By official rule, “characters who wish to master multiple crafts must take this ability multiple times.” In our campaign, this rule is replaced with the following: Craft uses specializations to represent the various crafts a character knows. Any craft roll within a specialty that a character has is rolled normally including the bonus from the specialty; however, craft rolls in an area in which the character does ''not'' specialize have three dice subtracted and their difficulty increased by one. Characters who learn Craft gain one specialty for free. In addition, Craft ignores the usual limitation on three specialities per ability, allowing as many specialities as desired, though no one speciality may be chosen more than three times. In addition, Craft specialties start at +0 instead of +1. This is spelled out in a bit more detail [http://exalted.xi.co.nz/wiki/wiki.pl?Wordman/Craft here].
'''Abilities'''<br>
''Awareness: ''••••<br>
''Brawl: ''••<br>
''Bureaucracy: ''••<br>
''Dodge: ''••••<br>
Endurance: ••<br>
''Investigation: ''••••<br>
''Larceny: ''••••<br>
Medicine: •<br>
Melee: •••<br>
''Presence: ''•••<br>
''Stealth: ''••••<br>
''Thrown: ''•••••<br>
Languages:
The specialties follow the lead of Second Edition, but others that are more or less specific may also be used. The primary specialties are:
'''Backgrounds'''<br>
Artifact: •<br>
Resources: ••<br>
Whispers: ••
*Mortal arts (anything a mortal can make fits into one of these)
'''Charms'''<br>
**Air: calligraphy, jewelry-making, creating precision instruments, glassblowing and composing music (making small, decorative or high-precision items)
Fivefold Sensory Exercise<br>
**Earth: masonry, sculpture, stone cutting, creating earthworks (creating buildings and large objects with stone or earth)
Sense-Eroding Gesture<br>
**Fire: blacksmithing, making ceramics (forging and casting large metal objects and creating objects using fire)
**Water: cooking, painting, brewing, leather working, pharmacy and poison-making (boiling and cooking plants, chemicals and animal materials)
Fivefold Shadow Form<br>
*Esoteric arts
Ox-Body Technique<br>
**Fate (Sidereals, pg. 104)
Deception-Piercing Stare<br>
**Glamour (Fair Folk, pg. 104)
Unsurpassed Interrogation Method<br>
*Ghostly arts (Abyssals, pg. 232-234)
Excellent Inquisitor Attitude<br>
**Jadecrafting
Cunning Criminal Style<br>
**Soulforging
Evidence-Erasing Method<br>
**Moliation
Theft of Face<br>
**Pandemonium
Flesh-Mending Discipline<br>
Concealing Distraction Discipline<br>
Encounter-Banishing Gesture<br>
Noiseless Phantom Style<br>
Aid of Ill Wind<br>
Hungry Missile Technique<br>
Incomparable Assassin Method<br>
Ivory Spine Attack<br>
Lightning Clutch of the Raptor<br>
Pitiless Scything Razor<br>
Ravening Crimson Chakram
</td></tr></table>
===Sciences===
==Personality==
Some endeavors require more knowledge that is represented by the Ability system, particularly tasks like making and repairing First Age magical items, designing manses, and so on. In this campaign, certain tasks are not possible without knowing the [[Forgotten Suns: Science|science]] behind it.
Though original confused, conflicted and indecisive, Regret's hatred of the Lover has given him more focus. He is, however, torn by the desire to embrace life again and the pull of his oath to the underworld.
===Lunar Shapeshifting===
==Appearance==
When in animal form, a lunar's own Brawl and Martial Arts abilities are supplanted by the Brawl skill of the animal form when making natural attacks. This reflects the fact that much of the training represented by human Brawl and Martial Arts skill assumes human limbs and hands. Lunars may buy specializations to Brawl skill that will add to fighting when in a specific animal form.
Looks like Robert Dudley, Earl of Leicester (Joseph Fiennes) in ''Elizabeth'', with longer, straighter hair, and extremely pale skin.
When wearing moonsilver armor to which they are attuned, a lunar may choose to banish the the armor Elsewhere when shapeshifting into any form. Such armor is still attuned and any hearthstones mounted in it continue to provide their effects. Lunars can only "summon" this armor by making another shapechange. This costs the same and takes just as long as normal. A lunar, for example, could change any form (including normal human form) into their normal human form with armor for the standard 1 mote, reflexive shapechange. Changing from any form into an armored animal form costs a simple action and the normal 3 motes, etc.
