Green Flame Rising (Exalted vs Dresden Files)

[X] Leave, back to the temple, you have Mayeda and that is what you came for

Guys we can kill the vampires later. If we do this we are gonna make more enemies.
 
[X] Plan Teamwork
-[X] Srew Charon and his 'neutral ground', if he's dealing with the likes of the Black Court he should expect consequences
-[X] Kill the vampire
-[X] Melee Excellency
--[X]All for One and One for All!: on cue, you and your Boon companions converge into a bristling formation of concentrated badass. So closely attuned are you to your companions that you battle as a single unit, scattering enemies with elegant precision. System: Assuming that you've all fought together as a unit before ( this stunt won't work for strangers or new allies), single member gets chosen to be the spokesperson of your group all employees the same initiative role - a new one based on the highest initiative rating in that group and then act one after another until everyone within that group has taken their actions. Only after the entire group has acted can you remaining enemies (if there are enemies remaining!) Get to respond to anything other than a block Dodge or Parry.
Roll: Dexterity + Awareness . Difficulty: 8
Damge: as normal. Actions: 1
--[X] Great Blow:Exposing himself to attack, the assailant throws everything he has behind a massive blow that will hopefully put a permanent end to the fight. This blow demands two actions - one to draw back, the other to strike - although it can, as usual, be performed within the same turn as a multiple action.
Roll: Dexterity + Melee. Difficulty: Weapon +2
Damge: Weapon +3. Actions: 2


-[X] STUNT: Parrially still in your telekinetic grasp you presses three finger like indentations into Harry and Lydia's backs as the walking corpse keeps talking slowly but surely releasing the pressure one after another. The second he finished talking and turning around "May God have mercy on your soul. Nathanael Cobbler." Shooting forward and up a blur at a third the speed of sound in a tight arc. Harry dips to your left, staff outstretched and Lydia to your right, right hand glowing with pale light Before the vampire can even react you are in front of him arm drawn back. In your empty hand Sparks, flame green and bright that flares into your sword. You bring your blade down.

Logic. We did explicitly did come here to kill him. We've got our young white vampire bonus.
Well we didn't get any answers and he still got to talk. If help is on the way it's already coming might as well actually make sure he's completely wiped off the board before anyone else gets here. Even with the multi-action penalty we're still rolling 4 dice at difficulty 5 in the dexterity plus awareness rule and we only need one success for it to go off.

To be frank I'm hoping if we just splatter him in one turn we can just kidnap his corpse either in torpor or dead and fly away then just use our Crown to Divine everything we need to know from him anyway.
 
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That's not how neutral grounds works. You don't need to sign something it's a place that the locals can agree on. By voilating it we are marking ourselves as problematic disruptive outsiders in the eyes of the people to respect it. That's how these things work.

Your right about taking him at his word but Molly thought he was being "surprisingly straight foward" and honest and she's pretty good at reading people. It's an odd thing to lie about aswell when we could have knowledge of such things and would know he's lying to our face.
Though by that definition this place isn't neutral ground at all. You can't claim to be neutral or be an enforcer of neutrality and then help store local kidnapping victims you can't do it. He might have been surprisingly straightforward about the power of Charon and his influence in this area that might be true. How much he's willing to expend on this walking corpse either in defense or Revenge is a different question.
 
Major Arcana, the Sun golden rayed. "You're over here wondering what you are."
Bullshit. The trouble with stuff from multiple iterations of reality ago is that there isn't physical evidence anywhere to look at. Just having some sitting around and recognizing enough to make the solar connection on sight basically screams trap.




You'll be rolling snake eyes till the sun's in the sky and then you will be wondering if maybe you shouldn't have pissed off a thing that was old when the Trojan War was young."
Iku Turso's story came from a tradition older than writing. I'm not saying we should pick unnecessary fights, but if Charon is going to curse us for breaking his peace we've already hit the bar and his age doesn't intimidate me.

Can you really call any location outside of a residence neutral ground? This seems more like a public location.
That's splitting hairs. The point of his establishment is that people can meet with assurances they won't be killed or worse by their enemies during negotiations or simply by a hit waiting for them to be present.

Defying that standard has consequences, like people trusting your ability to negotiate less.

Three factors effect us here though:
1) We didn't sign shit, so we're not breaking our word.

2) The defenders are small time compared to basically pissing off the whole planet by attacking Accorded Neutral Ground.

