A Window, A Light...

Still on a kick, it looks like. I'm sorely tempted to stat out the cast of Street Fighter and SNK in terms of Exalted. Ryu would be a Dawn Caste Solar, Chun-Li seems like she might be a Sidereal of some kind, considering she masquerades as a lot of different roles. Akuma is an Infernal, probably a, well, akuma. Iori would be an Abyssal, Blanka would be a Lunar. I haven't given it a lot of thought, though.

Autobot stuff later tonight an the Edit.  

The Edit!


My emotion is still accurate - pretty cheerful, considering. I've been there way too long. Might have been nice to have left on good terms, but actually, I don't think anyone leaves on good terms. So. It's more important that I did everything correctly.

I did some reading on Alchemical Exalts, and like I said, they're one of the more difficult factions. Every other group has a really granular power-set, an entire tree of powers that stems from a single ability. So, on your brightly colored fantasy super could have a set of powers just based around Melee, Dodge, or Archery. Even better, Linguistics, Occult, Academics, Sail, and all the rest have their own powers, too. These are your main abilities, puchaseable based off your Skill ranks and your Essence (powerstat) level, but Alchemicals are totally different.

While they've still got the kind of LEGO building block Power thing going on, their abilities stem from Attribute scores and are grouped by theme rather then by skills. This is the conceptual bases for why things might get complicated, but most other Exalt types get bonuses in the form of dice-adders, or Charms that add dice to your abilities in certain circumstances, or perfect effects that just work unless certain special conditions are met. Alchemicals don't have those abilities, but they're the abilities that more potent Exalts are made of.

Instead, they're machine-peeps. That means that, first of all, you can swap out Charms because they're not learned, they're actually machines socketed onto your clay-and-metal bodies. Second of all, they act like machines, so they tend to replicate special abilities that you can't expect to scale up with your own powerlevel, accept to feed them more energy. It's more like, instead of "Add X dice up to double your Skill+Attribute." it's "Does X dice per mote of essence spent, using your roll of Skill+Ability", where another module will give you, "Aims, giving you bonus dice dending on essence spent", so you're using your batterys to power your skillz.

Alchemicals also tend to have a lot of layered effects, so instead of just being a supereffective swords-person, you're probably only going to be as technically skilled as (the very best of) mortal warriors. OTOH, your focus on Attributes makes you stronger then just about anything, and you're still walking into battle with an electrified artifact sword with a cloud of toxic smoke wreathing you, along with a laser crossbow and rocket boots.

Because of the wonkiness of the Alchemicals, it took me a while to figure out if you wanted a generic warrior, what kind of abilities were must-haves. You know the type - you need to be able to defend yourself, and some attacks are going to be staples of combat, and I think I've got an idea. Non-combat is more nebulous, and the metal ladies and gentlemen get some real solid medicine charms and what have you. It's surprising that I've had the book for so long but never really looked at the powers. I was really stuck on the setting, and when we played, we tended to play Solars anyhow.

Some misc thoughts on what's otherwise a really gorgeous day. Seriously. 


The thing that really gets me, though, is some of the drama in my life recently. I don't normally talk about stuff like that, since it basically invites drama onto my journal; something I've been very wary about since I was in high school, but it's really more of a leadup into something that I see as a bigger problem in society in general. Besides the typical workplace shit I've come to expect, I hear a lot of secondhand stuff that seems to indicate that women in vulnerable positions tend to end up staying vulnerable because it's hard for them to find someone to trust. 

This isn't your typical 'why don't girls like nice guys' screed (which is a massive pet peeve of mine, and something I've gone out of my way to lay into people I don't even know for, which is pretty unusual for me) but rather that the people who lament about girls not liking nice guys tend to be pretty rotten individuals in the first place, and a lot of people who masquerade as friends are really just looking for something. As a guy, I think it's a lot easier for me to find real, supportive friends amoung both sexes because I don't have to be as worried that someone's trying to take advantage of my emotional state. From what I've seen, though, I think a women would be much better off to limit herself to either supportive female friends, or male friends whose intentions she knows. I've just seen too many women I've known fall into a vulnerable position and suddenly feel like they're surrounded by a pack of hungry wolves. 

This is especially touchy because just like Mr. "Why Don't Girls Like Nice Guys", Mr. "So, I Hear You're Not Dating Anyone" or Mr. "You've Had Sex In The Past, So I Assume You Put Out" don't really realize that what they're doing is disingenuous and predatory. In many ways, they're just following the social cues they're told to expect and don't see anything wrong with their actions. Being turned down makes the women the bad 'guy' in the scenerio, because she's being unreasonable, unfair, or close-minded. I feel that this is basically the patriarchy at work, a social construction designed to make women feel worse about themselves and put them in a disadvantaged situation. To society, women are prey. If you're up, it'll try to knock you down. If you're down, it'll keep kicking you. Seeing people I've known and otherwise like and respect from high school to post-college engage in this behavior is dissipointing to say the least.