Combat Builds - In 25 Charms or Less

[Maudova]

So I watching people debate over SPPitV and Melee. I'm sure you've all see it before. I'm curious, what would you do with 25 charms with a combat focused character from the current Ex 3 core charm set?

What I'm looking for are 3 things:
Your main combat focus charms
What you would call your build/function
How does it fulfill the roll you intend it too and how do these charms interact.

You can make it as short and to the point as you would like, or give a general description of your idea. I'm just wondering what people outside of my play group think is a good idea for charm sets related to combat.

There is also a Social and Leadership character building thread here

[Sandact6]

Even my Dawn has less than 25 combat charms yet still blew up every single encounter like confetti.

If you have the following bases covered, than its going to be very difficult for you to be overcome in battle:

• Anti-Stealth charms (Function as awareness in general, so nice to have)
• Join Battle charms. If you're stealth use that, if Awareness Awakening Eye, if Thrown well you have tons of crap.
• Nova hit capability. Something where you can do an immense amount of HL's in a single shot.
• Multi-hit capability, something where you can hit someone multiple times. This is to mainly bypass HL damage limitation charms such as Octivan's The Tower Still Stands or Legendary Size
• Defense. Obviously, using dodge or melee would be good bets. Getting Melee up to HGD is fine, Hail Shattering Practice most likely means you'll never be hit. FFBS for when you're seriously outnumbered but unless you're fighting multiple opponents who love multihits than generally Bulwark Stance is fine.
• Range. A means to deal with enemies at range. A really good rush pool and high mobility is nice, but if an enemy is flying you generally want something like Iron Raptor to blow them out of the Sky or Snake style to tear them down to the ground
• Soak/HL's: Nice to have, but if you do all of the above well enough you may not even need this. Still, Superheavy artifact plate makes it a living hell to damage you.

Multiple ways of going about those, but if you cover those than very little can stand against you. Melee can cover all of these bases, other styles (Like Crane or Snake) cover nearly all of them or don't need to due to other ways of handling things. Solar Melee + Awareness is the best way to accomplish all of this without relying on too many other abilities.

[DrLoveMonkey]

I agree with Sandact, 25 charms is a ridiculously uncessesary number to be able to deal with anything. Fifteen might be a better one to shoot for. In my games somebody with all of Single Point and Thunderbolt Attack Prana was probably the worst offender. Basically with a good join battle roll you can kill anything in the book except Octavian in a single hit.

[Sandact6]

I agree with Sandact, 25 charms is a ridiculously uncessesary number to be able to deal with anything. Fifteen might be a better one to shoot for. In my games somebody with all of Single Point and Thunderbolt Attack Prana was probably the worst offender. Basically with a good join battle roll you can kill anything in the book except Octavian in a single hit.

That or Legendary size, but this. I did 126 levels of damage in one hit with this combo once.

Let that sink in.

The only thing that can withstand this are resistance heavy builds or being very, very good at clashes and praying to god you win it.

[DrLoveMonkey]

That or Legendary size, but this. I did 126 levels of damage in one hit with this combo once.

Let that sink in.

The only thing that can withstand this are resistance heavy builds or being very, very good at clashes and praying to god you win it.

Legendary size is not a super effective defence, it specifically fails against damage levels added by magic so you can still easily annihilate a tyrant lizard with fairly low initiative.

Edit: actually a t lizard has enough health levels that you might need to attack with your sword too to kill it before it goes.

[Sandact6]

Shining Point adds some damage levels, but not enough to OHKO a Tyrant Lizard. Fatal Stroke Flash adds a shitton of dice potentially, but that's dice and not levels.

[DrLoveMonkey]

Shining Point adds some damage levels, but not enough to OHKO a Tyrant Lizard. Fatal Stroke Flash adds a shitton of dice potentially, but that's dice and not levels.

Yeah if you've got five strength you can swing 16 health levels per attack, assuming you have no other way to add damage. But if the form is up you can double tap* for 32 which will easily do it.

*pun intended.