3) We already raided it. If Charon wants his business to be taken seriously he must make an example of us.

We should never do this sort of thing after agreeing to meet someone in such a place, but right now killing him shouldn't be worse for us than what we've already done.
 
I don't think anyone could reasonably argue that Charon's domain, or whatever this place is here in Vegas, is actually neutral ground as any supernatural power would recognize it, not when the place is being used to shelter someone who is not only attacking agents of other factions in the city but also using the location to stash a kidnapped victim from one of those factions.

Sure, it could be Charon's backyard, his favorite vacation spot, or the deific equivalent of a mancave, and he could be rightly pissed off because we slipped through his security and made him look like a joke, but that is a far cry from violating recognized neutral territory.
 
So, what we know so far is Nate seems to be opposing the Pallbearers, who we have reason to believe are an outsider cult.

Do you think he's here for the same reason we are? Stop Sandra from killing the Sin-Eater and that's why Charon's backing him?

I mean, he did have a job that involved destroying ancient texts even back when alive. It'd be just our luck if we stumbled across the single Black Court Venatori.
 
Though by that definition this place isn't neutral ground at all. You can't claim to be neutral or be an enforcer of neutrality and then help store local kidnapping victims you can't do it. He might have been surprisingly straightforward about the power of Charon and his influence in this area that might be true. How much he's willing to expend on this walking corpse either in defense or Revenge is a different question.

It's worth noting this is sort of a grey area. Suppose two groups are at war and take prisoners. They want to do a swap, but don't trust each other very much.

One such solution would be to move the prisoners to a neutral spot, negotiate, then leave with your people under whatever terms you come to. That's a pretty clear case, but what if you don't have an ongoing desire to trade, communication channels, or some other issue? Maybe you want to show up with your prisoner in hand as a negotiating tactic, to demonstrate good faith, and so on.

There's also the thing where a lot of powers straight up don't have a problem with owning people, body, mind, and soul. Neutral in this case is simply making you check your active conflicts at the door regardless of who it favors.

Also worth considering that this isn't the Accords, it's a mom and pop tier operation. Charon basically runs a memetic old west saloon with some rooms for rent upstairs. He sits at the bar with a shotgun under the counter and makes it clear that nobody gets to start shit here without his personal retaliation.

It's for profit, so there are irregularities. Still appears to be the best the locals have though. Basically like a for profit hospital in an underserved city.

Doesn't matter if the locals hate the scalping, it's still their medical center.

So, what we know so far is Nate seems to be opposing the Pallbearers, who we have reason to believe are an outsider cult.

Do you think he's here for the same reason we are? Stop Sandra from killing the Sin-Eater and that's why Charon's backing him?

I mean, he did have a job that involved destroying ancient texts even back when alive. It'd be just our luck if we stumbled across the single Black Court Venatori.
We have their membership list, if he was involved we'd know.
 
One such solution would be to move the prisoners to a neutral spot, negotiate, then leave with your people under whatever terms you come to. That's a pretty clear case, but what if you don't have an ongoing desire to trade, communication channels, or some other issue? Maybe you want to show up with your prisoner in hand as a negotiating tactic, to demonstrate good faith, and so on.
If you can stash prisoners on an spot and can't rescue them without retaliation from the owner, then I wouldn't call it neutral ground.

It's one thing to bring prisoners to a neutral ground for negotiation, and another to hold prisoners there until you have need of them. The idea of neutrality breaks down when you favor one over another.
 
If you can stash prisoners on an spot and can't rescue them without retaliation from the owner, then I wouldn't call it neutral ground.

It's one thing to bring prisoners to a neutral ground for negotiation, and another to hold prisoners there until you have need of them. The idea of neutrality breaks down when you favor one over another.

It's possible that we just don't know the rules.

For example, it could be perfectly allowable to rescue a prisoner without retaliation, and the prisoner may be allowed to walk out and no one is allowed to use violence to stop them, including their captor who brought them there.

It's just that it's hard for a prisoner to walk out if they start out unconscious or tied up from when they enter.
 
That Ishtar worshiper should've told us about any neutral ground and how it works here, honestly kind of suspicious that they didn't warn us. She knows we are from out of town even if it maybe common knowledge to the locals that doesn't mean we would know.
 
