[Exalted] Ok, Walk me through Alchemicals...

[TimeWizard]

I'm getting my hands on the book later today, and I'm planning to use that and Gunstar Autocthonia (plus a few sidereal charms here and there) to make on bad mutha Gunslinging AlchemCowboy. Think Roland Deschain + The Man With No Name, but you know, a Robot An Exalted Robot. Because this is the Best. Game. Ever. (So maybe Mega Man X meets John Marston).

I'm taking my first turn ever as a DM (sorry, "ST") and I thought I'd keep it simple by doing a Metal Gear Solid meets No More Heroes kinda game, where the PCs have 5 days to kill (or deal with nonlethally) 5 unusual bad***es. So in the spirit of How Awesome Can I Make Everything, I want to make an Alchemical Exalted who is also a cowboy, but I don't know the first thing about Alchemicals mechanic-wise. so:

What are some good charms?
What are some good Alkies-don't-get-charms-they-get-upgrades?
What should I avoid?
Etc...

Can't wait to see what you got, Playground!

[Lord Raziere]

……

pick whatever. Alchemicals is the most well-made charmset in Exalted, and Autocthonia is the best setting in Exalted, because the whole thing doesn't have anything to do with the rest of Creation. the whole thing is designed as a cohesive whole, and doesn't need to be balanced against six other splats.

in fact, don't even bother specializing. you'll probably end up with more charms than you will have slots for cause Alchemicals are about switching up the game, changing your charms around for different situations.

Alchemicals is basically the safest part of Exalted, game-wise.

[Andreaz]

Autocthonia is the best setting in Exalted, because the whole thing doesn't have anything to do with the rest of CreationCareful, mister. That statement is correct for all the wrong reasons, and none of them have to do with Creation itself, but with how the authors screwed up writing it. Good content with bad presentation + contradictions, you know?

[golentan]

Well, the beauty of Alchemicals is that their mechanics are modular. I'd suggest picking 2-3 specialties (+1 for every 150 experience or so the alchemical starts with) and buying up a whole bunch of charms in those fields. An alchemical is only about as good as a heroic mortal, except when they're loaded for their specialty.

Where alchemicals really shine, IMO, is in building things, but that doesn't sound like it's your guy's cup of tea. There are too many other specialties to mention, but it sounds like you're focused on the high powered wuxia action, so I'll give advice primarily for that.

For combat, there are a number of nasty tricks. Since you said Cowboy, I'm thinking gunslinger, so I'd recommend buying a Transcendent Multimodal Artifact Matrix and investing in an Essence Pulse Cannon from Ink Monkeys. Now the question is how do you want to employ it? The Fifth Augmentation + fourth augmentation can mean that an essence 5 alchemical could have a dexterity of 16 for the duration of a fight, which makes them nigh untouchable without effective teamwork or mighty magic on the part of their enemies (Dodge DV of 11 if they don't have any dots in Dodge), but mere superhuman speed can be a bit boring.

Toroidal Shockwave Catalyst + Shock and Awe Cannonade is fun for Artillery: Shoot the ground and watch as a massive explosion rips up the enemy. Recursive Fractal Targeting is fun for a rapid assault flurry. For perfect defenses, I've found the alchemical's "Pseudo Perfects" to be more effective than their actual PDs: Light Etched Interceptor Barrier with an Emergency Overcharger submodule, and Essence Shield Projector (with Layered Ablation Nodes preferably) both provide limited perfects relatively cheaply, and longer term defense bonuses.

Never underestimate the power of good movement: Almost anything from the Speed and Mobility tree will be useful to a combatant, whether for during the fight or trying to escape. And it's where most of the best flurry charms are as well. If you want the guy to be a recurring enemy, a Biofunction Inhibitor will make him appear to all senses to be dead, allowing him to play possum if the folks aren't familiar with the fact alchemicals melt when dead. Combine with Emotive Aesthetics of the Body Electric and he can make a social attack to leave him alone while unconscious.

Optical Shroud, Aura Dampening Component and Stormwall Interrupter Circuits are all good for a sneaky combatant, letting him attack from invisibility and return to the shadows quite effectively. Optical Enhancement gives him a wide range of options, from essence sight to infrared and a built in targeting reticule. Manifold Transhuman Implants give him access to useful combat mutations, and last but not least Auxiliary Essence Storage will expand his endurance in the fight.

