fictionfan
Please sir, may I have some Meows?
- Location
- Tempe, AZ
We should thank the white king for the considerate birthday present.
Green Flame Rising (Exalted vs Dresden Files)
- Thread starter DragonParadox
- Start date
- Crossover Fantasy
The superior kind of stealth with distractions involving radioactive green fires and preemptive witness removal.
[X] Yog
Old realm, ask for the written alphabet of the language gets us far more. Getting the 26+ characters of old realm, each of which is usable for a crown question.
Kornet
Quite possibly a sloth abomination
- Location
- Mother Russia
For, like, a day.Lara wouldn't have known if we hadn't told them
- Location
- washington
actually yeah yog can you change this?
- Pronouns
- She/Her
[x] Yog
Okay, so, no obligation involved. And while on one hand this could seem like a bribe that makes us seem weaker… from a slightly different point of view, this could be seen as tribute, to appease us and stay on our good side. And I think as our power grows in more and more obvious ways, hindsight will make this seem less and less like the former and more and more like the later. And make it seem like a wiser idea to provide tribute to us as well to stay on the good side of the new Dread Lady of Chicago.
Okay, so, no obligation involved. And while on one hand this could seem like a bribe that makes us seem weaker… from a slightly different point of view, this could be seen as tribute, to appease us and stay on our good side. And I think as our power grows in more and more obvious ways, hindsight will make this seem less and less like the former and more and more like the later. And make it seem like a wiser idea to provide tribute to us as well to stay on the good side of the new Dread Lady of Chicago.
VOTE
[X] No
RATIONALE
Hard pass.
There are both pragmatic and ethical reasons to decline, above and beyond avoiding the impression that the White Court has more influence over us than it does.
Molly knows fuckall about movie productions or running a movie studio or Hollywood in general, and doesnt have the time to learn. Same with the people she has managing her financial affairs; Thomas knows nothing about movies professionally and doesnt have any interests in moving from Chicago where his brother and lover live in order to learn.
Not to mention that with Madrigal about to go either mysteriously missing or tragically die, we dont want to be anywhere near that circle of formal or informal investigation of his whereabouts or what happened to him. And we dont want to take responsibility for any shit the studio did while he was running it; it was Madrigal, you know there are skeletons there.
Ethically, it also looks kinda sus to neutral observers.
Furthermore, the employees of Red Star Studios would be an additional set of people we would be responsible for, and an additional attack surface for enemies to attack us by.
Which is to be avoided.
And ultimately, its not like we need the money.
Lottery Plan is January.
[X] No
RATIONALE
Hard pass.
There are both pragmatic and ethical reasons to decline, above and beyond avoiding the impression that the White Court has more influence over us than it does.
Molly knows fuckall about movie productions or running a movie studio or Hollywood in general, and doesnt have the time to learn. Same with the people she has managing her financial affairs; Thomas knows nothing about movies professionally and doesnt have any interests in moving from Chicago where his brother and lover live in order to learn.
Not to mention that with Madrigal about to go either mysteriously missing or tragically die, we dont want to be anywhere near that circle of formal or informal investigation of his whereabouts or what happened to him. And we dont want to take responsibility for any shit the studio did while he was running it; it was Madrigal, you know there are skeletons there.
Ethically, it also looks kinda sus to neutral observers.
Furthermore, the employees of Red Star Studios would be an additional set of people we would be responsible for, and an additional attack surface for enemies to attack us by.
Which is to be avoided.
And ultimately, its not like we need the money.
Lottery Plan is January.
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Even assuming good faith from Lara, which is....not guaranteed, but very likely?
1) A movie studio run by someone like Madrigal Raith is likely to have a series of skeletons in its closets, given his propensity for treating humans like property, and the general reputation of Hollywood preying on fresh meat desperate to break into movies.
Think Harvey Weinstein with mind control powers.
We dont need that kind of static.
2) Like I said previously, taking ownership of this place represents exposing another attack surface that our enemies can use to attack or otherwise fuck with us. And thats not just fucking with the business itself; all the normals who work there become associated with us, and our enemies can attack them to get to us.
Just look at the plot of Blood Rites for how easy it is to fuck up a film studio with magic.
Unlike Cauldron and the Jade Dogs, there is no way to harden a bunch of ignorant vanilla humans against supernatural intervention.
3)Movies are pretty high profile as a business.
Movies that have achieved cult status within a fandom are particularly high profile, and attract enthusiasts and obsessives who will devote personal time to digging into the circumstances around the movie and the studio that made them.
We dont need that sort of attention at this point in our lives.
It's worth considering that being seen to care about mortal assets and revenue streams will be something of a comfort to the White Court.
They're painfully aware that she's a terrifying murder machine, but one with material concerns.
If nothing else it presents an avenue of interaction and hypothetical leverage with much lower stakes than direct threats.
