Desert Hawk

There is a sad fact about roleplaying games and that is that they are dependent on people to make them good.  You need a competent Story Teller and you need competent players.  If you had a board game, the competent players would almost always win, but in a Role-Playing game, where there are no winners or losers only good times and bad times, competence is a prerequisite.  Well at least equal competence.

There was this one time that my friend wanted to tell a story and I asked to play it, as I had a concept that I wanted to play through.  I set up my character Desert Hawk as a mercenary captain of an independent mercenary soldiers.  

…

I had made a fortune and had sunk a considerable portion of that wealth into purchasing six perfectly crafted weapons, four pistols and two rifles.  Perfect means that they were crafted beyond exceptionally and they are a little bit shy of being magical, indeed they are so good that they could be considered magical, but they are not.  Purchasing them had cost me most of my wealth.

But that was the present, I had been born a few decades previously in the land of An-Teng, which was the vacation destination of choice for exalts for thousands of years.  In our history we served the Solar Anathema loyally for millennia, so that when they were overthrown, our entire populous was looked upon as traitors, but we continued our obsequious servitude to the victors of the revolution and were thus spared.  

We were trained from birth to revere the Dragon Blooded and never look directly at one, unless commanded to do otherwise.  Indeed we were trained to kneel and bow with our foreheads touching the ground whenever one was near.  The Patricians of the Realm were treated likewise, as one could never be sure; we were completely subservient.  We were raised as strongly to fear the Anathema and to watch for the signs of one.  

After I left An-Teng, I joined up with an auxiliary of one of the Famed Realm Legions and trained with them.  I learned how to fire a bow and later to use the artillery.  I learned many skills that one could trade in the wider world.   Due to my varied skills  I soon left their ranks to join a mercenary company in the pay of the same legion.  The pay was better and the risks were lower, but most of all the company valued my skills whereas the Realm legionaries looked down on them.  It was with them that I first learned to use fire weapons.

…

A good character has a solid backstory that they can fall back on and a good understanding of the setting.  I based my character in a real in game nation so that I could fall back on all the history and the character of an actual known region so I could say that I reacted this way because that is the way that someone would act from this country.  

The story was a Solar Campaign, but most of e world has been taught that Solar Exalted are very real nightmares.  I picked a origin story that would provide a lot of personal angst and growing opportunities.  I also selected weapons that I could use as an Exalt with the charms that I was going to pick.  I was going to play a character that only knew Martial Arts Charms in the beginning.  There were a few reasons, first the martial art in question was very cool, it used flame pieces and fire wands as weapons.  Secondly, I rarely get to play so I wanted to feel how the martial art worked first hand, and mostly and lastly because Fire Weapons in Exalted are much cooler than just guns in other games.  They are not pistols and rifles, at all, save in a few ways.

It is the Storyteller's job to either mold the story to the characters present or to set restrictions on character choices.  My storyteller was weak and I did not know it at the time.  I had been running games for him off and on for five years, and he had all the books, but it did not occur to me that he had not read any of them.  He passed the character on as being good for the story.

…

Desert Hawk was told that his mercenary company was not allowed in the core of Chiaroscuro because the Tri-Khan rulers had judged that as we had just come from the Veng States our loyalties were suspect (my idea). I had heard about a particular tea house where I might meet a potential employer that would meet our required payments.  One hundred trained soldier using fire dust weapons is still expensive close to the Pole of Fire, where fire dust is at least more common.  

Upon reaching the tea house I discovered some very unnatural truths about my potential employers: one of them was a monster and the other one was a soul devouring, baby eating Solar Anathema, a creature whom I was warned about from my cradle as the worst of the worst horrors that could ever exist. As my bowels turned to ice water and my stomach began to heave, I stilled myself and tried to form a plan as to how I could escape and warn the Realm, perhaps as a secondary goal, prove my loyalty.

I tried to remain calm and must have succeeded as my fowl potential employers did not notice my discomfort.  After what seemed to be an eternity, I managed to get them to agree to letting me go to gather my mercenary company.  I did not go directly to the outer city  to my troops, but headed in that direction initially but then headed to the main barracks where the Realm might have a post.  

When I found the correct location I headed directly in and asked to speak to a representative of the Wyld Hunt, the elite fighting force trained to clear the Anathema from Creation.  I was not so lucky, but there was a few Dragon Blooded in the City at the time and they were summoned, as much as any mortal can actually summon one who has been blessed by the Gods to rule all. 

When they entered the Hall, I was in a prostrate kneel, with my forehead pressed into to marble floor, arms raised above my head in complete submissive supplication.  I gave my report to them in this fashion and they quickly determined that they needed to confront this menace, that could destroy the entire city if it was left to fester.  I asked only one thing of them, as I required no reward for doing my duty to Creation by reporting this manifestation of pure evil, but wished to see with my own eyes the terrible Holy wrath of the Terrestrial Exalted as they destroyed the Demon.  They agreed to my wishes, as it seemed a just reward, a tale that I would be able to tell my grandchildren one day.

The Dragon Blooded took all of the scares resources they had at their disposal, including one hundred twenty-five elite soldiers, the black and red jade arms and armour that the two Exalted owned and headed out to the tea house I described.  Outside it while the most Illuminated Dragon Blooded began to call out the Solar Anathema so he could be destroyed, I set up my two Firewands and made sure my four Flame Pieces were loaded and loose in their holsters.

