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[Exalted] The Last Daughter -- Dragon-Blooded Sorcery School Quest

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[x] V'neef L'nessa

This quest continues to be a lot of fun and I am excited to see Ambraea's story enter its next chapter. Who knows I might even include references to her in a future Exalted game and then the whole thing will come full circle.

(For context since I just realised that probably comes across as very presumptuous, Nettle and Yula were both PCs in an Exalted game I ran and it is a delight to see them again.)
 
Welp, that is an ominous way to open the school year

Ok I will not lie I have been in the edge of my seat waiting for this and it delivered! Goddddd the Sesus thing was always gonna be sch a gunpowder keg in our friend group, and now that Sola is a Hearthmate it will be even more! doesn't help one of the marriage canddates s a Sesus, too! Marriage allance is something to look at seriously now that our continued standing is in doubt.

As for the vote hmmmm... we got a hefty dose of Maia and Sola this whole summer, and Amiti got a whole subquest for herself... they are evenly matched when it comes to social, with L'nessa having a more of an edge. Have we actually done school year activities/missions with her tho? Not as an assistant but a featured character.

Probably will hold off a bit to make the decision after I digest the update! I am enjoying this!
 
HBInquirer said:
Welp, that is an ominous way to open the school year

Ok I will not lie I have been in the edge of my seat waiting for this and it delivered! Goddddd the Sesus thing was always gonna be sch a gunpowder keg in our friend group, and now that Sola is a Hearthmate it will be even more! doesn't help one of the marriage canddates s a Sesus, too! Marriage allance is something to look at seriously now that our continued standing is in doubt.

As for the vote hmmmm... we got a hefty dose of Maia and Sola this whole summer, and Amiti got a whole subquest for herself... they are evenly matched when it comes to social, with L'nessa having a more of an edge. Have we actually done school year activities/missions with her tho? Not as an assistant but a featured character.

Probably will hold off a bit to make the decision after I digest the update! I am enjoying this!
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A factor you should probably consider is the marriage alliance. At this point our connections between Ambraea and house V'neef and house Sesus are about even with our aid to that wyld hunt. More likely than not we aren't going to double down and marry into the house we further by picking there member this year, which implies that we'll be marrying into the house we don't pick now, unless we do something rash and marry into Tepet just to spite the realm and absorb their members into our new great house a few decades down.

There is also the connotation for what someone might say to L'nessa and Amiti and how they might wiffer and who might be doing the saying.

For the Who it's safe to assume a Peleps or Mnemon when it comes to L'nessa, while Idelle comes to mind for Amiti.

As for what, that's a bit harder.

The last important factor is their focuses. Sorcery is more passion for Amiti and more Utility for L'nessa. The reverse is true for politics. That'll be a big factor in this chapter. Amiti will be more Sorcery focused, even if as their graduating year it's sure to be a focus regardless, while L'nessa will add political nuances, which will be a factor regardless based on the tone of the vote description.
 
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Maugan Ra said:
[x] V'neef L'nessa

This quest continues to be a lot of fun and I am excited to see Ambraea's story enter its next chapter. Who knows I might even include references to her in a future Exalted game and then the whole thing will come full circle.

(For context since I just realised that probably comes across as very presumptuous, Nettle and Yula were both PCs in an Exalted game I ran and it is a delight to see them again.)
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That would be sort of delightful.

Writing Nettle genuinely trying to be a responsible mentor figure for this arc was a lot of fun on my end, generally.
 
Gazetteer said:
Leska cracks a thin smile — a rarity for her. Then she delivers the highest praise she has ever given Vahelo, in a way that feels like nothing so much as being stabbed. "If you had only been blessed by the Dragons, I could hope for no more in a daughter."

Vahelo is old enough now that the last thin, feeble ray of hope have been extinguished for years. She'd reconciled herself to living and dying as a mortal woman by the time she'd turned eighteen, and turned her attention fully to the lesser ways she might prove herself and honour her family's name. The bitterness of that realisation had been undeniable, but she'd truly thought that she'd put it behind her. That she had at least robbed it of its capacity to hurt. A naive thought, she understands now. How can one ever truly feel nothing about failing the single most important test in a Dynast's life, when reminded of it so bluntly? She returns her mother's smile, bowing again. "You honour me."
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I need to write a structural analysis about why when a dynastic mom is trying to be nice to her daughter, she still ends up hurting her.

Anyway...

[X] V'neef L'nessa / Haven't seen what she's been up to in a bit.

Also, the legions haven't been broken up yet right? I forgot how that went down exactly.
 
Yesman said:
Also, the legions haven't been broken up yet right? I forgot how that went down exactly.
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The short version is that I laid out a rough timeline of events a while back.

The longer answer is like, for this quest, I generally try to stick pretty closely to 3e canon with appropriate expansions where they make sense, barring some very minor changes, most of which aren't deliberate.

The main exception to this is that some of the timeline stuff regarding the Realm following the disappearance of the Empress is a bit of a contradictory mess between the Corebook, What Fire Has Wrought, and the Realm. The early books in the line had a famously troubled development cycle, and while WFHW has less serious problems than some of the ones before it, it was still in that territory. Basically like, the breakup of the legions is improbably described as happening literally months after the Empress disappeared, and before the actual Fall of House Tepet. This doesn't make sense for a few reasons, but the big ones are like... No one among the Great Houses actually wanted to make that kind of a move against the Imperial Legions without being sure that the Empress wasn't going to show back up first, until it turned into a matter of taking drastic action before the Crown Marshals did. And the other Great Houses were hardly going to treat Tepet the way they did in the distribution of the Imperial Legions if they weren't already broken as a military power.

