A deluxe supplement detailing the Lunar Exalted for the Exalted 3rd Edition tabletop RPG
This post is for backers only. Please visit Kickstarter.com and log in to read.
Hello Gatecrashers,
It felt wrong, somehow, to not have an update from our Lunars book on this MOoNDAY. I mean, the excerpt from The Realm was cool... but this is Lunars, not Dragon-Blooded! So, let's have another peek at Lunar Dominions.
Great timber-walled forts stand guard at the borders of imperial Iscomay. Every few years, new ones rise from the earth of the Northwestern taiga, marking new expansions and fresh annexations. Beyond their painted walls, auroras waver in the night over miles-long lines of standing stones, drawing the eye toward the empire’s rich, fertile heartlands — the grand glacial basin of the Oma Valley.
While countless Iscomayari live agrarian lives in these lush, sheltered lands, a million more live in its scattering of walled cities, many of them less than a century old. Change has come to Iscomay, and rapidly. Only time will tell if its traditions survive — and if the nation itself survives its own hunger for land, resources, and power.
The monarchs of the House of Siladar have reigned over Iscomay for centuries. They claim descent from the Shogunate’s Dragon-Blooded daimyos, though this is no better-founded than the claims made by countless other kingdoms across Creation. In truth, they are a Moon-Touched dynasty, descended from True Voice, an ancient Iscomayari culture hero and Lunar shaman. Most lack the supernatural gifts of the first Siladars, distinguished only by their heavily muscled builds and hirsute appearance, although it’s not unheard of for a puissant Moon-Touched to be born into their line.
Under their rule, the kingdom’s grown into an empire, and its influence has spread across the Northeast. Siladar’s rulers forged treaties with the kingdom’s neighbors, trading food for iron, precious stones, jade, and slaves. As Iscomay’s coffers grew full, it amassed more and more military might, and began deploying its armies in aggressive conquests against weaker neighbors. After a several years of famine-stricken winters, they were able to coerce even their most powerful neighbors into becoming tributaries, subduing those who resisted in a series of bloody military campaigns. Now, Iscomay is a mighty empire, and many of its trading partners are sovereign powers in name only.
The Iscomayari still value the ancient ways their ancestors relied upon to survive. The nation’s laws are codified in the Book of the Bear, written three centuries ago by Iscomayari shamans who recorded their people’s oral epic tradition. Scholar-priests called khojas assist the citizenry in applying the Book of the Bear to day-to-day matters, and make religious rulings on the Book’s nuances and interpretations. There is no formal hierarchy among the khojas; one’s standing and the degree of authoritativeness attributed to one's doctrinal interpretations depends entirely on how she’s regarded by other khojas and the community at large. Becoming a khoja requires receiving tutelage in the Book from an established khoja over a span of years, culminating in a rite of passage in which the aspirant must enter a bear's den and commune with the totem beast without being harmed. Many khojas are selective about choosing students, taking only those from prominent or wealthy families, or who display exceptional talent as savants, geomancers, or mystics.
Iscomayari faith centers on a pantheon of local deities — some who they’ve worshipped since before the Book was penned, others newly added over time by decree of the khojas — headed by the Bear Avatar, the divine embodiment of all bearkind. While the small gods may be worshipped directly, Bear Avatar must be venerated through bears, which the Iscomayari regard as his earthly emissaries and their culture’s totem animal. In the weeks before winter, they leave offerings of fine food, wine, and fresh water at bears’ dens, provisioning the totems before the lean months of hibernation.
The Book of the Bear contains numerous laws dictating when various spirits can be petitioned and what for. The laity may pray to them directly, but rely on the khojas to interpret these rules. In addition to spiritual matters, the Book (and by extension, the khojas' interpretation) governs a variety of worldly topics: dietary rules, decorum, contract and tort law, agriculture, conduct in war, geomancy, and more. Iscomay imposes its laws on all its holdings; as its empire grows, so too does the khojas’ influence.
No sunlight filters down to Luthe in the Western ocean’s depths, consigned to perpetual twilight cast by luminescent seaweed. The City of a Thousand Gods’ diamond domes shattered centuries ago in battles between usurpers and loyalists, and spires snapped like twigs as the sea pulled them under. Luthe teeters on the precipice of a deeper abyss, which swallows a little of it every passing year.
The cataclysm that sank Luthe killed the vast majority of its population — though some survived, sheltering in air-filled chambers. Over the centuries, sea-dwelling beastfolk have thronged to Luthe, repopulating and recreating it. The first aquatic immigrants sought out Luthe for protection, taking shelter in its walls and under Leviathan’s watch. It’s grown to become one of the sea floor’s greatest economic and cultural centers, drawing in ever more new citizens. Luthe’s original inhabitants have largely interbred with beastfolk to the point of indistinguishability, although a rare few air-breathers still call the city home.
