The Gaming Den

So, according to therpgsite.com, there is a better game than Exalted, and does what Exalted does, designed by one guy, and is actually better. *Edit: their opinion, not mine.

It's still in beta, version 0.13.

https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B4qCWY ... lkU0k/view

I thought I'd throw it out here for others to take a look at and make judgements of their own.

Edit: Version 1.1 here:

https://drive.google.com/open?id=0B4qCW ... mFqSWEyMk0

HTH wrote: So, according to therpgsite.com, there is a better game than Exalted, and does what Exalted does, designed by one guy, and is actually better.

What precisely do the chucklefucks over at therpgsite think that Exalted "does?"

Exalted is rather famous for being inconsistent in tone, mechanics, world presentation, and even stated goals. Like, I genuinely don't know if Exalted is supposed to be a dark deconstruction of heroic fantasy or an over-the-top glossy heroic fantasy. We haven't done a lot on Exalted, but we did do a review of The Lunars. That's a really small slice of the Exalted pie (The Lunars was the thirteenth book of that series). But our verdict on it was that it was "rambling, incoherent, contradictory, and incomplete."

I'll look at Godbound, but before I could figure out whether it did what Exalted was supposed to do, I'd have to find out what Exalted was supposed to do.

-Username17

I'd be curious to see an OSSR of Exalted: Infernals. That's the infamous book with loli demon rape.

But yeah, Exalted doesn't have a theme or a goal. There's the utopian First Age where everything was better than now. There's a nominal masquerade where if your Anima activates fate ninjas and dragon monks start popping out of the woodwork. There are active Elder Exalted playing the political games that haven't progressed over the last thousand years. There are three different apocalypses on the schedule: Neverborn eating the world, Faeries eating the world, and Primordials taking over the world. And you are nominally supposed to interact with all of this crap.

EDIT: Oh, and you are also randomly going insane from time to time as your bullshit meter overflows.

OK, so I took a look at Godbound.



I can see why he chucklefucks over at therpgsite like it. It is specially tailored for their brand of chucklefuckery.

Godbound wrote:Godbound is based on an "Old School Renaissance" rules chassis strongly inspired by the classic gaming books of Gary Gygax, Dave Arneson, Tom Moldvay and Zeb Cook.

...

Roll or assign your hero's attribute scores to determine their innate strengths and weaknesses. If you want to roll them, roll 4d6 six times, dropping the lowest die each time and adding the other three together.

...

Record your hero's attribute modifiers. Usually, you don't apply your whole score to a relevant die roll. Instead, you just apply a bonus or penalty. If your attribute score is 3, your modifier for the attribute is -3. For scores of 4–5, its -2, for 6–8 it's -1, for 9–12 it's +0, for 13–15 it's +1, for 16–17 it's +2, and for a mighty score of 18, it's +3.

...

For each attribute, subtract it from 21 to find that attribute's check score.

Yeeeah. I got to page 8. This is an embarrassing D&D retroclone. Apparently you get divine super powers on top of being a shitty circa 1982 D&D fightan man. What fucking ever. I would be embarrassed to be seen in this game's company in 1998. I don't know if you've checked a calendar recently, but it's 2016.

-Username17

As I understand it, what Exalted was supposed to do was be a D&D competitor that White Wolf could print without supporting D&D's sales, and also appeal to the anime craze of that time.

I think it's literally impossible for something to do what Exalted was supposed to do because the thing Exalted was supposed to do was so hyper specific.

Exalted was supposed to bury the shambling corpse of 2e AD&D.

Exalted actually generated a fair amount of freelance work for people I gamed with in the late 90s and early 00s.

It is tautologically impossible for any current release to accomplish either of those goals.

However it is really simple to get quite number of people who have worked on Exalted to say nice things about retroclones.

I've read most of the beta. There are things to like (the adventure generation tools are good) and things to hate (the damage mechanic is a hack, fighting man plus powers) but overall it doesn't do enough to upset the apple cart on what OSR play could be.

In theory Exalted was supposed to offer a high fantasy superhero setting based conceptually on Bronze Age mythology (Eastern and Western).