==History==
==Backgrounds==
Birth into a merchant family gave the boy who would become Regret of the Sun enough education and spare time to grow envious and resentful of his lack of social mobility. He joined the Imperial Post at a young age, due more to a desire to see the rest of the world than any patriotic feelings for an empire he considered far too rigid and petty. Soon after becoming known for his willingness to deliver into “barbarian” lands, he was secretly recruited as a courier by agents of House Iselsi. This eventually led him to create an expanded “side business” as an information broker.
===Heart's Blood===
With contacts in the Empire, the Scavenger Lands (particularly Nexus and Lookshy), the Guild and elsewhere, his services were in high demand. In spite of his success, he never found much more to respect about society outside the Empire than within.
This lunar background has been substantially [[Heart's Blood|reworked]].
[[Image:Regret.jpg|left]]After several deals involving the Immaculate Order, he became aware of a force of fifty dragon-blooded being assembled into a Wyld Hunt, supposedly due to a prediction that a powerful solar would exalt on an isolated, wooded road nearby, though with indications that something may be “off” in the prediction. Wanting to gather information on the capabilities of the dragon-blooded, he travelled secretly to the road and waited in hiding. The Wyld Hunt arrived silently one by one, setting up an ambush.
===Manse===
As the sun started to set, a local farm girl came down the road leading a manure wagon. A karmeus swooped out of nowhere at the girl, attempting to carry her off. As the claws sunk in, the girl began to burn, the mark of twilight raging from her forehead. After the girl incinerated the karmeus with a disk of burning light, the Wyld Hunt unleashed on the girl.
If a hearthstone is mounted into an artifact to which you are attuned, you gain the benefits of the hearthstone (both essence respiration and other abilities) through the attunment, regardless of where the artifact is. Skin contact is not required. This functions even if the artifact is Elsewhere, but not across other dimensional boundaries. So, if you were in Creation, but an artifact with your hearthstone was in Yu Shan, no benefit would be derived from the stone. Effects of specific realms on hearthstones continue to apply in the way most detrimental. For example, if you are in the Underworld, but an artifact with your hearthstone is Elsewhere (or vice versa), the penalty preventing essence respiration in the Underworld still holds.
As he watched the girl’s flesh burn, the man who would become Regret felt the torrent of magic stir something within him, then the circle of night flared from his forehead as he, too, exalted. With the Wyld Hunt occupied, he managed to flee without detection, but the Immaculate Order soon realized that what had seemed “off” about their prediction was that it actually indicated the exaltation of two solars at the same place, not a single powerful one.
==Combat==
The Wyld Hunt tracked the man who would become Regret for over a year, an on-and-off chase culminating in Gem. Trapped and seriously wounded, the hunt’s prey took the only path of escape available to him, through one of Gem’s many small shadowlands and into the underworld. Carrionis (pg. 51) soon found him and took him to his mistress.
Since the characters were built with standard rules, we continue to use standard combat rules, with a few exceptions.
Not predisposed towards Creation before he exalted, the new solar learned to truly despise it after a year of being tracked like an animal and shunned as anathema. By the time they reached the Lover Clad in the Raiment of Tears, the solar had inherited some of Carrionis’ zeal, particularly against the Empire.
===Aborting to Cascading Parry===
The solar spent two weeks in the Lover’s company (and bed), being shown all the power of oblivion and its inevitable victory over life. By the end of it, he agreed to become her new deathnight. Though enthusiastic at first, after the Lover’s Malfean lord accepted him, he began to suspect that he had been duped, and shown only certain aspects of the underworld. By the time he was cursing Creation within the Monstrance of Celestial Portion, he realized he had make a serious mistake. This realization, however, made him more angry at Creation, and he cursed all the more.
Characters may abort their action to parry the same way they can abort to dodge, with a -1 cumulative penalty for each parry. The main difference is that the initial penalty starts at -2 instead of zero. Aborting to parry uses Dexterity and either Melee, Martial Arts or Brawl, gaining the defense rating of the weapon.