Luthian culture is a mélange that draws from the countless aquatic clans and peoples who’ve immigrated there. This intermingling of cultures — and the safe haven the city provides — have allowed art, philosophy, and literature to flourish, and almost every citizen engages in some amateur creative works. Depictions of Sunken Luthe’s history are a popular theme, as are fantastical fictions of Luthe before it fell.
While most of its immigrant populations still worship their ancestral gods, some ancestral practices have spread across clans and ethnicities. Many Luthians also worship the gods to which the city’s countless sunken First Age temples are dedicated, often syncretizing them with their own peoples’ traditional deities. Leviathan is widely worshipped as a guardian deity. Luthian cuisine encompasses nearly every form of seafood that can be found in Western waters (almost always served raw), along with various foodstuffs prepared from kelp, algae, and other aquatic plants.
Several of old Luthe’s buildings survived the cataclysm largely intact. But the city’s aquatic inhabitants prefer to live in the ruined districts, leaving intact ones as slums for the poor and unwanted; stairs are useless underwater, while doors and corridors are designed to be traversed by walking rather than swimming. Smashed buildings offer them the best of both worlds: the bare essentials of walls and fortifications, with ample opportunity to fit them to their own needs.
The largest such district is the Drowned Quarter, the thriving center of Luthian life. Leviathan himself rarely visits the Drowned Quarter in person, though he watches over it from a distance and lauds Luthe’s inhabitants for their resourcefulness in making the city their own.
Buildings in the Drowned Quarter are grown from kelp and coral, braided between crumbling walls to form small pods that serve as domiciles. Once the initial pod is firmly tethered to an old wall, inhabitants add rooms at need: homes grow up and out on stalks of titan kelp, swaying and breathing in the water. The choice of coral or kelp, or indeed of adhering closely to crumbling marble walls, is aesthetic. A squidwoman may prefer a cozy ball of braided kelp, while a lobsterman might choose sturdier walls grown from coral. Aesthetics also plays a part in the choice, and coral comes in a broader, brighter range of colors than kelp.
Coral tunnels crisscross the Drowned Quarter, lit by luminescent algae that provides illumination for those unable to see in the dark. The main tunnels are high-ceilinged enough to let whalefolk pass. Meanwhile, some offshoot tunnels narrow until they’re only accessible to soft-bodied cephalopodfolk, shapeshifting Lunars, and the tiny tetrafolk. No larger than human children, the tetrafolk maintain most of the quarter’s coral and kelp structures, a crucial task funded by the council.
Don't forget about LUNAR CHARACTER CREATION, a special Onyx Path presentation on their Youtube channel. Featuring Matthew Dawkins and Neall Reamonn Price, the duo will be walking through Lunars character creation on March 4th at 9:00 PM GMT (note the time zone!! - that's 4:00 in the afternoon where I am, so don't miss out!) You'll be able to catch it here: https://www.youtube.com/TheOnyxPath
Hello Gatecrashers,
HA! You thought I was kidding about sharing Dragon-Blooded stuff on MoOnday? During a Lunars kickstarter campaign? Is this some kind of jest?!?
Tomorrow, we plan to share another section of the Lunars: Fangs at the Gate manuscript, covering Lunar Dominions. We thought it would be helpful to have some additional information before digging in to that, so the Exalted team has kindly provided me with an excerpt from The Realm, an upcoming Exalted 3rd Edition release that serves as an in-depth guide to the Realm's history, culture, and politics.
From the sea, Faxai-on-the-Caul seems a port city like any other, a grey and brown mass that sprawls along the shore, its ancient, hieroglyph-crusted walls curving around it in a protective embrace. Flags of every house fly in the wind, along with the flags of innumerable outcaste families and martial orders. As the ship ties up at dockside, the first glimpse of the city’s strangeness can be seen — the dockside district sways upon the waves, and the docks continue into Faxai, becoming its streets and paths. Every building stands on thick pillars that lift it above the Caul’s soil, for the very earth here is sacred, and none tread it lightly. Anything buried in the earth of Faxai will endure beyond time, and Imperial decree forbids the interment of both the living and the dead.
Faxai is the Realm’s last foothold in the Caul, the last bastion of civilization before the hills and woods of the interior, where Lunar warlords rule over hordes of beastfolk and whatever unfortunates survived their sudden assault five years ago. The city is a melting pot, houses that loathe each other sleeping beneath the same roof, Dynastic royalty dining across from penniless outcaste crusaders. Here is the last breath of fellowship and safety before the pall of unending dread descends, where scions of Mnemon and Ragara break bread in the name of a greater good — the quest to drive the Lunars from the Caul forever. Yet even here, all the Realm’s intrigues remain, set against the Caul’s terrifying and alien backdrop. Whether faith in the cause or ancient Dynastic rivalries will win out in the end is yet to be seen.