Of course WW took as their principle inspiration a trilogy of esoteric horror fantasy novels by Tanith Lee which you could not possibly represent with any TTRPG ever (during a dalliance with Exalted I actually went and read 2/3rds of the trilogy - interesting books, impossible to RP). So what Exalted actually offered was a totally screwed-up non-functional world where the characters are designed to suffer at the hands of GM whims and all-powerful NPCs who have the hates for you and like to apply said hate in highly esoteric ways. Essentially Exalted is supposed to provide a setting where all the arbitrary awful crap that happens to Bronze Age heroes (hey Cu Chulain, congrats on being impossibly awesome, but you violated some crappy geas and must die now) happens to you.

Mechalich wrote:In theory Exalted was supposed to offer a high fantasy superhero setting based conceptually on Bronze Age mythology (Eastern and Western).

Of course WW took as their principle inspiration a trilogy of esoteric horror fantasy novels by Tanith Lee which you could not possibly represent with any TTRPG ever (during a dalliance with Exalted I actually went and read 2/3rds of the trilogy - interesting books, impossible to RP). So what Exalted actually offered was a totally screwed-up non-functional world where the characters are designed to suffer at the hands of GM whims and all-powerful NPCs who have the hates for you and like to apply said hate in highly esoteric ways. Essentially Exalted is supposed to provide a setting where all the arbitrary awful crap that happens to Bronze Age heroes (hey Cu Chulain, congrats on being impossibly awesome, but you violated some crappy geas and must die now) happens to you.

The worst part is that for actual the Bronze Age heroes the punishments were not arbitrary. For Exalted they are. Cu Chulain is stuck between breaking the dog eating geas and a general hospitality taboo, and chooses to break the geas. This weakens him, but he dies because he goes into battle and gets killed. People die when they are killed. Not when they broke a geas.

Upon the murderer I invoke this curse-
whether he is one man and all unknown,
or one of many- may he wear out his life
in misery to miserable doom!

Oedipus probably should have finished his investigation becfore making his curse.


However, what Exalted mechanics encourage isn't punishment for hubris, exalted encourages emotional brokenness.

Limit Breaks Are supposed to simulate that part of the Illiad when Achilles just refuses to come out of his tent at all. Or when Hercules just murders his entire family for no reason. A lot of Bronze Age heroes are terrifically fucked up people with severe emotional problems, and Limit Breaks are mechanical enforcement of that. So you hit a point where you just break down and cry for no reason, or you flip out and kill everyone around you.

It's a way to mechanically force the players to make fucked up choices, and in in character justification for why these characters are making fucked up choices.

If I remember correctly, Achilles got pissed at Agamemnon for stealing his trophy bride and refused to fight on the same side with him. Hercules got cursed with madness by Hera. They didn't just randomly flip out for no reason.

Mechalich wrote:Of course WW took as their principle inspiration a trilogy of esoteric horror fantasy novels by Tanith Lee ...

Which trilogy is this?

Well I know for certain that Death's Master from her flat earth series had influence on early conceptual design. Not sure if the other flat earth books or the Birthgrave trilogy were equally influential.

ignore this, double posted

I've never heard any of the Exalted devs mention Birthgrave, but they praise the Flat Earth series at every opportunity. (As well they might, those are pretty good books! But I agree they're impossible to emulate in an RP. Collaboratively written stories just don't come together that way, as a rule, and magic has to be handled in a far more consistent way.)

Josh_Kablack wrote:Exalted was supposed to bury the shambling corpse of 2e AD&D.

Exalted actually generated a fair amount of freelance work for people I gamed with in the late 90s and early 00s.

It is tautologically impossible for any current release to accomplish either of those goals.

However it is really simple to get quite number of people who have worked on Exalted to say nice things about retroclones.

Basically this. Exalted was greenlit in the waning end of 2nd edition AD&D and was explicitly made and sold as a D&D killer. It came out after 3rd edition D&D and gave the audience less of what they wanted, and Exalted failed. It failed because 2nd edition AD&D was already slain by a mightier hero, and it failed because it didn't manage to displace the D&D that had come to reclaim its crown while Exalted was getting its shoes on.

It is not possible to kill 2nd edition AD&D because 2nd edition AD&D is dead. But if you were going to kill 2nd edition, we have a pretty good idea how to do it: make 3rd edition.

Now this Godbound stuff has a version of THAC0 that is slightly easier to explain. You add your attack bonus to your opponent's Armor Class against a fixed target number. But while it's easier to explain this to a new player, it's not actually any easier at the table. You're still rolling a die, adding your bonuses, subtracting the result from a number, and telling the MC what AC you hit. That is bullshit.

