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Meghan Fitzgerald, Susann Hessen, James Huggins, Eric Minton, Neall Raemonn Price, Lauren Roy, Monica Speca, Robert Vance ARMS OF THE CHOSEN

Credits Playtesters

Authors: Meghan Fitzgerald, Susann Hessen, James The Dauntless Bureau of the Flame Duck: Rand Huggins, Eric Minton, Neall Raemonn Price, Lauren “Icaria Varus” Brittain, Elliott “Camena Dezla” Freeman, Roy, Monica Speca, Robert Vance Jenna “Dessa Svetlana” Moran, Vivian “Serestala Barut” Paul, Vera “Zanara” Vartanian Developers: Eric Minton, Robert Vance The Helpful Staff of Odd Ends and Wonderments: Additional Development: John Mørke, Holden Lee Adam Carbone, Caroline Davis Carbone, Michael Gilson, Shearer Patrick Prince

Editor: Stephen Lea Sheppard Ronin: Richard “Kukla” Hughes

Artists: Gunship Revolution Studios

Art Director: Mike Chaney

Creative Director: Richard Thomas

Layout: Josh Kubat Special Thanks

Neall Raemonn Price and Stephen Lea Sheppard, for their unflagging support.

Rose Bailey, for doing the communication thing.

Manda Collis and Meghan Fitzgerald, for jumping into the line of fire.

© 2017 White Wolf Publishing AB. All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, without the prior written permission of White Wolf Publishing AB. Reproduction prohibitions do not apply to the character sheets contained in this book when reproduced for personal use. White Wolf, Vampire and Chronicles of Darkness are registered trademarks of White Wolf Publishing AB. All rights reserved. Vampire the Requiem, Werewolf the Forsaken, Mage the Awakening, and Storytelling System are trademarks of White Wolf Publishing AB. All rights reserved. All characters, names, places and text herein are copyrighted by White Wolf Publishing AB. The mention of or reference to any company or product in these pages is not a challenge to the trademark or copyright concerned. This book uses the supernatural for settings, characters and themes. All mystical and supernatural elements are fiction and intended for Sampleentertainment purposes only. This book contains mature content. Reader discretion is advised. file Check out White Wolf online at http://www.white-wolf.com Check out the Onyx Path at http://www.theonyxpath.com

2 EX3 TABLE OF CONTENTS

Introduction 6 Magical Materials and the Exalted 16

This Book at a Glance 6 Designing Artifacts and Evocations 18 Custom Evocations 18 Suggested Resources 7 Craft (Errata) 19 Chapter One: The Forging of Miracles 10 Chapter Two: Weapons of the Chosen 22 The Dawn Time 10 Courante and Galliard 22 The First Age 10 The Distaff 25 The Age of Sorrows 11 Scarred Lands 11 Fist of Titans 28

The Magical Materials 12 Frost-Thorn Knuckles 30 Orichalcum 13 The Hawk Star’s Jess 32 Moonsilver 13 Heartsong 33 Starmetal 14 Heaven and Earth Gauntlets 35 SampleSoulsteel 14 file Jade 14 Irenio’s Bell 37

3 EX3 ARMS OF THE CHOSEN

Rainwalker 39 Chapter Four: Wonders of the Lost Age 114 Razor Dancer and Wise Steel 41

Summer Thunder 42 Natural Magics 114

Sun’s Brush 44 Miscellaneous Artifacts 115 Audient Brush 115 Tusk of Galaech-Ma 46 Clockwork Bird 116 Asphodel 48 Lorestone 117 Burning Branch 50 Lotus-Blossom Cup 117 Solar Seal 117 Flying Silver Dream 53 Stoneheart Coffer 117 Gnomon 55 Ultimately Useful Tube 117 Mistweaver 57 Winterbreath Jar 118