Download SHRINE CITY, a preview from The Realm, to read more...
Download link:
https://drive.google.com/open?id=1Uypy_4qWm6YWzjTjESmnYhpSVJk51Xhk
Pretty cool, right? Tomorrow, we'll return with our regularly scheduled LUNARS program...
Yesterday we had another awesome day, and unlocked (UNLEASHED!) another Stretch Goal - a new Add On reward:
Adding +$80 to your pledge total will allow you to select this Add On reward in our BackerKit pledge manager after the campaign has concluded. I know it's a lot of money to add to your pledge for an item that is all theory at this point - it will be designed as a map of Creation from a Lunar's perspective, with a particular highlight on The Caul. It's still just in the earliest stages of design, so we've got nothing to show you yet.
It will also be available as an Add On in the post-campaign Pledge Manager, so you can add it at some point in the future - after we've revealed an image or preliminary details (which will be some time away). However, adding it in BackerKit doesn't increase our campaign funding total, so won't help unleash additional Stretch Goals for this kickstarter.
So, if you're thinking about getting this, weigh your options carefully. Do you take the leap of faith now, knowing that the development team has a pretty solid track record and help push us toward our next Stretch Goal? Or, do you wait to see exactly what you'll be getting and hold off until a much later phase of the campaign?
To see what past maps have looked like, you can check out the Creation map in the redbubble store (available in a variety of formats) or you can still "pre-order" the Blessed Isle map in our Dragon-Blooded pre-order store.
I'll go over the steps for Add Ons and do a bunch of house-keeping posts in our final week, so don't worry if you don't quite know all the terms here - I'll make sure everything is clear before we get to the end.
BUT TODAY, don't forget about LUNAR CHARACTER CREATION, a special Onyx Path presentation on their Youtube channel. Featuring Matthew Dawkins and Neall Reamonn Price, the duo will be walking through Lunars character creation on March 4th at 9:00 PM GMT (note the time zone!!) You'll be able to catch it here: https://www.youtube.com/TheOnyxPath
This post is for backers only. Please visit Kickstarter.com and log in to read.
Hello Gatecrashers!
Now that we're in the back half of the campaign, things will start to pick up again, as we begin to gain speed and race toward the finish! I've still got lots of content to share - despite the SIX previews we've posted so far - so get ready for another Backers Only preview coming tomorrow!
To get you ready, here's an early peek...
Allia the Songbird remained independent of the Silver Pact throughout the Shogunate, shepherding and protecting the people of the small, isolated village she’d lived in all her life rather than taking part in her fellow Lunars’ war against the usurpers. Queen Nabira of Many Hands forged Night’s Sweet Whisper from moonsilver and the bones of angyalka for the singer-shaman in hopes of earning her gratitude and admiration — but, while Nabira succeeded in that regard, Allia still refused to join the Pact.
When the crusading armies of the Fair Folk fell upon Creation, Allia’s village was one of the few places spared from annihilation. For seven days and nights she played Night’s Sweet Whisper without ceasing, and such was the beauty of her song that no Wyld-born nightmare would dare harm her or the land that birthed her. The fae passed by, but Allia was not content to simply protect her homeland. She departed to Creation’s edge, doing whatever she could to help stem the invasion’s tide. She fought alongside the Silver Pact, but also with Dragon-Blooded, Sidereals, and mortal women and men taking up arms in defense of their homes.
For all Allia’s efforts, the lives she saved were but a grain of sand, while those claimed by the Fair Folk were a great desert. Though she survived, her spirit could not withstand this despair, and she returned to her village to live out the rest of her life in seclusion with her blood kin. She left Night’s Sweet Whisper with Nabira’s apprentice Snow Devil, for the queen had fallen to a raksha’s lash. Since then, shamans and artists of the Silver Pact have continued Allia’s song — as well as the occasional outsider, for to keep Night’s Sweet Whisper solely in the Pact’s hands wouldn’t honor Allia’s independence.
Nightmare-Soothing Melody
Cost: —; Mins: Essence 1
Type: Permanent
Keywords: None
Duration: Permanent
Prerequisites: Crossroads Walker Entreaty, Moonlit Serenity Paean
The fae remember Allia’s beautiful music, and even the cruelest Fair Folk cannot bear to harm those who continue her song. While the Lunar uses Crossroads Walker Entreaty (p. XX), as long as she plays Night’s Sweet Whisper and takes no non-reflexive actions, fae can’t attack her or otherwise attempt to harm her, even if they’ve paid Willpower to engage in hostilities. She can extend Crossroads Walker Entreaty’s duration to Indefinite, although such activations only apply to fae.
