[Exalted] Wot G-Style Criticals
So, sometimes the success scale in Exalted is kind of uninformative, eh. I was thinking about how you could mess with the combat system to get two effects: Make the resources game more interesting, and handle special effects (knockback, disarming, clinching) with a singular, cleaned-up system. Weapons of the Gods handles this well, but I don't really think I can get a game of that off the ground, so here's an Exalted conversion of its system!
So, first of all, what special effects can attacks have? (That is to say, non-damage effects that you can access without Charm use)
(I expected to find more than that.)
All these have at least one unique rules system attached! WTF? Also, this is a pretty lame and naked list. More on fixing that later.
So, here's the basic idea: You always make basic attacks. If you get a [i]Critical Success,[/i] you get to choose a critical effect from whatever options you have at the moment. (This is basically exactly how it works in Wot G.)
So, how do we define critical success? The book suggests that you can distinguish feats by basic success (1 success), challenging success (3 successes), and legendary success (5 successes). This seems a little flat to me, for a combat mechanic; I'd like to take the opposition's coolness into account. So let's suppose that you get basic attack success (i.e., damage) at 1 success, a basic critical at (3+your opponent's Essence) successes, and a special fancy critical, or two basic criticals, at (5+opponent's Essence) successes. That way, advanced opponents are less vulnerable even without active defences (you can call this my concession to soak), and extras and mortals suffer from crits almost automatically.
So how do you decide what criticals you inflict? Wot G suggests that weaponry and kung fu techniques provide critical options, which makes sense to me so I'll use it too. Let's say that you can [i]always[/i] use knockback and disarm, weapons can [i]always[/i] stun, and unarmed attacks can [i]always[/i] clinch.
But...but...what does that leave for kung fu? (I assume that, for Exalted, this means "MA forms and misc. combat enhancements.) Well, we'll have to add some stuff to the list. More stuff!!! I'm just going to crib this list more or less wholesale from the other game and invent Exalted rules.
[b]Disarmed:[/b] The victim loses his armament. [i]Basic:[/i] Victim drops his weapon, and needs to pick it up with an Athletics action that requires no roll; Graceful Crane Stance users and the like will basically be able to effortlessly retrieve their weapons reflexively the next time they have an opportunity to act. [i]Fancy:[/i] Victim drops his weapon; you reflexively roll Dexterity + Athletics. The victim must accumulate the same number of successes on Athletics dice actions to retrieve his weapon.
[i]Daunted:[/i] The victim's will to fight is disrupted. [i]Basic:[/i] The victim cannot spend Willpower until his next action. [i]Fancy:[/i] The victim cannot spend Willpower until he performs a non-reflexive dice action with success.
[b]Disoriented:[/b] The victim is set off his internal balance. [i]Basic:[/i] The next time the victim uses a Charm, its cost is increased by 1 Willpower. [i]Fancy:[/i] ???
[b]Down:[/b] Lose your balance. [i]Basic:[/i] You're fighting prone; take a unrolled action to get up. [i]Fancy:[/i] ???
[b]Knocked Back[/b] [i]Basic:[/i] Knock back (formula) yards. [i]Fancy:[/i] Knock back (bigger formula) yards.
[b]Shaken[/b] [i]Basic:[/i] double wound penalties, buyoff with willpower [i]Fancy:[/i] double wound penalties, buyoff with willpower and Medicine roll
[b]Stunned[/b] [i]Basic:[/i] Dicepool penalties, wears off. [i]Fancy:[/i] same penalties, buyoff with Endurance roll.
[b]Blind[/b] [i]Basic:[/i] fighting blind penalties, wears off [i]Fancy:[/i] requires medical attention
[b]Maimed[/b] [i]Basic:[/i] like blind [i]Fancy:[/i]
[b]Burning:[/b] This and the following are all scalable and follow basically same system...
[b]Entangled[/b] [i]Basic:[/i] [i]Fancy:[/i] [b]Grappled[/b] [i]Basic:[/i] [i]Fancy:[/i] [b]Poisoned[/b] [i]Basic:[/i] [i]Fancy:[/i]
[b]Embarrassed[/b] virtue stuff [i]Basic:[/i] [i]Fancy:[/i]
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