TonyC/SolarsVsLionSCDVote

Alrighty, everyone! I'm looking for a vote, here. We have a minor problem.
QUESTION: If a character uses Sequential Charm Disruption to cancel a reflexive Charm, as per Charm Redirection Technique, and the reflexive Charm's user re-activates it, can the character use the same instance of Sequential Charm Disruption to cancel it again, or does he have to activate a new Sequential Charm Disruption (or Charm Redirection Technique) to do so?

The Charm text for Charm Redirection Technique states that if a reflexive is surpressed, it can be immediately re-activated. Charm Redirection Technique would therefore have to be used repeatedly, clearly.
However, Sequential Charm Disruption can counter all Charms in a combo.

I had originally read the Charms such that you needed multiple applications to re-surpress reflexives (which would make the Solars lose the mote race badly). Tony clearly read it as being allowable with just one use, and I honestly couldn't say, after reading it, which is correct. Therefore, I'm putting it to a vote. Please just alter the votes below - no cheating. :) I've already recorded Tony's vote, and my own.

"Yes. SCD can counter all instances of reflexives, even if they're re-activated." - 4 Votes
"No. You need to activate SCD a second time to counter a second set." - 3 Vote
"Hell no! You can never counter a re-activated reflexive!" - 0 Votes

Comments on Vote

My answer is yes as accounted for above. BUT no matter what the charm texts say, activating the same charm for the same effect in the same instant should generally not be allowed. I believe the ruling was to prevent stacking the same charm over and over again for added benefits, but in this case it should also prevent a canceled charm to be reactivated for the same thing at the same instant. The same should apply for the supplemental charm-disruption. No reactivating it in the same instant and for the same effect if it should be canceled. SO of you REALLY allow the reactivation thing, you should treat it kinda like they never had ended, which leads to an instant long bleeding of essence as in "wizard standoff" till the weak link gives. No real reactivation involved, just committing more motes to keep the charms up and running. Just my 2 pennies... DogSkull

I would say that logically you have to spend the essence on a new activation of the charm countering, or else what is the benefit of allowing reactivation in the first place? If it can be countered for 'free' (since the cancelling person has already paid for the charm to cancel them) then there is little point allowing them to reactivate in the first place. Is that text about reactivation just there on the off chance the canceller wants to be kind and let them use the charm the second time? - Kraken

No, the SCD'er still has to keep up the "Essence-war", where in the newly re-activated charm cost motes to re-activate. The SCD'er can spend an identical number of motes to reflexively re-cancel (after all, the SCD works on "all charms in a combo" which includes the one just re-activated). So, once it's been reflexively re-canceled, the target can again re-activate, by paying the activation cost another time. The SCD'er can then spend the same number of motes to again disrupt. Essentially, the fight occurs at this level, rather than the level at which the SCD'er would need to continually re-activate SCD, over and over and over again. In fact, if someone was using something like CMoS form, and activated three separate combos in one turn, and each combo had a reflexive in it (say, DSD), if the SCD'er disrupted DSD once, rather than 'automatically reactivate', the target could instead use a different combo as the source of the DSD, activating it reflexively. In this situation, the DSD would be from a different combo, and as such, you'd need a new instance of SCD to disrupt it. Yes, it's a bit crazy to consider, but at the level that things like PAoC style work at, and the opponents one can be expected to fight at such levels, sequences like this exist, and they're crazy. - GregLink, pointing out the point of allowing re-activation.