After the dread gaze of the fae Prince Balor shattered the fabled lance Eternal Talon, Okopa the God-Slaver gathered as many of its fragments as she could. While she didn’t salvage enough to recreate Eternal Talon, she used what she had to forge the twin edges of the Ichneumon Blades. To her disgust and horror, the weapons she created had nothing of Eternal Talon’s nobility or wisdom, having drunk so deeply of Balor’s death-gaze that it poisoned them down to their Essence. The Ichneumon Blades know only ice-cold sadism, a hunger for pain that no master has ever been able to slake.
Each Ichenumon Blade is a long, thin spike of moonsilver, with jagged edges fit for maiming flesh. They’re attached to bracers of rune-embossed elk leather, reinforced with moonsilver rivets that gleam like pale stars. Though Okopa was disquieted by them, many in the Silver Pact have delighted in turning their malice against the hated heirs of the usurpers. Their last wielder fell in battle rescuing a newly Exalted Lunar, and the tales disagree on the weapons’ fate.
Argent Brood Eruption
Cost: 4m, 4i, 1wp; Mins: Essence 2
Type: Reflexive
Keywords: Perilous, Withering-only
Duration: Instant
Prerequisites: Silver Wasp Sting
The Ichneumon Blades’ progeny hatch in a gruesome display, extending countless spines that pierce their host from within. After her withering attack crashes an enemy with at least one splinter embedded in him, the wielder can use this Evocation to roll (splinters + 10s on the withering damage roll) dice of lethal damage, ignoring Hardness. The impaling spines remain extended, imposing a −1 mobility penalty (Exalted, p. 591) as long as any remain. Moreover, any subsequent splinters the wielder inflicts on the victim instantly blossom into spines, rolling a single die of Hardness-ignoring damage. This lasts until all transformed splinters have been removed.
Extracting splinters transformed by this Evocation is far more difficult than usual. The surgery is rolled at difficulty 5, suffers a −4 penalty if not enhanced by magic, and takes a day to complete.
Once this Evocation’s been used against a character, it can’t be used against him again until all splinters have been extracted from him.
In the Usurpation’s aftermath, the shaman-smith Saint of the Sands fled to the Wyld and built a palace-forge in its depths. He savaged the Wyld and its Fair Folk, feeding them to his furnace to quicken his weapons of vengeance. Weirdflame was the last of these masterpieces, crafted from the chaos-twisted ruins of his workshop itself.
Since the Saint’s death, Weirdflame and the rest of his arsenal have been scattered across Creation and the Wyld, wielded by the Silver Pact and its enemies alike, but few have matched Weirdflame’s infamy. Its flames burn with the Wyld’s power, twisting and tainting that which they touch rather than consuming them. In the hands of Eight-Eye Weaver, Weirdflame razed satrapies and transformed warriors into faceless monsters. The witch-king Kurzimand used it as an instrument of fear, warping criminals into awful grotesques.
Weirdflame is a gaudy weapon, with a spiral moonsilver barrel shot through with veins of garish, pulsating chaos and a mother-of-pearl grip. Its flames burn in a rainbow of colors, both those known in Creation and alien spectra born of the Wyld. It currently lies where its last wielder, the Four Pine Sage, sealed it away
…yet Weirdflame still burns, beckoning its next master.
The Moon in Flames
Cost: —; Mins: Essence 1
Type: Permanent
Keywords: None
Duration: Permanent
Prerequisites: Sharing Luna’s Gifts, Wyld-Flame Crucible
The Lunar may use Weirdflame’s fire to transform characters with Sharing Luna’s Gifts (p. XX), waiving its health level cost. If she knows Insidious Lunar Transformation (p. XX), she can make its gambit with Weirdflame, waiving its health level cost. Any Evocations that enhance Wyld-Flame Crucible can also enhance Insidious Lunar Transformation — for example, reducing the difficulty of using it against a target marked by Twisting Ash Brand.
Special activation rules: This Evocation awakens at no cost when the Lunar fails a roll against the Derangement inflicted by Spark of Madness.
Also, a reminder that Onyx Path's Matthew Dawkins and Neall Reamonn Price will be walking through Lunars character creation on the Onyx Path Youtube channel on March 4th at 9:00 PM GMT (note the time zone!!) You'll be able to catch it here: https://www.youtube.com/TheOnyxPath