Scarlet Empress

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The Scarlet Empress is quite obviously a canonical figure of great import to the Exalted game. As such, I won't be posting copyrighted material about her here. However, discussions of her relevant to my game and my guesses about here will appear here.

Strictly speaking, the rules suggest that the Empress should have Craft Air 6 due to her penning of the Broken Winged Crane. Of course a prostitute of Nexus is similarly credited with making a copy, so there is an issue of how that might be accomplished. Was that prostitute possessed by a Yozi? Perhaps she "merely" benefitted from some sort of Craft Endowment on the part of some powerful demon? Perhaps the Empress also was given such an Endowment by the Ebon Dragon, rather than possessing the skills herself?

Her centuries of studying the Imperial Manse make it seem odd to me that she is given no Craft Earth or Craft Magitech.

I understand mechanically why she was given such a high Medicine Ability (so she could manifest more than one element). However, this does make Ragara Bhagwei's story strange.

Age of the Empress. I don't think we know this, but the idea that she was only 50 years old when she assumed the Scarlet Throne is one that appeals to me. The Realm cultural bias against any Dragon-Blooded who hasn't made something of himself by this point could originate with such an age. I can imagine a House matron telling her wayward son something like, "The Empress saved all of Creation when she was 50 years old. What have you done, indolent child?"

Older Note: The comment in the Exalted Second Edition main rulebook about the Empress speaking 9 languages suggests to me that she has Essence 8, as Grabowski unofficially suggested that she might have. This note seems outdated given her final writeup in Return of the Scarlet Empress.

See also, Vengeance in Scarlet Regalia for information about the impostor who acted as the Scarlet Empress for a period of the Realm Year 770.

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