Green Flame Rising (Exalted vs Dresden Files)

[X] Use your Crown on something
-[X] Gorfel: What are the identities of those that Gorfel referred to as belonging to his brotherhood?

Each question burns a topic. I think it much more useful to get a full and accurate list of the people in that org (that we can give to Harry) than risk letting someone 'duck out' because Gorfel happens to not be aware of them.

For example, if there is someone high up in the White Council who is secretly part of his org, I don't think Gorfel would be aware. I'd not be comfortable with being uncertain.

uju32 said:

For one thing, Dresden didnt beat him up. He knows it, else he would have had Dresden arrested for assaulting a police officer.
In fact, it was Dresden and Molly who got him an ambulance.
There's no real room for irrational resentment.

Then there's the whole question of why he ended up outside Dresden's apartment.
Because remember that Dresden had no connection to the Splattercon killings besides being called to bail Molly out. And he's had no other contact with Greene in his capacity as a police officer.

So Greene has no official or unofficial reason to be lurking outside Dresden's home.

And he's a Homicide cop.
He's not Vice, or Narcotics, or Gangs, who might be able to justify long stretches of time on the street with vaguely characterized tasking; Homicide have actual cases to clear, and places to be where their presence is documented.

He doesnt have all that much free time to spare, and Dresden is a known quantity to CPD.
That he's spending so much of it in the last week outside Dresden's home suggests that he's under some sort of pressure.

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I agree that his initial stalking of Dresden is weird and certainly includes someone pressuring, enchanting or very convincingly lying to him.

But now that he sees Dresden as an enemy and for some strange reason seems to believe that Dresden was behind his recent beating, I don't believe more pressure or magic is needed.
Now he has homed in on Harry and he appears to be the kind of stubborn ass to need a lot of evidence and convincing to even consider that Dresden is not as bad as he thinks.

[X] Use your Crown on something
-[X] Gorfel: What are the identities of those that Gorfel referred to as belonging to his brotherhood?

Once we have the list we can rinse and repeat with other questions using someone else on it. All we need is a scene with a connection to work with, if any of them are public figures we can invent a reason for getting a look at them and then we're golden.

We might be able to swing asking questions of them while watching them give a speech on TV, or from pictures in the news. Or at worst arrange to be at some public event they're going to.

Then we can ask for everything they know about the society or something and walk away with our answers without anyone knowing what we've done.

Edit: Though I'm also tempted to ask for the information that Gorfel's colleagues are afraid he'll spill, since it was apparently important enough that they went straight for sniping him in broad daylight over it.

BronzeTongue said:

[X] Use your Crown on something
-[X] Gorfel: What are the identities of those that Gorfel referred to as belonging to his brotherhood?

Once we have the list we can rinse and repeat with other questions using someone else on it. All we need is a scene with a connection to work with, if any of them are public figures we can invent a reason for getting a look at them and then we're golden.

We might be able to swing asking questions of them while watching them give a speech on TV, or from pictures in the news. Or at worst arrange to be at some public event they're going to.

Then we can ask for everything they know about the society or something and walk away with our answers without anyone knowing what we've done.

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I want to give the full list to Michael and Harry and see if they recognise any of the names/aliases.

BeepSmile said:

I want to give the full list to Michael and Harry and see if they recognise any of the names/aliases.

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Yeah, we should definitely do that. I was just pointing out that we have the power of google and they don't.

Anyone public figure playing footsie with neo nazi sorcerers is probably going to at least try for insulation, but if we have real names we can look them up and work from there.

Hell, Molly still has the bullets that popped out while she was healing with her. We could ask questions about their minions and try getting a look at any public legal records related to them.

[X] Use your Crown on something
-[X] Gorfel: What are the identities of those that Gorfel referred to as belonging to his brotherhood?

I think we should consider getting Prince of Ruin Attitude eventually.

Not because I think it is likely that we will need it soon, or even because we could use it well right now (Appearance + Technology is literally the worst roll we can make).

But because I just rewatched Good Omens and the scene where Crowley uses this Charm on his burning car is one of my favorite scenes ever.

