Minireview: Scroll of Heroes (Exalted)

Generally, I’ve been liking the 2nd edition of Exalted a lot. Sure, the rules are a bit weird in places (I’d love a more functional social combat mechanic in the core, for instance), and the “crunch” of the game has more than a few errors and imbalances here and there. Still, we’ve lately gotten quite a bit of good errata on various Exalted stuff from White Wolf, and there are optional mechanics available to patch up (perceived) weaknesses in the core rules. Most importantly, the books for 2nd edition have been reasonably well-written and have contained tons of great game plot ideas etc. Some shoddy proofreading, the bane of White Wolf in general, has unfortunately always been a problem… but I’ve learned to live with that.

Well, every game line needs its clunker. To date, the low points have been Scroll of the Monk (with its ridiculously imbalanced “martial arts” paths) and the Dragon-Blooded book (with lots of charms that were obviously just cut+pasted from 1st ed and not given a proper think-through). And now there is this book, which unfortunately contains much more bad than good.

Scroll of Heroes is (in parts) a 2nd edition version of the 1st edition somewhat misleadingly named Player Guide. It contains rules for playing and running both “heroic mortals” and the offshoots of liaisons between men and gods, fae, demons and ghosts (the God-Blooded, Fae-Blooded, Demon-Blooded and Ghost-Blooded). It also contains Merits and Flaws, which can be used by any Exalted character. Sounds good, as such. But…

Well, let’s start of with the good. The beginning of the book (the “fluff part”) is pretty good. It talks about the game aspects of using mortals instead of Exalts, and how campaigns should differ. There is also some background given about the game world with respect to the various types of “mortals”. So far, so good.

Unfortunately, most of the rest of the book is crap. The Merits and Flaws are stupidly imbalanced; they are either totally useless (making you pay for abilities you had anyway) or are totally overpowered. Using these as-is in a game will seriously break things. And then we get to the rules for the various X-Blooded. Oh boy. Again, the “fluff” there is decent (mostly), but the “crunch” (i.e the actual rules) is horrible. The Charms again range from totally useless to totally overpowered (for a mortal character), and some of the mechanics given don’t even exist in this edition. It’s obviously a bad cut+paste job from 1st edition, by someone who either doesn’t fully understand the rules & setting, or who is under an overly tight deadline.

To add insult to injury, even some of the setting detail is.. off. Demon-Blooded are written to prefer “places of sin”, and to get mechanical benefits from that. Say what? Exalted demons do not work that way! In fact, Exalted demons are very, very different from “demons” in most other fantasy games, which is (imho) a bit plus. Sure, some specific demons might well revel in pain and suffering… but that’s far from being any sort of general trait. Here, the author clearly does not understand the assumptions of the setting. Places of sin, my ass.

Honestly, it might just be less work to write up your own rules for the X-Blooded than to use the mishmash given here. If you do decide to go with this, give the charm set a good read-through and be prepared to do some heavy editing… and really think twice before using the Merits and Flaws listed here.

I don’t say this about very many Exalted books, but: don’t waste your money on this.

1 comment »

1. 

   By Lönkka 4 days later:

   
   

   “Places of sin, my ass.”

   Well put, Sir! Although I kinda don’t know how sinny your rectal area rates… :o

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