves movement (and -1 Dex, IIRC.) Possibly just note that there's no penalty for having Strength or Stamina 0 from this unless another Charm takes precendence. - FrivYeti

The problem with reducing Sta is that it directly reduces the utility of another Charm in the style, which isn't something you should design into a Form. - willows

1) It would be very rare if someone only had strength and stamina of 1. If someone has strength of 1, they can only lift 80 lbs or so as mentioned on pg. 101 of E:2e. Also someone with Stamina 1 usually would stay indoors from fear of always becoming sick or dreadfully tired. A person like this might not be a martial artist, but more likely a fat old beaurocrat in the Imperial City. I made the drawback because Jade Mountain Style had a drawback in its form. That form gives an increase of your essence to your strength and stamina, powerful, so it needed a drawback. Semi-floating and a dv increase of half your essence powerful as well for a terrestrial style, so I feel it needs a drawback.

2) I didn't mean to actually turn into air, oops. I meant to move as if she were the air, flowing and whimsical. Consider it corrected, good catch! Frivyeti knew what I meant.

3) Dancing Humming Bird Style!! I picture the practioner of this style hovering and zipping from opponent to opponent, just as a Humming bird would fly from flower to flower. Maybe another name would work just as well. But I would stay away from doing another Jade "thing" Style, lets make it more unique to itself. Any ideas?

4) The form doesn't make it constant no-ground-touchy. Once every other action you have to touch. The form is not powerful enough for that.

5) And once again if someone has str and stm at 1, that is there own fault. They should not be a ma'ist. But a pencil pusher. Madoka

This is Exalted! Everyone and their cat knows martial arts, the latter of which probably does indeed have a strength and stamina of 1. One of my PCs (a Twilight girl) actually has Str 1, so this is rather pertinent. Why require physical burliness to power a martial arts style that seems to hinge on agility? I'd have thought it much more efficient to simply impose a penalty to rolls using strength or stamina instead of the rather-unprecedented attribute dot drops, as we shouldn't be prohibiting the very characters who are -most- likely to want to adopt this Style.

On the subject, how exactly does the floating mechanic work? Do guard actions (which may comprise only a single tick) count as actions? What if you stunt a means of staying aloft for the first action, but not for the next? If you'd like a possible alternative, when I was jotting down ideas for a form I was thinking of giving the martial artist the ability to 'hang' - selectively ignoring the pull downward of gravity, whislt being restricted as normal as to jumping distances - I don't know whether this is preferable, however. Regardless, I still strongly recommend against the strength and stamina sacrifice mechanic, and would like clarification on floatiness...DeathBySurfeit

Roll penalties sound like a good idea to me. I suggest the float mechanic be timed on DV refreshes, parallel to the Flaws of Perfection. - willows

Doesn't the Form usually have the same name as the style? Although Dancing Hummingbird makes a good alternate. (Like VBoS form had the alternate name of "Endings Form"). The form is quite powerful, so it does need a downside. Perhaps reduces damage by your Martial Arts? (So it scales with the DV increase). This also prevents bad synergy.

Hurricane Force seems awful powerful, as it both deals double damage(after soak!) and attacks two targets. So it's like a combo of Thunderbolt attack and Shockwave attack! Also, I don't think you want the Stackable keyword. -FlowsLikeBits

I'd assumed the chosen theme wasn't the intended name for the Style. 'Cause, y'know, Above The Ground Style would totally suck...DeathBySurfeit

The term is rarely the final style name. See older relays. - willows

Fair Enough. I'm ok with Dancing Hummingbird, although it's more spastic than I'd like; I started a poll at the bottem. -FlowsLikeBits

I like the alternate penalty of reducing damage pools and therefore, DeathBySurfeit wins...something. Consider it changed. Above the Ground Style is not the name. I put forth Dancing Humming Bird Style as the name. Does anyone else have any other suggestions? The floaty mechanic can be timed as DV Refreshes. Every other DV refreshing, the martial artists touches down. The martial artist isn't forced down, so don't think the form forces him to touch the ground every other action/dv refreshing. It is that the form can only keep the martial artist aloft for a limited amount of time. Madoka

Quick suggestion - you may want to check the keywords attached to the form Charm. I don't think you intended it to be combo-able...DeathBySurfeit

Here are some Ideas for Names. Vote were you want!

• Dancing Hummingbird
• Dancing Zephyr FLB, IP, D
• Soaring Roc
• Jade Zephyr

• Add Your Own!

I've changed Hurricane Force to be lethal instead of double. Is this acceptable? - IanPrice

So is this the final charm tree for this style? any last critiques or comments? Madoka

Uh, yeah. What's the next theme? - willows

Good question..I have an idea for it, but I don't know how to manipulate the pages on wiki. The eighteenth theme will be, "Mountain Meets the Storm." This is a high level celestial martial art. The charms require personal essence of 4 to 5. Basically two great forces are colliding, each using their own stengths to destroy the other. The mountain brings forth unending strength and resilience. While the storm uses her agility and speed in the battle. The martial artist that created ths style witnessed a battle between two great and powerful elementals and was inspired to create this art. This style utilizes the strenghs of both.

The style weapons for this martial art is any type of one handed axe and shield. Armor is typically not allowed due to its restricitve nature, but an armor with a fatigue and mobility penalty of zero is allowed.

So, I'll go look on how to move pages around. In the meantime, would someone mind moving things in the right place and starting the new theme mentioned above? Thanks...Madoka