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Exalted: Essence Player's Guide

Created by Onyx Path

An expansion for the Exalted: Essence tabletop roleplaying game, full of roleplaying advice and new mechanical content for players to enjoy.

Latest Updates from Our Project:

Exalted: Excellence! XSPG is Funded!
about 1 year ago – Thu, Mar 27, 2025 at 11:58:50 AM

Well, hello there! 

I love this project and this community, and I'm thrilled to see so many people come out to support this expansion for Exalted: Essence. The Exalted: Essence core rules covered a lot of ground when they came out and had to explain a million different things within the two covers, and didn't have a ton of time to really dig into each Exalt type the way some of us would want. Well, this book... each Exalted gets their own chapter!

And if you've read Chapter 1 and have seen the great job the team does covering Dragon-Blooded, you must be as excited as I am to see the rest of the book.

But enough of that... let's get right to the point! 

Exalted: Essence Player's Guide is FUNDED!


Thanks to your support, the Exalted: Essence Player's Guide has been funded and will get a fully-developed PDF, hardcover AND Deluxe hardcover release! Let me quickly switch into my Exalted mode...



Just more swords.

This happened a lot faster than I'd expected. With a lot of distractions lately and running around picking up MLB Opening Day snacks, I thought we might have a quieter start, but I should have really expected the BOOM and rapid take off. So let me scramble to get this all sorted...

Because we're not done now that we've hit our funding target! It's time to add more options, mark some milestones, and build a bonus reward!


As we increase the overall funding and support for the project, we’re able to add additional resources to the project, expand the rewards listed, and add in new offers and opportunities. Each Stretch Goal will have a target that, once reached, will add a project to the reward list for backers of the relevant Pledge Levels. Whenever we achieve a stretch goal, the listing will be updated to reflect the achievement.

At $30,000 in Funding - ESSENCE EXTENDED (Exalts of Creation Expansion I) 

Onyx Path will create a supplement further exploring the Solars and Sidereals. This supplement will be released for purchase on DriveThruRPG and added as a free bonus reward to all backers receiving the Exalted: Essence Player's Guide standard hardcover or Deluxe Edition [SIDEREAL PLEDGE+]

At $40,000 in Funding - ESSENCE EXTENDED (Exalts of Creation Expansion II) 

Onyx Path will expand the new supplement, adding material on Dragon-Blooded and Lunars. This supplement will be released for purchase on DriveThruRPG and added as a free bonus reward to all backers receiving the Exalted: Essence Player's Guide standard hardcover or Deluxe Edition [SIDEREAL PLEDGE+]



At $50,000 in Funding - ESSENCE EXTENDED (Exalts of Other Realms Expansion I) 

Onyx Path will expand the new supplement, adding material on Abyssals and Infernals. This supplement will be released for purchase on DriveThruRPG and added as a free bonus reward to all backers receiving the Exalted: Essence Player's Guide standard hardcover or Deluxe Edition [SIDEREAL PLEDGE+]

At $60,000 in Funding - ESSENCE EXTENDED (Exalts of Other Realms Expansion II) 

Onyx Path will expand the new supplement, adding material on Alchemicals, Getimians, and Liminals. This supplement will be released for purchase on DriveThruRPG and added as a free bonus reward to all backers receiving the Exalted: Essence Player's Guide standard hardcover or Deluxe Edition [SIDEREAL PLEDGE+]



So, our first four Stretch Goals will assemble a supplement for the XSPG giving us ... MORE. More on each of the Exalted of Creation and the Exalted of Other Realms. By the way, the Essence Extended title is just a placeholder for me, the team will actually come up with something way better when they actually create the book.

So, off to a great start! Lots of manuscript to come! Some fiction tomorrow! A handful of Stretch Goals to get us started, and the team will come up with more if we keep this project growing! I mean, surely there's room to add some new Exigents! And more!

Tomorrow... Dauntless Aelia also called herself Audacity because she didn’t fear the impossible!

