[2E] Third Excellency

[Fruan]

The first Excellency is the Dragon Blooded's 'thing', just like the third is the Siddies'.


You're right in suggesting that almost no DB will take the 2nd Ex for abilities like Melee - This is an intentional design choice; DBs are supposed to go for lots of dice, and hand trouble with auto sucsesses.


However, there are still certain abilities in which Dbs will opt for the 2nd ex. Athletics is my favourite example; Most of the time you're trying to get a small number of sucsesses to not fall, or whatever. Getting many more than the difficulty doesn't really help much.

 

[Quorlox]

You're right in suggesting that almost no DB will take the 2nd Ex for abilities like Melee - This is an intentional design choice; DBs are supposed to go for lots of dice, and hand trouble with auto sucsesses.

I agree it was intentional.  A DB is only as good as a Celestial Exalt with the Second Excellency; that's not that bad.  

It basically removes the second excellency from DB games, unless you have characters/players who want to make themselves gimped.

According to canon, DBs are better at 1st Excellency than 2nd, which suggests they would prefer to use 1st.  They can still learn 2nd if there's a reason, but few would.  It's not what they're best at.

 

[wordman]

Then why in the whole world would -any- DB take 2nd excellency?

Mathematically, the only real use of the 2nd for DBs is if you really need to pump DV. It's automatic (unlike first) and has a higher maximum (unlike third). It is really expensive, though.


That's not enough to warrant its purchase as a charm, IMO.

 

[Samiel]

It makes perfect sense to me.


Solars: Good at everything. Have reasonably priced first and second excellencies, and an o.k. reroller


Lunars: Have really good excellencies. Stat-based.


Siderials: Largely the same, but with a better reroller: they like their chances.


Terrestrials: Depend on efficiency and chance, but excellency (the noun) is not their schtick, so they get a discount only on the first.


Essentially they have a cheaper first and third excellency because they need it and because they burn bright, but they don't get a discount on the second and they don't really need it.


Being a DB player, I see no problems with it: as mentioned, you can use it to pump DV if you really need it, but it's just as useful out of combat for academic or craft skills, where mote efficiency isn't important.


I'd take the gift I'm given with a smile and thank DBs for having a dirt cheap first excellency, and use the second as I always have. Besides, the DB excellencies don't need fixing when they can use them freely with one another and other charms. For goodness' sake.

 

[Persell]

As a final note, DBs can apply the third excellency with the first two, and without a combo too. Cheesy? Well, they could use it with their limits, poor bastards. It's probably their most powerful one, for raw applicability.

As has already been pointed out, the guy who wrote the charms in the DB book said, on the WW forums, that this was an oversight. In the spirit of the rules, you can not do this, and won't if/when it's addressed with errata.

 

[Samiel]

Nuts... where was that mentioned? I'd like to see it. It makes sense though, I suppose. Poor Dragonbloods.


Doesn't change the essence of the point, that their excellencies are now reflexive rather than supplemental as many were in first edition. They can use their excellencies on everything without trubble.

 

[Persell]

Nuts... where was that mentioned? I'd like to see it.

There's a great big thread of DB book errata on the WW forum; it's somewhere in there, quite early on. I can't point you to it, my work firewall blocks the WW site.

 

[Solfi]

They've started an errata page on the Exalted wiki, that summarizes questions asked / answered in the errata thread on the WW-site.

 

[Zaramis]

Well, I hate having one charm in every charm tree that essentially screams "useless" at my DB's. I will keep the houserule that it is cheaper as well, since no one takes the charm even if it's cheaper.


The only person who did so far was an Earth who wanted to have, in the theme and mood of his element, stability instead of chance and strong-burning fires, which I think suited his character well.

 

[Flagg]

Well, I hate having one charm in every charm tree that essentially screams "useless" at my DB's.

It strikes me that there's quite a lot about Exalted that you dislike.


-S

 

[Persell]

I wouldn't say it's useless - just more expensive to use.  The way that I've rationalized it is that the First Excellency is like a Terrestrial Excellency - it's easier for all Exalted to add to the chances of their glory.  The Second Excellency, however, is like a Celestial Excellency - it allows them to prove their greatness.  Because Dragon-Blooded aren't at the same level as Celestials, that's why they aren't able to refine the 2nd Excellency as efficient as they have been able to refine the 1st Excellency.

 

[Zaramis]

Well, I hate having one charm in every charm tree that essentially screams "useless" at my DB's.

It strikes me that there's quite a lot about Exalted that you dislike.


-S

Mostly in the intepretation of Exalted by others. I love Exalted, the setting, the world. I just don't enjoy playing many of the things in the world.


