Jukashi
Four Thousand Club
So, I posted Cluivnarihe's backstory, and got some good response to that; so, I figured I might as well lay it all out mechanically as well. I've had the rough idea in my head for a while now; I'd just like some advice on the small particulars, as well as perhaps how to streamline it a little, since as it is it's a complicated artifact. I am going to reveal all this eventually in the comic, by the way... if you'd prefer to enhance the awesomeness when that happens (but not for a looong time), maybe you'd prefer to skip reading this.
So, first of all: Artifact 5. Yep, you heard me. This thing was made by a Deathlord, for himself. Nothing but the best!
His original idea was a soulsteel weapon that could fulfill all his needs as a weapon while being easily portable/concealed and, of course, being worthy of his stature. Hence the shapeshifting. The rest comes from what went wrong.
Cluivnarihe is made both from soulsteel (specially designed to be as flexible as possible) and moonsilver (which was obtained by gruesome means); the weapon consists of a single thread of soulsteel (guess who that is?) inside a core of moonsilver, overlayed with more soulsteel. The moonsilver also forms the grip, which is the only safe part of the blade to touch (even the flat of the blade both gnaws and chills any flesh that encounters it, dealing 2 dice of raw lethal damage every tick). Thus, Cluivnarihe is both a soulsteel weapon and a moonsilver weapon, and therefore gets both the moonsilver and soulsteel MM bonuses and can be fully attuned by both abyssals and lunars. However, Cluivnarihe offers no mote regain; though it drains motes as all soulsteel weapons do, it keeps them all for itself. In fact, if the user uses an attack-based essence regain ability with Cluivnarihe, it steals half the motes gained thereby. I'm not sure what the attunement cost should be yet.
The sword feels cold. Colder than most soulsteel weapons. After hundreds of years trapped in a block of ice, Cluivnarihe demands the warmth of living blood to dull the eternal chill that has settled in its core.
Normally, when someone tries to use Cluivnarihe, it will simply turn and go for their throat. The only way the weapon will accept you is if you have sympathy with the spirits inside the blade; you must either be someone who has betrayed something important to them or who has been badly betrayed themselves. Preferably both. If you fulfill one of these requirements, Cluivnarihe will permit itself to be wielded and will shift between sword, bow and concealed form at the user's direction... if the user gives the sword at least 1hl of blood for each time it changes. Not necessarily their own. If, within one day (or shorter, depending on the sword's mood), this debt has not been paid, the sword will take it for itself, generally in a painful fashion. If you fulfill both conditions, the sword will permit use of a more powerful form; the cold of the blade inhibits its shapeshifting powers, however, so it can only take this form when it has already inflicted at least 5 health levels of lethal damage. In this form the blade becomes long and whip-like, moving of its own volition to defend the user and to follow up their attacks with its own; it has greater reach, greater speed, and every attack made with it applies twice.
It should be noted that it is impossible to do bashing damage with Cluivnarihe. The sword will always turn itself on its edge, or grow spikes, or whatever it takes to draw more blood. I think that aside from the MM bonuses, the sword and bow forms of Cluivnarihe are essentially just a reaper daiklaive and a long powerbow. Except that they do more damage. The whip form is tricky; aside from the already impressive attack-doubling effect, I reckon its stats should be higher too.
All this pales in comparison to Cluivnarihe's ultimate form, which is the real reason for the Artifact 5 rating. To call it out, though, you not only need to fulfill both conditions for the lesser powers, you not only need to give it five lhls of blood first, but you also need to recite a formal request for its aid in Old Realm, during which you must call the silver snake's real name. The name which was, by the way, stolen from her when she was killed.
But it's impressive. The sword shifts and forms to coil around the user's body like armour, adding to any sort of soak they had before without actually counting as armour. If anyone attacks them unarmed, this "armour" forms spikes that plunge into their flesh, and pity the sap who tries to grapple them! I'm not sure how much damage this should deal, though. It extrudes a thin blade from each of their hands, each of which has the stats of its reaper daiklaive form but with Speed 1 tick lower. These can shift at will into a bow form. It also extends two large bladed "arms" from the user's back, each of which will make attacks completely independently of the user, again with the reaper daiklaive's stats, and each of which adds +1 to the user's Parry DV. And that's just the beginning! The form the blade takes immediately is still weaker than it should be. But the more blood it's fed, the more the blade warms and the more its shapeshifting powers increase. Every 10 levels of lethal damage dealt by the weapon allows it to grow two more "arms" out of its back, each with the same effect as the original two; at the point where 50 levels of lethal damage have been done, these arms can, at the user's will, form into a giant "tail" which the user can use to make a large, devastating attack (again, unsure of the stats) or to glide, snakelike, over and up any solid surface at high speed (leaving significant damage in its wake, since it's still all bladed). At the 100 lhl level (at which point, I remind you, it is making 22 attacks on any warm-blooded creature in range completely by itself), the weapon is so responsive and flexible that it can reflexively form itself into a shield against any attack, thereby forming an automatic, constant perfect defense for its user. At this point the only way to defeat it is to use mental or social attacks, to starve the weapon of the warmth it needs (either by removing all blood-bearing creatures for an hour) or by using a large piece of ice from the elemental pole of air) or to simply hope the user dies. While they're wearing this form of the weapon, you see, it deals 5 dice of damage every time they move. Soak, fortunately, applies.