And it's inexcusable bullshit. 3rd edition D&D submitted a better solution to the THAC0 problem in the year 2000. D&D's solution to the THAC0 problem has a driver's license, because it is sixteen fucking years old. If your solution to the THAC0 problem is less elegant than 3rd edition D&D's, you can fuck right off. If you wanna tell me that your game has a "-1 bonus to defense" in it, I'm gonna wanna hear a damn good reason why. And "Because that's how it was done in 1982!" is not good enough. Not even close.

-Username17

Most of Kevin Crawford's works are deriative of Labrinyth Lord which itself is a retroclone o BX D&D. While there are additions and adjustment here and there, most of the focus is on the sandboxing tools.

DISCLAIMER: Can't promise to answer questions, just don't have the time. Also, flying fucks and arguing minute points are not my cup of tea... but if it helps you deal with the real life, fire away. .

Regarding Godbound, a few things worth taking a look at:

1. The 1.0 beta of the Godbound book PDF:
https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B4qCWY8UnLrcSUhNYkIwSjZGc00/view

According to the author, not many changes (besides art and editing) are expected.

2. Key stuff:

a) Yes, this is a retroclone. No, it is not automatically bad. It does its job.

b) It has bookmarks, so you can skim through the contents and focus on more interesting bits.

c) PCs typically don't use magic (well, it's magic, it's just called differently) . Instead you have six divine powers (6 areas of power picked during character creation, similar to schools of magic), a power pool (called Effort, used to power your abilities), Gifts (spells) and Miracles (freeform effects that allow to mimic spells with ad hoc modifications at higher cost). A PC can pick an ability to wield mortal magic.

d) Mortals do use magic. It's either low magic (simple stuff) or theurgy (from powerful,, long lasting effects to reality bending changes, but still below gifts). Magic casting times makes it difficult to use in combat (unless we're talking about armies, sieges or ambushes)

e) There are enemies statted in the book. They are suitably epic.

f) Factions. This is the part about power plays an politics. Examples:

An Impoverished Raktian Village

Power: 1 Action Die: 1d6
Cohesion: 1 Trouble: 4
Features: No Features aid the desperate villagers.
Problems: Nezdohvan nobles raid the village for sport. 1 point
Their lord taxes them cruelly. 1 point
The villagers have lost all hope. 2 points

The Ulstang Skerries
Power: 4 Action Die: 1d12
Cohesion: 4 Trouble: 5
Features: The Witch-Queens have mighty magics.
Ulstang raiders rule the northern waves.
Draugr thralls labor with blind obedience.
Outsiders find it very hard to blend secretly.
Problems: Their neighbors seek their ruin. 2 points
The Witch-Queens squabble constantly amongst themselves. 2 points
Ulstang's living inhabitants scorn honest work as degrading. 1

A part of faction turn that illustrates in part what PCs can do to interact with faction (in general, the PCs resolve faction problems and add features; in their turn factions trade blows breaking features or taking straight damage or acquiring new problems; the PCs can commit their resources to the faction on temporary or permanent basis):

The Godbound Commits the Influence. If he leaves for good, the militia will crumble, but for as long as he's there to hold it together, Kistelek now has a Feature: "The village has a band of trained warriors." This change affronts the neighboring boyar, however, and so the village gets a 1-point Problem, "A Nezdohvan boyar considers them a threat." The GM decides he is a major noble, and his domain counts as a Power 2 faction. One Feature it has is "A band of autocossacks serves the boyar". He sends it to burn Kistelek to the ground.

The PCs are away on other business when the autocossacks clank in. The boyar's desired change is "The village has been burnt." The villagers oppose the autocossacks with their trained band; without it, they would have lost the Conflict automatically. They roll a 4, however, while the boyar rolls a 7. He wins the Conflict.

The villagers could take a point of Cohesion damage, but that would destroy the village. They could accept another point of Problems in "All our huts have been burnt.", leaving them shivering. Instead, the village elders sacrifice the young warriors, who fight desperately to the last spearman and drive off the automatons. The village loses the Feature they so recently gained.

g) The setting is interesting but painted in such broad strokes that it is not really usable. It's more about a few good ideas brought together than anything else.

3. A few impressions:

There is a lot of neat ideas. There are laundry lists for many features.

