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Revised Mutations (Complete, with Genesis)

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Revlid		Thursday, January 26, 2012 2:54:39 AM(UTC) #1
		EDIT: Now in Google Document form. A WORLD THAT HATES AND FEARS THEM (what are mutations?) Mutations are the mechanic used to model the inhuman abilities of characters in Exalted, ranging from natural traits (such as a cat’s fur or a raiton’s wings) to bizarre deformities inflicted by Sorcery or the Wyld. SPECIES, GENUS, FAMILY, ORDER (what kinds of mutations are there?) There are three kinds of mutations: physical, mental and spiritual. Physical mutations are the most common, being used to model the strange bodily traits of a creature, such as a tail, extra arms, acid spit, wings, or blindness. They are the easiest to apply and remove; any existing mechanics that simply refer to “mutations”, without specifying, are considered to refer solely to physical mutations. Mental mutations are used to describe the strange mental traits of a creature, such as an enhanced memory, intuition, lucid dreaming, telepathic communication, or a lack of free will. Notably, they are also used to model the various insanities that afflict the mind, such as addictions, delusions, obsessions, phobias, or hallucinations. Spiritual mutations are used to detail the strange supernatural traits of a creature, such as spirit-vision, enlightened Essence, an aspected soul, nativity to a given realm, or even its material state. These are the only mutations that ever require enlightenment, and are the rarest. I AM NOT AN ELEPHANT (what do mutations look like?) Mutations are inherent properties of the body, part of a creature’s biology. They are not internal; unless specifically stated, each mutation (even mental or spiritual ones) is physically apparent, in one way or another. This appearance is entirely customisable, however. The appearance and nature of a mutation can be almost anything; enhanced sight can express itself through glowing irises, overlarge eyes, slit pupils, coloured sclera, eyestalks, an inner eyelid, telescopic lenses, compound eyes, or anything else that the creature’s player and Storyteller judge appropriate. Similarly, flight might be expressed through feathered, leathery, or insectile wings, or an inflatable air-sack, or natural propellers, or a partially gaseous body, or an organic, muscular jetpack. What matters is that the creature can fly, not how this expresses itself. The difficulty to hide or disguise a mutation is generally equal to its cost in mutation points, and the pool to detect them is generally (Perception + Medicine), though Occult may also be used to detect mutations granted by specific supernatural beings, and Larceny or Awareness can be used to see through a disguise as normal. YOU ARE SO BEAUTIFUL TO ME (what are appropriate mutations?) The most common source of mutations in Creation is not mad science or rampant anathema; it is geography. Natural life is brought about by a balance of Essence, so introducing living beings to higher concentrations of a single aspect of Essence can induce mutations, as their body and soul adjust to the new conditions. Such concentrations of Essence can be found around demesnes, or within the marches of the Elemental Poles; currently, mechanics for it can be found in Exalted, pp. 283. This is how evolution occurs in Creation, permitted by the motes of colourless chaos sprinkled onto Creation’s night by the Silver Chair. Such sources of mutation often include the phrase “appropriate mutations”. This phrase refers to mutations that would mechanically aid a creature’s survival in that environment (such as water-breathing in the West, or disease resistance in Metagaos) or that fit with the aesthetics and themes of that environment (such as red hair in the South, or a sickly complexion in a shadowland). Ignore any references to mutations making a character less “real”. MOTHERS ONLY HAVE TWO HANDS (how much do mutations cost?) Mutations have their power and breadth measured in points, from a minimum of one to a maximum of six. Permanent mutations cost two experience per point, or two bonus points for three points. Removing a permanent mutation refunds this experience, in the same way as if a character lost a background they had paid xp for. Temporary mutations do not cost experience, but (unless otherwise specified) no character can bear more than (Willpower + Essence) points of temporary positive mutations at once. Where other texts refer to poxes, afflictions, blights and abominations, they are referring to one, two, four and six-point mutations, respectively. SURVIVAL OF THE FITTEST (how powerful are mutations?) Each mutation point is intended to be approximately as powerful as a single Specialty dot. Indeed, many outright mimic specialties, by offering a dice bonus equal to their cost to a single, specific area. The fact that each mutation point costs 1xp less than a single Specialty dot is balanced out by their inherent limitations (a mutation is unlikely to directly benefit a character’s swordplay or map-reading, for example), reduced malleability, and physically-apparent nature. Just as with Specialties, Storytellers are encouraged to use mutations as story-hooks; if a mutant has no sense of taste, an assassin attempting to poison them will be a greater threat. The mutations presented here, despite being heavily customisable, are not a comprehensive list. If a player or Storyteller requires an effect that can’t be produced through these mutations, they are encouraged to create their own, using the existing mutations to cost their creation accordingly. TIGHTLY COUPLED DANCE (how do mutations interact with other effects?) Dice added by mutations do not count as dice added by Charms. However, dice added by mutations count toward the maximum number of dice (normally three) that can be added to a pool by specialties. Dots in other traits (such as Attributes) added by mutations do not increase that trait’s actual rating; the unmutated rating still determines dice caps, experience point costs, minimum Charm requirements, etc. As with all effects in Exalted, multipliers from mutations stack additively. The Exalted cannot gain additional health levels through mutations. If a Charm or Sorcery would provoke a roll-off against a mutation, the Charm-user gains (Essence) additional dice. The Exaltations bond with humans, regardless of how altered they may be (though they seem to prefer baseline humans over mutants or altered races). Exalted Charms, therefore, assume their user has a human body-type. Due to this, an octopus-man Solar cannot create a Charm that specifically exploits his tentacles, though he could use normal Charms to enhance his actions with them as though they were regular limbs. To put it another way; Thunderclap Rush Attack can enhance a spiny tendril-strike just as well as a human fist, but “Spined Tendril Method” is not a valid Solar Charm. Lunar (and to an extent, Abyssal) Charms can cheat their way around this limitation, thanks to the ease with which their native Charms permit them to take on an inhuman form, while Primordial Charms tend to ignore it entirely. The Second Breath can remove any number of mutations, positive or negative; a player who wishes to have their Exalt come from a tribe of rotting mutants can do so without needing to give her the Failing Body mutation like her family, while one who wished to come from an artificial race with less need for food would not need to take (and pay for) the Small Appetite mutation like the rest of his race. Natural negative mutations can be bought off with experience even after character creation. Infernal, Abyssal, and high-Breeding Terrestrial Exaltations can also add minor appropriate mutations as Natural traits, as the Green Sun Prince takes on a mark or two from his coadjutor, the Abyssal acquires some deathly deformities, or the Terrestrial's elemental blood shows through. REFER TO APPENDIX (what about useless mutations?) Cosmetic mutations, such as altered hair colours or vestigial fingers, are detailed below (under physical “Mien” mutations). They do not cost any mutation points, and therefore do not cost experience; only mechanically-relevant mutations ever cost anything. This applies to all mutations that do nothing. If a mutation would provide an unstackable ability that the character already has, such as if an Abyssal with the permanent version of Restless as the Dead acquired the Sleepless mutation, or a character with no natural soak acquired the Weak Skin mutation, then it costs nothing. Similarly, if a negative mutation would further reduce a dice pool or trait that is already at zero, it is treated as a cosmetic mutation until that trait or dice pool increases such that it would be relevant. AN UPWARD PROCESS (how can mutations be removed?) There are a number of supernatural powers (ranging from Thaumaturgy to Charms) that allow the removal of mutations. Most of these rely on that mutation’s keyword; the majority of applied mutations are Shaping effects, and can therefore be removed by effects like Order-Affirming Blow or Ego-Infused Pattern Primacy. A few, however, are applied through different means; the infectious mutations of the Rat-Eating Liver Boy are Sickness effects, for example, and must be removed as such. Some mental mutations are applied as though they were mental influence, and can be defended against or removed appropriately. TREE OF LIFE (how are mutations presented?) All mutations are presented using the format below. *Mutation Name* *Cost: This is the mutation’s cost in mutation points; a mutation worth three points would have a listed Cost of 3pts. Sometimes, multiple costs will be included, with the varying effects detailed in the mutation’s text. Keywords: This details the keywords relevant to the mutation’s effects (Exalted, pp. 183). Along with normal keywords such as Shaping or Sickness, there are a number of keywords exclusive to mutations, detailed below: Physical/Mental/Spiritual: This is a physical/mental/spiritual mutation. A mutation possessing more than one of these keywords can fit into either category. Appendage: This mutation takes the form of an external limb or organ of some kind. It can be disabled or amputated by Crippling effects in the same manner as any other limb, and doing so deprives the creature of its effects until it is healed. If a creature has multiple Appendage mutations, its player may choose to consolidate them (upon acquisition) into a single extra limb or organ. Derangement: This mutation simulates madness in some way, whether a slight emotional imbalance or outright gibbering insanity. Derangements are always Negative and Mental mutations, and might be applied to particularly traumatized mortals as Natural mutations. While these mutations use the names of real-world conditions, they are not intended to simulate them in anything but the broadest sense. Devolve (Mutation): This mutation is a Negative mutation. If it is taken alongside the mutation listed in brackets, it has none of its listed effects, and is not applied at all; instead, it simply serves to remove the listed mutation (or, if it has a scalable rating, as with most Adaptation mutations, reduce its rating by a number of points equal to its cost), refunding xp as normal. This applies even if the Devolve mutation came first. Internal: This mutation is not expressed in the character’s appearance. It cannot be detected without an in-depth medical analysis or appropriate magic. Natural: This mutation is an inherent part of the character’s natural form. It is not treated as a mutation for the purposes of other effects (such as those which remove mutations); striking one of the djala with Order-Affirming Blow will not cause them to grow in size, any more than it would cause a cat to lose its tail. This keyword automatically applies to any mutation that a character is born with. It can also refer to mutations that are not really mutations; derangements caused by trauma rather than the Wyld, or ambidexterity earned through practice rather than demesne-radiation. Negative: This mutation applies a penalty of some sort to the character, rather than a bonus. As such, if it is a permanent mutation, it does not cost experience points; instead, it provides the character with a number of “free” mutation points equal to its own cost, which it can spend on positive mutations. Unless otherwise stated, negative mutations cannot be directly converted to experience points in the manner that removed positive mutations can. Where other texts refer to deficiencies, debilities and deformities, they are referring to one, two and four-point negative mutations, respectively. Requires (Mutation): This mutation requires the mutation listed in the brackets as a prerequisite. Stackable: When used on a mutation, this keyword indicates that it can be taken as multiple times; all other mutations can only be taken once per creature, with a scaling point cost. If the mutation in question has variants (such as Fast [Movement], which can affect different kinds of movement) then the Stackable keyword only permits the creature to have more than one of its variants, rather than stacking the same variant multiple times. Thereafter follows a description of the mutation’s mechanical effects, and some suggestions as to how it might manifest itself. DEOXY-RIBO-SOMETHING (what is the “M” value?)* A number of mutations use a value based off their own cost in mutation points. This is labelled “M”. So for a Natural Weapon that cost two mutation points, M would be two. The same applies to negative mutations; for Hallucinations worth three negative mutation points, M would be three. FOR REFERENCE: NATURAL ATTACKS Natural attacks are the “weapons” that are part of a character’s body; their fists, claws, feet, tentacles, etc. They are signified by the N tag, and function as detailed in Exalted (pp.373); a character cannot be disarmed of their natural attacks, they use Martial Arts (or Brawl), and can only be used to parry bashing attacks without using a stunt. By default, every character has the following natural attacks: Light Attack: Speed 5, Accuracy +1, Damage +0B, Defense +2, Rate 3, Tags N Heavy Attack: Speed 5, Accuracy +0, Damage +3B, Defense -2, Rate 2, Tags N Clinch Attack: Speed 6, Accuracy +0, Damage +0B, Defense —, Rate 1, Tags C, N, P MUTATIONS INDEX Below are listed a variety of mutations for use by players and Storytellers. They are divided into physical, mental and spiritual mutations, and further subdivided into thematic categories such as “Toughness” or “Community”; these latter categories are purely for ease of navigation, and have no mechanical impact. PHYSICAL MUTATIONS Physical mutations are split up into the following categories. Adaptation mutations refer to those oddities that directly mimic a specialty. Attack mutations refer to those oddities that enhance a creature’s natural attacks. Healing mutations refer to those oddities that change a creature’s regeneration and immune system. Hunger mutations refer to those oddities that affect a creature’s diet or breathing. Life mutations refer to those oddities that evolve a creature’s basic functions. Limb mutations refer to those oddities that alter the way a creature’s limbs work. Mien mutations refer to those oddities that adjust a creature’s appearance. Movement mutations refer to those oddities that vary the way a creature moves. Sensory mutations refer to those oddities that transform the way a creature perceives things. Size mutations refer to those oddities that increase or reduce a creature’s size. Toughness mutations refer to those oddities that adapt a creature’s ability to resist damage. Tropism mutations refer to those oddities that tamper with a creature’s other mutations. W.H. Auden wrote: To present the conflict between Good and Evil as a war in which the good side is ultimately victorious is a ticklish business. Our historical experience tells us that physical power and, to a large extent, mental power are morally neutral and effectively real: wars are won by the stronger side, just or unjust.
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Revlid		Thursday, January 26, 2012 2:55:36 AM(UTC) #2
		ADAPTATION MUTATIONS A single mutation point is approximately as powerful as a single specialty. Rather than list countless mutations that take this approximation literally, we will provide you with a template for such mutations, and some examples. Note that the upper limit for such mutations is three, just as with specialties. (Insert Mutation Name Here) Cost: 1-3pts; Keywords: Physical The creature adds (M) dice to any roll based on (area of activity no broader than a specialty). Such mutations must be appropriately representable as a physical trait; a mutation is unlikely to add dice to a Melee rolls using a slashing sword, for example, or Lore rolls on the rules of Gateway. Examples of how this template might be used follow: Enhanced (Sense) Cost: 1-3pts; Keywords: Physical, Stackable The creature adds (M) dice to any roll based on the chosen sense, be it smell, sight, hearing, or taste. Perhaps it has eyestalks or feline pupils, a canine snout or quadruple-nostrils, oversized ears or sound-sensitive cheekpads, a forked tongue or taste-buds on its lips. (Substance) Detection Cost: 1-3pts; Keywords: Physical, Stackable The creature adds (M) dice to any roll that would allow it to detect the chosen substance, be it blood, flowers, drugs, or laser-pointers. (Environment) Camouflage Cost: 1-3pts; Keywords: Physical, Stackable The creature adds (M) dice to any roll to conceal itself in the chosen environment, whether through a patterned hide, floral mimicry, or simply being the appropriate colour. Improved Immune System Cost: 1-3pts; Keywords: Physical The creature adds (M) dice to any roll to resist disease. This mutation might manifests itself through a fierce complexion, pockmarked skin, or thick, obvious veins. (Element) Resistance Cost: 1-3pts; Keywords: Physical, Stackable The creature adds (M) dice to rolls to resist the effects of environmental hazards or other natural deleterious effects stemming from the chosen element or substance, whether fire, air, acid, earth, electricity, or showers of frogs. Steady Cost: 1-3pts; Keywords: Physical The creature is less easy to knock over; it might have wide feet, a balancing tail, internal gyroscopes, multiple legs, or grips on its heels. In any case, it adds (M) dice to any roll to resist knockback (including knockdown) or ignore unstable footing. (Environment) Native Cost: 1-3pts; Keywords: Physical, Stackable The creature adds (M) dice to any roll to navigate, forage or find shelter in the chosen environment, be it the desert, the ocean, the jungle, or frozen wastelands, mountains, or the Silver Forest. Negative mutations can be generated in a similar fashion. However, the nature of specialty penalties as opposed to bonuses (the latter must be sought out, the former simply avoided), means that the upper limit of such Adaptations is only two, while the penalties they apply are doubled. Examples might include: (Environment) Stranger Cost: 1-2pts; Keywords: Physical, Devolve (Inhabitant of [Environment]), Stackable The creature suffers an internal penalty of -(M x2) to any roll to navigate, forage or find shelter in the chosen environment, be it mountains, marshes, frozen wastelands, or the Pole of Oil. Weak Immune System Cost: 1-2pts; Keywords: Physical, Devolve (Improved Immune System) The creature suffers an internal penalty of -(M x2) to any roll to resist disease. ATTACK MUTATIONS Natural Weapon Cost: 1-6pts; Keywords: Physical The creature’s strikes are more dangerous; it might have bone studs on its knuckles, oversized arms, hooked toenails, great bludgeon-fists, or fangs like daiklaves. One of the creature’s natural attacks has its Damage trait increased by (M), or by (M + 1) if (M) is greater than three. Expanded Weapon Cost: 1-2pts; Keywords: Physical, Requires Natural Weapon All of the creature’s natural attacks benefit from the Damage increase provided by the prerequisite. This mutation costs two points if more than three points were spent on Natural Weapon. Natural Missile Cost: 1-6pts; Keywords: Physical The creature has a ranged attack; it might spit acid, breathe fire, shoot laser beams from its eyes, launch psychic bolts, fling regenerating bone spikes, or fire missiles pods from ports in its body. One of the creature’s natural attacks gains a Range trait of (M x10), allowing it to be used at a distance. These attacks use Archery, unless they are made within twenty yards of the target, in which case they may instead use Thrown. Expanded Missile Cost: 2pt; Keywords: Physical, Requires Natural Missile All of the creature’s natural attacks benefit from the Range increase provided by the prerequisite. Lethal Attack Cost: 2-3pts; Keywords: Physical Whether due to claws, fangs, horns, razor-spines, or some other extrusion, the creature can choose to deal Lethal damage with one of its natural attacks. If such an attack would be made Lethal by another effect (such as a Martial Arts Form), it instead has its Damage trait increased by 2. The three-point version of this mutation extends this to all the creature's natural attacks. Piercing Attack Cost: 2-3pts; Keywords: Physical The creature has a smashing arm-piston, or a crushing pincer, or drips corrosive saliva. One of the creature’s natural attacks has the Thrust tag. The three point version of this mutation applies this tag to all of the creature's natural attacks. Toxic Attack Cost: 1-6pts; Keywords: Physical, Poison One of the creature’s natural attacks inflicts a single dose of poison every time it successfully causes even one level of damage. This poison has the following traits: Damage (M)/action, Toxicity (M ÷ 2), Tolerance —, Penalty -(M ÷ 2). All divisions are rounded up, and the poison deals the same type of Damage as the natural attack applying it. Any of the poison’s traits can be voluntarily reduced upon purchase by the creature’s player, to a minimum of zero. If the Damage of a poison is reduced to zero, it can instead be made into a Crippling effect, representing a bioelectric shock or muscle-aggravating strike; otherwise, it functions in the exact same way. Expanded Toxin Cost: 1pt; Keywords: Physical, Requires Toxic Attack All of the creature’s natural attacks benefit from the poison provided by the prerequisite, and it may spit, sweat, or otherwise smear this venom onto something else (such as an actual sword) as a miscellaneous action. (Hazard) Body Cost: 1-6pts; Keywords: Physical Whether it is wreathed in flames, exudes a deathly aura, or crackles with frost, the creature’s body constitutes an environmental hazard, with the following traits: Damage (M)L/action, Trauma (M ÷ 2), rounded up. This hazard does not extend beyond the creature’s actual physical form, though depending on its nature it might provoke additional hazards (such as a fiery body igniting flammable substances) at the Storyteller’s discretion. Expanded Hazard Cost: 1-6pts; Keywords: Physical, Requires (Hazard) Body The environmental hazard provided by the prerequisite gains a radius of (M) yards, with the creature at its center. Controlled Hazard Cost: 1pt; Keywords: Physical, Requires (Hazard) Body The creature can activate or deactivate the hazard provided by the prerequisite with a diceless, miscellaneous action, once per action. If the hazard has a radius (as per Expanded Hazard), the creature can instead choose to expand or retract the hazard to anywhere within that maximum radius. HEALING MUTATIONS Superior Healing Cost: 3pts; Keywords: Physical The creature closes bleeding wounds, ignores re-opened wounds, resists infection, recovers from disabling wounds, and heals health levels of damage as though it were a supernatural being, like a spirit or one of the Chosen (Exalted, pp. 148-152). The Exalted cannot take this mutation. Accelerated Healing Cost: 2pts; Keywords: Physical, Requires Superior Healing The creature’s basic rate of natural healing doubles, allowing it to (for example) heal a single level of bashing damage in an hour-and-a-half of rest. Limb Regeneration Cost: 2pts; Keywords: Physical The creature can heal entirely amputated body-parts without any medical care, as though each amputation was a single -4 health level filled with lethal damage. Weak Healing Cost: 3pts; Keywords: Physical, Devolve (Superior Healing) Any attempt to close or treat any of the creature’s wounds suffers a -1 external penalty, and the base amount of time necessary to heal its wounds doubles. No Healing Cost: 3pt; Keywords: Physical, Negative, Requires (Weak Healing) Perhaps it is an unliving construct of some sort, or simply has a crippled capacity to restore itself. The creature cannot heal naturally at all. Any attempt at healing it or closing wounds requires direct medical attention, which suffers the Weak Healing penalty as normal. Even if it does receive direct and constant medical care, the base amount of time it takes to heal is tripled, rather than doubled. Failing Body Cost: 1-6pts; Keywords: Physical, Negative Every day, the creature rolls (Stamina + Resistance), at a difficulty of ([M ÷ 2, rounded up] + days since maintenance). If it fails, it immediately suffers a single level of unsoakable bashing damage, which cannot be healed without medical care that includes maintenance. If the creature begins to suffer lethal damage due to this mutation, each level of lethal damage it suffers includes a single disabling injury, as limbs become useless and mangled. "Maintenance" takes at least (M) hours per day, and its nature varies depending on the nature of the creature; for necrotech constructs, it might take the care of a surgeon-engineer with needle, thread and oilcan, while a Wyld-entity of burning coals might need to hibernate in a fireplace. Superior Tolerance Cost: 4pts; Keywords: Physical, Internal The creature resists disease, poison and infection as though it were a supernatural being. The Exalted cannot take this mutation. (Disease) Immunity Cost: 1-6pts; Keywords: Physical, Internal, Stackable The creature is completely immune to a specific disease. It cannot catch it through any means, magical or mundane. The disease in question cannot have a Morbidity greater than (M +2). (Disease) Carrier Cost: 0pts; Keywords: Physical, Requires immunity to that disease, Internal, Stackable The creature does not avoid catching the disease it is immune to, it simply avoids any and all symptoms. While it remains unharmed, others can still catch the disease off it, as though it were infected as normal. A version of this mutation wherein the creature still displays the cosmetic symptoms of the illness exists; it has the Negative keyword, lacks the Internal keyword, and “costs” one point. Infector Cost: 1pt; Keywords: Physical, Sickness The creature sweats diseased