Arms of the Chosen Preview

[CycloneJoker]

*snip*

Yeah, if nothing else, it's a very powerful weapon that you can use to kill your foes even without going after Evocations, and you don't have that damned attunement penalty you used to on top of that. But for those who ARE dipping into Evocations, well...you can sort of turn that around and point out that to reeeally get the most out of Jade's theoretical versatility in general you *have* to have an artifact containing all five different colors of it. Which I don't think most DBs are going to do, precisely because not every character in the game world is mechanics omniscient.

I was going to snark a bit about Beemers here but I realized I would *never stop* if I got started. XDDD

[Ren9077]

to reeeally get the most out of Jade's theoretical versatility in general you *have* to have an artifact containing all five different colors of it.

... Why? What are its narrative themes? What does it do?

I'm not against mixed metal or mixed-color jade Artifacts, but the power these things have is determined by our imagination, and my imagination is captured a lot more by a great story and an interesting theme to Evocations than it is by "Haha, my Artifact has the potential power of all five Elements!" If you can present a coherent vision of what awesome powers a five-color Artifact might have, then that's got potential, but I have yet to see a character with so much spare XP that the player could fully explore the limits of one element's powers, let alone five together.

[CycloneJoker]

... Why? What are its narrative themes? What does it do?

I'm not against mixed metal or mixed-color jade Artifacts, but the power these things have is determined by our imagination, and my imagination is captured a lot more by a great story and an interesting theme to Evocations than it is by "Haha, my Artifact has the potential power of all five Elements!" If you can present a coherent vision of what awesome powers a five-color Artifact might have, then that's got potential, but I have yet to see a character with so much spare XP that the player could fully explore the limits of one element's powers, let alone five together.

Well, the idea that's been brought up backthread is that the beauty of Jade (and thus of DBs being Resonant with it) is that it's not one magical material, it's five. Each color of Jade has its own full set of Evocation themes, as deep as the non-Jade MMs. This is certainly true, but what I'm opining here is that resonance with Jade alone isn't sufficient to convey the scale of Dragon-Blooded capacity for Evocation mastery.

It is though, just my personal opinion. If well, one I'm willing to defend. XD

[Eric Minton]

But for those who ARE dipping into Evocations, well...you can sort of turn that around and point out that to reeeally get the most out of Jade's theoretical versatility in general you *have* to have an artifact containing all five different colors of it.

The dominant color of jade in a jade artifact is treated as its primary magical material for purposes of associations. You can add multiple colors to a specific artifact when appropriate, much as Shining Ice Mirror in the core adds starmetal to blue jade to flavor a particular approach to its magic. But dumping all five colors of jade into a blender isn't a no-brainer thematic enhancer to give you The Powers Of All Five Elements Combined.

[Gigaton-Falcon-Emu]

The dominant color of jade in a jade artifact is treated as its primary magical material for purposes of associations. You can add multiple colors to a specific artifact when appropriate, much as Shining Ice Mirror in the core adds starmetal to blue jade to flavor a particular approach to its magic. But dumping all five colors of jade into a blender isn't a no-brainer thematic enhances to give you The Powers Of All Five Elements Combined.

That has got to be a pretty impressive blender...

[CycloneJoker]

The dominant color of jade in a jade artifact is treated as its primary magical material for purposes of associations. You can add multiple colors to a specific artifact when appropriate, much as Shining Ice Mirror in the core adds starmetal to blue jade to flavor a particular approach to its magic. But dumping all five colors of jade into a blender isn't a no-brainer thematic enhances to give you The Powers Of All Five Elements Combined.

Oho, good to know. So yeah, even if Jade is technically five magical materials, most characters really aren't going to get five bangs for their buck from it. XD

[Isator Levi]

"You are wearing a ceremonial piece of clothing from each of the elemental directions. Now, I will join the five elements into one! Black jade... white jade... red jade... blue jade... green jade... Five elements together as one!""
{throws mixture onto anvil, where smith pokes at it}
"This is just mud."

[Crumplepunch]

For those interested, I wrote up an alternate second half to the Stormcaller Evocations compatible with my Dragon-Blooded Charm set.