I would prefer to extend the same logic of CRT to SCD for basically the reasons GregLink just specified. Moveover, "parry" use notwithstanding, SCD reads too much like an attack for me to be comfortable with the idea of interpreting the rules to decisively its direction. Defense over offense in this game, right? -- Hapushet

My personal thought is that "essence attrition" is really how the charm is supposed to work. But really, I'm fine with either interpretation. If FrivYeti decides to go for "Yes" then of course Student annuls everything, as reducing Lion's essence motes is a good idea. If "No" is the prevailing thought, then Student, who in-character knows how SCD and CRT work, will let Grasping Mantis Defense pass and annul Charm Redirection Technique instead. CRT, being Supplemental, can't simply be reactivated. In fact, CRT's text specifically says that if a supplemental is annuled, the original dice action must be carried out without the supplemental. Meaning once Lion's CRT is annuled, Lion must apply Grasping Mantis Defense against Scourge. Scourge hits. However, if that is the case, I'll change Burning Mandala's action back to transferring essence to Princess. FrivYeti, you may want to ask around on the WW forum and rpg.net forum, maybe patternspider.net too, but only if you're thick-skinned. But remember that you're the Final Word and regardless of what the vote result is, ultimately what you say goes. Once you've made up your mind, just let me know and we'll proceed. - TonyC

Well, the key is that if it's Yes, the Lion is dead in the water, since he can't activate anything at all against Gaia's Rebuke (Scourge is really an afterthought, there - Student has more motes than the Lion and can (and would) counter anything the Lion could throw up). If No, Scourge is meaningless to the Lion because his combo is already active, and he can survive Gaia's Rebuke with �lan. At the moment, the vote is tilting towards yes, which means that my cunning plan to demonstrate the Lion's total invunerability by giving you an easy opening to use Gaia's Rebuke will instead reduce him to a smear of Essence and scraps of metal. ;) Either way, I'll resolve tommorow afternoon based on how the vote went. *shakes head* You know how people always say Sidereal Martial Arts win you the game? I think it's just PAoC. - FrivYeti

Yeah, gotta agree with you there. The second you've got things like "and make your Essence = 10", and "Cancel anything the other guy can do", you're doing pretty well. One on one, PAoC is about equal to other high-essence combat, but when you've got a PAoC guy and someone else against one target, the PAoC guy just sits there, ruining the target's day, while the ally does all the killin' work. Stupid counterspells. Always did hate blue decks. - GregLink, with an unnecessary MTG reference.

I've not yet voted because I'm torn. On the one hand, having re-read the charm text, I'm pretty sure that mechanically, TonyC's interpretation is correct. At first I thought that SCD being an instant means otherwise, but the charm text specifically mentions the ability to cancel reflexives "as they are used", which implies the reflexive parts of the combo live until the end of the turn and may be annulled as they happen, however often they happen, from a single casting of SCD. On the other hand, if that is the way it works, it makes Sequential Charm Disruption unbalancingly powerful. It would mean, more or less, that nearly any two people could defeat any single target, provided one of them had SCD. Note how Lion's larger (total) essence pool didn't help him here, for example. His only defense was to use a combo costing more than Student could pay on the first turn, a strategy which only works for a few (in this case, one) turns. The only other thing he could have done, it seems to me, was somehow add a SCD of his own to counter Student's SCD. (In which case, figuring out the costs gets funky.) The basic imbalance is that combos, the only way to activate multiple charms per turn, can only be cast once per turn, while SCD can be cast repeatedly in the same turn by using multiple parry actions. In any case, it seems to me that if SCD really does work this way, then a rules misunderstanding has led to Friv making a tactical error that Lion would not have made. - Wordman

Actually, no, the Lion would probably have made the same error - his error was believing (as I did) that his uber-Combo would kill Student, and therefore that it wouldn't become an issue. Once that failed, bam. - FrivYeti

SCD by itself is not broken. There's actually quite a lot of restrictions built in. There's the cost. It is a supplemental charm that needs an MA parry action reserved. You need to beat a difficulty equal to the opponent's Essence (10 for Lion, so this isn't trivial). You need to be a target or be very close. So it's not that any two people will beat any single target as long as one of the two has SCD. It's just that I have specifically prepared Student to overcome the restrictions. Between Soul Fire Shaper Form and Gem of Perfect Mobility, I get around the need for MA parry action. The Gem also makes me able to get close (and even then I have to break the rule by using a stunt). Between the Form charm and Chosen of Endings Sidereal Way, I ensure myself enough successes to beat the difficulty 10. Essence Containing Gem doubles Student's motes, and even then it isn't enough. My chance comes when FrivYeti bet on that combo. It is not a bad bet. It's a very good bet. If it wasn't for the stunt, it would've worked too. If any charm is broken, it's Soul Fire Shaper Form and possibly (Type) Exalt Ways. - TonyC