ooze, or is host to colonies of bacteria, or otherwise cultivates disease like farmland. Any rolls to resist infection caused by the creature suffer a -1 external penalty. (Poison) Immunity Cost: 1-6pts; Keywords: Physical, Internal, Stackable The creature is completely immune to a specific poison. The poison in question cannot have a Toxicity greater than (M +2). Poisons with the L tag increase their effective Toxicity by two, while those with the M tag decrease it by two. HUNGER MUTATIONS Small Appetite Cost: 1-4pts; Keywords: Physical The creature requires 25% less food and water in each “full meal” than its size would normally dictate, and the interval necessary for its deprivation penalties to increase is raised to two days. The two-point version of this mutation reduces the amount of food the creature requires by 50%, while the three-point version reduces its dietary needs by 75%, and the four-point version leaves it requiring only 10% of the normal amount of food for its size. Large Appetite Cost: 1-4pts; Keywords: Physical, Devolve (Small Appetite) The creature requires 25% more food and water in each “full meal” than its size would normally dictate, and the interval necessary for its deprivation penalties to increase is reduced to half a day. The two-point version of this mutation increases the amount of food the creature requires by 50%, while the three-point version increases its dietary needs by 75%, and the four-point version leaves it requiring twice as much food in each full meal. Restricted Diet Cost: 1-3pts; Keywords: Physical, Negative By default, characters are considered to be omnivorous. This one-point mutation restricts the creature to being either carnivorous or herbivorous, rendering it unable to digest the other type of food. The two point version of this mutation narrows the diet further, restricting the creature to one type of food, such as insects, fish, birds, leaves, fruits, bamboo shoots, or dried food-pellets. The three point version of this mutation narrows the diet to some rare or difficult-to-acquire food, such as the Peaches of Immortality, demonflesh. Used alongside the Expanded Diet mutation, this mutation costs points based on how broad the food in question is; sunlight would provide one point, while hair would provide two and uranium would provide three. Expanded Diet Cost: 1-2pts; Keywords: Physical, Stackable The creature can digest a physical substance that would not normally be considered food, such as rocks, metal, wood, plastic, glass, sand, bone, or hair. The creature does not suffer any harm from ingesting this substance, regardless of their usual properties. The two-point version of this mutation expands it to more ethereal substances, allowing the creature to consume some kind of energy, such as light, noise, heat, prayer, or electricity. (Substance) Allergy Cost: 1-5pts; Keywords: Physical, Negative, Stackable The creature has a dreadful allergy to an otherwise harmless substance, such as fungus, thick pollen, certain drugs, dairy products, sunlight, or salted peanuts. If it consumes or directly inhales that substance, it treats it as poison, with traits of (M x2)B/action, Toxicity (M), Tolerance —, Penalty -(M). If it is simply exposed to a concentration of that substance, it treats it as a hazard with traits of (M)B/minute, Trauma (M). Hunger Frenzy Cost: 1pt; Keywords: Physical, Negative The creature applies starvation penalties to any Temperance roll it makes to avoid taking food or drink. If it fails such a penalized roll, it must gorge itself until completely satiated, attacking anyone who gets in its way like a partially-controlled Berserk Anger (Exalted, pp.105). (Element) Metabolism Cost: 1pt; Keywords: Physical Within the boundaries of a demesne or manse of the relevant aspect, the creature requires (rating x10)% less food and water for each full meal. However, they require 50% more sustenance while away from such an energy-source. If the number of creatures regularly leeching off a given demesne or manse is greater than Magnitude (rating), it suffers Essence Buildup or Power Failure every (4 -excess Magnitude) weeks, to a minimum of one day. Note that supremely powerful concentrations of Essence, such as Elemental Poles, the Daystar, or Primordial jouten, are treated as being level 5 manses for this purpose. They cannot be exhausted by any number of creature, and span a far greater area than mere dragon-knots. (Substance) Breather Cost: 2pt; Keywords: Physical, Stackable The creature has the ability to breathe something other than air, allowing it to ignore any suffocation or environmental harm that would normally come from inhaling that substance. Perhaps it amphibiously breathes water through gills, or smoke and poison through a heavily-scarred throat, or even dirt through strange grinding lungs. Large Lungs Cost: 1-3pts; Keywords: Physical The creature adds (M x2) dice to any roll to hold its breath, thanks to oversized lungs or semi-vestigial gills. Air Drowner Cost: 3-6pts; Keywords: Physical, Negative The creature cannot breathe air. Attempting to do so results in suffocation, just as in water, except that all intervals are at one hour rather than 30 seconds. The four, five and six point versions of this mutation decrease the length of such intervals to ten minutes, one minute, and 30 seconds, respectively. For obvious reasons, it is recommended that these creatures also have at least one example of the (Substance) Breather mutation. LIFE MUTATIONS Longevity Cost: 1-5pts; Keywords: Physical, Internal Common lore holds that the natural life of a creature is a century, though malnutrition, disease, and wear-and-tear reduce this considerably. With this mutation, the creature ages (M x20)% more slowly than normal, with its maximum lifespan increased by an equal number of years. Immortality Cost: 5pts; Keywords: Physical, Internal, Requires Longevity (5) At some point, usually early adulthood, the creature simply stops aging. It will not die of old age, unless such a condition is deliberately imposed on it through Abyssal time-magic or strange raksha stories. Humans with this mutation are rendered ineligible for Exaltation, as their soul mingles too closely with their body for it to attract the spark of divinity. Short-Lived Cost: 1-5pts; Keywords: Physical, Internal, Devolve (Longevity) With this mutation, the creature ages (M x20)% more quickly than normal, with its maximum lifespan reduced by an equal number of years. If this would reduce the creature’s lifespan to zero years, it instead lives for a timespan ranging between one hour and five years, as determined by the creature’s player. At the three-point level, this mutation loses the Internal keyword. Weird Body Cost: 1pt; Keywords: Physical, Stackable This mutation grants the creature an additional functional organ of some sort, or moves one of its existing organs to be somewhere other than one might naturally expect; its brain might be located in its tail, its eyes might be set into its palms, or its genitalia might be found in its knees. This has no direct mechanical effect, but the organs are not cosmetic; they provide access to certain stunts, and might allow the creature to play dead or avoid a disabling injury aimed at the wrong spot by a misinformed enemy. Short Gestation Cost: 1-6pt; Keywords: Physical, Internal Common lore in the Realm holds that the natural period of a pregnancy is nine months so that the unborn may witness a full cycle of Ascending, Resplendent and Descendant months each for the body soul, and mind. Those conceived or born on odd-months are thought to have unbalanced characters because of this. Creatures with this mutation reduce the number of months their offspring must gestate by (M). Despite having a cost in mutation points, Short Gestation does not cost xp; instead, children born from a shortened gestation period must bear at least (M) points of negative physical or mental mutations, which they receive mutation points for as normal. Long Gestation Cost: 1-6pt; Keywords: Physical, Internal, Devolve (Short Gestation) The creature increases the number of months their offspring must gestate by (M). Despite having a cost in mutation points, Long Gestation does not award xp; instead, children born from a lengthened gestation period must bear at least (M) points of positive mutations, which cost xp as normal. Alternate Reproduction Cost: 0pts; Keywords: Physical The creature’s method of reproduction differs from the default of “sex followed by live birth”, in either conception, or birth, or both. Perhaps it lays eggs, or expels spores, or asexually buds, or utilizes pails of incestuous genetic slurry. Whatever the case, the process must still be recognizably biological, and still burdens at least one character in some way for the normal gestation period; they might not need to be pregnant, but will have to tend to their eggs, or monitor the larvae, or water the pods. (Climate) Sensitivity Cost: 2pts; Keywords: Physical, Negative, Stackable In a given climate or condition, such as cold, sunny, moist, or hot, the creature applies a -1 internal penalty to all non-reflexive dice pools. Natural Provider Cost: 1-6pts; Keywords: Physical Whether by being milked, laying infertile eggs, or having shearable wool, the creature can provide food or some other resource without harming itself. If it provides food, the creature can produce sustenance equivalent to a full meal up to (M) times per week, taking two hours per meal (this mutation expresses a permanent ability to produce nutrients, rather than the temporary provisions of pregnant mammals). If it provides Resources, the creature can produce raw materials worth approximately Resources (M ÷ 2) each year, rounded up. If the creature suffers from starvation penalties, (M) is reduced for the purposes of this calculation, by the average penalty it suffers across the week or year. Natural Tool Cost: 1pt; Keywords: Physical, Stackable The creature has a tool as part of its body, using wood-sawing jaws for carpentry, a brush-like tail to paint, or rock-dissolving spit to engage in earthworks. This mutation does not offer the usual dice bonus of a tool (which would be represented through a related Adaptation), but instead allows the creature to perform work that would normally require the tool in question without any penalties. LIMB MUTATIONS Additional Arm Cost: 3-4pts; Keywords: Physical, Appendage, Stackable Whether through an extra arm, a flailing tentacle, prehensile hair, or a tumorous crystalline claw, the creature has one more than the standard duo of manipulators. All the creature’s natural attacks gain +1 to their Rate value, to a maximum of 5. Any multiple action penalties stemming from a flurry of actions that involve using that arm alongside another are reduced by one, to a maximum reduction of (Wits). The creature has access to an additional "arm", which is capable of wielding a weapon, parrying attacks, carrying objects, etc; this can also be represented by multiple manipulators that are incapable of significant action unless working together. This arm is always an “off hand” (Exalted, pp. 148). This mutation normally costs four points, but its cost is (retroactively) reduced to three points if the creature has it more than twice. Missing Arm Cost: 4pts; Keywords: Physical, Devolve (Additional Arm), Stackable All the creature’s natural attacks have their Rate value reduced by one, to a minimum of 0. Natural attacks with their Rate reduced to zero can still be used, but increase their multiple action penalty by an amount equal to their normal full Rate (even if they would not normally have such a penalty). Any multiple action penalties stemming from a flurry of actions that involve using both arms are increased by one. The creature has one less arm available for wielding weapons, parrying attacks, carrying objects, etc. This mutation can be taken a maximum of twice. Ambidextrous Cost: 1pt; Keywords: Physical, Mental, Internal The creature ignores all off-hand penalties, allowing it to use its hands equally. Characters can gain this mutation as a result of training for (7 - Dexterity) months; acquired in this manner, it has the Natural keyword. Omnidextrous Cost: 2pts; Keywords: Physical, Requires Ambidextrous The creature may use its feet as hands; as such, it can spend a miscellaneous action to apply the effects of the Missing Legs mutation to itself, in exchange for also acquiring the effects of the Additional Arm mutation. Note that it is not actually acquiring or losing any new appendages; it is simply using the rules for these mutations to simulate its omnidexterity. The creature can switch back to not applying the effects of these mutations reflexively. Lopsided Arms Cost: 2-4pts; Keywords: Physical, Negative Only some of the creature’s arms are healthy; the rest are withered and frail, or simply designed for a different task. The creature suffers an effective -2 Dexterity or -2 Strength when using its non-healthy arms. Tasks that require the use of both types of arms instead suffer a -1 internal penalty to related rolls, for simplicity. The four point version of this mutation applies to both Dexterity and Strength at once, and its cost is decreased by one for every healthy arm past the first that creature possesses. This mutation must affect at least one arm. No Opposable Thumbs Cost: 6pts; Keywords: Physical, Devolve (Omnidextrous) Paws or hooves make a poor substitute for fingers. The creature cannot engage in fine manipulation of any kind; it cannot use its hands to pick objects up, wield weapons, turn doorknobs, etc. It can use its mouth to do this, but suffers a -4 internal penalty to do anything more complex than holding a suitably sized object (and is rendered vulnerable to any poisons on such an object). Extended Arms Cost: 2-6pts; Keywords: Physical With long, snake-like arms, or telescoped joints, or pulsing telekinetic tendrils, the creature extends its effective reach by a number of yards equal to its (approximate) height in yards. Note that three feet equals one yard; therefore, a roughly six-foot tall human with Extended Arms would have its reach increased by two yards, allowing it to interact with things further away, including making attacks; all its attacks gain the R tag when made anywhere inside their maximum range. Enemies can target the creature’s arms when they themselves are out of range as a called shot with an external penalty of -2. The four and six-point versions of this mutation multiply this increase by three and five, respectively. W.H. Auden wrote: To present the conflict between Good and Evil as a war in which the good side is ultimately victorious is a ticklish business. Our historical experience tells us that physical power and, to a large extent, mental power are morally neutral and effectively real: wars are won by the stronger side, just or unjust.
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Revlid		Thursday, January 26, 2012 2:57:02 AM(UTC) #3
		MIEN MUTATIONS Cosmetic Cost: 0pts; Keywords: Physical, Stackable If a mutation has no mechanical impact, it does not cost any mutation points at all. Such things might include oddly-coloured skin or hair or eyes, natural markings, lisping, baldness, odd-smelling blood, a lack of fingernails, or twin sets of eyebrows. Such oddities cost nothing, and are, in fact, fairly widespread outside the stasis of the Blessed Isle; shades of blue hair are common throughout the West, while a number of tribes in the South-Eastern jungles have teeth in the shades of sunset. Note that this is not intended to permit magic that applies mutations to also inflict an infinite amount of mechanically-null weirdness with each application; such powers cannot apply a greater number of cosmetic mutations than they could actual, functional mutations. Shifting Cost: 1pts; Keywords: Physical, Requires (Cosmetic) One or more of the creature’s cosmetic mutations can be altered with a diceless miscellaneous action. The most common manifestation of this mutation is a conscious alteration of colour, as skin or eyes or hair shifts shades. The mutation is still cosmetic; still has no direct mechanical effect, though it might be used as part of a stunt, or as a signal. A visual language based around a given variety of Shifting can be learned as a tribal tongue, but (obviously) requires the relevant mutation to actually speak. Poker Face Cost: 1-6pts; Keywords: Physical, Mental Whether through supreme mental control, or a literally blank face, those attempting to pick the creature’s thoughts are often left stumped. The difficulty to read the creature’s motives increases by (M). The creature suffers an equal internal penalty to any social attack (or parry) based on its own emotions, such as an impassioned appeal or fearful plea. Characters can gain any number of points in this mutation as a result of training for (7 + M - Wits) months; acquired in this manner, it has the Natural keyword. Luminescent Cost: 1pt; Keywords: Physical The creature (or one specific part of it) glows, projecting light with the same intensity as a torch. This natural lighting can be reflexively turned on or off once per action. Skulker Cost: 3pts; Keywords: Physical The creature has chameleonic skin, a natural foggy shroud, or a transparent glass body, and can hide in plain sight, allowing it to make rolls to hide (including re-establishing surprise) in places where there is no cover or other obstructions that would normally allow it. Invisible Cost: 4-6pts; Keywords: Physical, Requires (Skulker) Whether through perfect shifting camouflage, an optical phase-field, or an ethereal form, the creature is actually invisible, imposing a -2 external penalty on attempts to notice or interact with it that would rely mostly on sight. The six-point version of this mutation allows the creature to phase in or out of visibility once per action, as a diceless miscellaneous action costing one point of temporary Willpower (or four motes, if it is an Essence-user). Mute Cost: 2pts; Keywords: Physical, Mental, Negative Perhaps the creature lacks a mouth, or its throat is deformed, or parts of its mind are simply undeveloped; whatever the case, it cannot speak any language, verbally or telepathically. Instead, it must remain silent or produce nothing but meaningless groans. Hypnotic (Aspect) Cost: 2-6pts; Keywords: Physical, Mental, Compulsion, Obvious The mutant may pay a point of Willpower (or four motes, if it is an Essence-user) whenever it makes a social attack against a single character, producing an Obvious display of some kind; perhaps its eyes glow in patterns, or it releases coloured gasses, or its voice takes on a reverberating hiss. The target of the social attack can try to avoid the display if they are aware of its effects (such as by looking away or closing its eyes for a visual display, or blocking its ears or discordantly humming into an audial display) by applying a -2 internal penalty to any Awareness rolls based on that sense for the next action. If they do not, they treat the social attack as unnatural mental influence. The six-point version of this mutation can enhance social attacks made against multiple targets. Disturbing (Aspect) Cost: 3-4pts; Keywords: Physical, Obvious, Sickness or Emotion Anyone attacking the creature in close combat suffers a -1 external penalty on attack rolls against it. If this is due to a horrifying appearance or chilling cry, it is a fear-based Emotion effect, automatically resisted by characters with a Dodge MDV of 8+. If this is due to a disgusting stench or putrid aura, it is a Sickness effect, resisted with a (Stamina + Resistance) roll at difficulty 4. Either way, the effect can be ignored for a scene by those who spend two points of temporary Willpower. The creature reduces its effective Appearance to 0 for the purposes of determining MDVs (with the usual effects on intimidation) when engaged in social combat with a character who lacks its variant of this mutation. The four-point version of this mutation affects attacks made at any range. MOVEMENT MUTATIONS Fast (Movement) Cost: 1-6pts; Keywords: Physical, Stackable Hooves, powerful flippers or wide wings push the creature along through its chosen medium. This mutation covers one kind of movement, whether swimming, flying, ground movement, climbing, or burrowing. The creature increases its effective Dexterity for the purposes of calculating the relevant Move and Dash distances by (M). For every two points spent on this mutation, it increases its long-distance dramatic travel speed (Exalted, pp.264) by one level; from “Foot” to “Drawn Carriage” to “Horse” and so on. If a creature has more than one iteration of this mutation, the total cost of all but the most expensive example is halved, rounded down. Slow (Movement) Cost: 1-6pts; Keywords: Physical, Devolve (Fast [Movement]), Stackable This mutation covers one kind of movement, whether swimming, flying, ground movement, climbing, or burrowing. The creature decreases its effective Dexterity for the purposes of calculating the relevant Move and Dash distances by (M). For every two points spent on this mutation, it decreases its long-distance dramatic travel speed (Exalted, pp.264) by one level; from “Horse” to “Drawn Carriage” to “Foot” and so on. If a creature has more than one iteration of this mutation, the total cost of all but the most expensive example is halved, rounded down. Immobile Cost: 3pts; Keywords: Physical, Requires Slow Ground Movement (6), Negative Plants and legless turtles alike prefer to remain stationary. The creature cannot make Move, Dash or Jump actions of any kind; it is unable to move under its own power. Jumper Cost: 1-6pts; Keywords: Physical Whether through powerful muscles, incredibly light weight, or a literal spring in its step, the creature increases its effective Strength for the purposes of calculating Jump distances by (M). It also increases the number of yards it has to fall before taking damage by (M x2). Stumbler Cost: 1-6pts; Keywords: Physical, Devolve (Jumper) The creature decreases its effective Strength for the purposes of calculating Jump distances by (M). It also decreases the number of yards it has to fall before taking damage by (M x2). Natural Swimmer Cost: 2-4pts; Keywords: Physical Natural aquadynamism can stem from any number of shapes. The creature adds one automatic success to all attempts to swim (or Athletics rolls to take actions underwater), making botches impossible without an external penalty. The four-point version of this mutation removes the need to roll for anything but turbulent water, and allows the creature to use its full movement rates when swimming. Glider Cost: 4pts; Keywords: Physical The creature does not take damage from falling, unless deliberately forced to the ground by a Knockdown effect or similar. When falling (or jumping), it may land anywhere within (Strength x2) yards of its normal landing point. For simplicity’s sake, characters and objects are typically considered to fall at 25 yards per tick; fast enough that most falls are resolved on the tick they occur, but slow enough that, in an epic tumble (such as a vault off the snout of Heshiesh), they can be resolved more dramatically. A creature with Glider can choose to slow their fall, to a minimum of five yards per tick. Flier Cost: 4pts; Keywords: Physical, Requires Glider, Appendage The creature can take Move or Dash actions in three dimensions, allowing it to move into the air on wings, propellers, fleshy gasbags or an organic, muscular jetpack. It no longer falls unless it is forced to by a Knockdown effect or similar, or if it chooses to. Note that the creature is considered to be constantly exerting itself while flying; it is never “at rest” in the sky. Wall-Crawler Cost: 2-5pts; Keywords: Physical The creature adds one automatic success to all attempts to climb (or gain a foothold, etc), making botches impossible without an external penalty. The four-point version of this mutation removes the need to roll for anything but sheer or unstable surfaces, and allows the creature to use its full movement rates when climbing. The five-point version of this mutation allows the creature to dicelessly climb and hang from any non-frictionless surface, including ceilings; they need only stay in physical contact with one of their limbs at a time. Creeper Cost: 1-6pts; Keywords: Physical Whether it possesses rubbery bones, a ridiculous number of joints, or a semi-liquid body, the creature can move through impossibly small spaces, allowing it to squeeze through gaps (or fit into spaces) up to (M x2) times smaller than itself with a successful (Dexterity + Athletics) roll. This boneless contortionism also has appropriate applications in stunts. Burrower Cost: 2-6pts; Keywords: Physical Spade-like claws, a drill-body, or a worm-like consumption of earth allows the creature to burrow with ease. The creature can use Move or Dash actions to "swim" through sand or soil as though it were water, with the usual restrictions on movement distances, breathing and need for Athletics rolls. The four-point version of this mutation adds one automatic success to all attempts to dig (or Athletics rolls to take actions underground), making botches impossible without an external penalty. The six-point version of this mutation removes the need to roll for anything but quaking ground, and allows the creature to use its full movement rates when burrowing. Rock-Digger Cost: 2pts; Keywords: Physical, Requires Burrower The creature can move through stone as well as soil or sand, though the difficulty of any Athletics roll to do so is increased by one, and the creature's movement distances is halved from that provided by Burrower. An alternate version of this mutation sometimes found in Autocthonia is Metal-Digger, allowing native fauna to tunnel through the machine god's metallic hide. Tunneler Cost: 2pts; Keywords: Physical, Requires Burrower The creature can leave tunnels in the earth it passes through. If it does so, then other characters can follow it into the ground as though they possessed the two-point version of Burrower, provided they take the exact same path that it did. Tunnels created in this way close at the end of the scene, unless Craft rolls are made to expand and fortify them. SENSORY MUTATIONS Hyper-Awareness Cost: 2pts; Keywords: Physical, Mental Eyes in the back of the head, or radial ears, or a tingling danger-sense. The creature is always treated as being actively wary for detecting unexpected attacks (see Exalted, pp. 155). This grants a single bonus die to all rolls to detect ambushes, and allows the creature to ignore any penalties on such rolls for being distracted. No (Sense) Cost: 2-6pts; Keywords: Physical, Negative, Stackable The creature is blind, or deaf, or anosmic; it lacks a single sense, and so suffers a -4 internal penalty to all Awareness or Investigation rolls that should involve that sense. On rolls that solely involve