Lunars

The Lunars in General

Be careful when committing to Spirit Shape here - they're not mentioned at all in Gunstar - I suspect because in part they're kinda wonky in Autochthonia, and also because they're probably gonna be different in 3E which is where their mindset was when they were writing.

The Lunars in Exile

The thrill of the hunt. That is a phrase that comes up often when discussing the Lunar shikari, and a good one. But too often, the conversation turns bestial - relentless bloodlust, unstoppable predators, savage animals. The Lunars are that, of course - but they are also so much more.

The Lunars are more than hunters, they are protectors, and so they must use all of their wiles in their investigation and apprehensions. People still talk of the early triumphs of Ma-Ha-Suchi manipulating the emotions of revolutionaries. Through cunning and disguise, Tamuz was able to move two Fiends against each other before sweeping in and taking the heads of both. To the Chosen of Luna, every emotion and piece of personal knowledge is both informant and weapon.

For the chaos within the Gunstar, the Lunars are incredibly effective at stamping out Voidbringer cults, Faceless saboteurs, Titanic and deva incursions, cosmic horrors from beyond what have even been described by eyes that have seen the Primordial War, and even Populat riots. But for all their competence, the reaction to Lunars is divided. Some see their heroism, dedication, and passion, and call them brave guardians. But they are all also ruthless and oppressive at times, and even discussion of dissent can lead to invasive investigation by the Void Hunt, as well as responses from other branches regardless of the results. The fact is, the Lunars are always respected for their abilities - but whether they are to be loved or feared because of it varies upon who you ask.

Notable Lunars

Leviathan: Admiral, Full Moon caste

• “Not ten months into his tenure as the captain of the scoutship Far Moonrise, Leviathan single-handedly destroyed one of Kimbery’s swarms by luring it into a Wyld-nebula thick with raksha. The tactic was unorthodox, experimental, and insane—and it set the tone for the Admiral’s career. The wily Full Moon has made a name for himself by taking risks no one else would, and staring down odds that would make other Chosen go pale in the face. Stories of Admiral Leviathan’s exploits are the grist for countless popular novels; broadcast programs feature audio dramas of his encounters with things out in the void. Though as fearsome a foe as any of his brethren, Leviathan is also magnetic and charismatic, a trait he puts to good use in his leadership of the Gunstar’s Expeditionary Fleet. His crews would die for him, and he would die for them, in turn—and both put their all into ensuring that neither outcome happens. More than once, he’s thrown himself from an airlock, assumed the form of an interstellar horror, and savaged the monsters attacking his ship. Leviathan has hunted some of the deadliest creatures of the cosmos, and he’s all too happy to turn their forms against the Gunstar’s pursuers.”
• However, he knows the worlds and inhabitants the Gunstar leaves barren in its wake, breaking his heart as he does his duty.
• “Leviathan has seen them in person—he’s heard the heartbreaking greeting-song of the Motlani, and seen the mind-shattering complexity of the hive-thoughts of the Lok’thul. He’s taken outsiders as friends, mentors, students, and lovers—and all have been lost to the aeons, along with their worlds.”

White Scar Huntress: 'Queen of the Menagerie,' No Moon caste

• “White Scar Huntress is the No Moon priestess who oversees the Hallowed Menagerie of Emerald Children, a sprawling arcology of floating adamant spheres strung between the metropoli of Nurad. Here can be found herds of wild yeddim roaming through artificial grasslands, orcas and kraken swimming in deep-sea habitats, and the last tyrant lizard in his lonely jungle home. While the nation’s other synthetic environments house agricultural industry or civic entertainment, the tiger-queen’s conservancy is an arsenal. Luna’s Chosen come to sample the Heart’s Blood of deadly predators and exotic flora, while genesis engineers harvest breeding stock and raw materials to make their artificial life. The White Scar Huntress holds exclusive right of approval over all such requests, giving her considerable political sway among both her Lunar peers and the savants of the Twilight Caste. Her favored bribe is sex—not just for herself, but for the animal inhabitants of the menagerie. Over the years, she has amassed a personal army of Half-Caste beastman through such bribes, and eagerly awaits the day when she may lead them against the Primordials.”

Vanilla Lunars

Leviathan's the only interesting No Moon caste in Vanilla. Strength-of-Many gets honorable mention for having SOME personality, but it's a ripe caste for original characters.

Lilith: Changing Moon caste

• In Vanilla, hates Solars. That's about it.
• Your idea to me sounds more 'Anja Silverclaws' inspired than 'Lilith' inspired, it sounds like it'd only carry Lilith in name. And as mentioned, she'd be defined by the Solars - again, not necessarily a bad thing, but not the best thing. I'd prefer my take if anything, but I think we could pass pretty easily and no one would care.

Ma-Ha-Suchi: Changing Moon caste

• In Vanilla, a crazy goat man with a rape camp.
• We can...draw more from his First Age personality. Fatally charming, and incredibly hedonistic, desiring to sleep with every Celestial Exalted. Think about it.

