Exalted mass combat!

[Random Encounter]

I'm playing in Hatter's Exalted game.
The game is set in the default timeline for the setting, 2nd age just as the Solar's are returning to Creation. Rather than the more plot driven games Hatter usually runs, this game is supposed to be more freeform. It was assumed going in that it would even be possible for us to take control of a nation and increase the scope of the game to dealing with other nations, raising armies and establishing trade etc. Think BIG was the idea.

Well, none of the players (myself included) have been very aggressive about moving us up to that level.
Some of us have been slowly building up our power, personal, political and through allies; while trying to stay inconspicuous. And some players are so used to reactive role play that when there isn't a big bad to stop or specific tracks to follow they don't know what to do with themselves.

Last session though Hatter through us a curve toward the end that really stirred things up.
We learned that a fair folk noble has agreed to lead his army in an attack on a farming community near the city most of the PCs reside in. The attack is to be the day before the major election that the more political members of our group have been involved in-which is in 3 days! :shock:

Now we have 3 choices:
1)Leave the farmers to thier fate, at most warning them to leave the area.
2)Let the local authorities (ie the Realm garrison) know about the attack so they can mobilize and fight the fair folk. They do have an army.
3)Raise our own forces to oppose the fair folk and save the day ourselves.

Almost all of us have a high compassion and if we were the kinds of people to just sit around on our asses we wouldn't have been exalted. And letting the Dragonblooded save the day would be against everything we have been working toward so far as getting the Realm out of the Lap (the town/country) is fundamental to all of our goals, mostly because they would want us dead.

So we have 3 days to put together a force that can fight off an army of fair folk. It's going to be interesting.

[Random Encounter]

This thread is mostly for folks who play or at least are familiar with Exalted.

I've been brainstorming with one of the other players in our group and we have a few ideas on getting an army together fast.
Most of our few allies we've made so far are too far away to get to the battle in time. The magic we have access to for traveling quickly won't transport mass numbers of people.

What we do have:
A dawn caste with 4 ranks in the War skill, and at least one War charm, to lead a unit of men.

Two other characters with resources 4 each who can afford to hire mercs.

One character embeded in the bureaucracy of the Lap (the Capital we are near) who may be able to arrange some of the Lap's own guards and soldiers.

One No moon Lunar with Death of Obsidian Butterflies.

An owl totem lunar archer. No war rating but can act as a sorcerer special character in a unit taking pot shots at enemy leaders.

A Twilight sorcerer with Summon Elemental. Given the time constraints may be able to summon 5-6 elementals before running out of willpower.

A Flame Duck ally with a charm allowing her to call to other Flame Ducks for help.

The Twilight runs a University where Thaumaturgy is trained. Unfortunately, the school is too far away to get even a small group of mortals trained in warding, enchantment and/or alchemy here in time for them to ply their arts, unless we find a way to get creative.

Our main difficulty, I think, is that only the dawn caste has any ranks in War. That will limit the number of units we can field with exalted leaders.
The other difficulties will be:
We have no idea what kind of force the fair folk are going to have. We assume just a large number of hobgoblins, but cataphractoi are likely, maybe more than one noble or even a behemoth!
The group that "hired" the fair folk to attack are, at the very least, affiliated with a demon worshipping cult. And the date indicates they have some stake in the election. Is the attack an election ploy to get the more hawkish candidate a seat? Is it supposed to highlight the Realm's reduced reach? Is it a diversion to get the legion out of the city so they can do some ritual or plot without tripping over dragonblooded? Is it some or all of these things? We don't know yet.
And finally, but not least, the solars and lunars will need to flare their anima in front of everyone. Unlike other places in Creation where the Realm is in control in name only the Lap is too important as a source of food to withdrawl the house legions from. Two of the solars have a lot to lose should they be discovered as anathema and forced from the Lap.

[Dr_Avalanche]

Well, if you're exposed as anathema, will you be strong enough to oppose the local dragonbloods, or is that a whole different magnitude of opponent? Unless you feel obligated to help anyway, that seems to be the springing question. Assuming there's something left of your army after the first battle, just turn it around and march toward the Lap...

Regardless if that seems like a bad idea or not, I think you have to assume that it will be difficult to hide your identities after a battle like this. Are the two Exalted that had something to lose in the Lap, ready to give up their positions there? If not, maybe they shouldn't get involved, at least not overtly?

