Need advice for new exalted campaign

[dayolen]

Hello all, i find myself running a new group of exalted players, they have very limited experience with RPGs in general outside of video games and the only real table top games they have played is 5e D&D.

They have asked that they game be very lore intensive, as in the want to experience creation in its broken glory. My idea was to play a game in Nexus based around the great contagion. Not so much just in Nexus and the surrounding area but that will be their base of operations. I am not sure if it will be the actual returning contagion, a bastardization from the Mask of Winters or some other Deathlord.

I am asking for any input from everyone for any fun little encounters that maybe you have been through or any ideas for things my players should do or go through.

Thank you all for your input.

[JeenLeen]

This is a different route, but in the one Exalted game I was in, the DM took some free scenarios that the company had posted and merged them together. The first might have been home-made, but it was pretty simple: a sorcerer (god-blooded, maybe, not exalt) with summoned-demon guards was using a ghost ally to possess villagers in a nearby village and make them walk to his cave for ritual sacrifice. Undead hordes kept the village isolated. Exalts wind up there and solve the issue.
Then find some notes that he was trying to open a portal to the underworld via his ritual.

Next up: the Daughter of Nexus (https://www.drivethrurpg.com/product/56333/Daughter-of-Nexus-Exalted). Which I thought was free, but I guess isn't?
Edited or tied up that an abyssal wanted the Daughter in order to do a rite to help turn Nexus into a shadowlands.

He then followed up with some other pre-made adventures, editing it to make a consistent plot and some Abyssals that were behind everything. Basically a running plot of a Deathlord wanting to make a big shadowland like <whoever turned that one city into a shadowland and rules it>, and succeeding if not for the PCs intervention.

[Lord Raziere]

What edition?

This is incredibly important and will greatly affect the advice more than anything else.

[dayolen]

2nd edition, i typed this post last night but it never posted, it timed out and i forgot to re-add that part

[JeenLeen]

Some general advice I'll give for a new system: have the first scenario be a learning experience where the long-term repercussions are minor. Even if it's just the first game. Also, let players re-spec their characters at least some if they find out something that seemed cool wasn't.
Also, as coming from D&D/video games, discuss how much finding a bad guy is "should kill them as default" vs. things with more realism or legal implications. Let them know, for example, potential consequences of investigation if they kill a random Dragon-Blooded they get in an argument with. This isn't as big a deal in Exalted as, say, modern games like old or new World of Darkness*, but still something to talk about to make sure expectations are common amongst the group.

*my group had a big learning curve when we met the implications of killing gangsters who tried to mug us outside a library

2nd Edition advice: we played without errata. If you use errata, a few critical things change, especially the Twilight caste power and how Combos work.
I think you can find Scroll of Errata for free legally.

[Grod_The_Giant]

I'm a lot more familiar with 3rd edition, but both of these pieces of advice should help:

Start simple-- maybe as heroic mortals, or with just Excellencies. Exalted is a complicated enough system even before you add piles of charms.
Stay out of the Scavenger Lands. I don't really remember how 2e presented things, but "big skeezy cities full of commerce and corruption" like Nexus are a dime a dozen in fantasy. The farther you get from the center of Creation, the cooler the places-- compare Lookshy to somewhere like Gethamane or the Skullstone Archipelago. Really dig into the grandiose weirdness of the setting.

[Lord Raziere]

Oh no, you got 2e. My condolences.



2nd Edition advice: we played without errata. If you use errata, a few critical things change, especially the Twilight caste power and how Combos work.
I think you can find Scroll of Errata for free legally.

This, so much this. 2e is a thoroughly broken machine of an edition. between chungian combat, willpower-based social combat, rocket tag attacks, 2e is something thats very breakable and stupid without meaning to. it is a far cry from Dnd 5e's or Exalted 3e's much more well-designed systems. errata can help but....you have learn the errata and that takes more time. it is possible to play, but there is a reason its considered the worst edition of Exalted, and I wouldn't recommend it as a system to introduce people to Exalted. like five years back when 3e was announced the fandom and dev consensus on 2e was that its mechanics were garbage and some of its fluff was to and that it was in dire need of a new edition.

not to say you can't have fun with it, but it was pretty universally agreed that everyone would rather have a system that actually worked. I'm warning you that you better be prepared for this system to go bad.

[lightningcat]

If you have an optimizer in your group, just ask them to not do so. They will do plenty of it by accident already and become plenty powerful as is. This will fix 70% of the problems with the system.

Avoid PC Siderials. At all costs. They just don't work. I think they Fey might actually work better than Siddies, and they are broken AF too. They can both work as antagonists, or mysterious benefactors, but not PCs.

Make sure each PC has a workable motivation, and that the party has a reason to stay together. There is nothing wrong with party conflict, as long as they aren't going to kill each other over it, and will work towards a common goal. While motivations are built in story hooks, you should use them.

[dayolen]

I've played exalted myself several times and am aware of chungian defense and optimizers, I've had fellow players optimize to the point that the rest of the party quit because the storyteller was having to throw things at us that could kill the rest of us in one hit just to compete with him.

I have limited the players to solars, and all characters are subject to my review to ensure nothing broken.

My problem mostly is i have never had to play with people so new and limited, but I've seen some really good ideas on here so far. I know second edition is broken and i did some looking last night on third and I'll probably be updating in the next few months. I'll probably be back then for advice on the best way to update editions mid game at that time.