As for the rules, I have come to grip with the fact that War went to Earth, and have incorporated it into the philosophy, among some other things in the game.


Autochtonians? I can see their charm, but not in the theme and mood we are playing in right now. In another campaign, sure thing, but the mood has to be different.


It all comes down to the setting I have envisioned for the current campaign, and for that campaign, many things don't really fit, but most of the changes i've made to the game have been suggested in one way or another in St guides and such, so it's hardly a strange thing.


But If I posted every time I liked something in the game, it would get rather spammy, but I like discussions where people don't agree, so that's where I voice my opinions on the matter.


And our houserules seem rather small compared to things like "We've ignored training times" or "I give out 8-10 exp per session" We have just toned the game down, made it harder to learn without a teacher, and made the 2nd excellency better for DB's. We've also removed the Piercing value from many of the weapons, because I think that mechanic is flawed. Mostly because of how Mace and Goremauls are so infinitely superior to every other weapon in the game, just because they do over 2x the damage as most other weapons, and then have piercing damage.


The goremaul in particular is really weird. 16B, Piercing. What can withstand that? An articulated plate with it's 12 soak has no problems withstanding most Daiklaves. It soaks a full 12 vs their damage of say, +5.


But vs a Goremaul? It removes 50% of the soak, down to 6. Then it does 16 base damage, being reducing to 7 after soak counting with 3 stamina. Add strength of 3, and maybe 3 extra successes. 13 dice of damage vs an Articulated Plate and 3 in stamina, and that's not with a particulary good roll!


The daiklave has 2 more dice in accuracy and 1 more dice in defense than the goremaul. It has 6 damage and no piercing value. The same roll vs the same person would go through the armor with 1 dice ( counting that the 2 extra accuracy gave 1 extra success ) 13 dice vs 2-3 dice. Sure, it's bashing damage, but in the end, even if it's halved by extra-super soak, it's still better than most other weapons.


Why would anyone use a Daiklave when a Goremaul ( that can be wielded with a shield ) is so infinitely better? It seems they have done the same thing on many of the bashing weapons. They have more than doubled their damage -and- given them Piercing quality, just because they have the B sign.


We did some test-fighting, trying this system out. Gave people the standard combat charms of DB's and Solars. The people with goremaul + shield basically whooped everyone else with ease, since if they hit a single hit, they massacred the opponent, through any kind of armor. Sometimes they lost ( mainly when they wore no armor themselves, because then the daiklaves can suddenly hurt a lot ), but as soon as you got a guy in a good armor with a Goremaul and shield, he was extremely hard to stop.


Uh. Yeah. this became a long debate over something small

 

[greasy golem gunk]

Didn't do all the reading, but what about this:


A dragonblood who boosts himself for a scene (doubling his ability+specialty)


or a celestial martial artist with the Blade of the Battle Maiden charm (doubling their entire abilty+attribute).


When the 3rd Excellency adds half of the ability to a defenders DV, is it half the base ability, or half the ability+bonus... or half the ability+half the bonus?


I Ask, because in a session I'm going to abuse (some might say moleste) this Martial Art technique (Blade of the Bat. Maid.+Infinite "3rd") severly, and I'm looking for some rules lawyers to back me up on it.  


-g3


--edit--


I guess the meat of it is, assuming a base martial arts of 9 (4 dex, 5 MA), when I double it (18 dice), is my parry DV 9+3 (adding half the base MA), 9+3+3 (my half-ability twice), or 9+3+5 (my half ability plus half my bonus dice).

 

[memesis]

Why would anyone use a Daiklave when a Goremaul ( that can be wielded with a shield ) is so infinitely better? It seems they have done the same thing on many of the bashing weapons. They have more than doubled their damage -and- given them Piercing quality, just because they have the B sign.
We did some test-fighting, trying this system out. Gave people the standard combat charms of DB's and Solars.

Did you do the test fights against all the guys who had their NATURAL bashing soak pumped to ridiculous levels through the fairly cheap Charms built for such purposes?

 

[Zaramis]

Did you do the test fights against all the guys who had their NATURAL bashing soak pumped to ridiculous levels through the fairly cheap Charms built for such purposes?

Yep. The only thing that does is that it doubles the efficiency of the soak charms. For example, Five Dragon Fortitude gives 2 bashing for 1 mote.


Since the goremaul does more than 2x the damage of a Daiklave, and still has piercing on top of this, doubling the efficiency wouldn't cut it. The daiklave is still inferior, even if the person uses soak-augmenting charms in every single hit, which won't happen.


Opponent has articulated plate and Five-Dragon Fortitude.


