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Green Flame Rising (Exalted vs Dresden Files)

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Artemis1992 said:
Could work.

We'd have to survive a bit as the only melee fighter facing the Dragon, while the others are cleaning up mooks and knocking out Sandra (if she is still here and didn't flee once we got close).
But we are very survivable, especially in Shintai, so I like the odds.

Still, I'd prefer to have the Fire Teams on dragon-shooting rather than Sandra.
They just showed how useful massed fire is against big targets.
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Vicissitude 8

••••• ••• Breath of the Dragon


The vampire becomes like one of the terrible draculs of the Old World, able to exhale a deadly gout of flame. This flame does not hurt the vampire himself, though he may become trapped in flames if it engulfs flammable objects.

System: The flaming cloud affects a six-foot area, doing two dice of aggravated damage to anyone in the flames' circumference. This fire may cause combustible items to ignite, and it may ignite victims who suffer fire damage as per the fire rules.
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Vicissitude 9: The Last Dragon:

••••• •••• The Last Dracul


The most fearsome of the Tzimisce's monstrous forms, this power allows the Dragons to assume the shape from which their ancient nickname is derived.

System: By expending six blood points, the Tzimisce grows in size and girth, its flesh sloughs off reveal gleaming scales, wings sprout from its back, and its head becomes crocodilian. Its Strength and Stamina doubles, its scaly hide becomes the equivalent of 4 Armor, it gains five additional "Bruised" health levels, and difficulties to hit it are decreased by one because of its huge size. Its enormous wings function in the same way as the Chiropteran Marauder's. The dragon uses Strength with the Intimidation Ability and its mere presence triggers an Intimidation check each turn; this is a free action that happens automatically unless the Tzimisce deliberately suppresses it. While in dragon form, the vampire's blood immediately bursts into flame when exposed to open air, doing damage as described for Blood of the Earth. Those who manage to damage the dragon must take a dodge action to avoid being splashed with one blood point's worth of dragon's blood; those who have never fought a dragon before will not likely know to save actions for this eventuality. Even worse for its opponents, the dragon can spit any amount of its blood at its foes as a one-round action, even splitting blood points up among closely clustered opponents. This fiery vitae does damage as described for Blood of the Earth. The dragon cannot consume blood in the normal fashion due to its size, but can supplement its diet by consuming fresh human corpses. Consuming a corpse requires an entire turn's action and grants the Tzimisce blood points equal to however many blood points remain in the corpse's veins.
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Assuming he only has Fortitude 5, thats at least 9 Aggravated Soak against whatever our people are shooting.
If he has Fortitude 6, thats 10 Aggravated Soak.
For reference, our guns do 9 agg damage.

This boss is a Molly task.
Not something where massed fire from minions is gonna help. And we certainly dont want them drawing attention from a Rampire who almost certainly has Celerity.

We get in his face and stay there and hold his attention.
Let everyone else handle the others.
 
Just finished binging this quest a few hours ago, loved it and excited to see more of it. Quick question: so Tiffany/Lash has Shape Flesh'd her Dexterity up to Five, right? What's stopping her from doing the same to Strength and Stamina?
 
Artemis1992 said:
What's Average here?
The description of Manipulate Flesh is uncomfortably vague, saying "7 or 8" difficulty for adding Dex.
And then there's the fact that Lash would be working on Molly's Shintai form, not anything following the normal rules of biology.

I'd rather focus Lash's attention on the people less likely to survive a casual swipe of a big-deal vampire than on raising Molly's giant dicepool further.
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Rolling Intelligence 4 + Medicine 4 (no stunt) at DC7 is 3.2 successes.
Round down.

She works on Molly BEFORE Molly assumes shintai.
Because like I said, otherwise Molly is going to need to burn a lot of Melee Excellencies she could save Essence for other shit.
Like handling whatever they have been doing here so far.

Because if the Dragon is walking around with Vicissitude 9 equivalent, you can be looking at Potence, Fortitude and critically Celerity at around 5+ dots.
Flower of Death, anyone?
 
