Quote from: Crabbyapples;851620

Quote from: Crabbyapples;851656If I never returned to the game, because of the first impression, they would have lost my purchase. One guy in my group who was part of the same playtest session will not revisit D&D 5e, as he considers his opinions already set. He said something like, "there are so many other great games out there, why go back and reconsider?".

Without the wide playtests, its entirely likely that the game would still be in a similar form to the one he hates, so secrecy doesn't solve the problem.

Another example for the playtest pile: the WH40K Only War playtest that FFG did (which, if I remember right, was their first experiment in open playtests for their RPGs). Not only is Only War surprisingly popular for a comparatively late entry in their WH40K line, but also its rule system is so robust that when FFG tried to go in a radically different direction for the Dark Heresy 2E playtest the overwhelming feedback was "Nah, don't do this, just apply the Only War update to Dark Heresy and then tweak a few things here and there and you're good", and to my eyes the resulting game is decent.

As controversial as the backpedalling on DH2E was, evidently FFG must see the playtests as successes because they've used a similar process for all their Star Wars games.

Count me with those that don't see the point in secrecy in development, but that's just me:).

Quote from: Orphan81;850276There's many reasons, and I'll try to go over some of them briefly.

What's up with you, people? Several posters in the last couple of weeks seem to be trying to make me buy 1e as well;)!

Quote from: AsenRG;851783Count me with those that don't see the point in secrecy in development, but that's just me:).



What's up with you, people? Several posters in the last couple of weeks seem to be trying to make me buy 1e as well;)!

1e, the Screen, Scavenger Lands, and the Player's Guide for the "Power Combat" rules update, all you need.

Something that has puzzled me about the Exalted community is how deeply invested many of writers and fans seem to be in having every level of mook and flunky be as dangerous as possible, down to the local wildlife for a game about playing beings out of myth, legend and pop culture fantasy anime and wuxia.

Its like how in Aberrant, tagline "What would you do with the power of God?" unless you built your character in very specific ways a meth head with a pistol stood a fair chance of taking your "god" out. Let alone police or other trained well equipped "baselines".

Quote from: Nexus;851951Something that has puzzled me about the Exalted community is how deeply invested many of writers and fans seem to be in having every level of mook and flunky be as dangerous as possible, down to the local wildlife for a game about playing beings out of myth, legend and pop culture fantasy anime and wuxia.

Its like how in Aberrant, tagline "What would you do with the power of God?" unless you built your character in very specific ways a meth head with a pistol stood a fair chance of taking your "god" out. Let alone police or other trained well equipped "baselines".

No different to the way all WoD games are written. Look at a starting nWoD character. Then look at the stat-line for a beat cop. Or a police dog.

Quote from: Kiero;851956No different to the way all WoD games are written. Look at a starting nWoD character. Then look at the stat-line for a beat cop. Or a police dog.

Yeah, the nWoD "nerf" went a bit overboard IMO. I'm OK with a SWAT operative or even a veteran beat cop being a threat, but a regular beat cop?

I've seriously considered just giving starting supernatural PCs 7/5/3 attributes, 13/9/5 skills and 7 merit points, like God and Mark Rein*Hagen meant it to be.

Quote from: Kiero;851956No different to the way all WoD games are written. Look at a starting nWoD character. Then look at the stat-line for a beat cop. Or a police dog.

Yeah, but its strange as Exalted (and Aberrant)'s alleged selling points are how powerful your PC is and how they're such a mover and shaker, a demi god (or god) especially compared to those "other" game were you just a peon.

Quote from: Nexus;851966Yeah, but its strange as Exalted (and Aberrant)'s alleged selling points are how powerful your PC is and how they're such a mover and shaker, a demi god (or god) especially compared to those "other" game were you just a peon.

It's almost that they don't know, or maybe don't trust their players on how to do superhero, fantasy or modern.

It's also why I'm worried about Aeon/Trinity.

Quote from: Nexus;851966Yeah, but its strange as Exalted (and Aberrant)'s alleged selling points are how powerful your PC is and how they're such a mover and shaker, a demi god (or god) especially compared to those "other" game were you just a peon.

I don't have a problem to much with multiple mortals being a threat for an Exalted... Well for a starting Exalted...

A trained Dragon Blooded was said to be a match for 10 men back in the 1st edition. A powerful Dragon Blooded should of course be a threat for even more, but being their Terrestrial Exalted, enough numbers should be able to overwhelm a single Dragon Blooded...