A daiklave user hits a person in articulated plate with 6 successes. The daiklave does 6L, and the person has Strength 3. 6 successes above DV is pretty high. This totals a damage of 15, minus 12, you end up with 3, the same as minimum damage would be ( probably ). The person didn't even have to use Five-Dragon Fortitude.


The same guy hits with a goremaul. He gets 5 successes above DV, since he has two less dice. The goremaul does 16B, and he has strength 3. This equals a damage of 24B. If you subtract the armor, this leaves 18 dice of Bashing that goes through. To get this down to the minimal level of 3 dice, the person would have to spend 8 motes.


= The Goremaul was superior, again, and by a lot too.


It is a slightly lesser difference if the Daiklave-user only hits with say, 2 successes. Then he would get the minimum damage of 3 ( or 4 ) and the person would have to spend no motes.


If the goremaul only hits with 1 successes, it does 20 damage. It still goes through with -14- dice after soak. To get this down to the minimum damage, the person would have to spend 5 motes. Alas, the goremaul is once again superior, and by a whole ton, even there.

 

[Persell]

Doesn't Piercing only halve armored soak?  If that's the case then natural soak is just as good against a goremaul as it is against a daiklave.

 

[Solfi]

yup. Alohahaha is correct. Any piercing damage only works on the portion of the soak afforded by armor. Any natural soak (which soak generated by Charms is generally counted as) would not be affected:

... effects that bypass armor (in full or in part) only pierce armored soak and do not reduce the protection afforded by natural soak in any way. The most common armor-bypassing effect is called piercing damage' date=' a special tag used by some weapons (such as target arrows).[/quote']

 

[Zaramis]

I already counted with that in my calculations. It only halved the 12 soak from the armor, not the pumped soak with Five Dragon Fortitude, so your arguments are void ;P

 

[Zaramis]

Actually, I forgot stamina soak alltogether. Sorry.


It changes it slightly, the person with a stamina of 3 gets 1 less damage from the Goremaul compared to the daiklave. Still a very small difference, and still means the goremaul wins out easily.

 

[Samiel]

Didn't do all the reading, but what about this:
A dragonblood who boosts himself for a scene (doubling his ability+specialty)


or a celestial martial artist with the Blade of the Battle Maiden charm (doubling their entire abilty+attribute).


When the 3rd Excellency adds half of the ability to a defenders DV, is it half the base ability, or half the ability+bonus... or half the ability+half the bonus?


I Ask, because in a session I'm going to abuse (some might say moleste) this Martial Art technique (Blade of the Bat. Maid.+Infinite "3rd") severly, and I'm looking for some rules lawyers to back me up on it.  


-g3


--edit--


I guess the meat of it is, assuming a base martial arts of 9 (4 dex, 5 MA), when I double it (18 dice), is my parry DV 9+3 (adding half the base MA), 9+3+3 (my half-ability twice), or 9+3+5 (my half ability plus half my bonus dice).

This isn't molesting the rules, it's against the rules.


No combination of dice adding charms or magics can increase an exalt's pools greater than their limits.


Thus, the third excellency, which adds their skill to their effective pool, cannot be used to any effect when a scene-long effect has already filled their limits.


Blade of the Battle Maiden has already brought them up to their maximum: in a solar, to twice their base pool, in a siderial to their base pool + essence, and in a lunar or terrestrial to their base pool plus attribute or skill, respectively.

 

[greasy golem gunk]

king for some rules lawyers to back me up on it.  
-g3


--edit--


I guess the meat of it is, assuming a base martial arts of 9 (4 dex, 5 MA), when I double it (18 dice), is my parry DV 9+3 (adding half the base MA), 9+3+3 (my half-ability twice), or 9+3+5 (my half ability plus half my bonus dice).

This isn't molesting the rules, it's against the rules.


....


Blade of the Battle Maiden has already brought them up to their maximum: in a solar, to twice their base pool, in a siderial to their base pool + essence, and in a lunar or terrestrial to their base pool plus attribute or skill, respectively.

So, a person with a scene length dice adder can not reroll an action, or can not enchance their DV?  Because I don't see how rerolling exceeds the dice limit.


-g3

 

[wordman]

So' date=' a person with a scene length dice adder can not reroll an action, or can not enchance their DV?  Because I don't see how rerolling exceeds the dice limit.[/quote']
It's certainly true that Third Excellency could not be used to pump DV in this case, because the pool on which DV is calculated is maxed, and Third Excellency (essentially) works by adding to that pool.


The case of a reroll is more ambiguous. There is nothing rules-wise preventing it directly; however, the rule stating that Third can't be used the same time as First and Second strongly indicates the intent of the charm as not being usable in situations where you are already pumped. So, I'd rule it as not being usable in this case either.