Common vs Noble Warstriders

    Common Warstriders didn't even exist until recently. During the First Age all Warstriders were made from High Magitech. During the harsh centuries since the Great Contagion when so many Factory Cathedrals and workshops have been lost and jade is in short supply, people, usually in the Threshold, have to resort to more primitive expediencies to construct these monsters. Only the underlying Essence powered systems are constructed from jade- with the rest of the machine covered in steel. Such makeshift workmanship would be viewed as utterly vulgar in the Realm but in the Threshold fielding a Warstrider of any description is enough to make an impression. Hence the Realm's introduction of the derogatory name 'Common Warstrider' for those built in the barbarian lands as opposed to the 'Noble Warstriders' piloted by Dynasts.
   Point of Reference: compare the original suit in Iron Man to Tony Stark's factory build model.

Blessed Isle vs Threshold

    Dragon-Blooded have marks of their Aspect on their body. In the East these often take on the forms of animals orpatterns of plants such as coiling thorns. These marking become animated and apparently alive when the Terrestrial starts to manifest their anima. The Dragon-Blooded of the Blessed Isle often look upon the Terrestrials of the Threshold as primitive because of this strong animal connection, even though they may come from an advance culture. The Threshold is a much wilder place than the Blessed Isle and it's inhabitants like it that way. Which is the reason for their reputation as 'barbarians' by those who live on the Blessed Isle. On the Blessed Isle life exists in harmony and everyone knows their place. Which is great if you're at the top but often leaves people wanting more. The Threshold is a land of opportunity. You might lose everything, but there is a lot to gain.

Essence Pulse Cannon

    Concussive Essence Cannon don't just hit a point and explode but blast a line of elemental force across the ground. Everything in the affected area suffers damage and knockback.

   Essence Pulse Cannon
   One of the most conceptually simple weapons of the First Age. Their straightforward design made them extremely popular, and they are even now still produced in some workshops in the second age.
   Essence Pulse Cannon (Concussive Essence Cannon) project elemental Essence through their entire range. What form the energy takes depends on what they are made off.
   Earth Jade cannon carve a furrow through the ground. Rather than hitting targets on the ground it's power is directed against the ground itself. These weapons have uses other than military applications. In the First Age they were often used in mining.
   Ice Jade cannon- Thunder Hammers- fire with a deafening, reverberating crack as an ice elemental blasts from the barrel with the force of a hurricane. These weapons cause tremendous devastation, scattering everyone and everything in their path. Thunder Hammers were extensively used in First Age warfare on land and sea. Objects strong enough not to suffer knockdown or catastrophic (i.e. destroying) damage stop the blast but take the full brunt of it. Ice elementals don't like being stopped in their tracks.
   Blue Jade cannon were used exclusively in aquatic warfare. They send a surge of elemental force through the water as a devastating tidal wave or a  crushing undersea current. These weapons were used in subaquatic warfare (craft armed with them are among the rarest relics of the First Age) and for bombarding coastlines as well as attacking other ships.
   Fire Jade cannon were the most fearsome of all to see in battle. They fires a raging inferno through enemy ranks. As well as being used for tactical reasons they were also used as terror weapons and in all out assaults on cities where the attackers didn't even bother to loot them but burn everything to the ground. They're particularly deadly in naval warfare in the second age.
   Heavenly Fire Lance- Despite Immaculate disapproval, these weapons are still highly prized for their effectiveness against Creatures of Darkness. Each one, made from pure orichalcum, is decorated with Heavenly iconography and prayers to the Unconquered Sun. In addition to normal damage, Creatures of Darkness affected by this weapon burn in cleansing flame; zombies and nemissaries' bodies burn to ashes, ghosts are released from their fetters and pass immediately into Lethe, Nephwracks are exposed to holy light no shadow can hide from.
   Soulsteel cannon- Oblivion's Dark Light- the most terrifying of all Essence Cannon, this diabolical creation has the power to drag people straight into Oblivion.

Black Sun Princess Style

    Weapons and Armour: This style focuses on inflicting pain and form weapons are based on the same intention. Generally the style is practised unarmed but a character may use whips (as per Exalted but with Damage +0L) or wear elegant leather strips fitted with metal blades. Weapons have a damage of no greater than +1. The Princess keeps her fingernails sharpened like razors to inflict lethal damage. This style emphasises performance rather than blatant combat and elegant cruelty over brutality. Wearing armour blocks the use of this style.

