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View Full Version : Not a session from Malfeas, but it damn well wasn't Yu-Shan [Exalted 2e, rant]



Fortuna
2011-02-25, 04:26 AM
Well. That was annoying.

A few hours ago, we finished a session of Exalted. Now, at the time it was so-so, and looking back on it from a few minutes was annoying, and now it's actually making me angry. Which is, itself, annoying.

The session began much as I expected it to: since the last session had ended poorly, we made an entirely new circle. The ST then proceeded to deliver us all mysterious notes, including names and descriptions of the others in the circle. Now, I can understand the railroading, but it goes a bit beyond the norm for my character.

Perhaps now is the time to describe the group. There is the ST, obviously. There is me, and I'm probably the second most competent player there. Maybe first, depending on the day. I was playing a Dawn Caste, aiming for the fifth type of Even Blade Style, whose Exaltation was very public and who is therefore very paranoid. There's my brother, who was playing a craft-focused Twilight. There's another player, I'll call him D, who was playing a Full Moon Lunar and has achieved a reputation in our group for spectacularly dumb moves. And the last player, M, didn't even have a character sheet, but was an Abyssal. I think he might have been a Dusk caste.

So, my character has just been found, apparently described, maybe even named, in a Direction that he had thought safe. There's no good option except to play along, so play along he does.

We meet, we get shown a super-spear of Jade that's serving as a MacGuffin, we get told to kidnap someone so they'll look suspicious before we take the spear, blah blah blah.

So we split up, because to get to the spear we'll need to lie in wait where it is, and to get to the kidnappee we need to be outside that area. I volunteered to take the spear, and M joined me. We had a discreet signal prearranged, so we could get a go-ahead. We also had a half-hour window to get the spear.

When the go-ahead didn't come through, we figured 'half is better than none', and so I grabbed the spear. Then, before my character with a Gem of Perfect Mobility can get out of there, three Immaculate monks walk in. Needless to say, that wasn't in the job description. Worse, there seem to be more following them. Grabbing M, I run for it.

So far, so good. If the session had ended there, I would have been happy enough. Then a mysterious metal thing appears in my path, and blows up. I'm told that it's treated as a huge number of successive attacks, so when I use HGD against it it drains my entire personal pool and flares my anima totemic to boot. That's ten attacks. I ignore it, and just keep running.

Now we get to the prearranged meeting-place, where the others have also arrived with a swarm of dragonblooded on their tail. The meeting-place is a cave, so my plan is to hide in the cave until some of the dragonblooded have gone deep into it looking for us, then collapse the entrance and fight off the rest. Naturally, therefore, the DBs just send a massive shockwave through the thing. I run from the cave, see that there are a couple of dozen (!) DBs outside, and run for it.

But apparently, they can keep up with me, and pepper me with arrows until I run out of motes (no input on that point from me, incidentally). So now I'm surrounded by DBs in fairly obvious martial arts forms. I then try to persuade them to do the whole public execution thing (another chance to escape, see?). The ST's response? "STAB. You're dead."

Based on what happened to the rest of the circle, the cave wasn't any better a bet. They were cornered and would have been slaughtered if not for the ST's sudden departure. So Yeah.

That's a bit better. Thanks, playground, for existing.

Cespenar
2011-02-25, 04:41 AM
Based on what little information we have here, one can theorize that the ST wasn't very happy and didn't want to play that much after all.

Fortuna
2011-02-25, 04:46 AM
Perhaps, but what annoys me is that while he had said that he would like to play, he had agreed to ST. If he had decided that, should he ST again, he was going to kill us all, he could have just said 'No, I'm not going to.'

Fishy
2011-02-25, 05:31 AM
Alternative theory:

It was a locked-door puzzle. You weren't 'supposed' to get the MacGuffin via smash-and-grab, so overwhelming force was put in place to stop you. Instead, there was a specific and obscure 'win condition' that the DM had in his mind.

If you had found the guard-captain's daughter and asked her to identify the ship that delivered the exploding thing and and then found the scrap of paper nailed to the mast and read it upside down in a mirror, you would have known exactly what defenses the spear had, and how to waltz past them unmolested.

Newbie and controlling DMs sometimes make those kinds of scenarios, and don't know how to back out of them.


Or, he doesn't like STing.