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Sandra running is a win condition for us. Maeve is supposed to have hunter-killer teams circling the city, which should be something Winter is good at organizing.
 
BronzeTongue said:
Sandra running is a win condition for us. Maeve is supposed to have hunter-killer teams circling the city, which should be something Winter is good at organizing.
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We have no idea in what state the Nevernever is here and now.

Right on top of a gate to Outside, after a heavy-duty Chaos Ritual?
Might be bad enough conditions that even Winter's hunters can't get in.

Also she might run in a mundane escape and cause yet more damage in the city before we find her again.

I'd much prefer to finish this down here.

[X] Not Splitting The Party
 
uju32 said:
ssuming he only has Fortitude 5, thats at least 9 Aggravated Soak against whatever our people are shooting.
If he has Fortitude 6, thats 10 Aggravated Soak.
For reference, our guns do 9 agg damage.
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Plus the successes on the attack.
We have a lot of guys and each can shoot multiple times when using Rage.

The weight of dice will definitely lead to some serious damage.
 
You know, one of these days when the world isn't on the ragged edge of exploding and held together by nothing but Exalted will, we really need to just sit down and have a nice slice of life arc. Find some fun mundane utilities for our Green Sun Princess's abilities, craft a few silly and absurd bits and bobbles, that sort of thing.
 
Schitz said:
You know, one of these days when the world isn't on the ragged edge of exploding and held together by nothing but Exalted will, we really need to just sit down and have a nice slice of life arc. Find some fun mundane utilities for our Green Sun Princess's abilities, craft a few silly and absurd bits and bobbles, that sort of thing.
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Maybe we could have a semi-regular freshman semester of college at Harvard if we relocate to Boston.

Before we have to step on the throat of the local supernatural community, of course.
 
You know what would be dumb but funny? Raising our Alchemy as high as we can, then brewing The Absolutue Best Cup Of Coffee. Not for more AP, but just to see how far we could push coffeemaking to. Maybe max out Craft as well, just for kicks. What would that even look like? I'm assuming Alchemy goes up to 5 dots-not entirely familiar with the Exalted system honestly-but still, if we turned the absolute pinnacle of crafting and alchemy towards creating The Best Coffee...
 
Schitz said:
You know what would be dumb but funny? Raising our Alchemy as high as we can, then brewing The Absolutue Best Cup Of Coffee. Not for more AP, but just to see how far we could push coffeemaking to. Maybe max out Craft as well, just for kicks. What would that even look like? I'm assuming Alchemy goes up to 5 dots-not entirely familiar with the Exalted system honestly-but still, if we turned the absolute pinnacle of crafting and alchemy towards creating The Best Coffee...
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Alchemy like all sorcery paths technically goes up to 6, although that last dot is maybe-literal-hell to find teachers for.
 
Artemis1992 said:
We have no idea in what state the Nevernever is here and now.

Right on top of a gate to Outside, after a heavy-duty Chaos Ritual?
Might be bad enough conditions that even Winter's hunters can't get in.

Also she might run in a mundane escape and cause yet more damage in the city before we find her again.

I'd much prefer to finish this down here.

[X] Not Splitting The Party
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Ultimately, if it comes to a choice between letting Sandra run or letting Vegas burn, or losing a party member?
Its not really a choice.
We can always keep coming for her, and after Vegas, more than Winter is going to be very motivated to run her down.

No big deal.
Artemis1992 said:
Plus the successes on the attack.
We have a lot of guys and each can shoot multiple times when using Rage.
The weight of dice will definitely lead to some serious damage.
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Nope.
=====
Lets assume that our guys are all peak human after buffs.
All physical attributes, Melee, Brawl and Firearms at 5.
Dicepool of 10. Gear to eliminate circumstantial debuffs like darkness and the like. SPICE for extra actions.