==Psyche==
===Clinches & Holds===
==Goals==
Clinches and holds are resolved using the new Power Combat mechanics. These just make more sense and are easier to apply.
As his name indicates, Regret hates his current state and wants to become a solar again. Failing that, he wants to get as far from his mistress and the Malfeans as possible. He currently thinks is best chance is to find a place that is neither creation nor the underworld.
===Delaying Action===
==Data==
We tend not to have "race towards zero" problems, but the following rules are used to delay action. If you do not want to act on your standard initiative tick, you may do one of two things. You may ''conditionally delay'' your action, specifying a condition that will trigger your action. For example, you might delay and say "if someone tries to attack my friend, I will attack them." If the condition is triggered, you may act ''before'' the condition takes effect. The delay generates no penalty for your action. To continue the example, when an enemy declares an attack on the friend you are protecting, you may act first, effectively interrupting the attack. Once your action is completed, if declared actions of others were interrupted, they may change their minds and redclare their action.
*[[Media:regret.pdf|Character sheet]]
*[[Media:regret.xml|Raw data]]
You may also ''unconditionally delay'' your action. This allows you to act at a later time in the round without penality; however, it does ''not'' allow you to interrupt the actions of others. You can act before someone declares an action, but once they have done so, you cannot use your action until they are done.
==Items of Note==
If you chose to conditionally delay and wish to react to something that doesn't involve the condition, you can abandon the conditional delay and follow the rules for an unconditional delay.
*[[Bonewedge]]
In either of these cases, you may split your pool when you announce that you are delaying. Usually you would do this to declare defenses that can be used while you wait. Such defenses may be used without defaulting your action.
===Martial Arts Styles===
A clarification: martial arts styles can be divided into four groups:
#Styles that allow use of armor at all times
#Styles that allow specific (usually light) armor at all times
#Styles that prohibit use of armor with their form (and maybe one or two other) charms, but allow it with other charms of the style
#Styles that prohibit use of armor with all charms in the style
It is often forgotten that most styles are actually the third type. Five-Dragon and Immaculate styles are the first type, except Fire-Dragon, which is the third.
===Mixing Martial Arts Styles===
The rules on how weapons and armor work when mixing more than one style of Martial Arts are slightly confusing. This campaign interprets these rules enforcing a "low watermark" concept, where the greatest restriction applies. In particular: bonuses to attacks or parries granted by charms can only enhance attacks or parries made with form weapons, or barehanded. If you attempt otherwise, any such charm effects terminate before the attack is resolved.
The practical upshot of this is that, unless two styles share the same signature weapon(s), fighters wanting to use charms for attack or parry from both styles at once must fight bare-handed. Note that it is possible to use charms that neither attack nor parry from other styles while using incompatible weapons. For example, Distracting Finger Gesture does not enhance a weapon attack or parry, so could be used while holding a goremaul or other weapon incompatible with Ebon Shadow Style.
===Celestial Practice of Immaculate Styles===
The errata to the ''Dragon Blooded'' makes several changes regarding the Immaculate Martial Arts styles, most of which became official in the ''Player's Guide''. Some, however, did not, making it a bit ambiguous. Regardless of the intent, this campaign works as follows:
*Celestials do not need to make rolls when activating Immaculate forms.
*Celestials do not need to dedicate themselves to an Immaculate path, so may learn other Celestial Martial Arts before, during and after mastering an Immaculate style.
*Celestials transcend the need for "elemental harmony", so gain signature weapon benefits and do not pay a 1 mote penalty for each charm.
===Mixing Shaping and Normal Combat===
The rules governing how shaping combat mixes with normal combat are a bit confusing. The following is how these rules are interpreted in this campaign:
A raksha gets a single shaping action per scene. This action may be backed with a shaping charm. The raksha may take this action reflexively at any time during the scene; however, if multple raksha are involved, a standard shaping initative roll is made and those with higher initiative may preempt the action of slower characters with their own.
This can be a typical shaping attack, in which case it is resolved as such, with effects based on how the given shaping attacks affect creatures of Creation. Most shaping attacks can only be targeted at a single target at a time, but there are exceptions.