Lacking thingies:
- the factions should have some geographical scale - after all, growth of a faction should also affect an area
- many things are hand-waved or not structured. Some people are fine with that, me, I would prefer a procedure over a "one or more" or "you should embrace this" approach.

Overall, it's leaps and bounds over stuff I saw in Exalted 3 book excerpts. Faction rules need work, but can be ported anywhere. The setting and foes are also interesting.

Oh, and the magic stuff is interestingly limited - you either do stuff personally (via heroic superpowers) or take a long time to cast spells. No fireballs and lightnings without creating artifactic artillery first.
This nails down the most important wuxia aspect for me - why do the weapons stay relevant in a world of magicians.

That's it.

Regards,
Ruemere

ruemere wrote: a) Yes, this is a retroclone. No, it is not automatically bad.

Hey look, a new paradox!

Retroclones are a stupid idea. There are good ideas in old systems, but you should incorporate those into new systems that also use good ideas from newer systems. Voluntarily making your system shittier to evoke the feeling of being an old shitty system is just a retro stupid thing to do.

In any case, the specific assumptions of a retro clone make it a terrible fit for superheroics of any kind. Attributes only go up to 18 and stat checks are rolled on a d20. If you want to tell me that my gods-born maximum strength character still fails a basic strength check that a random peasant has a coin flip's chance of succeeding at a full 10% of the time, I'm gonna tell you to fuck off.

I seriously got to page eight in this game before I knew it was a piece of shit. The core resolution mechanic is so laughably and obviously incapable of handling epic actions of any kind that the only reason to keep reading was to find more pieces of unintentional hilarity. A character with maximum Intelligence or Dexterity only succeeds at a test 40% of the time more than a character with average Intelligence or Dexterity. That's incapable of being anything but a Captain Hobo style farce.

-Username17

FrankTrollman wrote:Retroclones are a stupid idea. There are good ideas in old systems, but you should incorporate those into new systems that also use good ideas from newer systems. Voluntarily making your system shittier to evoke the feeling of being an old shitty system is just a retro stupid thing to do.

So when does a retroclone become its own system?

For example, one of the most important aspects of D&Dish games is combat. In Godbound, combat damage is like this:
(page 20 excerpts)
- instant gifts can be used at any time - this means that there are out of turn actions
- godbounds deal damage that is differently calculated against different opponents. Basically godbounds take 1-4 damage, other creatures take 1-4 hitdice of damage (just substract hitdice). Excess damage is applied to all targets within range that have the same or lower AC. Moreover, a godbound in combat inflicts automatic damage on same and lower level opponents via Fray dice (with spillover applied as usual).

This is definitely not your average D&D combat.

I'm not saying you're wrong about this being a retroclone. There are enough carry-overs to recognize it. However, dismissing it just because it is a retroclone smacks of prejudice.

FrankTrollman wrote:In any case, the specific assumptions of a retro clone make it a terrible fit for superheroics of any kind. Attributes only go up to 18 and stat checks are rolled on a d20. If you want to tell me that my gods-born maximum strength character still fails a basic strength check that a random peasant has a coin flip's chance of succeeding at a full 10% of the time, I'm gonna tell you to fuck off.

If you redefine stat checks, this will not happen. For example, page 18, attribute checks look like this:

Godbound, Attribute Checks wrote:An attribute’s check number is equal to 21 minus the attribute score.
To make an attribute check, roll 1d20 and compare it to the most
relevant attribute’s check number, adding +4 to the roll if they have a
Fact that would help them with the task. If the roll is equal or greater
than the score, they succeed. If the roll is lower, then something
happens to complicate the situation and it doesn’t work out as they
desire. Godbound almost never simply fail at something they try to
do, but it might take too long, work as unanticipated, or add some
fresh complication to the situation.
A natural roll of 1 on a check is always a failure, while a roll of 20 is
always a success, assuming success is at all possible.

So, a "4d6, drop lowest" Joe Godbound has 13 in an attribute. This means that they need to roll 8+ to succeed on a task they are not proficient, and 4+ when they have a relevant Fact established. This is 65% success chance for non-proficient task, and 85% success chance for a task they are skilled at. However, in case of Godbounds, you do not necessarily fail - you rather get "fail forward" instead, a complication.

Again, this is not something entirely to my liking (I prefer 13th Age for the resolution system), but it's not as bad as the old d20 skill system.