Now lets assume that, with confirmation of at least one Discipline 9-equivalent, the Dragon's stat block is along the same lines of what we saw from Walker!Duke Skavis

Walker!Duke Skavis
Core Discipline(Chimestry) 9
Celerity 7, with access to Flower of Death.
Fortitude 5
Physical attributes and abilities at 5+.

But instead of Chimestry 9, the Dragon is Vicissitude 9. Fortitude 5. Celerity 7.
The Dragon would be rolling Attribute 5+ + Ability 5+ + Celerity 7 = 17+ dice, and after spending 4x blood points to activate Flower of Death, he's going to maintain the Dex bonus from Celerity for the entire scene, whether he uses extra actions or not.

Our minions are rolling Attribute 5 + Ability 5 + Weapon Accuracy bonus 2 = 12 dice.
See the problem?
They wont even hit.

EDIT
They would have a better chance if they were all carrying grenade launchers.
However, those are indiscriminate weapons in an underground combat theater so the risk of friendly fire goes way up. And they only do Lethal damage, so he would get to add his currently enhanced Stamina to his soak.

For reference, that means going from around 9+ Aggravated Soak (Fortitude 5+ + Last Dragon Armor 4) to around 21 Lethal Soak [(Stamina 12+) + (Fortitude 5) + (Last Dragon Armor 4)]
 
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uju32 said:
Our minions are rolling Attribute 5 + Ability 5 + Weapon Accuracy bonus 2 = 12 dice.
See the problem?
They wont even hit.
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I don't see the problem.

Dodging is not a free action.
Thus, every action the Dragon spends on dodging a shot, is one he doesn't use on attacking Molly.
We have 25 guys with guns.

Assuming he spends his normal, primary action on hitting Molly and one reserved Celerity action on dodging her, much more dangerous single attack, that would leave 6 bonus actions from Celerity (each costing a BP to activate!).
After those there are still 19 gunshots.
Dodging the first increased difficulty due to multi-actions, he can dodge only 4 more until his dodge-DC would be over 10 and he can't take further actions.

That leaves 15 shots. Rolling against a roughly equal soak-pool with an average of only 0.5 successes would still make 7 wounds, enough to kill a regular vamp, or to moderatly harm one in Dragon mode.

Alternativly, he uses Full Defence to dodge all the shots.
In this case we have already won, because his situation is never going to get better from the situation.
Giving Molly in Shintai and with Excellency free attacks against you can only end one way.
 
Artemis1992 said:
I don't see the problem.

Dodging is not a free action.
Thus, every action the Dragon spends on dodging a shot, is one he doesn't use on attacking Molly.
We have 25 guys with guns.

Assuming he spends his normal, primary action on hitting Molly and one reserved Celerity action on dodging her, much more dangerous single attack, that would leave 6 bonus actions from Celerity (each costing a BP to activate!).
After those there are still 19 gunshots.
Dodging the first increased difficulty due to multi-actions, he can dodge only 4 more until his dodge-DC would be over 10 and he can't take further actions.

That leaves 15 shots. Rolling against a roughly equal soak-pool with an average of only 0.5 successes would still make 7 wounds, enough to kill a regular vamp, or to moderatly harm one in Dragon mode.

Alternativly, he uses Full Defence to dodge all the shots.
In this case we have already won, because his situation is never going to get better from the situation.
Giving Molly in Shintai and with Excellency free attacks against you can only end one way.
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Why would he Dodge when he has Block and Parry?

Elder Celerity is when that bullshit comes out to play. Matrix Agent/Neo-style bullshit.
And you dont run out of defense actions in ExWoD without extra actions; the defense DC just starts increasing, if you have no negators or compensating ability or contingency. But defense DCs still cap at 9.

If you want to stop him parrying or blocking, you have to immobilize him.

Nevermind that if you start making that kind of attack, you are likely to suffer circumstantial bonuses against friendly firing Molly with Agg weapons.
Or the fact that all the other Red minions and Outsiders are not going to exactly sit by and do nothing.

