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Introduction is the standard fare, with inspiration sources ranging from Eastern fairy tales to the surreal fantasy of Michael Moorcock to the old Merry Melody cartoons. The idea here isn’t that “the raksha are wacky and unpredictable” as much as “the raksha are used to doing –anything- they like.” The Introduction also points out the change from “fae” to “raksha” as being due to a refining of the Fair Folk’s flavor. For those who demand pixies and elves, they can still have them, but I think this book is very much going for a more exotic and alien approach, trying to create something we haven’t really seen before.
Chapter One: Rakshastan starts off well enough, covering the nature of the lands “bordering” Creation and the Wyld as well as some of the lesser creatures who populate it. A lot of attention is paid to the nature of Freeholds as well; places where the Raksha have turned a Demesne into their version of a Manse. Now, when I previously said Rakshastan “borders” Creation, this is a bit true and a bit false. It seems that the two exist parallel to one another and overlap at the edges, kind of like the Underworld in a loose way. The closer one gets to the Wyld, the more Rakshastan becomes real. The closer one gets to the Center of Creation, the less Rakshastan becomes real. The Raksha are trapped between the two, just as their realm. Too stable to survive in the Wyld, too chaotic to survive in Creation, they ride from their land of dreams and chaos to feed and play. Wee folk are described here, and consist of various minor creatures made of dreams and brought to life. They’re minor annoyances at worst, but serve to really fill Rakshastan with life. The chapter then goes into a region by region look at how Rakshastan interacts with Creation and the Wyld. Strange monsters and even more dangerous locations abound, touched by the Elemental Poles and the Wyld alike.
One other thing this chapter introduces is the concept of “Hazard Ratings”, a way to gauge how much of a challenge something is for different groups of PCs. For example, a 2 dot challenge is listed as:
- “This would challenge a God-Blood or a powerful mortal thaumaturge. This could be a creature like a lion or a shark. If it is a trap or a natural hazard it does 8-12L of environmental damage.”
Now, I’ll be honest, I thought Challenge Ratings were a neat but flawed idea in D&D 3ed. In a more cinematic, story-driven game like Exalted, where party and character balance are fairly optional, the idea feels clunky. I’d say it was a nice attempt to make the game easier to run, but… well, I’ll come back to this.
Chapter Two:the Raksha goes into the history, politics, current affairs, and psychology of the dream-eaters. If the last chapter detailed “natural” locations, this chapter details the “fae-built” places and groupings. The different Raksha courts, VIPs, and customs are detailed, as well as some ideas for making characters from these courts. Despite my brevity, this is a good chapter with a lot of ideas and worth re-reading for ideas in any game involving the Fair Folk.
Chapter Three: Character Creation, is fairly short and too the point. Raksha characters are either commoners or nobles. Nobles get more points to build on and are from two castes, commoners have fewer points are from one. Castes determine a Raksha’s favored abilities, personality, Charms, and what Virtues they feed from. Since Nobles have two Castes, one favored over the other, they can feed more readily from multiple Virtues. Each caste also has its own Grace, a stat tied to a specific Virtue, reflecting how well the Raksha maintain their sense of self-identity. So nobles have two Graces, since they have two castes.
Chapter Four: Traits goes into greater detail about the Graces, how Raksha enter Bedlam when they spend their last point in a Virtue, new backgrounds, caste overviews, and stunting in the Wyld. Cool thing, Rakshas can create just about –any- imaginable effect with a Wyld stunt. I’m still not sure why the Raksha need an additional new Grace stat, when the old Virtue stat on its own seems able to do just as fine. But the layers of odd new mechanics only gets worse in the next chapter. Bedlam functions similar to Solar Limit Breaks, where the Raksha become slaves to their emotions, and are triggered by the Raksha being Lured into using their Virtue. As an example, a Compassionate Raksha might be Lured by Romantic love for instance, and seek it out, and spend Virtues on it, until it entered Bedlam. At which point it would become petty and cruel until it performs a number of truly regrettable acts.
Chapter Five: Raksha Magic is big, filling almost a third of the entire book. Besides some rather complex Charm trees, we also have Shaping Combat. Shaping Combat is where one Raksha uses his ability to control the Wyld to attack another. Firstly, time and space aren’t easily definable in the Wyld, and thus things are measured in dramatic concepts like Stories and Waypoints, a Story being a campaign or a story-arc as the GM dictates and a Waypoint being a place which allows for character interactions. A shaping attack may have a range of several waypoints, hitting its target long before he gets near the attacker, from a story-driven sense. Secondly, the Wyld can be shaped into anything, but the Creation-born can override any shaping. If a Raksha says an Exalted is dead, he can spend a Willpower point and not die. Thirdly, the weapons and damage from this combat can unusual forms. A noble might send a dragon to break his enemy’s spirit or steal his prized possessions, rather than kill him outright. There’s a lot more, but this is a huge chapter and hopefully you get the idea. One thing missing however is a sample Shaping Combat. Ideally that would have really helped explain how Shaping works, and shown GMs how to use it more quickly and easily.
