Green Flame Rising (Exalted vs Dresden Files)
- Thread starter DragonParadox
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- Crossover Fantasy
[X] Try to intimidate the demon of Kakuri Wan out of the girl
-[X] Ask your dad to stop you from leaving until the demon is gone to trigger Cracked Cell Circumvention
-[X] Use Naked Wicked Souls to see what is the most shameful thing the possession resulted in the girl doing, to gain insight into the demon's character and purpose
-[X] Use the Crown on the Girl to learn the True Name of the demon bound to her
-[X] Intimidation excellency.
-[X] Stunt: "Dad, guard the door please; no one leaves until this thing is gone, me included" you whisper to your father, as you start moving towards the altar. With each of your steps, the air in the room becomes colder, as your aura unfurls, letting the demon feel the chill that is not kin to Kakuri's frost, but something far, far older. Your anima illuminates the room with eerie glow, and through the eyes of your soul you observe the girl, and the girl's past, her most shameful secrets laid bare. "Spite, *insert true name here*?" you ask, as you walk, and you voice reverberates through the room. "You think you have enough power to spite me here? To harm this little one last time, as you did *insert description of NWS gain here*?" You smile, letting her see it. "oh, buy you are a hopeful one. No, the girl will be free, and she will be healthy and stronger and hale - this I know. You, on the other hand... Choose now - flee, without harming the girl, saving me some effort, or resist, and serve as raw materials for her recovery".
Redone the stunt, and added getting a True Name using the Crown. @DragonParadox can we use the crown with a specific question to get the full True Name? I mean, normally the names are not "from the mouth of the speaker", but those are gained from generalized questions like "what is the list of X?". Can we ask for an actual True Name? It should be possible, if its name has ever been spoken before, the Crown should be able to find it in the past. And we have the strong arcane link before us.
-[X] Ask your dad to stop you from leaving until the demon is gone to trigger Cracked Cell Circumvention
-[X] Use Naked Wicked Souls to see what is the most shameful thing the possession resulted in the girl doing, to gain insight into the demon's character and purpose
-[X] Use the Crown on the Girl to learn the True Name of the demon bound to her
-[X] Intimidation excellency.
-[X] Stunt: "Dad, guard the door please; no one leaves until this thing is gone, me included" you whisper to your father, as you start moving towards the altar. With each of your steps, the air in the room becomes colder, as your aura unfurls, letting the demon feel the chill that is not kin to Kakuri's frost, but something far, far older. Your anima illuminates the room with eerie glow, and through the eyes of your soul you observe the girl, and the girl's past, her most shameful secrets laid bare. "Spite, *insert true name here*?" you ask, as you walk, and you voice reverberates through the room. "You think you have enough power to spite me here? To harm this little one last time, as you did *insert description of NWS gain here*?" You smile, letting her see it. "oh, buy you are a hopeful one. No, the girl will be free, and she will be healthy and stronger and hale - this I know. You, on the other hand... Choose now - flee, without harming the girl, saving me some effort, or resist, and serve as raw materials for her recovery".
Redone the stunt, and added getting a True Name using the Crown. @DragonParadox can we use the crown with a specific question to get the full True Name? I mean, normally the names are not "from the mouth of the speaker", but those are gained from generalized questions like "what is the list of X?". Can we ask for an actual True Name? It should be possible, if its name has ever been spoken before, the Crown should be able to find it in the past. And we have the strong arcane link before us.
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You can get the name but not the matahysical weight of hearing it from the speaker no matter how you ask it.
OK, true name should still be useful, even without weight. It demonstrates our insight, especially coupled with NWS results. Should help in intimidating it and making it believe that we know and anticipate everything it can do.
We were already told that NWS would give us the kid's greatest shame, not the demon's.
The name thing also seems unlikely to be that helpful, because saying its full true name incorrectly demonstrates limits. It's not really a threat and can't be unless we go through the whole process to get it by other means. It's like threatening someone with a nerf gun.
There's no reason to overcomplicate things, and doing so could be actively detrimental since it dilutes focus.
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Did we ever get a ruling on if the church is already locked up and if that counts for CCC? It's kind of awkward to inject into my vote as I have it, but activating the effect would be nice.
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It does not, no one is trying to keep Molly in the church.
Looks like intimidating is going to win just deciding on the stunt.
Yes, which is why I am using it for "You think you have enough power to spite me here? To harm this little one last time, as you did *insert description of NWS gain here*?" part. It gives context, makes the speech more personal.
We'll have to agree to disagree here. I think that even without the metaphorical weight, it would still have psychological effect.
CCC is valuable enough and the situation is important enough, that we should definitely game it in somehow. This is the reason why I want to make portable shock bracelet or something similar, to activate CCC on demand. Situations like this one.
Also, as the text is written, you are not even using an excellency.