Nightmare Shard 60 Arete 118

Sekhem 62 Carnelian Phoenix 119

Shipbreaker 65 Dragon Tear Tiara 120

Sirrush 67 The Golden Hounds 120

Strife’s Crucible 69 Illusion-Shattering Mirror 121

Sunflash 71 Jade Steed 122

Talion 74 Resplendent Satchel of Healing 122

Vainglory 77 Second-Shadow Drum 122

Zelator 78 Brass Legionnaire 123

The Forgotten Blade 81 Collar of Dutiful Submission 125

Gorgon 83 Shadow-Casting Jewel 125

Soulfarer 86 Sorcery-Capturing Cord 125

Stormcaller 88 Wings of the Raptor 126 Chapter Three: Armor of the Chosen 94 The Golden Viper 126

Baldaquin 94 The Veil That Holds Back Time 127

Heartsbalm 95 Siege Weapons 127 Lightning Ballista 129 Kaijin 97 Implosion Bow 130 Midnight Thorn 99 Vehicles 131 Five Edicts Dominion 100 Horizon Endeavor 131 The Quincunx 103 Chariot of Aerial Conquest 131

Sozen, the Cataphract of Keys 105 Hearthstones 132

Mela’s Coil 107 Chapter Five: Warstriders 140 SampleUnison 110 Warstrider Evocations file140

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Piloting a Warstrider 140 All-Conquering Colossus 144 Warstrider Strength 141 Cathedral of Sublime Annihilation 147 Soak, Hardness, and Damage 141 Crusading Spear of the Depths 152 Weaponry and Combat 141 Mobility 142 Emerald Chevalier 157

Legendary Size 142 Godspeed Vanguard 160 Limitations of Scale 142 Ascendant Nova Phoenix 163 Maintenance and Repairs 142 Karvara, the Walking Devil Tower 168 Fighting Warstriders: Special Gambits 143

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5 EX3 Introduction “This is your novitiate, your apprenticeship. You don’t become Swordbearer simply by taking up the blade. You and Daubendiek are like bride and groom. You have to get to know one another. You have to meld into a single unconquerable engine of destruction. That takes time and practice.” — Glen Cook, The Swordbearer

Magical relics are staples of myth and fiction. Gods Wong Bongerok; or how the Prince of the Wounded City and heroes ranged afar with flying carpets and sev- offered Ten Thousand Fathoms to the sea-goddess Siakal en-league boots, donned feathered garments to take to petition her aid against his enemies. For each artifact is on falcon or swan shape, and turned invisible with aid a legendary tool that passes through many hands, with each from enchanted rings, cloaks, or helms. Jamshid scried hero leaving her own mark on its myth and its power. in his seven-ringed cup to espy the ends of the earth; Empress Jingū employed the Tide Jewels to drown the enemy army and conquer Korea; forged the This Book at a Glance wealth-making Sampo to win the Maiden of ’s Chapter One: The Forging of Miracles begins with a hand; the Baba Yaga sojourned upon her flying mortar history of Exalted craft, then describes the five magical and within her walking chicken-legged hut. materials and their importance in unlocking Evocations, and provides guidelines for Evocation design. Weapons may be the most numerous and memorable such items. We recall King Arthur’s blade Excalibur Chapter Two: Weapons of the Chosen offers a range of and its wound-stopping scabbard; Circe’s staff, a blow legendary armaments, each granting access to an array from which changed men into beasts; Cú Chulainn’s of deadly Evocations. gruesome spear, the Gáe Bolg, which split into many barbs upon entering an enemy’s body, so that it need- ed to be cut free from the victim’s flesh; and Sun DROWNING IN EONS Wukong’s gold-banded cudgel, which could become tall as the firmament or tiny enough to hide in his ear. Every artifact has a story. All of them are true. (Not to mention Illyana Rasputin’s spell-shattering Whether they actually happened is another matter. soulsword, Inuyasha’s demon-slaying Tessaiga, and countless others.) The First Age is lost, buried beneath an avalanche of time and apocalypse. All that remains are frag- Creation’s artifacts are equally renowned. When ments, pieced together by modern savants into his- Southerners tell of Indaba the Traveler’s nine legendary tories — artful mosaics assembled from their own preconceptions and ideals. Even immortals only of- journeys into the West, they speak of her triple-masted fer narrow, faded recollections, like peering through ship Horizon Endeavor, with its fiery dragon cannons keyholes into the treasure-house of the past. From and its marvelous sails of cloth-of-jade; of her black diaries, propaganda, novels, fables, poems, scrip- jade bow Piercing Rain, with whose arrows of water she tures, and myths, scholars construct overlapping drowned the hybroc of Zela Island in midair; and of her braids of timelines and eras: a Gossamer Dawn of behemoth-shell armor Ten Thousand Fathoms, which glorious exploration, a Falling Stars Interregnum let her breathe beneath the sea as she sought the True between the reigns of two mighty Deliberatives, an Pearl and wrestled the Pale Leviathan. inscrutable Era of Limitless Light where magics be- yond modern ken reshaped Creation. But they know And when such tales are done, storytellers go on to recount nothing with certainty. how centuries later, Laughing Mirror captained Horizon Even these relics show us only splinters of the truth. Endeavor at the Battle of Five Suns; or how the warrior-queen SampleBut each splinter shines with thefile radiance of legend. Emeroda wielded Piercing Rain to subdue the fire-dragon