    Unnatural Agony Infliction
Cost: 2m; Mins: Martial Arts 2, Essence 2; Type: Supplemental
Keywords: Combo-OK, Obvious
Duration: Instant
Prerequisite Charms: None
   Dark Essence courses through the Princess' weapon or through her very hands. She can however camouflage the Obvious effect of this Charm through appropriately coloured accoutrements, she often paints her fingernails black to hide the use of this Charm. On a successful attack the wound inflicts a -1 penalty for every level of damage inflicted as well as the normal penalties for losing health levels.

   Lascivious Excoriating Caress
Cost: 4m; Mins: Martial Arts 4, Essence 2; Type: Supplemental
Keywords: Combo-OK, Touch
Duration: One Scene
Prerequisite Charms: Unnatural Agony Infliction
   With this Charm the Princess can turn the most pleasurable acts into indescribable agony. A gentle sweep of her hand can strip the skin from a paramour's face or she can flay flesh from bone with her fingertips.
   Any direct physical contact causes lethal injury. All attacks made with this Charm cause lethal damage as her victim's flesh is pulled apart. Even striking her becomes an exercise in self-inflicted pain. On each attack a character touches her they suffer one die of lethal damage.

   
Cost: 2m; Mins: Martial Arts 3, Essence 2; Type: Supplemental
Keywords: Combo-OK
Duration: Instant
Prerequisite Charms: Unnatural Agony Infliction
   Such is the disturbing beauty of the Black Sun Princess her allure leaves a foe utterly helpless before her onslaught. This Charm merges performing a social attack with a physical one. Subtract her Relative Appearance from her opponent's DV.

    Mistress' Bitter Pain Revenge
Cost: Mins: Martial Arts 3, Essence 2; Type: Reflexive
Keywords: Combo-OK, Touch
Duration: Instant
Prerequisite Charms: Unnatural Agony Infliction
   The Black Sun Princess is a master of pain. Everytime an opponent inflicts a blow that would cause a wound penalty she can use the sympathetic backlash caused by their physical contact to inflict the same wound penalty on her opponent.


   Black Sun Princess Form
Cost: 5m; Mins: Martial Arts 4, Essence 2; Type: Simple 
Keywords: Form-Type
Duration: One Scene
Prerequisite Charms: Lascivious Excoriating Caress, Mistress' Bitter Pain Revenge


    Unending Orgy of Suffering

    The Princess was brought into this world to cause pain, pain that brings her unholy joy. What force can stop her when her unleashed appetite is in full flood?
    Every time she inflicts a blow that increases her opponent's wound penalty she regains a number of motes equal to the penalty's new rating.

    I don't know where the line gaps are coming from. The coding must be crap. 

Black Sun Princess Style (Abyssal Martial Arts)

    Changing into the Form of this martial art the Black Princess drives herself into an orgiastic frenzy of violence. Allowing her deepest impulses free rein she becomes an unstoppable ravaging fiend.
   When she activates this form she is affected by the full Virtue Flaws for Hedonistic Indulgence and Bezerk Fury. She cannot attempt to control these conditions as the Form requires complete lack of self control. However she gains a number of Virtue Points equal to her Temperance and Valour. While in this form she may spend Willpower points to channel Virtues without reducing her remaining channels. Note that using channels requires them to be used for a task that is appropriate in a similar way to regaining Virtue channels using Phoenix Renewal Tactic. The Form ends when the scene ends or when she uses all her temporary Willpower, whichever comes first. If she does spend all her Willpower she becomes comatose for a number of hours equal to her highest Virtue.

   This Charm should really be a later Charm, probably the last one of the Style. It's too powerful to be a Form Charm. I came up with a better one later.