The Hubris of the Anathema was great and he entered the field of battle with his shock troops.  He was wreathed in fire that surely was gifted on him powerful Demons form the Demon world of Maelfious.  The elite soldiers of the Realm quaked before him and his power was felt as a crushing grip upon my heart, squeezing tightly.  He drew his demon blessed diaklave and issued a challenge to the Realm.  Such fear he put in me that I nearly fainted, but it was amongst the Realm soldiers that its roar had the greatest effect, all of them voided their bladders and bowels on the spot and half of them dishonoured their post by fleeing in terror.

The Solar's troops charged and I took careful aim.

…

It was at this point that I discovered that my friend had not read the book.  Firewands look like a blunderbuss or a musket.  A long barrel that fires one shot and then needs to be reloaded, a practice that takes a good length of time.  A Flame Piece looks like a one shot pistol.  Both weapons have a short range only and that is where the similarities end.  In Exalted, guns do not fire bullets, they are flame throwers.  The range of a bow in the game is measured at 200 yards at short range, 400 yards at medium range and 600 yards for long range; it is an epic game so shooting things at that distance is cool.  Flame weapons have only short range and that range is 10 yards and 8 yards for Firewands and Flame pieces respectively, but anything in that range is hit by a gout of fire that does 12 lethal damage and 8 lethal damage, respectively, to anything in the flames path, plus any additional successes that good aim has given the shooter.  My Storyteller had not realized this when he okayed my character because he had not read the book and just assumed that they fired bullets.

…

I had carefully positioned myself just off the main courtyard, seemingly so that it appeared that I was going to get a good view of the action, but my true reason was so that I would be able to hit as many targets as possible with each blast of my Firewands when the enemy passed through a few obvious choke points.  I was hoping that the good money that I had paid for my weapons had been worth it.  The Firewands were longer than standard to improve their accuracy and range, while the pistols were lighter and shorter to allow a quicker draw and faster use.  In this fight to come I had planned to fire one Firewand and exchange it for the other within easy reach and discard both of them until after the fight, if I lived, and used the four others in rapid succession, dropping spent guns for later retrieval, again only if I lived.  Then to use my slashing sword until I could reload my last gun.

The Anathemas troops boiled past me in their eagerness to kill the Realm soldiers, a fatal mistake.  My first and second shot were lucky ones and I was able to hit over half of the twenty-five warriors and despite the heavy armour each wore, they all dropped like the bags of charcoal that they were.  The Solar Anathema, who had been charging the two Realm Dynastic Dragon Blooded, made a quick threat assessment of his foes and halted his charge forward and determined that I was the bigger threat as the remaining mortal warriors in his control had dropped their weapons and were fleeing me and my guns, some of them slightly crisped.

Drawing my guns two at a time from holsters and firing them as the Anathema came into range, his golden armour was not able to provide much protection from my barrage. His sword was raised high as he charged, but since it was a very heavy weapon it would take him a bit of time to bear it down on me, me a mercenary without my armour, who would without a doubt would die from only one hit of that weapon.  I tried my best, but I was very surprised that it was I who still stood when he came to a dead stop at my feet.

…

A mortal should not be able to to kill a Solar Exalted, no matter what he is armed with.  His magical powers should stop some of my attacks and dodge unharmed away from the others, but it was not what had happened in this case and so I was rewarded for my bravery and my greatness, with an Exaltation of my own, a Solar Exaltation. 

…

So there I was, the hero of the day who struck, half the Anathema's troops before incinerating the Anathema itself, all in about ten seconds and now cursed as the new enemy of the Dragon Blooded.  They looked at me Standing in my new Solar Glory, the light of the sun spilling into the sky at night from my own skin.  They took a breath, a slow deep breath before yelling at the top of their lungs, "ANATHEMA!!" 

I was not sure what was happening.  Who were they yelling at, as the Anathema was dead.   I was in a daze.  The world looked differently and a secret knowledge was pounding in my head.  I knew things that I did not know before.  I knew the Ebon Devil Martial Arts, a style that had not been practiced in over fifteen hundred years, and I was a Master of it.  

I spilled Firedust into the air, it formed a small cloud around me as I loaded both guns in my hands simultaneously, without using my hands.  The guns now blazed with the light of the sun as I reflexively pointed the barrels at my new attackers, the Dragon Blooded, and I measured their souls as 'wanting' in the scales of life.  I judged them as Creatures of Darkness for the purposes of their sentence, while mystical blue targets appeared over their center chest and I fired.  

Although they were both armed with the very best tools of the Realm, the thickest and strongest armour that the Empire could provide it did not do anything but slow the fire that consumed them down.  I wondered if my men would accept me now as the newest Holy Warrior of the most Exalted Sun, or whether I would have to cut them down like so many blades of wheat.

…

I should not have been allowed to have that character in that story, or the story should have taken my weapons into consideration, or that before I cut down so many people I should have Exalted, else-wise been controlled or made to understand.  The Storyteller did not know the setting, did not the rules.  He should not have been story telling.  I thought that he did.  He had all the books and said that he had read them and understood them.  He was dismayed by my actions and caught by the power of the character that I wrote up.  He was surprised that I demolished everyone in the game so quickly, first as a mortal and then as a "True" Solar Exalted.  

This was a lesson on the importance of competence in RPGs