#XSPG 

Welcome Aboard - Manuscript Preview #1
about 1 year ago – Thu, Mar 27, 2025 at 11:05:26 AM

Hello Alchemists!

My name is James, and I’ll be your Onyx Path Crowdfunding Concierge for this fun new project - Exalted: Essence Player's Guide, a jam-packed new player-facing supplement forfor the Exalted: Essence tabletop roleplaying game. I’ll be updating the campaign as we go, sharing the draft mansucript previews, answering questions, and providing support wherever needed as best I can.


I’ll note that I’m not part of the creative team on this project – so I won’t be able to immediately answer some of the more intricate rules or design inquiries – but having me manage this Crowdfunding campaign allows the Exalted Crew to keep their focus on the awesome projects that they’ve got in the works.

That said, feel free to make me your point person for any questions or issues you may have. I'll make sure to dig up answers as quickly as possible and clear up any issues that arise. Mostly, I'm just looking forward to an exciting ride along with all of you on this (and future) projects.

Our comment section is for all members of this community – united by our shared desire to see this project fund and develop – to cheerlead the project and figure out how best to spread the word about what we’re building here. If you’ve started a thread on whatever social media platform exists today or a Discord conversation about the game or this campaign – let me know about it so we can share that info. If you’ve discussed the game on a blog or podcast, let’s hear about it! If you’ve got funny ideas for social media hashtags, well we can do those too!

I will also be the person who gets to share the updates and previews with you! As noted on the main page and in the pledge descriptions, I also get to share an exciting treat – The Exalted: Essence Player's Guide Draft Manuscript previews, so you can start reading the book immediately! Scroll down to the bottom of this post on the website to see the first BACKERS-ONLY update for a download link.

So, welcome to Crowdfunding by BackerKit! Welcome to this awesome expansion for Exalted: Essence! It's time learn what it means to be Exalted!



Some quick things to note before we get into the manuscript.

Shipping Costs will be Collected in the Pledge Manager

First up, it's amazingly expensive to ship, especially from Onyx Path's home base in the US. And that's as of today - we're all in the dark about how things will look in 2 years. We get that, but there's not much we can do at this time. Onyx Path is in a difficult space where the company is big enough that they're not saving money by fulfilling out of Rich's garage, but small enough that they haven't been able to set up ongoing international partners to handle portions of the fulfillment. So we are where we are - for now.

The best we can do at this point is to plan carefully, advise everyone up front that shipping will likely be expensive (see our projections on the main page) and only charge what it costs us when the time comes. We’ll be charging for shipping in the Pledge Manager once the books are being printed and we can deal with the actual shipping charges rather than using our best-guesses this far out. If you aren't sure you want the hardcover or other physical items, you can pledge to the PDF tier now and upgrade your pledge in the Pledge Manager once we know the final shipping costs.




Draft Manuscript Previews

Over the course of the next 4 weeks, backers will receive the entire current draft manuscript for Exalted: Essence Player's Guide, but it's not going to come to you all in one go. The previews will come out in Exalt-based sections throughout the campaign. This helps me seem interesting over the next 28 days, but it's more about guiding the conversation and helping steer feedback for the developers.

Because they want your feedback! These manuscript previews are of the current draft manuscript – the document in its latest, approved form. This may not be the final form after editing and any additional development, but you can consider it about 95% finished, so keep that in mind.

In fact, you can help guide the team through the next stages of development by providing feedback on these manuscript previews! The Onyx Path team has set up a special Feedback Form just for campaign backers for this very purpose: https://forms.gle/sqmxdW6u87pT3Mhg8



You can use this Feedback Form to share your thoughts directly with the Exalted: Essence creative team to help guide them through the next rounds of development and editing.




DRAFT MANUSCRIPT PREVIEWS - BACKERS ONLY

Remember, thanks to BackerKit magic, these download links are visible to Backers only - you must be logged in and reading this on the website to have access to the manuscript preview links. So, if you're reading this via e-mail, click that "Learn More" link on the bottom and I'll see you below the Exalted emblem.