Seven Devils Clever: Changing Moon caste

• In Vanilla, a freshly Exalted Lunar that refuses to play in the politics of the Silver Pact, instead working to improve her street in Nexus.
• Again doesn't need to be an exact rip, but a young shikari who has more loyalty to the people they grew up with instead of the Deliberative is a decent hook in the civil unrest the Gunstar is rife with.

Tamuz: Changing Moon caste

• In Vanilla, hopes to shape the world through the Thousand Streams River, then fucking rocks the Infernals during Return of the Scarlet Empress.
• He can be an older one who skillfully outmaneuvers Titanic plots routinely. Or he can just not be, that's fine too, not the strongest of hooks.

Ten Stripes: Changing Moon caste

• In Vanilla, a young Lunar who tries her hand as the Thousand Streams River. And keeps messing up again and again.
• In Gunstar, we can pull from the same inspiration - as a young girl she saw the shikari of the Void Hunt perform amazingly, and she wanted to perform the same way. She got her chance when she Exalted, but she's too eager - she's willing to push the borders of the law or believe any source in hopes of doing the Void Hunt proud. As such, she can be used as an antagonist to the group - easily manipulated into thinking they have treasonous ties by Zirak, and depending how things play out she can be either a comical rival or a bit of a tragic figure as she gets struck down (or at least injured) in a situation set up by someone like say Zirak.

Anja Silverclaws: No Moon caste

• In Vanilla, a young Lunar who finds out she's got the shard of a famous Lunar before her, and takes on a similar name in confidence. Also wants to free Thorns from Mask of Winters, because Mask of Winters is boring.
• Young and reckless can be fun, but we're making the Abyssals a lot more terrifying so she might not be Warren art anymore. Or, Mindfuck.

Raksi: No Moon caste

• The youngest Lunar to ever Exalt and enter Celestial level sorcery, she created innovations for the early Silver Pact before getting sidetracked fucking apes. Oh Lunars.
• Let's focus on the early part. Young and capable, Raksi set the bar for Lunar innovation, involved in the process of creating the Titanomach among other wonders. Incredibly talented and knowledgeable, she still hungers for more - bartering for secrets and lost wonders with dangerous sources. INCLUDING ZIRAK???

Original Lunars

Behemoth: Full Moon caste

• The strongest Lunar (subjectively) on the void hunt. All of his forms are meant more for fighting in the reaches, inside Autochthon. He is a master of guerrilla warfare, with a specialization in rooting out gremlins, Apostates, and Akuma. He could definitely be a giant dick, where Lilith wants people to live up to her expectations, Behemoth can tell them they can never do it.

Luna and Gaia

Currently I'm not gonna create pages for them or copy/paste much if anything here, because I think of all the Incarnae, they're the ones who who are least relevant to a Gunstar game. In fact, I think we could easily run the game without ever bringing them up - they'd bring some interest and could really shake up the setting if need be, but as it is I don't think it'd ever be NECESSARY. Going from that:

Luna, the Argent Madonna, is ready for a rematch against the Unconquered Sun. She desires to protect the people of the Gunstar (and is ecstatic with the changes the Deliberative have performed on the Primordial), but she has an unsettled score against the Primordials too - and she knows they are not fluid enough to ever forgive the Gunstar, they will hound it forever if she knows them well. Still, a part of her worries for Gaia - she fears losing her in the return - for even if captured and spared due to Cytherea's affection, it would be unlikely that the Divine Ignition would ever let her go again.

Gaia is of a much more peaceful mind. She is still haunted by the transformations of Adrian into Adorjan, or the Lidless Eye into Sacherevell. The horrors of war were too much for her compassionate heart, and even still beyond that she secretly fears what would happen to her in Fetich death. She knows Luna desires to follow through, but she also knows Luna was cut deep, and that she might not be so lucky in their next encounter. In fact, she fears Luna is not fully healed and putting up a strong front out of her desire to protect. The Gunstar, though unsettling in its affectionate parody of her elements, is capable of sustaining life, and she'd rather stay among the stars than go back and fight the Primordials more. The destruction wrought on the land and the deaths of her siblings weighed heavy on her when the battle coursed, and after the blow she saw, she realized without the Fickle Lady she would fall into inescapable despair. She can't gamble that, not for any prize, much less something of such little significance to her.

• We need to figure what's up with her dragons. Are they contained within Gnosis, along for the ride? Are they still in Creation, slumbering beneath, even unknown or unmolested by the Primordials? Or were they killed after the war - or during? If so, did that have any effect on her, or make her a more viable target for the Abyssals? Some pretty good hooks every which way this can go.

