Editing Solar Exalted (section)

==So, the Sun Chose You?==
''Or, advice for players''

===Exaltation is Character Building=== 
There is quite a lot to building a Solar character, so I will divide this into three sections: Concept and Background, Dots on the Sheet and Charming Your Way Through Life. 

===Concept and Background===
Think big, or at least have big potential in mind. Nobodies don't exalt. Exalts are either exceptional now, or will be exceptional soon. A boy who spends his entire life in one village, cutting wood isn't going to exalt if it's his destiny to spend the rest of his life cutting that wood. Exalted all have tremendous strength of character in one way or another (the virtues system pretty much assures this), so your concept should reflect this. A good method to straddle the potential versus competence now line is through the Exaltation, which brings us nicely to the second part of concept and background: Exaltation. This is one the player and Storyteller should really go over together (a bit more than normal). Exaltation is the single most dramatic event in the characters life up until that point. No one Exalts lying comfortably in bed (unless ninjas burst through their window and try to kill them at the same point). Work up an Exaltation that ticks one or more of the following boxes with your Storyteller: 

*It must be cool. This is a bit of a vague category to fill, but it?s pretty much the cardinal rule of Exalted. For example battling the other relic scavenger who has been your nemesis since you took up the trade atop a ruined pyramid, in an elemental storm is a perfect time for you both to Exalt. However, a tense bargaining session, where the wrong word could cost you your life, in a bar the nemesis owns, which is full of his men could also be a great time for your character to Exalt. 
*The character must be under some pressure. Exaltation should happen at a time of stress for the character, the perfect time for a mortal hero to shine, and show the gods what he is really made of. 
*It should provide a plot hook. Sure, backgrounds exist to give the Storyteller plot hooks, but what better opportunity for the beginning of an epic quest than a message from a god. 
*It must be dramatic: Even if your exaltation is uneventful on the surface (e.g., you exalt while walking down a street of your city at night) you can make it eventful by having some sort of dramatic revelation for the character (the gladiator realises he?s wasted his time in the arena, when he could have been fighting to push back the dark in the world, the scholar who has never seen his knowledge leave the library realises that there is so much more potential for learning out there in the world). First age memories are excellent for this, as the character realises the revelation comes from the attitude of one of his former incarnations. 

With those guidelines, your Storyteller and you should be able to work up a kick ass Solar Exaltation in short order. 

Given the huge setting of Exalted, it is imperative that you work with your Storyteller to create a character appropriate to the area the game is going to be set in and the style of game you are going to be playing in (yup, I know this is stock advice, but in my experience, it is of more importance in Exalted than pretty much any other game I?ve played). Nothing sucks more than crafting a fantastic background for your northern ice-walker chief who exalted while battling the Fair Folk, and now leads a coalition of tribes to reclaim the North from the Fairies, only to find out your Storyteller wants to run a game of sea bound adventure in the South West, battling deadly pirates and demon cults. Not that it couldn?t be done, however.

===Dots on the sheet===
When building a Solar character, one of the things to remember is you have a fairly large number of points to play with. Your character can be staggeringly competent in one area and still be able to hold his own in others. Naturally this offers a fair bit of freedom for character generation. 
First, look at your attributes. You get a fair number of points to put into these too, so the biggest decision is what to make your primary and secondary attribute set. Generally a frontline combat character should have high physical stats, a savant or sorcerer should have high mental stats and a socialite or religious icon style character should have high social attributes. This doesn?t however mean that that section has to be their primary attribute set, the secondary set gives just enough points to be very competent in that area (as opposed to the staggering competence of the primary attribute set). Either way, it?s generally a good idea to have physical as either primary or secondary, or sink some bonus points into increasing your attributes; Exalted is an action game, and not being physically capable of the impressive stunts you?d expect to be able to do can be annoying. Again, there are exceptions to this, it?s a guideline at best. 