Here's the prerequisite Stoking Bonfire Style for anyone who doesn't want to look it up:

Stoking Bonfire Style
Cost: 1a; Mins:Melee 2, Essence 1
Type:Supplemental
Keywords:Uniform
Duration:Instant
Prerequisite Charms:None

When attacking an opponent of lower Initiative, the Exalt may expend an anima level to reduce the cost of the Melee excellency to 1m per two dice added or rerolled and can reroll 6s until they fail to appear. Once per scene unless reset by landing a decisive attack and building back up to 10+ Initiative

Dual Thunders Strike
Cost:—; Mins:Essence 3;Type:Permanent
Keywords:None
Duration:Permanent
Prerequisites:Stoking Bonfire Style, Sleeping Demon, Wake!

The infernal tsunami sings in unison with the Dragon-Blood’s cataclysmic Essence. When attacking with Stormcaller, the Dragon-Blood adds the storm’s current Intensity to her Initiative for the purposes of determining a valid target of Stoking Bonfire Style.


Grasp The Lightning
Cost:—; Mins:Essence 4;Type:Permanent
Keywords:None
Duration:Permanent
Prerequisites: Dual Thunders Strike

When the Dragon-Blood uses Lightning Cleaves the Heavens she may travel through the blast of lightning in an instant, appearing in a flash anywhere within short or close range of the target of her attack. Her anima increases to its highest level.


Storm Binding: Stepping Between Raindrops
Cost:10m, 3a, 1wp; Mins:Essence 5;Type:Simple
Keywords:None
Duration:Instant
Prerequisites:Grasp The Lightning

As she draws the sheathe closed on Stormcaller’s gleaming blade, the Dragon-Blood calls a word of command to the storm that rages above. The lightning crashes down upon her, mingling with her Essence and surrounding her with a terrifying mandala of bound stormcloud and arcing ball lightning. After a moment of terrible stillness, she releases the storm in snaking streamers of lightning, forming vague images of phantom dragons and cackling demonic faces. At the moment of sheathing, the storm’s Intensity increases by the Terrestrial’s Essence. As normal, the storm deals (Intensity x3) decisive damage within a number of range bands equal to its Intensity. As long as the wielder has attended to the daiklave’s purification dutifully for the past year, she can distribute the damage of the resulting blast precisely as she desires, annihilating some while sparing others entirely. However, if she has lapsed in purifications or has an Intimacy that she formed after interacting with the bound demon, Akavadra can wrest control of those dice of decisive damage added by the Exalt’s Essence, which she can direct to any target that pleases her, often with tragic results.

This Evocation is subject to the same reset conditions as Storm Binding: Lightning Cleaves the Heavens. Once one is used, neither can be until they are reset. After learning this Evocation, she may attempt to subdue the demon by will alone as per the Resonant effect of Lightning Cleaves the Heavens. However, if she fails, she automatically gains an intimacy towards the demon representing the corruption of her influence.

EDIT: I hate forum formatting.

I don't know if alternative sets like this are kosher for different Exalt types, but Stormcaller's set felt incomplete when cut off halfway through.

[WhirlwindMonk]

So, I love the Resonant/Dissonant mechanic from a wide setting perspective, and I absolutely agree with the idea that every character in the setting shouldn't be omnisciently XP optimized, but I feel like it raises a problem at the player character level. Namely, regardless of what NPCs with effectively untracked XP do, why would I intentionally choose an artifact of a magical material that I'm not resonant with when I have to spend the exact same amount of XP to unlock lesser power than another player who chose a resonant MM? And as demonstrated by the number of people earlier in the thread who are perfectly okay with just changing the magical material of Stormcaller and putting a quick thematic coat of paint on it, there are plenty of people who see no issue with PCs being omniciently XP optimized. What I'm getting at is that it's all well and good for NPCs to use neutral or dissonant MMs, but if we want players to be willing to do so, there ought to be some sort of incentive to do so. Maybe something like a 1 XP discount if an evocation has a Resonant effect you can't access or a Dissonant effect that applies to you, combining for a 2 XP discount if both are true. That way, a player who wants their DB to take a Soulsteel daiklave for story reasons doesn't feel like a chump for spending the same 10 XP on a Dissonant evocation that his or her circlemate spent on a Resonant evocation on a Jade daiklave.

