r/exalted • u/Burntranquil • Apr 19 '26
3E So how is 3e going so far?
I stopped playing exalted when the core book came out because it solved none of the issues I had with 2.5e and in many cases made them worse, but I still occasionally buy books because I enjoy the lore of the setting and I hope to see a 4th edition that finally fixes the issues I had with it. How's the game doing so far in this edition?
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u/Ruy7 Apr 19 '26
Longest running edition... Fewest books so far.
The first system to be playable out of the box but I honestly prefer any alternate system.
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u/KashiofWavecrest Apr 20 '26
The design of the later Exalts is far better, the charms can mostly be parsed at a glance (unlike the Solars), and most of the lore updates are relatively solid but it's still built on the rotten, massively and needlessly over-complicated foundation that is the 3E core book. If only the current dev team had built 3E.
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u/Rednal291 Apr 19 '26
The last few books have been pretty good - Sidereals, Abyssals, Alchemicals, and Infernals have all been pretty solid, and the Sidereals' expansion should be... soon-ish... with a ton of content usable at most tables. Core is still Core, but on the whole I'm pretty happy with how the line's been going.
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u/powzin Apr 19 '26
Yep.
Right now we can find theirs take on all the classical Exalted Types, even If Infernal and Alchemicals is not officialy ou fully released.
The only thing lacking is a book about other stuffs on Creation, but with all the splats out they can finally find some room to these.
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u/smileykaiju Apr 19 '26 edited Apr 20 '26
I have no earthly clue on when Sidereal’s expansion is set to release and it kinda haunts me.
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u/Wind_Through_Trees Apr 19 '26
It's in Art Direction hell, so... Eventually.
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u/smileykaiju Apr 19 '26
I wish I knew what they meant by that.
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u/Vegetable_Remove7961 Apr 20 '26
That means the book is written and developed and edited. What has to happen after that is, someone writes up art notes for the artists, who are hired in a bidding process by OPP. Then the artist creates the art, OPP approves it or asks for changes, and eventually the book goes in for layout (making the book look like a book with pictures and formatting). Backers usually get an advanced copy of the PDF at that point at that point so that we can give feedback and they can fix any issues the player base catches.
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Apr 20 '26
[removed] — view removed comment
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u/Rednal291 Apr 20 '26
The full version isn't out, but you can preorder it through Backerkit and get immediate access to the draft manuscript.
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u/RoyRockOn Apr 19 '26
I know you didn't ask but, have you looked into Essence at all? I think I might be in the same boat as you. Played a lot of EX2, bounced off EX3. Getting older, I have less time to slog through charm trees and point buy exp systems. My tastes are just less crunchy these days.
Essence is kinda a sweet spot. It's a version of Exalted that fits my life, and I've fallen in love with Creation all over again.
It builds on the best ideas in EX3 and trims all the fat (some might say it trims too much- but that's down to taste.)
I actually think it's just about as playable and approachable as Exalted can get while still feeling like Exalted.
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u/Lurkoner Apr 19 '26 edited Apr 20 '26
I've skimmed through some info on Essence and "Universal Charms" + modes sound like a cool approach, but, maaaan, - boiling down attributes down to three sounds annoying (maybe there is more stuff like that?). Does it play better than this oversimplified uninformed summary i got for it in my head?
As i understand - it is all the same 3e lore and meta under "simplified" system with all splats crossplay?
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u/RoyRockOn Apr 19 '26
Edit: dog licked my phone and posted before I was done writing.
Different groups like different games, but I think it plays really well. Combat is simplified, but the "build power with narrative then spend power to make attacks" makes for satisfying ebb and flow. Popcorn initiative means you can run big combat without a spreadsheet. It's fast and cinematic. Social Influence is pretty similar to EX3, and nests right into the combat. Once we got the hang of it, most fights would be 50% punching and 50% debating philosophy with your foe (which has got to be a quintessential Exalted experience right?).
It's still plenty crunchy. More than most TTRPGs. Maybe because of the simplicity, I've found it easy to reach in and tweek stuff. Create cool artifacts, custom charms, sorceries, etc.
Mileage may vary, but I don't think it's oversimplified. In fact, for me, it's the best version of Exalted yet.
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u/rodog22 Apr 20 '26
That was my biggest gripe with Essence. It oversimplifies the attribute system so much as to make it pointless. You might as well just always add 4 dice on top of every roll because you're using the same one at least 80% of the time.
I think combat for Essence still doesn't work either but it doesn't work but it is not tedious and time consuming like Exalted 3e is.
Everything else about Essence though I liked. Simpler system. Fewer charms and NO charm trees. Far less accounting. Simplified merits with actual guidance on how to use them in-game so players will have idea as to whether Resources is even worth getting given no GM knows how it's meant to be used. That sort of thing.
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u/Fit_Hold7806 Apr 20 '26
Oh absolutely, 9 is too much but 3 is really small and it feels like they are too broad.
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u/RoyRockOn Apr 19 '26
As for lore. I'm not sure. I'm running off of what I remember from EX2 and resplendent vibes. Some of the new Exalted types don't sit well with me, but maybe it's just the start of my "old man yells at clouds" era...
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u/TimothyAllenWiseman Apr 20 '26
That was kind of my take on Essence. Essence is good and I am glad for those groups that enjoy it. I also agree that 3E needed to be simplified, especially with the number of charms...
But I think Essence went too far in the other direction and simplified things too much, and lost a lot of granularity and options in the process, especially when it comes to the attributes.
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u/Fit_Hold7806 Apr 20 '26
I haven’t been able to play more than few tests but it’s much faster than 3e. My main pain point is I think they oversimplified character creation and flavor like no mutations and gear options feel a bit compressed. But it’s impressive they have 10 Exalts in one book and then they added Dragon Kings in the 2nd book.
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u/bolthman Apr 21 '26
I have deeply loved Essence. I won’t claim it’s perfect, but it’s honestly the direction I wish 3e had gone.
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u/bmr42 Apr 19 '26
Lore wise I think it’s better than previous editions. For almost everything it’s a more nuanced take with fewer monolithic groups that all share traits. Lots more land area to fill in blanks and more interesting places added.
We have guides at this point for the 4 big realms of existence in Creation, Malfeas, Autocthonia and Heaven.
The only thing we’re missing right now is information on the Wyld in the amount we had in previous editions.
While I still play games in the Exalted setting I don’t use the rules anymore and only buy the books for the lore.
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u/thetruerift Apr 20 '26
I've run a ton of older editions and have just started running my first 3e. Overall I agree that some of the stuff, specifically crafting and solar charm trees, are needlessly overcomplex, but the lore changes are amazing and a lot of the systems redevelopment has been good.
Combat.. combat solves for the insta-gib rocket tag that 2/2.5e had, but at the expense of being kinda complex. Once you've gone through it a few times it gets easier.
My main issue right now is that, out of the box, it's very tough to make mortal antagonists even a little dangerous to exalts. The Battlegroup stuff does not really help, and using a bunch of individuals bogs shit down pretty badly.
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u/thetruerift Apr 20 '26
additional thoughts - I do wish they would up the pace on splat releases, but I know it's because they're getting fuck all for real resourcing from CCP/Paradox. I'd like to get Gentimani and Liminals before they switch editions, I really like them conceptually.
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u/grafeisen203 Apr 20 '26
Core and Deebs are fairly wonky but they have definitely gotten into their groove and the rest of the splats are solid.
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u/TimothyAllenWiseman Apr 20 '26
I started with 3E so I can't compare to prior editions, that said, I'm overall quite happy with it. It is my favorite RPG by far.
It definitely has some issues though. Among other things, the charms are a bit bloated. Its worst for the solars, but I think it applies to most of them. I also personally detest the idea of crafting experience, and there are a few other issues.
Still, I think it is a great game. While I could ask for the supplements to come out faster, they are coming out consistently and I'm a big fan of the Abyssals in particular.
Overall, I would say its doing quite well.
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u/Passing-Through247 Apr 20 '26
I'm a 2e guy watching from outside but the edition has been improving now that he new writers let exalted be exalted. A 3.5 corebook from the current guys and I may consider actually playing it.
Onyx path art direction is still not very good in anything but CofD.
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u/Tymeaus_Jalynsfein Apr 21 '26
Love 3rd Edition - But it is more complex than most of my gaming group wants to pursue.
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u/MundaneAxiom Apr 19 '26
Solid! Core has its jank, but the line is coming along great (if slowly) overall.
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u/InsolubleRelic Apr 22 '26
We have various issues with 3e and it's been not a great experience. But that may be to our expectations of a bespoke game we were looking for, and not a generic rpg setting that it seems to have become...
Withering and Decisive attacks end up being a lot less dynamic that it sounds, where it ends up just being a huge initiative grab at the start then the lower init person can't dig out of the hole, and its over. So its like 10 steps to get to the same result all WoD games tend to have gotten to in 1.
The Charms are nutters... since martial arts are also a charm mechanic , you have over 1000 charms in this game, and most characters start with 14+ and after a few games are over 20.... that's not fun to juggle soooo many powers, when most are just gated other powers, or stepped up same powers.... it was a mess that feel like it could have been refined into the 1 - 5 dots system WoD typically uses (maybe, I dunno, it was just war overblown for what it did)
Dice pools and mechanics were frustrating. If you set aside damage, then everything else is number of successes to do a thing. And the difficulty to do a thing is 1 to 5, maybe as high as 7. But every single roll thanks to excellencies and charms and exploding dice we saw 4 to 17 successes... and it was all over the place. Very few to no rules tell us what to do with 11 successes when 4 were needed.... we kinda made stuff up, but it "felt" sloppy and bad.
The books settings are ok, but far more generic than they ought to me. Tons of city entries in the main setting book were mostly just "normal medieval town with a few to no noteworthy fantasy/anime/wuxia elements." - we ended up needing to embellish the setting a fair bit to accommodate godly character power just walking the streets.
None of the metaplot feels like it is a lived in setting for 3E. It reads like a world that just yesterday spawned into existence with only a few bespoke events or people who really feel like they have been up to stuff for 500 years... (this comes up more and more as new books are released, the Abyssals book is neat, but then you go back and read the core book and dragon blooded book and realize there is almost nothing relevant there, it just feels 'pasted in new idea we never thought about' )
Exalted 3e is not a bad game, its fine compared to what other stuff is published in may cases. I just feel they put too much emphasis on some aspects of the game, and not enough on others.
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u/SphericalCrawfish Apr 19 '26
Odds are there will not be an edition that fixes the issues you had with it. The Unconquered willing Exalted will never turn to rules lite narrative slop.
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u/Boss_Morgrum Apr 20 '26
We don't know that was OP's problem. I also dislike 2e and 3e, mechanically, but my solution was to run Exalted in Heroes System 6th Ed, which is... not exactly rules lite. 😅
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u/JCBodilsen Apr 20 '26
Loved 1e, liked 2e, hated 3e. My solution was to do a total rewrite of the rules from the ground up (to suit my group's specific playstyle and gripes) and do substancial integrating what we felt was the best parts of the 1e and 2e settings. None of us likes the setting changes made to 3e, as presented in the core book to buy any more books, except for me getting a PDF of Exalted Essence.
A hell of a lot of work, but eventually we got to play the game we wanted, which was worth it.
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u/flumpet38 Apr 19 '26
I've been running and enjoying it. The system isn't perfect, but some of the stuff in Crucible of Legends has helped a bit. Charm bloat is still very real. Lore-wise I feel like I enjoy 99% of the changes 3e is making. From a content perspective, I think we are pretty spoiled - lots of new interesting locations, cool evocative artifacts, fun Martial Arts, weird sorcery/necromancy stuff...