ExaltedPokemon
Contents
Exalted - Pocket Monsters
This is an Exalted mod that can be used for any "pocket-monster" genre game, like Pokémon, Monster Rancher, Digimon, etc., as well as things like Final Fantasy X-2 or "magical girl" anime where characters have to transform to get access to their supernatural powers.
Characters
A character in ExPokemon has six stats: Essence, Willpower, and the four Virtues. (You might consider, for some genres, using different Virtues than the default set.) He also has an Affinity, expressed as an Exalted Caste. Based on his Caste and stats, calculate an Essence pool.
Optionally, Trainers can have their own Attributes and Abilities. Stat these out as though they were mortals.
Monsters
Whenever a character needs to use a supernatural power, he brings out one of his Monsters. A Monster has its own Exalted Caste, as well as Attributes, Abilities, Health Levels, and Charms. You can more or less assume that the Monster will do whatever its Trainer tells it; it's just a subpart of the character. It's a convention of this genre, in many cases, that the Trainer is sacrosanct. He does not have Health Levels because it is unlikely that he will ever engage in unaided combat.
A Monster can only have Ability dots in its Caste and Favored Abilities. It can have Specialties in any Ability, and even Charms based on those Specialties, but obviously it can only use these "shaky foundation" Charms within the scope of the Specialty. Even no-cost permanent Charms such as the World-Shaping Artistic Vision and the Ox-Body Technique can be learned in this manner.
When using Charms, a Monster draws on the Essence and Willpower of his Trainer. Monsters who are not of the same Essence (Solar, Lunar, etc.) as their Trainer suffer a 1-mote surcharge on all their Charm activation costs, as do Terrestrial Essence Monsters who are of a different elemental Aspect than their Trainer.
Using Monsters
Pokemon Model
Choosing a Monster is a Reflexive action. Switching Monsters is a dice action that requires no roll; the final action provided by any Extra Actions Charm can always be used to switch Monsters instead of its ordinary purpose.
Magical Girl Model
At the beginning of a confrontation or when a Trainer arrives at a confrontation already in progress, all involved parties must choose their Monster and make an Appearance + Performance or Presence roll: Performance if the Trainer chooses to make a dramatic speech or pose threateningly, and Presence if the Trainer chooses to make some dramatic, but uncommunicative, gesture.
Sailor Moon Option: The Monster that the Trainer chooses can only activate Charms with a permanent Essence requirement less than or equal to the number of successes rolled. Successes in excess of the Trainer's permanent Essence allow the Trainer to activate Charms with a duration of One Scene, one Charm per success. Trainers must leave the scene and return if they wish to activate a different Monster.
Final Fantasy X-2 Option: For each success, the Trainer may activate a Charm with a duration of One Scene. Successes in excess of this are converted one-for-one into an initiative bonus for the next turn. As his action for the turn, a Trainer may make his Appearance + Ability roll as if he had walked onto the scene afresh, to choose a different Monster. This is resolved for all purposes as though the Trainer just arrived.
With apologies to ikselam.
Comments
giggles uncontrollably this is great ^_^ - Kraken
