FourWillowsWeeping/ExaltationBackground

Exaltation Background

This is intended to simulate the "blaze of glory" that characters experience in certain Exaltation stories. Basically, it allows starting characters access to advanced magics by harnessing their strength of personality. A character with the Exaltation background may channel Virtues to activate Charms he doesn't actually have; he may exchange a Virtue bonus die for the ability to behave as though he knows one Charm that he does not, ignoring Essence and Ability requisites but not Charm requisites. It is possible to use high-ranked Charms by using this "virtual Charm" capacity on their requisites as well. For instance, a Solar with no Melee Charms could exchange four dice for the ability to use the Iron Whirlwind Attack once. The Background also permits characters to channel multiple Virtues simultaneously.

Only Caste or Favored Charms of the Exalt's type can be activated with this ability; this explicitly means that Martial Arts Charms, Sorcery, and Necromancy are unavailable. The maximum duration for a virtual Charm is a scene.

Characters with the Exaltation background don't have their Virtues refresh normally, at the end of stories. Instead, when their Virtues are depleted, they lose a dot of the Exaltation background and their Virtues refresh fully, immediately.

•: You can channel 1 Virtue per turn, and spend any amount of bonus dice on virtual Charms.
••: You can channel 2 Virtues per turn, and spend any amount of bonus dice on virtual Charms.
•••: You can channel 3 Virtues per turn, and spend any amount of bonus dice on virtual Charms.
••••: You can channel 4 Virtues per turn, and spend any amount of bonus dice on virtual Charms.
•••••: You can channel 4 Virtues per turn, and spend any amount of bonus dice on virtual Charms; you can spend 1 bonus die for 2 virtual Charms.

Comments

WOW this's powerful.\\ I really like the idea; Solar Essences are AGES old and knew just about all their charms their first time around, and it makes sense that the Essence would remember what the Body doesn't. I, though, would say that this background is only available with Freebies, and most likely costing more than regular Backgrounds. Not sure how much yet, maybe +1 Freebies.\\ But that's just me.

Cheers,\\ ~*~Braydz~*~

It's cool, but I suspect that it might be something better modeled as a merit than a background; this seems to cover some of the old WoD ground where backgrounds acted less like backgrounds and more like merits (like Mage's Arcane and Avatar.) Other'n that lil nitpick (especially since this was probably written pre-PG), it's cool. --Miedvied

Thanks for commenting! It certainly was pre-PG. Even post-PG, though, I think it serves better as a Background; it represents characters who haven't been around so long, so buying it with your base points will perforce block access to the Backgrounds that reflect a character's worldliness - such as Connections, Allies, etc. Unlike, say, Breeding, which should should be a Merit. - willows