Glamour-based magic is an interesting idea, but very underpowered. To use a Charm outside of the Wyld, a Raksha must power it with Glamour. But, since Glamour-powered Charms are automatically resisted in a trait vs. trait comparison, and Creation-born add their Essence to resist, the average –starting- Exalted will resist most such Charms without needing to roll. Raksha can avoid this by taking Mutations, and using Charms against themselves instead of others, but it still essentially means that Glamour magic only works against newbs and peons.
Of greater interest to some is the addition of Glamour Sorcery, Adjurations, and Behemoths, bundles of Raksha Charms with specific fixed effects, fewer restrictions, and can be used in Shaping Combat. They’re basically Artifacts crafted from the Wyld and bonded to a being. What’s special about these three however is that Lunar Exalted can also purchase them, giving them access to strange sorceries, oath-based mutations, and horrible monsters. Each is given several examples, and show clever ways to use the Charms listed previously. A lot of people have complained that the Lunars aren't magical enough, and this simple allowance really helps change that. I really liked this part, for Raksha and Lunar alike, and wished it was a bit longer.
Chapter Six: the Mountain Folk is almost a complete 180 degree turn from the rest of the book. Not to say that it’s bad, but it is different in tone, feel, and presentation from the rest of the book. Basically the Mountain Folk are spirits, trapped when Creation was formed, and chosen by Autocthon to make wonders as he does. Geased to remain beneath the surface of the world, and serve the Exalted, the Mountain Folk toiled away making incredible Artifacts and serving their masters as Autocthon told them to. But they also war with the dark things beneath the surface of the world, as their society begins to slowly evolve in ways their leaders are terrified of.
I like this chapter. A lot. It’s simple, straightforward, and doesn’t confuse the heck out of me. The Mountain Folk are extremely advanced, but they’re also very secretive and insular. They don’t give out their advanced technology willy-nilly, and they don’t advertise they’ve got it. These aren’t dwarves though, and more than the Raksha are elves. They’re different and unique. It does suffer in that it creates yet another “enormous and unstoppable foe threatening all of Creation” but for a game like Exalted I’m not so sure that’s a bad thing. Their Charms, technology, and enemies are all covered. There’s a lot of crunchy material here, but it’s not hard to digest or follow at all.
And remember when I said I’d get back to Hazard Ratings? Well, here it is. See, this chapter introduces several new threats and creatures. Not only do none of them have Hazard Ratings listed, but at least one of them would be off the scale given back in chapter one. I appreciate the idea of new tools to help GMs, but if you’re going to introduce a new tool, use it consistently. And if you find it isn’t really all that useful at doing what you want, then revise it or cut it out entirely.
Chapter Seven: Storytelling covers the basics. What kind of stories can you tell with Raksha? How do you use them with Exalted types in mixed parties? Etc. etc. Nothing too earth-shattering here, although there’s a blurb about the Deathlords and the Fair Folk that some may find interesting. I do wish this space had been trimmed to make room for an example of Shaping combat back in chapter Five. One other annoyance was the lack of Raksha “breeds” anywhere really. Several books introduce what appear to be related types of Raksha, such as the Lion Folk in the South, but this book makes no mention of such things or how GMs could go about creating their own.
For those who wonder about relative power levels, the Mountain Folk are between Dragon Kings and Dragon-Blooded in terms of personal power, but with possibly more Artifacts than either. The Raksha are almost equal to Solars outside of Creation, largely due to Shaping Combat, and about equal to weak Dragon-Blooded in Creation due to the need for Glamour.
Style. Okay, art in this book ranges from decent to awesome. Nothing struck me as bad, and I actually –enjoyed- the art in this book. The cover is gorgeous, and the map on the inside cover is pretty and useful. The prose writing was much like the art, ranging from decent to exceptional. A lot of the book was simply fun to read, and made me want to go out and use the stuff in a game. For style, I’ll give it a 5. It doesn’t revitalize the industry or anything, but it entertained me and makes me want to use the material.
Substance This was a bit harder. The Mountain Folk are fairly vanilla really, but after all the drudging through new obscure and esoteric rules, I came to like vanilla. The chapter’s good, but it also feels really out of place in a book so heavy on ethereal dreams and chimerical monsters. I want to like the Raksha, I really do. I never cared for pixies and sprites, but these things are different. Unfortunately, their power is weaker than previous works would indicate, and their mechanics are underdeveloped and convoluted. If I could have just read through and understood everything by the second try, I’d give them the benefit of the doubt and say it was me, but as it is the Raksha are so confusing and weak I don’t want to either play them or pit them against my players. There’s a great set of core ideas here, but it doesn’t really get across for me. Between that and the lift from the Mountain Folk chapter, I’ll give it a 4 for Substance, but not a strong 4.
Who should get this book? Besides Exalted completists, I’m not really sure. This isn’t a terrible book, but it does have some flaws keeping it from being great. There are a few ideas that could be mined for use in other games, but this is really an Exalted supplement and the majority of the book wouldn’t be useful outside of the setting and ruleset. Those wanting to put Fair Folk into their games will either love this book or hate it, as these Raksha are very different from the fae of earlier books. People new to Exalted might also want to avoid it, as this book is dense and complicated. But those wanting something different, something challenging, should look into this book.
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