Changing the minimum damage

syys

syys

New Member
I'm not terribly fond of the minimum damage being set by Essence, so I thought to change it to (Raw damage)/10, rounded up, instead.


However, I'm not sure what to do with Overwhelming weapons. Using the highest of the two would make the Overwhelming tag on some weapons rather superfluous (which is, to be sure, anyway the case with a minimum damage of Essence). However, adding, say (Overwhelming-1) to the minimum damage would make for rather high minimum pools. What do you think?
 
I personally think minimum damage is fine as it is.  Being able to deal potentially hard-hitting blows even when everything should deny you that chance is a gift of Essence -- you're more than human, and that's one of the benefits.  


Like Smegged said, if you allow everyone to have a set amount of minimum damage, you're lessening the benefit of being able to manipulate the very fabric of Creation.  I wouldn't like to think that a four-HL bandit could take out any of my Exalted characters given that formula for minimum damage.
 
Smeggedoff said:
keep in mind if it's not set by essence, extras become a bigger threat
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I don't mind. Besides, large or heavy weapons already have Overwhelming at 2 or higher. And with lighter weapons, you need a good extra (or good luck) to get Raw damage higher than 10. Slashing Sword with S3, for example, would require 5 successes above DV. I think that's worth an extra damage die.
 
I can't really comment on your suggestions unless I know what you're objections are to the official mechanic.
 
Eh...I'd personally not want to have to calculate the minimum bevery single time that I swung my fist/sword/implement of destruction, myself. Raw Damage is calculated (Str + Weapon + Extra Successes), and so is never a set number, and I've got enough calculating to do all the time as it is for me to want to have to add yet more math into the equation.


I hate doing math.


I personally feel the mechanic is fine as is....just have been considering the possibility of tweaking overwhelming so it's not so pointless at high levels, like making it add one to your essence if your essence is higher than the base damage, or adding (overwhelming amount / 3), round up to your essence when using an overwhelming weapon. Iunno. Nobody's picked one up yet, so I've not had to worry about fiddling with it.


But yeah...I don't see what the issue with Essence minimum damage is, either...might help if you explained why you don't like it, as Flagg said.
 
Dracogryff said:
I hate doing math.
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If you can't quickly divide by 10 in your head, I fear for your ability to overcome day-to-day life.
 
Does it say anywhere in the rules that you have to choose which one you use? What if they both stacked :twisted:


I mean it makes sense. The weapon does the overwhelming, you Essence does the ping. Doesn't sound mutually exclusive to me. But it does sound pretty intense, almost broken. The divide by three seems a little too diminishing. Halving and rounding up suits my tastes a little better.
 
It would sort of make wading through Extras a damn sight more difficult...


It would certainly level the playing field, but the playing field is tipped to the favor of the Gods and their servants--which is sort of the point. The Creation is hardly fair, and being a Mortal is damn dangerous when there are Gods and their ilk running around.
 
I have two reasons for the change.


One, I don't like the metaphysics of Essence minimum damage, it feels tacked on for game mechanics reasons. (A related point is that there are large differences in the Essence ratings of PCs. Having different power levels are fine, but I don't want to them to translate  into raw damage potential that straightforwardly.)


Two, this makes minimum damage from environmental effects, attacks by large creatures and other non-Essence wielding sources more consistent with weapon damages, without having to assign an Overwhelming number to all sources of damage individually.
 
Hmmm, well. To be fair, those reasons would not stir me into action and actually you are achieving a whole load of side effects which have nothing to do with your original goals.


Because of this I think your proposal is not good as it is,  but I can't really offer another good solution right now, without knowing what changes you are willing to make/endure (for example in regard to extra power level. Are you ok with extras becoming several times deadlier or should they stay the same?).
 
I don't mind extras being more effective. I would be more concerned with too large minimum damage pools in general.


Anyway, I think I will settle for taking the highest of (Raw damage)/10 and the Overwhelming rating.
 
If you want to give a more direct influence to the Overwhelming value, you could make it raw/(10-Overwhelming) or raw/(12-O), both rounded up. It looks closer to the original mechanics that way.
 
Looking at the numbers this produces, this might be good. However, the division becomes annoying to do.
 
Well the essence minimum damage rule is also built (me thinks) to mark the level of danger of an opponent. You don't say "fuck off" and draw your sword to a deathlord/war or major god, because he WILL kill you in 2 blows.


