Epsilon/MartialArts

Yet Another Take On Martial Arts

Many people have complained about Martial Arts being the "uber" ability of Exalted game play. Both the fact that is universal to all Exalt types, that it seems to be able to accomplish anything, and that it "overpowers" many other abilities. I won't get into that argument here.

However I like many of the martial arts Charms and Styles as written, and like the symbology and flavor that martial arts has taken on in the game system. I just don't like its general ability to do anything while ignoring the usefulness of other Abilities (such as Athletics, Stealth and so on). That being said, many solutions to this problem have been presented. Some involve adding multiple new prerequisite Ability scores to Martial Arts charms, others to eliminating the Martial Arts ability all-together.

THE IDEA

I don't want to eliminate the Martial Arts ability at all. However, not all Styles are based on Martial Arts, in fact, most of them are NOT. Each style is a cascade of Charms built on a separate Ability score.

This means that the Style is now a subset of Charms for that Ability, much like there are Solar Archery Charms and Sidereal Archery Charms there would now be Martial Arts Archery Charms. This also makes the new book-keeping incredibly simple. Just change all reading of the words "Martial Arts" in the Charm description as a reading of the appropriate Ability score (for the use of Martial Arts minimums, adding to dice pools, maximum damage adds and so on).

I like this idea, because I think its fairly easy to link each existing Celestial style to a separate Ability score, as follows.

Snake Style is based on Martial Arts.\\ Tiger Style is based on Athletics.\\ Mantis Style is based on Brawl.\\ Ebon Shadow Style is based on Stealth.\\ Hungry Ghost Style is based on Occult.\\ Air Dragon Style is based on Lore.\\ Earth Dragon Style is based on Resistance.\\ Fire Dragon Style is based on Dodge.\\ Water Dragon Style is based on Larceny.\\ Wood Dragon Style is based on Medicine.\\ Violet Bier of Sorrows Style is based on Melee.\\ Celestial Monkey Style is based on Endurance.\\ Dreaming Pearl Courtesan Style is based on Socialize.\\ Righteous Devil Style is based on Archery.\\

Similarly the Terrestrial and Sidereal Styles are also based on different Abilities.

Five Dragon Style is based on Martial Arts.\\ Crimson Pentacle Blade Style is based on Melee.\\ Charcoal March of Spiders Style is based on Occult.\\ Prismatic Arrangements of Creation is based on Martial Arts.\\ Citrine Poxes of Contagion is based on Medicine.\\

The "gateway" Charms (Spirit Sight, Spirit Mastery and the alternatives form the Player's Guide) are all Charms based on the Martial Arts ability.

Nothing says that two styles couldn't be based on the same Ability, though I think the choices I used above are all thematically appropriate and I liked the idea of Martial Arts Styles each deriving from a different Ability at each power level. It opens the door to some neat mental exercises designed styles based on Abilities like Linguistics, Sail, Survival and others that I like.

One notable thing about this is that it allows for the possibility of deriving purely splat specific "generic" Martial Arts charms, that would only be available for that splat (for every splat except Lunars and Alchemicals, who rely on Attributes, not abilities, anyway). Also, its gets kind of confusing to refer to Charms as Martial Arts Charms, but a better name eludes me.

RULES

To use the option presented above you would need to incur the following changes to the basic Charm rules.

1: All Martial Arts Charms may be freely comboed with any other Martial Arts charm as long as they obey the normal rules for Combos.

2: Martial Arts Charms may NOT be comboed with non-Martial Arts Charms, even if they are derived from the same ability, unless the Charm may be explicitly comboed with Charms of other abilities or is Reflexive.

3: Alternatively, disallow non-Martial Arts Charms from being comboed even if they are explicitly allowed, for flavor or balance or whatever reason you prefer.

4: The minimum Ability requirement for the Charm changes from Martial Arts to the appropriate Ability, regardless of how high his Martial Arts ability is (unless, of course, the Ability in question is the Martial Arts ability). The minimum Essence requirement remains unchanged.

5: The character must buy the Charm (with Freebie or Experience points) as if it was a Charm of that Ability, regardless of whether he favors the Martial Arts Ability or not. Thus if the base Ability is Caste/Favored/Aspect/Auspicious the character pays the reduced cost, if it is not, he pays full price. Lunars always pay full price for Martial Arts charms, regardless of whether they Favor the ability in question. The caveat to number four applies here as well, of course.

6: In the text of the Charm, replace all mentions of the word Martial Arts with the appropriate base Ability to determine all effects of the Charm such as duration, bonuses, penalties and so on. The only exception is attack rolls, which are always made with the characters Dexterity + Martial Arts dice pool.

7: The maximum dice-adder bonus for any Martial Arts charm for any Exalt regardless of splat is their full Attribute + Ability pool. The Ability in question is always the base ability of the Style. If two or more styles are combined, use the lower of the two values. Combining multiple styles requires equal mastery of both styles to be efficient.

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