Editing Mnemon Explains Solar Combat (section)

====How much essence and willpower should I spend?====

This is more than a little contextual. Minor skirmish with scouts just ahead of the Wyld Hunt? Go cheap. Desperate final battle with your Deathlord nemesis? Spend at every good opportunity.

In general, it's silly to die with motes left unspent, but being out of motes is a common cause of death.

If you have a Hearthstone, you can safely spend more, assuming you'll have any time at all between battles (and if you don't have time, why, it's going to be the same Scene, so rely on your persistent charms!). Likewise if the time between battles will be peaceful enough to rest, or include social scenes where you can safely stunt back essence.

If you're trying to remain roughly mote-neutral, you should be able to spend 4 motes a turn, and stunt it back with two +2 stunts. If you're under an unfriendly stunting regieme, or if you feel bland or uninspired, cut that back somewhat.

Let's look at Invincible Sword Princess, early in her career. She has Essence 3, Willpower 6, and virtues totalling 9. She has a Reaver Daiklave and an orichalcum reinforced buff jacket, for a total commitment of 8 motes. She has 15 personal essence, and 36 peripheral, cut to 28 after commitment, for a total of 43 motes.

If she's in a battle where she needs to conceal her Solar nature, she'll only have Personal essence at her disposal. After activating Flow Like Blood and Fivefold Bulwark Stance, she's committed 10 of those 15 motes, and is down 2wp. She has a total budget of 5 motes, but feels confident that she won't need to use Heavenly Guardian Defence, so she can spend and regain that fairly freely. In the first two turns of combat, she spends 3 motes using Fire & Stones Strike for 1 mote on each of three attacks, and does two +2 stunts, gaining 1 wp and 2 motes between them. She keeps this pattern up for two more turns, but takes essence from her stunts at 4 motes per turn, showing a slight profit. Finally, with 5 motes back in the bank, she makes 4 Fire & Stones attacks each turn, and stays roughly mote-neutral with stunts. After the battle, she just needs to regain the ten committed motes with some light rest and her Hearthstone.

In open pitched battle against the Wyld Hunt, she has no such concerns. In addition to Fivefold Bulwark and Flow Like Blood, she commits nine motes to Increasing Strength Exercise for a total of nineteen motes, leaving her with 24 motes. She decides she needs to reserve twelve motes spare for emergency Heavenly Guardian Defence, but is happy to fluctuate between 12-24 motes through stunting and offence charms. After holding her action in the first turn in order to act last, she knows she won't need a charm for defence in the first turn. She attacks a Dynast who foolishly used a Simple charm in front of her, spending 3 motes on Fire & Stones Strike on each of four attacks, easily killing him. She takes 2 wp for her two +2 stunts for the turn. The next two turns she uses no essence, and regains 8 motes instead. Happy with that, she spends motes when the opportunity comes from then on, usually no more than 6 or less than 2, gaining four essence from stunts per turn. When the Hunt is substantially broken, an Air Immaculate seeks to flee, and goes within sprinting distance of Invincible Sword Princess. Seeing an opportunity, and feeling fairly safe, she dips into her 12 mote reserve, and fires off a Leaping Tiger Attack + Hungry Tiger Technique + Fire & Stones Strike combo.

For a situation between a quiet "No-one here but us mortals, officer" brawl and a pitched battle, try letting your essence gradually degrade. Spend, say, 6 motes every turn, regaining four motes with stunts. You'll have a good reserve for defences or opportunities for combos, but will still be getting good use out of your offence charms. If you like to use a combo every turn, you'll probably need to make sure you regain 1wp per turn, and will likely be using much more essence, so expect this to be a sharper decline, suitable for faster battles.

In general, spend when you feel safe. Try not to spend too much willpower, and if you do, stunt it back as a priority - essence is much easier to regain between battles. Spend some essence up front to free up space for stunt essence, but otherwise look for good opportunities rather than brute-forcing the situation with big essence spends.