No it doesn't, for two reasons. First foremost is that the demon tricked the girl, the girl didn't trick the demon. The bane isn't going to be moved by the shames of its victim.
Secondly, even if it could be moved that way there's no guarantee that it actually a useful data point. In order to be helpful it has to change the tone in a way that is threatening to the demon and ideally not to the child.
It's already admitted it can't stop us, doing so was part of its last ditch sadism play to cause as much pain as it can on the way out.
The suggestion you're formulating here is playing into its hands, not refuting its play.
You're trying to end run an explicit ruling, so I think it's strongly likely it will fail.
Even setting that aside, the demon knows the score here. The fear you're trying to tap into is making an explicit and specific threat that we can't back up. It undercuts the unknown menace because it implies that we thought this was the scariest hint we could drop when we in fact have nothing.
So I guess agree to disagree, but I legitimately don't understand why you think this should work.
I didn't write it in because DP made a comment about it being automatic in situations without a reason to conserve essence.
I still fundamentally disagree with the way you want to game CCC. Controlled situations like this one are possibly workable, but anything that would trigger the charm is too big a risk to activate while facing real opposition.
Still, in this particular case it's a tempting argument, and it doesn't actually change the substance of the scene much, so I'll add a CCC trigger.
[X] Try to intimidate the demon of Kakuri Wan out of the girl
-[X] Before starting ask Micheal to split off and guard the door. No one in or out until this is over. Trigger CCC
-[X] [Stunt] Looking down on the child Molly closed her eyes, a dangerous sort of calm sweeping through her. Sinking deep, she reached out to her tools; the whispers of her own demon, the reverence of poisoned waters, and after a moment the teeth newly rooted in her soul.
--[X] With a beat the lid on her heart peeled open in time with her physical gaze. A twisted orb of fire announcing itself, herself, in a place beyond the reach of mortal sight.
--[X] With a sensation caught between clearing her throat and narrowing her gaze echoing in her soul, she glared down on the demon within the child.
—[X] "We?" Molly says with affected curiosity. "You have tricked a mortal child into believing you part of her soul Bane, but I can see you" her voice dropping into something inhumanly cold as she glares into the creature's shadowed eyes.
--[X] For a moment she sees something reflected there; a flash of green and the impression of teeth spiraling inward along an iris. Impossible shapes descending through a pupil into something far more permanent than Hell.
—[X] "The game is over. I am ending it. You have two choices. Return to the girl what you have taken and depart with the greatest care for her health, or be forced out so that I can personally make an example of you."
Even if we only use it in controlled situations like this one (or, for example, when negotiating with Mab), we would still need a way to activate it at will without it being obvious that we have done so.
Mab is the furthest thing from a controlled situation.
Viable applications outside of prepared ground should be rare enough that we can handle them ad hoc. Carrying around a shock collar or whatever would just encourage us to make bad decisions.
It's not gaming the charm, it's using it as intended, it is made for you to find excuses to count as imprisoned.
What I'm referring to there is the stuff Yog has proposed to constantly have access to it in the past, like bondage armor and shock collars.
The thing is we have a separate ruling that to trigger CCC an imprisonment like that has to have some actual teeth to it. Stuff like being delayed by a turn busting out of locked armor, which doesn't sound like a big deal itself but has the potential to be a real problem.
Picking out the weird rules of other people's powers and exploiting them is rule one of Dresden Files combat. If we expose something like that it will get noticed and it will get used against us at the worst possible time.
CCC is meant to be exploited but carrying it around to use as a routine buff against hostiles who haven't already trapped us is pushing it, and leaves us wandering around with the next best thing to a glowing critical hit point.
Mab is very much a controlled situation, paradoxically enough. No one besides Mab is going to attack us in her presence. And, thus, it's safe to use CCC.
That's also what I'm talking about, this is the intended use.
Probably, but there are issue ls here beyond direct attack.
The first is that I have little faith in the idea that what we're doing won't get noticed one way or another, and I'd rather not broadcast the details of that charm so clearly. Explosives on our workroom door aren't as obvious unless you know exactly what the orders they have are.
Which leads into the other issue; the winter fey test people, especially when they see potential weak points. It's a psychological foible they almost universally share.
It's not always (immediately) violent and stronger fey tend to have more self control, but it's still sort of like turning your back on a predator or leaving a shiny red button labeled "do not touch" in a college dorm.
I disagree.
The baseline intended use is to make it easier to escape when captured or detained. Setting up facilities to toggle them is in the same wheelhouse to an extent.
It isn't supposed to be used to generate buffing totems to carry around independent of the context we're operating in.
We can still do it, but it's a real stretch and a bad idea besides.
We already had this conversation, this is the intended use if you look at how infernal charms where made, particularly the excellencies that were written with it, the goal of all charms is to have the user think like the primordial it comes from, and this charm is Ebon Dragon to its core, it is the desire to escape and the contradiction of making said escape as convoluted as possible because you actually are stronger when imprisoned, wanting to be free but needing to be a prisoner at all times to be at your best.
