Xeriar/LunarReverseVasectomy

Lunar Reverse Vasectomy

Or: Lunars Rebuilt.

Lunars are a troubled Exalt. Abyssals, Solars, and Sidereals all have persistant defenses, all have perfect defenses, some of these pretty thoroughly trumping the Lunar 'Shtick' of soak and regeneration.

So, my goal is to re-build the Lunars from the ground up. A part of this will be Setting also, in particular, rules for Chimerae which I will hope to blend with the Raksha rules.

I have a few house rules that will be affecting this work:

1. See Xeriar/LunarReverseVasectomy/CustomDefense and Xeriar/LunarReverseVasectomy/CustomWeapons - my weapon and armor charms will be making use of these rules.

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During the Primordial War, Lunars were, of course, incredibly multitalented - nearly as much as their Solar mates were. They often served first-strike roles, where a combination of surprise and overwhelming force was needed. They were also potent bodyguards and scouts, often invisible to the eyes of the Creators and their servants until it was too late.

Surprise was their key - they could be anything, even taking the forms of first-circle demons themselves. It took a lot of concentration for a Primordial to pick out such a mole. Every Malfean and nearly every Yozi lost at least one of its highest souls because of this disctraction. Sometimes, the Lunar lived to do it again.

As the Primordial War came to a close, Lunars maintained many of their roles, especially as bodyguard and guard forces. Outside of combat and 'standard Celestial purview', Lunars served the Deliberative by keeping a more direct eye on the populace. Theres was not to manipulate - though many had at least some skill at it, but merely keep an eye out for insubordination and mutiny and dispense Justice where necessary.

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All Lunars can channel Essence through their animas to generate a number of basic effects. They can all spend a single mote of Essence to:

• Cause their Caste Mark to burn brilliantly for a scene, as if they had spent 4-7 motes of Peripheral Essence. Lunar Caste Marks glow a brilliant silvery blue-white.
• Cause their Anima to glow bright enough to read by for a scene, as if they had spent 8-10 motes of Peripheral Essence. Lunar Animas put off a brilliant blue-white glow.
• Know the exact phase of the moon, and month and day of the year - even during Calibration.

The Lunars are divided into five Castes:

Full Moon: Counterpart to the Dawn, Full Moons are the warriors and generals of the Lunars. Where the Dawn masters combat itself, the Full Moon masters mobility and tactical command of his current situation.

Caste Abilities: Athletics, Brawl, Endurance, Melee, Resistance
Anima Ability: May spend 5 motes to attune her Essence to her body, doubling all running and jumping distances for the remainder of the Scene. This stacks with Charm and Artifact effects, but remember multipliers add (doubling running speed twice makes for triple running speed, etc.)

Gibbous Moon: Counterpart to the Zenith, the Gibbous Lunars are the holy women of Luna, receiving more frequent contact from their goddess, and often performing rituals in her name.

Caste Abilities: Archery, Larceny, Lore, Performance, Presence, Anima Ability: For 10 motes, the Gibbous can project an image of herself Elsewhere for a scene. This image must remain within her sensory range (sight, sound, or smell), and she sees through its eyes, speaks through its mouth, hears through its ears and smells with its nose. The image is, however, incapable of manipulating objects, and blows will pass straight through it, though it will leave footprints, move the air with it, breath, and seem otherwise real.

• Gibbous Lunars are the priestesses of Luna.

Half Moon: Counterpart to the Eclipse,

Caste Abilities: Craft, Dodge, Investigation, Linguistics, Socialize Anima Ability: By spending 5 motes, a Half-Moon can disguise her form to appear as any specific being she has previously met for a single scene. This also disguises both smell and voice, but the Half-Moon must be in a shape fairly close to the being she wishes to impersonate. She cannot impersonate Celestial Exalted, Incarna, Demons of 2nd Circle or Higher, or Deathlords with this power. This can fool the Raksha. This disguise breaks if ever the Lunar displays any level of Anima Flux.

Crescent Moon: Counterpart to the Night,

Caste Abilities: Awareness, Martial Arts, Ride, Stealth, Survival Anima Ability: By spending 5 motes, a Crescent Moon can disguise her very Essence for a scene. In game terms, this allows her to disguise her Essence as that of a simple mortal or animal with no Essence pool when detected by charms such as Measure the Wind. Essence spent on this Anima ability will not trigger the Lunar's Anima Banner. This disguise breaks if ever the Lunar displays any level of Anima Flux.

