Quick Update
Not much noteworthy going on for me, really. Getting back into the routine of work. The fire downtown was big news in Durango, though. I know it's not the first time, but it's strange to think of buildings a few blocks away from work on Main Avenue gutted by fire. Even with the fire at the apartments over the El Rancho a few years ago, it wasn't as visible a loss of property.
Been enjoying the game for the most part. I worry a little that trying to play every night people are together is a little much - it's certainly more than the twice-a-week schedule we planned on originally. I'll admit I've wanted to bonk people for playing WoW on the side (and thus being relatively uninvolved in some sessions) when the biggest complaint I've heard is "there isn't enough opportunity for the characters to interact and get to know each other like they should with traveling months at a stretch." The answer tends to be: Okay, well focus and interact more.
So far there's been relatively little actual combat. I suppose that's what happens when you have a group leader who is against spilling blood when she can help it (the horrors of high Compassion). I really envisioned Alexandra as more the face and heart/moral compass of the group, I hadn't planned on how *caring* about methods as well as results and having decent social skills would actually make her be the one in charge. Some command decisions are going to be difficult and in the meantime I worry that playing a character who readily and eagerly tries to defuse situations before the develop into combat may be reducing a portion of the game that people expect and/or desire to see more of.
There are still times when it's unavoidable. We've been jumped by demons and pushed into attacking a group of Abyssals by being unwilling to stand by and watch them sell people into slavery. And last night gave us a situation that's almost sure to devolve into combat at this point, though it's moderately civil thusfar.
While excavating a legendary combat airship with intent to repair it, our group of would-be heroes was approached by a group of (presumably) Solar exalts. With a certain amount of style and a social combat roll, the figure in the lead explained our group had found the property of their friend, laying claim to the ship. Well, Alexi doesn't mind giving property back to rightful owners, but she's not so eager about handing a powerful warship over to strangers, so she resisted.
This bit of social combat was both interesting an a little disgusting to watch. Wind throws out 33 dice at this attempt, showing he's pretty much maxxed out his possible dice pool (stat 5, ability 5, specialty 3, 10 dice from an excellency) toward this end AND had augmentation granted by his friend/patron/sponsor. You could expect that to reliably overcome a DV of around 15. A character specialized in defending against this sort of thing could expect a DV in the range of 5-12. None of the PCs are so specialized. Alexi's mental "dodge" DV of 7 is actually pretty high, considering. So there was very, very little chance he could actually fail on his attack, and this stands in the realm of overkill.
But, in social combat, you can spend some Willpower and say "nah, I don't give in to his argument." He was also using charms to boost the cost of resisting in this fashion, but Alexi still spent 3 Willpower (of her 8) and refused to simply obey. If she weren't such a caring person, she might have gone to punching him in the face for being so arrogant. This epitomizes how social combat goes, I think. Even with tons of bonuses, you need to have the opportunity and ability to wear your opponent down (until they can't pay the Willpower cost) to get results. In some ways, this mirrors physical combat, but it feels more awkward to me because it's somehow expected to be covert on some level. I dunno.
This also exemplifies how we're still a little iffy on certain sections of the rules. Authority-Radiating Stance comboed with Irresistible Salesman Spirit? Uhh... no, because ISS is Combo-Basic. Plus, reading ARS in detail, it actually wouldn't have done anything to her (including making her pay 2 of those Willpower) because her dodge MDV (7) is not lower than Wind's Presence (5). But that's okay. Exalted suffers from having Magic-like rules complexity: the basics aren't necessarily hard, but keeping track of how the multitude of charms interact is a pain.
After a return jibe at one point, the results of the social combat: Alexi has spent 7 essence and 3 willpower, accumulating 1 limit, versus the other circle where Ichabod has spent 1 willpower and Wind has spent around 16 essence and 1 willpower. As an individual, Alexi is closer to faltering and giving in, but as a group the other side has expended more resources.
Neither side trusts the other, and as the PCs acquire/remember details about the Solar who sponders this other group, it becomes more apparent they don't want to turn the ship over. It's too powerful a weapon to hand to a ruthless ruler. Theoretically, they should all be on the same side. But you generally don't give a weapon of mass destruction to someone, even a friend, if you don't want to see it used and you fully suspect they would use it.
And neither side is willing to let the matter go. So now they're discussing the possibility of duels to settle the matter. That's where I say it's, at least, still somewhat civil. The "tactically wise" thing to do would probably be just attack all out, so as to make use of the superior numbers on the PC side. But then, we're dealing with the "Lords of Creation" here, so that might be a little chaotic for the bunch.