Obviously this has strings and the like that come with it, but that's not a bad thing for an Exalt who can pull those strings if she cares to.
They're painfully aware that she's a terrifying murder machine, but one with material concerns.
If nothing else it presents an avenue of interaction and hypothetical leverage with much lower stakes than direct threats.
Obviously this has strings and the like that come with it, but that's not a bad thing for an Exalt who can pull those strings if she cares to.
More useful? Sure I guess. Seems to me that she's deeper in with us than the reverse. We aren't strictly needed to keep things moving this direction, but Lara has more to lose ignore our requests than the other way around simply because her consolidation relies/relied more on us than our operations do on her.
The way I measure it we're ahead in the tally even if we behind in experience.
Well that's certainly an offer with a hook in it. Very closely monitored since they know it inside and out already, and the sort of thing that could be used to feel out our resources if they weren't already obvious at this level of the game.
Also a little insultingly light as a bribe on the surface level. A guest kills an Outsider, arguably a threat to everyone in the area by default, at your party because of your internal problems and a movie studio is the payoff?
She has access to her father, who has super senses of the tier needed here. She'd have almost certainly learned when she compelled a full report from him later tonight.Lara wouldn't have known if we hadn't told them
Whamps. She's not going to do that unless something goes wrong; her people know the score, they just respect her power more while it's set up in this sort of intrigue game.
There is a calculation here. I don't want too deep a perception either, but it's worth noting that the illusion of influence is valuable to them but has no substance to us. Lara has only the leverage she plays out of us with her superior political skill.
Lara is good at that, but she still has to pay for our cooperation regardless.
We don't want to taint our rep as being their creature, but the more critical the whamps think we are to the new order the more Lara has to pay to keep us from disabusing them of that notion.
It's a matter of finding the sweet spot in my view.
Mooks are also a commodity here; why kill them when you can smash bosses and have the little people run errands for you instead?
Killing more mooks isn't really useful.
It isnt.
Molly has Expression 0, and it isnt a Key ability either, which means she is worse at this than a mortal professional. Molly does not have any inclination or ability or the Backgrounds to run a movie studio, nor does she have anyone who knows how to. Nor does she have the time to learn.
Not everything you are offered is something you should take.
Its worth knowing and respecting our limits.
Do we actually need to be good at this? Presumably Madrigal wasn't actually doing everything himself. A new point person would be good, but that's a matter of money.
If he actually was we could mothball it and take the passive income from the IP I guess, for what that's actually worth at our level of abstraction.
Not saying we definitely should take it, but there is technically value available beyond the scope of being personally involved.
My calculation here is more on involvement level. Is this over the line into too much apparent influence to third parties, or something distinct enough to look like "normal" business while still making Lara/Raith rule more dependent on us playing nice?
OctarineShrike
Avatar of Mandos
This is basically we do the opposite of what Trump and Musk did. Find somebody who knows their stuff and be a hands off landlord who listens to them while we learn the ins and outs of a movie studio. We've got other concerns though like making stuff for Odin, finishing the station, etc. That's in addition to everthing Uju brought up.
- Location
- washington
mind you we could take then just sell it.
Why would the ablity to make rational logical arguments matter for directing movies. Empathy would be the directing stat.
Goldfish
Friendly Spider-Fish Abomination
- Location
- Formerly of the Far Realm
[X] Yog
We don't have to actually manage the studio or make most of the decisions. We have people for that. Or we can find people for that. Either way, we can just be hands off and leave it to do its thing.
The main reason to accept, IMO, is not for money or another feather in our cap, but rather because it's an easily understandable transaction to most of the Whampires who are present. They're going to see a Walker-slaying monster standing here before them, but if we're also seen as a monster who accepts payment in goods or services, we suddenly fit into a more familiar box from their POV. It should just make things easier when dealing with Whampire politics, at least in the short term.
We don't have to actually manage the studio or make most of the decisions. We have people for that. Or we can find people for that. Either way, we can just be hands off and leave it to do its thing.
The main reason to accept, IMO, is not for money or another feather in our cap, but rather because it's an easily understandable transaction to most of the Whampires who are present. They're going to see a Walker-slaying monster standing here before them, but if we're also seen as a monster who accepts payment in goods or services, we suddenly fit into a more familiar box from their POV. It should just make things easier when dealing with Whampire politics, at least in the short term.
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fictionfan
Please sir, may I have some Meows?
- Location
- Tempe, AZ
I wonder if Lara will invite us to the next party when we aren't getting our murder on? Sort of want to spam NWS all over the place here.