6 EX3 Introduction

Chapter Three: Armor of the Chosen details several Movies puissant defensive panoplies and their own guardian Doctor Strange, directed by Scott Derrickson: Evocations. Stephen Strange’s growing mastery of the Eye of Agamotto reflects unlocking an artifact’s Evocation suite. Chapter Four: Wonders of the Lost Age catalogues Meanwhile, his relationship with the Cloak of Levitation all manner of miscellaneous magics, from occult herbs showcases how artifacts bond with their owners, and to hearthstones to Essence-powered siege engines and how they’re rich with personality even without speech. vehicles. Comic Books Chapter Five: Warstriders reveals the secret powers Witchblade, published by Top Cow Productions: indwelling in these towering god-armors of the First Age. NYPD cop Sara Pezzini struggles to master her sentient artifact, the Witchblade, a gauntlet that becomes su- Suggested Resources perpowered armor and deadly weapon in battle. After getting past the initial stereotypical ’90s fare, the story Classics turns to how the Witchblade’s legacy forces Sara to con- Ramayana: Divine Loophole, by Sanjay Patel: This front the burden such power brings. stylistic version of a Hindu legend depicts the battle of Vishnu’s avatar Rama with the ten-headed demon Ravana. Rama faces a universe-ending trident with a Bleach, by Tite Kubo: This long-running series might magical bow that summons another universe-ending suffer in pacing from its creator’s love of introducing a power to counter it, and ends the battle with an arrow dozen new characters whenever he gets bored, but since of pure light. each character gets a unique signature weapon with an array of spectacular, imaginative superpowers, it’s the The Táin, translated by Ciaran Carson; Gods and single best source of inspiration for Evocations. Fighting Men, by Lady Gregory: Irish mythology’s deities and heroes wield a plethora of divine artifacts in Fate/Zero, by Gen Urobuchi: To wage a shadow war their epic struggles, from the Dagda’s magical harp to over the Holy Grail, modern-day magicians summon the mighty Spear of Lugh, to Cú Chulainn’s Gáe Bolg and mythic heroes, each belonging to a class of warrior large- war chariot bristling with weapons. ly defined by their panoply. Iconic artifacts tied to specif- ic legends, such as Arturia’s Excalibur and its scabbard Fiction Avalon, often make or break a victory. Elric, by : This seminal sword and sorcery series follows the exiled sorcerer-prince of , by : Heroes (and vil- Melniboné’s adventures, aided and cursed by his closest lains) from a long-lost kingdom reincarnate centuries companion, the murderous runesword Stormbringer. later with the powers, messy dramatic relationships, and Their relationship showcases a powerful artifact’s role coveted magical artifacts they held long ago. Characters in its wielder’s legend, and how a willful weapon’s vaga- find new and greater power in legendary weapons des- ries manifest as a Flaw. tined for their hands, and such weapons needn’t always kill to win the day. Lord of Light, by : Godlike immortals rule a fallen world in part through bespoke armaments Anime so advanced they might as well be magic, which am- The Vision of Escaflowne, directed by Kazuki Akane: plify their quasi-divine gifts into something greater. Set in a fantasy world whose inhabitants first built giant The deathgod Yama is an excellent example of a master suits of armor called Guymelefs to fight dragons and now Exalted artificer’s potential. use them to wage war, this anime is the closest media Samplegets to portraying warstriders as theyfile exist in Creation.

