TrialBySchmendrick/ThunderGodVsWaterDragon

TrialBySchmendrick

Trial started: {date}
Trial completed: {date}

Home: Water Dragon Style

Details of the "home" Schmendrick, known as The Water Dragon, including possessions, style specifics, etc. Played by Aincumis. This Schmendrick is referred to as Water Dragon for the rest of the document. Decked out w. orichalcum tiger claws and a breastplate of same. He is a practitioner of Water Dragon Style, an Immaculate martial art he mastered from a blind Lookshy Immaculate who owed him his life.

Besides all of Water Dragon Style and the special Schmendrick Ox Body, he has the following Charms: First Martial Arts Excellency, Shadow over Water, Leaping Dodge Method, Monkey Leap Technique, and Increasing Strength Exercise

His Combos are:

• Scarlet Tide of Your Heart Prana - Focusing his thoughts to hone in the beating of the human heart, the Water Dragon's anima begins to beat and throb along with the opponent's heartbeat until he leaps forward with his claws ready and attacks over and over again with each beat. The cerulean essence pulses through the victim's body until on the last blow, their heart explodes. First Martial Arts Excellency, Crashing Wave Style and Drowning in Blood Technique

• Unfathomable Might of the Dragon - Flexing his muscles and gritting his teeth, the Water Dragon poses in five perfect katas focusing the grace and power of the Elemental Dragons. As his anima froths and foams with will and essence, the ground begins to split and crack, until the final kata is struck and the ground bursts from the force of a mighty geyser of water behind the martial artist. Increasing Strength Exercise, Monkey Leap Technique, Flowing Water Defense

Away: Thunder God Style

Details of the "away" Schmendrick, called Thunder God. Played by Han'ya. This Schmendrick is referred to as Thunder God for the rest of the document. He's got his entire style plus the Schmendric OBT, and five Solar charms. These are First MA, First Presence, Shadow Over Water, Essence-Gathering Temper, and Willpower-Enhancing Spirit. Equipped wiv teh smashfists and a breastplate (Orichalcum, natch). He used to be a conscripted line soldier from a Realm satrapy who learned his style at the foot of one of Black Grinning Bear's lieutenants.

His Combos follow:

• Crush The World Down - Channeling his desire to dominate all things about himself through his own soul and through the very fabric of Creation, he holds up the destruction of his foes as an offering to Heaven as he descends upon them like a falling star. Heaven's Revenge Strike, Essence-Gathering Temper, & Willpower-Enhancing Spirit

• Slice Like A Hammer - Doesn't matter who it is, he'll damn well crush anybody. His anima assumes the aspect of a snarling hundred-armed storm god with a beard of rimefrost and hair of lightning. This manifestation strikes with him, every blow as mighty as the stone-splitting lightning. Strike Like the Lightning, Booming Thunderclap Strike

Signs

• Musician: Standard 2e rules
• The Ship's Wheel: Both characters are Solar Exalted of the Dawn caste with 5 other Solar charms available to them
• Haywain: Visibility penalties from monsoon-level rains in a dark abandoned temple to some forgotten God
• Guardians: Artifact armor (Breastplate)
• Spear: Style's form weapons (Tiger Claws & Smashfists respectively)
• Sorcerer: Each combatant begins with up to two Combos which may contain up to three Charms within.

Transcript

Both Martial Artists have Martial Arts 5 and Essence 4 (as that is the prerequisites for the highest Charms in both styles)

Combatant: damage, willpower, essence (remaining/committed/total), DV penalty (including wounds, but not mobility), soak (bashing/lethal/aggravated), channels (compassion/conviction/temperance/valor)

   WD: --|-----|----|-|-, wp: x/x, psnl: x/x/x, prph: x/x/x, DV plty: -0, Soak: xB/xL/xA, Ch: 3/4/3/4
   TG: --|-----|----|-|-, wp: x/x, psnl: x/x/x, prph: x/x/x, DV plty: -0, Soak: xB/xL/xA, Ch: 3/4/3/4
   Distance: 10 yards

Round 1

Flavor text describing the events, stunts, etc.

Mechanics of one fighter

Mechanics of another fighter. If a fighter makes an attack, use the attack steps. Second Edition, for example, would be:

1. Attack specifics, including charm use.
   1. Additional details, like countercharms
   2. Or other responses to the attack made during this step
2. Defense declaration
3. Attack roll
4. Attack reroll
5. External penalties
6. Defense reroll
7. Base damage
8. Soak
9. Counterattacks
10. Result

Conclusions

A section for what was learned

Initial Negotiations

Alright, Signs. The Musician (2nd Edition rules) for sure. Any reason to not go Ship's Wheel and be Solars? Would your style benefit a lot from Free Reflexives? Wanna do 5 other Charms?

Musician and Ship's Wheel seem reasonable. Keep it simple and all. I think Haywain for the environment, but we can go Banner if it tickles your fancy. I don't really want any rules signs, but I'm open to persuasion.

Haywain's good with me, we should be fighting down by the docks on a foggy night, with lots of ships, crates, barrels and such to stunt off of. Does Thunder God Style allow armor? How about the ones for Artifact armor or weapons? I like the Combo one too.

I was actually thinking in the ruins of some First Age temple in a pouring monsoon. It's not specified, but yes, armor is a-okay. The combo one...eh. I have trouble with combos. Artifacts are OK, as I suppose it's hard to have an Exalt fight without them. Three dots would give us form weapons and a breastplate. We can have more if you want, but breastplate is about as far as I can go and still maintain my Schmendrick's overly boisterous lightning-tossing freak barbarian image.