[X] Screw Charon and his 'neutral ground', if he's dealing with the likes of the Black Court he should expect consequences
-[X] Kill the vampire
 
Y'know what, I agree with @ImBuda and @BoredMan: Know who you are aggroing before you aggro them.
And understand what the consequences are.

We didnt come to Las Vegas to pick a fight with Charon, or whoever is cosplaying as Charon, and doing so is a distraction and runs the risk of further destabilizing an already unstable city.
Dont just start shit to start shit.

I certainly have no interest in carrying the living body of a Black Court vampire back to the Brass Courts which are linked to Molly's soul. If I was worried about Ishtar potentially using the body of her Chosen as a beacon to locate Sanctuary, I'd worry a lot more about Blampires and the things that are associated with them in this AU.

===
VOTE
[X] Leave, back to the temple, you have Mayeda and that is what you came for


We can come back to ask questions at the site of the other vampire's murder, but lets return Mayeda, and question both him and Ghorbani further.
Replies and commentary later.
 
[X] Screw Charon and his 'neutral ground', if he's dealing with the likes of the Black Court he should expect consequences
-[X] Kill the vampire
 
Adhoc vote count started by Goldfish on Jan 8, 2024 at 9:50 PM, finished with 32 posts and 8 votes.

  • [X] Srew Charon and his 'neutral ground', if he's dealing with the likes of the Black Court he should expect consequences
    -[x] Kill the vampire
    [X] Leave, back to the temple, you have Mayeda and that is what you came for
    [X] Screw Charon and his 'neutral ground', if he's dealing with the likes of the Black Court he should expect consequences
    -[x] Kill the vampire
    [X] Srew Charon and his 'neutral ground', if he's dealing with the likes of the Black Court he should expect consequences
    -[x] Capture the vampire
    --[x]Stash him in our kingdom for our intelligence service to pick apart any information that can be gotten out of him.
    [X] Plan Teamwork
    -[X] Srew Charon and his 'neutral ground', if he's dealing with the likes of the Black Court he should expect consequences
    -[x] Kill the vampire
    -[X] Melee Excellency
    --[X]All for One and One for All!: on cue, you and your Boon companions converge into a bristling formation of concentrated badass. So closely attuned are you to your companions that you battle as a single unit, scattering enemies with elegant precision. System: Assuming that you've all fought together as a unit before ( this stunt won't work for strangers or new allies), single member gets chosen to be the spokesperson of your group all employees the same initiative role - a new one based on the highest initiative rating in that group and then act one after another until everyone within that group has taken their actions. Only after the entire group has acted can you remaining enemies (if there are enemies remaining!) Get to respond to anything other than a block Dodge or Parry.
    --[X] Great Blow:Exposing himself to attack, the assailant throws everything he has behind a massive blow that will hopefully put a permanent end to the fight. This blow demands two actions - one to draw back, the other to strike - although it can, as usual, be performed within the same turn as a multiple action.
    -[X] STUNT: Parrially still in your telekinetic grasp you presses three finger like indentations into Harry and Lydia's backs as the walking corpse keeps talking slowly but surely releasing the pressure one after another. The second he finished talking and turning around "May God have mercy on your soul. Nathanael Cobbler." Shooting forward and up a blur at a third the speed of sound in a tight arc. Harry dips to your left, staff outstretched and Lydia to your right, right hand glowing with pale light Before the vampire can even react you are in front of him arm drawn back. In your empty hand Sparks, flame green and bright that flares into your sword. You bring your blade down.
 
Edge of Night​
12th of January 2007 A.D.
COMMENTARY
Nathanael Cobbler is a relatively young Blampire, given as our data puts him around 200 years old maximum.
First he demonstrates magic, now divination and ancient lore that he really should have no business implying.
Man either has a sponsor, or he's the mouthpiece of Something Else.

We REALLY should have Hellscry'd him. CAN we still Hellscry him?

Going to note that the Sun may be taken as a symbol for Solaroid Exalts.
But that its also a central symbol for Egyptian mythology.
Dude could be guessing of course.

But the divinatory tarot, while invented in Italy in the 15th century for card games, has been associated with Egyptian mythology by occultists.

Capital HE?
Cobbler certainly believes that Charon is a god, apparently. And a male god at that.
Nemty was the Egyptian god of ferrymen. Ra travels through the underworld every night on a boat.



No explicit lies.