Sorry to follow my own post, but another thing Lion could have done was to stay away from Student. Since the charms being countered are not targeting Student, the only way Student can counter them is to get close. Interestingly, the solars are obliging in this respect because Gaia's Rebuke is going to carry Lion a mile into the air, well out of Studen't SCD range. - Wordman

An accurate, if scary statement, but from my understanding of Gaia's Rebuke, it's not something that really has a concept of 'time' in which to actually do anything to save your own life. Given that I've a physics background, my gut reaction is that being moved one mile, then flipped the other direction and thrust the other direction for another mile, requires you to go 1 mile in 1.5 seconds (assuming it's cast at the beginning of the turn). That means that you're being accelerated at about 1400 meters per second squared, and we can safely assume that the Lion weighs at least 150 kilograms (he is wearing armor, after all), that you're being exposed to about 213333 newtons, or about 50,000 pounds of force, or say, 25 tons of oomph. Now, that's being applied on only one side of his body, or just less than 1 square meter or so. Let's say 0.8 square meters, for about 5600 pounds per square foot. Now, the calculation I just did assumed that at the top, you're going really fast. But in this example, you're not - you stop at the top, as if you'd hit a really big wall. Since he'd be going 2100 meters per second at this point, that's a pretty big impact. Assuming that the Lion is semi-squishy, and it takes 0.1 seconds for him to stop moving, he would be exposed to forces much greater than the simple 1.5s acceleration he just underwent, easily (I'm tired of calculating at this point) over 50,000 pounds per square foot. Given this, and the next phase, which is another 56,000 lb/sq. ft. decent, followed by another 50,000 lb/sq. ft. stop. So, we can safely say that the Lion could, in theory, use something like Adamant Skin Technique on the 'up' part, where he's away from Student. On the way back down, however, he's still gonna be squished, for about half of the damage, perhaps more (gravity helps so on the way down). I'd say, if nothing else, we're looking at about 80L of damage, even assuming he could perfect-soak the upswing. Otherwise, once the spell is in play, he really can't do anything about it, as even moving an arm would require him to move against the nearly 3 tons of acceleration his arm is undergoing. Yes, HGD is powerful, but being pushed around isn't really an attack, and if he wants to do anything else, like, say, move, he's got to have a Str+Athletics in the range of 23+ to lift an arm, and significantly higher to think about moving his body out of the way. Just some thoughts, because I'm a physics junkie, and because in my head, getting out of Gaia's Rebuke, once in action, is almost impossible, due to the speed and force you're being moved through. - GregLink

You're not actually using physics in an Exalted game, are you? :-) If you assume that he can use reflexives on the up part and that the damage is (nearly) half on up half on down (which I don't agree with), he could activate both Adamant Skin and Essence Gathering Temper. This would give him enough essence to outspend Student on the way down. Also, in order for Student to cancel charms on the way down, he'd have to have nearly impossible timing in order to cancel the reflexives in the exact milliseconds in which Lion is within a few yards of him. Since he doesn't have any perception charms active to give him such supernatural awareness, I'm not sure he could manage it. Also, he'd have to be standing right next to the impact site, which would probably kill him. One other thought that occurs to me is that, given the description of how the rebuke is Creation rejecting the target, there would be at least a slight justification that the spell doesn't work at all in a shadowland. - Wordman

If someone actually tried to justify that to me, I'd smack them upside the head, most likely. Regardless, neither Adamant Skin nor Essence Gathering could be activated until the Lion hits the ground. At which point he's next to the Student again. - FrivYeti

Yes, but the plug of earth that Lion is on is 10 yards thick, which means the hole it slams back into (once inverting) is also 10 yards deep. Since Lion doesn't take damage until impact, at the time of impact, he will be 10 yards from the surface, making him seven yards outside of Student's countering ability. Unless Student wants to jump in the hole before the plug lands. If the plug doesn't land right back in the hole, then it probably isn't within three yards of Student either. - Wordman