[Crumplepunch]

The Perfectly Defensive Samurai:

Snake Style:
Serpentine Evasion

Crane Style:
Empowering Justice Redirection
Fluttering Cry of Warning
Crane Form

Resistance:
Durability of Oak Meditation
Spirit Strengthens the Skin
Iron Skin Concentration
Ox-Body Technique x2
Front-Line Warrior's Stamina
Essence-Gathering Temper
Diamond-Body Prana
Iron Kettle Body
Adamant Skin Technique
Tiger Warrior Endurance
Willpower-Enhancing Spirit
Battle Fury Focus
Wound-Knitting Exercise
Ruin-Abasing Shrug

Dodge:
Reed in the Wind
Searing Quicksilver Flight
Drifting Leaf Elusion
Shadow over Water
Force-Stealing Feint
Flow Like Blood

She uses Full Defense, and waits. Her defense is primarily Resistance (her Supernal), but she's no slouch at dodging stuff or even parrying. She plays hell with an attacker's initiative and can defend her entire party using Fluttering Cry of Warning. Crane Form allows her to counterattack every time, enhanced with Empowering Justice Redirection for an efficient damage and accuracy boost.

[putty]

I really hate the dodge/resistance minimal offense build. Anti-fun

[Crumplepunch]

I really hate the dodge/resistance minimal offense build. Anti-fun

I figured the Melee kill-combo builds would be covered by others. I find defence fun.

[Ren9077]

I figured the Melee kill-combo builds would be covered by others. I find defence fun.

While your build isn't one I'd probably choose to play, it's interesting. I haven't seen that combination before. Great concept. Thanks for sharing it.

It occurs to me that immediately bashing the first build shared is a bit thread-crappy and not conducive to further sharing.

[Maudova]

I agree with Sandact, 25 charms is a ridiculously unnecessary[sic] number to be able to deal with anything.

That's not the point. The point of the thread is to put some combat builds to just see how people would do it.I want it to be an exploration of what people would do with that level of focus.

I understand that 25 charms is a significant number. That's to give freedom to someone to explore options. It's possible and probably that characters will have quite a bit of combat viable charms. With the focus on less solar friendly locations in the world I think it's going to be more common for resistance to solar rule. with 25 charms you can explore multiple modes of combat from defence, to resistance, to offence (withering or decisive). Clever ST's will create NPC's to counter a singularly focused solar if they just spam one combat charm set. So a smart player will have their character develop multiple combat styles for versatility. I mean I know if my player spammed one combat style that game would become less fun for everyone as the challenge would dry up. You can easily explain that people of the world have heard of you and are employing those with the skills to match/counter or spend time developing abilities to beat them (Wyld hunt for instance). anyways, I just would like to see that creative styles people would come up with.

[Maudova]

I really hate the dodge/resistance minimal offense build. Anti-fun

Please stay focused. This thread isn't about building optimal combat characters, its about exploration. While yes this is a free forum, I think that your post wasn't constructive. No offense intended. I just want this to be fun. Thanks!

[danelsan]

The Perfectly Defensive Samurai

While the Conviction flaw of Invulnerability that originated her is no longer even part of the game and HGD functioning very differently and so on...it still feels a bit wrong to have the Perfectly Defensive Samurai not using Heavenly Guardian Defense and other Melee Charms.

What is she gonna due with her single, Defining Intimacy of "I’M IN UR FIGHT, BLOCKING UR ATTACKS" if parrying is not her primary defense?

Anyway, 25-Charms combat builds, huh? Well, if we are using names from Exalted history...

OMNI-TACTICAL BATTLE HYDRA

ARCHERY
Wise Arrow
Sight Without Eyes
There Is No Wind

ATHLETICS
Increasing Strength Exercise
Monkey Leap Technique
Thunderbolt Attack Prana

AWARENESS
Sensory Acuity Prana

BRAWL
Thunderclap Rush Attack
Vicious Lunge

DODGE
Reed in the Wind
Reflex Sidestep Technique
Dust Motes Whirling

MELEE
Dipping Swallow Defense
Bulwark Stance
Fivefold Bulwark Stance
Heavenly Guardian Defense
Excellent Strike
One Weapon, Two Blows
Peony Blossom Technique
Iron Whirlwind Attack
Solar Counterattack
War Lion Stance

RESISTANCE
Ox-Body Technique

THROWN
Triple Distance Attack Technique
Cascade of Cutting Terror


The idea is having a build that applies multiple combat abilities in their approach to fights. Of course, there are a great many ways to make such a character, and this one probably spreads things a bit excessively (and would likely really want a custom Charm to reflexively change which weapon is ready). Not the most powerful build out there, but it can do a lot of stuff (good Initiative, a good starting strike in Thrown, consistent long range attacks with Archery, it can Rush and Disengage well, Has great Melee defense, multiattacks, counterattack, defend other) and is fun to use.

[Eltacolibre]

in 25 charms or less?Alright: Solar sorcery with free spell: Demon of the Third circle.
How? Summon a demon of the third circle specialized in combat.
???
Profit.