       Black Princess Form
Type: Simple (one action)

Key Words: Form-type, Emotion, Social
Duration: One Scene

   The Princess becomes the very embodiment of the Hate she felt the night she was Exalted and revels in her murderous triumph. Those unfortunate enough to witness her atrocious acts of cruelty fall to their knees gagging and vomiting, stand dumbstruck in shocked disbelief or flee trying to escape the shocking acts they've witnessed.
    To activate this Charm the character must perform a physical of social attack that embodies heartless cruelty to the point it induces thoughts of suicidal despair. She suffers from the Virtue Flaw partially controlled Deliberate Cruelty as she is given in to malice.
    The first time another character witnesses her making an attack while in this state finds her unbridled viciousness is so unbearable they must spend a number of Willpower points equal to their Compassion to withstand the sight of the horrifyingly inhuman abuse she subjects people to. If a player choses they may instead spend a Willpower point to make a Conviction roll. Those who pass flee If they pass they have the choice of fleeing and not returning for the rest of the scene to avoid seeing more debasement or standing inactive until an attack directed against them shakes them out of their stupor. If the player fails or they have no Willpower left they are rendered inactive for the rest of the scene while their mind and body revolts at the atrocity they have just watched.
    Those who spend the full amount of Willpower are unable to use their Compassion again for as long as the Charm lasts and they remain in her presence. As a backhand advantage they cannot gain Limit from Compassion while in this state.
   The Emotion effect of this Charm affects her not the onlookers. She exerts unnatural mental influence on herself to relive the most hate-filled and joyous moment of her unlife. The effect it has on bystanders is a natural effect of her sadistic cruelty. Despite the effect it has on others this Charm does not stop her from using Compassion in the twisted way she feels it. Far from it. She positively revels in the shocked sickness and impotent outrage others feel in her presence when she uses this Charm.

    Notes

   One problem is the limit of 2 Willpower points per scene people have to spend to resist natural mental influence. I wanted to avoid the use of direct Unnatural mental influence as it seemed too artless, anyone can force people to feel emotions, a real artist inspires them. People for who Compassion is not a dominant Virtue would be unaffected. Those who are Essence users may spend all of their Compassion in Willpower, if it above 2, to create a Compulsion effect that allows them to remain in control of themselves, accruing Limit for doing so. She also incurs a point of Resonance for activating this Charm for drawing on the darkness that allows her to resurrect such hate.
   I'm not sure if it's more fitting for a character to gain Resonance from drawing on the power of the Abyssal Exaltation or trying to defy it. The Abyssals says both.

   About Willpower use, the rules say that after they spend two Willpower points the attacker must use a stunt to come at the character from an unexpected direction. Use of Charms are often interchangeable with stunts and attacks performed with this Charm should be similar to stunts in any case, especially the initial one that activates the Charm, that's a condition of activation.

   Whether or not this Charm qualifies as unnatural mental influence is not clear. I do not want the Charm or even the style to involve unnatural mental influence. The direct effect of it is since she is becoming a sinister Essence empowered embodiment of Abyssal cruelty. On the other hand it doesn't directly cause an emotion, which is at the root UMI, investing Essence into words and actions to give them an unnaturally potent social effect. It doesn't literally invade other people's minds or invest her words and actions with any supernatural power. Rather supernatural power is the cause of her words and actions and she's using them to achieve levels of hatred people are not usually capable of. That's what so disgusts people. It's sort of a half-way state of unnaturally caused mental influence rather than an unnatural effect. The only direct effect is on her.

   Also the name is obviously different but I think it might work.

    Each Aspect of Terrestrial has abilities that suit their environment.

Wounds Mean Nothing

    Having cheated death once, it's a foolish opponent who lets their guard down thinking an Abyssal is finished. All too often once their back is turned on an assumed dead opponent they rise up like macabre puppets ready to stab their presumptuous enemy in the back.

Concussive Essence Cannon

    Concussive Essence Cannon aren't just valued because they inflict casualties. They can knockback and disrupt entire formations. They're valuable because they break up attacking forces or defensive lines.

    Magitech devices can be powered in one of three ways. They can use a socketed hearthstone which acts as a conduit for the energy of a manse. Secondly they can be on an Essence grid attached to a manse in a similar way to a character recovering Essence by being present at the manse. Thirdly they can use Essence capacitors (different to the device described in Lords of Creation.) These magitech artefacts can be recharged by a device attached to an Essence grid or at the manse itself in a dedicated socket. Unlike 'magical' artefacts magitech is powered by pure Essence so it can be designed to do almost anything. However devices depend on being powered whereas other artefacts have intrinsic properties.

    The history of the Immaculate Order is not hooey. It's true, it's just not exactly true. But it's as close to the truth as people knew of at the time, even the Solars. The Terrestrials defeated the Solars but they were not Lawgivers anymore. They weren't what the Unconquered Sun Exalted.
   The advent of Immaculate martial arts came as an unpleasant surprise to the Solars.