Artemis1992 said:

A nice charm to have would be a variant of Skyfire Seizing Repaste:

Adjusting for the different setting it should regenerate fewer motes and only cost one to use, but it is still nice to have a defence against energy-based attacks, when we start messing with Wizards and particularly with Winter and Summer Fey, who do love to use their elements as weapons.

I wouldn't buy it now, but certainly at Essence 3.

Could look like this in ExWoD:

Lanka Charm:
Skyfire-Seizing Repast(••)
As Ravana dreams of harnessing nuclear devestation, the Infernal already seizes such energy and its lesser brethern with her bare hands.
System: As a reflexive Action the Infernal may use this Charm to absorb any elemental or fully energy-based attacks. This includes such things as a wizard's fireball, but also a taser's charge or raw necromantic energy aimed to drain the Infernal's life.
The post-soak damage is reduced by the Infernal's Essence-rating, and the absorbed Energy causes her Anima to flare if it hasn't done so yet (if it is already flaring the duration until it goes down is reset).
If an attack is completly absorbed in this manner the Infernal regains the motes equal to the lower of her Essence Rating or the absorbed attack's post-soak damage.

@DragonParadox
Acceptable adaption?

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Yes, but you gys do not have the capacity to make charns right now. This is something you woud have to make. There is a Sikh defense that works a little like this in Way of the Serpent, I would post it but the potato generously called a laptop I am currently tiping at will take a while to download all the WoD books I have in dropbox.

DragonParadox said:

Yes, but you gys do not have the capacity to make charns right now. This is something you woud have to make. There is a Sikh defense that works a little like this in Way of the Serpent, I would post it but the potato generously called a laptop I am currently tiping at will take a while to download all the WoD books I have in dropbox.

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I would have though that adapting existing Infernal Charms would be within our options?
Like, going by the FAQ of ExWoD some Charms were deliberatly left out because they don't fit the new world (Wyld Shaping, and propably the all the extra-Essence Storage charms and the mass-destructive ones).
But other were left out for either being too niche or just not being important enough to the creator.

I would guess that Skyfire-Sizing Repaste would be too niche in many WoD games, Vampire or Changeling campaigns will propably never have you attacked with anything elemental and Mage will be less vulgar about if for paradox-reasons. Werewolf might have people throw balefire at you and Demon certainly will.
But in this world it's a reasonably useful but not overpowered Charm.

Artemis1992 said:

I would have though that adapting existing Infernal Charms would be within our options?
Like, going by the FAQ of ExWoD some Charms were deliberatly left out because they don't fit the new world (Wyld Shaping, and propably the all the extra-Essence Storage charms and the mass-destructive ones).
But other were left out for either being too niche or just not being important enough to the creator.

I would guess that Skyfire-Sizing Repaste would be too niche in many WoD games, Vampire or Changeling campaigns will propably never have you attacked with anything elemental and Mage will be less vulgar about if for paradox-reasons. Werewolf might have people throw balefire at you and Demon certainly will.
But in this world it's a reasonably useful but not overpowered Charm.

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Hmm... that makes sense, but on the other hand I have not read that many exalted charms and I'm leaary to just open the door to adoptions before I have more of a hang of them. In principle it looks fine though.

Vote's tied.

DragonParadox said:

Hmm... that makes sense, but on the other hand I have not read that many exalted charms and I'm leaary to just open the door to adoptions before I have more of a hang of them. In principle it looks fine though.

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It's ultimatly your choice anyway.

I'm just looking through some Charmsets to find things that look cool and potentially useful without going against the design-ideas of ExWoD.
So I certainly wouldn't try to take anything that creates a 10-mote pool of extra Essence, nothing that spreads radiation-sickness through a town-sized area, nothing related to Manses and nothing Wyld-shaping (unless you later decide that Outside would count for that last one).

DragonParadox said:

Yes, but you gys do not have the capacity to make charns right now. This is something you woud have to make. There is a Sikh defense that works a little like this in Way of the Serpent, I would post it but the potato generously called a laptop I am currently tiping at will take a while to download all the WoD books I have in dropbox.

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That's fair enough for mechanical purposes, but I'm curious about where Molly's charms come from IC.

They aren't the original infernal charm set, so I assumed her exaltation was making them up as we spend exp on them using inspiration from the hell juice it had access to.