[Hatter]

Well, if you're exposed as anathema, will you be strong enough to oppose the local dragonbloods, or is that a whole different magnitude of opponent? Unless you feel obligated to help anyway, that seems to be the springing question. Assuming there's something left of your army after the first battle, just turn it around and march toward the Lap...

Regardless if that seems like a bad idea or not, I think you have to assume that it will be difficult to hide your identities after a battle like this. Are the two Exalted that had something to lose in the Lap, ready to give up their positions there? If not, maybe they shouldn't get involved, at least not overtly?

The Lap is the Realm's most prized satrapy, it's grain feeds all the imperial legions and the city itself is a fortress from which the Realm could launch strikes against any other southern vassals that get uppity. So in short, no. The player characters are aware that the legion defending the Lap has substantial resources including a couple warstriders and some basic essence weaponry. But mostly an experienced sworn brotherhood of elder dragon-blooded and an unknown, but significant number of younger terrestrials looking to make a name for themselves in the Realm. While not impossible, it would be extraordinarily risky to take on that force with the circles current resources.

[Freedom Canadian]

You might also try to meet the fair folk leaders and see if you can fight in singular combat. If your offer is dramatic enough and it makes for a good story, they might be inclined to agree. :D

For that matter, see if you can find a way to make them betraying their alliance into this huge dramatic extravaganza. :)

Otherwise, I'd try to find more war commanders because without exalted unit leaders, you're pretty much fucked unless your one guy can fight the enemies by himself. Human troops led by a competent mortal commander (say, mercenaries) will probably not fare very well against even hobgoblins. (I'm assuming you'll have iron weapons.)

Also, you can't retrain troops from different sources into one large unit in a few days (unless there's a charm that does this), so you'll definitely need more than one commander. Can one of the other PCs insta-train War ?

Hey, does the Flame Duck have War ? She probably does. She could lead human troops.

Personally, I would arrange for the Realm to fight the faeries. You would gain intelligence about and might also weaken the Realm forces, which I assume would both be good for you in the long term. Plus it's why the gentle Laplander farmers have been paying taxes for. :lol:

[Ancalagon]

Flame duck?!?

[Freedom Canadian]

Flame duck?!?

It's a type of fire elemental. They are hot (ha !) soldier chick types.

[Ancalagon]

It's a type of fire elemental. They are hot (ha !) soldier chick types.

... I can't take exalted seriously after this...

[Freedom Canadian]

... I can't take exalted seriously after this...

You're so close minded ! :D

How about dinosaurs that pee heroin ?

[Hatter]

... I can't take exalted seriously after this...

Hey, they're nicer than the Fire Butterflies, an elemental that will use fire to disfigure anyone prettier than they are.

[Random Encounter]

You might also try to meet the fair folk leaders and see if you can fight in singular combat. If your offer is dramatic enough and it makes for a good story, they might be inclined to agree. :D

For that matter, see if you can find a way to make them betraying their alliance into this huge dramatic extravaganza. :)

Challenging the leader to a duel might work but if we don't field any kind of force then there's no reason for them to agree to a duel when they know they hold all the cards. And we don't know exactly what the Fair Folk noble agreed to. If he gave his word then he can't betray them since Fair Folk cannot break thier word.

Otherwise, I'd try to find more war commanders because without exalted unit leaders, you're pretty much fucked unless your one guy can fight the enemies by himself. Human troops led by a competent mortal commander (say, mercenaries) will probably not fare very well against even hobgoblins. (I'm assuming you'll have iron weapons.)

Also, you can't retrain troops from different sources into one large unit in a few days (unless there's a charm that does this), so you'll definitely need more than one commander. Can one of the other PCs insta-train War ?

Hey, does the Flame Duck have War ? She probably does. She could lead human troops.

Flame ducks have a 3 war with a 2 die speciality in Flame Duck Formation. So they aren't bad on the battle field but much better if their unit consists of other Flame Ducks.
I'm planning on summoning at least one Ifrit and they get War 4, good combat skills as well as the Charisma and perform abilities to make them very good unit commanders.
And Hatter has house ruled the "instant training" of favored/caste abilities to be you use the training time as if you were being mentored even when learning those abilities on your own so you do still need time to raise an ability.



Personally, I would arrange for the Realm to fight the faeries. You would gain intelligence about and might also weaken the Realm forces, which I assume would both be good for you in the long term. Plus it's why the gentle Laplander farmers have been paying taxes for. :lol:

While this is an option it is far from ideal for us. We want to convince the Lap that they don't need the Realm to defend them and to balk at said taxes. While it's theoretically possible we may be able to take over the Lap with force in the future it would be very far off. It's much more in our area of expertise to convince the Laplanders reject the Realm first and then we can save the day by aiding in their liberation rather than assault the place with an army and be seen as invaders.
That and I doubt the Fair Folk are bringing a large enough force to significantly weaken the Realm forces.