So we left off with Alexandra looking to her more-tactically-aware (those who actually have a War ability) companions for advice. They haven't given any yet. *nudgenudge* It'll be at least Thursday night before we pick up.
Been enjoying the game for the most part. I worry a little that trying to play every night people are together is a little much - it's certainly more than the twice-a-week schedule we planned on originally. I'll admit I've wanted to bonk people for playing WoW on the side (and thus being relatively uninvolved in some sessions) when the biggest complaint I've heard is "there isn't enough opportunity for the characters to interact and get to know each other like they should with traveling months at a stretch." The answer tends to be: Okay, well focus and interact more.
So far there's been relatively little actual combat. I suppose that's what happens when you have a group leader who is against spilling blood when she can help it (the horrors of high Compassion). I really envisioned Alexandra as more the face and heart/moral compass of the group, I hadn't planned on how *caring* about methods as well as results and having decent social skills would actually make her be the one in charge. Some command decisions are going to be difficult and in the meantime I worry that playing a character who readily and eagerly tries to defuse situations before the develop into combat may be reducing a portion of the game that people expect and/or desire to see more of.
There are still times when it's unavoidable. We've been jumped by demons and pushed into attacking a group of Abyssals by being unwilling to stand by and watch them sell people into slavery. And last night gave us a situation that's almost sure to devolve into combat at this point, though it's moderately civil thusfar.
While excavating a legendary combat airship with intent to repair it, our group of would-be heroes was approached by a group of (presumably) Solar exalts. With a certain amount of style and a social combat roll, the figure in the lead explained our group had found the property of their friend, laying claim to the ship. Well, Alexi doesn't mind giving property back to rightful owners, but she's not so eager about handing a powerful warship over to strangers, so she resisted.
This bit of social combat was both interesting an a little disgusting to watch. Wind throws out 33 dice at this attempt, showing he's pretty much maxxed out his possible dice pool (stat 5, ability 5, specialty 3, 10 dice from an excellency) toward this end AND had augmentation granted by his friend/patron/sponsor. You could expect that to reliably overcome a DV of around 15. A character specialized in defending against this sort of thing could expect a DV in the range of 5-12. None of the PCs are so specialized. Alexi's mental "dodge" DV of 7 is actually pretty high, considering. So there was very, very little chance he could actually fail on his attack, and this stands in the realm of overkill.
But, in social combat, you can spend some Willpower and say "nah, I don't give in to his argument." He was also using charms to boost the cost of resisting in this fashion, but Alexi still spent 3 Willpower (of her 8) and refused to simply obey. If she weren't such a caring person, she might have gone to punching him in the face for being so arrogant. This epitomizes how social combat goes, I think. Even with tons of bonuses, you need to have the opportunity and ability to wear your opponent down (until they can't pay the Willpower cost) to get results. In some ways, this mirrors physical combat, but it feels more awkward to me because it's somehow expected to be covert on some level. I dunno.
This also exemplifies how we're still a little iffy on certain sections of the rules. Authority-Radiating Stance comboed with Irresistible Salesman Spirit? Uhh... no, because ISS is Combo-Basic. Plus, reading ARS in detail, it actually wouldn't have done anything to her (including making her pay 2 of those Willpower) because her dodge MDV (7) is not lower than Wind's Presence (5). But that's okay. Exalted suffers from having Magic-like rules complexity: the basics aren't necessarily hard, but keeping track of how the multitude of charms interact is a pain.
After a return jibe at one point, the results of the social combat: Alexi has spent 7 essence and 3 willpower, accumulating 1 limit, versus the other circle where Ichabod has spent 1 willpower and Wind has spent around 16 essence and 1 willpower. As an individual, Alexi is closer to faltering and giving in, but as a group the other side has expended more resources.
Neither side trusts the other, and as the PCs acquire/remember details about the Solar who sponders this other group, it becomes more apparent they don't want to turn the ship over. It's too powerful a weapon to hand to a ruthless ruler. Theoretically, they should all be on the same side. But you generally don't give a weapon of mass destruction to someone, even a friend, if you don't want to see it used and you fully suspect they would use it.
And neither side is willing to let the matter go. So now they're discussing the possibility of duels to settle the matter. That's where I say it's, at least, still somewhat civil. The "tactically wise" thing to do would probably be just attack all out, so as to make use of the superior numbers on the PC side. But then, we're dealing with the "Lords of Creation" here, so that might be a little chaotic for the bunch.