    The North is a lot like the Underworld. It is dark a lot of the time especially in winter. The moon shines over the north for months. The north was a stronghold of the Lunars just as the south was a stronghold of the Solars and has a disproportionate number of Lunar manses. The Chosen of the Moon were drawn to this shadowy and eldrich land.
   In shadowlands the ground is covered in the ashes of the dead. A shadowland is created when the land is completely a realm of death. Shadowlands often occur in graveyards and other places where death has dominated Creation and became the only thing present there the Essence of the Underworld spills through it. Graveyards are often surrounded by iron fences to stop the dead from escaping and are carefully warded.

    Not all artefacts require the use of magical materials. The significance of them is that they can encorporate the artefact into the Exalt's anima and a way of channelling the ingredients' power.

    Just as the Solars were made to command Creation, the Lunars were made to live beyond it, both it's physical boundaries, it's social control and some say it's reason.
   Just as the moon only shines brightly during the sun's absence the Lunars were made as a juxtaposition of the Solars, those who didn't need the Solars' guidance. Far from having a controlling bond with the Solars Lunars seemed almost designed to oppose them at times. In the Old Realm the Solars found the Lunars invaluable allies and infuriating obstacles. Often the feeling was mutual.
   The Solars could forge new stretches of Creation and condemn it's enemies but the Wyld was endless and the Lunars could enter and leave it with impunity.

    The Fair Folk in the outer reaches of the Wyld often seek to subvert the existing elemental surroundings such as turning a lush forest into a mad technicolour jungle.

    Each Elemental Pole is the source of the element within Creation. An elemental pole creates the element, pushing reality against the Wyld.
   Elemental energy comes from Heaven, through the Heavenly Mountain and then separates and spreads out to the four directions of Creation.
    Life should thrive near the elemental poles. Why not have plants and animals that live around them.
   Five elemental creatures- totem of the Immaculate Dragons
   Earth- crane
   Wood- monkey
   Water- fish
   Fire- reptile
   Ice- fox, bear, wolf

    Ordinary humans cannot change surroundings in the Wyld. The lack the ability to Shape.
   The raksha are players. The Wyld is a stage. In the Wyld the raksha's stories are horrifyingly real. Because of a Creation born's formed nature the further in Creation they are the harder they are for the raksha's Shaping effects to affect. Until then they are in Creation proper they are safe (at least from Wyld Shaping.) They can't make their stories if there is no dreamscape to work in. This is the reason people fear Wyld storms. It gives the Fair Folk a certain amount of ability to use their magic. In pure chaos there is nothing but what the Fair Folk make. Creation has slid away completely leaving no foundation for reality to rest on. An injury a Creation born suffers here is real. So far into the Wyld fantasy is reality. Life played out at freeholds usually in the form of court dramas is like a theatre and hungry courtiers feed on the emotions of those who are centre stage.

Each to His Own

    Get it. The Solars don't do what the Sidereals tell them. They did what the Unconquered Sun told them. The purpose of the Sidereals was to advise the Solars by giving them insights they didn't have access to. A recurring problem with Exalted is the repeated portrayal of classes as dupes. Who wants to play a fucking dupe? Even one who knows they are? It would be a far better game if they got over this idea and portrayed people as having more autonomy. If everything is just a big conspiracy by the Sidereals, Deathlords etc. it's just shit cause no one has any free will.

   The Solars are beholden to no one but their Celestial master. Certainly not lesser Exalted like the Sidereals. The whole point of the Gold Faction is to restore Solar rule. Solars outnumber the Gold Faction drastically and once they attain comparable levels of Essence to the Faction's elders will be nigh unstoppable. Indeed the Gold Faction wants them to be. Who else will combat the Deathlords and other dire threats to the world? The Gold Faction are under no illusions. The Solars are chosen for their desire to use power for their own ends and can oppose anyone who tries to stop them as the Primordials found out to their cost. The Solars were made to rule Creation and don't take orders from anyone.

