Sorry that I only found this post - I know it's been a while
But Technical Grappling does exactly this, invoking the normal attack, defense, roll damage (control) mechanic used in normal striking combat.
Peter (Dungeon Fantastic) and I even worked up a version of this for D&D that we like that hews to the same principle: why bother with new mechanics when you have perfectly good ones right in front of you?
I'm not familiar with Exalted's mechanics, so I won't speculate, but it seems like you're on the right track with each success level giving a certain amount of control. Then you could attack back to remove that control, or grapple your foe to provide a bit of immobilization where two are locked in combat.
Normal attack rolls for grappling
But Technical Grappling does exactly this, invoking the normal attack, defense, roll damage (control) mechanic used in normal striking combat.
Peter (Dungeon Fantastic) and I even worked up a version of this for D&D that we like that hews to the same principle: why bother with new mechanics when you have perfectly good ones right in front of you?
I'm not familiar with Exalted's mechanics, so I won't speculate, but it seems like you're on the right track with each success level giving a certain amount of control. Then you could attack back to remove that control, or grapple your foe to provide a bit of immobilization where two are locked in combat.