Engaging a Non-Combat Character in a Combat Circle, or Dialling Back a Combat Circle

[Xerxes]

My current crop of players are a reasonably mixed bag. So far we have two characters who are willing to kill pretty much anything that stands in their way, one that is happy to watch things play out, prepare in the shadows and then have a devastating alpha strike, and one who really doesn't do combat. So far they've killed or are preparing to kill any NPC who doesn't comply completely with their moral compass and/or their wishes (granted so far this amounts to some thugs, household guards and a magistrate, so I may be over-reacting based on sample size). Given the raw combat capability of Solars, how can I get them to stop treating every opponent like a proverbial nail, and bring the non-combat character in from the cold?

[prototype00]

What is the not so stabby member of the party good at?

[Xerxes]

She's a smith Twilight, with a liking for climbing and acrobatics. There is a tournament of skill for all types (martial skill and making stuff) happening in the next few days, but that's assuming that the circle don't raise hell in the 48 hours or so they've got before it gets announced.

[prototype00]

Hmm, Athletics (that's what is governing her Acrobatics?)has all kinds of crazy lethal stuff in it like Thunderbolt Attack Prana. I take it she took none of these options?

Does she have a weapon she favours? Sorcery?

[BrilliantRain]

Talk with them to see if they're all having fun.

Alternately, apply some consequences. Have their anima banners get noticed. Call in a Wyld Hunt and have them form multiple teams, so that, after the PCs waste their energy on the first team, the second one shows up. Have a plan for how to save them, if needed.

Solving problems with violence tends to create more violence. Look for ways to give their actions consequences.

[artex]

The sidebar on p.205 has the right idea - but, personally, I think showing them choice is preferable to giving them consequence. At the very least, make sure they realize combat doesn't have to end with death. Guards are people, with families and loves and goals. (Zenith anima effect says "Hello. You guys are asshats.") Give them an incentive to spare their enemies, perhaps by not stabbing them in the back for it. Fighting is easy - but bargaining might actually be profitable.

If none of that works, there's the No Mercy approach.
It's all nice and fun to drop in some town and kill every Immaculate-lovin' person inside. Did you know there are Immaculate Order-run orphanages, and workhouses for the differently-abled? Great job dooming everyone there, too. Oh, and, the town will probably turn to chaos, because a bunch of murderhobos dismantled the government without offering any meaningful replacement. Imagine how the townspeople must feel right now.

Some people like to play the villains, and that's just fine if that's the kind of game they want. But some people just wonder how much they can get away with by calling themselves "Anti-Heroes". Make sure that line is there for them to see.

It's not enough to send a Wyld Hunt after them. Solars expect a Wyld Hunt no matter what they do. But having everyone in town cheer the Wyld Hunt on might put things in perspective.

[Xerxes]

Hmm, Athletics (that's what is governing her Acrobatics?)has all kinds of crazy lethal stuff in it like Thunderbolt Attack Prana. I take it she took none of these options?

Does she have a weapon she favours? Sorcery?

No, none of those athletics charms. She is having a reshuffle to add some in (something I allow for all of my games for the first few sessions as people get more used to the characters), but none that are particularly offensive.

Talk with them to see if they're all having fun.

Have done, which prompted this line of thought. The player wants more non-combat stuff, as she didn't want to build a combat character.

Alternately, apply some consequences. Have their anima banners get noticed. Call in a Wyld Hunt and have them form multiple teams, so that, after the PCs waste their energy on the first team, the second one shows up. Have a plan for how to save them, if needed.

This is... getting there. Although with 2 Nights spending motes like crazy not to flare and the Dawn not breaking into a sweat, we've yet to have anyone reach glowing.

Solving problems with violence tends to create more violence. Look for ways to give their actions consequences.

Will definitely do so. We're in Vaneha, but there's a big Lookshy embassy in town, so lots of Immaculates kicking around waiting for the tournament to start. And if they start going round murdering clan lords (which they may start doing soon), the political stuff will hit home fast.

The sidebar on p.205 has the right idea - but, personally, I think showing them choice is preferable to giving them consequence. At the very least, make sure they realize combat doesn't have to end with death. Guards are people, with families and loves and goals. (Zenith anima effect says "Hello. You guys are asshats.") Give them an incentive to spare their enemies, perhaps by not stabbing them in the back for it. Fighting is easy - but bargaining might actually be profitable.

True. I have at least two characters who will probably take that sort of thing, so long as they can see a gain in it for them.

I'm also kind of wondering around non-combat challenges with this group. Is it just a matter of discouraging combat with a carrot-and-stick combination until they get that every problem isn't a squishy nail, so to speak?