    It was not that the existence of the Solars, and to a lesser extent the Lunars and the Sidereals, has been eradicated from history. Rather their earlier identity had been lost under a history of decadence and absolute power. No one even recognised the Solars as Solars anymore. The Zenith Caste had long since become tyrants, priests of a god in whose name they no longer spoke and whose power they only abused not carried out. The Twilight Caste, once great enlighteners and brilliant sorcerers, had turned into twisted experimenters pushing the boundaries of knowledge with no care for humanity or their own souls. Even the Solars had forgotten what they were. In ancient histories, old enough to become myths, great heroes called Lawgivers raised mankind to rule the world. In the third age of the Old Realm their epithet became replaced by one far more fitting given to them by their Dragon-Blooded underlings: Anathema. They were no longer recognisable as or knew that they used to be Sun-Kings. Instead they'd become living demons. Great mortals would be chosen by a corrupting force that would twist their souls as they power swelled to inhuman proportions making the as evil as they were almighty. It was in this atmosphere of tyrany and oppression that the five Dragon-Blooded who would become known as the Immaculate Dragons started to foment rebellion against them.

Celestial Power

    The Essence of the Solars is the ability to wield power in Creation.
    The Essence of the Lunars is the ability to wield power in the Wyld.
    The Essence of the Sidereals is to wield power of Fate.

    The Loom of Fate is the font of the Sidereals' power. So the Wyld is the source of the Lunars' power. Due to it's infinite potential and the Lunars' ability to use it, their power is potentially limitless, restrained only by their Essence. This is how they manage to battle against mighty Fair Folk in a place beyond Creation and Fate, beyond reality itself. The Solars may be able to push back the borders of the Wyld but it is always there, it is limitless and so are the Fair Folk. Only those whose power is equally limitless, whose power is drawn from it can hope to successfully fight against it. To this end she made her Chosen, to fight against the Wyld in many ways, each one was an aspect of her nature. The weakness of the Lunar host caused by the Wyld Hunt precipitated the creation of the Silver Faction who were determined never to risk Creation being swallowed up by the Wyld ever again. Lunars are still vulnerable to the forces the Sidereals can put against them. Although they can escape Fate by entering the Wyld, it is their natural battle ground, they need human contact as much as anyone and part of their duty is to lead people to fight against the Wyld with them. Hence Arvida's expedition that created the Haslanti League by leading ice walkers to rediscover the lost wonders of Tzatli.

Sidereals

    Each Sidereal Exaltation is essentially a strand of Fate. The Exaltation of a Chosen of Battles is an unending story of conflict. An Exaltation of a Chosen of Serenity is an eternal tale of love.

Neverborn

    End Of All Hope

    Every night the moon takes on a different form. Some believe this to be random, others believe the face of the moon brings portents of things to come. The moon isn't limited to one phase regularly waxing and waning but appears each night as Luna wishes, sometimes with one phase, sometimes with two. It can appear as a corona of silver, two phases on opposite sides, identical or mismatching and at changing angles. Unlike the path of the sun the path of the moon is not constant either. travelling during the day and during the night along any path Luna choses, in which direction and how high in the sky are up to her.

    An artefact ship can move through water without disturbing it as if it were part of the water itself. As the vessel is inhabited by a water elemental or bonded to the anima of a Terrestrial Exalted this is actually true. A vessel of frost jade can move as easily over the frozen sea as snow over ice. A vessel of fire jade can travel through rivers of burning rock.
   Earth jade is extraordinarily hard and requires age of strenuous hammering to craft it into shape. It's far stronger than most tools used to craft it as a result they have to be repaired or replaced frequently. Jade can survive any condition of it's Elemental Pole. It was intended to be the bodies of elementals.
   Artefacts made from jade are the houses of elementals. The Dragon-Blooded are representations of the living things of Creation just as they are descended from their forebears. Their artefacts aren't just objects but living weapons.

