sol invictus.indd

EXALTED • SOL INVICTUSthe Storyteller a chance to correct them; beginning agame with high-Essence characters brings all thesepotential problems to the fore at once.Firstly, it can prove difficult to create a balancedand compatible party at this level. Creating veryexperienced characters is already more difficultthan creating starting characters. When severalplayers are doing so in concert, it can be difficultto integrate these characters with one another.This pitfall is most obvious in regard to combatcapability. For normal starting Exalted characters,the range in possible combat skill — from completelyineffectual to highly skilled — is reasonably small.In most games, simply nudging players towardsthe low or high end of fighting ability is enough tokeep all the PCs within a reasonable range of oneanother. For more powerful characters, this balanceis harder to create because the scale is larger. Evena character with 500 experience points can still bea poor fighter, but he might also be a masterful,world-shaking combatant — or anywhere inbetween. As a Storyteller, you should pay closeattention to the combat capability of your PCs, andwork to ensure that they do not diverge too greatlyfrom one another.A similar problem can occur with characterbackgrounds. It’s pretty simple to bring a groupof starting PCs together — often they will be nearthe beginning of their adventuring careers, and willhave hooks which can easily lead them to becomeinvolved with one another. However, the historiesof higher-powered characters will be far moreelaborate. Reaching Essence 6 requires a characterto have lived at least 100 years — and she is likelyto have had a great deal of excitement in that time.Trying to create backgrounds of this scope formultiple characters, all of whom are intended towork together, can be quite challenging. There’sno easy solution — the Storyteller simply needsto work closely with all of her players to create acompatible group of PCs.Once play begins, some players might havedifficulty getting into character. Many playerschoose to establish their characterization duringplay, rather than deciding on their character’smotivations beforehand. This is an entirely validapproach, but beginning with old and powerfuladvanced characters can make it more difficult.Starting characters with only a brief backstory oftenhave enough wiggle room that their personalitiescan emerge over time. However, experiencedcharacters tend to require an elaborate backgrounddescribing the nature of their past adventures. Ifyou have players who seem intimidated by this,or who you think might run into trouble, it mightbe wise to run a session or two where the settingtakes a backseat— allow the players to leave theirbackgrounds vague to start and fill it in afterplaying through a session in which backgroundisn’t important.Despite the potential pitfalls, beginning a gamewith powerful Exalts has its own rewards as well.A game like this allows a group to enjoy playingvery powerful characters without taking the timeto build up to it through play. In addition, it givesthe Storyteller an excellent setup for a variety ofnarrative tricks — flashback sessions or purposelyvague background elements which are filled in ata later date, for example.FLASHING FORWARDAnother method combines the two previous stylesby taking existing PCs and leaping forward in timeto a period in which they are far older and moreexperienced. This approach can circumvent manyof the problems discussed above: it gives players achance to get used to their characters at a low powerlevel while still reducing the real time it takes tobegin a high-powered game.However, it’s worth thinking carefully about afew things before proceeding. Unless you knowyour players very well, you shouldn’t attempt thiswithout asking their permission — some may notbe interested in high powered play, while others176