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A game I'm a part of might end up with a big "world war" between three factions — undead, fae, and demons. In order to plan our next moves, we are trying to figure out if a side is immune/resistant/weak to another side's powers or not.

I have heard things such as "Fae are good allies if you need to fight undead", but I have also heard "Fae are especially weak against undead", with no explanation on one side or another

In general then, what are the relative strengths and weaknesses of Underworld creatures (ghosts, skeletons, Abyssals) versus Wyld creatures (mutants, Fair Folk) in a combat situation?

Does this change whether the fight happens in Creation, in the Underworld, or in the Wyld?

Note that I am strictly asking about straight mechanical advantages — not "there are more of X than Y" or "X has better infrastructure than Y", but more "X is immune to Y's charms" or "X's charms are more effective against Y".

SevenSidedDie
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Cristol.GdM
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    Big question: 1E, 2E or 3E? What power level? That is a huge difference! Also, Demons and undead scale very much (at least in 3E): there are weak undead like Hungry Ghosts, and there are quite deadly ones, such as a Nephwrack, which can easily cull two or three exalted of essence 2-3 without starting to 'sweat'. For demons, there are 1st circles that range from not really dangerous to quite challanging for Exalted, while 2nd circle demons such as Mara are deadly even to seasoned exalted, and that ignores 3rd circle. For Fae, the variance is even bigger, as they all depend on their story. – Trish Aug 20 '16 at 15:18
  • 2E I guess, although a general answer would be good. Tbh I'm still pretty confused as to why this question has been so problematic until now :/ I'm just looking for general, mechanic strengths / weaknesses. Like "Fae take aggravated from undeads" or this kind of things. For example, in Pokemon, Fire-types are weak against Water-types. There are various power levels, there are several generations, but overall this never changes: Fire takes 50% more damage from Water, and does 50% less damage to Water. If there is no similar thing, so be it, "No" is an answer too :) – Cristol.GdM Aug 21 '16 at 02:53

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The power levels of Undead and Wyld creatures vary too much to draw any concrete conclusions. the Undead go from Ghosts to the Neverborn the Wyld have Moppets to the Shinma.

if two beings at equal footing fight it's up to the dice.

Where they fight is another matter. In creation both have trouble regaining essence and the Undead feel the scorn of the Incarnae and the Wyld start to calcify so neither will likely be at full power when the meet.

In the underworld Wyld creatures calcify and stagnate at an alarming rate and the Undead wouldn't need to even fight them, just wait them out and/or prevent them from escaping.

The deeper into Pure Chaos you go the more of an advantage the Wyld creatures have. they cannot be Shaped by the chaos unless the want to and they can actively direct the chaos in their favour. they are somewhat limited in what they can do because things born of Creation dampen chaos somewhat but they can still bring whatever they can imagine into being. an Undead subjected to the natural Wylds will begin to mutate faster than a living being and they will be protected somewhat by their willpower if they poses any but they can't regen essence and they have to deal with Chaos itself. Where trees fall purple when you sing to them in the language of cold, but only on Katilsday. Today the floor is lava unless you are wearing canoe feathers.

Saelvarath
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The simple answer: No there is no such thing as a universal "X is better than Y" in exalted ever.

The more elaborate answer: Things in Exalted are not easy, because Exalted is not D&D. It is neither WoD, it is Exalted. There are no vulnerabilities shared by all beings of the same splat! Like, no, not all Alchemical Exalted are vulnerable to fire effects, not all DragonBlooded succumb to Poison X and not all Lunars do love their Solar mates (I'm looking at Lilith here...). There simply*is no thing like a Pokémon weakness grid in Exalted.

Atop that, beings in each of the classes scale extremely wide. Let's take undead for an example:

  • On the low end, there are Zombies and Hungry Ghosts, that even in bigger groups aren't a real threat to newly exalted Solars - but if you get an army of some thousands, then a circle of Solars might start to sweat.
  • On the high end, there are Nephwrack, that have Essence 5, 19 Health Levels and 100 motes. These Undead Prophet-General-Kings can cause serious harm to a circle of 5 seasoned Exalted or even kill them.

You can't put those two into the same box for any other thing than "both are undead". None shares the same weakness with the other even in this box, some don't have charms or something similar, so comparing them beyond general power level is moot.

Now, looking at Fae is somewhat different and more troublesome, because Fae don't just scale in their splat, but also where you are, but for that see below. Also, Fair Folk, Wyld-Mutants and stuff like Hobgoblins are also all handled in the "Wyld" bracket or enemies, so they are highly variable again. Some of these (Hobgoblins) have weaknesses, most don't.

So, there is no universal weakness... at least usually, because there are two exceptions: Artifacts and Places.

There are weapons that all beings of some splat are weak against - however, that is not because of the beings having a specific vulnerability against this weapon type, it they are weak against. It is the weapon artifact, that is specifically made to harm these beings, and these weapons (usually Daiklaives) are pretty unique and rare.

To some degree this also holds true for various places: The Underworld has specific effects on any being in it, but what this is depends on if the target is alive or undead, Malfeas does so for hell origin or not, the Wyld handles Wyld creatures different (empowering them) from anything other (it tries to warp everything else). Even Creation handles beings of Underworld/Malfeas/Wyld origin different (generally weakening them over time) from anything else. Yu-Shan has special rules that are different for Gods and other beings... To sum it up: Almost all places do handle things differently for specific splats, but that doesn't count as a collective weakness.

Trish
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  • Thanks :) I didn't mean that Pokemon example so literally but that works. But I kind of disagree about "there are no shared vulnerabilities". For example, from what I remember, a lot of Sidereal abilities are weaker or outright useless against Fae (or Undead? not sure), because of being outside of Fate and all that. Hence, Sidereals have a weakness against those guys, and they have a Strength against Sidereals. There is definitely nothing like that here? Fae shaping not working on undeads, undeads not being able to absorb Fae essence, this kind of things? – Cristol.GdM Aug 22 '16 at 01:33
  • No, it is a power-specific weakness, not a general weakness. Nowhere is a rule that says "all Sidereal Powers don't work on Fae" or "Fae can't shape undead" - it is all specific to a power. – Trish Aug 22 '16 at 19:49
  • And nowhere did I say "all Sidereal Powers don't work on Fae". My point being: Divination/Astrology/some Charms don't work, or are weaker, when used against Faes. Those are generally the specialty of Sidereals. Hence, this specific point can be seen as a disadvantage of Sidereals over Faes. Are Sidereals stronger or weaker than Faes? Impossible to tell. Do Sidereals have advantages/disadvantages over Faes? Yes, they have a disadvantage: some of their powers don't work - or are weaker - when used against Faes. – Cristol.GdM Aug 23 '16 at 06:35