PS
I dont think this guy is relying on 12HLs either.
Not with an Outsider mage in support, and with preptime. The ExWoD rules for building an elder vampire boss allows the QM to double or triple their base HLs.
Bloated with the Blood of Nations: The vampire has twice as many Health Levels as a normal person.Treat this as the vampire having two of every rating of health box (two Hurt, two Mauled, etc), except for Incapacitated (he still only has one of those) and Bruised(he's got three of those). If you want them to be really tough, give them this power twice.
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Im not even counting whatever bennies his Mantle as Dragon gives him.
 
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Goldfish said:
Will this work?

[X] Not Splitting The Party
-[X] Drawing upon your Essence you armor yourself in stone and brass and fiery purpose, a crown upon your head (Enter Shintai)
-[X] Only one try, you can't spare the Essence for two tries. Activate Steel Skin and All Things Betray in addition to the hopefully already-active VLE and use Melee Excellency once you get in range.
-[X] Lydia, Lash, and Harry, with support form the fire team, handle Sandra and whatever forces remain available to her. Adkin and Harrowmont accompany the group and provide what aid they can, including use the sun charm at an opportune moment.
--[X] Lash uses Flesh 2 to boost the group's Dexterity as much as possible as quickly as possible without expending resources. If there is time available, she will boost as many fire team members as she can before the fighting starts. For the fight, she activates her Apocalyptic Form (all Low Torment traits, plus spend 2/10 Torment for Mist-wreathed Form and +2 Perception).
--[X] Lydia provides support against remaining Rampires and their mooks, conserving her Essence for an emergency.
--[X] Harry acts to shield the group as necessary while engaging Sandra and whatever Outsider forces she has at hand.
--[X] Our fire team spreads out to minimize their vulnerability to AoE attacks. They fully activate their augments and go weapons free without regard for conserving ammo.
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In general I like it. Lash has lore of light as offensive ability, there's that. Dexterity boosts are useful, but do we have enough healing items to afford the bashing damage?

I am guessing we are relying on eating lesser Outsiders to refill our essence pool? I still kinda expect the gate to be breached by the end of it.
uju32 said:
Nothing.
Just downtime at the end of the arc.
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Not just five. Technically, she can go up to 10. But anything above 7 will cause SAN damage to pure mortals observing her.

Goldfish said:
Maybe we could have a semi-regular freshman semester of college at Harvard if we relocate to Boston.

Before we have to step on the throat of the local supernatural community, of course.
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That would be nice. Join a sorority that is either just a normal sorority, or a mortal illuminati recruiting front, so we can laugh at rich white people who think they control the world. Stuff like that could be fun when we aren't desperately trying to stop the end of the world.

Schitz said:
You know, one of these days when the world isn't on the ragged edge of exploding and held together by nothing but Exalted will, we really need to just sit down and have a nice slice of life arc. Find some fun mundane utilities for our Green Sun Princess's abilities, craft a few silly and absurd bits and bobbles, that sort of thing.
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Well, I wanted to try and finally meet the alphas next turn. Maybe play a game with them. Wonder what kind of character Molly would play.
 
Our agents should be massively superhuman.

They should have the benefits of a magitech civilisation worth of Path Sorcerers with Alchemy and/or Enchantment. That means combat drugs paired with multiple pieces of enchanted gear, both implanted and not each that can do this:

**** Alchemists can bring about truly potent improvements to living beings. They can increase a single Attribute or Ability by two or two Attributes or Abilities each by one, and the normal human limit of five no longer applies.
**** Objects of truly superhuman power. These can raise Attributes above 5, duplicate powers (up to the second dot) of other supernatural beings, and otherwise warp reality in significant ways.

That means our strike teams should be rocking Celerity 2 themselves, 7+ dots in Attributes and 7 dots in key Abilities.