So militarily that plan is sound, politically it would be a big setback for our long term goals.

[Freedom Canadian]

And we don't know exactly what the Fair Folk noble agreed to. If he gave his word then he can't betray them since Fair Folk cannot break thier word.

Yeah, but that's pretty meaningless as they can use any number of semantic tricks to do what they want anyway. I'd quote the book if I had it with me.

At the very least, you could send those PCs with no war preparation to do to visit them to get more info.





Flame ducks have a 3 war with a 2 die speciality in Flame Duck Formation. So they aren't bad on the battle field but much better if their unit consists of other Flame Ducks.
I'm planning on summoning at least one Ifrit and they get War 4, good combat skills as well as the Charisma and perform abilities to make them very good unit commanders.

Good point. You can summon pretty much anything.

[Hatter]

Things are complicated. There's four different factions vying for political control over the Lap: the Realm, the Guild, the Solars and the Brotherhood of Harmony. The Solars are currently backing a guildsman that they think is probably the best choice of candidates. The Brotherhood has set up the Fair Folk attack for some reason and the Realm has yet to take a direct hand in the election. Things are pretty muddy for the PCs and I think I've set up a series of quandaries that will keep them guessing for a bit.

[Random Encounter]

And then he wonders why none of us have gone off to try finding artifacts, spells, followers etc. etc. :tongue:

[Hatter]

And then he wonders why none of us have gone off to try finding artifacts, spells, followers etc. etc. :tongue:

Hey you guys don't have to get involved.

[Hatter]

BTW, I was struck with inspiration last night so you should now be very worried.

[Name Lips]

The mass combat system I like is the one that works for all RPGs. That is to say, you ignore the battle entirely. The outcome depends on how well the PCs do particular objectives - perhaps they meet an enemy leader in single combat, or perhaps their job was to destroy the enemy supply trains. Or successfully deliver false intelligence to the enemy commanders. Or spy on the enemy and determine their plan. Or obtain Ye Olde Artifact Of Winning Ye Important Battles before the week has passed. Or causing an avalanche in the pass to cut off enemy reinforcements. Or melting a pass (depending on how uber these particular characters are) to allow friendly reinforcements through. Or finding the cure for the magical disease that's crippling the troops.

What I'd avoid is finding some mechanic to randomly determine the outcome of major battles. To me that's not what tabletop RPGs are about - they take the focus off the characters.

[Hatter]

Yes, but Exalted is about the great rulers of the world leading their glorious armies to victory over their enemies. It's hard to envision the characters not playing the primary role of leading the troops. If it always comes down to single combat with the opposing general then why are we even bringing an army?

[Random Encounter]

The mass combat system I like is the one that works for all RPGs. That is to say, you ignore the battle entirely. The outcome depends on how well the PCs do particular objectives - perhaps they meet an enemy leader in single combat, or perhaps their job was to destroy the enemy supply trains. Or successfully deliver false intelligence to the enemy commanders. Or spy on the enemy and determine their plan. Or obtain Ye Olde Artifact Of Winning Ye Important Battles before the week has passed. Or causing an avalanche in the pass to cut off enemy reinforcements. Or melting a pass (depending on how uber these particular characters are) to allow friendly reinforcements through. Or finding the cure for the magical disease that's crippling the troops.

What I'd avoid is finding some mechanic to randomly determine the outcome of major battles. To me that's not what tabletop RPGs are about - they take the focus off the characters.

Exalted 2ed has rules for mass combat because the characters are not only likely to fight an army at some point but also probably lead one. Certainly individual heroic characters will have an impact on the battle but the rules are designed around this.
We don't want to abstract it too much because then it makes it pointless for characters to take the charms that have to do with War and battle or to get/train crack troops.

The players still shine in this system with units abstracted to the point where the commander of the unit makes the attacks and such with the unit providing bonuses based on size, training and supernatural composition. It looks like a facinating system and I'm looking forward to seeing how it works out in actual use.

[Dacke]

The players still shine in this system with units abstracted to the point where the commander of the unit makes the attacks and such with the unit providing bonuses based on size, training and supernatural composition. It looks like a facinating system and I'm looking forward to seeing how it works out in actual use.
Yeah, I saw someone describe the Exalted mass combat system as "Generals pounding on one another with armies."