- Pronouns
- She/Her
There's also the fact that this is primarily a horror movie studio, and we have Skavis minions who are natural fear-eaters and can probably handle it pretty well. And we're probably likely to get a bunch more Skavis minions since House Skavis is sorta collapsing in on itself after the death of both the Lord and his Heir and the White King seizing a bunch of their blackmail and other assets. The studio is a good place to dump any who come flocking to our banner in the wake of suddenly becoming the least of the three major Whamp families.
It's also the blanket art skill here, based on how it's been used in quest previously. Trying to do the whole thing ourselves would probably require expression to translate whatever we're trying to accomplish into something actually worth playing for people.
COMMENTARY
Alright, thats where the other Raith girls went. Good to have them accounted for.
Im still unclear on whether House Skavis is getting dissolved as a formal body, or if its just the Skavis ruling family thats getting fucked up and there will be a replacement Skavis duke chosen later. Guess Isabella will let us know.
Lara is taking the opportunity to sharply curtail
House Skavis have a mansion HQ in Boston? Kattrin Sigfridsdottir was based out of the outskirts of Boston before we killed her.
I doubt that she was in residence without their knowledge, which implies that the unlamented Duke Skavis has been playing with fire for longer than we knew. Also, Charity's family apparently live in Massachusetts, iirc.
Yeah, thanks but no thanks.
Ownership of a movie studio is uncomfortably high profile for someone who kills people.
This just makes our ownership of Chicago Synthetics look worse.
There's no real way that ownership of a movie studio is transferred to an unrelated 18-year old without looking sketchy as fuck.
Especially after the current owner dies or goes missing.
Just the IRS declarations are going to draw not just a first, but a second and third look.
Nevermind the talk in the trade media.
And given that this studio was run by Madrigal Raith, the dude who fucked up so badly as to give an FBI agent a good look at the White Court blackmail/influence apparatus? And then tried to have said agent murdered? The dumbass who tried to sell Dresden on Ebay? I guarantee there are unpleasant secrets there that neither Molly nor Lara know anything about.
I dont think Lara will intentionally screw us on this, but precedent suggests that she didnt, couldnt have done a comprehensive check on this at 3 days notice even if she wanted to.
1)Yes, we do.
You dont do Hollywood at secondhand, and you need not just a feel for people, but an appreciation for their talent and how to get the most out of it. Madrigal Raith had it as his day job and still had Lucius Glau as his personal lawyer and fixer up till around six months ago or so when the Scarecrow killed him.
There are people who play financier for movies, but they dont run studios.
2) Thats also a worry IMO.
But Im immediately concerned with the complications of owning a horror movie studio previously run by a sex/fear/despair vampire who, according to Thomas in Proven Guilty, had a distinct record of killing his victims.
Its like taking over a casino previously run by the Mafia, or an airline run by a drug cartel.
Or a youth group run by a pedophile.
We cant do this. You cant hire a person off the street.
This is Madrigal Raith, White Court princeling. His righthand man was a supernatural as well. I guarantee there are landmines in his studio that arent obvious to Molly or Lara. This was the guy who exposed the entire White Court blackmail network to an FBI agent.
Anyone we're dumping into this is going to turn up shit we'd be responsible for.
Expression is the art of communication and entertainment, not rational logical arguments.
Anyway, this isnt directing a movie, its running a movie studio.
You need both Expression and Finance, neither of which are Key abilities for Molly.
Even directing a movie would be Expression.
- Pronouns
- She/Her
@uju32 I think you are seriously overestimating how hands-on we are going to be running this studio, instead of delegating it to competent minions.
Also, if scandals are something you're worried about… Night Swallows Secrets is a favored charm for us. We can bury anything we want to have buried far deeper than anyone less than a full-blown Heroic Mortal can possibly uncover for relatively little effort.
Also, if scandals are something you're worried about… Night Swallows Secrets is a favored charm for us. We can bury anything we want to have buried far deeper than anyone less than a full-blown Heroic Mortal can possibly uncover for relatively little effort.
We dont, in fact, have people for that.
Thomas is our business person, and he has no experience or connections in Hollywood. He lives in Chicago.
And you underestimate just how personal the business of moviemaking is.
The understandable transaction already exists:
Madrigal, Duke Skavis et al attacked Molly and people she had responsibility for after the White King had a non-aggression treaty with her and Lydia.
Thats very straightforward, and is the reason why we came here in the first place.
We dont have to do anything more.
===
I keep coming back to this.
The average movie production allegedly has almost 300 people involved according to Google. I have no idea how many permanent or temporary staff a studio employs. We cant even begin to protect them all if someone, from the Red Court to the Fomor to some Outsider affiliate, chooses to attack them as a proxy for us.
We saw this shit happen in Blood Rites.
When Lord Raith and the witches chose to attack Arturo Genosa's porn movie studio with ritual magic, they murdered people with impunity and ended up bankrupting the studio. Dresden only managed to track down the perps after the fact.
Dont adopt responsibility for people you cant protect. Limit your exposure.