The other solution I see is to just not worry about it and let them design a fully neutral Soulsteel artifact with effects as powerful as Resonant Jade ones, but then I ask what's the point of having mechanical limitations and differences if we just ignore them when it's convenient?

[Jen]

EDIT: I hate forum formatting.

If you write your homebrew in Google docs, then you can copy them and paste into Word, then copy them from Word and use the Paste from Word button on this forum's edit bar (it's next to the Font), it keeps most of the text's format save size from what I've seen.

[Tiresias]

Namely, regardless of what NPCs with effectively untracked XP do, why would I intentionally choose an artifact of a magical material that I'm not resonant with when I have to spend the exact same amount of XP to unlock lesser power than another player who chose a resonant MM?

Because you want a power that's impossible to obtain with the magical materials you are

And as demonstrated by the number of people earlier in the thread who are perfectly okay with just changing the magical material of Stormcaller and putting a quick thematic coat of paint on it, there are plenty of people who see no issue with PCs being omniciently XP optimized.

I'm highly dubious that this will work beyond "Oh shit, I really need a Soulsteel artifact, but there aren't any that fit what I want and I don't have time/don't know how to homebrew one, so I'll just rip off another set of Evocations that's close enough make it work" once Arms of the Chosen comes out, and in any case, house rules shouldn't affect baseline mechanical design.

[WhirlwindMonk]

Because you want a power that's impossible to obtain with the magical materials you are

Like what? What is an example of a mechanical effect that is entirely gated behind a particular artifact being primarily X magical material?

I'm highly dubious that this will work beyond "Oh shit, I really need a Soulsteel artifact, but there aren't any that fit what I want and I don't have time/don't know how to homebrew one, so I'll just rip off another set of Evocations that's close enough make it work" once Arms of the Chosen comes out, and in any case, house rules shouldn't affect baseline mechanical design.

That what will work? You think all GMs are just suddenly going to find Theme Paint completely unacceptable just because AotC has some guidelines on artifact creation?

[Isator Levi]

Hmm, question: is an Artifact theme of being an instrument to hunt down and punish criminals something that could or should be readily transplanted across magical materials?

[The Unsung Hero]

Like what? What is an example of a mechanical effect that is entirely gated behind a particular artifact being primarily X magical material?

If I want a sword that will set my foes on fire, it'll need to be made of Red Jade, not Soulsteel.
If I want armor that will allow me to sidestep the fate of an attack, it'll need to be made of Starmetal, not Moonsilver.

Magical Materials in 3e have specific properties that aren't duplicated with other materials. Some of those properties are broad enough to be duplicated elsewhere, some aren't. For those that aren't, if your table wants to reskin that artifact as something it's specifically not designed to work with, that's totes fine, but it's not the base design of the game.

[WhirlwindMonk]

Hmm, question: is an Artifact theme of being an instrument to hunt down and punish criminals something that could or should be readily transplanted across magical materials?

Reading through the descriptions of the MMs, I don't see any reason why that broad of a concept should be limited to one particular material. Now, if you wanted to punish them by, say, cursing their family line, or by making them catch on fire whenever they break the law in the future, those should probably be the domain of soulsteel and red jade respectively, but broad goals that define the "what" rather than the "how" seem to me to be pretty MM neutral.

If I want a sword that will set my foes on fire, it'll need to be made of Red Jade, not Soulsteel.
If I want armor that will allow me to sidestep the fate of an attack, it'll need to be made of Starmetal, not Moonsilver.

Magical Materials in 3e have specific properties that aren't duplicated with other materials. Some of those properties are broad enough to be duplicated elsewhere, some aren't. For those that aren't, if your table wants to reskin that artifact as something it's specifically not designed to work with, that's totes fine, but it's not the base design of the game.

I said mechanical effect, not thematic. "Extra ongoing damage" is a mechanical effect. Doing it by lighting them on fire (red jade), or freezing them to their core (blue jade), or poisoning their soul (soulsteel), are thematic effects. There are, of course, players who will be willing to only do 2 dice of extra poisoned soul damage for the same XP cost as another party member doing 3 dice of extra fire damage in the same way that there are players who are willing to play a deaf or blind character just for the heck of it. But for the same reason we grant mechanical benefits for taking Flaws, I think a mechanical benefit for taking a neutral or dissonant artifact makes sense.