FrankTrollman wrote:I seriously got to page eight in this game before I knew it was a piece of shit. The core resolution mechanic is so laughably and obviously incapable of handling epic actions of any kind that the only reason to keep reading was to find more pieces of unintentional hilarity. A character with maximum Intelligence or Dexterity only succeeds at a test 40% of the time more than a character with average Intelligence or Dexterity. That's incapable of being anything but a Captain Hobo style farce.

-Username17

A character with maximum intelligence (18), has 10% chance of not-succeeding on non-proficient task. If they are proficient, they have 5% of not-succeeding. Also, this "non-success" is not equal to failure.

Cheers and regards,
Ruemere

R wrote:So, a "4d6, drop lowest" Joe Godbound has 13 in an attribute. This means that they need to roll 8+ to succeed on a task they are not proficient, and 4+ when they have a relevant Fact established. This is 65% success chance for non-proficient task, and 85% success chance for a task they are skilled at. However, in case of Godbounds, you do not necessarily fail - you rather get "fail forward" instead, a complication.

Again, this is not something entirely to my liking (I prefer 13th Age for the resolution system), but it's not as bad as the old d20 skill system.

This is way worse than the d20 skill system. The d20 skill system has lots and lots of problems, but it specifically addresses many of the issues of the AD&D attribute checks. There are defined difficulties, you can push normal people off the RNG, there are tasks that your character can't fail on and tasks they can't succeed and so on and so forth.

This is just the AD&D attribute check system which addresses the hilarious fail rate that all characters have even on tasks they are supposed to be extremely competent in simply by redefining failures as being "not that bad." That's insulting. The author noticed that his system output failures on all tasks as often as Loony Tunes cartoon, and then rather than actually do anything about the system he just said that failure was actually just a lesser form of success. This is bullshit Republican primary logic where coming in third is a form of "winning."

If you want to do something with epic characters, they have to get numbers that interact with the RNG in such a way that they are actually epic when compared to random hobos. Making them pretty much the same but telling the DM to have pity on them at every turn to avoid hurting their precious feelings is not an answer to the fucking problem.

-Username17

FrankTrollman wrote:

R wrote:So, a "4d6, drop lowest" Joe Godbound has 13 in an attribute. This means that they need to roll 8+ to succeed on a task they are not proficient, and 4+ when they have a relevant Fact established. This is 65% success chance for non-proficient task, and 85% success chance for a task they are skilled at. However, in case of Godbounds, you do not necessarily fail - you rather get "fail forward" instead, a complication.

Again, this is not something entirely to my liking (I prefer 13th Age for the resolution system), but it's not as bad as the old d20 skill system.

This is way worse than the d20 skill system. The d20 skill system has lots and lots of problems, but it specifically addresses many of the issues of the AD&D attribute checks. There are defined difficulties, you can push normal people off the RNG, there are tasks that your character can't fail on and tasks they can't succeed and so on and so forth.

This is just the AD&D attribute check system which addresses the hilarious fail rate that all characters have even on tasks they are supposed to be extremely competent in simply by redefining failures as being "not that bad." That's insulting. The author noticed that his system output failures on all tasks as often as Loony Tunes cartoon, and then rather than actually do anything about the system he just said that failure was actually just a lesser form of success. This is bullshit Republican primary logic where coming in third is a form of "winning."

If you want to do something with epic characters, they have to get numbers that interact with the RNG in such a way that they are actually epic when compared to random hobos. Making them pretty much the same but telling the DM to have pity on them at every turn to avoid hurting their precious feelings is not an answer to the fucking problem.

-Username17

I see your point, I disagree with your interpretation and opinion to certain degree. Specifically "If the roll is lower, then something
happens to complicate the situation and it doesn’t work out as they desire." is not equal to "redefining failures as being >>not that bad.<<".
This means that the result is not the one intended by the acting party. The nature of the change is explained as "Godbound almost never simply fail at something they try to do, but it might take too long, work as unanticipated, or add some fresh complication to the situation. "

As per the nature of the change, this is "almost never simply fail". Instead, the result is altered.
How's that different from simply failing? The new result can be adapted to, can be compromised with, an unforseen delay is introduced, a new factor is introduced. A failure is a failure - you don't get to do anything.
In terms of project management, the result is almost always within parameters of the project, at the cost of new risk or risks being introduced.