====Abilities====
A good idea at this stage is to look over the Charms section of the book (and the charm picking guide of this 101)and pick a few you like the look of, then note their minimum requirements, so you don?t have to point juggle too much at the next stage. Picking your favoured abilities is extremely important, as you can buy dots in them for less, and you get discounted experience costs to increase them, and charms in them cost less. Ideally you want a combat ability (archery, brawl, martial arts, melee, thrown) and dodge, if they are not already caste abilities. This is because you will need to be able to hit your enemies, and cheap increases and charms helps this immensely, and dodge is useful to pretty much everyone (there are exceptions, but I?ll get into those later...) Generally, picking one of the social abilities (presence, socialise, bureaucracy) is also a good idea, a fast tongue can avoid many dangerous situations, especially when combined with the phenomenally powerful social charms of the Solars. 
So, the first things you should buy are the prerequisites for the charms you have picked. Remember, however, that to buy an ability at 4 or more, you need to spend bonus points. Then you can spread any remaining points around. As a general rule of thumb, to be competent enough to be chosen as a Solar Exalted, you should have either one ability at 5, and one or two at 3+, or two abilities at 4 and a few at 3. However, this isn?t a hard and fast rule, more a way to get the most out of those starting points. Specialities are a good way to increase an ability that would otherwise be lower, or to push an ability to the limits of mortal competence, in certain areas. Picking specialities for favoured abilities is very cost effective in terms of adding basic dice to your pools, but when it comes to adding to those pools with charms (such as the dice adder charms in the melee tree) specialities don?t count to the attribute + ability maximum addition. 

====Virtues====
In some ways, these four simple stats are amongst the most important to your character; They influence the way he acts in a broad swathe of situations, they can dramatically increase a characters prowess for a short period of time, and most importantly, they define how the great curse of the Exalted manifests. You have only seven points to distribute here, so doing it according to character is the order of the day. Pick what you would like to play: A cold, calculating mercenary captain would have high conviction and valour, but a low compassion, and possibly low temperance (maybe behind the iron exterior he hides a liking for hard liquor). The best recommendation for picking virtues is go with what feels right, since it?s down to how you want to roleplay the character. 

====Essence====
This begins at two, if you intend to play a sorcerer, remember Essence 3 is needed, as terrestrial circle sorcery requires it. However, I would recommend taking essence 3 to all starting characters, the benefit it gives outweighs the bonus point cost.
No if it suits your character to have three essence, have three, if not, don't.

====Backgrounds====
Several of the backgrounds available to Solar characters can be relatively easily picked up during play: Followers can be picked up by anyone with decent social abilities, Resources by anyone with good Larceny and Stealth (and no morals). Familiars, at least at lower levels, can be picked up with basic survival charms. Influence, backing and contacts simply accrue through play, without any specific effort to get them. The big reason to buy these backgrounds straight out is simple: You begin play with them, no effort at all has to be expended to get them. This can be very important, since generally you will want to be doing more heroic things than bankrolling your expeditions, or training a pet. 
*Followers can be useful if your storyteller allows them to be more capable than the average man on the street (or in the jungle or whatever), but otherwise, they can be more of a hindrance than anything else, unless you?re feeling particularly heartless and you want a meat shield. 
*Resources is a very campaign dependant background; either you will pretty much require it, or it?ll be a nice extra. One thing to remember is that there is a comprehensive price list at the back of the core book (pg 324 onwards) and that a purchase of equal to your resources value permanently reduces your resources by one. This means if your Storyteller is using resources for the purchasing of starting equipment, you may want to stock up on it. 
*Familiar is, at higher levels, a fairly useful background that can be difficult to get in play; the familiar is a magical creature linked to the characters essence. At lower levels, the familiar has no interesting powers, and is basically a normal animal. At higher levels, however, the familiar gains some interesting abilities; the ability to share senses with it can provide excellent spying possibilities, and the ability to drain some essence from it can be useful. 
*Influence is one thing Solars can guarantee gaining through play: Being one of the most powerful entities in creation (at least potentially) means some folks will listen to you, and the incredible social prowess of the Solars means that listening is the first step to following. 
*Backing and Contacts essentially achieve the same thing in the game world: Give you access to people and things to make your life easier. Both require some sort of recompense for the access, and both can be advantages and drawbacks. 

Backgrounds that are definitely worth picking up at character creation: 
*Allies: Allying with someone is worth a couple stories by itself, since allies are extremely close friends, and the default power level is a starting solar character. 
*Artefact: Orichalcum artefacts are very difficult to come by, since the setting assumes that any known orichalcum artefacts are either heavily guarded, in the hands of someone important, or lost to the world. 
*Manse: Unguarded manses are very rare, so to get a manse in play generally involves evicting the current owners. While this may be fun, it certainly isn't easy, since manse owners are either fae, Exalts or spirits, and as such can present a challenge to a competent solar circle, especially if they're fighting on their home turf. 
*Mentor: Having someone show you the ropes of being an exalt is worth its weight in orichalcum and that is only part of what the mentor can do. 
A good way to break up your backgrounds is to think of every background dot as what would be a single story's worth of play time in game, since that?s about how long it takes to build up one background dot.