7 EX3 “That’s the problem,” muttered Jalith, more to her- quarter-mile above the earth, Sayn’s self now. She was Haltan; animals she could deal hammer beat a steady rhythm with. She dropped into the shadowed foliage be- across the hours. Spiraling branches low, Achal beside her. obscured a forest below, overshad- owed by the towering yew upon which he stood. An Essence-laden blood trail led them to the AHe’d carved a workspace into the tree’s apex, and squirrel-spirit’s drey. Jalith called a word glazed his kiln with the shavings’ ashes. Around half-remembered, a greeting — she hoped — in him, the endless blue of the midday sky. On his its own tongue. But the injured spirit emerged anvil, the Twilight’s work: an orichalcum skycutter, from its home with four siblings, each calling fine and light as a maple seed’s blade. back in a furious, piercing staccato as they leapt to surround her. Jalith couldn’t follow their rapid With each hammer-swing, Sayn folded a wisp of speech, but she was fluent in aggression. the sky into the weapon. With each pass through the kiln, he seared in the tree’s vital, poison- Each spirit had strong, springy limbs, and tusks ous Essence. With each strike, sparks and yew for carving off bark. Preferring her bark where it needles scattered to the branches below. Sayn was, Jalith led them on a chase, filling her wake called the metal’s potential out into Creation, with boomerangs and knives. Two spirits fell from beat after beat. sight, riddled with blades. And then Jalith had these remaining: three foes, a trunk at her back, He didn’t see the creature that crept up the and one blade. Jalith drew her sword. She wished bole of the tree, from the shadows below. It it were golden, curved, and weighted for throwing. reached for Sayn’s leg with a nimble, rust- furred paw, broad as a man’s hand and tipped The spirits were far more comfortable fighting with curved claws. But it, too, was hunted. The face-to-face. So was Achal. He scattered the crea- first Sayn knew of any danger was the clamor tures, and Jalith dashed through, until she faced of skirmishing animals, the rustling of a brief the forest far below. She turned, concentrated, chase through foliage. He turned and peered and cut the air between her and the spirits just down, hammer ready, and saw his Circlemate so. When the wind itself gouged spirit-flesh, Ja- Jalith just below, looking back at him. Her tree- lith did not hesitate: she cut continuously, denying leopard companion Achal soon returned from her foes time to reach her, to encircle Achal, to es- his chase, muzzle bloody. cape. She cut until the spirits lay still under a rain of needles, lit by the sunburst on her forehead. “The squirrels are back,” said Jalith. “I don’t sup- pose my new boomerang’s ready yet?” A ringing crack broke the stillness. Jalith looked up from the squirrels’ remains to see the great “Mm,” replied Sayn, annoyed, eyes already turning yew’s trunk, splintered by deep cuts. She looked back to the cooling orichalcum. up still further. “They don’t like having a fire up here, you know,” Sayn felt the shift under his feet, felt the tree’s apex Jalith added. “In their tree.” begin its slow topple. He allowed himself a moment “Perhaps you can reason with them,” said Sayn, of fear, then of anticipation. He held up the gleaming as the forging rhythm began once more. “They’re skycutter, still warm from the forge. “Ah, Yokuka,” spirits, not animals.” he whispered, revealing its name to Creation for the Samplefirst time. “I suppose it is time tofile see how you fly.”