If I'm running a game and somebody tries to justify that to me, I'd smack them upside the head, most likely. - TonyC

On what grounds? If the contention is that Lion won't take any damage until impact, the spell description seems to indicate the Lion will not be within three yards to Student at the time of impact. That seems completely logical to me. The only counter-argument I can see (though I don't agree with it) is that since Student was within three yards when he countered the combo, he doesn't need to be within three yards to counter the combo's reflexives. - Wordman

<snip>Edited out my own comment since it adds nothing important. - TonyC

(Since charms require neither gesture nor incantation, Shadow-Stepping Motion would extract him from the hole without much problem, but that's beside the point.) Having the spell deposit Lion out of range of Student seems to require less "reality lawyering" than the stunt that allowed Student to live this long in the first place, but, whatever. It's your game. - Wordman, who is obviously rooting for the crocodile and hopes it eats your friends whole.

I agree with TonyC and FrivYeti on this one. If a player started arguing for a mechanical advantage based on physics and flavor text, I'd start throwing dice at him. Flavor text is there to make it sound cool and to give you a description of how it looks, not to give additional mechanical complexity. Gaia's Rebuke has one mechanical effect: the target takes 150L damage. Anything else is trying to bend both the rules and the Storyteller's patience as well as add needless complexity to something that's already complex enough. Also, I think that the Lion's arrogance would definitely lead to him believing that his Mega-Ultra-Death Combo was completely infallible - after all, it's never failed before.

"My Liege, what about during the Usurpation?"

"IT'S NEVER FAILED BEFORE! THEY CHEATED!" - notsoangrydave

The "flavor text doesn't matter" argument, while I understand it, leads to things like Unstoppable Fountain of the Depths not actually making anything wet, because its only "mechanical effects" are to deal bashing damage and knock people down (and make it hard to stand back up). The fact that this is all caused by rushing water is just "flavor text" and "SFX" so, clearly, couldn't do things like soak manuscripts or extinguish fires. Like I said, it's your game, but since Exalted is meant to be a cinematic game, the flavor text can color rulings I make as an ST. - Wordman

Wordman, let us just take a deep breath, watch Serenity, and relax. I mean, yeah, both of our positions, taken to the extreme, are ridiculous, but I'm sure that both of us are actually pretty moderate. - TonyC

I am a leaf on the wind. - Wordman

Hmm, things are getting a bit heated, at least partially on account of me. Let me reiterate with a slightly-less-inflammatory tone: there needs to be a balance between flavor, mechanics and cool. When taken to either extreme, it's bad. I would give the Gaia's Rebuke descritption a DBZ-style reappearance, "Then a tremendous pillar of earth comes crashing down on him, leaving a voluminous cloud of gray-brown smoke... after the smoke clears, you see the bent and broken form of the First and Forsaken Lion atop a freshly-disturbed pile of dirt. he lifts his head to say, "Nani! [swear that always sounded to me like k'so-ah]!" before collapsing to the ground and expiring."

or, you know, something like that. I wouldn't discontinue Charms from such a cool teamwork-based strategy, though. If you can't tell, I want to see the Solars come out on top here. - notsoangrydave

PS - I like physics, too - that was cool to see.

Let me just take a second to hopefully interrupt this discussion. As the primary instigator, and "bringer of the numbers", let me apologize. My intent was not to actually say anything, it was to merely show off how much I love physics. Having said what I came to say, I hereby distance myself from the discussion, and will continue to let FrivYeti run his scene without my unnecessary interruption. Sorry for the tangent, and TonyC - good luck! - GregLink

Would anyone mind if I usurped this page into a new entry in the new Rulings section, then made this page a redirect to there? -- Wordman

_I_ don't mind. Just make sure it makes sense to people coming both from the Rulings mainpage and the Solars Vs. Lion page. This probably means adding an explanatory paragraph at the top. - TonyC