On the opposite, changing min damage not only makes the extras more dangerous, but everyone else... changing this rule makes the DB even more lethal than usual.


The only thing it actually does, is reduce the lethality of high essence beings.
 
Now that I had the time to think about I would go a different way.


I would reduce the minimum damage as far as I could... probably down to 1 die or overwhelming whichever is higher.


Why?


Because exalted is wuxia or greek epics. Heroes don't die from a single blow no matter how powerful the foe is. Wuxia heroes die a death of 1000 stings.


Exalted is about not being hit, which honestly is boring. Heroes need to bleed, they need to be battered and pull through anyway.


Of course to achieve this more rules changes are needed and I am not sure the exalted engine can cope with them.
 
cyl said:
The only thing it actually does, is reduce the lethality of high essence beings.
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That's true. It makes the link between the Essence of a being and the raw damage they do in combat less direct. I prefer the danger of high Essence beings to come from high attributes+abilities and powerful Charms, rather than minimum damage. But this is obviously a matter of taste.
 
No no, my point was not about taste but about the effects of the system.


Safim brought up the old first ed system, 1 hit, 1 min damage die.


This system was "fair" (if you consider fair an extra striking as hard as any other opponent), until lunars got out, and then no one was able to seriously hurt a lunar, and despite their astronomical strength, lunars would not kill others just by blinking at them.


Thing is with that rule, first the Twilights are invincible, second, fights will last forever, especially with the tick system.
 
Those are good reasons for not doing what I said.


At least not without considerable changes to other parts of the system.
 
Well there is no real solution about that I can think of right now.


The DV system took out the problem of the extras and non combative characters hitting the pc, pinging min damage everytime.


Hardness handles the lower incoming damage part.


But the problem of damage is still the same with essence beings/users.


Actually one hit at maximum power does not work out as well as several hits, lowering DV and pinging min damage, mainly because of perfect defenses, but that's another problem.


Things are:


- linking min damage to essence is dangerous: minor blows from minor opponents (DB drowning Solars with min damage), or minor blows from major opponents (deathlord but kick... 10 min damage)... but they express the overall power of the being.


- you can't link the minimum damage to the weapon either, else a dragon blooded is as dangerous as a solar (basics charms won't really make a real difference: when you pass DV, you hit, when you pass the hardness, you passed the hardness), or even a deathlord... charms uses won't make a significant difference with higher essence beings, because they will need combos etc etc.


I see only 2 options from here:


- reducing min damage to essence/2 rounded down with a minimum of 1, which is not a viable option because a twilight with an essence of 5 has a dicepool of 5 with his anima power to neglect a 5 dicepool from a being with essence 10.


- converting min damage in automatic successes =


* from essence 1 to 2 = 1 die roll


* from essence 3 to essence 6= 1 health level


* from essence 6 to 9= 2 health level


* essence 10= 3 health levels


Of course the Twilight anima power still applies as originally mentioned. So to neglect 3 health levels from your deathlord foe, you'll need 3 suxx.


Considering it is more expensive than a perfect defense, I think it's quite a simple way to deal with things.
 
cyl said:
reducing min damage to essence/2 rounded down with a minimum of 1, which is not a viable option because a twilight with an essence of 5 has a dicepool of 5 with his anima power to neglect a 5 dicepool from a being with essence 10.
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Thing is...it's not a die pool. It subtracts their full Essence score automatically from the successes rolled for damage. They don't roll dice, they don't subtract dice..they subtract successes. It's a nasty power. I'm still not sure what to make of it. It means that anyone of the same Essence cannot touch a Twilight with ping...and the fact that it goes up automatically once they've hurled a spell or two...it complicates minimum damage immensely. :/


Edit: Oh yeah...


And on this:

cyl said:
Of course the Twilight anima power still applies as originally mentioned. So to neglect 3 health levels from your deathlord foe, you'll need 3 suxx.
Considering it is more expensive than a perfect defense, I think it's quite a simple way to deal with things.
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You'd just need to be an Essence 3 Twilight to negate it, actually. Not get three successes on a roll....just have a 3 Essence. At least, as written.
 
Hell I got confused between 1e and 2e.


Well I don't see any problem in that, it's like a perfect defense, just 1 mote more expensive.


It protects them from min damage, that's the concept of the power.


And against increased damage, it still works.
 
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