Plus, as they're Fomor, Rage, relevant Spirit Gifts that can modify target numbers, etc
 
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Yog said:
In general I like it. Lash has lore of light as offensive ability, there's that. Dexterity boosts are useful, but do we have enough healing items to afford the bashing damage?
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Flesh 2 does not cause bashing damage, but only affects Strength, Dex, Perception and wound penalties.
Flesh 3 is the one that can cause bashing damage, but in return you can alter any mental or physical attribute.
• • MANIPULATE NERVES
Like Body Control, this evocation allows the demon to manipulate a subject's nervous system. Strength and reflexes can be enhanced, senses can be dulled or sharpened, or the person can be subjected to waves of intense pleasure or pain.

System: Roll Intelligence + Medicine. The difficulty is determined by the complexity of the intended effect. Reducing the effects of pain is difficulty 6, while increasing the speed of a person's reflexes (increasing his Dexterity) is 7 or 8. Sharpening a person's senses (or dulling them) might require a difficulty of 9 or more.

Each success increases or decreases a relevant physical trait or wound penalty by one, as appropriate for the effort. The effects of this evocation last for the duration of the scene. To perform this evocation on another individual, the demon must be able to make physical contact, and a resisted Willpower ( difficulty 8 ) can be made to counteract your character's effort.

Torment: A monstrous demon risks inflicting severe physical damage to a subject by crudely manipulating the victim's nervous system. After rolling, the total successes are compared to the subject's Stamina. Successes that exceed the target's Stamina are suffered as lethal damage.

• • • MANIPULATE FLESH
This evocation allows the demon to manipulate a subject's physical form (be it her own or another's), adding muscle mass, increasing bone density or expanding mental faculties.

System: Roll Intelligence + Medicine. Each success is a point that can be added to any of the subject's Physical or Mental Attributes, There is a risk, however. Compare the total number of successes to the subject's Stamina. Any excess successes are suffered as bashing damage due to system shock. This damage cannot be soaked. To perform this evocation on another individual , the demon must be able to make physical contact, and the individual can attempt to counteract its effects — the Storyteller makes a Willpower roll ( difficulty 8 ).

Torment: Monstrous demons alter flesh and bone without regard for their subjects' frailty. If performed on another, a Willpower roll is made for the subject, with a difficulty equal to the demon's Torment. If the roll fails, the subject suffers a temporary derangement that makes him uncontrollably paranoid and prone to violence. If the roll is botched, the derangement is permanent.
Yog said:
Not just five. Technically, she can go up to 10. But anything above 7 will cause SAN damage to pure mortals observing her.
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Eh.
We'll see. Ultimately, I dont really see the need for her to go above 5-6 in anything other than Stamina.
Not when she can manipulate her own biology for scene-long or even multiple days of buffs, even without Apocalyptic Form.

We just need to prioritize making her an item to simulate the Hoard background.
Alratan said:
Our agents should be massively superhuman.
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They arent massively superhuman. None of them are fomor; we have not given anyone IDU.
The heavy troops, the Gurvel in power armor, have no experience acting on Earth, and stand out as inhuman pretty strongly.
So none of them are here.

And I assume that noone has Tier 4 items just on the shelf at short notice.

EDIT
Also, Tier 4 there says +2 to 1 Attribute, or +1 to 2 Attributes.
So assuming that you had a bunch of Attribute 4, Ability 4 agents, after their consumption of drugs, you're either going Attribute 6, Ability 4, or Attribute 5 Ability 5 for the scene.
 
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So, to bring our Alchemy up to 5 dots would require...27 XP if I'm reading this right? That's...well, that's pretty expensive. 15 XP if we just want to bring it to 4 dots, and we can brew permanent statbuffing potions at that level, right? Would it be worth focusing on getting 4-dot Alchemy once this arc closes out?
 
Schitz said:
So, to bring our Alchemy up to 5 dots would require...27 XP if I'm reading this right? That's...well, that's pretty expensive. 15 XP if we just want to bring it to 4 dots, and we can brew permanent statbuffing potions at that level, right? Would it be worth focusing on getting 4-dot Alchemy once this arc closes out?
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Not IMO. This has been a massive arc so we should be getting a lot of XP, but we've also got a lot of other priorities to spend it on.
 
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