Luckily Dragon Blooded tend to travel in groups and form their own Circles, so you're not likely to get a 20 on one situation...

Now as for the Solars...
A new Starting Solar being threatened by 10 to 20 seasoned Mercenaries who are human? This I don't have a problem with...

However, Solars quickly outstrip the ability of normal mortals to be a threat. Even an army of mortal soldiers without significant magical assistance should no longer be a threat to a moderately powerful Solar.

But this is why things like the Gunshogan of Lookshy exist, as well as Beastmen, Fae, Elementals, and Hungry Ghosts exist... To give enough mooks to threaten Exalted in numbers once the humans just stop sort of existing as anything beyond the people who have to deal with the Gods fighting around them all the time.

Quote from: Christopher Brady;851976It's almost that they don't know, or maybe don't trust their players on how to do superhero, fantasy or modern.

It's also why I'm worried about Aeon/Trinity.

I really think that's a component of it particularly things like the Great Curse and role play directive built into the mechanics (Crafting, I'm looking at you...).

Back to the secrecy thing, some of the lengths are asinine or deliberately provocative like "redacting" the charm names. Really? What's that going to "give away" especially considering most of them are recycled from earlier editions anyway.

And fiddly die mechanics just feel so pointless

QuoteImagine my Twilight has the first Charm in the Power tree, [Redacted] [Redacted] Method, and the next two Charms in the tree, [Redacted] [Redacted] Focus, plus [Redacted]-[Redact]ing Prana, which is used to purchase their upgrades. We'll say my Twilight also has two Charms out of the Momentum tree to get the white Craft XP to pay for their use.*


Intelligence 5, Craft (gimmick) 5, full Excellency for 10 dice, 2 dice for a basic stunt description, 1 WP for a bonus success = 22 dice plus 1 success base. 10 more motes and 1 white Craft XP to reroll 10s and 6s and earn double successes on 7s, 8s, and 9s.


My 22 dice (via online die roller) turn up 13 successes, slightly better than average: 10 10 9 9 9 8 8 8 8 8 7 6 6 6 5 5 5 5 5 5 3 1.


I add nine more successes from all the 7s, 8s, and 9s I rolled. Then I get to reroll my 10s and 6s, for five more dice, producing: 8 7 4 2 2.


The 8 and 7 are doubled again, so four successes. The total is 26 successes – I subtract 5 for the difficulty of the roll, and 21 remain, 22 since I spent a WP for a success. I will need to roll three times to make an Artifact 50, well below the terminus. I'm likely to finish it and earn a bonus for doing so quickly – not bad for only investing 5 Charms in my Supernal!**

*Buying different Charms with [Redacted]-[Redacted]ing Prana will give the same result without spending white XP, so these two Momentum Charms aren't really necessary, but they're so useful most serious Craft experts will pick them up anyway.

**Per previous asterisk, this could be 3 Charms, easily. Of course, my actual character does not have Craft Supernal, so she's going to have to do this the hard way by actually reaching Essence 3!

Its a matter of different taste but I really don't see what's in fiddly dice games like that or grinding your way up the totem pole for the sake of acquiring more fiddly little rules exceptions to play with (that you're going to use every time you make a roll to build something since its not a major tactical choice). Just give me some simple abilities that add successes or straight dice and be done with it, IMO. If I do decide to use these rulkes (however unlikely) I know I will not be using the Crafts RAW or ever playing a Crafts character in a game that does.

I'm so burned out on the drama I'm done talking about it. Will I run/play it when it drops? Ya. Am I 100% happy with it? Naw. But that's most RPGs. But is it decent enough and fixes some issues with 2E. Yay.

Did they do this totally the wrong way? Yay. But I'll chock this one up to inexperience by the devs.

Quote from: Kiero;851956No different to the way all WoD games are written. Look at a starting nWoD character. Then look at the stat-line for a beat cop. Or a police dog.

I've heard the devs claim they weren't actually intending to have them come out like that but a lot of WW writers don't really play the game so they pull numbers out of their ass. Of course that sounds worse so I have no idea why they admited to that.

Yeah just use the nWoD 2nd edition retainer rules.  I make dog retainers two to three.  That is a range of four to six dice on things they are good at and two to three dice on things they are bad at.  A none combat mortal can easily handle the retainer two dog.  Hell with athletics that none combat character can be a human defense shield against retainer three attack dog.