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Autochthonians takes Exalted to a " setting, hermetically sealed in a world separate from Creation. Its a vision straight out of interwar dystopic sci-fi: The whole world is made up of machines, workers labor at jobs they were assigned to in a past life, only the inside of the planet is inhabitable, and nations vie with each other for raw materials. This is the fantasy of the 1920s, inspired by the "sentimental Futurism" ofFritz Lang
Futurism was an artistic movement concerned with movement, machinery, and the alienation of humanity from its labor: That is, a blacksmith who makes armor is an armorer, and stamps his name on his product. But a guy who works on an assembly line for tanks is an employee just like anyone else, he could be making radios just as easily. It isn't part of who he is. Autochthonians takes this alienation a step further. The heroes, Alchemicals, are cyborgs. Your soul is an amalgam of the soul of many great heroes, tour body is just a collection of magical parts. If you don't like your old hand, just trade it in for a new hand. Or a rocket launcher or a grappling hook - Transformers appears to be a major influence as well.
The modality is represented pretty well by the crunch. You have a pool of spare charms, if you don't like your normal charms, swap them out for the spares. Alchemicals were the prototypes for the other kinds of Exalted, so they can imitate (almost) anything the other kinds of Exalted can do: Heal (almost) as well as a Lunar, put up a (nerfed) persistent defense, an elemental bolt attack, short term flight, a not quite perfect lie detecting charm, an essence tank charm, anything. This flexibility makes for a nicely adjustable power scale. They start off weak enough to provide a good antagonist for Dragon Blooded. But with enough XP they can compete with Celestials.
Two chapters which would normally be in a hardback - "The Alchemicals" and "Storytelling" are missing. I wish they were here, Alchemicals are a pretty unique idea and I'd like some more info on them. Instead we get a second full chapter of crunch and three invasion scenarios. The crunch contains new artifacts, Machine Gods, technological monsters, and a new kind of Alchemicals only Sorcery. Its all really cool and well done, but some of it feels kind of unnecessary - what was wrong with old Sorcery?
The invasion scenarios are reminiscent of the World of Darkness ending Time of Judgement books. You get three different ways to send Alchemicals into Creation. All are cool, but I wish one had given me a slightly lower key way to integrate Alchemicals into Creation, so I could use them in a regular game without making them the focus of the plot.
One is the full out military invasion, complete with maps of invasion routes, polluting factories, evil armies of death, political chaos in the realm; and the whole thing ends with "rocks fall, everyone dies." It was a fun read but I can't see running it.
The second scenario is basically every Console RPG plot ever: The PCs and their funny transportation device travel from themed dungeon to themed dungeon on a quest to save the world. There are some stealable ideas here, but it was very poorly written. There's a ton of crunch you'll never use, instructions to start a bizarre religous debate on an obscure theological point not described elsewhere, and forth. But again, cool ideas.
The third scenario looks freaking incredibly, but it has a twist I don't want to spoil for those of you who might play it.
The writing style is high on cool ideas and vivid visuals, but low on percision. There are a number of rules questions that the book doesn't answer. The index is terrible (why organize charms by category? If I knew what category the charm was in I wouldn't need the index.)
The art is really cool, this assignment clearly challenged a lot of artists to expand their horizons. You see artists like Ross Campbell and Melissa Uran, who normally use curves or smooth lines, being forced to draw blocky robots. The results are always orginal, and some of the pieces are just gorgeous. Their art budget has clearly increased since first edition days.
I don't think there are any Exalted fans who won't enjoy this book. The setting is immensly orginal and draws from a huge diversity of inspiration. And the book is full of awesome crunch, if that's your bag. The only serious problem is that Autochthonia does not fit in well with the rest of the setting. Hopefully new products will give more support to Autochthonian games.
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