So yeah. I have to second that Autochthonia is the best setting, and Alchemicals are at least one of the best splats. Have fun.

[Lord Raziere]

Careful, mister. That statement is correct for all the wrong reasons, and none of them have to do with Creation itself, but with how the authors screwed up writing it. Good content with bad presentation + contradictions, you know?

it is also the best setting, because it has magitech, robots, unusual elementals, and other such things that I am biased towards because of opinion and what I like. Does that sound like a better reason to you? :smallconfused:

[Andreaz]

Sure, it's as valid as any. Just don't go dropping inaccurate info to diss the setting!
If you're going to do it, do it with the right info :p

[Tengu_temp]

I don't think Alchemicals are mechanically well-done at all. They're extremely inconsistent - for example, charms are much cheaper than charm slots in BP, but actually more expensive in XP. In fact, the low XP cost of charm slots means that for more experienced Alchemicals it's often best to have all/most of your charms installed at once, rendering their modular versatility shtick pointless.

[golentan]

Uh, the cost of a charm + slot is supposed to be about equivalent to buying a charm for other exalts. The initial cheapness of charms in character creation allows people to purchase a wide variety of separate "specializations," and the choice when gaining experience is whether to buy up additional versatility (to within limits, because the real limit is the commitment cost of the charms) or expanding the power within those specializations by buying additional charms. It's initially cheaper to buy up the charm slots to expand your access to existing capabilities, but soon you run into the hard limit of your personal essence. You can push that a little by grouping your charms into arrays, but then you're codifying your loadouts, and you're forced into certain modular arrangements. Past that limit, until you boost your essence you're stuck with the modules you can fit at any one time, less if you can't afford to show your anima. You can buy additional charms and modules, and it's cheaper to do so than for any other exalt type, but you DO have to choose which to apply at any one time.

[Tengu_temp]

Which in the end translates to "Alchemicals have more or less as many charms as Solars, but can't use all of them at once". Considering that they were supposed to be more versatile than Solars in that department, I'd say it's not exactly working as intended.

[SiderealDreams]

Which in the end translates to "Alchemicals have more or less as many charms as Solars, but can't use all of them at once". Considering that they were supposed to be more versatile than Solars in that department, I'd say it's not exactly working as intended.

You really don't get how modularity works. Alchemicals can switch out their charms to adjust to whatever task is before them. A guy who is playing say...a Solar scholar with little combat skill can't just go...oh I'll spend one day and switch out all those Lore charms for combat stuff. A group of Alchemicals can run into a combat oriented issue, leave, get refitted and return as a group of all combat oriented killers. Modularity is working as intended.

[golentan]

Which in the end translates to "Alchemicals have more or less as many charms as Solars, but can't use all of them at once". Considering that they were supposed to be more versatile than Solars in that department, I'd say it's not exactly working as intended.

The typical alchemical will have more charms than the typical solar at the same experience, and can't use as many of them as once. This is exactly as intended, and the fact that you don't like it doesn't mean it's mechanically unsound or a bad idea.

As an example, we can crunch the numbers on 10 years after exaltation going by standard rules, and assuming the exalts haven't raised their essence yet (10 XP in that pool, 16 and 18 required for the solar and alchemical respectively). The alchemical has a personal essence pool of 16 if they maxed willpower, meaning they can install up to 21 charms if most of them are in arrays. They can have up to 37 charms purchased (10 background dots, 13 bonus points, 8 starting, and up to 6 more purchased by experience). They have to trade off between number of charms, and number of slots, and if they maxed their selection of charms during character creation they cannot have bought enough charm slots to install even 2/3rds of them, and even if they had THAT they wouldn't have the essence to manage anyway. Conversely, if the solar follows similar guidelines (max willpower, max charm purchases), he will have half the charms available to the alchemical at 19 (10 starting, 4 from bonus points, 5 from experience if an only if they limit themselves to caste and favored) but will have access to the full field at any given moment, something the alchemical would be pushing against his commitment ceiling to try and duplicate. Exactly as advertised.