    Some demons breathe themselves forwards as surging tides of fog.
   Demon Lords are wary of promoting their subordinates or of progeny who grow too powerful. Most find it expedient to impress upon them that Elder Progeny is the highest station they can attain to retain a monopoly on power, and make sure that this rak is hard enough to accomplish. However once in a while through extraordinary guile circumstance and luck a progeny manages to attain some degree of power over his lord and simultaneously prevent himself from being deposed. Tales are told of rulers who have slowly become little more than figureheads because of the rise of a cunning and consummately manipulative underling. As a result demons are very cautious when dealing with powerful underlings. Yes they're very useful but they're also potentially very dangerous. The mighty owe their preeminence largely to those beneath them but the more powerful those beneath them become the more in danger they are of being overthrown. Sometimes an entire collective of progeny fall on their master. When the succeed they often set up a form of group rulership. Often this dissolves sooner or later as it's members turn on eachother. This is often the result of one of their number declaring their superiority, which often happens immediately after the coup usually by the one who slew their former master. Demons have to contend with not only their superiors and lessers but also their peers. Such an act is extremely riky as short sighted conspirators have learned. Demon Princes do not take their subsidiary souls being slain lightly and often fall on the offenders who discover they have angered a being far more powerful than the one they overthrew. Occasionaly the winner of an internecine conflict among a group of conspirators is offered the chance to be transformed into the Demon Prince's soul. Such an enticement is also used to fragment such a group of renegades, being held out as a reward for selling out their peers. Often all the usurpers perish in such a conflict which is what the Demon Prince sometimes wants.
   Having a subsidiary soul overthrown in a significant embarrassment to a Demon Prince and could incite attack from all quarters. However if one of the rebels prove to show particular promise they may think they're better off with them instead as they will be a more effective weapon to use against their rivals.

    Luna could see the Unconquered Sun was making Chosen who would one day rule all of Creation. She wanted to make something that would like herself be beyond the Unconquered Sun's control, beyond even the control of Fate. Luna's fundamental relationship is to Gaia not the Unconquered Sun. Why would she make her Chosen differently?

    As the Solars were the masters of Creation, Luna made her Exalted to be, like the Wyld they were spawned from, beyond it and beyond their control.

Warstriders

    Scout and Common Warstriders were constructed by and for the Terrestrial Exalted so they could fight along side Celestial Exalted armed with Colossal and Royal Warstriders. In great battles Solar Generals in their orichalcum war machines would lead armies of Terrestrials in their Warstriders. Although the models made for the Terrestrials were far smaller they could be produced en masse and allowed hosts of Terrestrials fighting as sworn brotherhoods to go into battle shoulder to shoulder with their Solar masters like a warlord leading his retinue.

The Haslanti and the Discovery of the North

    The Haslanti probably have a legend about their long journey north truting religiously in their Lunar guide travelling to Tzatli to found the city of Diamond Hearth. This story could become legend in it's own right with the Haslanti prepared to trust the tall tale of the Lunar of a fantastical lost city to journey out on to the ice in the hope of reaching this place before winter, then people dying or turning back and the Lunar and the faithful convincing them to carry on and then they find this amazing city and become the founders of Diamond Hearth. Then the tale goes on with how they settled and explored the city and survived the first winter there. The Lunar selected the brave and adaptable Ice Walker tribes to rediscover this lost technology. Since then they have thrived resurrecting the First Age technology they found.
   Although the technology of Tzatli kept the Wyld out, the Haslanti and their Lunar guide still had to fight through the dark tunnels against the Fair Folk to reclaim it and during the winters when the Wyld returns.
   This sounds like an Icelandic saga but on a much bigger scale.

    The Immaculate Order is so named because because they could not be corrupted by the debased Solar emperors. The Immaculate Order maintains this spiritual purity of the Dragon-Blooded empire primarily by spreading it's philosophy and through the Wyld Hunt and individually through hard, acetic training.

The Descending Hierarchy

Essence 2  Serf    You live and act  at your master's command
Essence 3    Greater Serf   You have lived long enough to gain some experience. A fraction of the absolute terror you experience has started to be replaced by an inkling of ambition.
    Under-breeds. Dross to be used at your master's will

Essence 4    Progeny    You have attained full demonhood and are powerful enough your patron is not ashamed to recognise you as one of their offspring. They have actually addressed you by name.
Essence 5   Elder Progeny   The highest most First Circle demons can aspire to. Elder Erymanthoi are captains of battle lines. Other Elder First Circle demons occupy similar positions.


Essence 6   Demon Lord   You have crossed the watershed. You are either a novice Second Circle demon or a First Circle demon who has had the extraordinary luck to achieve a rank belonging to your betters. Such Progeny are still under the heel of their master but are given lofty positions such as advisor or personal chamberlain. Some have been mystically transformed to assume the powers (and responsibilities) of Second Circle demons by their master. A Demon Lord the replace might have fallen from favour or fallen afoul in dubious circumstances. If you are a true Second Circle demon you have just entered a world of devious and unforgiving politics. At this level you are no longer ordered to assassinate someone. You get someone to do it for you.