Tethys of the Untrammeled Path

• Despite her ambiguous purview, Tethys is a goddess of much distinction in Creation as well as Yu-Shan. In Creation, she is widely known as a patron of runaways, missing persons and exiles, holding sway over the wilderness and forgotten roads. In Heaven she is known to be a goddess of the lost and those who have gone astray, holding sway over desolate and uncharted tracts of the world, as well as over states of limbo that exist throughout Creation. More importantly, the citizens of Heaven know her to be one of the most strident adherents to Luna’s political vision.
• Tethys performs a hard service for Creation. She creates situations in which people are banished or become lost. She also guides the lost and prepares them for a return from exile. Tethys’s aid to the lost is not without a price, however. She demands that those whom she cares for grow strong from their hardships and meditate upon all the things that led them into her care, so that they might better understand their world and not forget the reason for their travails. Tethys sets to wandering in her shadow for all eternity those who are unable to learn or grow stronger from their crisis and who lean too heavily upon her without relying on themselves. For those who are shaped favorably into new and better creatures by their time in her care, Tethys prepares an end to exile, supporting them and guiding them back into the world. In many cases, her charges go on to unseat their enemies, thrusting them into states of exile and creating new subjects for her fierce attention, or more wanderers for her long shadow.
• Tethys uses strife and discord to cause diaspora, so that she might gather the lost and cull the weak from the strong. Hers has been the demanding voice that whispers banishment into the ears of judges at trial, as well as the coaxing voice that calls the mistreated child to run away from home. Hers has been the voice that tells the displaced prince never to forget who murdered his father and sacked his kingdom, and the voice that shipwrecks sailors on the rocks. “Gone into the shadow of Tethys” is a common phrase in Creation, referring to any and all who have been cast out, forgotten, lost or gone astray.
• Tethys has long favored the Exalted for their incredible skill at dispersing and displacing one another. She was there when the Sidereals led the Dragon-Blooded in their Usurpation of the Solars and drove the Lunars into exile. Of all the people to have ever come into her dominion, Tethys favors the Lunars most. She has harbored and aided them on the fringes of the world since the Usurpation, and is preparing them for their eventual glorious return, for she knows that they could scatter the entire Realm—or all of Creation—to the four winds. There she will be waiting, to remake the fallen in an image of strength that is worthy of existence, and to swallow the rest in her shadow.
  • Tethys appears as an attractive ivory-skinned young woman in an armored black dress and cowl. Her robes are fashioned from strands of the Cloak of Night bound to the moonsilver-tattooed skins of Lunars who willed her their remains, and they flow behind her at nigh infinite distances. Under the shadow of her robes, countless thousands wander, offering her an endless source of prayer.

Truculee

• Little known and infrequently seen in Creation, the truculee act as Luna’s personal servants, honor guards, concubines, pets and playthings. These strange gods strongly resemble common depictions of the Fair Folk, and are often mistaken for them. They possess long, tapered ears, delicate features, inhuman grace and the hungry gaze that are all characteristic of the raksha. Yet, their fantastic livery is almost always decorated in shades of crimson and silver, and the coloration of their skin and hair tends to lunar hues: blue, pink, silver, purple.
• Truculee strongly resemble the Fair Folk because each of Luna’s beautiful slaves was once a raksha noble. When the Fickle Lady desires new servants or toys, it is her habit to venture into the courts of Rakshastan, striding among the hordes of faerie like a wondrous and terrible monster. Her dreams and fantasies rend Graces asunder, shatter freeholds and subvert the lords of chaos to her overriding tale of a mad and triumphant moon. Those who amuse the Silver Lady with their doomed attempts to fight her narratives are singled out in a flurry of fictitious military maneuvers, their Heart Grace stolen and transformed by the touch of the Argent Madonna. These are the truculee—once dream, now god.
• Truculee are primarily encountered on the surface of the moon and within the inner halls and chambers of Silver Chair. They maintain their mistress’s sanctum, entertain her visitors with their tales and bodies, and rend limb from limb and devour any whose presence distresses or displeases the Silver Lady. Most of their time is spent in the labyrinthine caverns beneath the surface of Silver Chair, tending to Luna’s dreams where they bubble up from the lunar core. They drift through the ever-present fog of the Silver Lady’s fantasies, shaping them, trimming them back and feasting on dangerous or excessive dreams. These topiary feeding efforts help keep Silver Chair’s cyclical passage across Creation’s sky within acceptable parameters.
• They are occasionally seen in Yu-Shan, running small errands for Luna or accompanying her as living symbols of her power and station. Most other divinities are instinctively uneasy around the moon fae, finding them far too reminiscent of the hungry monsters outside Creation, which they once were. Luna appreciates this response, for it is rarely her inclination to set other gods at ease. Truculee can occasionally be encountered in Creation, carrying out tasks as their mistress bids. Luna has ordered them to always bring her any trinkets or oddities she might find interesting, and so when in Creation they sometimes attempt to bring those they find amusing or unique back to Silver Chair.
  • It's possible there's a few of these floating around, there's of decent interest and relevant to your Wyld hook.

Alternate Lunar Creation Rules

Just to have this on here.

During a private messaging session with a fan, Peter Schaefer discussed his original intentions for Lunar Exalted character generation:

Off the top of my head:

• 28 Ability dots
• 9/7/5 Attributes
• 7 Charms (4 Caste/Favored)
• 3 Knacks
• Two Favored Attributes from the three related to your Caste, two more chosen from any of the remaining seven.

That probably covers the important differences.

Backgrounds do not cost any more for Lunars than they do for Solars; e.g., a Lunar can take up to 5 Influence without spending twice normal bonus points.

Knacks cost 8xp per instead of 11xp.

Nothing else comes to mind.