Take your straw man and shove it up your ass. My suggestion was not that Solars and Dragonblood should necessarily get the same powers. My suggestion was that when a Solar spent 7 points on a power that it should be at least roughly the same power as when a Dragonblood character spent 7 points on a power. And that if you wanted Solars to be better, that the correct choice was to give them more points, rather than to charge them the same amount for things that are explicitly worth different amounts.Laertes wrote:I absolutely agree that Exalted is, in its current published form, not well designed. I absolutely disagree - to the point of feeling that a lot of Frank's reputation for being a guy who understands system is evidently undeserved - that fixing this by saying "here you go, Solars, you start like Dragon Blooded but have some extra points" is a solution.
And the reason why everyone is jumping on your ass for saying otherwise is that the position I staked out is obviously true. Even if you wanted to make sure that you would never have a Dragonblood character and a Solar character in the hands of different players at the same table, you're still expected as a Solar to fight a bunch of Dragonblood opponents. So being able to gauge how many points a Dragonblood character would need to be the equal of a Solar character would be useful to the Storyteller, if no one else.
Now obviously putting Dragonblood and Solars on the same fucking point scale would be useful in a whole host of other ways if you wanted to do all kinds of stuff like mixed splat parties or sidekicking or whatever. But I didn't even fucking mention those things because it wasn't an argument I felt like having at the moment. The point was and is that the argument for a universal point scale did not and does not depend on that.
But since you've been such a raging asshole about this, I will leave you with one thought: arguing that such and such a change would fundamentally change the precepts of Exalted is not an argument for not making that change. At least, not an argument that morally righteous people should take seriously. Because let's get this out in the open: Exalted is bad and being a fan of it is problematic. Morally problematic. Because Exalted has considerably more Rape Apologia than is socially acceptable in the modern world. It has more Rape Apologia than was acceptable when it was first published. And the zeitgeist of history has not become any more accepting of paeans to sexual assault over the last decade and a half.
Exalted fluff is objectively terrible. Like, to the point where people finding out that you are in possession of Exalted books is grounds in polite company for you to be ostracized. It does have to change. It has to change in literally every single way. The fluff is bad in the way that Space Gypsies and Pygmies were bad in 2nd edition AD&D. If a new edition cannot be made that quietly excises the objectionable material while radically rethinking everything about it, the entire brand should be allowed to quietly die. And if people disagree with that statement, they are morally in the wrong.
-Username17
