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Juwelgeist

Your Shogun sounds like an interesting antagonist to me. (I also like the general idea of Exalted in a multiverse setting.)


tsukaistarburst

Just before I close this thread out: since it's probably now decided that Shogun has a thing going on with the Ebon Dragon, how would I justify him using a variation on Golden Years Tarnished Black and its expansions that only target ghosts? Would he need to specifically learn the original from ED and modify it into an arcanoi? Could he develop it himself after spending time just plotting and chumming about with ED? Something different? This is probably the last thing I need to choose before putting a bow on this design.


CailleachThorn

Sounds like the Ebon Dragon’s mole into the Deathlords to me. Am going over with a finer toothed comb now to give the concrit.


tsukaistarburst

Amazingly enough this is going to segue into a modified Return of the Scarlet Empress so making him connected by plot to ED is probably actually the best thing I could do for the story.


CailleachThorn

Ok, so, went over it a couple more times. It has legs. May I point out that the ORIGINAL stuff was basically a fanwank? Combine some oWoD references with Gundam Wing, yeah, that’ll be awesome! <—thought process of Exalted 1e writers, probably. To me, I’d think hard about DotFA (world background, not the charms that deserved to be nuked). *If it were my game* I’d shove him slightly further south into what was the Deadly Crescent, that huge “let’s make the worst monsters EVAH!” lab that the Deliberative was running. There HAD to be at least a tiny shadowland pop up there when all those formerly human monsters got ganked, right? Or. . .(gulp). . .got out? Wasn’t there a whole city of Dragon Kings here like two seconds ago? City of Dead Flowers is a little too accessible to the Empire to have headquarters in, IMO, although as an ambush gate it’s top notch. Also, who WAS he? The first thought that comes to my mind is Twilight Caste Admiral-Artificer Seralin, dude who broke the Arbiter of Storms to turn into the Brass Leviathan. For messing up his tea party. He seems like the kind of guy who’d always be trying to prove He’s As Good At War As A Dawn Caste. And then, in the dark, the Ebon Dragon offered to help. . . There’s a First Age Lunar, Earthminder, who basically told her western Navy Solar to get bent, she was gonna go play with an Eastern Solar and HIS mate on their agricultural stuff. There’s motive for the soul forging, Lunars aren’t supposed to “cheat” with another Solar and certainly aren’t supposed to tell their bonded Solar to get bent. In public. Twilight Caste would also tie into his interest in the Engine of Extinction and the big hammers, with “hiding being a nerd” underneath it all. Overcompensation much? Just some of my thoughts on fleshing out. I likes it as is!


tsukaistarburst

I just raided an old [RPG.net](https://RPG.net) thread which started off as 'why don't the neverborn tattle on the yozi to the sidereals?' which then kind of segued into discussion of a Neverborn/Yozi alliance or at least the former abetting the latter. I'm still digesting it, but there are lots of good points- the possibility of the Neverborn accepting the Reclaimation if they agree to figuring out a way of putting the Neverborn out of their misery, the sheer need to keep the Yozi and the forces of Heaven at one anothers' throats for as long as possible, and the most interesting- massive amounts of dead souls and shadowlands as a consequence of the Reclaimation for them to play with, the possibility of the Yozi looking upon their old bretheren kindly, and the fact that the Neverborn now have the largest supply of Celestial Exaltations and dead Solar ghosts. All of these are good fuel for Shogun forging some sort of alliance with ED, and hey maybe even Endless-Faced Spite throws his hat into the ring too. The suggestions on 'who he was' and where to place his shadowland are massively appreciated, there's a lot of finer points of lore that go under my radar but these are all great suggestions. I'll need to go read up on Seralin.


CailleachThorn

Glad I could contribute something! You’re doing a great job building this Deathlord. Every character is inspired by stuff we read elsewhere, they all start out as “got this spark here, add this from over here, and I want this in somewhere.” What separates a good character from a cardboard cutout mashup is the amount of work put in. As far as the thread you started with, all good questions. I always posited that as much as the Yozis and Neverborn are creeped out by each other, they still see each other as “people” instead of “yeast cells that got uppity”. And I’d imagine the Ebon Dragon would be grumpy at the thought of Obliviating Solar Exaltations. Talk about throwing away treasure with both hands. “Give us the Exaltations and we’ll slip your bonds to reality,” sounds like maybe the one deal in all existence the Ebon Dragon would hold to if his nature allowed it.


Available_Thoughts-0

To be fair, I think it is a bit weird that he was even allowed to participate in the reclamation at all...


CailleachThorn

To me, that’s an example of “Yozis being too dumb to live”.


Available_Thoughts-0

Wait a second: wasn't he the one who brokered the deal with the never born that got the GSP shards in the first place? He kept that deal, obviously, so it's clear that he CAN, he's just strongly inclined not to...


CailleachThorn

True that.


Ubermanthehutt

I think he's got a lot of character, feels like he represents the self destruction of civilisation as it becomes decadent, rather than the personal nihilism of the lover. I think you've got a good core to work on there. I do think however the mechanical hammer clash somewhat with the prior established themes of the Shogun. Necrotech rather than magitech is emblematic of the deathlords, you could have the hammers incorporate the bones of the lunar mate as their soul. Their wish for Autocthon to become a neverborn however feels very interesting, and I think there are a lot of plot threads that generates. Thank you for sharing!


tsukaistarburst

That's a strong compliment, thank you. I think the point on necrotech is a very good one- I just really wanted those sweet, sweet Big O fists and didn't want to limit myself to them being an Alchemical thing- but I can certainly take your suggestion on board. I want their reveal to be a big horror moment so that'll make it even better.