that sense, it automatically fails. The two-point version of this mutation removes taste, while the three-point version removes smell, the five-point version removes hearing, and the six-point version removes sight. Night Vision Cost: 2pts; Keywords: Physical For the purposes of determining visibility (Exalted, pp. 135), the creature treats “No Moon” as “Full Moon”, treats “Full Moon” as “Day”, and treats “City or Forest” as “Grass or Leafless Forest”. Sonar Cost: 2pts; Keywords: Physical The creature can use its hearing in place of sight, reducing any penalties for blindness or darkness to a -1 internal penalty. This form of sight obviously lacks colour, and is affected by penalties that would inhibit the creature’s hearing; for a creature relying on its sonar, a deafening sound would have the same effect as blinding light would on someone using their eyes. (Emotion) Sense Cost: 2pts; Keywords: Physical, Stackable The creature can use one of its senses to detect a single variety of base emotion, such as fear, anger, lust, or joy, through a standard roll to detect sensory information. (Spirit) Sense Cost: 2-6pts; Keywords: Physical, Spiritual The creature can use one of its senses to detect one kind of immaterial being, at -1 internal penalty; it might smell demons, hear gods, or see ghosts. The four-point version of this mutation allows the creature to apply all of its senses to that kind of immaterial being, or one sense to all kinds of immaterial beings. The six-point version allows the creature to apply all its senses to all kinds of immaterial beings, though it still suffers the penalty. SIZE MUTATIONS Large Cost: 1-6pts; Keywords: Physical By default, creatures are considered to be roughly the size of a human being. With this mutation, they are instead a larger size. The creature's Strength increases by (M) for the purposes of inflicting damage, performing feats of strength, and gaining control of (not performing) a clinch. The effective range of its natural and close combat attacks increases by (M ÷ 2) yards, rounded down, as do its Move and Dash distances. It also gains (M) additional health levels. The wound penalty associated with each of these health levels increases by one each time, to a maximum of -4, before cycling around again. However, the creature's Defense pools and Stealth rolls suffer a –(M) internal penalty, as do any roll it takes to engage in fine manipulation of an object significantly smaller than it. The one-point version of this mutation covers creatures about the size of a horse or lion, or a very large human being. The three-point version covers creatures roughly the size of a bear or rhinoceros. The six-point version is for creatures about as big as an elephant. Giant Cost: 4pts; Keywords: Physical, Requires Large (6) This mutation simply stacks its cost onto Large for the purposes of (M), and renders the creature as large as a yeddim or tyrant lizard. Further upgrades to represent even larger entities are possible, as the square-cube law simply does not exist in Creation. However, most such creatures of these are behemoths or other supernatural creatures, which do not generally rely on the mutations system. Small Cost: 1-6pts; Keywords: Physical, Devolve (Large or Giant) By default, creatures are considered to be roughly the size of a human being. With this mutation, they are instead a smaller size. The creature’s Stamina decreases by (M) for the purposes of calculating natural soak, to a minimum of zero. It suffers an internal penalty of -(M) to its dice pools for performing feats of strength and gaining control of (not performing) a clinch, and any Strength-based pool of damage dice suffers the same penalty, to a minimum of one die. Its Move and Dash distances decrease by (M) yards, to a minimum of one. It also loses an equal number of health levels (chosen by its player), which can reduce it to a minimum of one health level. Anyone attempting to attack or spot it suffers an external penalty of (M ÷ 2), rounded down. The one-point version of this mutation covers creatures about the size of a child or dog. The three-point version covers creatures roughly the size of an infant or housecat. The six-point version is for creatures about as small as a mouse. Any creatures smaller than this are mechanically negligible unless acting as a swarm (which uses the environmental hazard rules rather than creature traits). Component Creature Cost: 2pts; Keywords: Physical The creature can fuse with other, willing creatures of its type (which must also have this mutation) by spending a miscellaneous action while in physical contact with its fellow component-creature. The fusion completes when all involved creatures have taken that miscellaneous action, producing a new, more powerful beast. Reduce the Genesis rating of each component creature by one, before adding them together; this is the final Genesis rating of the creature their fusion produces. The same type of creature is always produced by a given fusion, and its Motivation, intimacies and Virtues should be based off the creatures that formed it. TOUGHNESS MUTATIONS Natural Armour Cost: 1-6pts; Keywords: Physical The creature has scales, fur, thick skin, a leathery hide, or a tough carapace. The creature’s natural soak is increased by (M)L/B. Natural Plating Cost: 2-6pts; Keywords: Physical, Requires Natural Armour (2) The creature's natural armour is thick and tough enough to rival actual protective equipment. The two-point version of this mutation provides the creature with armour that provides 3L/B soak, but inflicts a -1 mobility penalty. The four and six-point versions double and triple these effects, respectively. This armour is fused with the creature's body; it cannot be removed or destroyed without killing it. Weak Skin Cost: 1-6pts; Keywords: Physical, Devolve (Natural Armour) Peeling skin, a soft hide, or raw flesh offer little protection. The creature’s natural soak is decreased by (M)L/B. Superior Soak Cost: 2-5pts; Keywords: Physical The creature calculates natural soak as though it were a supernatural being, and can reflexively close bleeding wounds in the same manner. The six-point version of this mutation increases the creature's base natural lethal soak to its Stamina rating (rather than half). The Exalted cannot take this mutation. Natural Hardness Cost: 4pts; Keywords: Physical, Requires Superior Soak (2) Whether plates of bone armour, steely scales or a stone body, the creature has natural bashing and lethal hardness equal to half its Stamina, rounded down. Fragile Cost: 3-6pts; Keywords: Physical, Negative The creature’s bones splinter easily, and its flesh bruises even easier. Whenever the creature suffers levels of bashing damage in Step 10, half of those levels (rounded down) are instead converted directly into levels of lethal damage (this can lead to disabling injuries as normal). The six-point version of this mutation instead converts all bashing damage the creature suffers into lethal damage. Vulnerability Cost: 2-4pts; Keywords: Physical, Negative Whenever the creature suffers damage from a specific source, that damage is converted to aggravated (at the start of Step 7, if the damage stems from an attack). Narrow vulnerabilities, such as silver, iron, rowan wood, salt, or mistletoe, are a two-point mutation. Broader (generally elemental) vulnerabilities, such as fire, ice, wood or stone, are a four-point mutation. The spiritual Creature of Darkness mutation includes its own version of this mutation, rendering such creatures vulnerable to Holy Essence. Blade Proof Cost: 1pt; Keywords: Physical The creature can parry lethal attacks barehanded without a stunt, thanks to its natural toughness, or smooth plates of bone that can deflect blades. Natural Defense Cost: 2-4pt; Keywords: Physical, Requires Blade Proof Shield-like protrusions or cartilage hooks or a ragged membrane of misdirection allow the creature to better defend against its opponents. The creature’s non-clinch natural attacks increase their Defense value by (M ÷ 2), rounded down. Natural Counterattack Cost: 2-4pt; Keywords: Physical, Counterattack Whether venomous pustules that burst on impact, quills that shoot out in response to pain, or acidic blood, the creature has a defense mechanism that makes attacking it a bad idea. Whenever the creature suffers even one health level of damage, it may target one character within close-combat range with a single counterattack in Step 9. This counterattack has a dice pool of (Stamina + levels of damage inflicted), treating lethal or aggravated damage as two levels, and deals (threshold successes on attack roll + Stamina) damage. The four point version of this mutation targets all characters within close-combat range. Inexhaustible Cost: 1-5pts; Keywords: Physical Rather than gaining a point of fatigue penalty every hour past its limit (Exalted, pp. 130), the creature’s fatigue increases every two hours, and the interval of each fatigue roll for wearing armour is doubled. The three point version of this mutation raises the interval before a fatigue penalty increases to four hours, and reduces by half the amount of rest or sleep necessary to reduce the penalty, but has no further effect on armour. The five-point version of this mutation simply renders the creature immune to all mundane fatigue penalties. This mutation has no effect on sleep deprivation. Easily Exhausted Cost: 2pts; Keywords: Physical, Devolve (Inexhaustible) Rather than gaining a point of fatigue penalty every hour past its limit, the creature’s fatigue increases every half-an-hour, and the interval of each fatigue roll for wearing armour is halved. Painless Cost: 2-6pts; Keywords: Physical, Mental Whether through quick-release chemical anesthetic, deadened nerve receptors, or a leathery soul, the creature is more inured to pain than most. It reduces any wound penalties it suffers from bashing damage by (M ÷ 2), rounded down. Enhanced Painlessness Cost: 2-4pts; Keywords: Physical, Requires Painless This mutation permanently expands its prerequisite, allowing it to reduce wound penalties suffered by lethal damage. This mutation's cost is increased to four points if Painless costs more than five points. Ignores (Poison or Sickness) Cost: 2-3pts; Keywords: Physical, Stackable, Requires Painless This mutation permanently expands its prerequisite, allowing it to reduce penalties from another source. The two-point version of this mutation affects Sickness, while the three-point version affects Poison. TROPISM MUTATIONS Alternate Form Cost: 2pts; Keywords: Physical, Stackable The creature’s player groups together any number of its other mutations, physical or otherwise (the majority of which must be positive mutations) as a single set. By default, these mutations are demanifested; they have no mechanical effect, and are Internal for the purposes of anyone trying to detect them. The creature may manifest that entire set of mutations as a miscellaneous action costing a single point of Willpower (Essence-users may instead pay four motes), and demanifest them in the same way. After manifesting or demanifesting a set of mutations, the creature may not do so again until its DV has refreshed twice. Involuntary Transformation Cost: 0pts; Keywords: Physical This mutation functions in the same way as Alternate Form, except that the creature has no control over when its chosen mutations manifest; instead, they do so upon encountering a specific external trigger, such as the full moon or cold water. Internal Mutation Cost: (M ÷ 2)pts; Keywords: Physical, Internal, Requires (Physical Mutation) This mutation alters whatever its prerequisite is, adding the Internal keyword to it. It cannot be applied to mutations that have the Appendage keyword. Its cost is equal to half the cost of its prerequisite, rounded up. External Mutation Cost: 1pt; Keywords: Physical, Devolves (Internal Mutation), Requires (Physical or Mental Mutation) This mutation alters whatever its prerequisite is, removing the Internal keyword from it. It cannot be applied to mutations that initially lack the Internal keyword. Appendage Mutation Cost: 1pt; Keywords: Physical, Negative, Requires (Physical or Mental Mutation) This mutation alters whatever its prerequisite is, adding the Appendage keyword to it. It cannot be applied to mutations with the Internal keyword, or Negative mutations. Deathly Construct Cost: 0pts; Keywords: Physical, Mental, Spiritual, Natural This is a combination of a number of mutations, and represents mindless undead creatures, raised by Necromancy, constructed through necrotech, or animated by some other dark magic. It is included here as a "package" for convenience. Where mutations could have multiple point costs, the default is listed here; more expensive variants can be freely applied (at a commensurate increase in cost). Note that not all undead creatures will use this template, only the mindless constructs that fill the ranks of the Deathlords; more complex mortuary entities may well ignore it entirely. The positive mutations included are the three-point version of Disturbing Stench, the five-point version of Inexhaustible, Infector, Machine Mind, the three-point version of Sleepless, and the two-point of Small Appetite. The negative mutations included are one-point version of Restricted Diet (Carnivore), Creature of Darkness, Creature of Death, the one-point version of Failing Body, Hunger Frenzy, Mute, No Healing, Weak Healing. W.H. Auden wrote: To present the conflict between Good and Evil as a war in which the good side is ultimately victorious is a ticklish business. Our historical experience tells us that physical power and, to a large extent, mental power are morally neutral and effectively real: wars are won by the stronger side, just or unjust.
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Revlid		Thursday, January 26, 2012 2:58:01 AM(UTC) #4
		MENTAL MUTATIONS Mental mutations are split up into the following categories. Savant mutations refer to those oddities that directly mimic a specialty. Capacity mutations refer to those oddities that change the creature’s intellectual capabilities. Emotional mutations refer to those oddities that shift the creature’s emotional balance. Integration mutations refer to those oddities that make the creature automatonesque, or part of a hive mind. Madness mutations refer to those oddities that simulate some kind of insanity. Psychic mutations refer to those oddities that expand the creature’s mind beyond the norm. Reflection mutations refer to those oddities that alter the way the creature remembers and dreams. SAVANT MUTATIONS Mental mutations can be used to mimic specialties as directly as Physical ones, using the template laid out in the Adaptations section. Of course, such mutations have the Mental rather than Physical keyword, and will likely grant bonuses to very different areas. Note that they still lack the Internal keyword (which is possessed by most other mental mutations); whether through enlarged lobes or a semi-visible spine, mental mutations are still visible by default. CAPACITY MUTATIONS Quick Learner Cost: 3pts; Keywords: Mental, Internal The creature halves all training times, whether it is working with or without a tutor. The Exalted cannot possess this mutation; it is replaced by their natural aptitude for certain Abilities or Attributes. Slow Learner Cost: 2pt; Keywords: Mental, Devolve (Quick Learner), Internal The creature doubles all training times, whether it is working with or without a tutor. If applied to the Exalted, it increases the time necessary to train their Favoured/Caste Abilities to one day. Mute Cost: 2pts; Keywords: Physical, Mental, Negative Perhaps the creature lacks a mouth, or its throat is deformed, or parts of its mind are simply undeveloped; whatever the case, it cannot speak any language, verbally or telepathically. Instead, it must remain silent or produce nothing but meaningless groans. (Species)-tongue Cost: 0-2pts; Keywords: Mental, Internal The creature knows a single language shared by all other characters with this same mutation; all dogs can speak "Dog-tongue", with different breeds acting as regional dialects. This language is not entirely spoken; rather, it is instinctual, a mixture of scents and sounds and body-language. It cannot be written, and reduces the creature’s effective Intelligence by one for the purposes of communicating higher concepts. The zero-point version of this mutation renders the creature unable to gain normal languages through its Linguistics ability. Ambidextrous Cost: 1pt; Keywords: Physical, Mental, Internal The creature ignores all off-hand penalties, allowing it to use its hands equally. Characters can gain this mutation as a result of training for (7 - Dexterity) months; acquired in this manner, it has the Natural keyword. EMOTIONAL MUTATIONS Emotionless Cost: 4-6pts; Keywords: Mental, Internal The creature is biologically incapable of feeling emotion, rendering them immune to natural Emotion effects, and preventing them from acquiring or maintaining intimacies with an emotional context through natural mental influence. They also suffer a -2 internal penalty to any social attacks with an emotional component. The six-point version of this mutation immunizes the character to even unnatural Emotion effects or unnaturally-acquired emotional intimacies. Mood Swings Cost: 2pts; Keywords: Derangement, Devolve (Emotionless), Internal The creature suffers from a -2MDV penalty against Emotion effects. In addition, while characters normally only suffer from Emotion effects if applied by some outside effect (whether social interaction, drugs, or passion-inducing magic), the creature always feels an Emotion effect of some variety (Manual of Exalted Power: Alchemicals, pp. 147), unless magic would render them absolutely emotionless. This Emotion in question is chosen by the Storyteller and the creature’s player as-is appropriate to the scene. (Emotion) Trigger Cost: 1pt; Keywords: Derangement, Internal, Stackable Phobias and philias and inexplicable furies. Upon encountering a single “trigger”, the creature immediately feels a single base Emotion (fear, lust, rage, anxiety) that lasts until the end of the scene, and costs two Willpower to suppress (or one if the source of the trigger is no longer present). The trigger might be a colour, or a scent, or even a particular phrase. (Madness) Trigger Cost: 3pts; Keywords: Derangement, Internal, Requires (Emotion) Trigger, Stackable Rather than the associated emotion, the trigger forces the creature into a controlled Virtue Flaw (Exalted, pp.103) appropriate to it; rather than simply feeling fury, the creature would be sent into a Berserk Anger, while a Heart of Tears might replace mere sadness. This Virtue Flaw lasts until the end of the scene, and costs the same amount of Willpower to suppress as the Emotion effect, though doing so only replaces it with the Emotion effect in question. A common trigger for this derangement is the full moon, when Luna’s grip on the Wyld’s raw Essence is at its most slack. Applied to an Exalted character, this mutation instead provides another trigger for the Exalt to gain a single point of Limit per scene. Cursed (Madness) Cost: 6pts; Keywords: Derangement The creature constantly suffers from the controlled version of a single Virtue Flaw. Any effect that would apply a controlled Virtue Flaw of any kind (such as Hunger Frenzy or Madness Trigger) instead render its normal Virtue Flaw uncontrolled. The controlled Virtue Flaw may be suppressed for a scene (reducing it to an equivalent Emotion effect) by paying five points of temporary Willpower. A creature who possesses this mutation reduces the cost of the (Madness) Trigger mutation to one point. The Exalted cannot possess this mutation. INTEGRATION MUTATIONS Pack Instincts Cost: 1pt; Keywords: Mental, Internal This mutation links the creature to a single “pack”. The pack’s makeup may change over time, but all of its members must have this mutation. The difficulty for any member of that pack to launch a co-ordinated attack (Exalted, p. 144) is halved, provided all of the attackers are its packmates (or reduced by one, if only the majority of the attackers are its packmates). Whenever the creature receives teamwork bonuses, the maximum co-operation bonus increased by (relevant Ability ÷ 2), rounded up, provided all of its helpers are members of its pack (or one, if only the majority of helpers are its packmates). Colony Communication Cost: 2pts; Keywords: Mental, Internal, Requires Pack Instincts This mutation provides the benefits of Silent Communication, except that it can only be used to communicate with fellow members of the creature’s pack, and cannot distinguish between packmates in the creature’s immediate presence. One Mind in Many Cost: 1pt; Keywords: Mental, Internal, Requires Colony Communication For any member of the pack to benefit, all members of the pack created by Pack Instincts must have this mutation. All members of the pack share the same intimacies and Motivation; they are literally of one mind. They are all affected by any mental influence applied to one member. They must all have the same Ability and Virtue ratings; any member who increases one of these ratings forces the others to increase them as well, as a Training effect. This only applies within the range of the silent communication provided by its prerequisite; should any one of the creatures leave this range, they immediately drop to Intelligence 0, becoming mindless. This state persists until they re-enter the range of their hive mind. The Exalted cannot possess this mutation. Machine Mind Cost: 4pts; Keywords: Mental, Internal The creature lacks intimacies or Virtues; it has no Virtue channels, and automatically fails all Virtue rolls (with an effective rating of 1) unless they support its Motivation, in which case it automatically succeeds (with an effective rating of 5). It regains a single point of Willpower every hour it spends working toward its Motivation, but no longer regains Willpower from sleep. It cannot take any actions that do not directly further its Motivation; it treats mental influence that would lead it to do so as unacceptable orders. This mutation models the consequences of a removed soul, but can be used to represent other eventualities. The Exalted cannot possess this mutation. Programmed Imperative Cost: 1pt; Keywords: Mental, Internal, Stackable, Requires Machine Mind Despite normally lacking the ability to acquire or retain intimacies, the creature has a single intimacy, with a subject and context defined by the player applying the mutation, which represents subsidiary programming or residual instincts. This intimacy cannot be removed or changed, and the creature is unable to act against it in the same manner as its Motivation, treating mental influence that would cause it to do so as unacceptable orders. If the intimacy and Motivation’s dictates clash, the Motivation always takes primacy. MADNESS MUTATIONS (Thing) Addiction Cost: 1-3pts; Keywords: Derangement, Internal, Compulsion, Stackable The creature is addicted to a specific thing; a substance, person, sensation or place. When presented with an opportunity to indulge in that addiction, it must succeed on a Temperance roll to avoid doing so for the scene. If it fails, it may suppress the addiction as though suppressing a Virtue, but otherwise must indulge as much as possible for the rest of the scene. This does not preclude other actions, but the creature must prevent others from deterring it, with violence if necessary. If the creature’s addiction would be actively harmful to its well-being, this mutation costs three points. (Action) Obsession Cost: 1-3pts; Keywords: Derangement, Internal, Compulsion, Stackable The creature is obsessed with performing a specific action. Perhaps it must clean itself, or compulsively cuts its own flesh, or organizes small objects in alphabetical order. When presented with an opportunity to engage in that action, it must succeed on a Temperance roll to avoid doing so for the scene. If it fails, it may suppress the obsession as though suppressing a Virtue, but otherwise must perform it at least once in the scene. If the creature’s obsession would be actively harmful to its well-being, this mutation costs three points. Severe (Addiction or Obsession) Cost: 1pt; Keywords: Derangement, Internal, Compulsion, Requires (Thing) Addiction or (Action) Obsession, Stackable This mutation makes its prerequisite more severe, applying an internal penalty to the Temperance roll equal to the number of days since the creature indulged in its addiction or obsession. If this penalty exceeds the creature’s Temperance, it must seek out a way to indulge its addiction or obsession, a Compulsion it can suppress for a day by spending a point of Willpower. The creature can reset the penalty back to -0 by suffering temporary insanity for a scene, which mimics the effects of a partially-controlled Virtue Flaw appropriate to the situation and the addiction or obsession, such as Berserk Anger or Slothful Apathy. (Idea) Delusion Cost: 1-3pts; Keywords: Derangement, Internal, Illusion, Stackable The creature is convinced of a single, untrue thing. Perhaps it knows that rocks fall upward, or is certain that it is a frog, or believes that the Guild is run by the god of Sloths. If presented with evidence that the delusion is untrue, the creature can reject it for a day by spending two points of Willpower, or else must ignore, deny, or attempt to explain away the evidence of their own senses. The creature’s delusion must be relevant to it, or else it would not have come about; a purely subterranean entity is unlikely to develop the delusion that the sky is green, because it has never experienced the sky (green or otherwise), so this is more of a misconception than a delusion. If the creature’s delusion would be actively harmful to its well-being, this mutation costs three points. (Thing) Hallucination Cost: 1-3pts; Keywords: Derangement, Internal, Illusion The creature’s senses are mistaken about one specific thing. Perhaps it replaces one colour or scent with another, or hears all speech as a whisper, or perceives an imaginary companion. The creature can be convinced that its hallucination is unreal, but this will not end it; any rolls to interact with a situation other than that presented by the hallucination suffer from an internal penalty based on how much the hallucination differs from the actual situation, ranging from -1 for a minor difference to -4 for a complete alteration. A creature who is convinced of the falsehood of its hallucination can ignore it for a scene by spending two points of Willpower. If the creature’s hallucination would be actively harmful to its well-being, this mutation costs three points. Additional Personality Cost: 3-4pts; Keywords: Derangement, Internal, Stackable The creature has an additional personality, with distinct Intimacies and its own Motivation. It also has distinct Virtues, but its total Virtue dots cannot exceed those of the primary personality. Each personality retains the experiences of the others, "remembering" what the others did while in control. Each personality (including the primary personality) must be assigned a distinct trigger that allows it to take control, which can be no narrower than “fail a (Virtue) roll”; examples might include nightfall, hearing a common word, or head trauma. Additional personalities past the first are worth only three mutation points. Segregated Memories Cost: 1-2pts; Keywords: Derangement, Internal, Requires Additional Personality None of the creature’s personalities are able to access the memories of its other personalities, past the point of their creation. If the creature has more than three distinct personalities, this mutation "costs" two points. PSYCHIC MUTATIONS Reader Of Others Cost: 3-5pt; Keywords: Mental, Internal Whether through hypersensitivity to bodily cues, or rudimentary telepathic capabilities, the motives of others are laid bare. The creature can make a roll to evaluate another character’s motives (Exalted, pp. 131) with an unflurried miscellaneous action (or reflexively once per action, if they are operating on a social timescale), rather than a few minutes of analysis. The five-point version of this mutation allows the creature to perform such evaluations even if it cannot perceive its target, generally incorporating some kind of rudimentary telepathy; so long as the target is within (Perception x5) yards of the creature, it can make an evaluation roll. Characters can acquire the three-point version of this mutation by training for (10 - Perception) months; acquired in this manner, it has the Natural keyword. Poker Face Cost: 1-6pts; Keywords: Physical, Mental Whether through supreme mental control, or a literally blank face, those attempting to pick the creature’s thoughts are often left stumped. The difficulty to read the creature’s motives increases by (M). The creature suffers an equal internal penalty to any social attack (or parry) based on its own emotions, such as an impassioned appeal or fearful plea. Characters can gain any number of points in this mutation as a result of training for (7 + M - Wits) months; acquired in this manner, it has the Natural keyword. (Personal or Ideal) Detachment Cost: 1pt; Keywords: Derangement, Internal, Stackable The creature has trouble forming certain kinds of attachments. It doubles the number of scenes necessary to acquire intimacies toward specific people, or to abstract causes, respectively. Hyper-Awareness Cost: 2pts; Keywords: Physical, Mental Eyes in the back of the head, or radial ears, or a tingling danger-sense. The creature is always treated as being actively wary for detecting unexpected attacks (see Exalted, pp. 155). This grants a single bonus die to all rolls to detect ambushes, and allows the creature to ignore any penalties on such rolls for being distracted. Hypnotic (Aspect) Cost: 2-6pts; Keywords: Physical, Mental, Compulsion, Obvious The mutant may pay a point of Willpower (or four motes, if it is an Essence-user) whenever it makes a social attack against a single character, producing an Obvious display of some kind; perhaps its eyes glow in patterns, or it releases coloured gasses, or its voice takes on a reverberating hiss. The target of the social attack can try to avoid the display if they are aware of its effects (such as by looking away or closing its eyes for a visual display, or blocking its ears or discordantly humming into an audial display) by applying a -2 internal penalty to any Awareness rolls based on that sense for the next action. If they do not, they treat the social attack as unnatural mental influence. The six-point version of this mutation can enhance social attacks made against multiple targets. Silent Communication Cost: 4pts; Keywords: Mental, Internal The creature can silently communicate, through telepathy or Elsewhere-routed hypersonic whines, to any character within its immediate presence. It can do so with any language it knows, as though talking, and can make social attacks as normal. Its voice is not disguised at all when doing so, and can be recognised as normal. Distant Communication Cost: 1-6pts; Keywords: Mental, Internal, Requires Silent Communication or Colony Communication The communication range of this mutation’s prerequisite is increased to (M x50) yards, unless it costs more than three points, in which case it is increased to (M x100) yards. REFLECTION MUTATIONS Perfect Memory Cost: 3-5pts; Keywords: Mental, Internal The creature has a near-eidetic memory, allowing it to make (Perception + Awareness) rolls to notice sensory details of a scene even after it has ended. This does not allow the creature to notice something it would have been functionally unable to notice at the time (such as a temporarily blind creature “remembering” visual details), but has no other time limit. Other applications, such as reading through a training manual once and perfectly recalling its advice years later, are also possible (though this would not actually decrease training times any more than simply having the manual on hand would). This mutation does not offer a roll-off against memory-altering magic, but does grant one automatic success to any rolls to defend against such. The three-point version of this mutation applies to only a single area of memory, no broader than a specialty, such as “books”, “faces”, “dialogue” or “people I’ve killed”, while the five-point version applies to all memory. Characters can gain this mutation as a result of training for (10 + M - Intelligence) months; acquired in this manner, it has the Natural keyword. Fleeting Memory Cost: 2-6pts; Keywords: Mental, Internal, Negative Sorry, what is this mutation called, again? The creature automatically maintains those memories necessary to justify its Motivation, intimacies, and Ability ratings. Otherwise, they slip through its fingers like sand; at the end of each interval, the creature loses all additional memories, and must roll (Wits + Investigation) to remember events from such lost scenes, suffering a -1 external penalty for each day that has passed since that event was relevant. In addition, if it has not interacted with an intimacy even once during an interval, it treats the end of the interval as a scene spent eroding it. The length of the interval is determined by the points cost of this mutation; at two points, it is one week, while at four points, it is one day, and at six points, it is one scene. (Element) Dream Communion Cost: 1-4pts; Keywords: Mental, Internal Essence comforts and cushions the sleeping mind, shaping the glamour-stuff of the Wyld into pleasing phantasms. Within the boundaries of a demesne or manse of the relevant aspect, the creature benefits from (demesne rating) additional dice on any roll to regain Willpower from sleeping, to a maximum of (M). Just as with (Element) Metabolism, appropriate sources of aspected Essence can also act as demesnes or manses for this purpose. (Element) Dream Dependency Cost: 1-4pts; Keywords: Mental, Negative, Internal Unfamiliar surroundings produce jagged, distressing dreams; how much worse when even the local geomancy is lacking? The creature suffers from an external penalty of -(M) to rolls to regain Willpower from sleeping when outside the boundaries of a demesne or manse of the relevant aspect. Lucid Dreaming Cost: 4pts; Keywords: Mental, Internal Within a natural dreamscape or trained memory-palace, work proceeds apace through slumber. The creature can treat any time spent dreaming as time spent working on purely intellectual problems or projects (such as plans or mental training), and remembers any events (such as intruding Lunar Exalted) that take place in its dreams, as though it were awake. Characters can gain this mutation as a result of training for (12 - Perception) months; acquired in this manner, it has the Natural keyword. Sleepless Cost: 3-5pts; Keywords: Mental, Internal The creature is unable to sleep (and therefore cannot regain Willpower through sleeping), but does not suffer any penalties for sleep deprivation. The five-point version of this mutation allows the creature to sleep if it desires, although it halves its effective Conviction for the purposes of regaining Willpower, rounded down. Narcoleptic Cost: 1-3pts; Keywords: Mental, Internal, Devolve (Sleepless) The creature must roll to avoid falling asleep when they are alone with nothing to do, even if they suffer from no sleep deprivation penalty. Such rolls are made at difficulty 1, and while success tides the creature over for an hour, failure sends them to sleep for a minimum of an hour. The three-point version of this mutation also forces the creature to roll even if it is not alone with nothing to do, provided it suffers a sleep deprivation penalty; simply being at ease (Exalted, pp. 115) is sufficient relaxation to provoke a roll, albeit at -1 difficulty (to a minimum of difficulty 1). W.H. Auden wrote: To present the conflict between Good and Evil as a war in which the good side is ultimately victorious is a ticklish business. Our historical experience tells us that physical power and, to a large extent, mental power are morally neutral and effectively real: wars are won by the stronger side, just or unjust.
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Revlid		Thursday, January 26, 2012 2:58:57 AM(UTC) #5
		SPIRITUAL MUTATIONS Spiritual mutations are split up into the following categories. Essence mutations refer to those oddities that alter the creature’s Essence. Nativity mutations refer to those oddities that designate a creature’s origins. Pneuma mutations refer to those oddities that expand the creature’s responses to spirits. Virtue mutations refer to those oddities that change how a creature reacts to the shinmaic principles of Virtue. Charm mutations refer to those oddities that specifically mimic a Charm of some kind. ESSENCE MUTATIONS Racial Enlightenment Path Cost: 2pts; Keywords: Spiritual, Internal By the very nature of their conjoined souls, no human (demi or semi or otherwise) bears awakened Essence from birth. They must rely on thaumaturgy, such as the steady, quinquennial art of the Essence-Enlightening Sutra (Oadenol’s Codex, pp. 139), or the blessings of supernatural patrons (spiritual or Exalted), or the touch of enlightening artifacts. This creature, however, has another method of acquiring enlightenment naturally, which can be no simpler than spending the training time meditating in a place of specific spiritual power, such as a demesne of a single Aspect. The creature might need to dedicate itself to performing a series of ritual murders over the course of the training time, or have to spend the time in complete and total isolation, or need to travel at least thousand miles away from the point of its origin from the start to the end of the training time. At the end of its training, the creature gains the Enlightened Essence mutation. This training always takes a total of two years, though it is reduced to one year if the character is being tutored by an Essence-user who either enlightened through the same method, or resonates with the method of enlightenment (i.e. a Water Aspect or Water elemental or river god or aquatic demon for a creature who enlightens through periods of submerged meditation). This mutation’s cost is refunded when the creature actually enlightens, though it can still be passed on to any offspring. Enlightened Essence Cost: 6pts; Keywords: Spiritual, Natural, Internal The creature is enlightened, gaining access to a single pool of Personal Essence calculated as an enlightened mortal: (Essence x 5) + (Willpower) + (sum of all Virtues). As an enlightened being, the creature may spend its Essence as it pleases (to fuel thaumaturgy, attune to artifacts, pay tolls to ghosts, etc), and with a proper tutor can gain access to Emerald Circle Sorcery and Terrestrial martial arts. Note that this mutation (or enlightened Essence in general) is not necessary for a creature to raise its Essence rating. This mutation is not, by default, passed on through the blood; any creature who does inherit enlightened Essence (i.e. is born as an Essence-user) lacks a truly human soul and so cannot Exalt. Limited Awakening Cost: 2pts; Keywords: Spiritual, Negative, Internal, Requires Enlightened Essence The creature has free access to only one-third of its total motes. If it wishes to spend more than this, it must spend a single point of Willpower, freeing up the remainder for the rest of that scene. (Element)-Aspected Essence Cost: 1pt; Keywords: Spiritual, Negative, Requires Enlightened Essence The creature’s Essence is aspected toward a specific Element (or other metaphysically-potent aspect of Essence). It suffers the same out-of-aspect surcharges on martial arts as Dragon-bloods of the appropriate Aspect. Some Storyteller-interpretation may be necessary here; a Half-Caste with the Solar-Aspected Essence mutation will not have to pay a surcharge on Golden Janissary Style. Detecting this aspect with Essence-sight requires a (Perception + Occult) roll at difficulty (5 –creature’s Essence). Those Dynasts who fail to Exalt but awaken their own Essence nevertheless often bear this mutation appropriate to their Breeding. Anima Banner Cost: 1pt; Keywords: Spiritual, Negative, Internal, Requires Enlightened Essence The creature’s mote pool is split into Peripheral and Personal pools, consisting of two-thirds and one-third of its motes, respectively. Expending motes from the Peripheral pool produces a glowing anima banner (though the creature lacks an anima power of any kind), at the same intervals as a Lawgiver (Exalted, pp.114). The aesthetic of the anima is not that of an Exalt; most fundamentally, non-Exalted lack Caste Marks (though equivalent sparkles of power flicker about them at the appropriate levels of anima flare). Pure mortals tend toward colourless auras of power, but they are vanishingly rare in Creation nowadays; some in the Bureau of Nature doubt that there is a single human in Creation who does not carry at least a drop of Dragon’s blood, or remains untouched by Wyld taint, Lintha-strain, or genesis-meddling. Perhaps the hermit preserved in the amber-demesne of Mount Meru, but no-one else. Natural Attunement Cost: 2pts; Keywords: Spiritual, Internal Despite lacking access to an Essence pool, the creature can still attune to an artifact it owns. This requires the usual interval of time, and requires that the creature spend a single point of Willpower for every mote the artifact would normally need committed to it. This false attunement is less persistent than the real thing; it must be renewed at least once every (6 –artifact rating) weeks, breaks after only an hour’s bodily separation, and the artifact is not treated as attuned for the purposes of hostile or thieving powers targeting it. The creature can attune to a maximum of one artifact at a time in this fashion. This mutation is removed if the creature actually becomes enlightened, with xp refunded as normal. (Material) Resonance Cost: 1pt; Keywords: Spiritual, Requires Natural Attunement or Enlightened Essence The creature can gain the benefits of attuning to a single kind of magical material, as though it were the relevant variety of Exalt. NATIVITY MUTATIONS Native to (Realm) Cost: 0pts; Keywords: Spiritual, Internal By default, all creatures are native to Creation. This mutation renders them native to another realm of existence, such as the Underworld, Malfeas, Yu-Shan, Autochthonia, or Gnosis. This has no mechanical effects on its own, but some magics have greater, lesser, or altered effects when applied to creatures native to a certain realm. Limited Respiration Cost: 2-3pts; Keywords: Spiritual, Internal, Negative, Requires Native to (Realm) The creature can only naturally respire motes in its native realm of existence, and halves the number of motes it receives from manses or demesnes outside of its native realm. If it would already be limited in this respect (as with creatures of death), this mutation costs only two points. (Realm) Gatekeeper Cost: 2-3pts; Keywords: Spiritual, Internal, Stackable The creature can spend one point of Willpower (or two motes, if they are an Essence-user) to learn the general direction of the nearest passage to a single realm of existence, adding one automatic success to any navigation roll to locate it. This might be the nearest Heavenly Gate, the quickest way to Cecelyne through a place of desolation (the secret paths to Hell are not so easily uncovered), a shadowland, or some more obscure area. If the creature is native to that particular realm, this mutation costs only two points. Creature of Darkness Cost: 4pts; Keywords: Spiritual, Internal, Negative The creature (or its source, or its breed, or something that has contaminated it) has been marked as a threat to Creation by the Unconquered Sun. It is a creature of darkness, and thus more susceptible to Holy Essence. The exact effects of this vulnerability vary, but often mimic the results of the Vulnerability mutation. This mutation does not indicate any actual affinity toward darkness; the shining, rayborn hyll are creatures of darkness just as much as the Ebon Dragon. Most applications of this spiritual mutation carry the Natural keyword. Just as the Exalted do not pay bonus points for their awakened Essence, or gain them for having an anima, Exalted who are creatures of darkness or creatures of death do not gain bonus points in exchange for their state; their character creation system is a complete whole, needing no reference to this list of mutations. Creature of Death Cost: 1pt; Keywords: Spiritual, Internal, Negative Some things are dead, and some are alive, and some keep walking regardless. Normally, creatures respire Essence at half-rate in the Underworld. Creatures of death respire Essence at the normal rate in the Underworld, but at half-rate everywhere else. In addition, if a creature of death leaves a ghost when it dies, that ghost’s Essence rating is equal to their own, not reduced. Most creatures of death are also creatures of darkness, thanks to Sol’s fair disgust at their existence; similarly, most applications of this spiritual mutation carry the Natural keyword. Creature of the Wyld Cost: 2pts; Keywords: Spiritual, Internal, Negative All things can eventually trace their ancestry back to the Wyld, but this creature is more directly descended from chaos than most; of these entities, the raksha are the most well-known in Creation. Such creatures rely on the infinite energies and elastic physical laws of the Wyld; they suffer a poor reaction to the static, limited realms outside Pure Chaos. The specifics vary from creature to creature; for raksha, this takes the form of Stasis, while the abatwa undergo a more destructive conceptual combustion. If applied to a creature without any specific mechanics for it, simply treat this reaction as a two-point version of the Allergy mutation, reacting only to exposure to Creation. Again, most applications of this spiritual mutation carry the Natural keyword. PNEUMA MUTATIONS (Spirit) Sense Cost: 2-6pts; Keywords: Spiritual, Physical The creature can use one of its senses to detect one kind of immaterial being, at -1 internal penalty; it might smell demons, hear gods, or see ghosts. The four-point version of this mutation allows the creature to apply all of its senses to that kind of immaterial being, or one sense to all kinds of immaterial beings. The six-point version allows the creature to apply all its senses to all kinds of immaterial beings, though it still suffers the penalty. Complete Spirit Sense Cost: 1pt; Keywords: Spiritual, Physical, Requires (Spirit) Sense This mutation removes the -1 penalty from (Spirit) Sense. Chakra Eye Cost: 6pts; Keywords: Spiritual, Obvious The creature can spend three points of Willpower (or ten motes, for Essence-users) as a miscellaneous action to benefit from the effects of All-Encompassing Sorcerer’s Sight for the rest of the scene. This is accompanied by an Obvious display of some kind, most commonly in the form of the creature’s eyes (however many it may possess) glowing, or a mandalic design of veins throbbing into existence on its forehead. If the creature also has the six-point version of Spirit (Sense), this mutation’s cost is reduced by two. Awakened Vision Cost: 3pts; Keywords: Spiritual, Obvious, Requires Chakra Eye The activation cost of Chakra Eye is reduced to two points of Willpower, or six motes. Sorcerer’s Sight Cost: 1pt; Keywords: Spiritual, Obvious, Requires Awakened Vision The creature constantly benefits from the effects of its prerequisite (including its Obvious display), at no additional cost. If it had (Spirit) Sense, it may remove that mutation, with its experience cost refunded as normal. Spirit Walker Cost: 4pts; Keywords: Spiritual The creature can interact with immaterial things as though they were material, and vice-versa. This mutation grants no ability to actually perceive the immaterial, however. Marked for (Spirits) Cost: 2-3pts; Keywords: Spiritual This mutation consists of an immaterial mark, addressed to a specific spirit or variety of spirit (no broader than a single demon breed or godly job title), with similar effects to the one placed by Plague of Menaces (Books of Sorcery: Roll of Glorious Divinities I, pp. 165). This mark need not be murderous in nature, however; it might ask that the spirit offer the creature shelter, or refuse to answer its questions, or report its location to their dark and forbidden mother. The three-point version of this mutation is addressed to all spirits of a given type; demons or elementals or gods or ghosts (or other, stranger things). This mutation gains the Negative keyword if the mark conveys something harmful to the creature who bears it. VIRTUE MUTATIONS Lacking (Virtue) Cost: 1pt; Keywords: Spiritual or Mental, Negative, Internal, Stackable An imbalance in the soul, or in the mind? Some savants claim they are much the same. One of the creature’s Virtues cannot be channeled, and is treated as having a rating of one for all purposes. An Exalt's Primary Virtue cannot be affected by this mutation. Overpowering (Virtue) Cost: 1pt; Keywords: Spiritual or Mental, Negative, Internal, Stackable, Devolve (Lacking [Virtue]) One of the creature’s Virtues always succeeds in its rolls (this does not affect its channels) and the cost to suppress it for a scene is increased to two points of Willpower. CHARM MUTATIONS Mutations cannot, by default, exactly mimic the effects of Charms. Most Charms (or similar powers, such as Paths) are expressions of the Essence-patterns of a given kind of entity, and thus are exclusive to it. Solars are the only ones who can learn Solar Charms, while Sidereals are the only ones who can learn Sidereal Charms, and they learn them as Charms, rather than mutations. There are, however, exceptions. Certain Charms apply mutations to creatures that mimic the effects of Charms, such as Locust Mana Plague, which provides the Charm Transcendent Desert Creature as a six-point mutation (Manual of Exalted Power: Infernals, pp. 127), or Two-And-A-Half Breaths Inversion, which provides the Arcanos Charm Dead Child’s Madness as a six-point mutation. Such mutations are always Spiritual. Charm mutations almost always cost six-points, though sometimes their functions may be split between multiple, separate mutation costs. The Charms that can be applied as mutations are generally Permanent, introducing some fundamental benefit or alteration to a creature’s operation. As such, these effects are most commonly found in Primordial Charm sets. However, the customisability of Spirit Charms means that they are sometimes used to model Essence-fuelled mutations granted by other Charms. In any case, Charm mutations are not “general” mutations, as with the ones presented throughout this revision. They are (as with other, similar ones, such as the [Grace] Bearer mutation) exclusive to the power that produces them; an Infernal might be able to colonize her servants souls with Cecelynian magic, but wandering into Chaos would not. W.H. Auden wrote: To present the conflict between Good and Evil as a war in which the good side is ultimately victorious is a ticklish business. Our historical experience tells us that physical power and, to a large extent, mental power are morally neutral and effectively real: wars are won by the stronger side, just or unjust.
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Revlid		Thursday, January 26, 2012 2:59:54 AM(UTC) #6
		IT WAS THE MONSTER MASH (the Genesis system) What follows is a brief system for generating creatures using the mutations described above. Storytellers can use it to produce monsters as they please (though as with all mechanics the Storyteller interacts with, it is mostly a system of guidelines rather than outright restrictions), while players will sometimes gain access to Charms or other magic allowing them to produce monsters or animals, such as Goblin-and-Ghoul Manufacture, or Great Mother’s Wame. Characters can also craft their own monsters through Medicine, as described later. Creatures created through the Genesis system, whether in the laboratories of disgraced Shogunate scientists, the island-wombs of Kimbery, or the mad dreams of the Wyld, each possess a rating. This “Genesis rating” determines a creature’s capabilities, providing them with points to spend on their traits and mutations. It also determines how difficult it is to create that creature; in this sense it acts as a rough analogue to an Artifact rating. To design a creature, determine its Genesis rating, and then consult the creation template below (or vice-versa). GENESIS CREATION TEMPLATE Mutations: Each creature starts with (Genesis rating x 5) mutation points, which it may spend on mutations in any way it pleases. It may also expend these points to increase its Attributes or Willpower, as described below. Negative mutations can offset this total cost, but cannot increase the total maximum by more than half. Attributes: Each creature starts with all its Attributes rated at 1 (or 0, if its player wishes). It may raise these traits by spending mutation points, at a rate of one point per dot (or two points per dot for Dexterity), to a maximum rating of 5 or (Genesis), whichever is higher. Abilities: Each creature starts with all its Abilities rated at 0, but may distribute up to (Genesis rating x 4) dots between these Abilities as it pleases. None may be raised higher than the creature’s Genesis rating or 10, whichever would be lower. Up to (Genesis) of these dots can be freely converted into mutation points, which can then be spent normally. Attacks: Creatures have the usual three natural attacks. Health Levels: Each creature starts with the normal seven health levels: -0/-1/-1/-2/-2/-4/Incap. These health levels are reduced, as normal, if they are used as extras. Virtues: Each creature starts with its Virtues rated at 1, but may raise these traits by spending mutation points, at a rate of one point per dot, to a maximum of 5 each. Willpower: Each creature starts with Willpower 2, but may raise this trait by spending mutation points, at a rate of one point per dot up to Willpower 5, or two points per dot past that, to a maximum rating of ten. Essence: Each creature starts with Essence 1, but may raise this trait (to a normal maximum of 3) by spending mutation points, at a rate of six points per dot. Creatures are unenlightened by default. Creatures possess Motivations appropriate to their Virtues and Intelligence; most base animals will lack a Motivation any more complex than “survive”, while smarter and more passionate entities may develop their own Motivations. Magic that creates beings wholesale often carries a ready-made Motivation along with it; by default, the creator has no control over a creature's Motivation. Creatures develop intimacies as normal. The appearance and effects of applied mutations assume an essentially humanoid form is being used as a base; this is for simplicity’s sake, not a representation of how Genesis actually works in a world constructed by supersapient geography. ALL CREATURES GREAT AND SMALL (example creatures) What follows is a few examples of mundane creatures that might be created through this method. Bear (Genesis 4) Strength 5, Dexterity 2, Stamina 3 Charisma 3, Manipulation 1, Appearance 1 Perception 2, Intelligence 1, Wits 2 Athletics 2, Awareness 2, Integrity 2, Investigation 2, Martial Arts 3, Presence 3, Resistance 3, Survival 3 Valor 3, Conviction 1, Compassion 1, Temperance 1 Willpower 4, Essence 1 Large (3), Lethal Attack (3), Intimidating Roar [Presence Adaptation] (3), Snuffling Snout [Investigation Adaptation] (2), Natural Armour (3), Painless (2), Bear-tongue (0) Large Appetite (-1), No Opposable Thumbs (-6) Crow (Genesis 3) Strength 1, Dexterity 3, Stamina 2 Charisma 1, Manipulation 2, Appearance 1 Perception 2, Intelligence 1, Wits 3 Athletics 3, Awareness 2, Dodge 2, Martial Arts 1, Resistance 1, Stealth 1, Survival 2 Valor 1, Conviction 1, Compassion 1, Temperance 1 Willpower 3, Essence 1 Glider (4), Flier (4), Bird-tongue (0) Small (-3) Horse (Genesis 3) Strength 4, Dexterity 4, Stamina 3 Charisma 1, Manipulation 1, Appearance 2 Perception 2, Intelligence 1, Wits 3 Athletics 3, Awareness 2, Dodge 1, Martial Arts 1, Presence 1, Resistance 2, Survival 2 Valor 2, Conviction 1, Compassion 1, Temperance 1 Willpower 2, Essence 1 Large (1), Fast Running (4), Steady (1), Horse-tongue (0) Herbivore (-1), No Opposable Thumbs (-6) Siaka (Genesis 6) Strength 6, Dexterity 4, Stamina 4 Charisma 2, Manipulation 1, Appearance 1 Perception 4, Intelligence 1, Wits 2 Athletics 3, Awareness 2, Dodge 2, Integrity 2, Investigation 3, Martial Arts 3, Presence 1, Resistance 3, Stealth 2, Survival 3 Valor 3, Conviction 5, Compassion 1, Temperance 1 Willpower 5, Essence 1 Large (6), Lethal Attack (3), Inexhaustible (1), Water Breather (2), Blood Sense [Investigation Adaptation] (3), Fast Swimmer (2), Shark-tongue (0) Carnivore (-1), No Opposable Thumbs (-6), Air Drowner (-5), Slow Runner (-3) Tyrant Lizard (Genesis 7) Strength 7, Dexterity 3, Stamina 6 Charisma 3, Manipulation 1, Appearance 1 Perception 3, Intelligence 1, Wits 2 Athletics 3, Awareness 2, Dodge 1, Integrity 2, Investigation 2, Martial Arts 5, Presence 5, Resistance 4, Survival 3 Valor 3, Conviction 1, Compassion 1, Temperance 1 Willpower 4, Essence 1 Large (6), Giant (4), Lethal Attack (3), Superior Soak (2), Natural Armour (4), Fast Runner (1), Tyrant-tongue (0) Carnivore (-1), Poor Sight [Awareness Adaptation] (-3), Cold Sensitivity (-1), Large Appetite (-3) Zombie (Genesis 2) Strength 5, Dexterity 2, Stamina 3 Charisma 0, Manipulation 0, Appearance 0 Perception 2, Intelligence 1, Wits 3 Athletics 1, Awareness 1, Dodge 1, Martial Arts 2, Melee 1, Resistance 1, Stealth 1 Valor 1, Conviction 1, Compassion 1, Temperance 1 Willpower 2, Essence 1 Deathly Construct (0) Slow Running (-1) WE BELONG DEAD (making creatures with genesis and necrotech) Building a creature from scratch requires a Medicine workshop of at least exceptional quality, along with raw materials with a total Resources cost equal to half the Genesis rating of the creature, rounded up to a maximum of five. Creatures with a Genesis rating higher than six also require ([Genesis rating - 5] ÷ 3) appropriate exotic ingredients, rounded up to a maximum of five. Such creatures are not actually artifacts, but require a similar degree of exotic investment. Examples of exotic ingredients might include demon's blood, the hair of an animal avatar, or divine fire for incubation. A prospective genitor cannot build a creature with a Genesis rating more than twice his Occult rating (plus any relevant specialties). Making the creature is an extended roll, with an interval of one month and a cumulative difficulty of (Genesis rating x 10). It uses dice pool of (Intelligence + Medicine), at a difficulty of (Genesis rating + 2). A botch halves the number of currently accumulated successes or decreases it by (Genesis), whichever would be higher; if this would reduce the accumulated successes below zero, the creation fails, and any resources expended on it are wrecked. Despite not being a craft project, the difficulty of making creatures through Genesis can be decreased with existing plans as normal. When the roll is complete, the creature is birthed, decanted, solidified, hatched, animated, or whatever word best describes the process of its completion. Just as with other mundane crafts, genesis (or necrotech) creations require no expenditure of experience points on the part of their creator, unless such a creature becomes part of a Background; a Familiar or Follower or Ally, in which case it is tied to them and costs experience points as normal for that Background. EVERY LIVING CREATURE THAT MOVES (creating a race) Creating a new species functions in the same way as creating a single creature, but in bulk; a creator can produce multiple examples of a single template for which she possesses existing plans with a single extended roll. Doing so increases the effective Genesis rating of the creature for the purpose of calculating the cumulative difficulty and Resources cost by (number of additional creatures x [Genesis rating ÷ 5]), rounded up. Therefore, creating eight Genesis 2 creatures would effectively be a Genesis 9 project for the purposes of cumulative difficulty and resources cost, while creating four Genesis 7 creatures would effectively be Genesis 15 for those purposes. SECRET OF THE OOZE (applying mutations to existing characters) Another way to use Genesis is to apply physical mutations to an existing creature. Whether adding wings to a horse, hooves to a bird, or a drooling carnivorous maw to a bonsai tree, applying mutations requires a subject who is either willing, or restrained for the duration of the operation. A genesis operation requires exceptional Medicine tools or a fine Medicine workshop, as well as raw materials with a Resources value of (M - 1), to a minimum of 1 and a maximum of 5. Such an operation can take many forms; one genitor might take to a patient with thaumaturgically-infused scalpels and syringes, while a less sophiscated practitioner might daub the ritually tattooed shoulderblades of a subject in gooseblood and have him consume nothing but quills and egg-whites. Floaty tubes of indeterminate liquid were a common element in the First Age. Whatever its form, this kind of Genesis operation is an extended roll with an interval of (M) days, a difficulty of (M + 3), a cumulative difficulty of (M x 5) and a dice pool of (Intelligence + Medicine). Although multiple mutations can be applied with a single operation (with their costs combining to form M for the purposes of the operation), the maximum cost of mutations that can be applied in a single operation is equal to the genitor’s (Occult +1). Negative mutations reduce the total cost of these mutations for the purposes of determining difficulty, but count toward the total cost for the purposes of determining cumulative difficulty, intervals, and how many mutations can be applied in a single operation. The creature suffers (M) unsoakable dice of lethal damage at every interval, making death mid-operation a very real risk; this is effectively internal surgery, and carries all those risks (Exalted, pp. 137), whether through the patient bleeding out on the slab, or having feathers grow into the lining of the stomach. As such, pausing the operation to administer medical aid (or simply go back to the biothaumaturgic drawing board) is not unusual. The genitor may put the operation on hold mid-interval, though he loses one of his accumulated successes for every day (past the first in a given interval) that he is not actively working on the operation. The creature is not treated as being at rest for the purposes of healing while it is being worked on. A genitor with access to an appropriate workshop (i.e. a surgery or actual genesis-lab) can double the length of the interval to reduce the difficulty of the roll by one. Once the operation is complete, the mutations fully manifest (or set in, or become functional) over the next (M) days, at a rate of one mutation point per day. As permanent mutations, they cost experience points, paid as a Training effect. Physical mutations applied through Genesis carry the Natural keyword. MY DAD’S DENIM TROUSERS (inheriting mutations) By default, all permanent mutations can be passed on to a creature's offspring, regardless of their source; this is the foundation of the mutant tribes produced by demesnes and marches. So long as two creatures share a common ancestor, they can breed (and even such loose distinctions are removed by the Wyld); a cat that has developed an octopus-beak and a tentacle-tail can breed perfectly well with an ordinary moggy. Generally, the Storyteller should combine the total points of mutations possessed by both parents, and then divide this total by two (rounded up) to determine the child's mutation points; in the cat example given earlier, the kitten might have an octopus beak, but lack a tentacle tail; with a few more generations, the mutations might be almost entirely bred out. This is only a guideline, however; Storytellers should feel free to dictate different terms of inheritance as they please, excluding certain mutations or sources of mutation from being inherited, allowing children with "all the strengths, and none of the weaknesses", or producing consequences for inbreeding with heretofore-unseen negative mutations. The obvious exception to the "all mutations are inheritable" rule is for mutations that are not actually mutations, but simply used to represent different effects; amputated limbs, addictions, prosthetics, enlightenment, trauma (physical or otherwise), or learned skills such as improved memory. For reference, here are a few examples of how engineered races, beastmen, or mutant tribes of the Age of Sorrows would be built in character creation: Air People: Enhanced Sight (1), Flier (4), Glider (4), Fragile (-3) = 4bp Dune People: Albino (0), Night Vision (2), Sunlight Allergy (-1), Sunlight Sensitivity (-1) = 0bp Earth People: Lethal Light Attack (2), Slate Skin (0), Superior Soak (2), Wall-Crawler (2) = 4bp Sea People: Natural Swimmer (4), Water Breather (2) = 4bp Tree Folk: Ambidexterity (1), Green Skin (0), Omnidexterity (2) = 2bp Djala: Ambidextrous (1), Longevity (3), Spotted Skin (0), Small (-1) = 2bp Arczeckhi: Enhanced Hearing (1), Fast Running (1), Forest Native (1), Lethal Attacks (3), Night Vision (2), Lacking Compassion (-1), Personal Detachment (-1) = 4bp Snakemen: Desert or Forest Native (1), Enhanced Smell (1), Lethal Clinch (2), Natural Armour (1), Cold Sensitivity (-2) = 2bp EVEN GOD HAS A SENSE OF HUMOUR (further mutations) Again, the list of mutations above is not comprehensive, and likely never can be; if a player or Storyteller requires an effect in their mutations that is not catered for above, or needs to be more specific, they should feel free to create their own mutations, using the guidelines provided. On the other end of the scale, if Storytellers feel their players are abusing the intent of this system, they are encouraged to find ways to trip them up with the logical holes in their creations, or else simply put their foot down and ban certain combinations; all efforts have been made to keep the system balanced, but the ingeniousness of gamers knows no boundaries. INDISTINGUISHABLE FROM BADLY-WRITTEN SCIENCE (charms) Below are seven Charms designed to interact with the Genesis system, for Solars, Abyssals and Infernals. Terrestrials and Sidereals have less call for such native magics, while Lunars have one of the greater claims to such Genesis-powers, but are pending errata. The Alchemical Charm Integrated Genesis System is unchanged, but replaces references to "Craft (Genesis)" with "Medicine" or "the Genesis system", as appropriate. Other than the effects presented below, Genesis-relevant Charms might reduce the minimum ratings necessary for a roll, reduce the investment (exotic and otherwise) necessary for each project, allow the addition of unique mutations or actual magic to a creature, ensure certain intimacies or Motivations in a creation, or other effects. As a major obstacle and balancing-point of the theoretically-unlimited creature-building facet of the Genesis system is its relatively high difficulty, effects that substantially reduce (or entirely eliminate) this difficulty should be subject to serious consideration. Altered Solar Charm! SCIENCE OF MUTATION replace the text of the Charm with the following: Cost: — (10m); Mins: Medicine 4, Essence 3; Type: Permanent Keywords: Shaping, Touch Duration: Permanent Prerequisite Charms: Wholeness-Restoring Meditation This Charm permanently enhances Wholeness-Restoring Meditation, allowing the Solar to use it to remove individual physical mutations as though they were ordinarily-incurable Crippling effects. Mutations with a cost lower than the Solar's (Essence) are treated as removable Crippling effects. If the Solar wishes, she may increase the difficulty of such an operation by two to perform it on a pregnant character, removing mutations from the unborn offspring. At Medicine 5+, Essence 4+, this Charm also allows a Solar to spend ten motes to enhance a single interval in a Genesis operation to add mutations to an existing creature. If he does so, the difficulty of the roll is reduced to one, and its interval is reduced to one hour. Such an enhanced operation also removes the limit on how many mutations the Solar can add in a single operation, though the target still takes (M) dice of lethal damage at the end of the interval. New Abyssal Charms! BONE-AND-CERAMICS ANIMATION Cost: — ; Mins: Medicine 5, Essence 4; Type: Permanent Keywords: Shaping Duration: Permanent Prerequisite Charms: Life-Mocking Assembly The dark inventiveness of the Abyssal Exalted knows no boundaries. This Charm permanently enhances its prerequisite, removing the Spectral keyword. Further, the Abyssal may, instead of producing a zombie, produce any creature that he has existing plans for with a Genesis rating of no more than (Essence ÷ 2) rounded up, allowing a deathknight to hatch skin-hounds from the ribcages of his enemies, weave bone-serpents from sundered skeletons, or fuse broken armour with twitching nerves into diminutive gore-moppets. Any creatures made with this Charm must always have the Creature of Darkness and Creature of Death mutations; most will be outright Deathly Constructs, though greater elegance or intelligence is entirely possible. A second purchase of this Charm allows the Abyssal to produce multiple creatures from a single corpse, so long as their total combined Genesis rating remains no more than (Essence ÷ 2). MORBID MONSTER REMODELING Cost: — ; Mins: Medicine 5, Essence 3; Type: Permanent Keywords: None Duration: Permanent Prerequisite Charms: Ivory Whirlwind Restoration At the deathknight's direction, the rotting meat of zombies and the half-dead rearranges itself to reflect the abominable nature of their existence. This Charm permanently enhances its prerequisite, allowing the Abyssal to use its second function to perform a Genesis operation to add permanent physical mutations on the affected body-parts with a single, instantaneous interval, which inflicts no damage, and ignores the need for a workshop or any raw materials other than the dead tissue the deathknight is using to redesign his target's body. He may also freely remove any mutations on the remodeled body-parts. As the tissue for these mutations is drawn from dead bodies they generally have some obviously necrotic aspect, as with the prosthetics applied by Bone Graft Technique, producing tentacles made of repurposed spines, poison glands formed from withered kidneys, and fur made from dozens of reconstituted scalps. New Kimbery Charms! GREAT MOTHER'S WAME Cost: 2m; Mins: Essence 2; Type: Simple Keywords: Desecration, Obvious Duration: Indefinite Prerequisite Charms: Intolerable Burning Truths (Mother Before Daughter) Some claim Kimbery is barren, but her darkest depths are dotted with unholy tentacle-lined wombs that teem with brewing horrors. For the duration of this Charm, the Infernal manifests an unsightly bulge somewhere on her body, swollen with primordial ooze. She may use this womb to build creatures through the genesis system, treating it as a master’s Medicine workshop for this purpose. She reduces the Resources cost of creating such creatures by (Essence), to a minimum of zero, and must ingest any raw materials or exotic ingredients, routed through the Infernal’s system to the nascent creature (the reproductive material of appropriate powerful individuals is a perfect exotic ingredient for such a project, and results in the birthed creature being considered the offspring of the donor and the Infernal). This brewing of hellish lifeforms is a natural act, allowing the warlock to use her Stamina in place of her Intelligence, and increasing her effective Occult rating by (Essence). The rolls for this project are made independently to anything else the Infernal is doing (indeed, she need not even be conscious). Once the project is completed, the creature emerges into the world, tearing itself out of the deflating flesh-sack, being expelled through an open pore, or being birthed more conventionally. Regardless of the method of its exit, it causes no harm to the Infernal; even a ruptured chest will seal itself as a cosmetic injury. The act of the creature's birth is a Desecration effect; if it was not already a creature of darkness, it is now. This Charm has no restriction on gender, though women can hide the Obvious nature of the Charm by disguising it as a natural pregnancy. Similarly, there are no restrictions on size, as the womb distends and folds into Elsewhere to hold all manner of monstrosities without ever inflicting a mobility penalty or increasing the warlock’s necessary food intake; it is fuelled and supported by her Essence. The alien womb may hold only one creature at a time; it cannot produce in bulk. Just as with a natural pregnancy, Crippling amputation effects (such as a maiming coup de grace) may be used to target and abort a creature in the womb, messily reducing it to the slime from whence it was formed. If the Infernal is carrying more than one creature at once thanks to an upgrade Charm, each Crippling effect only destroys a single creature, chosen by the warlock herself upon the application of the effect; never let it be said that Kimbery does not play favourites. Ending this Charm before the completion of a project-child has much the same effect, ending all extant projects prematurely. A warlock may also use this Charm to conceive immaculately, impregnating herself with an otherwise normal baby (this counts as a project, blocking the use of the womb-lab for the duration of the pregnancy). The gestation period for such a child is as normal, though the warlock may apply mutations to the child in the womb, using the rules for mutating existing creatures (and may include the Short Gestation mutation, to hasten the pregnancy). TEEMING SEA-HAG PLURIPAROSITY Cost: — ; Mins: Essence 3; Type: Permanent Keywords: None Duration: Permanent Prerequisite Charms: Great Mother's Wame Kimbery’s depths are without fathom, the monstrosities that populate her without number. This Charm permanently enhances its prerequisite, allowing the Infernal to bear multiple creatures within herself at once, whether by allowing her monstrous children to crawl about in her womb like a pack of shark foeti, or growing multiple tumourous bellies to hold her offspring. She may produce creatures in bulk as detailed in the Genesis rules, or work on up to (Essence) entirely separate projects. If the Infernal’s body is large enough for her to be counted as a mass combat unit, she may do both. If she is landscape-scale, she reduces the effective number of additional creatures for bulk-production in each project by (Essence). SWALLOWED CHILDREN REBORN Cost: — ; Mins: Essence 2; Type: Permanent Keywords: Desecration Duration: Permanent Prerequisite Charms: Great Mother's Wame When Kimbery looks upon something that mispleases her, wanton destruction is seldom her response. No, so long as she has not been actively crossed, the Sea that Marched Against the Flame is a more constructive titan, willing to take the symmetrical misfits of the world into her melting embrace and remake them, unweaving their paltry genetics to produce something new and impressive. The warlock may force another living character of roughly the same size as her or smaller into her womb-lab, whether by opening up a gaping pore or simply swallowing them. This is a clinch attempt which can only be made against a willing or incapacitated character. Within the womb, the character is held in liquid stasis, rendering them incapacitated for the duration of their stay. Once a character is in the womb, the Infernal may apply mutations to them as a Genesis operation and Desecration effect, with all the normal benefits of Great Mother's Wame; the master's workshop, reduced Resources cost, replacement of traits, etc. Such operations use an interval of only an hour, and inflict no damage on their subject. The warlock may perform as many separate operations as she wishes, for as long as the character remains inside her. Once the warlock is satisfied, the swallowed character is rebirthed as normal. Aside from being mutated and coated in disgusting fluids, they are in perfect health. If the project is aborted with a Crippling effect, the character in question is immediately ejected, with the current operation ended before any mutations could be applied. If the warlock knows Sea Dissolves Herself, then she can use them to reject Shaping effects and remove mutations from swallowed characters just as though they were her. As an alternative measure, if the swallowed character is reviled, the Infernal may pay a single point of temporary Willpower to dissolve them into a nutritious broth of ill-feeling, which she may then use as a single exotic ingredient in another Genesis project. This is a Shaping attack, taking one full day to complete. FORGIVENESS IN FORM Cost: — ; Mins: Essence 2; Type: Permanent Keywords: None Duration: Permanent Prerequisite Charms: Swallowed Children Reborn Once, there was a Wood-Aspect Shogun, whose mother was Ghisuge, the Lady of Tails and one of Kimbery’s own souls. As his life drew to an end, he begged to be forgiven for the sin of not submitting to the glory of his grandmother. Kimbery, infinite in her compassion, assented, and drew him back into his mother’s womb, to be reborn again. The child that emerged was a favoured grandson, and doted on until he returned to Creation, to wander the bogs. If a reviled character swallowed using this Charm’s prerequisite willingly submitted (regardless of any mental influence that might have compelled) to his reshaping within the womb-lab, then upon being mutated and rebirthed, the Infernal loses any negative intimacies she might have toward him as he becomes beloved once more. Obviously, use of this Charm does not preclude the reborn character becoming reviled once more through their own selfish failings; Kimbery is too forgiving for her own good, at times. This entire post written with thanks to Dustin Shampel, who wrote the original necrotech mechanics it pillages so heavily from. W.H. Auden wrote: To present the conflict between Good and Evil as a war in which the good side is ultimately victorious is a ticklish business. Our historical experience tells us that physical power and, to a large extent, mental power are morally neutral and effectively real: wars are won by the stronger side, just or unjust.
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Revlid		Thursday, January 26, 2012 3:01:44 AM(UTC) #7
		So yeah, this is the start (and hopefully, bulk) of my attempt to tackle mutations, and pull them together into a more cohesive and customisable system. All commentary is, as ever, welcome! If all goes well, and I get mental and spiritual mutations done, I'll get started on the Genesis system mentioned once or twice above; basically consolidating Necrotech and Genesis into a single "build a monster" system. Which, not coincidentally, will also have applications to my ideas for raksha shaping combat. W.H. Auden wrote: To present the conflict between Good and Evil as a war in which the good side is ultimately victorious is a ticklish business. Our historical experience tells us that physical power and, to a large extent, mental power are morally neutral and effectively real: wars are won by the stronger side, just or unjust.
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notthepenguins		Thursday, January 26, 2012 3:26:47 AM(UTC) #8
		Revlid wrote: So yeah, this is the start (and hopefully, bulk) of my attempt to tackle mutations, and pull them together into a more cohesive and customisable system. All commentary is, as ever, welcome! If all goes well, and I get mental and spiritual mutations done, I'll get started on the Genesis system mentioned once or twice above; basically consolidating Necrotech and Genesis into a single "build a monster" system. Which, not coincidentally, will also have applications to my ideas for raksha shaping combat. This. This is really cool. Once, there was a maiden... who spent all her time on the internet. "Someone out there is WRONG," she said. So she tossed a noose made of golden light... and strangled her opponent. Both of them died alone. "Love is for football players and cheerleaders," her obituary said. I've promised to provide feedback to anyone whose Exalted-forum-based work is being ignored. PM me if you want my opinion on whatever you've done.


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Tiresias		Thursday, January 26, 2012 4:02:02 AM(UTC) #9
		Revlid wrote: an organic, muscular jetpack. Well, you have my unconditional approval.


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Kukla		Thursday, January 26, 2012 4:17:28 AM(UTC) #10
		Size mutations continue to be difficult to implement cleanly, I see. Come check out Myriad Song, a retro-styled science fiction RPG. Or, go straight to our Kickstarter. Exalted art and commissions by Myrrh. Kukla-Tested, Kukla-Approved. Prices ranging from $10 for sketched busts to $70 for color figures.


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Revlid		Thursday, January 26, 2012 4:28:48 AM(UTC) #11
		Kukla wrote: Size mutations continue to be difficult to implement cleanly, I see. They're troublesome but necessary, yes. W.H. Auden wrote: To present the conflict between Good and Evil as a war in which the good side is ultimately victorious is a ticklish business. Our historical experience tells us that physical power and, to a large extent, mental power are morally neutral and effectively real: wars are won by the stronger side, just or unjust.


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The Invisible Voice		Thursday, January 26, 2012 4:50:40 AM(UTC) #12
		I've started working on something similar, albeit more slowly, for a similar end. I wonder if I should wait until you do the brunt of the work and see if I want to adapt yours, or finish mine and then check back to see how similar our designs are. Kukla wrote: Congratulations! You're dumb as hell! You win a free Mardukth!
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WarDragon		Thursday, January 26, 2012 5:40:33 AM(UTC) #13
		Pray continue, sir. Sometimes it helps to ask yourself, "What Would The Ebon Dragon Do?" and then do the opposite of that. -Luna (speaking through Wise Old Guru)


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Schleiermacher		Thursday, January 26, 2012 12:58:16 PM(UTC) #14
		This is wonderful.


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vegetalss4		Thursday, January 26, 2012 1:22:15 PM(UTC) #15
		This is seems like great work. JimB wrote: What? Goofy? How is goofy the usual fashion around here? We're always as solemn and serious as mourners at the pope's funeral. I'd never be silly or ironic around here: That would be disrespectful to the inherent dignity and gravity of our shared hobby of playing make-believe superheroes.


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Arrghus		Thursday, January 26, 2012 2:06:36 PM(UTC) #16
		Cool, flexible and powerful, but a little boring, reference-rain aside. Is there any way to spruce it up, you think? Arrghus will never threaten to stab you, and in fact, cannot hate. Arrghus has begun using 'zon' instead of he, she, his, her, etc.. There is no reason for this, it's just silliness. Avatar by kaidenmoon on DeviantArt. Used with permission. Author of the Slayers Style Spell Chants and Personalizing Solar Charms threads.


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Kukla		Thursday, January 26, 2012 2:46:47 PM(UTC) #17
		Revlid wrote: Kukla wrote: Size mutations continue to be difficult to implement cleanly, I see. They're troublesome but necessary, yes. Necessary indeed, and damn the square-cube law. It looks like there are some typoes, tho. :C So, to be clear - after someone spends 20 mutation points on Large, they've: Multiplied their size in every dimension by six. Have +20 to Strength and Stamina. Have +20 to Move and Dash speed. Have 5 each of -0, -1, -2, -3, and -4 health levels Have -20 to their Dodge, Parry, and Stealth pools, as well as fine manipulation pools Have 10 yards of close combat reach, which is a little strange because they aren't even ten yards tall? And - once you spend 4 mutation points on Small, you have reduced your size by 100% and no longer exist. So I'm not sure how that works. Come check out Myriad Song, a retro-styled science fiction RPG. Or, go straight to our Kickstarter. Exalted art and commissions by Myrrh. Kukla-Tested, Kukla-Approved. Prices ranging from $10 for sketched busts to $70 for color figures.
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Synapse		Thursday, January 26, 2012 2:48:21 PM(UTC) #18
		Shifting is all the wonders for me. Is it new to Rev's Revision? ShadowDragon8685 wrote: ...never miss a good riot. It's like missing a Cynis orgy. So she didn't lose her head after all.


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Octopoid		Thursday, January 26, 2012 2:58:35 PM(UTC) #19
		Revlid, I love you. Mockery wrote: DISCLAIMER: I am obviously not a well-rounded sample group unto myself. And while Maddy has a more sizeable sample population, it obviously contains its own population biases. So does Octopoid's. Neither of theirs--nor this forum!--are really inherently representative of the player base as a whole.
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Raziere		Thursday, January 26, 2012 3:15:07 PM(UTC) #20
		Cosmetic mutations are free eh? Cool, if only for that. and if its more customizable than the current mutation system, then I'm really going to like it, cause its customizable as it is already, so something even more customizable will be even better. Sol give me the Temperance to accept the things I cannot change. Valor, for the things I can, and the wisdom to tell the difference. Raziere Project Index
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Taliesin		Thursday, January 26, 2012 3:34:37 PM(UTC) #21
		I like it alot. Revlid, when my group tackles Lunars, may we plunder your ideas for our revision? Sojiko: Best theory I've heard on that topic yet, Taliesin. Nice one. Eldagusto: That is Awesome! Kukla: You own, Taliesin. :D ATrainToCatch: My God, that was more than I could wish for! Thank you very much! You are awesome! Exalted Rewrite: Rules (Rules-pdfs in the first post) Background


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Imrix		Thursday, January 26, 2012 3:37:53 PM(UTC) #22
		Revlid wrote: organic, muscular jetpack. Birds have wings. Man has jetpack. Revlid wrote: By default, every character has the following natural attacks: Light Attack: Speed 5, Accuracy +1, Damage +0B, Defense +2, Rate 3, Tags N Heavy Attack: Speed 5, Accuracy +0, Damage +3B, Defense +0, Rate 2, Tags N Clinch Attack: Speed 6, Accuracy +0, Damage +0B, Defense —, Rate 1, Tags C, N, P Ignoring, for a moment, that the proper names are Punch, Kick and Clinch, the values here are wrong. Kick attacks have a defense of -2. Other than that, I really like it. And seriously, I've tried contacting you every which way I can think of. Can you please at least tell me what's going on? There are no problems, only plothooks. Terrifying Argent Witches Hub Dex Davican wrote: I need them for my collection: Enormous Gonads of 2012: A Retrospective.
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Aleph		Thursday, January 26, 2012 4:42:10 PM(UTC) #23
		Kukla wrote: And - once you spend 4 mutation points on Small, you have reduced your size by 100% and no longer exist. So I'm not sure how that works. 25% reduction in size x 4 does not equal 0. Effectively, you're multiplying your height by 0.75 each time. So with a starting height of 175cm (5'9"), the first purchase takes you down to 131cm (4'4"). The second takes you further down to 98cm (3'3") and by the third you're 74cm (2'5"). Finally, with the fourth point, you're left at a miniscule 55cm (1'10"), and can probably be dropkicked some considerable distance by anyone with an urge to play midget football (looking at you, First Age Celestials). As to the Large values, there you're multiplying your height by 1.25 each time. So with 20 mutation points sunk on it, you'd be a towering 151 metres tall - verging on 500 feet. At a more reasonable estimate, 4 purchases of Large take you to 4.27m, or 14 feet. Scary, and probably large enough to look in through first floor windows. A good-sized "giant mutant" for players to fight, more than twice the size of any normal human. "Adorjan is a 5000-year old, Kit is 17. That fails the Half Age +8 Test so bad that there has to be a new category for it." -- Earthscorpion, referring to my Scourge's schoolgirl crush on her patron. "Fanfiction is what literature might look like if it were reinvented from scratch after a nuclear apocalypse by a band of brilliant pop-culture junkies trapped in a sealed bunker."
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Synapse		Thursday, January 26, 2012 5:04:59 PM(UTC) #24
		For calculation simplicity, your Small Size is 0.75^M and your Large Size is 1.25^M (up to 20). You can choose your final size and calculate the necessary mutation with a simple logarithm. ShadowDragon8685 wrote: ...never miss a good riot. It's like missing a Cynis orgy. So she didn't lose her head after all.
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Imrix		Thursday, January 26, 2012 5:13:37 PM(UTC) #25
		No, for calculation simplicity you simply realize that the multipliers are applied one after another, not all at once. So, you reduce your size by 25% with the first purchase, and then you reduce your new size by a further 25% with the second purchase. Or at least, that's how you write it to avoid mutating yourself smaller than the minimum existence threshold. Jeeze, you people with your decimals and your ^'s. EDIT: I think Revlid rewrote those mutations There are no problems, only plothooks. Terrifying Argent Witches Hub Dex Davican wrote: I need them for my collection: Enormous Gonads of 2012: A Retrospective.
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Kukla		Thursday, January 26, 2012 5:33:21 PM(UTC) #26
		I know what an exponent is, and the functions described in the Large and Small mutations are not exponential growth. They are clearly linear functions, piecewise linear for Large, and for the Small mutation that culminates in dropping to zero for M=4, so THPPPPT. :P Anyway, I'm sure Revlid will fix it whenever he pops on nexxt. Come check out Myriad Song, a retro-styled science fiction RPG. Or, go straight to our Kickstarter. Exalted art and commissions by Myrrh. Kukla-Tested, Kukla-Approved. Prices ranging from $10 for sketched busts to $70 for color figures.


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Revlid		Thursday, January 26, 2012 5:38:21 PM(UTC) #27
		Size mutation is altered a bit. To clarify; the increase in size and weight is done all at once. So if you purchase a 5-point Large, your size will increase by 125% (to 225%). While a 12-point Large will increase it by 600% (to 700%) Assuming a base height of six foot for simplicity... Large 0 = 2 yards tall = 6 feet tall Large 1 = 2.5 yards tall = 7.5 feet tall Large 2 = 3 yards tall = 9 feet tall Large 3 = 3.5 yards tall = 10.5 feet tall Large 4 = 4 yards tall = 12 feet tall Large 5 = 4.5 yards tall = 13.5 feet tall Large 10 = 7 yards tall = 21 feet tall Large 16 = 18 yards tall = 54 feet tall Large 20 = 22 yards tall = 66 feet tall Large 24 = 38 yards tall = 114 feet tall Large 30 = 47 yards tall = 141 feet tall Large 40 = 82 yards tall = 246 feet tall Meanwhile, Small has been clarified, as I realized that the Devolve keyword that I myself had written allowed me to ignore any need to account for larger creatures, herp derp. Imrix wrote: Ignoring, for a moment, that the proper names are Punch, Kick and Clinch, the values here are wrong. Kick attacks have a defense of -2. Fixed. "Punch" and "Kick" seemed a bit nonsensical in a system that expects the use of tentacles, blade-arms, hooves, crab-claws, and miscellaneous pseudopodia. Taking the bash-em-up naming scheme feels more appropriate. Imrix wrote: And seriously, I've tried contacting you every which way I can think of. Can you please at least tell me what's going on? I should be able to get on Steam tomorrow. It's been a bit... hectic, over here. Synapse wrote: Shifting is all the wonders for me. Is it new to Rev's Revision? Yep. Taliesin wrote: I like it alot. Revlid, when my group tackles Lunars, may we plunder your ideas for our revision? Inspiration is a fundamental part of any writing. W.H. Auden wrote: To present the conflict between Good and Evil as a war in which the good side is ultimately victorious is a ticklish business. Our historical experience tells us that physical power and, to a large extent, mental power are morally neutral and effectively real: wars are won by the stronger side, just or unjust.
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Kukla		Thursday, January 26, 2012 5:49:25 PM(UTC) #28
		Revlid wrote: So if you purchase a 5-point Large, your size will increase by 125% (to 225%). While a 12-point Large will increase it by 600% (to 700%) Assuming a base height of six foot for simplicity... Large 0 = 2 yards tall = 6 feet tall ... Large 20 = 22 yards tall = 66 feet tall You jumped from 'each point is a 25% increase' to 'each point is a 50%' increase between the 5 point and 12 point modes. Dude what? Come check out Myriad Song, a retro-styled science fiction RPG. Or, go straight to our Kickstarter. Exalted art and commissions by Myrrh. Kukla-Tested, Kukla-Approved. Prices ranging from $10 for sketched busts to $70 for color figures.
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Imrix		Thursday, January 26, 2012 6:13:28 PM(UTC) #29
		Revlid wrote: "Punch" and "Kick" seemed a bit nonsensical in a system that expects the use of tentacles, blade-arms, hooves, crab-claws, and miscellaneous pseudopodia. Taking the bash-em-up naming scheme feels more appropriate. Agreed, just thought it warranted comment. Revlid wrote: I should be able to get on Steam tomorrow. It's been a bit... hectic, over here. Hectic. For four months? Jeeze, this'll be an interesting story. There are no problems, only plothooks. Terrifying Argent Witches Hub Dex Davican wrote: I need them for my collection: Enormous Gonads of 2012: A Retrospective.
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Revlid		Thursday, January 26, 2012 6:30:30 PM(UTC) #30
		Kukla wrote: Revlid wrote: So if you purchase a 5-point Large, your size will increase by 125% (to 225%). While a 12-point Large will increase it by 600% (to 700%) Assuming a base height of six foot for simplicity... Large 0 = 2 yards tall = 6 feet tall ... Large 20 = 22 yards tall = 66 feet tall You jumped from 'each point is a 25% increase' to 'each point is a 50%' increase between the 5 point and 12 point modes. Dude what? I said I had made changes. Revlid wrote: To hell with the square-cube law! There are no limits on this mutation’s maximum cost. The creature’s size and weight increase; if (M) is 10 or less, they increase by (M x25)%. If (M) is 20 or less, they increase by (M x50)%. If (M) is 30 or less, they increase by (M x75)%. If M is more than 30, they increase by (M x100)%. W.H. Auden wrote: To present the conflict between Good and Evil as a war in which the good side is ultimately victorious is a ticklish business. Our historical experience tells us that physical power and, to a large extent, mental power are morally neutral and effectively real: wars are won by the stronger side, just or unjust.


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Kukla		Thursday, January 26, 2012 6:31:34 PM(UTC) #31
		"I MUST FIGHT THE ERRORS," said Kukla. "NO, KUKLA," said Revlid. "YOU ARE THE ERRORS." And then Kukla was a derp. Come check out Myriad Song, a retro-styled science fiction RPG. Or, go straight to our Kickstarter. Exalted art and commissions by Myrrh. Kukla-Tested, Kukla-Approved. Prices ranging from $10 for sketched busts to $70 for color figures.


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Brasstreader		Thursday, January 26, 2012 6:47:29 PM(UTC) #32
		Simple. Clean. Pure. This will work. Most excellent. "The true interest of an absolute monarch generally coincides with that of his people. Their numbers, their wealth, their order, and their security, are the best and only foundations of his real greatness; and were he totally devoid of virtue, prudence might supply its place, and would dictate the same rule of conduct." — Edward Gibbon, The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire, Chapter V .... in reaction to the Solars in the First Age.


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vegetalss4		Thursday, January 26, 2012 6:53:34 PM(UTC) #33
		Might I suggest that the limit on the number of cosmetic mutation a being can be given be changed to the number of functional mutations the source can give instead of the number it does give? JimB wrote: What? Goofy? How is goofy the usual fashion around here? We're always as solemn and serious as mourners at the pope's funeral. I'd never be silly or ironic around here: That would be disrespectful to the inherent dignity and gravity of our shared hobby of playing make-believe superheroes.


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Revlid		Thursday, January 26, 2012 7:49:20 PM(UTC) #34
		vegetalss4 wrote: Might I suggest that the limit on the number of cosmetic mutation a being can be given be changed to the number of functional mutations the source can give instead of the number it does give? Done. W.H. Auden wrote: To present the conflict between Good and Evil as a war in which the good side is ultimately victorious is a ticklish business. Our historical experience tells us that physical power and, to a large extent, mental power are morally neutral and effectively real: wars are won by the stronger side, just or unjust.


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Lafing Cat		Thursday, January 26, 2012 8:39:44 PM(UTC) #35
		I had a character in the old system who could only live on prayer. This was a 2 point negative mutation. If I wanted to replicate that in your current system, it seems like I would need to take the 2 point expanded diet along with the 2 point restricted diet, netting me 0 points for starving to death if people stopped praying to me. This doesn't really seem appropriate to me. Weird Body lists its cost as "1-2 points" but has no information about when each cost is appropriate. The costs on flight/wall-walking don't seem logical. Why is it more expensive to cling to a wall than it is to just hover next to it? (Flight doesn't restrict hovering or anything) Resident Forum Prism Cat
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Sanctaphrax		Thursday, January 26, 2012 8:45:56 PM(UTC) #36
		I haven't read this yet. I just want to say that I'm very much looking forward to it, because mutations interest me enough that I was considering my own rewrite. You've saved me the trouble. I have high hopes. Please don't let me down. Go here to get feedback on your work. Go here to see other people's NPCs. Go here to download comment files that add the latest errata to Exalted PDFs.


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Kelly Pedersen		Thursday, January 26, 2012 9:05:51 PM(UTC) #37
		I like this a lot! Overall, looks flexible, reasonably balanced, and cool. I look forward to seeing the mental and spiritual ones. Just a couple criticisms, though: Revlid wrote: (Emotion) Sense Cost: 2pts; Keywords: Physical, Stackable The creature can use one of its senses to detect a single variety of base emotion, such as fear, anger, lust, or joy. This mutation can grant the ability to detect a complex, societal “emotion”, such as love, loyalty or schadenfreude, but doing so removes the Physical keyword and replaces it with Spiritual. While I think the 2-point version is reasonable for a single sense, I'm not sure of the flat scaling here - it seems to me that it would be reasonable to offer an "empathic sense" mutation that simply allowed you to detect any emotions. Now, I'll admit that I'm not sure that 6 points would be quite cheap enough for this, though - perhaps make it a separate, 6-point mutation, that has one or two (Emotion) Sense mutations as prerequisites? Revlid wrote: Natural Shield Cost: 2-4pt; Keywords: Physical, Requires Blade Proof Shield-like protrusions or cartilage hooks or a ragged membrane of misdirection allow the creature to better defend against its opponents. One of the creature’s natural attacks increases its Defense value by (M ÷ 2), rounded down. While I certainly agree that this mutation is mechanically necessary, I'd argue that the name should be changed - shields already exist in the system, and have a different mechanical effect, so calling this "natural shield" could cause confusion when players buy it expecting to get something that actually functions like a shield. I'd suggest Enhanced Natural Parry, instead. I think there is room for a "Natural Shield" mutation as well, though. I'd cost it as 2 points for a buckler-equivalent, 4 points for a medium shield, and 6 points for a tower shield. Revlid wrote: Internal Mutation Cost: (M)pts; Keywords: Physical, Internal, Requires (Physical Mutation) This mutation alters whatever its prerequisite is, adding the Internal keyword to it. It cannot be applied to mutations that have the Appendage keyword. Its cost is equal to the cost of its prerequisite. I have to question the pricing on this one. A cost equal to the basic mutation just doesn't feel justified, IMO. For instance, that would put all of the "duplicate a speciality" mutations as actually costing more XP than the equivalent specialty. I suggest making the cost of Internal Mutation be (M/2), round down, minimum 1. Another mutation to add to the Movement category would be "Burrower", for creatures that can tunnel beneath the ground. Suggested writeup: Burrower Cost: 2 or 4 pts; Keywords: Physical The creature can tunnel through soil, sand, or other soft earth, using digging claws, a drill attached to its head, or by altering the earth to the consistency of water to allow it to "swim" through. At the 2-point version, this allows the creature to move (Dex) yards as a miscellaneous action with a -2 to DV. The 4-point version allows the creature to make normal Move or Dash actions through soft earth. Stone-Mover Cost: 2 pts; Keywords: Physical, Requires Burrower This mutation expands Burrower, allowing the creature to not only move through soft earth, but even solid rock. The creature can only move through rock at half the speed that Burrower allows them to move through soft earth, however. Tunneller Cost: 4 pts; Keywords: Physical, Requires Burrower The creature can not only dig, its burrows are structurally sound enough that they remain open behind them, allowing others to travel in the same path. Tunnels remain open for the scene, then collapse, unless appropriate Craft rolls are made to stabilize them.
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Exploding Frogs		Thursday, January 26, 2012 9:06:01 PM(UTC) #38
		When a mutation has as its prerequisite a mutation that merely grants an ability the character already has (like an Exalt taking Regenerating Limbs, which has a prerequisite of Superior Healing, which grants...the ability to heal like an Exalt) do you disregard the prerequisite, treat it as a costless cosmetic mutation as outlined under Refer To Appendix, substitute a different prerequisite, or simply rule that the character can't take that mutation on the grounds that their native magic is probably better anyway? Or is there something I'm missing? EDIT: Just realized that I answered my own question. Real brain fart, there...Still, making the prerequisite costless as opposed to waiving it entirely strikes me as somewhat inelegant, especially considering that for all mechanical purposes, it's exactly the same thing. One might as well save the space on the character sheet and/or Storyteller notes. Warning: I link to TvTropes a lot. Click links at your own risk.
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DoggieBert		Thursday, January 26, 2012 9:16:59 PM(UTC) #39
		Overall I like this a lot, but I have a few comments. The Penetrating Attack mutation is always worse than the Natural Weapon mutation. Making Penetrating attack (2*M) seems too good, but maybe (M+1) or granting Expanded Penetration for free might work. Should the Additional Arm mutation have the stackable keyword, or is this effect supposed to represent any number of extra appendages? The Alternate Form mutation has the Negative keyword, but it seems like a beneficial mutation. Imagine a mutant who interacts normally with other humans, but can then spawn webbed feet and gills when he goes into the water without anyone being the wiser.


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Revlid		Thursday, January 26, 2012 9:39:16 PM(UTC) #40
		Lafing Cat wrote: I had a character in the old system who could only live on prayer. This was a 2 point negative mutation. If I wanted to replicate that in your current system, it seems like I would need to take the 2 point expanded diet along with the 2 point restricted diet, netting me 0 points for starving to death if people stopped praying to me. This doesn't really seem appropriate to me. Seems fine to me. Rather than starving to death if you can't eat, you starve to death if no-one prays to you. A one-for-one exchange. Lafing Cat wrote: Weird Body lists its cost as "1-2 points" but has no information about when each cost is appropriate. Editing relic. Fixed! Thanks for the catch. Lafing Cat wrote: The costs on flight/wall-walking don't seem logical. Why is it more expensive to cling to a wall than it is to just hover next to it? (Flight doesn't restrict hovering or anything) Flier requires the Glider mutation, which makes it effectively worth eight points. That said, the scaling does seem off. I'll take another look at the costing on both Flier and Wall-Crawler in the morning. W.H. Auden wrote: To present the conflict between Good and Evil as a war in which the good side is ultimately victorious is a ticklish business. Our historical experience tells us that physical power and, to a large extent, mental power are morally neutral and effectively real: wars are won by the stronger side, just or unjust.


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Revlid		Thursday, January 26, 2012 9:46:32 PM(UTC) #41
		Kelly Pedersen wrote: While I think the 2-point version is reasonable for a single sense, I'm not sure of the flat scaling here - it seems to me that it would be reasonable to offer an "empathic sense" mutation that simply allowed you to detect any emotions. Now, I'll admit that I'm not sure that 6 points would be quite cheap enough for this, though - perhaps make it a separate, 6-point mutation, that has one or two (Emotion) Sense mutations as prerequisites? I don't object to it on any fundamental grounds. I'll consider adding such a mutation later. Kelly Pedersen wrote: While I certainly agree that this mutation is mechanically necessary, I'd argue that the name should be changed - shields already exist in the system, and have a different mechanical effect, so calling this "natural shield" could cause confusion when players buy it expecting to get something that actually functions like a shield. I'd suggest Enhanced Natural Parry, instead. I think there is room for a "Natural Shield" mutation as well, though. I'd cost it as 2 points for a buckler-equivalent, 4 points for a medium shield, and 6 points for a tower shield. I'll change the name to Natural Defense, but I'm not going to add Natural Shield, as shields basically do the same thing, but worse. Kelly Pedersen wrote: Revlid wrote: Internal Mutation I have to question the pricing on this one. You have a point. I'll take a second look. Kelly Pedersen wrote: Another mutation to add to the Movement category would be "Burrower", for creatures that can tunnel beneath the ground. Blast, I knew I'd missed something. Thanks for pointing out the gap, I'll be sure to add them when I've got time. Kelly Pedersen wrote: Suggested writeup: Very neat. W.H. Auden wrote: To present the conflict between Good and Evil as a war in which the good side is ultimately victorious is a ticklish business. Our historical experience tells us that physical power and, to a large extent, mental power are morally neutral and effectively real: wars are won by the stronger side, just or unjust.


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Revlid		Thursday, January 26, 2012 9:47:36 PM(UTC) #42
		DoggieBert wrote: The Penetrating Attack mutation is always worse than the Natural Weapon mutation. Making Penetrating attack (2M) seems too good, but maybe (M+1) or granting Expanded Penetration for free might work. oh god how did I even miss that Adding "Penetrating Attack" to the list of things to be looked at. DoggieBert wrote:* Should the Additional Arm mutation have the stackable keyword, or is this effect supposed to represent any number of extra appendages? Mistake, fixed. DoggieBert wrote: The Alternate Form mutation has the Negative keyword, but it seems like a beneficial mutation. Imagine a mutant who interacts normally with other humans, but can then spawn webbed feet and gills when he goes into the water without anyone being the wiser. Editing relic, fixed. W.H. Auden wrote: To present the conflict between Good and Evil as a war in which the good side is ultimately victorious is a ticklish business. Our historical experience tells us that physical power and, to a large extent, mental power are morally neutral and effectively real: wars are won by the stronger side, just or unjust.


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Omicron		Thursday, January 26, 2012 9:48:18 PM(UTC) #43
		I have a sudden urge to play a Slayer with Devil-Tyrant Avatar Shintai and 20 points of Mutation: Large. Also this looks very cool. Characters, setting hooks and other things of mine. Chaka wrote: Thief-of-Faces wrote: Oh my God. What the Hell happened in this thread? HAPPY INTERNATIONAL WOMEN'S DAY EVERYBODY


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Revlid		Thursday, January 26, 2012 9:54:01 PM(UTC) #44
		Exploding Frogs wrote: Still, making the prerequisite costless as opposed to waiving it entirely strikes me as somewhat inelegant, especially considering that for all mechanical purposes, it's exactly the same thing. One might as well save the space on the character sheet and/or Storyteller notes. Frankly, the main reason I'm leaving them in is because it seems like "costless but still present" is less likely to lead to mechanical screw-ups on my part. If a Storyteller wants to just leave them off the character sheet, I'd encourage him to go right on ahead. W.H. Auden wrote: To present the conflict between Good and Evil as a war in which the good side is ultimately victorious is a ticklish business. Our historical experience tells us that physical power and, to a large extent, mental power are morally neutral and effectively real: wars are won by the stronger side, just or unjust.


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Kelly Pedersen		Thursday, January 26, 2012 10:10:10 PM(UTC) #45
		Revlid wrote: Kelly Pedersen wrote: I think there is room for a "Natural Shield" mutation as well, though. I'd cost it as 2 points for a buckler-equivalent, 4 points for a medium shield, and 6 points for a tower shield. I'll change the name to Natural Defense, but I'm not going to add Natural Shield, as shields basically do the same thing, but worse. Don't shields add their bonus to both Parry and Dodge DVs, though? I don't have books handy, but I'm pretty sure the large ones do, anyway. And even a natural shield based on the small ones would allow you to add to parry without tying up a hand, which is still useful, IMO. Revlid wrote: Blast, I knew I'd missed something. Thanks for pointing out the gap, I'll be sure to add them when I've got time. Kelly Pedersen wrote: Suggested writeup: Very neat. Heh. It came up in my campaign - one of the Lunars took the Knack that lets you get Wyld-mutated creatures, then went looking for a badger-mole, basically. I needed to quickly make up the effects, but he appreciated it -he spends a lot of time underground now. Thinking about other mutations to add... I'm wondering whether you could make something to switch the Attribute used for a common thing. On the one hand, making, for example, your burrowing Move based on Str rather than Dex makes sense. On the other hand, it leads to cheese like the "Brutal Attack" merit, and that's a bad path to go down.


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Heath Robinson		Thursday, January 26, 2012 10:54:53 PM(UTC) #46
		Revlid wrote: Short Gestation Cost: 1-6pt; Keywords: Physical, Internal ... Short Gestation does not cost xp; instead, children born from a shortened gestation period must bear at least (M) points of negative physical or mental mutations, which they receive xp for as normal. (My underlining.) You don't gain experience for having negative mutations by default (as per the Negative keyword definition). I assume you mean that they receive experience as an exception to the normal rules. Face it. Today will be as bad a day as any other.


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Lafing Cat		Thursday, January 26, 2012 11:49:36 PM(UTC) #47
		Revlid wrote: Lafing Cat wrote: I had a character in the old system who could only live on prayer. This was a 2 point negative mutation. If I wanted to replicate that in your current system, it seems like I would need to take the 2 point expanded diet along with the 2 point restricted diet, netting me 0 points for starving to death if people stopped praying to me. This doesn't really seem appropriate to me. Seems fine to me. Rather than starving to death if you can't eat, you starve to death if no-one prays to you. A one-for-one exchange. Well, food is produced by plenty of charms, you can carry food along with you, and you don't have to social attack or otherwise convince your food to be eaten by you, you can just take it by force, if it's even animate. It doesn't seem one-to-one to me at all. (as another example, why does "I can only eat rice" get you two points, when "I can only eat uranium" gets you only one. Surely the latter is more restrictive than the former, and should be worth more) Resident Forum Prism Cat
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Lafing Cat		Thursday, January 26, 2012 11:58:00 PM(UTC) #48
		Omicron wrote: I have a sudden urge to play a Slayer with Devil-Tyrant Avatar Shintai and 20 points of Mutation: Large. Also this looks very cool. Speaking of this, there should probably be some cap on the number of mutation points you can sink into a mutation based on Essence. (for ones that are just stackable, the old (Essence) cap should work fine.) Maybe no more than Essence*5 points? Resident Forum Prism Cat


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WarDragon		Friday, January 27, 2012 12:24:23 AM(UTC) #49
		Revlid wrote: Temporary mutations do not cost experience, but (unless otherwise specified) no character can bear more than (Willpower + Essence) points of temporary positive mutations at once. Sometimes it helps to ask yourself, "What Would The Ebon Dragon Do?" and then do the opposite of that. -Luna (speaking through Wise Old Guru)


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Ryumaru		Friday, January 27, 2012 2:04:12 AM(UTC) #50
		Omicron wrote: I have a sudden urge to play a Slayer with Devil-Tyrant Avatar Shintai and 20 points of Mutation: Large. Also this looks very cool. MAKE MY MONSTER GROOOOOOW! There's a secret... in the tip of the nose. Development blog and wikifor tabletop ponies. Want something reviewed?


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White Wolf » Exalted » Exalted » Revised Mutations (Complete, with Genesis)

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