Applicability of Solar perfect defenses

syys

syys

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The Solar perfect Dodge and Parry charms are said to work against any attacks, even those which are undodgeable and unblockable. But I'm not sure what should count as an attack.


Let's say that a character falls into a river of molten lava. Could he dodge/parry the damage? What about other environmental damage, like from the demon wind in Malfeas? Or let's say that the character slips down from a great height. Could he perfectly dodge/parry to avoid the damage upon hitting the ground?


Adamant Skin seems to clearly apply in these situations (it refers to "damage of a physical attack or similar effect"), but somehow it wouldn't make sense to me to allow a dodge or parry.
 
It has to be coming at you, not you coming at it.  If you can't logically dodge, block or parry a type of damage, then perfect defenses won't work.  I would allow an Athletics roll at varying difficulty to avoid falling into a river of molten lava, but I wouldn't allow a perfect dodge to apply.


On the other hand, if a boulder tumbles off a high cliff and plummets down to the character who then utilizes something like Heavenly Guardian Defense, I'd allow it, because it's an "attack" that can logically be blocked as per the Charm description.
 
A) Solars aren't the only one with Perfect defenses...so any anwer to this likely applies to others as well.


B) My own thought is 'Can they explain how it works in this case with an interesting stunt?' If the character falls from the skyship and says 'I Heavenly Guardian Defense', well, then they get to splatter. If they say 'As I fall from the massive height, I watch the ground coming at me, bringing my daiklaive to bear, with a mighty swing, the power of the sun radiating around me I cleave it into the ground, arresting my momentum with the charm Heavenly Guardian Defense'...or something more interesting...then sure. You can block nuclear explosions with it...the ground coming at you shouldn't be too hard... similarly with the Winds of Malfeas... simply saying 'I heavenly Guardian Defense...' not too interesting, slamming your Grand Daiklaive into the earth and sheltering behind it, the winds whipping past and tearing into any not so guarded...more so. With the dodges, the falls...whether into lave or the ground can have easy explanations...the wind, not so much, unless you use it to dodge behind some form of cover. I'd say if you can reasonably stunt getting out of the way, a Perfect Dodge is viable....similarly with reasonably stunting using your weapon to stop momentum or deflect it. Cloud catching himself from a fall in Advent Children with his sword would be a good example of a parry based defense from falling, for example.
 
I would probably just say "No, you can't" because sometimes allowing something perfectly legit and well stunted just opens the doors to all sorts of other abuses. However, in a group that I didn't think would abuse it, I probably would.
 
I wouldn't allow any of the listed situations. At best, you could dodge the silent wind.
 
Eh, this is Exalted, the game of 'that is so unrealistic!' It's part of the fun to be able to pull off something that's completely impossible because you were creative enough to do so. After all, Advent Children is a good source for Exalted combat scenes, and I'd agree that the sword into the building would be a good parry stunt to falling.


It looks cool. You're a Solar (or other Exalt)....you're supposed to look cool and do impossible stuff. *chuckles* It's part of the fun, for me. But, hey, if others don't want to allow such things as parrying or dodging falls, that doesn't make their game less cool or anything...just how people prefer to play. :)
 
syys said:
The Solar perfect Dodge and Parry charms are said to work against any attacks, even those which are undodgeable and unblockable. But I'm not sure what should count as an attack.
Let's say that a character falls into a river of molten lava. Could he dodge/parry the damage? ... Or let's say that the character slips down from a great height. Could he perfectly dodge/parry to avoid the damage upon hitting the ground?
Click to expand...
If you go by Douglas Adams' rules, a perfect dodge of the ground=flying.   :P


Kajiri's stunt examples are neat, but I would be wary as well.  In any event, it should not be treated as a regular usage.
 
Exalted Rule #2: "There is no such thing as over the top".


I would certainly allow Heavenly Guardian to parry falling into lava. For the Instant of the the charm's duration.
 
I would allow parrying the demon wind with a stunt by swinging your sword rapidly around your person to create a "bubble" of deflected air to protect you.


Of course, then you suffocate. But that's the next problem.
 
Jukashi said:
I would allow parrying the demon wind with a stunt by swinging your sword rapidly around your person to create a "bubble" of deflected air to protect you.
Of course, then you suffocate. But that's the next problem.
Click to expand...
In terms of environmental damage you could still call yourself fortunate.


And true, dodging the ground results in flying.
 
I think that I too would allow a perfect dodge/parry against molten lava, the Silent Wind of Malfeas or other environmental damage, but only for one damage interval. (So, one turn for Silent Wind, one minute for supernatural ice storm, etc.)


After all, if perfect defenses don't work against environmental damage, that would give a too easy way of bypassing them. One could have a high-Essence DB charm that creates a destructive elemental wind (or an Abyssal charm that creates a necrotic wind) similar to the Silent Wind, for example.


But for falling, probably not. The sword-into-a-building is a nice stunt, but I wouldn't say it's a use of Heavenly Guardian Defense.
 
Actually


From what I've read on the Wiki, HGD is a perfect defense against any attack, thus forms of damage that aren't attacks bypass HGD and SSE.


Adamant Skin is a perfect defense against all damage, thus attacks that don't deal damage bypass this defense.
 
Adamant Skin


Oh, and I believe Adamant skin simply sets the damage you take to 0, so maybe charms that deal damage levels (in step 10) would bypass this too.


Hardness does appy vs. lava however, but you might rule that anything above one's head is subject to suffocation.
 
As a follow on, are there any Charm, Anima, Sorcery, Artifact,  attacks that will get past a Perfect Defense?
 
Moonsilver said:
As a follow on, are there any Charm, Anima, Sorcery, Artifact,  attacks that will get past a Perfect Defense?
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If I remember correctly, there's a Sidereal Martial Arts Charm that lets you do so if someone doesn't do what you say. I think there's also a Charm that lets you disrupt other people's Charms as they use them.
 
Well...


Unstoppable force vs. Immovable object is meant to give players survivability and cheesing your way past them is bad form... but who cares when you really want that person to die!


Adamant Skin: Sets raw damage to zero.  There are charms that deal levels of damage which aren't calculated in step 7.


HGD: Unexpected attacks or attacking when the character doesn't have their weapon in hand.


SSE: Unexpected and (rules lawyering incoming!) rendering the Solar unable to dodge.  This is not the same as an attack that is undodgable.  This is where you freeze a solar in a block of ice.  He himself in incapable of dodging, it's not the attack that is undodgeable.


Environmental Damage: If it's not an attack, SSE and HGD will not apply to it.
 
This of course means that reshaping the terrain with sorcery can be a potent aid when it comes to fights between high-essence Exalts.
 
OK lets say I am a Solar with a Perfect Defence. I do a normal attack this action. Can I use my PD on each and every attack that comes in at me? Attacked six times, use my PD six times.


OK now my PD is part of a Combo (only supposed to be able to use each Charm once). So here I only get one use of the PD Charm? Or as I think does it apply to all atacks if used?
 
(only supposed to be able to use each Charm once)
Click to expand...
Errr? Where did you get that idea from? The only thing I can think of is you somehow misread the fact that no charm can be -included- in a combo more than once... which would be silly anyway really.
 
Yeah, there's nothing about only using a given charm once. To bring up a few examples, a Supplemental Combo'd with an Extra Action Charm must be used multiple times in the combo, once for every attack. An Excellency in a combo can be used freely to both defend and attack. A perfect defence can be invoked however many times you want, though it might get quite costly if that's your only defence.
 
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