New Moon: Counterpart to the Twilight,

Caste Abilities: Bureaucracy, Medicine, Occult, Sail, Thrown Anima Ability: By spending 10 motes when casting a spell or ritual, a No Moon can accelerate her magical abilities, taking one less action to cast a spell (with a minimum on one action). Thaumaturgic Rituals cast in this manner trigger on the No Moon's initiative value.

• New Moon caste marks are thin silvery circles, much like the Night Caste Mark. New Moons are -not- Luna's priestesses.

Tattoos

Being natural shapeshifters and illusionists, Lunars are exceptionally resistant to the taint of the Wyld - this resistance gave them the ability to flee there in the first place, after all.

Lunars are forever immune to the physically twisting effects of the Wyld. Instead, prolonged exposure to Wyld energies begins to twist and warp their magics and their minds, slowly transforming them into Chimerae.

This normally takes quite some time, but after the Usurpation, the Lunars were driven into the Wyld for some centuries, and, one by one, Charm by Charm, over half of the Chosen of Luna were twisted into the Chimerae before the New Moons discovered the potential of Moonsilver Tattoos.

In addition to giving the Lunar more complete control over her form, it provides a greater resistance to derangements and utter immunity to the Chimeric Warping of their Charms in the Wyld. See below for more details.

Anima Banner, the Tell and the Faces of Luna

Anima Banner works much like it does on page 110 of Exalted: The Lunars, except ignore the parts regarding the Tell and use the values below.

Upon her Exaltation, a Lunar finds, or is found by, her totem animal. This must be a normal, original animal that has not been Wyld-Tainted - an original creation of Gaia. Physical properties of this creature (her Tell) begin to manifest immediately, even if she is unable to take its form yet through Finding the Spirit's Shape.

The Tell is a set of features that make up the totem creature - scales, fur, ears, eyes, tail and so on. How obvious these are depend on the Lunar's Essence, current level of Anima Display, and the current phase of Luna herself. The use of Charms such as Masking the Brilliant Form and False Face of Luna allow the Chosen to modify this somewhat.

Add the Lunar's Permenant Essence to her level of Anima display, plus a value based on the phase of the Moon - 0 from the New Moon, 1 from Crescent, 2 from Half, 3 from Gibbous and 4 from Full. Add 1 if the phase matches her Caste. Then consult the table below.

    0: The Lunar appears as a normal human, or normal creature of whatever form she is in.  Her Tell is nonexistant.
  1-3: The Tell is visible if looked for, but easily hidden or explained away.
  4-6: The Tell is harder to hide, and may even begin to affect her voice and smell.
  6-9: The Tell cannot be hidden without the aid of extremely heavy clothing, and likely marks her voice and smell strongly.
10-14: The Tell is impossible to hide.  It has multiple animal components and there is little mistaking the Lunar for what she is.
15-19: At these levels of Tell display, the Lunar looks more like her Beast Form than anything else.
   20: At this level of Tell display, the Lunar is forced into her Beast Form, or otherwise looks the part if she does not have one.

Chimerae

Without tattoos, in the Wyld, Lunars slowly lose their magics to its twisting influence. This manifests in Chimeric versions of the charms they have taken.

While in the Wyld, they must make a Willpower + Essence roll. Once per month in the Bordermarches, once per week in the Middlemarches, once per day in the Deep Wyld and hourly if trapped in Pure Chaos. This is at a difficulty of 1 in the Bordermarches, 4 in the Middlemarches, 7 in the Deep Wyld and 10 in Pure Chaos.

Every time this roll is failed, one of the Lunar's Charms changes to its Chimeric Aspect. If the Lunar ends up with more Chimeric Aspected Charms than her Willpower + Essence, she becomes a Chimerae.

Aside from the aspected nature of their Charms, Chimerae lose Moonsilver as their Magical Material, gaining Faesilver in its place, a white, shimmering silver that seems to shift and flow, made from Wyld-Tainted silver alloyed with the dreams of mortals. It acts like Moonsilver in most respects, including acting as a Magical Material. Its bonus to Artifact Weapons is +2 to Rate. Armor and Shields retain the same bonus that Moonsilver does.

Comments

This is extremely insightful. I'm impressed, and inspired to work on lunars some more as well. I thank you for all of these ideas. If I have any more of my own, I'll post them here or on a similar page somewhere on my userpage. - Morpheus