Now, I agree that this is not a good system. It's too loose to produce easily quantifiable results, it's prone to abuse and human fallibility, and the person with better PR skills is going to own this game.

Why I prefer this system over d20? Because under d20 the results are too simple, because if you're competent you never fail, and because a successes of two different people are the same. The success of an expert is the same as the success of Joe the Average.
And that's why I think that Godbound system is better for Godbound.

Anyhow, that's my opinion.

Regards,
Ruemere

ruemere wrote:I see your point, I disagree with your interpretation and opinion to certain degree. Specifically "If the roll is lower, then something
happens to complicate the situation and it doesn’t work out as they desire." is not equal to "redefining failures as being >>not that bad.<<".
This means that the result is not the one intended by the acting party. The nature of the change is explained as "Godbound almost never simply fail at something they try to do, but it might take too long, work as unanticipated, or add some fresh complication to the situation. "

As per the nature of the change, this is "almost never simply fail". Instead, the result is altered.
How's that different from simply failing? The new result can be adapted to, can be compromised with, an unforseen delay is introduced, a new factor is introduced. A failure is a failure - you don't get to do anything.
In terms of project management, the result is almost always within parameters of the project, at the cost of new risk or risks being introduced.

AD&D + Quantum Bears = PROFIT?

Now, I agree that this is not a good system. It's too loose to produce easily quantifiable results, it's prone to abuse and human fallibility, and the person with better PR skills is going to own this game.

I don't get this. You're acknowledging that this resolution mechanic isn't actually a mechanic at all, being merely an invitation to play Magic Tea Party with your GM and a pack of Quantum Bears. Your beef with d20 is understandable, but you're basically saying here that having no mechanics at all is superior to having one specific implementation of a mechanic that you don't like. It seems to be a case of black-and-white thinking.

Mord wrote:

ruemere wrote:I see your point, I disagree with your interpretation and opinion to certain degree. Specifically "If the roll is lower, then something
happens to complicate the situation and it doesn’t work out as they desire." is not equal to "redefining failures as being >>not that bad.<<".
This means that the result is not the one intended by the acting party. The nature of the change is explained as "Godbound almost never simply fail at something they try to do, but it might take too long, work as unanticipated, or add some fresh complication to the situation. "

As per the nature of the change, this is "almost never simply fail". Instead, the result is altered.
How's that different from simply failing? The new result can be adapted to, can be compromised with, an unforseen delay is introduced, a new factor is introduced. A failure is a failure - you don't get to do anything.
In terms of project management, the result is almost always within parameters of the project, at the cost of new risk or risks being introduced.

AD&D + Quantum Bears = PROFIT?

Now, I agree that this is not a good system. It's too loose to produce easily quantifiable results, it's prone to abuse and human fallibility, and the person with better PR skills is going to own this game.

I don't get this. You're acknowledging that this resolution mechanic isn't actually a mechanic at all, being merely an invitation to play Magic Tea Party with your GM and a pack of Quantum Bears. Your beef with d20 is understandable, but you're basically saying here that having no mechanics at all is superior to having one specific implementation of a mechanic that you don't like. It seems to be a case of black-and-white thinking.

You're not getting my point because you try to oversimplify my words. It's like making a photo of a panorama, and complaining that it is two-dimensional.

I acknowledge that the system is flawed, I haven't denied its existence or usability - I have played and enjoyed AD&D 2nd edition over a significant span of time, dammit. People can and do use the rules, but they need to work around the problems.
The rudimentary mechanics of Godbound suit it better than d20 skill system. Note that this is my opinion, and it is based only on my personal experience. This means that it not necessarily replicable or applicable to your situation or to your experience.

The benefits of using this system are as follows:
- it's fast.
- it's fun for a GM because every time a player runs into a complication, a GM can be inventive (yes, it does sound in ears of doubting Thomases like a mandate for screwing players over),
- it's fun for a player, because you get to play a big-damn-hero, and at the same time you get a lot of problems thrown at you.
- everyone is encouraged to build - players create and develop their factions, you're essentially playing a godsim, with your character in a spotlight.

In other words, it provides everything Exalted promised but never delivered. Unfortunately, it does it at the cost of being what it is - an indie game, with many issue glossed over. Nevertheless, the rule set is usable.

My recommendation would be to steal faction rules, maybe a few items from the premise, maybe adapt a few combat options. Or wait and see for a kickstarter.

Regards,
Ruemere