[Hatter]

Yeah, I saw someone describe the Exalted mass combat system as "Generals pounding on one another with armies."

Yes. Your army is essentially 'equipment' that you 'wear'. The idea is that the leader is leading from the front lines through his shining example. However, if you want to play the strategist type who doesn't go toe to toe, you can lead the unit while having a hero make the units attacks. Either way, the unit is still 'equipment'.

[Random Encounter]

We played yesterday and although most of the game time was spent getting ready for the battle we got a chance to get through a few rounds of mass combat.

We have:

A magnitude 3 unit of mortals under the direct command of our dawn caste.
A magnitude 3 unit of mortals under the command of Ali, a summoned ifrit friendly to our cause.
A magnitude 2 unit of archers with a heroic mortal commander.
A magnitude 2 unit of Flame ducks led by my character's flame duck ally.
And a magnitude 2 unit of garda with one of the garda commanding the others.
The rest of the circle has no ranks in the war skill and are acting as special characters in other units.
Our lunar archer is a sorceror special character making the ability rolls for the unit of archers.
Our eclipse martial artist is a hero character in the ifrit's unit.
Our lunar sorceress is acting as a solo unit using Death of Obsidian Butterflies and Emerald countermagic to good effect even without a leader.
Our twilight is acting as a non-combatant unit setting up a triage in town behind the front lines.

The fair folk brought:
A magnitude 3 unit of hobgoblins led by a fairy noble.
A magnitude 3 unit of mortal cultists led by a giant fairy noble with nasty stats.
A magnitude 2 unit of cataphractoi riding dinosaurs(sort of) led by a noble as well.
A magnitude 3 group of goblins I think.
At least one of their units has a sorcerer special character or leader as they have used shaping magic against us.

Going into the preperations for the fight our lunar sorceress was able to talk a couple of gods into providing aid. A goddess of the harvest we've dealt with before helped us by overgrowing areas of the battlefield so we could have cover and hopefully set up an ambush along the lone clear path left through the vegitation. And the god of snow for the south (not a particularly powerful position and mostly religated to moutaintops) granted a blessing to our troops to make them highly resistant to fire for the duration of the battle.

Our suprise attacks, the initial volley from DoOB and the garda exploding on the cataphractoi have been effective so far but next time we play the fair folk are going to attack us, which could cost us lots of troops just from failed moral checks when faced with a force led by a supernatural commander.

Interestingly enough, the sides seem more or less evenly matched and it will be up to our characters and good tactics to swing the tide of battle in our favor.

[Hatter]

A couple corrections.

The current (obvious) enemy forces consist of:

A magnitude 3 unit of hobgoblins led by a noble with a well-equipped glamour sorcerer as a special character.
A magnitude 3 unit of human ravagers led by a noble who is currently shaped into a giant.
A magnitude 2 unit of cataphractoi cavalry riding savage anklok (think magic dinosaurs).

Small in number but superior in quality to the forces the players have brought to bear. Especially the cavalry.

[Random Encounter]

Ok, we finished the mass combat battle last session.
We won with very little in the way of losses except a lot of our mortal soldiers failed moral checks and fled the battle early.

My take on Exalted mass combat is that it works but I wouldn't want to do it too often. Even for Exalted the numbers for attack and defense get way high and rolling for attacks, damage, exhaustion, and moral every round adds a lot more time to the already long normal combats.

I think that the next time we do anything with mass combat I'll want to have a seperate character sheet where I can write out the stats of the unit and add them in to the commander's stats so everything can be calclulated out ahead of time, with spots to write down the moral check dice pool, exhaustion dice pool, attack values for melee and ranged, etc.

I think that having the option for heroic characters to work within units led by characters with high War worked out very well in getting all the players invloved in the combat without crippling them, even though only one player character had any ranks in the War ability.

And while there are advantages to having one large unit (magnitude of the unit giving you a higher minimum damage and adding the difference in magnitude to attack and defense) we also had great success with breaking our mortal soldiers into two smaller units and attacking from two sides, forcing one of their units to suffer the zero defense penalty from a attacks from behind made a huge difference.

[Freedom Canadian]

I think that the next time we do anything with mass combat I'll want to have a seperate character sheet where I can write out the stats of the unit and add them in to the commander's stats so everything can be calclulated out ahead of time, with spots to write down the moral check dice pool, exhaustion dice pool, attack values for melee and ranged, etc.