8 EX3 Sample file Chapter One The Forging of Miracles

another’s weapon with a touch, unlocking its Evocations The Dawn Time for them to master. A few scholars write instead of how The oldest artifacts predate the human race. When the Feranth Dambresile, called the Invisible, stole the art of makers of the world strode from pole to pole like colossi, Evocations from Thau Irim, The City in the Ruby, that all manner of lesser beings — elementals, gods, prehu- long-lost prehuman race which was also a single stone. man races — dwelt in their shadow. In the time before humanity, these peoples forged arms and armor to hunt and make war much as mortals do, and made other The First Age devices for myriad purposes. These species bore little The end of the Divine Revolution marked another be- resemblance to humanity, and the unthinkably rare sur- ginning for the Chosen. The world was still new to them, viving relics of their cultures — twelve-fingered gaunt- a yet-uncharted patchwork of foreign peoples, untamed lets woven from immortal vines; fractal armatures of wilderness, and prehuman ruins. It was a time for explo- flexible crystal; luminous purple vapor that can be sung ration, adventure, new wars and new struggles. Servitor into a seagoing vessel’s shape; eternal unflames shedding races and other creations of the world’s makers lingered a cold deathlight; lances of tangible mathematics — are in dark places; the war’s shadowlands unleashed ghast- unrecognizable as artifacts to all but the most erudite sa- ly Underworld spawn; Fair Folk stalked world’s edge. vants. Many are of such bizarre configuration that only Mighty peoples and great alliances pitted themselves Lunars, by dint of prowess, might wield against the Exalted Host: the Niobraran League, a ben- them unmodified. Even relics of races built roughly like thic confederation of peoples led by strange Chosen humanity, such as Mountain Folk and Dragon Kings, are to challenge the Host’s supremacy; the Nine Foxfires, often of exotic materials and peculiar construction. dreadful witch-ogre siblings who grew stronger with each defeat; and countless others, many lost to history. The first Chosen were quick to master the forging of orichalcum and moonsilver, the art of alloying jade with The Host’s artificers rose to the challenges of the new mundane metals, and the smelting of fallen stars. Many age. They devised tools to chart and tame the incalcu- legendary artifacts were born amid the conflict with the lable wilds, such as the wise pages of Brigid’s Atlas, the world’s makers, given form by the dire necessities of wondrous Singing Staves, and the unerring Compass the war and the passionate, desperate brilliance of the of Mercury’s Grace. They crafted regalia to mark their Exalted. authority over Creation and its people, such as the leg- endary Daiklave of Conquest, and the accursed crown Among the Exalted’s most notable innovations was the Vainglory, begemmed with an ancient’s frozen blood. art of making colossal weapons — goremauls, direlances, And they forged arms and armor equal to their oppo- daiklaves — whose mass made their blows devastating, sition. Some were weapons of the dawn time reforged yet which their masters could lift as easily as a feath- and renewed — swords enlarged to daiklaves and maces er. The Exalted likewise taught themselves the art of to goremauls, their powers enhanced to the pinnacle Evocations, bonding with artifacts to draw forth secret of their potential. Others were such as the world had Sampleinner power from shield and cuirass, bludgeon and blade. never seen: siege engines that hurledfile lightning and fire; Even today, some recall the legend of Eternal Nova, the soul-severing blades; towering warstriders fit to wrestle Sword Priest, so gifted with blades that he could awaken behemoths and demolish demons.

10 EX3 chapter one: the forging of miracles

As the centuries advanced, First Age artificers contin- ued to break new ground. They integrated new fruits INHUMAN WORKMANSHIP of sorcerous projects — liquid light, crystallized music, condensed dreams — into their artifacts. They drew Some artifacts borne by Exalted champions have forth bizarre and unnatural metals, flora, and fauna from their origins entirely outside humanity’s reckoning of the Wyld to incorporate into their work. And they min- history, forged by timeless entities who have shaped gled artifice with geomancy, tapping geomantic Essence wonders since reality’s dawn, and shape them still flows to empower mighty artifacts, or fusing enchanted today, taking little interest in the doings of mortals devices with the structure of arcane architecture. All or Chosen. The Mountain Folk still harvest jade deep manner of new marvels — prosthetic limbs superior to beneath the Imperial Mountain; fiery elementals use their own blood and breath to heat forges to incan- the originals, self-aware automatons, ships that sailed descence; spider-gods in Yu-Shan weave armor the sky — flowed from their forges into the world. from their own Essence silk; demon smiths hammer brass and black iron into caustic blades and sorcer- The height of the First Age, with its eccentric marvels ous engines. And in the darkness beyond Creation’s and its conflicts against weird, forgotten powers, led to sun and moon, ghostly artisans smelt their own wail- the creation of artifacts as puissant — and in some cases ing kindred into relics of soulsteel. as unfathomable — as the mightiest works of the world’s creators. They crafted cornucopias that disgorged end- less wealth; synthetic minds more brilliant than them- selves; Essence-drinking metal dragons mighty enough Echo, with which Alac Mere shattered the bridge at to level cities. Kesuth Amaldui’s Treatise on Wonders Archflame to halt the Gilt Tiger advance; the black jade describes the miraculous crucible of the sorcerer Tarim, dagger Breathstealer, with which Otani Kensen assassi- which distilled spells into liquid form, while bas-reliefs nated Shogun Issen to buy her son’s freedom from a god; in the ruins of Kingfisher Bastion depict the Seat of the the red jade armor Slumbering Phoenix, whose fiery Sun Ascendant, an orichalcum throne that unfolded into plumage reduced the cataphracts of the Hyacinth Court a city-sized colossus of war. And even today, the world to ashes; the moonsilver daiklave Disillusion, wielded fears the power of the Sword of Creation, the invincible by Eyes-Like-Knives to flense the souls of the Velen mountain-heart of the Realm Defense Grid. daimyos — all these and more were forged in this era. Civilization has fallen farther still since the Great The Age of Sorrows Contagion. Much First Age lore is entirely lost, and aside from the Realm and the great Lunar domains, even the After the Dragon-Blooded cast down the Solar Exalted most powerful and storied civilizations in Creation — and established their Shogunate, they spent centuries from Whitewall and Randan to the Scavenger Lands’ engaged in open war — against one another, against ma- great cities and the empires of the Southeast — possess rauding Fair Folk, and against Lunar forces that sought few of the occult tools and exotic ingredients required to to destroy them. It was a time of bloody battle and fragile awaken a new artifact’s Essence. Obtaining even a paltry truce, alliance and betrayal, triumph and tragedy. Across selection of such resources requires the aid of capricious centuries of Terrestrial rule, Dragon-Blooded dynas- sorcerers, cagey scavenger lords, or conniving Guild ties and their Lunar adversaries crafted weapons with merchants. But for all that few newly forged artifacts which to pursue their endless strife. Lunar warlords can match those of the Old Realm, each is nonetheless a and shamans armed themselves with new-forged moon- wonder and a marvel. silver; Dragon-Blooded shoguns and daimyos arrayed themselves and their champions in panoplies of radiant Scarred Lands jade. The secretive Sidereals in their hidden fastnesses continued to seek out meteoric iron and hammer it into More than merely aiding heroes in their deeds, artifacts starmetal artifacts suitable to their clandestine pursuits. leave marks upon the world. Creation itself was scarred by the Empress’ use of the Realm Defense Grid to an- Many of the Time of Tumult’s most renowned and nihilate the invading Fair Folk with earth-shattering infamous weapons were born in the crucible of the elemental forces. Ten thousand hobgoblins stand locked Shogunate. Though the era’s artificers couldn’t match in stone on the Plain of Statues; the Persimmon Marshes the fallen Solars’ peerless skills, and their supplies of are still stained red with rust where storms of iron barbs the most marvelous First Age tools and reagents quickly Sampleonce rained from the sky; a dozenfile city-sized columns of dwindled, their superlative craftsmanship still bore mi- prismatic flame still simmer at the Need-Fire Pergola raculous fruit. The white jade wrackstaff Thundering

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