The raksha may also use his shaping action to form a more generic narrative shaping, defining the parameters of a scene. Narrative shapping is assumed to affect any targets involved in the scene that tha raksha wishes to include in the narrative. This works as per the "Effects of Reality Shaping" on pg. 134, where targets from Creation can either accept the reality, gaining one die Wyld bonus, or can spend a Willpower to reject it, suffering an environmental penalty equal to the raksha's Essence. Other raksha are assumed to be aware of the narration, but are not beholden to it in any way.
Charms such as Integrity-Protecting Prana compeletely stop shaping attacks. They also allow those protected to reject a narrative shaping without spending Willpower; however, even protected characters suffer the environmental penalty, though it is cut in half (round up).
=== Stunts ===
In an effort to encourage more stunting, we will be using the stunt rewards from Second Edition. These essentially double the mote reward for stunts.
==Charms Changes==
===Tweaks===
====Martial Arts====
The Air Dragon signature weapon effect is a bit unbalanced compared to the other effects. This campaign replaces it with the effect from Second Edition: An Air Dragon Immaculate may hurl two chakram as a single attack, using one attack and defense roll, but they do damage independently. To use a charm for such an attack, an additional mote must be spent.
Because we allow anyone to abort to a cascading parry, the Mantis Form is no longer as useful. It now adds Essence to any parry attempts, but must have a base Martial Arts pool available to use this bonus.
====Craft====
Shattering Grasp claims that it "doubles damage successes" when augmenting an attack on an object; however, rules for attacking objects state that you don't actually roll damage against objects. Whatever the intent behind this is, in this campaign, this charm doubles the raw damage of such an attack.
===Power Combat Changes===
Our campaign, having gone on fairly long using the original combat rules, elects not to use the new power combat rules from the [[Exalted Player's Guide|Player’s Guide]]; however, these rules contain a some changes/clarifications to charms that make sense for either rules system. Note that some of them are significant changes. The following are considered official in our campaign:
====Archery====
''Immaculate Golden Bow:'' Accuracy and rate equal to Essence. Range 300 yards.
''Trance of Unhesitating Speed:'' Costs a flat 3 motes per attack. No more extra attacks than Essence.
====Athletics====
''Feather Foot Style:'' Cost now 5 motes. Duration one scene. In addition to effects listed in book, also doubles running and sprinting rate (though this does not stack with other speed enhancemnets).
''Monkey Leap Technique:'' Distance measured in yards, not feet.
''Spider-Foot Style:'' Cost now 3 motes, duration one scene.
====Charisma====
''Flowing Body Evasion:'' Type now reflexive. Also, no roll is needed for this charm (for 6m and 1wp, you can avoid the annoyance of a minute chance of failure).
====Dodge====
''Absence:'' Type now reflexive. Defensive supplemental make no sense.
====Endurance====
''Armored Scout’s Invigoration:'' Cost now 3 motes per point of mobility and fatigue negated, a max number of times equal to Endurance. Each 3 motes negates a point of each.
''Essence-Gathering Temper:'' Each success on the roll gains a number of motes equal to Essence, though no more successes provide benefit that the character has points of Stamina.
''Front-Line Warrior’s Stamina:'' Cost now 5 motes + 1 Willpower. Cancels all fatigue and mobility until the armor is removed.
''Tiger Warrior’s Endurance:'' Cost now 6 motes + 1 Willpower + 1 lethal health level. While in effect, character regains Essence as if meditating (8 motes/hour) and cannot suffer fatigue checks or penalties. Character does not and cannot sleep. Duration is Essence + Endurance in hours. Health level remains “comitted” while the charm is active.
====Martial Arts====
''Armor-Penetrating Fang Strike:'' Cost now 4 motes + 1 Willpower.
''Essence Venom Strike:'' Cost now 7 motes + 1 Willpower.
''Striking Serpent Speed:'' Cost now 6 motes only.
''Walking in the Footsteps of Ten Thousand Things:'' Drop the 2 xp from the cost of this charm. The rest works the same, except that the charm awards additional die instead of additional successes.
====Melee====
''Dipping Swallow Defense:'' Text is changed such that it adds its dice to a parry, providing a pool if none exists, rather than allow the character to use is normal pool. This is a subtle difference, but it means that these dice count as "dice from charms" rather than the characters normal pool. This allows the charm to stack with charms that just allow a roll when there normally wouldn't be one (such as Bulwark Stance and Five-Fold Bulwark Stance), allowing Dipping Swallow Defense to stack with those charms. (This is not part of the Player's Guide changes, but otherwise this charm is just a speedbump).
''Fire and Stones Stike:'' Each mote make a damage die an automatic success. (From erratta).
''One Weapon, Two Blows:'' Cost now 2 motes.
''Peony Blossom Attack:'' Costs a flat 3 motes per attack. No more extra attacks than Essence + 1.
====Presence====
''Majestic Radience Presence:'' The Willpower roll to oppose or attack character made every time attempting to disobey or harm character, but no more than once per turn.
''Terrifying Apparition of Glory:'' The Valor and Confiction rolls to oppose or harm character made every time attempting to disobey or harm character, but no more than once per turn.
====Resistance====
''Durability of Oak Meditation:'' Cost now 1 mote per 2B added to bashing soak. A roll is no longer needed. May be used with existing armor.
''Iron Skin Concentration:'' Big change: now reflexive and of instant duration, costing 3 motes only. It reduces the damage dice of any attack you are aware of to the attackers Essence.
''Spirit Strengthens the Skin:'' Big change: now reflexive and lasts one scene. For 2 motes and 1 willpower, you may soak lethal damage with your bashing soak until the end of the scene. Incompatible with armor. (Note that this is somewhat similar to what Iron Skin Concentration used to do, but is slightly cheaper with a higher resistance requirement).
''Unfailing Toroise Technique:'' Cost now 2 motes. Character's natural lethal soak becomes Stamina + Resistance to defend against a single, even unanticipated, attack. Charm is compatible with armor.
''Iron Kettle Body:'' Cost is now 3 motes. Character gains +8B/+9L soak to a single attack. In addition, if the number of damage dice rolled for the attack starts at eight or less, the attack does no damage at all.
====Thrown====
''Fiery Solar Chakram:'' Cost now 4 motes. Accuracy bonus equal to Essence.
===Additional Charms===
The following charms are legal in this campaign and may be learned like any others:
*[[Leopard Style]] martial arts
*Any of these additional [[Exalted Charms|charms]]
*Any of these combos [[Exalted Combos|combos]]
==Sorcery==
===Lunar Sorcery===
Lunars have an innate connection to the Wyld and a lot of practice shaping themselves with their will, both of which make them natural sorcerers, particularly no-moons. To reflect this, experience costs for lunars to learn new spells are reduced to 7xp for no-moons and 9xp for other castes.
Costs for learning necromancy remain unchanged.
===Learning Sorcery===
On learning the charm for a new circle of sorcery, you can learn a spell of that circle for free as part of your training.
==Training==
===Combo Training Time===
As written, the rules do not set a fixed training time for combos. In this campaign, the base time for learning a combo is equal to the sum of the minimum Ability or Attribute requirements of all charms in the combo, times the sum of the minimum Essence requirements of all charms in the combo, in hours.
This time is further modified by multiplying it by a factor of ''x''. The value of ''x'' is calculated as followed:
*''x'' starts at the value of the highest minimum Essence rating found in the combo.
*Add 1 to ''x'' if your Occult score is 1 or lower.
*If you lack a trainer, add 1 to ''x'' for each charm in the combo from an unfavored Ability or Attribute.
This total is then divided by a factor of ''y''. The value of ''y'' is calculated as followed:
*''y'' starts at 1
*Add 3 to ''y'' if you have a trainer.
*Add 1 to ''y'' if your Occult score is 4 or higher.
*Add 1 to ''y'' if your Lore score is 5 or higher.
*For each dot you possess in [[Forgotten Suns: Science#Charmcraft|charmcraft]], add 1 to ''y''.
===Modifying Existing Combos===
Using canon rules, combos cannot be modified. If you want to add a charm into a combo, you must learn a whole new combo. Unfortunately, this has the effect of preventing people from developing combos. In our game, we allow this rule to stand, but provide steep discounts in xp cost and training time for learning the new combo.
Suppose you have a combo with two charms in it and you want to add a two more charms into it. Determine the training time (T<sub>2</sub>) and xp cost (X<sub>2</sub>) spent learning the two charm combo. Then determine the xp cost (X<sub>4</sub>) and training time (T<sub>4</sub>) that would be required to learn the four charm combo from scratch. To learn the four charm combo, you pay X<sub>4</sub>-X<sub>2</sub> xp and you must train for T<sub>4</sub>-T<sub>2</sub>. At the end of this, you know both the original two charm combo and the new four charm combo.
If you want to learn a subset of a combo you already know, you must learn a brand new combo; however, as with adding charms, you do so at a much reduced cost. Removing charms is much easier, so to learn such a combo, you pay a number of xp equal to the minimum Essence of each charm removed. You must train for a number of hours equal to the minimum attribute/ability of each charm removed. Note that, since reflexive charms in combos do not require activation when the combo is used, learning a subset combo should really only be needed to remove non-reflexive charms.
===Attribute Training Time===
Being masters of their own form, Lunars cut the training time to raise an attribute in half.
===Trainers Required===
In addition to things in the rules that ''require'' trainers to learn, characters must have tutors to learn the following:
*Your very first martial arts charm of any kind
*Any martial arts form charm
*The pinnacle charm for a martial arts tree
*Any Immaculate martial arts charm
===Training Others===
Exalted can both learn and teach at the same time. Thus, two exalted could be teaching each other different charms simultaneously. This is slightly non-sensical, but makes the game flow a little more smoothly (particularly since training times are long enough already).
===Lunar Martial Arts===
Lunar characters may learn martial arts charms from a style based on their totem animal for eight experience points each. The lunar may do this with one and only one style, selected by the lunar.
===Sidereal Martial Arts===
The ''Sidereals'' book implies that any celestial, including lunars, can learn sidereal level martial arts (in addition to sidereals, of course). The ''Players Guide'' restricts this to only solars and abyssals. In this game, Lunars can learn sidereal martial arts at a cost of 18 xp per charm (16 if MA is favored).
Note that all sidereal MA charms ''require'' a tutor, and finding one is the most difficult part of learning these styles. Sidereal ''sifu'' tend not to give up these secrets lightly, if at all. In this game, to qualify as a tutor to non-sidereal exalted, the teacher must be a master (i.e. know ''all'' of the charms) of the tree he or she is teaching.
===Fair Folk Charms===
As mentioned in the Fair Folk book, Lunars (along with Eclipse and Moonshadow caste) can learn Fair Folk charms, provided a Fair Folk has forged an appropriate grace for them. In a departure from the standard rules, however, Lunars pay only 17xp to learn these charms (not double cost).
===Graces===
Non-Fair Folk may improve the rating of any grace forged for them, even if they do not own it. All graces held by non-Fair Folk are considered to be minor graces.
==Armor==
Clothing of any kind may be used with charms that do not allow armor, even if the clothing provides soak bonuses. Charms that don't allow armor (such as martial arts forms) conceptualize this restriction with the idea that the bulk of armor restrains movement needed for the charm, which is not a factor in clothing (else the charm could only be used naked). Examples of clothing with soak bonuses would be Demon Embracing Robes or the gossamer garments of Fair Folk. Note that such clothing ''is'' bypassed by charms that explicitly penetrate or avoid armor (e.g. Armor Penetrating Fang Strike). To balance out this change, such clothing provides no soak against aggravated damage.
==Astrology==
Officially, a character may not have "two of the same destiny on herself" (side.218). In this campaign, this is purposely misinterpreted to mean that the sidereal cannot have two of the exact same identities at the same time; however, a sidereal ''may'' have multiple destinies from the same college on themselves, provides they are distinct identities. The practical result of this is that sidereals use effect dice from one destiny for special effects while reserving those of a maintained identity in the same college. Since the number of astrological effects on a single person is already limited by their Essence, this does not seem particularly unbalancing.
[[Category:Forgotten Suns]]
[[Category:Forgotten Suns]]
[[Category:House Rules]]
[[Category:Characters]]
[[Category:Exalted]]
Revision as of 05:58, 14 August 2005
Name:Regret of the Sun Gender: Male Birthdate: 1 Descending Water 742 Height: 185 cm Weight: 86 kg Eye Color: Pale green Hair Color: Black Skin Color: White Caste: Day Nature: Survivor
Charms
Fivefold Sensory Exercise
Sense-Eroding Gesture
Corruption-Sensing Scrutiny
Flitting Shadow Form
Fivefold Shadow Form
Ox-Body Technique
Deception-Piercing Stare
Unsurpassed Interrogation Method
Excellent Inquisitor Attitude
Cunning Criminal Style
Evidence-Erasing Method
Theft of Face
Flesh-Mending Discipline
Concealing Distraction Discipline
Encounter-Banishing Gesture
Noiseless Phantom Style
Aid of Ill Wind
Hungry Missile Technique
Incomparable Assassin Method
Ivory Spine Attack
Lightning Clutch of the Raptor
Pitiless Scything Razor
Ravening Crimson Chakram
Personality
Though original confused, conflicted and indecisive, Regret's hatred of the Lover has given him more focus. He is, however, torn by the desire to embrace life again and the pull of his oath to the underworld.
Appearance
Looks like Robert Dudley, Earl of Leicester (Joseph Fiennes) in Elizabeth, with longer, straighter hair, and extremely pale skin.
History
Birth into a merchant family gave the boy who would become Regret of the Sun enough education and spare time to grow envious and resentful of his lack of social mobility. He joined the Imperial Post at a young age, due more to a desire to see the rest of the world than any patriotic feelings for an empire he considered far too rigid and petty. Soon after becoming known for his willingness to deliver into “barbarian” lands, he was secretly recruited as a courier by agents of House Iselsi. This eventually led him to create an expanded “side business” as an information broker.
With contacts in the Empire, the Scavenger Lands (particularly Nexus and Lookshy), the Guild and elsewhere, his services were in high demand. In spite of his success, he never found much more to respect about society outside the Empire than within.
After several deals involving the Immaculate Order, he became aware of a force of fifty dragon-blooded being assembled into a Wyld Hunt, supposedly due to a prediction that a powerful solar would exalt on an isolated, wooded road nearby, though with indications that something may be “off” in the prediction. Wanting to gather information on the capabilities of the dragon-blooded, he travelled secretly to the road and waited in hiding. The Wyld Hunt arrived silently one by one, setting up an ambush.
As the sun started to set, a local farm girl came down the road leading a manure wagon. A karmeus swooped out of nowhere at the girl, attempting to carry her off. As the claws sunk in, the girl began to burn, the mark of twilight raging from her forehead. After the girl incinerated the karmeus with a disk of burning light, the Wyld Hunt unleashed on the girl.
As he watched the girl’s flesh burn, the man who would become Regret felt the torrent of magic stir something within him, then the circle of night flared from his forehead as he, too, exalted. With the Wyld Hunt occupied, he managed to flee without detection, but the Immaculate Order soon realized that what had seemed “off” about their prediction was that it actually indicated the exaltation of two solars at the same place, not a single powerful one.
The Wyld Hunt tracked the man who would become Regret for over a year, an on-and-off chase culminating in Gem. Trapped and seriously wounded, the hunt’s prey took the only path of escape available to him, through one of Gem’s many small shadowlands and into the underworld. Carrionis (pg. 51) soon found him and took him to his mistress.
Not predisposed towards Creation before he exalted, the new solar learned to truly despise it after a year of being tracked like an animal and shunned as anathema. By the time they reached the Lover Clad in the Raiment of Tears, the solar had inherited some of Carrionis’ zeal, particularly against the Empire.
The solar spent two weeks in the Lover’s company (and bed), being shown all the power of oblivion and its inevitable victory over life. By the end of it, he agreed to become her new deathnight. Though enthusiastic at first, after the Lover’s Malfean lord accepted him, he began to suspect that he had been duped, and shown only certain aspects of the underworld. By the time he was cursing Creation within the Monstrance of Celestial Portion, he realized he had make a serious mistake. This realization, however, made him more angry at Creation, and he cursed all the more.
Psyche
Goals
As his name indicates, Regret hates his current state and wants to become a solar again. Failing that, he wants to get as far from his mistress and the Malfeans as possible. He currently thinks is best chance is to find a place that is neither creation nor the underworld.