So what if a fey finds out our shock collar? It needs to have teeth, not kill us on the spot, and the benefits far outweighs the *problems*, because we also get bonuses on stopping the fey from using the collar against us, after all, this is being in the way of our freedom.
It's not a stretch when everyone thinks about it, the fact it's an obvious use to us probably means it was one to the creators too, and they didn't do anything to *patch* it.
Having CCC actively literally always, and permanently, isn't the intended use as far as I know. Permanent -3 dif is very close to that sort of Mage system fuckery that Holden utterly abhors.
Getting smart and clever with things and exploiting the system is meant to be rewarding, but that's kind of on another level.
/what I know and thonk
Getting smart and clever with things and exploiting the system is meant to be rewarding, but that's kind of on another level.
/what I know and thonk
I'm pretty sure there's someone that pointed out that the thing you are calling as not something he wants is something Solars and Abyssals get, so....
The way I'm looking at this is in part based on comparing the basic scenario.
The core application of CCC is breaking out of prison. It helps you win contests to get free from other people's control.
Setting up a lab or whatever to use it essentially building a prison where you play that game against yourself. Weird, but still the same.
CCC charm bracelets are taking the prison and carrying it around with you so you can dynamically alter the rules of it to benefit doing things that are unrelated to the prison you built.
Technically it works, but there's a lot of munchkinry that various systems reward that are more exploit than application.
Pun-Pun Kobold god springs to mind for one example of this sort of thing.
The IC design goals of the primordials, who in Molly's case aren't even actually involved in the base of these charms anymore, is just a justification to rule lawyer system text that wasn't written with court room rigor.
As to why the exploit is dangerous, getting hit at the wrong time can have an outsized effect in a delicate situation. A one turn stun at the wrong time can be lethal, for us or someone we're trying to protect.
You gonna have to explain in more details, I am not getting it. What are you trying to say?
As an aside that I was about to edit in, I think that CCC here is pretty fine, given the circumstances. "Lock the door behind me while I do X" is that sort of stuff I was arguing for early on in the thread when CCC debates were in their early stages.
You really think the Shadow of all things wouldn't take his prison with him if he could?
Actually, just look at one of the ways the Infernals where supposed to free the primordials, namely, by literally becoming them and thus making it so that they're out without having to get out, which is exploiting the rules in that exact same way, and tell me that wanting to carry your prison with you is not absolutely intended as the sort of things you should do.
This is not Pun-Pun level of shenanigans at all, not even in the same ballpark, Pun-Pun is literally becoming a god in character generation by deliberately exploiting several ruling's interactions in the way that arrange you the most, not just taking a rule and using the obvious implications to make it better.
I am saying that I remember someone pointed out that Solars and Abyssals had a permanent difficulty modifier on the same level as CCC without the hoops, which if it is something I am remembering correctly, means that your argument don't hold water.
Under this system it's a significant bonus, and I don't think it's intentional.
Should Holden have noticed? Probably, but I don't exactly think he put much brainpower into infernals.
See how he translated charms across systems without rebalancing their most blindingly obvious context related errors. Like the damage looping interaction with BAE, or how WtD still has the debuff buy in price for the whole core charmset included despite charm trees not existing under his system.
Now I get it.
They have a number permanent difficulty modifier charms on the same level as Boiling Sea Mastery - charms that allow -1 dif when you are riding a horse, stand on a deck of some ship, that sort of thing.
Additional -2 dif charms Solars could stack on top of their -1's are somewhat harder to proc or require supernal slots. There is strong argument to made that at least some of them are better than CCC-as-intended simply because stuff like "-2 to All Social Rolls, ever" is very strong, but none of them are close to -3 dif on everything of perma-CCC.
This could easily spiral into "But other Solar charms are generally better than Infernal equivalents, so busted Dif Reduction is fine for Infernals" but -3 on everything forever feels to me like a bit too radical of a fix. That's just making things unfair and broken in a different way.
It has been a bit since I picked up ExWoD pdf, so if something is mechanically incorrect, do feel free to hit me with the book and quotes.
EDITED - some interesting typos. lol
EDITEDx2 - had some thonks about Solar vs Infernal balance since it got brought up
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On a less contentious and funnier note, the solars have some real lemons of their own too.
Like this:
This is a four dot eclipse charm, the exalted politician caste, and it only does something if the target is out of willpower.
The sort of things a solar willing to purchase expensive social charms can do to someone without any temp will left are so much worse than simply killing them. It's kind of hilarious that this is even a charm.
Really the eclipse set as a whole is carried by a few good charms that make up for a lot of circumstantial filler.
A little off topic, but I think it's worth bringing up to remind us that ExWoD doesn't exclusively shit on infernals before the next round of "why are solars so much better" salt kicks in.