Also, any thoughts on getting the Twilight to engage would be great. She's actively walked away from the other characters when she found out they were going to a dodgy part of town to get information, for example. She'll be there at the tournament producing work (her NPC employer can make sure of that), but beyond that getting the characters to stay together is going to be interesting, and her player is actively trying to avoid combat with her.

I kind of want a climatic moment during the tournament where they all start glowing together and realise what each other are (most of them have met by this point, but not thought anything weird is going on with most of those). That can happen fairly easily so long as I force them to spend motes, but part of me is now worried that encounters with several Immaculate monks, some dragon-blooded and maaaybe an Exigent may not do that...

[prototype00]

I like the City Under siege scenario. Gives crafters a reason to be crafting, spies a reason to be spying and fighters a reason to be fighting.

[Happy Hermit]

For your kill happy players, perhaps you could try two strategies.

- Firstly that its profitable to ransom foes or spare them for interrogation. A last ditch "My family will pay well, if you spare me" or a "wait, I know why X is doing Y" might give them pause... especially if they have a use for the money or information. However any 'ST duplicity' early on would harm this strategy, so play it reasonably straight

- Secondly (assuming they are martial artists, but workable for other warrior types), you could introduce the concept of reputations being enhanced by sparing foes. Killing foes does not enhance their reputation (in fact one's reputation might be diminished... if killing is done to excess). Humiliating foes does however count to reputation gains (and to your players it might be a 'fun' substitute for murder) The more inventive or public the humiliation, the better. You could also introduce other customs that feed into this reputation... taking/breaking a foe's weapon, extracting a promise that no retribution will follow... or their honor is forfeit, etc. It does require other NPCs to buy into the concept and encourage it.

For your non combative Twilight, have a look at her intimacies and see if any tie in with current events. If you can get a handle on her mindset (and her dislikes regarding the other PCs), you'll have an easier time fitting her in the game. Regarding combat, it could be worth staging 'some' combats when the Twilight is elsewhere... and cross between her and the combat group every full turn. You could also attempt to show the Twilight what 'benefits' there are to associating with the other PCs. For example, they could be reintroduced as saviors... stepping in to dissuade an unruly customer, aiding her in the recovery of her stolen goods, or allowing her access to some of their contacts/allies (who could really help her business).

Finally I'd caution against publicly outing these particular characters as Anathema, your players might adopt a more wary and/or NPC murdering philosophy that makes it more difficult for you. Privately revealing their Solar nature to each other might work best in building group synergy.

Please do let us know how it goes

[Meianno Yuurei]

Letting her operate separately in some way might also help. It can be a little more work, but as long as they're not clinging to her butt to kill anyone she goes to talk to and make stuff for, she might be able to have fun doing things while they're getting their murder on. [And if they do that, well, that's when talking to them might help].

[Zale]

I mean, in these sort of circumstances I always advocate saying something like this:

"Hey, everyone, while I know you can kill basically anything that shows up, you may want to keep in mind that (Twilight) didn't build a combat character. Maybe you could try some less violent solutions to your problems from time to time so that she doesn't feel left out?"

If that doesn't work, the twilight can just build a warstrider and show them the error of their ways.

[Ryoki]

So I don't have a "non-combat character" in the group I am the ST of, but I play a Supernal Crafter with like 3 Martial Arts Charms so that I am not completely useless if it comes to a fight, which is unavoidable since all of the other players have supernal combat characters.

I find combat only investment to be a waste of potential in Exalted. The game is very combat heavy but it has so many other options and I as a player as well as ST am very interested in playing those out. So I talked to my players and told them that there are gonna be situations in which combat is not a real solution and that they need other skills to do fun stuff. Nobody gets to lead a kingdom without a bit of Bureaucracy or Presence etc.

Also choice and consequence as well as information gathering are very important for me as a ST. My players just killed a 2nd circle demon that ruled over a little city without the people actually knowing they had a demon overlord. The city was prospering but every other night the demon used Sorcery to do sometimes very cruel and deadly social experiments (he really wanted to understand humans and their actions in extreme situations).
They knew about this and thought he was evil. They also knew that the ghosts who were the official rulers of the place (ancestor cult and such) had an agreement with a death knight (they don't know about abyssals yet) so he would take tributes to not attack the city.

They did not knew that the demon was the only reason the abyssal didn't just take over the city. So they killed the demon and in the next one or two sessions they get to know that their "good deed" caused almost the whole city to get slaughtered. And the Abyssal is letting just enough people survive to tell the tale that it was all thanks to the circle.

