Editing Crimson Pentacle Blade (section)

===Formations===
The charm Five Directions Formation Protocal is sufficiently distinct that it requires another section just to deal with it. It is, to the best of my knowledge, the most lengthy and complicated charm currently in existence in Exalted. It is on the one hand intensely flavorable, and can be used to do many cool and interesting things. It is also horrifically flawed in terms of game balance.

Explanation Of The Text
*The FDFP is not technically a charm, but rather a methodology for designing multi-user "combos". To use one, the following qualifications must be present:
**A "combo" must have been devised. This requires a number of martial artists who know FDFP, each of whom must contribute at least one charm to the "combo". All of these charms must either be martial arts charms or charms that are explicitly permitted to be used in combos with charms from other abilities. Devising this combo requires an expense of XP equivilent to the cost the "combo" would have if designed as a normal combo, which is divided up evenly among the group, with non-Terrestrials paying double.
**All the martial artists who designed the formation must be present within a 10-yard radius.
**All martial artists must activate the formation, which counts as their charm for the round and cannot be used with a "normal" combo. All must spend one point of temporary willpower.

*The effects are as follows:
**All users must remain within 10 yards of all other users. The formation ends when any of them go farther than 10 yards from any others.
**All have a movement speed equal to that of the slowest user unless a movement speed boster is part of the protocal. If one is, all may use it.
**All users have access to the charms in the formation. This is the case even if they do not meet the Minimum Essence and Minimum Ability ratings required, as long as the one in the formation who actually has the charm meets those ratings.
**Any user who has a charm up with a duration longer than instant may "bleed" it to others, allowing them to share its benefits, for one mote per recipient, payed by the "bleeder." Note that there is not a requirement that these be Martial Arts charms. Only one Form may be used at once, and permanent charms cannot be shared.
**All essence costs (but not, it seems, willpower, health, or XP) of charms in the "combo" are split as evenly as possible across all the users of it.
**A bonus of +1 per user of the formation is given to all rolls of charms present in the "combo," to a max of the Attribute+Ability of the user (as in Solar dice adders). 

*There are, however, a few problems
**Access can be gained to charms that are far outside of one's normal ability, explicitly allowing the use of charms that you don't meet the requirements for. This means, really, that if Sidereal Martial Arts are put in the "combo," everyone can use them. Even Dragonblooded. Even mortals. One Sidereal sifu and a dozen dragonblooded lackies can use FDFP to throw 48 Pattern Spider Touches at every enemy in view. This raises the question of why, exactly, the Usurpation was particularly difficult.Alternatively, they can shoot out a dozen Essence Shattering Typhoons and maintain them for some time, allowing one to annihilate quite a few square miles of land (and, of course, everyone in them who can't throw half a dozen perfect defenses) from a good number of miles away.
**The "bleeding" cost is absurdly low, and it can be done with charms not in the combo. It is, for example, possible for someone with Bottomless Depths Defense to share it with everyone else in the formation for one mote each, rendering them all functionally invulnerable. Or, consider again what can be done with Sidereal Martial Arts. A master of the Prismatic Array of Creation could with ease share all his many hellishly powerful persistants with his minions. This gets even more sickening if you toss in fae, because they have many charms that are story-long, which with a raksha in your formation could result in everyone running around with half a dozen raksha charms on them for the rest of the campaign without the need for any pesky commited essence. 

Between these two reasons, I'd say that about a dozen people from various sorts of magical character who had a properly designed formation would stand at least even odds of defeating everyone else in Creation at once. This is, one thinks, a capability a bit beyond what a midtree terrestrial martial art charm should provide. As far as fixing it... it is suggested that only Martial Arts charms of a sort that a character could use with his current initiations be usable by him, and that bleeding charms across requires paying and commiting the entire cost of those charms. It is also suggested that your Storyteller read this and slap on the back of the head any players trying anything described herein.

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Original Author: Random Nerd on RPG.net
(Note: The blurb on the [[Exalted Martial Arts]] page was originally the lead-in to this article)

[[Category:Exalted]]