In trying to unfuck this a bit, I ended up shifting several events forward a year, which is a decision I might not have made again if I could go back and revisit it, but as long as things are internally consistent and I'm not drastically changing the general arc of the Realm leading up to 768, I'm okay with that. Regardless, it's currently late in 764, the Empress has been gone for most of a year, and this stuff is all flagged for 765:

Gazetteer said:
RY 765: Ambraea is due to graduate this year. The Tepet Legions are almost completely destroyed, the Council of the Empty Throne occurs, the Imperial Legions are divided up amongst the Great Houses.
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Randino Treviani said:
A factor you should probably consider is the marriage alliance. At this point our connections between Ambraea and house V'neef and house Sesus are about even with our aid to that wyld hunt. More likely than not we aren't going to double down and marry into the house we further by picking there member this year, which implies that we'll be marrying into the house we don't pick now, unless we do something rash and marry into Tepet just to spite the realm and absorb their members into our new great house a few decades down.
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Dear sister V'neef may have a leg up in that particular race if she feels like running it, having the husband an all.

I didn't quite get what you meant just before that bit, are you saying that this talking choice decides the marriage or...?
There is also the connotation for what someone might say to L'nessa and Amiti and how they might wiffer and who might be doing the saying.

For the Who it's safe to assume a Peleps or Mnemon when it comes to L'nessa, while Idelle comes to mind for Amiti.

As for what, that's a bit harder.
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Hmmmm Amiti will probably get straight up bullied, having aspersions cast on her house and her Necromancy and her association with us. Tho I guess that's more of a "how" it's said than "what" is said.

L'nessa... my guess is something about how her house is a carrion bird or betting on losing horses or something. Like I said up there, V'neef's main alliance at this moment is Tepet, whose legions are currently being broken in the North by order of the Empress. This aligns with our similar situation of suddenly losing status with the Empress gone, and can be projected on L'nessa personally due to her twofer friendship with us and Sola. That's just a guess tho.
The last important factor is their focuses. Sorcery is more passion for Amiti and more Utility for L'nessa. The reverse is true for politics. That'll be a big factor in this chapter. Amiti will be more Sorcery focused, even if as their graduating year it's sure to be a focus regardless, while L'nessa will add political nuances, which will be a factor regardless based on the tone of the vote description.
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Tbf this seems to be a purely political/social decision point, so I doubt it will have impact in our Sorcery progress.

On that note I think I'll go for

[X] V'neef L'nessa

Because of the more bitchy intriguey angle she provides and because I also want her reaction on adding Sola to the Hearth!

That being said don't think I am neglexting the Sorcery aspect. We still need more danger noodles, people!
 
VagueZ said:
Is it wrong that I want to see more Vahelo content in future?
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Potato Anarchy said:
I really thought for a second in the update she was going to get copied by a Lunar, which was sad (because Vahelo dies and/or only appears on screen as someone else's vtube persona) but also amazing (because a Lunar posing as Vahelo promises incredible content, and more "Vahelo").
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Vahelo sounds like a candidate for a celestial exaltation. Extremly competent mortal dynast or gens scion exalting late as solar or lunar is always an interesting plot hook because drama.

[X] Sesus Amiti
 
HBInquirer said:
I didn't quite get what you meant just before that bit, are you saying that this talking choice decides the marriage or...?
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I'm saying taking either V'neef or Sesus character now makes it unlikely we'll pick that house for betrothal, since we likely have a strong relationship with them from this pick, and are more interested in strengthening our relationship with a different house.
 
Randino Treviani said:
I'm saying taking either V'neef or Sesus character now makes it unlikely we'll pick that house for betrothal, since we likely have a strong relationship with them from this pick, and are more interested in strengthening our relationship with a different house.
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Ah got it! Hmmm I'd hope we still get the grand tour after graduation as a buffer to establish greater ties but it's true the situation is really fraught

Bohnenpflanzer said:
Vahelo sounds like a candidate for a celestial exaltation. Extremly competent mortal dynast or gens scion exalting late as solar or lunar is always an interesting plot hook because drama.
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Ah yes that reminds me
Vahelo is old enough now that the last thin, feeble ray of hope have been extinguished for years. She'd reconciled herself to living and dying as a mortal woman by the time she'd turned eighteen, and turned her attention fully to the lesser ways she might prove herself and honour her family's name. The bitterness of that realisation had been undeniable, but she'd truly thought that she'd put it behind her. That she had at least robbed it of its capacity to hurt. A naive thought, she understands now. How can one ever truly feel nothing about failing the single most important test in a Dynast's life, when reminded of it so bluntly?
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Nooo don't Exalt as an Infernal your so sexy aha
 
Bohnenpflanzer said:
Vahelo sounds like a candidate for a celestial exaltation. Extremly competent mortal dynast or gens scion exalting late as solar or lunar is always an interesting plot hook because drama.
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Oh. Oh that's mean. Gazetteer would be willing to do something like that, and it could lead to a fun "Ambraea has to chose whether to kill her former girltoy for reasons that are completely not said girl's fault" decision point.

It's doubly mean because Vahelo's first big success was as part of a Wyld Hunt, her seeing the same type of Hunt coming after her is great.
 
[X] V'neef L'nessa

I CAUGHT UP (ﾉ◕ヮ◕)ﾉ*:･ﾟ✧
 
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