A good use of Investigation, Occult, maybe even Lore or Craft, Presence, Socialize, to an extend even Bureaucracy Charms would have helped them so much to prevent this outcome. It was also possible without them but way more difficult.
Not every fight is going to have consequences like that but if they keep running into fights like headless chickens they probably will win (the supernal Brawl lost his arm in the fight against said demon though) but they never really can anticipate what is going to happen. I hope that makes alternative solutions more attractive to my players.


The ST I play under like to use solo screen so that I can feel relevant. Supernal Craft with a thematical focus on cooking (Solar Chefs are just too freaking cool!). Till now (we are halfway to Essence 3) I used my Craft mainly to please gods or spirits and to reapair a few artifacts that the ST gave us. Craft is very easily very useful when it comes to artifacts. But since artifacts are not nearly everything it can do and the system expects you to do other stuff as well, it can be difficult for the ST to create craft friendly situations.
He also very clearly said, that I need to have a few charms and points into a combat abillity since battles are unavoidable in the long run. The beauty of 3rd Edition compared to 2nd Edition is that non-combat character can have impact in a fight with just 2 or 3 charms without acutally dying to the very first attack. It was such a chore to play a pacifist character in 2nd... I won't do that ever again. It's just plain boring to sit there somewhere in cover and praying to the sun that nobody dares to hit you. I guess even your player wouldn't like doing that every single fight (assuming a fight every 2 to 3 sessions). Fights still take a long time. So if your player is happy with that... Well that is fine. But I doubt it would be a good idea to always give her something to do while the fight is going on. We are at 3 hours for one fight and it is still going strong and I expect it to last at least 2 or even 3 more hours. In my opinion it is easier to give the weaker character something to do in the fight (using craft to do something with the battlefield or presencing the minions or buffing the group with lore and performance charms) than splitting her from the group and giving seperate screen time.

[Sandact6]

In terms of leaving NPC's right, others are correct in that consequences are the main name of the game if you want to execute opponents. If you leave a hot blooded anathema hating stepchild of the Realm alive? Maybe he's the brother of a much more powerful, influential dragonblooded who would be enough to not only do a major attack on Veneha to get the NPC's, but also strangle the country with economic pressure due to the proper ties. It wouldn't be just the PC's on the line, but a ton of other people as well. If you want a good example of truly testing cover in a tournament, have a Dragonblooded in the contest go "to hell with this", full flare and activate his blatantly magical combat charms for a mortal dare doing well against him.

To the Twilight: MA is fine, as it can be disguistingly powerful just in of itself. However a lot of times you may often need a lot of dodge (mainly because many MA's don't have good defenses, if yours does than skip it).

[nalak42]

To be fair there are possible ramifications to combat characters leaving a trail of the dead behind them that don't involve the Realm and DBs. I mean Abyssals in 2E had a tendency to result from pissed off people that turned out to not be fully dead; bringing murderers to justice is probably going to help the reputation of most Exigents; it's not like a quest to avenge slain relatives has never resulted in a Solar exalt before; then of course there's the new Frankenstein nightmare that a Liminal can be especially if the party is just leaving good limbs on the ground.

[webkilla]

The sidebar on p.205 has the right idea - but, personally, I think showing them choice is preferable to giving them consequence. At the very least, make sure they realize combat doesn't have to end with death. Guards are people, with families and loves and goals. (Zenith anima effect says "Hello. You guys are asshats.") Give them an incentive to spare their enemies, perhaps by not stabbing them in the back for it. Fighting is easy - but bargaining might actually be profitable.

If none of that works, there's the No Mercy approach.
It's all nice and fun to drop in some town and kill every Immaculate-lovin' person inside. Did you know there are Immaculate Order-run orphanages, and workhouses for the differently-abled? Great job dooming everyone there, too. Oh, and, the town will probably turn to chaos, because a bunch of murderhobos dismantled the government without offering any meaningful replacement. Imagine how the townspeople must feel right now.

Some people like to play the villains, and that's just fine if that's the kind of game they want. But some people just wonder how much they can get away with by calling themselves "Anti-Heroes". Make sure that line is there for them to see.

It's not enough to send a Wyld Hunt after them. Solars expect a Wyld Hunt no matter what they do. But having everyone in town cheer the Wyld Hunt on might put things in perspective.

this

If your players want to be murderhobos - fine - just make sure to them peaceful alternatives, and then remind them of the consequences of their choices when they choose either. Reward them for being compasionate and kind. 'Reward' them with a sidereal-supported wyld hunt if they keep playing murderhobos.

and if all else fails, then talk to them before a session: make it clear that you, as ST, are not in this for supplying them with murderhobo funtimes. Explain that you want more than that - and if they fail you, then you can always find other players