I don't see the point of trying to capture this dude, and the thought of letting him go is unpalatable, to say the least. I do worry about the possibility of angering Charon, but at this point Charon should be considering the consequences of angering us.

After all, how neutral are you really when you're providing shelter to a supernatural predator and letting it stash victims in your domain?
I will remind you that in Book 3 Grave Peril, both Dresden and Michael Carpenter held civil discussion with Mavra the Black Court vampire sorceress at a Red Court diplomatic reception without immediately trying to murder her. This didnt stop Dresden and Mavra trying to murder each other in Book 6 Blood Rites.

And then in Book 7 Dead Beat, Dresden was actively working FOR Mavra to retrieve the Word of Kemmler.
Under blackmail, but same point; she was the person who warned him that the Kemmlerites were coming to Chicago.
Interests can align. Even with monsters.


There is as of yet, no evidence to conclude that where we found Mayeda was Charon's domain.
Greek themed construct defenses are not really evidence of anything.
Especially when the Blampire in question was a grave robber who operated along the coasts of the Mediterranean Sea.


He is obviously a factor, but he seems to be overreaching. Besides a captured Nathanael in our kingdom is a hostage if Charon care about Nathanael and if Charon doesn't care about Nathanael we should not have much trouble getting him to forget about it.
I genuinely dont see how you can make that argument.
We have never even met the dude; we just know he's powerful enough that noone is willing to cross him.

He could be a powerful Exalted-era spectre or hekatonkhire pretending to be a god.
He could be the real deal from Greek mythology, which while a god isnt all that if you believe the myths where Hercules spanked his ass. He could be a major god on the order of Odin or a Dragon, cosplaying under an assumed name for Reasons.

He could be Charon from Wraith the Oblivion: the first Ferryman and only Emperor of Stygia.
He could even be an angel, whether proper Fallen or unaligned/grigori walking the Earth; I doubt Mac's unique, and in Demon the Fallen Charon was a rebel Angel, duke and deputy to the archduke Azrael.

A lot of those possibilities could spank our ass quite soundly.

===
He doesnt have to care about Cobbler.
He just has to care about the affront to his guarantees. Mab doesnt care about most randos, but if you break the truce at an Accords Neutral location, she will take retaliatory action because you are breaching her guarantees.

Same deal.

And frankly, given the origins of Black Court vampires as we know them, I would vehemently oppose any plan that involves bringing one into our Hell.
Thats just giving Drakul and potentially the Neverborn a set of breadcrumbs to Sanctuary.


That's splitting hairs. The point of his establishment is that people can meet with assurances they won't be killed or worse by their enemies during negotiations or simply by a hit waiting for them to be present.
Defying that standard has consequences, like people trusting your ability to negotiate less.
Agreed.
Three factors effect us here though:
1) We didn't sign shit, so we're not breaking our word.
2) The defenders are small time compared to basically pissing off the whole planet by attacking Accorded Neutral Ground.
3) We already raided it. If Charon wants his business to be taken seriously he must make an example of us.

We should never do this sort of thing after agreeing to meet someone in such a place, but right now killing him shouldn't be worse for us than what we've already done.
1) You dont have to sign anything to be judged to be breaking custom and law.
If we'd blundered into Mac's place and started shit without knowing about its neutrality, that wouldnt be a defense.

2) The Venetian Canals are acknowledged as a neutral spot in Las Vegas.
The spirit domain we travelled to is neither in Las Vegas, nor acknowledged as a neutral location.
Charon isnt obliged to do anything about it.

3) Like I've said previously, there's no evidence that the spirit domain is Charon's.
Charon presumably helped get Mayeda there.
But he doesnt appear to have assumed any responsibility for his health or fate while he was there.


Note that Cobbler wasnt making any threats or implications about Charon coming after us for rescuing Mayeda.
Because doing so broke no rules.
Only if we attacked him(Cobbler) in the Canals would we have committed an actionable infraction.
 
VOTE
[X] Leave, back to the temple, you have Mayeda and that is what you came for
[X] Use Hellscry Chakra + Occult Excellency on Cobbler: 2m



RATIONALE
Dont start an occult fight against a Black Court vampire sorcerer in the neutral place of a divine entity.
Especially in front of a casino with security cameras and with multiple civilians walking around
There is NO fucking way that ends well, in the short term or longterm.