===Charming your way through life=== 
A starting Solar character begins with ten charms. That is at least 80 experience points worth of charms, or put more clearly, a fair amount of bang out of the box. So what do you do with this bang to make it as loud as possible? 

Well, it is a good idea to have a broad selection of charms; being really, really good in one area, like the best in creation (which could be just possible if you sink all ten charms into something, maybe) might seem like a good idea, but when you face some competition in anywhere except that area, especially if it is Exalted competition, you are going to wish you?d generalised a bit more. 

Assuming you are not into [[Exalted Martial Arts]] or [[Exalted Sorcery]], a 5/5 split between direct combat and non-combat charms is a good way to divide up your charms. At least three of the combat charms should be defences of some kind, whether soak boosts (e.g. Iron Kettle Body), dodges (e.g. Reed in the Wind) or parries (e.g. Dipping Swallow Defence). The defensive charms should be taken from two different abilities if possible as well. This is because you can parry an attack once, dodge an attack once, then boost your soak to take any remaining damage, hopefully reducing it down to ping damage. For offensive charms, picking two from the same tree isn?t a bad idea, since it gives you good combo possibilities, and more importantly, options for attack. Lets, for example, take brawl charms. You could pick both Fist of Iron technique and Thunderclap Rush Attack, meaning you could pre-empt your enemies, or hit harder than normal. For the five non combat charms, a range of abilities is important. There are several trees which are worth picking up for almost any character build. For example, athletics charms are always useful, whether increasing your mobility, or boosting your strength. The initial athletics charm from the acrobatic side of the tree is known in many groups as the ?wire-fu charm? for good reason. It allows you, without dice rolls, to perform actions which wouldn?t be out of place in a Jet Li or Jackie Chan movie. 
The Solar social charm trees are also well worth getting a foothold in, since they are the most efficient and powerful charms available to Solars, especially at the top levels. Ox Body Technique is a very good investment for starting characters, and it is a good idea to take one level of it regardless of concept, since it improves your survivability dramatically. Overall, taking almost any of the non combat charms is useful, with only Ox Body being close to necessary. 

====Martial Artists and Sorcerers====
Martial Artists and Sorcerers require somewhat different charm picks from regular exalted; the unusual way their abilities and/or charms work merits special attention. 

''Martial Artists'' 
Solar martial artists are in something of a strange situation when it comes to picking abilities and charms: Martial arts provides both unarmed and armed combat options (in this, it is similar to Brawl) and the charms have effects commonly associated with several other abilities (notably Lore, Occult, Dodge and resistance, depending on the martial arts tree). Also, a solar martial artist has the problem that their non martial arts charm options are often more attractive, as they tend to be more powerful or wide reaching in effect. However, the wide range of effects available within a single tree makes up for less directly powerful charms. 

Overall, martial artists still want to have a broad selection of defensive charms, with the three charm guideline still applying. Another good guideline for the dedicated Martial artist is to buy all the charms up to and including the form charm at character creation; the pre form charms tend to be slightly underpowered, while the form is dead on power level, and the post form charms are slightly overpowered. Buying up to the form gives a wide range of effects for a starting martial artist, and generally provides at least two charms to combo together early on. It?s also worth noting that taking much more than the form at character creation tends not to pay off in the same way as taking a large number of melee charms; you sacrifice flexibility for domination of a single niche. It is important to remember, however, that a very competent Solar martial artist takes time to build, usually 20-30 exp points, by which point you should be deep enough in your chosen tree to have access to good abilities, and powerful combos. Remember too, to factor in whether your chosen martial arts style allows armour to be worn with it, when choosing defensive charms: A naked (comparatively) martial artist may need a stronger active defence than an armoured one. It?s also worth stressing again that a Solar martial artist who picks only Celestial level martial artists will not have the same raw power of a solar Brawler or Meleeist, but will have far, far more flexibility in the effects of his charms. 

