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Exalted: Essence is the finest version of Exalted ever released. This edition condenses the rules into a coherent and practical system, drawing upon the extensive experience of the exceptional team at Onyx Path. Dixie Cochran, one of the most accomplished RPG developers in the industry, has assembled a dream team for this book. Richard Thomas, has forgotten more about RPG development than most people will ever know, and his involvement alone, brings invaluable expertise to the project, enhancing its value.
That being said, this book is meaty. While character creation seems concise, spanning only around 8 pages, the sections on different exalt types cover 40 pages, and the systems for skills encompass an additional 5 pages. The system itself is straightforward, and if this is your first exposure to an Onyx Path system, you're in for a treat. However, be prepared for a substantial amount of reading to establish a solid foundation.
Combat in Exalted: Essence is remarkably smooth, like buttery silk. The flow of combat rounds creates an incredibly cinematic experience, arguably the most immersive RPG combat available at present. If you or your players are familiar with recent titles like Final Fantasy, FromSoftware, or Team Ninja games, you'll find the combat descriptions and mechanics to be familiar and engaging.
However, where the system truly shines is in the diverse range of charms. With approximately 125 pages dedicated to charms (special attacks, abilities, spells, etc.), each character you or your players create will possess unique and tailored abilities. The interplay between charms and artifacts (which provide access to additional charms) allows for remarkable character customization options.
Finally, the appendix includes rules for custom charm creation, as well as a charm adaptation and modification system. This book exceeds the expectations of both new players and Storytellers, offering a fantastic gateway into the Exalted universe and will provide long-time fans of the setting with an exciting new way to engage with it.
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An excellent game for Campy, cheesy and low budget films!
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I am just starting to weave God Machine themes into my Changeling The Lost (2nd Ed) campaign, and this guide was invaluable to doing so. Thank you very much!
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This is based on the pre-indexed version of the PDF, but this comes closest to giving me what I've always wanted out of an Exalted game since I first dived in during second edition. The authors did a fantastic job condensing and consoidating mechanics while keeping the flavor of individual options strong. Be forewarned, this ia a rules lighter Exalted, I would in no way call this game rules light. It's not a replacement for 3e if you appreciate the intricate crunch of the game, but it keeps that same spirit in a much more accessible form if you want something simpler. That being said, even fans of 3e that are content with that level of crunch might appreciate the window into Exalt types that are still years off from development.
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Exalted 1st edition is the coolest game ever
This, on the other hand, may very well be the best edition of Exalted
Edit to add a bit of context:
- E1 is coolest, but the rules are broken, which may be even flavorfull but doesn't add to playability
- E2 was meant to be Great, even trading some cool for extra content...Even the errata is great with 100+ pages. Still broken rules
- E3 is a great game...and massive. The rules are not broken, but the sheer pagecount makes it somewhat harder to play. And (more ands) it may be a decade from now before it gives comparable options to ExEss
Now, ExEss has interesting mechanics that are fun to play and engage with but still are narrative and reasonably fast and accesible
Another good point is that the lighter rules make adding your own ideas or adapting from previous editions relatively easy. Adapting material from latter editions is a good thing, it means you can reuse all the good content from if you want, instead of building everything yourshelf. Adding your own content was a cool point in E1 that got a bit lost with the complexity of latter editions
Regards
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A great example of a city/regional supplement for Scarred Lands. Or any setting, really. Just enough information to really immerse your games into the city, while compartmentalizing the books portion of the setting. Seamlessly adds to your Scarred Lands setting when your stories go to this location and doesn't try to add layers on to the setting as a whole by discussing anything outside this little pocket of the setting. A lot more intrigue and cloak & dagger than I was expecting from a book about Dwarves and Giants.
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This is one of the best books a storyteller can have if they are running a crossover game. While very helpful for adjudicating effects on NPCs, it is invaluable if you ever intend to run a mixed party game with vampires, mages, changelings or other supernatural PCs playing together. While written as a companion to the Contagion Chronicle, you absolutely can and should use this book by itself. Fantastic book, exactly what I have been looking for. Cannot recommend enough.
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An incredible book for all Mage storytellers! The chapters about the Orders past, about the "awakened nations" (and their Mysteries to solve!) around the world are awesome and very, very useful for any storyteller. It's full of plot hooks.
In fact, I can imagine an entire chronicle around the world, where PCs are the Order ambassadors and try to find allies against the Seers, learn of the complex history of the Orders, or discover the many magical weird things found in this book.
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The content of the book is great and the PDF is well scanned. HOWEVER, the print-on-demand physical book is atrocious for the price. Here are the reasons:
- The paper is low quality, about a step or 2 above "Bible quality"
- It's gluebound which is ridiculous both for the price and the size of the book (600+ pages). This will fall apart very fast when in actual use
- The print quality is awful, the text (and especially pictures) are ACTUALLY BLURRY.
Note that this is not necessarily a dig at DRPG as I've ordered good quality print-on-demand books from here before. But I am still saddened by DRPG collaborating with such a low-quality printing company.
Wish I had believed the other 1-star review on here.
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A wonderful recourse for Scions, both Divine and Draconic! In particular I loved the unique takes on the dragons themselves, the storybits hidden within, and the clear love that went into its creation! It is well worth any Scion players time!
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Fantastic bookAnd it has a much wider set of supported game styles than you might think.While the book has been built with pulp adventures from the the 40 through 60 in mind. But other kinds of story can be told, like a more political tale or a purely investigative story.
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Fun reading a story about someone erupting with superpowers and how they deal with that.
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This book seems to have been writent with a "less is more" approach, as in less information is more inspiration. The problem is the "less" part. Page count ? Lack of inspiration ? Weak direction ? The fact is that this book never give details on any of the many subjects. Asking for Storyteller to fill in the holes by not giving information is a bad way to encourage inspiration, especialy when compared to other WoD sourcebooks, old and new.
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Dense with ideas, story hooks, fun monsters and enough room, to make this story your own!
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I've been a fan of White Wolf games (and then Onyx Path) since almost the beginning and I have an extensive library of WW/OP products from several lines. One thing that I have always appreciated about Vampire/Werewolf/Mage/Wraith/etc. is how well-researched and informative their books are so that if you want to run a story or campaign in a time or setting that you are not intimately familiar with, you can do a decent job immersing your players in the setting in a believable way. I'm currently preparing to run a Technocracy campaign for my group and when I discovered that a new book had just been released, I was excited and bought it as soon as I could.
While I was looking forward to learning more about the Victorian Age with a World of Darkness spin to it, what I was continually frustrated with was that this book cannot help but interject "modern sensibilities" into nearly every page. Yes, there were many atrocities committed during Imperialism. Yes, humanity has a bad track record of how it treats humanity. That being said, it is now history, and I didn't particularly enjoy paying $55 for a hard-bound 260+ page essay about how awful and evil Imperialism was and that we should continue to somehow be ashamed of events that occurred over a hundred years ago. Historical context is what I paid for. Op-ed lectures get extremely tiresome and are not helpful.
I would love to keep buying new products from Mage 20th Anniversary edition, but I don't want to keep supporting treatises about current socio-political opinions when I'm trying to run what amounts to a modern fantasy game. If you are one of the authors, PLEASE stick to the fantasy setting and stop drowning readers in your biases.
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