So we left off with Alexandra looking to her more-tactically-aware (those who actually have a War ability) companions for advice. They haven't given any yet. *nudgenudge* It'll be at least Thursday night before we pick up.
And Naga's in the throes of Limit Break. As a servant of the Maiden of Battle, he's trying to escalate it to combat now.
ReplyDeleteActually, I would prefer if the players kept the distractions down to a minimum. I dislike having to wait 3-5 minutes for someone to respond to something addressing them, and it would be nice if the characters did activities outside of being specifically addressed. It would make the interactions between characters run a lot smoother, and give the NPCs chances to flesh themselves out in response to the PCs. Yeah, I may have screwed up ARS/ISS. Not too big a problem, I can assume ARS was activated a little earlier, and then ISS was used. I'm still not entirely used to Combo-Basic being used in combos yet, I'll get better as time progresses. And I keep finding myself wanting to avoid running combat, but combat's actually pretty enjoyable. So I'm trying to make a situation where combat is likely, though not an absolute given. We'll see how this plays up. Social Combat needs to be worked out more. I'm thinking Join Debate should only be rolled by the people who are going to be actively involved in it, though.
ReplyDeleteThough it looked like things were going that way anyhow. Still hoping for some in-character input on this dueling idea... though it all may just devolve into a brawl, first.
ReplyDeleteAhh. Might want to be a bit more specific IC about what kind of input Alexi wants. :) I was thinking you were just wanting some generic input. :)
ReplyDeleteNaturally distractions are "bad" for a game. In an online, text-based environment there's going to be time between poses, though, so people will tend to find something to fill that. I'll admit to it myself, though I try to stick to things I can drop/pause at any given moment to focus my attention back as soon as something happens. Things like WoW and Guild Wars are only that forgiving in very specific circumstances (no group to inconvenience with your idle, no monsters around that'll come kill you, etc.) so I tend to avoid those games. ARS/ISS? Yeah, no big deal. Even counting the specialty toward added dice didn't *bother* me, but it came to mind at the time so I mentioned it. Sure, I can play rules lawyer, but I don't actually want to bring a scene to a halt for the sake of rules accuracy. Combat? A mixed blessing, I think. As with most RPGs, there's a certain amount of focus on combat in Exalted. So if you avoid combat, there's tons of charms/weapons/etc. that you'll never use. So it can be fun and interesting, but things slow down when dice start rolling, too. As a player... I think I'd like to see a little more combat. We've been in... two fights? My character, though, will try very hard to avoid it unless her compassion doesn't come into play that way(say, demons as enemies, or innocents in danger of a clear villain). I don't actually know how the other players feel on the subject, though I'm sure Kashim ICly is itching to bash heads. Maybe it's hard to explain, but the situation feels funny to me. It seems like the "moral compass" of the group usually counsels and advises a leader who's in a position to make the hard choices when they're necessary. Having the moral compass be the leader seems strange. It's led away from several combat situations - which is good in some ways, but maybe not so good in others. Yeah. Lots of mixed feelings. Tangentially and as I was telling Kyn yesterday, I'm thinking Alexi may place Auric "officially" in charge of retrieving the Queen of Winter's crown when the group gets to that point. Talking her out of it seems unlikely, so the mission is probably best treated as one of cunning/stealth/larceny. I don't know if Auric is really up to taking the reins of the party. From what I've seen thusfar, I'd be inclined to think not... but he hasn't really had the opportunity to try either. We'll see if the role suits him at all. Social Combat... is odd. :p Yes, you're probably right that only those involved should Join Debate, just as with Join Battle. Of course, it's hard to know who will be involved when a basic comment could be a social attack. Forcing results *requires* specialization (unnatural charms... or a target with Will 2 or less), which isn't necessarily true in physical combat. DVs seem to max out lower than in physical combat in most cases, especially for the unprepared, while attack pools remain high, but Willpower can be used to resist. ... Hard to analyse, but I feel like you can "do okay" in a whole range in physical combat, but in social combat you're either specialized and good or not-specialized and pretty much can't do anything. And now as Alexandra is learning the last couple medical charms to cover the "critical" stuff in that field, I'm faced with either picking up a couple more martial arts and a combat combo or delving into social charms. Aieee. So many things. Suffering from old D&D bard syndrome: jack of all trades, master of none.
ReplyDeleteGuess so. I thought I was clear, but I don't currently have text of my last poses, so I can only say "I guess I wasn't clear enough."
ReplyDelete