''Sorcerers''
Sorcery is the area where the Solar Exalted excel best, their large essence pools make them more capable than other terrestrial and celestial level sorcerers, and only they have access to the most powerful magic in creation: Spells of the Solar Circle. 

Overall, as a starting Sorcerer, a 4/3/3 charm split between sorcery/combat/non combat charms is a good guideline: It gives you Terrestrial Circle Sorcery and three spells, three combat charms to be split between offence and defence, and three other charms to be used to broaden your abilities. 

As far as spell picks go, the only spell which is really necessary is Emerald Countermagic: It is the spell to take sorcery to get: The ability to shut down enemy sorcerers as they cast is not to be underestimated, especially when you consider how powerful even terrestrial spells are. As far as other spell picks go, check what you want out of sorcery; want to be the best battlefield sorcerer of a generation, take Storm of Obsidian Butterflies. Sorcerer-savant who searches for ancient texts; The Eye and the Mouth. It is also important to consider how your spells interact with your other charms: You don?t necessarily need a powerful defensive charm if you can cast Invulnerable Skin of Bronze against powerful opponents. From your three combat charms, taking two defensive and one offensive is a good rule of thumb if you want to be effective in a fight aside from sorcery. For the non combat charms, naturally the non sorcery occult charms are very useful (especially All Encompassing Sorcerers Sight) and social charms will help overcome the in setting stigma associated with sorcerers in some areas of creation. Overall, specialising in the broad area of -the unusual and occult- isn not a bad idea, as this vague area includes most of the abilities associated with the Twilight caste, except Craft.

This brings up another benefit of sorcery: the knowledge of magic to craft powerful artefacts: If you decide to take Crafts as a sorcerer, the combination of high crafts and the high occult needed to buy sorcery gives an excellent starting dice pool for artefact creation. 


====Are You Experienced?==== 
Once you have experience, you are going to want to spend it. Early in your career as a Solar, where you sink your experience can make a big difference to the effectiveness of your character. As you start to reach middling experience levels, where you sink your points into matters less and less until you reach the point where no matter what you buy, you will be deadly in one way or another. So this experience guide is broken into three stages: New exalts, experienced exalts, and masters of the universe. This guide doesn?t really apply to dedicated marital artists or sorcerers, who will be covered separately 

''''New exalts (0-40 exp)'''': As a new exalt, there are two things you should be spending your experience on: Basic combos, especially defensive ones, and heading deeper into your favoured charm trees. 

''Combos'': Combos are what set competent exalted apart from their peers, and having a good range of basic combos sets you in good stead for later advancement. A powerful defensive combo, or a combo with an attack and a powerful defensive element are virtually essential, and are not expensive to build, most costing about the same as a new charm. 

''Charms'': Favoured charms are cheap, you should be able to afford one every other session, give or take. They are also very useful, heading partially into one or two trees is a good way to spend your experience, and it gives you a wide range of options for combos. Defensive charms are always a better choice than offensive ones, since a good defence is stronger than a good offence in Exalted. 

''''Experienced exalts (40-90 exp)'''': Experienced exalts have a few more options open to them, but one thing should dominate your exp spending, as it will make life as an exalt far easier: Persistent defences. That is defensive charms that last a full scene, and allow a free action to defend yourself. A good persistent defence frees you of using a defensive charm every turn, so you can act more effectively, using a wider variety of charms. It?s also worth noting that stacked persistent defences (that is more than one active at the same time) make you very very hard to hurt. 

Other things to spend exp on at this level are; improving your abilities, it?s cheap if they are favoured, and it makes your charms more effective. Solar social charms; this is the time to get a foothold on those social charm trees, as they are the most powerful charms the Solars have access to. If you picked some up before, now?s the time to get the more powerful ones. Essence: This is a prerequisite for persistent defences if you didn?t buy essence three at character creation, so you may want to pick this up. More combos. Wide ranges of combos are always good. Perfect effects: As you gain access to persistent effects, you also gain access to perfect defences. As the big strength of the Solars, picking these up is no bad thing. 

''''Masters of the Universe (90 exp plus)'''': Now it is time to either buy up the last few charms in your favourite tree, or make your own custom charms. Either that, or finish off the social trees. You can also up your essence to four or five, if you feel it necessary, or up some of your abilities. By now, you are powerful enough to pick and choose whatever you like to spend exp on.