Did it just whip up a charm list while waiting for a wielder when it lost the original one?

BronzeTongue said:

That's fair enough for mechanical purposes, but I'm curious about where Molly's charms come from IC.

They aren't the original infernal charm set, so I assumed her exaltation was making them up as we spend exp on them using inspiration from the hell juice it had access to.

Did it just whip up a charm list while waiting for a wielder when it lost the original one?

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They are very close to the original Charmset though.

I suspect the Exaltation was making very close equivalents to its old Charmset, drawing on inspiration from the surrounding hells and also adjusting the whole package to the low-essence environment out there.

Artemis1992 said:

nothing that spreads radiation-sickness through a town-sized area

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I ran the numbers for Gifts of Invisible Flame and converted them to square meters.(Convert yards to meters and run it through pi*r^2). Real World benchmarks are derived from Wikipedia's Orders of Magnitude(Area) article. Orders of magnitude (area) - Wikipedia

Essence 1(50 Yard Radius): 6566.9289291 Square meters(Somewhere between an American Football field and a soccer field)
Essence 2(100 Yard Radius):26267.7157164 Square meters(A ways over a manhattan city block)
Essence 3(150 Yard Radius): 59102.3603619 Square Meters(A ways over the Base of the Great Pyramid of Giza)
Essence 4(200 Yard Radius): 105070.862866 Square Meters(Approaching 5 Manhattan City Blocks)
Essence 5(250 Yard Radius): 164173.223228 Square Meters(Approaching 7.5 Manhattan City Blocks)

BronzeTongue said:

That's fair enough for mechanical purposes, but I'm curious about where Molly's charms come from IC.

They aren't the original infernal charm set, so I assumed her exaltation was making them up as we spend exp on them using inspiration from the hell juice it had access to.

Did it just whip up a charm list while waiting for a wielder when it lost the original one?

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I was looking at it as conceptual echoes of the primordial filtered and altered by the hell of Yomi Wan closest to them. Which is why the Kimbery hell has heat related effects.

OctarineShrike said:

ran the numbers for Gifts of Invisible Flame and converted them to square meters.(Convert yards to meters and run it through pi*r^2). Real World benchmarks are derived from Wikipedia's Orders of Magnitude(Area) article. Orders of magnitude (area) - Wikipedia

Essence 1(50 Yard Radius): 6566.9289291 Square meters(Somewhere between an American Football field and a soccer field)
Essence 2(100 Yard Radius):26267.7157164 Square meters(A ways over a manhattan city block)
Essence 3(150 Yard Radius): 59102.3603619 Square Meters(A ways over the Base of the Great Pyramid of Giza)
Essence 4(200 Yard Radius): 105070.862866 Square Meters(Approaching 5 Manhattan City Blocks)
Essence 5(250 Yard Radius): 164173.223228 Square Meters(Approaching 7.5 Manhattan City Blocks)

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The ExWoD version does not cause Malfean super-cancer that kills any mortal without magical treatment though.

Just a limited amount of damage that will heal in time.

BronzeTongue said:

That's fair enough for mechanical purposes, but I'm curious about where Molly's charms come from IC.

They aren't the original infernal charm set, so I assumed her exaltation was making them up as we spend exp on them using inspiration from the hell juice it had access to.

Did it just whip up a charm list while waiting for a wielder when it lost the original one?

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That goes a bit into deep lore spoilers, but I will say this much, the exaltation does not make up charm sets, they are not like spells in a D&D wizard's spellbook, they are aspects of the person who wields them, so from that PoV a charm you can take is a step towards a path of enlightenment leading... somehwere.

Vote closed, I'm going to trry to get something up today.

Well the exaltation doesn't make up charms, the Exalted person does. Mind their are upgrades, and something older charms are let left behind in favor of new ones. A part of the reason celestial charms are so good is they where developed to be mathematically perfect in the first age. You don't have to waste time developing lesser powers when your inherited memories, let you skip trial and error to go straight to the best possible result.

Having just watched spirited away and was wondering if we could pull some of that name stealing bullshit on spirits and demons we bind or would we need to create a charm for that?
Do things like river spirits and kodama from Japanese folklore exist? because a lot of spirits in Japanese folklore actually come about via things like artificial construction and human artifice.