Cool with me, temple and monsoon works. So, the Guardian and the Spear but no Sorcerer? What's your issue with Combos, exalted combat (especially Solars) have a lot of them.

I've just never really felt comfortable with them. But hey, life is about pushing your comfort zone. We can do Combos. So about visibility penalties; we should probably see what the corebook has to say about this situation. If it's mute, we'll figure something out.

Page 135 has it all under the section on Vision. A foggy night means we take a constant -1 external penalty from poor visibility, and beyond a 3 yard radius we have a -2 penalty for no visibility, people outside that radius are effectively invisible. Without Charms or stunts we can't attack beyond 6 yards with ranged attacks. If we hold a torch or other light source (I suppose animas count) we can be spotted for miles but still have the -2 external penalty if someone tries to make a ranged attack. As for Combos, I'd prefer them because they'd more closely model what Exalted combat is really like, even for martial arts. Unless you're really against them, I'm all for them. Lastly, wanna just call our guys "The Dragon of Water" and "The God of Thunder", though neither of us are technically Gods or Dragons? We could take other names too.

Should we have all three Martial Arts Excellencies for free, or should we buy them if we want them with our five Solar charms? And, while I'm at it, should Thunder God Form be Combo-OK?

Buy em. Yes it is. Is it cool with you if I add two charms to my style? I had this burst of inspiration the other day.

More Charms is fine, but do you know of any other Martial Arts Forms that are Combo-OK? I thought it was an explicit downside of Martial Arts that you had to make a deal about striking your combat pose and you couldn't just combo it with a bunch of other things.

I hadn't considered that. I wasn't going to combo it anyway, so I didn't really think about it much. But you raise a good point.

Perhaps you don't think of the Charm sets as potential for Combos, but the Charms on their own, unless they are explicitly not Combo-OK, are all fodder to be put together. If a Charm is too weird or too thematic to make Combo-OK, it shouldn't be. Forms I know for one are never Combo-OK, and Martial Arts are generally very pick-and-choosy about what Charms in the style can be comboed and which can't. Generally the weaker, modular effects are Combo-OK, the scene-longs rarely are, and the ultimate moves usually aren't. Wish I knew more about Charm design myself really but I know that much.

I'll run through your Martial Art and give it a look see. I hope you don't mind if I post my opinion on what Tags should be in each Charm? Don't take these as demands, just suggestions and criticism. Rumble of Thunder Battlecry, as a Simple Charm, should probably be Combo-Basic so people can't Extra Action charm it but could Combo it with a Performance Excellency. Roar of Elemental Fury, very very good for an initiate Charm; with the stunning damage, I again suggest Combo-Basic if it's comboable at all (initiate Charms should generally be weaker then Solar Charms, making it not Combo-OK would make it less useful, which would make balance sense). Booming Thunderclap Strike should CERTAINLY be Combo-OK. Fist of the Storm ... should it really be a constant success doubler like a permanent, no need to activate it after it's activated version of Solar Hero Form? I'm tempted to strongly suggest Fist of the Storm, if it is the central attack Charm of the martial art, should either NOT be Combo-able or if it IS all the other initiate Charms probably shouldn't.

Thunder God Form is costed high but for what it does that makes sense. Any chance of limiting it to either +Presence to your damage or Essence in dice to accuracy and not a choice between the two when activated? Like I said before, Forms shouldn't be Combo-OK.

Earth to Sky Leap. Now this looks to me like an Initiate level charm. Perhaps Roar of Elemental Fury or Booming Thunderclap Strike should switch it positions? Any reason why THIS one ISN'T Combo-OK? Heaven's Revenge Strike is ... weird, I'm not sure I completely understand it. Singing in the Rain Stance could either be Combo-OK or not depending on what the balance of the others are. Judging from how most things are Combo-OK in the tree as it stands right now, I'd suggest it not be Combo-OK. Also, what are the Willpower costs to ignore the Unnatural Mental Influence that it creates? Finally, Strike Like the Lightening is probably the Charm that deserves to be Combo-OK THE MOST of the whole tree, but it isn't.

My suggestions to the Style; Switch Earth to Sky Leap with Roar of Elemental Fury. Make RoTB Combo-Basic, make RoEF, FotS, TGF un-comboable, leave HRS and SIRS Combo-OK and change SLLT into Combo-OK.

Wow...you obviously have a sense of balance that I lack. To be honest, Charm design isn't really my thing. I have pretty good ideas, but translating them into mechanics? Eh. I did some thinking and some number-crunching, and your suggestions seem prudent. I shudder to think what would have happened to me if I went up against you with my lame-butt broken style, as opposed to the new, shiny, collaborative-effort style.

YAY! I'm glad you like my suggestions rather then take offense. I didn't want it to seem like I was trying to hobble your martial art before the competition.

Hey dude, you still there? Sorry I haven't been on in a while, I was away from home.

Understandable. Yep, I'm here, and in no real rush.

Soooooooooooooo, what is it we got left to do now?

Battle to the death. I'm free all the rest of this week?

I work but whatever, it's a wiki, I can get on about once a day at least. Is there any more setup that needs to be done?

Not to my knowledge.

Well, we should get that Transcript with our basic combat stats properly formatted and then you could probably post an introduction to your character. The temple will probably be to some forgotten Thunder God, don't you think?

My thought was Sol Invictus, but whatev. I'll make time for it.

Player Chat

A space for the combatants to discuss things with each other.

Observer Comments

A space for onlookers to discuss stuff (and players to respond).