Possible sources of inspiration for demon lore: the world of Cthulhu and H.P.Lovecraft; Hellboy.


This didn't turn out in it's nice and neat new post layout due to the incompetence of the people who wrote the program for putting up blogs. They can't even make it handle a simple table as if using computers wasn't annoying enough as it is. I have total contempt for everyone who writes computer programs are they are all incompetent. Didn't it occur to them to make the editing page match the format of the page presented of the website? Obviously not. What the fuck do they pay you for?

Gods and Essence

    The motes of Essence in a god's possession are it's very life force. When a god spends motes it feels weary and when it has a full Essence pool feels lively and energetic. If a god spent all it's Essence it would no longer exist as an Essence pattern and fade away. When a god (or another spirit) does when it spends Essence is spend itself. Gods have peripheral Essence pools which they can spend with obvious effect. They can also spend Essence from their Personal Essence pool but it's not something a god does lightly. They are spending the Essence that makes up the core of their being. By spending Peripheral Essence they're also spending part of themselves but less important outer layers that can be more easily spent and recovered. Worship is so important to gods because people are spending their valuable motes dedicated to the god itself so that Essence becomes part of the god's form. For every day of dedicated worship to the god they recover a number of motes equal to the Magnitude of the group praying to them. This is why Creation often holds day-long festivals. If a group taking part in dedicated worship has an Essence greater than one multiply it's magnitude by their Essence. Enlightened human priests are often separated into different castes according to their spiritual advancement. Such priests spend virtually every day of their lives in devotion and directing the worship of the masses.
   Demons often promote just enough of their servants to induce hopes of betterment to keep their underlings loyal.

Dragon-Blooded Abilities

Ice- awareness, survival
Fire- Melee, resistance
Water- sail, awareness, linguistics
Earth- bureaucracy, performance, craft, martial arts, war
Wood- athletics, stealth, thrown, socialise

Dragon-Blooded and the Immaculate Order

    The Dragon-Blooded know that they cannot be greater than the Solars. Although by the time of their decline they were no longer recognisable as the Lawgivers the Unconquered Sun gave his blessing to. The 'Immaculate Dragons' were the first to discover the possibility that Terrestrial Exalted could practice Celestial martial arts and each created one of the Five Glorious Dragon styles based on their animas. A tradition that Immaculate Monks maintain to this day.
   The Immaculate Philosophy is the greatest cultural and philosophical achievement of the Dragon-Blooded for it gives them a way to control Essence in the same fashion as Celestial Exalted albeit within the purview of martial arts alone. To learn it the student must internalise and understand the writings on the sacred scrolls of the Immaculate Order, written by the Immaculate Dragons themselves, after climbing to the Order's temple on the slopes of the Heavenly Mountain and while undergoing years of punishing training to help them comprehend their lessons. One of the monks' favourite exercises is making their pupils climb all the way down the slopes to the base of the mountain and collect water to bring all the way back up again.
   The original purpose of the Solar Exalted had become long lost and their great war against the Primordials little more than myth by the time the Usurpation came. The age of the Lawgivers had long past. By then the Solars were all-powerful dictators, rulers of dark empires. The Immaculate personification of the Solars as evil spirits was to their best knowledge the truth. They could no longer be recognised as Solars but little more than evil demonic and omnipotent spirits. Generations of absolute power and obedience corrupted them so they thought nothing of making pacts with the most vile of demons. In fact by this time they found they had more in common with the hate-twisted Yozis than their distant patron.
   The First Age can be divided into three broad sections. The Solars' victory over the Primordials and their consolidation of power over mankind, dubbed Lawgivers after receiving the Mandate from Heaven. The exploration of their true potential; this is when the Celestial Incarnae withdrew their attention from their Chosen and the Great Curse started to make itself known. The terrible zenith of their power and the nadir of the rule of mankind; the Solars had become twisted by their unspeakable, inhuman desire for glory. The Lunars were largely unable to stop them, tormented by their own inner natures. Some became willing allies of the Sun Children other had fallen in with the very people they were made to defend Creation against- the Fair Folk. Who cares what's happening in Creation when you can have everything you want in the Wyld. The Lunars' individualism had become narcissism, they cared nothing over what happened in Creation but abused their power to Shape the Wyld to satisfy every inhuman lust they could think of, often only venturing out to sate their whims with the bodies and souls of real people. Luna lost sight of her children being hardly able to distinguish them from the Fair Folk. Other more conscientious Lunars became throughly disillusioned with mankind and escaped the pervading corruption by living among kingdoms of animals, but still they had to wrestle with their own tainted desires.
   Learning the ways of the Immaculate Order is to remove yourself from the constraints of your Terrestrial nature and try to attain godhood. Monks who have been initiated into the Order leave their old lives behind and take on a new name. Learning to use Celestial Essence is only the first step on the path.