Artemis1992 said:

I voted for asking the absolute question on the organisation, not Gorefels knowledge about them.
If one of his associates is a White Council wizard, we will know.

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Like I said, still cant prove it.
Nor does it show the motivations behind this stuff; who's being blackmailed, who is being ridden by Nemesis, et cetera.

And Peabody in canon demonstrated that you could be personally wellmeaning and still be acting in the Black Council's interests because someone else is whammying you.

Artemis1992 said:

I agree that his initial stalking of Dresden is weird and certainly includes someone pressuring, enchanting or very convincingly lying to him.But now that he sees Dresden as an enemy and for some strange reason seems to believe that Dresden was behind his recent beating, I don't believe more pressure or magic is needed.

Now he has homed in on Harry and he appears to be the kind of stubborn ass to need a lot of evidence and convincing to even consider that Dresden is not as bad as he thinks.

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I wouldnt agree.
Because attempting to pursue Dresden like this actively jeopardizes both his professional standing and his job.
If the pressure went away, he might still want to screw Dresden if it was in his power, but he wouldnt seek him out like this.

Artemis1992 said:

I would have though that adapting existing Infernal Charms would be within our options?

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I'd just steal and refluff charms from the Solar and Abyssal sections of EXvWoD.

---

Anyway, as per lottery:
Average yearly stock market return is 6-7%. And total taxes on a lottery payout are around 40%.

Assuming she wins a lottery with a $35 million dollars cash payout? State and federal taxes will run around $14 million, leaving her with $21 million. $1 million gift per family member comes up to $8 million total for parents and siblings, and goes in a managed family trust with a yearly payout to minimize tax exposure and prevent anyone giving theirs away or investing it in Bitcoin.

$2 million to charity.

Of the remaining cash, $10 million goes into diversified personal investments, which with an average yearly return of 6% to match the stock market, gives a yearly income of $600k, which would be senior BigLaw money.
And leaves her $1 million in liquid cash.

Basically, that sets Molly's floor for personal financial independence in the mid-single digit millions, with thirty five million being enough to essentially ensure that her siblings can pay their way through college and have a base income afterwards.

===
Alternatively, we could learn Ancient Sorcery Countermagic and go loot Siriothrax's Dragon hoard.Word of Jim is that its still there and untouched, because the fucoff Draconic death curse it left behind after Michael killed it means the people powerful enough to loot it dont need it, and those suicidal enough to poke it dont have the power to survive the curses on that stuff.

uju32 said:

Alternatively, we could learn Ancient Sorcery Countermagic and go loot Siriothrax's Dragon hoard.Word of Jim is that its still there and untouched, because the fucoff Draconic death curse it left behind after Michael killed it means the people powerful enough to loot it dont need it, and those suicidal enough to poke it dont have the power to survive the curses on that stuff.

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Would Ego-Infused Pattern Primacy also work?

Since its basically an Anti-Shaping Charm for us.

uju32 said:

Like I said, still cant prove it.
Nor does it show the motivations behind this stuff; who's being blackmailed, who is being ridden by Nemesis, et cetera.

And Peabody in canon demonstrated that you could be personally wellmeaning and still be acting in the Black Council's interests because someone else is whammying you.

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It's as good a place as any to start.
Sounds like a great adventure for Dresden to use his full detective-skills on.
And in the unlikely even that the name of a Senior Council member does drop (I don't think so), it would get Ebeneezer involved.

uju32 said:

I wouldnt agree.
Because attempting to pursue Dresden like this actively jeopardizes both his professional standing and his job.
If the pressure went away, he might still want to screw Dresden if it was in his power, but he wouldnt seek him out like this.

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I admit that I don't have a good grip at the character yet.
He might be petty and stubborn enough to pursue Dresden further without outside pressure or he might not.

uju32 said:

I'd just steal and refluff charms from the Solar and Abyssal sections of EXvWoD.

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Eh, I like Infernals feeling a bit more unique in terms of Charms from the two main-Solaroids.
So I'd rather convert more fitting Infernal Charms from E2 Exalted, than adapt non-Infernal Charms from ExWoD.