Demonic Primacy of Essence + Boiling Sea Mastery = -3DC to perception roll.
The vampire appears to be implying things that someone as young as he is doesnt have any business knowing.
We really should look deeper.

And information should proc +2m Essence regen for the scene, so we should be net neutral.
 
[X] Leave, back to the temple, you have Mayeda and that is what you came for
[X] Use Hellscry Chakra + Occult Excellency on Cobbler: 2m
 
Hopefully people don't jump the gun with this vote and possibly escalate this in a bad way. Civilians everywhere, neutral territory we were just warned of this could go bad fast and for what? To get a kill that we should easily be able to get later?
[X] Leave, back to the temple, you have Mayeda and that is what you came for
[X] Use Hellscry Chakra + Occult Excellency on Cobbler: 2m
 
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[X] Screw Charon and his 'neutral ground', if he's dealing with the likes of the Black Court he should expect consequences
-[X] Kill the vampire
[X] Screw Charon and his 'neutral ground', if he's dealing with the likes of the Black Court he should expect consequences
-[X] Kill the vampire
*sigh*
Quite aside from the sheer recklessness of aggroing an apparent god we know fuckall about just to kill a Black Court vampire....
Has any of you looked at where we are? On a map?
Google Maps said:

This is the middle of the Las Vegas Strip, one of the most heavily surveilled areas of real estate in the world, and one of those with tourists and party-goers up and about 24/7. We are literally inside the Venetian Resort, Hotel and Casino, a 5-star hotel, and close to 3-4 hotels and casinos. Cameras caught us coming in and boarding a boat.

And you want to commit a homicide here? Thats like murdering someone in Time Square.
We literally just saw Cobbler walk towards a crowd of civilians.
We are currently in a boat with another civilian ferryman witness

Please pay attention to your surroundings before contemplating murder.
A Blampire doesnt care; he has no identity to salvage.
We do. So do our companions.

And if there's civilian collateral because we picked a fight in the middle of civilians.....
 
That Ishtar worshiper should've told us about any neutral ground and how it works here, honestly kind of suspicious that they didn't warn us. She knows we are from out of town even if it maybe common knowledge to the locals that doesn't mean we would know.
That's because if there was even a semi legit neutral zone here they would have told us. We agreed to do a service for them and they didn't anticipate any problems with it knowing we were coming here. We are getting baited hardcore.
 
That's because if there was even a semi legit neutral zone here they would have told us. We agreed to do a service for them and they didn't anticipate any problems with it knowing we were coming here. We are getting baited hardcore.
Or they didnt think it was necessary to tell us because every fucking supernatural knows it.

We literally walked into the Hanging Gardens with Mutt, a known local White Court vampire in our retinue.
Why the hell would they think it necessary to point out what is common local knowledge?
We obviously did our research well enough to find the Ishtarites.
 
*sigh*
Quite aside from the sheer recklessness of aggroing an apparent god we know fuckall about just to kill a Black Court vampire....
Has any of you looked at where we are? On a map?


This is the middle of the Las Vegas Strip, one of the most heavily surveilled areas of real estate in the world, and one of those with tourists and party-goers up and about 24/7. We are literally inside the Venetian Resort, Hotel and Casino, a 5-star hotel, and close to 3-4 hotels and casinos. Cameras caught us coming in and boarding a boat.

And you want to commit a homicide here? Thats like murdering someone in Time Square.
We literally just saw Cobbler walk towards a crowd of civilians.
We are currently in a boat with another civilian ferryman witness

Please pay attention to your surroundings before contemplating murder.
A Blampire doesnt care; he has no identity to salvage.
We do. So do our companions.

And if there's civilian collateral because we picked a fight in the middle of civilians.....
Okay that's fear-mongering. We have cyber devils that is it there is no camera or computer system that could have seen us or can see us that we cannot immediately sabotage. Secondly he is starting to walk away from us into three or four people that were walking into that building that is what it says. So he hasn't even cleared distance with us yet never mind actually gotten towards civilians. Who are they going to tell if we splatter him across the concrete? That they saw a flying girl a wizard and a witch that fired a bolts of gray light that turned to random guy into a smudge and no cameras caught that yeah sure that that's definitely going to fly. Also we have connections to the Library of Congress you know the supernatural law of the US. That can also cover any tracks that we might leave on this case if we were to contact them about the specifics.
 
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