Denied and Forsaken Widow Style

    No one with a Compassion of more than two is capable of learning this style as the are unable to perform the vilest acts of pitiless cruelty that this style requires.

      Obedient ________ Torment
   What greater mastery of the art of pain is there than inflicting the most excruciating agony on your opponent and having them beg for more.

   The master of this art has no mercy. Any act of compassion is just a pretence to make their victim's subsequent torment all the more heartless. The Forsaken Widow often enjoys pretending be compassionate and motherly perhaps revelling in the sheer strangeness of the emotions she's imitating. Some of her followers seem to enjoy being tormented.

   An unfortunate target of this Charm wants to be hurt. They'll fawn and scape on the floor for their mistress' attention even though they receive only the lowest form of it.

      Graceless Chattel Abasement
   Those far gone in Widow's service will perform any act on themselves or others no matter how grotesque at her command to receive their punishment.
   The wretched subjects of this Charm can be made to perform acts that contradict their Virtues.
   The Widow may chrge one of her subjects affected by Obedient ________ Torment with a task. Make a social attack. If they succeed the subject may not use their affected Virtue to prevent them performing their task.
   During that time they cannot exercise that virtue in any way to resist the Widow or use any of it's channels.

      Adjuration of the Impure Psyche
   The Widow may command one of her subjects to perform a task. If successful (the social attack) the subject's Motivation becomes 'do what the mistress commands' and will perform any acts no matter how abhorrent at her request.

   Of course the real torment of this Charm is of the one who'd Virtues they are forced to betray. The Denied and Forsaken Widow enjoys forcing those around her to perform acts they find abhorrent but cannot stop themselves.

       Psyche Evicerating Dominatrix
    By torturing her unfortunate supplicant in ways she feels particularly significant (or enjoyable) from outright physical abuse to forcing a man watching his loved ones being tortured to a barrage of well-worded insults and malicious teasing in public, she condenses a whole day of denying someone Willpower recovery into a single scene. If someone's will is broken through this Charm she replaces their Motivation with a Servitude effect to obey her. This Servitude effect remains as long as they do not recover their Willpower back to it's full rating.

   A mistress' dignity is expressed through her aloofness to those she torments. She embodies something that they desperately desire and are unable to take.
   Whenever the Widow offers the target something that appeals to one of their Intimacies, dominant Virtues or their Motivation but she can deny them without the use of direct physical force she savours their torment. Direct physical force doesn't rule out using physical means. She could writhe and dance erotically in fine night attire in front of a captive tied to her bed, especially if his restraints draw blood, or make suggestive comments on desires close to the heart of a courtier that they cannot respond to honestly without drawing approbium from the whole court.

   The later Charms are more what I have in mind for this style. The earlier ones seem more similar to Laughing Wounds Style. The purpose of this martial art is not to make people enjoy pain in any sense. It's a very social martial art, even more so than Dreaming Pearl Courtesan Style. It focuses on social interaction rather than only drawing on it as a basis for Charms used in combat. Actual physical violence is something used as part of the style rather than something the style is used for. The character herself is very socially based. I originally thought of her as a Midnight Caste but then the Shadow (Day) Caste might offer her more room to use her powers. I'm not sure about how their anima banner affects obvious Charms though.

    In a very fundamental way Lunars are everything the Fair Folk are not. They have the potential for true creativity and innovation. These qualities are essential for them to live in the Wyld and are the basis for which the Lunar Exaltation choses it's host. In a way they are everything the Fair Folk pretend to be. Although in the Wyld what's 'pretend' is real.
   An example of the mad Wyld spawned landscapes you find in the far east are the toxic jungles of Nausicaa.

   Once again I disagree with the game canon on this. The Fair Folk should be capable of genuine creativity not merely restricted to copying. They live in a world where anything's possible. Why shoul they be confined to copying, especially when they lived in a time when there was nothing to copy.