Fortuna
2011-02-25, 05:34 AM
Well, he's not a newbie, and the mysterious figure who knew my name (!!!!) presented it as simple smash-and-grab. So while I guess that's possible, it seems unlikely.

TheCountAlucard
2011-02-25, 05:48 AM
You posted this thread twice.

You posted this thread twice. :smalltongue:

Okay, with that out of the way, you have my sympathies; that sounds pretty awful. :smallfrown:

MickJay
2011-02-25, 06:10 AM
...and the mysterious figure who knew my name (!!!!) presented it as simple smash-and-grab.

If something like that happened to me, I'd assume it was a set-up, and either avoid the place, or at least scout the whole area three times prior to moving to the destination.

Fortuna
2011-02-25, 06:17 AM
Look, if he wanted to screw me over he had easier ways to go about it than getting me to steal the spear. He knew my name. There was an Immaculate temple right there. If he wanted me gone, all he had to do was drop a hint and I'd have been buried in DBs before it hit the floor. I don't buy him having faulty information, either, once again because he knew my name. That shows serious information-gathering capacity.

MickJay
2011-02-25, 06:41 AM
Perhaps the goal of that NPC was to make you steal that spear there and then, and/or to kidnap that other character, and not necessarily screw you over? Besides, just because he knew your name doesn't mean he was friendly, or even neutral towards you. Then again, I'm playing with a ST who loves his intrigues and plotting, and the whole game reflects that.

Fortuna
2011-02-25, 06:54 AM
No, but just because he knew my name meant he had way easier options for screwing me over. He didn't get the spear, because it wound up in the hands of a couple of dozen Immaculate Monks, so I can't even see a motive for this guy.

MickJay
2011-02-25, 07:03 AM
Too many "if's" here, I'm afraid :smallconfused: you should probably just ask your ST about what was really going on there, after this story is finished.

Mikal
2011-02-25, 09:13 AM
I'm going to go with "The ST didn't want to run".

Railroading in Exalted? Strike 1
No escape chance? Strike 2
Killing protagonist PCs with no fanfare or no chance for winning? Strike 3.

Urpriest
2011-02-25, 04:13 PM
If something like that happened to me, I'd assume it was a set-up, and either avoid the place, or at least scout the whole area three times prior to moving to the destination.

For Luna's sake, this isn't Shadowrun! :smalltongue:

MickJay
2011-02-26, 07:56 AM
To be fair, I am currently in a terrestrials game. This means, among other things, that if you want to organize a concert, you have to be prepared to protect your musicians from horrible death orchestrated by another bored dynast (who will benefit regardless of whether you succeed or fail). And if you want to send your men to spy on someone important, it's good to give them some snacks to share with all the other spies who are already there, and who are working for at least 3 different employers.

Is it paranoia if everyone really is out to get you? :smallbiggrin:

Indon
2011-02-26, 09:52 AM
Ask your ST what he was thinking. Maybe he just has different expectations from the game than you guys, and isn't telling you.

That said, he does sound pretty bad. Don't be afraid to find a new ST if it's not that.

nolispe
2011-02-26, 11:29 PM
Heh heh heh... Yeah, I was the ST. Sorry about that. Now, as a highly biased party, take everything I say with a few hundred grains of salt, but I might just clear up a few errors in the story:

- Yes, he knew your name. Completely within the mysterious quest giver's capacities, and you know that OOC.
- Yeah, sorry about the railroading. But I asked you guys to come up with a reason to be together, and you spent five minutes looking at me blankly. Yes, it was blatant. But I couldn't think of anything else on the spot, and I had a whole lot of blank stares waiting for the game to start.
- Yup, there was a blantant macguffin, and I had even made sure that it would be nowhere near as powerful in your hands as in the hands of others. Looking back on that, it's pretty bad. Sorry. Again, this adventure was in response to a specific request from the circle. Still, I should have come up with a better response than that - I will try to do better.
- When you split up, the party split was somewhat idiotic, but that's not the point. Needless to say, the other half of the party decided to attack a dragonblooded openly in a house full of his dragonblooded buddies. They also lead all of them to the cave, incidentally. When the signal didn't come through, you decided to brute force through an immaculate temple, knowing that there was extensive security in place. The plan, if I remember correctly, was to go right through the walls, hoping like hell that the immaculate dragonblooded monks that I had taken great pains to point out just wouldn't wake up. Yes, they woke up. Now, at this point I suspect my bias may come into play, so ignore the opinion bits in there.
- You where then attacked by the dragonblooded. Undergoing a rain of attacks, and explosive devices, drained your essence pool. No complaints at the time, as you said.
- You then led the dragonblooded to the cave, which you were supposed to lead the dragonblooded into later with the macguffin, which was then to be collapsed on them. You ran into the cave (which had no dragonblooded around it) and hid inb the shadows inside. Mysteriously, the stealth 0 character did not manage to hide perfectly from the monks who followed somewhat later. So, you ran. Through the dragonblooded, who, since you were nice enough to wait for them at the cave, now included the entire city's supply of angry dynasts. Yes, they caught you. Yes, you died. Sorry about them not taking prisioners - you only gave me a reason why thay should take the heavily armed anathema prisioner ten minutes after you died.
- For the rest of the circle, who ran into the cave that was supposed to trap dozens of dragonblooded perfectly, I wrote no less than two escape routes in for them. Then I left, so they will probably escape via one of them.
Sorry about the bias, but the story as relayed by the OP is just wrong on so many things. In summary, though, I will give you that I probably handled many things wrong. I'm open for suggestions.

Indon
2011-02-26, 11:47 PM
- For the rest of the circle, who ran into the cave that was supposed to trap dozens of dragonblooded perfectly, I wrote no less than two escape routes in for them. Then I left, so they will probably escape via one of them.
Sorry about the bias, but the story as relayed by the OP is just wrong on so many things. In summary, though, I will give you that I probably handled many things wrong. I'm open for suggestions.

Make sure your players know what kind of campaign you're running so they can be prepared both in and out of character.

Don't set your party up for challenges you know one or more members of the party are woefully unprepared for.

Presumably, you sent low-XP-total (I bet none were even Essence 5) Exalts on a stealth/espionage mission (because there was absolutely zero chance of them beating up on what was apparently one of the best-manned immaculate temples in the extant Realm, what with most immaculate monks being mortal, and most immaculate monks capable of supernatural martial arts _still_ being mortal, and the Exalted immaculates being stretched to their limit by the Wyld Hunt and frankly probably not sitting around guarding MacGuffins) when you knew that one or more of them were probably not fit to take part in such a campaign challenge - what did you expect to happen when you sent the "Stealth 0" character to go kidnap someone or steal something, success?

I mean, that sort of thing is okay in a _sandbox_ game, where players can pick their challenges and walk away from things they know they can't tackle. "Guys, I don't think we're powerful enough to capture the Imperial Manse today," sort of thing. But when you're pressuring players into challenges with similarly life-threatening consequences, the players don't have that option, which means if you don't pick the challenges you make carefully your players will all die, or have some other Bad Things happen to them.

Also, it's Exalted. "You were supposed to," is not a reliable approach. Exalts, by their nature both in and out of character, defy the plans gods and men plan for them, and that includes you (also, each other and sometimes themselves, but I digress).

When you devise challenges for your players, plan out multiple contingencies - take a gander at one of White Wolf's official modules to see a good way to do just that while still using fairly static material.

Reynard
2011-02-27, 05:14 AM
Railroading in Exalted is a futile task bound for flames and hatred all around, unless your players are spectacularly timid and unassertive.

Dropping a big, obvious impossible challenge just makes Exalts want to go and sort it out, weather it's by Heaven-Thunder-Hammering Peleps Deled through a Wyld Hunt, or a 5-dot manse in the middle of a city that's about to explode. You can't make Exalts run where you want to easily, as it's both their nature and the nature of the game to stand up and punch/fix these things.

Other things:

All bombs in exalted are one of two things:
> Environmental Effects, such as Total Annihilation or and exploding garda bird.
> Or single attacks.
Dropping a homebrew bomb that works like a ten-attack Extra Action charm is Not Okay for an ST pull. Such a thing would be High Artifact 5, and then there's not justification for it to be just sat as a trap in a tunnel.

Don't ignore the effects of Hearthstones and other things. Gem of Perfect mobility should have allowed for an easy escape. He's moving double speed, and he's a combat-specced Dawn. Unless all these DBs were Air Aspected and stacking as many speed-increasing Artifacts as possible (metagaming, ho!), they simply shouldn't have been able to catch him.