So, what do you think? I think it's kind of cool, and has that "We need to stop it now before it becomes invincible!" flavour that too few artifacts in Exalted have. Also, I think it's the only Artifact 5 weapon I've seen that manages to reach that level of power based solely on blood everywhere.
... Speaking of, do you think the health level requirements should be higher?
So, first of all: Artifact 5. Yep, you heard me. This thing was made by a Deathlord, for himself. Nothing but the best!
His original idea was a soulsteel weapon that could fulfill all his needs as a weapon while being easily portable/concealed and, of course, being worthy of his stature. Hence the shapeshifting. The rest comes from what went wrong.
Cluivnarihe is made both from soulsteel (specially designed to be as flexible as possible) and moonsilver (which was obtained by gruesome means); the weapon consists of a single thread of soulsteel (guess who that is?) inside a core of moonsilver, overlayed with more soulsteel. The moonsilver also forms the grip, which is the only safe part of the blade to touch (even the flat of the blade both gnaws and chills any flesh that encounters it, dealing 2 dice of raw lethal damage every tick). Thus, Cluivnarihe is both a soulsteel weapon and a moonsilver weapon, and therefore gets both the moonsilver and soulsteel MM bonuses and can be fully attuned by both abyssals and lunars. However, Cluivnarihe offers no mote regain; though it drains motes as all soulsteel weapons do, it keeps them all for itself. In fact, if the user uses an attack-based essence regain ability with Cluivnarihe, it steals half the motes gained thereby. I'm not sure what the attunement cost should be yet.
The sword feels cold. Colder than most soulsteel weapons. After hundreds of years trapped in a block of ice, Cluivnarihe demands the warmth of living blood to dull the eternal chill that has settled in its core.
Normally, when someone tries to use Cluivnarihe, it will simply turn and go for their throat. The only way the weapon will accept you is if you have sympathy with the spirits inside the blade; you must either be someone who has betrayed something important to them or who has been badly betrayed themselves. Preferably both. If you fulfill one of these requirements, Cluivnarihe will permit itself to be wielded and will shift between sword, bow and concealed form at the user's direction... if the user gives the sword at least 1hl of blood for each time it changes. Not necessarily their own. If, within one day (or shorter, depending on the sword's mood), this debt has not been paid, the sword will take it for itself, generally in a painful fashion. If you fulfill both conditions, the sword will permit use of a more powerful form; the cold of the blade inhibits its shapeshifting powers, however, so it can only take this form when it has already inflicted at least 5 health levels of lethal damage. In this form the blade becomes long and whip-like, moving of its own volition to defend the user and to follow up their attacks with its own; it has greater reach, greater speed, and every attack made with it applies twice.
It should be noted that it is impossible to do bashing damage with Cluivnarihe. The sword will always turn itself on its edge, or grow spikes, or whatever it takes to draw more blood. I think that aside from the MM bonuses, the sword and bow forms of Cluivnarihe are essentially just a reaper daiklaive and a long powerbow. Except that they do more damage. The whip form is tricky; aside from the already impressive attack-doubling effect, I reckon its stats should be higher too.
All this pales in comparison to Cluivnarihe's ultimate form, which is the real reason for the Artifact 5 rating. To call it out, though, you not only need to fulfill both conditions for the lesser powers, you not only need to give it five lhls of blood first, but you also need to recite a formal request for its aid in Old Realm, during which you must call the silver snake's real name. The name which was, by the way, stolen from her when she was killed.
But it's impressive. The sword shifts and forms to coil around the user's body like armour, adding to any sort of soak they had before without actually counting as armour. If anyone attacks them unarmed, this "armour" forms spikes that plunge into their flesh, and pity the sap who tries to grapple them! I'm not sure how much damage this should deal, though. It extrudes a thin blade from each of their hands, each of which has the stats of its reaper daiklaive form but with Speed 1 tick lower. These can shift at will into a bow form. It also extends two large bladed "arms" from the user's back, each of which will make attacks completely independently of the user, again with the reaper daiklaive's stats, and each of which adds +1 to the user's Parry DV. And that's just the beginning! The form the blade takes immediately is still weaker than it should be. But the more blood it's fed, the more the blade warms and the more its shapeshifting powers increase. Every 10 levels of lethal damage dealt by the weapon allows it to grow two more "arms" out of its back, each with the same effect as the original two; at the point where 50 levels of lethal damage have been done, these arms can, at the user's will, form into a giant "tail" which the user can use to make a large, devastating attack (again, unsure of the stats) or to glide, snakelike, over and up any solid surface at high speed (leaving significant damage in its wake, since it's still all bladed). At the 100 lhl level (at which point, I remind you, it is making 22 attacks on any warm-blooded creature in range completely by itself), the weapon is so responsive and flexible that it can reflexively form itself into a shield against any attack, thereby forming an automatic, constant perfect defense for its user. At this point the only way to defeat it is to use mental or social attacks, to starve the weapon of the warmth it needs (either by removing all blood-bearing creatures for an hour) or by using a large piece of ice from the elemental pole of air) or to simply hope the user dies. While they're wearing this form of the weapon, you see, it deals 5 dice of damage every time they move. Soak, fortunately, applies.
So, what do you think? I think it's kind of cool, and has that "We need to stop it now before it becomes invincible!" flavour that too few artifacts in Exalted have. Also, I think it's the only Artifact 5 weapon I've seen that manages to reach that level of power based solely on blood everywhere.
... Speaking of, do you think the health level requirements should be higher?
