Potential

Mizu said:
War form is a true form' date=' last I checked. Use that.[/quote']The amazing capacity of the protean Lunars to effectively have three usable shapes. One of which is almost always just a hybridization of the other two.
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Yep, it isn't like they have the ability to activate mutations with a charm, or turn their blood and bone into a cage to entrap someone's weapons when they strike them, or any other number of bizarre body changing charms/knacks that they still have access to because using them doesn't take them out of their 'true' forms.
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I think Lunars don't get the shaft at all, although they might be a bit more forced into specific paths to get to high essence power.


key charms to look at


Hate being locked into true forms with to much peripheral essence, pick up Subtle Chameleon Practice (pg 71 glories most high)


Tell a problem get hide of the cunning hunter (pg 176 lunar)


Dice cap a problem use relentless lunar fury (pg 158 lunar), irresistible silver spirit (pg 177 lunar), or inevitable genius insight (pg 189 lunar)


high essence power


getting any charm you can eat is nice, see defeated technique mastery (pg 75 dreams of the first age lords of creation) and essential mirror form (pg 68 dream of the first age lords of creation)


and don't forget the Fae powers you can learn easier as a lunar.


big problem with lunars is a smaller charm set then most other (except sidereal), but that just means more of an excuse to make custom charms
 
I think the problem with form-locking is most obvious when we look at Heart-Theft of the Behemoth. I go through all the trouble of hunting down and killing a creature of epic scope and power so that I may take his form and use it to destroy my enemies. I spend a few motes of Essence on some defensive Charms. I now glow and am forced to relinquish my city-crushing shape for something less potent. WTH?
 
Kyeudo said:
I think the problem with form-locking is most obvious when we look at Heart-Theft of the Behemoth. I go through all the trouble of hunting down and killing a creature of epic scope and power so that I may take his form and use it to destroy my enemies. I spend a few motes of Essence on some defensive Charms. I now glow and am forced to relinquish my city-crushing shape for something less potent. WTH?
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Forgive me since I'm a Exalted noob so I hope this isn't a really dumb question but; Couldn't you still spend your personal essence running into this problem? I was under the impression you'll only start glowing and have your anima banner only revealed itself if you draw too heavily on your peripheral essence or was I reading that part of the rule wrong?
 
LaFreeze said:
Forgive me since I'm a Exalted noob so I hope this isn't a really dumb question but; Couldn't you still spend your personal essence running into this problem? I was under the impression you'll only start glowing and have your anima banner only revealed itself if you draw too heavily on your peripheral essence or was I reading that part of the rule wrong?
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You can avoid shapelock by restricting yourself to personal motes only, yes. You can even spend a certain amount of peripheral motes without bumping into shapelock (a very small amount). This isn't really going to help the problem, though.
Lunars are meant to be the shapeshifters. They're Fox disguised as your wife, or a demon-cat from the woods who steals your baby and raises it to be a witch. They're the trickster-gods who give advice to a king as a raven from on high, or look like a fine horse worth taming and then turn into a behemoth when the foe draws near. Only, they can't really do that very well, because doing cool things requires motes, and the more motes you spend, the more likely you can't really shapeshift all that much. When they have to carefully manage motes like a god-blood, Master of Ten-Thousand Forms they are not. It's even one of those vicious cycles, because shapeshifting costs motes, and motes end up restricting your shapeshifting.


So, instead of being a Lunar who wears many faces, you're a Lunar who is sometimes a bird or something until things actually get serious.


Very specific loopholes like Hybrid Body Rearrangement and meta-choices like spirit shape just don't cut it. A given Lunar can fulfill one or two of those shifty tricks above, if they're built specifically for that trick. That's lame. What Lunars have now is technically, almost minimally, functional, backed by a lot of inertia and legacy from a previous edition and even an entirely different game. The Lunars need a change, and they will get one.
 
Are you just being dramatic about home brews or have the Inkmonkey's mentioned a Lunar Errata update or a 3rd edtion Lunar or something crazy like that? :?:


If home brews may I ask do you have something in the works? How would like to see Lunars adjusted?
 
Lunar errata is going to be a long way off I feel... at the very least behind sorcery and sidereals.


As a fairly immediate fix to shapelock without really having to change anything, just create a custom charm to reduce your anima banner. We've already seen that it's valid charmtech.
 
Just remembered a charm in Glories: Luna called Subtle Chameleon Practice (Ess 3, Wits 5, and a couple pre-req charms) that gives you a 3m surcharge to make any peripheral essence you spend react as personal essence. With this in place, you could hit a 0 total essence pool before you start flaring up or getting form-locked. Page 29 for those who have it and want to brush up on it.
 
Doesn't negate the very valid argument that lunars shouldn't lose access to their schtick at -all-, essence or not.. you shouldn't have to spend xp and then a 3 mote surcharge each shift to do so. Hell, it even takes a miscellaneous action too, or yet more essence and knacks to do so faster.. I'm really not sure why they put shapelock in when there are already plenty of limits and downsides to doing so in battle
 
Oh, it was never meant to replace their shape-lock problem fully, it's just an option for people who want to handle it Night-Caste style.
 
On the issue of behemoth shapes and shape-lock due to anima flare, I don't see the major argument about this. No other Exalt can get their stats up to behemoth levels with only a few motes of Essence and then stay that way for as long as they like. You can even keep the personal pool full with Might Bolstering Blow (unless this has already been changed and I'm not aware of it). If I recall, bonuses to Attributes from false shapes also count as dice added by charms, and so Excellencies are not really an issue in these forms.


When it comes to smaller shapes and stealth, these activities are not nearly as mote-intensive as combat, and the personal pool should not be a big deal to stay within.


It looks like this argument is really based on the idea that everyone wants something for nothing and some folks are never satisfied with the power level established by the rules. Lunars are the most versatile of the Exalted in every area. They are not the most powerful in any area, and that is the way it is meant to be. Exalted power is based on the use of Essence and learning charms and other ways of using Essence, so yes, magic powers cost motes and exp. The Gift and Fury mechanics combined with their charmsets make Lunars incredible warriors worthy to fight beside the Solars. The No-Moon anima power makes the Lunar sorcerer truly potent even under pressure. The broad-based nature of the average Lunar charm makes the character more versatile and adaptable no matter what role they fill in a game. On the topic of the smaller charmset, the majority of Lunar charm trees are not as deep as those of other Exalts, but the number of things they can do with each charm is generally superior to all others (excluding Infernals, who's shtick is to be broken). I don't see these as design flaws, I see them as a theme.
 
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