Yeah, I made sheets like that. Very practical.

Even better would be to use an Excel spreadsheet on a laptop. (And that's when you know that a system is too complicated, especially for a system claiming to be storytelling based.)



(magnitude of the unit giving you a higher minimum damage and adding the difference in magnitude to attack and defense)

IIRC, when I ran mass combat (like, once), I simplified the system a bit by adding Magnitude to attack successes and defense instead. That way, you can add it to your unit character sheet and stop worrying about it.

[Freedom Canadian]

Oh, I also used Mass Combat rules to run fights between PCs (solo units) and large number of bad guys.

[Hatter]

Oh, I also used Mass Combat rules to run fights between PCs (solo units) and large number of bad guys.

I can't really do that since the players would get owned.

[Freedom Canadian]

I can't really do that since the players would get owned.

It's what convinced one of the players to raise his War score above 2. He had been a Realm unit commander for over 10 years of game time at the time so it made sense. :)

You could always just house rule that solo units don't need War to be effective though. It makes a kind of sense (especially when the ST is only using the mass combat rules to speed fights up and you are not really in a war at all).

[Hatter]

It's what convinced one of the players to raise his War score above 2. He had been a Realm unit commander for over 10 years of game time at the time so it made sense. :)

You could always just house rule that solo units don't need War to be effective though. It makes a kind of sense (especially when the ST is only using the mass combat rules to speed fights up and you are not really in a war at all).

Frankly, they don't have any good combatants.

[Freedom Canadian]

Frankly, they don't have any good combatants.

Oh. :)

[Random Encounter]

The two of us that are usually good at rules, tactics and generally coherent character design; are playing super-bureaucrat and mega-teacher.

[Hatter]

The two of us that are usually good at rules, tactics and generally coherent character design; are playing super-bureaucrat and mega-teacher.

Truly, I miss having the tactical challenge of Dr_A's builds.

[Random Encounter]

Truly, I miss having the tactical challenge of Dr_A's builds.

I could have built a combat monkey, I just figured Mega-teacher sorcerer guy would be better in a nation building/creation shaping kind of game.

[Dr_Avalanche]

Truly, I miss having the tactical challenge of Dr_A's builds.

:D

I've found it's become much harder to become near-impossible to touch with the 2nd edition rules. I'm playing a(nother) Zenith caste in our Exalted game, and even though I partly have myself to blame for making an archer, I feel like a complete wimp. And I succumb to my own assumption every time that just because *I* am a ranged fighter, that our enemy melee fighters are going to be nice and pair up with our melee fighters, but no, they have to go and stick pointy things in me like I was some kind of pin cushion.

[Hatter]

:D

I've found it's become much harder to become near-impossible to touch with the 2nd edition rules. I'm playing a(nother) Zenith caste in our Exalted game, and even though I partly have myself to blame for making an archer, I feel like a complete wimp. And I succumb to my own assumption every time that just because *I* am a ranged fighter, that our enemy melee fighters are going to be nice and pair up with our melee fighters, but no, they have to go and stick pointy things in me like I was some kind of pin cushion.

Defense is still strongest in 2e, so you can't go wrong with the Melee tree for getting the most bang for your buck. Now that HGD doesn't cost willpower, you take the parry tree down to that and pick up Hungry Tiger and Fire and Stones Strike and you have the makings of a starting character combo of doom. Especially since I made the following addition to the Dawn anima power:

5m, 1WP - until your next action you may combine charms from the Archery, Dodge, Martial Arts, Melee, Resistance or Thrown abilities as though the charms were in a valid combo. The charm must be able to be used together in a combo. At the 11+ mote anima level, the 5m cost is waived.

[Dr_Avalanche]

Well, I'm gonna have to pick up something defensive soon. It's getting tiresome bleeding all the freakin' time. The only upside is that it's not going to be a big deal if his abyssal sister need a blood donor.

Otherwise I feel like I'm playing a conglomerate of the characters I played in your old games. I'm a Zenith (like Ojima), with awesome Charisma (like the Emissary) and Manipulation (like Senkura). Despite being a woodsman from the beginning, he routinely has a sorcerer, a princess and a roguish nobleman (all player characters...) following him as if he was the authority. It's pretty funny - I say what I think we should do, end my sentences with "if that pleases your lordships", and they all nod and agree with my plans. Sometimes when I suggest something outrageous (as I think) I even ask "should I make a Charisma-Presence roll?" but the other players just respond "no, we trust you." I would be terrifying if I was really evil. :lol: