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Beelzebub Quest [Yet Another Worm/Exalted Quest]

[X] Talk to Khepri - Unwoven Coadjutors are a wellspring of useful info.
[X] Cecelyne Excellencies - Evil Genie Charms FTW!

Also, she should sacrifice Mind Hand Manipulation for Counter-Conceptual Interposition. Cause some attacks can't be dodged even with Sands Through Fingers Defence, even without exploiting the Imperfection of the Endless Desert.
 
Finagle007 said:
Also, she should sacrifice Mind Hand Manipulation for Counter-Conceptual Interposition. Cause some attacks can't be dodged even with Sands Through Fingers Defence, even without exploiting the Imperfection of the Endless Desert.
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Without Mind Hand Manipulation we have no exalted based offensive abilities. Also without mind hand manipulation we wont have access to our Parry DV of 8, nor the 0 mote (not counting the committed ones) 15 dice ranged attack. It also lets us get any raw material we want for only 1 more charm purchase. For contest a peak human would have a Parry DV of around that when you factor in high end weaponry to parry with. That is before excellencies, stunts or virtue channels with them we can pretty much parry anything thrown at us by the vast majority of foes.

Getting a second perfect defense at the cost of all that is a really unwise decision. Especially since attacks that can hit the immaterial aren't likely to be common in worm as immaterial threats aren't common, and people that have attacks like that won't know to use them against us as turning to sand wouldn't look like the appropriate situation to bring those out. (Sophia and that E88 cape are the only ones I can think of and Sophia has an electricity weakness)

Perfect defenses are cool and it is good to have one but they cost an obscene amounts of motes. If you have them as your primary defense then you will be mote tapped in a couple seconds and killed quickly. They are best used as a means of evading attacks that can't be survived in any other manner. Your DV, scene long charms, and penalty negators should be your plan A defenses.



@GM How did you calculate Taylors dodge DV? My math says she should only have a Dodge DV of 4. (dexterity+dodge+essence)/2=(4+0+3)=3.5 round up=4
 
Finagle007 said:
Also, she should sacrifice Mind Hand Manipulation for Counter-Conceptual Interposition. Cause some attacks can't be dodged even with Sands Through Fingers Defence, even without exploiting the Imperfection of the Endless Desert.
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Swapping Cecelyne's PD and SWLIHN's PD would be possible, although the latter has its own imperfection to deal with. Losing MHM would cost us our only offensive option, unless you want to swap Occult 5 for Firearms 5 and spend 3 background points on a Grand Shellcaster or something. That would be awesome in its own way, but I'm pretty sure it's not happening. Maybe if the cultists got a really nice care package for us...

cyberswordsmen said:
Perfect defenses are cool and it is good to have one but they cost an obscene amounts of motes. If you have them as your primary defense then you will be mote tapped in a couple seconds and killed quickly. They are best used as a means of evading attacks that can't be survived in any other manner. Your DV, scene long charms, and penalty negators should be your plan A defenses.
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A couple of minutes would be more accurate, at least once we get an upgrade like Soul-Sieve Transmutation. I'm pretty sure we're not using the full 2.5 rules for them. At least, I hope not. As an Infernal who doesn't favor Malfeas or Adorjan, we'd be pretty screwed. A high DV and scene long charms are really good for most situations, though. Using a PD against gangsters would be both wasteful and boring.

Nervaqus987 said:
We just need to worry about people with Essence 5+ taking a shot at us.
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On SB the GM said that Endbringers would trigger the flaw of invulnerability. Certain high end capes might pose a problem, so let's try not to piss them off. There are also a few capes that can damage incorporeal things to worry about.
 
[X] Talk to Khepri - Unwoven Coadjutors are a wellspring of useful info.
[X]She Who Lives In Her Name Excellencies- Makes you better at doing things when you do them precision and only the exactly right amount of force needed.

Cecelyn's excellency is MUCH more restricted in applications when dealing with the unexpected or crisis situations. Excellencies are the best counter to nasty surprises, and having one that works only when things are going just as planned is enormously limiting.
 
Zion automatically bypasses Cecelyne's PD, even if the user is Essence 10, due to his multidimensional nature. SWLIHN's PD does not have that weakness. I would suggest Ebon Dragons' PD since nobody in Earth Bet uses Holy attacks, but it comes with other issues.
 
Finagle007 said:
Zion automatically bypasses Cecelyne's PD, even if the user is Essence 10, due to his multidimensional nature. SWLIHN's PD does not have that weakness. I would suggest Ebon Dragons' PD since nobody in Earth Bet uses Holy attacks, but it comes with other issues.
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I don't know, TED's PD is hugely useful in a setting without Holy, being both a PD and a flurry breaker all in one.

Plus, it's only two Charms deep and its prereq is Cracked Cell Circumvention, which is also hugely useful.
 
Nervaqus987 said:
I don't know, TED's PD is hugely useful in a setting without Holy, being both a PD and a flurry breaker all in one.

Plus, it's only two Charms deep and its prereq is Cracked Cell Circumvention, which is also hugely useful.
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True. Also, CCC sets you up for the Heretical Scale-Shedding Solution... Go for it!!
 
Finagle007 said:
True. Also, CCC sets you up for the Heretical Scale-Shedding Solution... Go for it!!
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Eh....

Scale-Shedding is honestly pretty useless outside of a very few edge cases.*

All it does is provide a quick removal for armor for a scene. It's not even useful as a way to store armor since it's Obvious.**


*Which are A)your armor is fucked with and you need out of it in a hurry or B)you're a Martial Artist wearing incompatible armor***
**Black flames hovering over your shoulders.
***In which case, why are you wearing that armor?
 
The lack of convenient Elsewhere storage always was something I didn't like about Infernals.
 
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[X]Talk to Neon Girl
[X]Talk to Khepri

[X]Cecelyne Excellencies (Character Sheet will be updated when I get around to it)

A Massachusetts Exalted in the Black Jade Emperor's Court 3

Parties weren't really your thing. Even before the betrayal you mostly just followed Emma's lead, and ever since parties just meant an opportunity to try and suck up to the Trio by snubbing you or suck up to them even more by turning the entire thing into a conga line of humiliation and trauma.

While the cult leader starts making his rounds among the cultists you find a nice stretch of wall to lean up against. It gave you a clear view of the rest of the room, especially the stairs with their bandaged guard, would allow you to easily spot anyone approaching you, and the nearby curtains on the wall could be ripped off and used as a distraction in case of a battle. Furthermore, you could- Whoa, whoa! Wait! Since when have you been THIS paranoid?

"Hmm… Points for style, but I would've used Blood instead of that Pink," Khepri offhandedly comments while watching laser light show that the girl you saw earlier was making. You have to admit she was pretty damn good. Neon light flows like liquid out of her hands to paint a moving picture of epic, mythic heroes being betrayed by their traitorous sidekicks and two of their own that the sidekicks managed to corrupt. At least… that's what you think it's about. The subtitles were all in that odd pictogram language of theirs.

Still! You had more important things to worry about than movie night at the cultist's! Like a certain giant spider who has some 'splaining to do…

"Khepri…." You growl under your breath. It was weird to be talking to yourself, but at least no one was close enough to hear. You keep catching the cultists casting looks in your direction, but all of them seemed to be keeping a "respectful" distance. Heh, maybe they just didn't want to get irradiated by your own personal bonfire? Though on that note you were glad to see that it had receded from bonfire level to desk side lamp. Trying to maintain a secret identity would suck if you glowed all the time. Wait, wait, you're getting off track. You shake off those thoughts and say, "Where the hell are you and why can I hear you in my head?"

"Hm? What do you mean? I'm right here of course," She says, her mental voice sounding distracted.

You keep one eye on the crowd. There looked to be about two dozen cultists all told including the cult leader and the guard. Most of them wore what looked to be the standard cultist robe, a black under robe worn under what could only describe as a sleeveless brown robe open at the front and a green mantle and hood. Interestingly, you notice that neon girl seemed to have modified her robe into a belly shirt and skirt combo. A high ranker or… is she just like that?

"And where is here?" You ask.

"Why right up here, Darling! In your head. It is quite strange, I must admit. However do you get along with only four limbs?"

Well, you suppose that explained the whole telepathy thing, still resting your head in your hand you have to ask, "Right. Ok. Are there any other surprises I should be aware of?

"Hmmmmm…." Khepri says musing it over, "Well the only thing I can think of is that you'll probably get an invitation to hell in the next couple of weeks."

"What." You sa- Ok, no, wait, wait, just... what? Sure you figured something hinky was going on when a bunch of freakin' cultists started worshiping, but seriously? Hell? What the… You're not going to finish that thought, "Erm…. I'm agnostic."

"Oh…. You poor, poor deluded dear. Well I'm sure you'll grow out of it," Khepri simply sighs.

"Look. You said that the world was broken, right? That I could fix it? The thing is, I can't do that!" You explain gesturing to yourself, "Not if I keep getting surprised like today! Or when you did- whatever it was that you did! And that vision! So you are going to explain everything from the beginning right now, or I'll walk straight out of here and turn myself over to the PRT, understand?"

"...Everything? Khepri asks.

"Every. Thing."

"In the beginning there was the Wyld, formless and chaotic…."

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

"... and ok, I admit, maybe I -shouldn't- have told that joke about She Who Lives In Her Name and the pig at the mixer, but She must sure have liked it! Why else would she have chosen me for the honor of taking an Exaltation out into the worlds beyond Creation?"

"Maybe… she just wanted to get rid of you," You say, mentally adding, 'and foist you off on me,'

Still, it helped to explain some things, the Calibration event, and how Motic Energy didn't even exist before ten years ago. but to think that an entirely different world, not even another earth, but an entirely different universe! could just punch a hole through to our world?

You're so busy trying to wrap your head around the sheer ramifications of that you don't notice the footsteps walking up to you, "Heeeeeeeeeeey! Um… Are you ok?"

"Eh? Um, yeah… yeah… Sorry, I just have a lot to try and take in." You say shaking the cobwebs out of your head. It was the neon girl you noticed earlier. She looked about the same age as you, but you didn't recognize her so she probably didn't go to Winslow. It would've been hard not to notice her if she did between her short cut hair dyed into a riotous neon rainbow and a body that promised lower back problems in the future.

She sits rocking back and forth on her heels, looking at you with a smile just short of being creepy. When you say you're ok she does a little hop and chirps, "Yay! Ehehehehe, my name is Jenny Smith, though my stage name is Glimmer, and can I just say that we're all so glad you're finally here! We've all been waiting for this day for um…. well, actually it's only been about three months. Sorry, your holiness, we're still pretty new, but now that you're here will kick all those baddy E88 and ABB mooks out of town and then invite everyone to one big party! Glory to Malfeas! Glory to the Green Sun Princess!"

"Erm…. Yeah… Ok…" You say taking a step back from the overly energetic cultist when something occurs to you, "What exactly was "Foretold" about my coming, anyways?"

"OhmyMalfeas, that's right! She Who Lives In Her Name sent you, right? Um…. well, she's cool too, but you know Malfeas is just so… Mmmmm….." She purrs staring off into space. Part of you wonders how exactly she could find a City hunky, but the rest of you violently squashes that thought before your magic has a chance to provide you with the answer. Eventually though she shakes off the daydream and continues, "Anyways, we were told that a messenger bearing the Light of Lieger would appear. It would know who would be most worthy of holding the Light even if they did not know themselves. They would be reborn, blessed by She Who Lives In Her Name who forges Order out of Chaos, and they would speak with the voice of Cecelyne, mother of Law. It was our duty to bow before them, to render any assistance that they may ask of, or even to stand aside if that is was they demanded. Hehe, you know, Ed thought it was all a bunch of hogwash, but then one day Jimmy summoned an Anuhles and before he even had a chance to bind it, it dematerialized and sped off! You should've heard him cuuuuuuurse. Anyways, that was how we knew the day was at hand and now here you are!"

"I see…" You say thinking. That was honestly a lot of freedom those… "Yozi" were giving you. Technically that meant you should be able to just walk out of here if you wanted to. Why have the cultists go to the trouble of stealing your co- your Chrysalis Grottesque (seriously, they need a better PR team down below) in the first place anyways? Was it a gift? "Here, have this shiny new cult! Oh, and if we wanted to we could've had them destroy your house, kill your dad, and all sorts of fun stuff instead, so yeah!" Maybe if you-

"Oh, by the way I just looooooooove that whole eye thing you got going on there. It's so cool! Can you see out of it?" Jenny says.

"Eye thing? What eye thing! What's wrong with my eyes!" You say swatting at your face to try and find the eye thing.

"Here, Look." Jenny says snapping open a compact and handing it to you.

You notice the "eye thing" Jenny was talking about right away. On your forehead you had what looked like a third eye burning with colorless flame. According to Khepri's story that was evidently your "caste mark." The glow around you had died out sometime around the time that Khepri had started describing pattern weavers as "elitist snobs who think they're soooooo much better than everyone else," so the eye was the only visible sign of your Motic powers you currently have. You couldn't see through it, however the same instinct that allowed you to shape your shadow into an azure robe tells you that you could if you tried hard enough. With some experimentation you learn that yes, you can cause the flame burning in the eye to move around like a pupil. Ok, that was pretty fun, however you notice something else under your actual eyes.

There were three three small dots underneath each eye. They looked like tiny pearls embedded in your skin each of which was exact same shade of ruby red of your eyes. (Never mind the fact that your eyes used to be brown.) Most people would just think it was some form of exotic jewelry. You recognize spider eyes when you see them though, in particular the eyes of a certain spider currently bumming around in your head, "Kheeeeeeeeeepriiiiiiiii…"

"Hmph, well if you ask me, I think they suit you."

Jenny leads She talks with him, but you only catch her side of the conversation. He never speaks above a whisper. Evidently this was the "Jimmy" that had summoned Khepri, and evidently he was a high ranker in the cult. He wore the standard robes of a cultist but were tattered and smelled like… blood and wet dog? Everywhere that the robes didn't cover was wrapped up in white bandages decorated with even more of the pictograms they use. Just judging by the tight and drawn skin around his eyes as he glares at you, you can only imagine what kind of burns could cover his body to require all those bandages. Eventually though, he relents and lets you go up.

You actually recognize the store. You mom used to buy donuts here before the global recession caused by the Endbringers forced it to close down. You always remember being scared by the giant smiling donut painted on the walls as a kid. Now it was just a faded relic of the past, staring out with those creepy, horrible eyes at the empty bakery.

There's a restroom in the back. Jenny leads you there and then waits outside while you let your shadow robes dissolve in order to see what -other- changes your time in the Cryshallis might have wrought.

It was… Ok then! You weren't at super model level or anything like that, but you could be one of the "pretty girls" at school now. The first thing you notice is your hair. It was the colored of polished obsidian and fell in a single smooth sheet down to the small of your back. A twinge of regret shoots through you at the sight. Between the dilapidated bakery and now your new hair it was like little bits of your Mom were falling away one after another.

You take a deep breath and force yourself to keep looking. The wide, frog like mouth you inherited from your dad was now small and "petite," and you'll never again be confused for a twelve year old boy. It even looks like you're a bit taller now. Maybe 6 feet give or take a half inch? Even the extra eyes only add to the effect, given you an air of exoticism. The entire effect added up to just...

"Darling? Are you ok down there darling? You've been staring at your reflection for fifteen minutes, I think the party's starting to break up," Khepri says breaking you out of your trance. Right! Ok then, instant face lift; that's a point in favor of selling your soul to Eldritch Abominations from another dimension, however it also made keeping all this secret from your Dad next to impossible.

Unless…. Maybe….

You reach out with your mind, following your instincts to once again shape your shadow around you. When it collapses down on the ground there stands regular old curly hair, bespectacled, Taylor Herbert dressed in an azure sweater and grey skirt. Even your caste mark had faded to the point that you could only see it if you looked at just the right angle. You keep the extra height though… Just because.

"Ah, um… Sorry I took so long?" You sheepishly say leaving the bathroom.

"Oh wow! If you can do all that in 15 minutes then take all the time you need! How'd you get your hair to curl like that," Jenny asks, bouncing over to investigate your disguise,

"Er… Powers?" You answer taking a step back. Casting your eyes about you spot the cultists climbing up from the basement and folding their robes up in a box before leaving the bakery. The cult leader says goodbye to each as they leave finishing by talking quietly with the guard for a few minutes before the latter stalks out of the door, "So, the party's done?"

"Yuppers! These shindigs are fun, but you know how it is; things to do, bills to pay, and all that rot. OH CRAP! That reminds me! I'm late for work! It was super fun meeting you Glassy! Here's my number, call me if you want to hang out!" Jenny exclaims, shoving a piece of paper in her hand before tearing out of the bakery.

The cult leader watches her go for a bit before turning to you and lowering his hood. Your eyes widen as the handsome, chiseled face of ADAM LEE, OF ACTION 9 NEWS! looks back at you.

"Hey there, we never had a chance to be properly introduced, I'm ADAM LEE, OF ACTION 9 NEWS! Though I go by Jade Lion when in costume," He says offering a hand.

"I suppose there's no point in trying to keep my identity secret since you already know where I live," You say taking his hand. His grip is firm just to the point of being shy of painful and he nearly shakes your arm off with the greeting, "Taylor Herbert,"

"Look, you all seem like nice enough people," You say, leaving off 'for cultists,' "However, I'm not really interested in your religion. All I want to do is to try and make the world a better place. I won't tell anyone about your… cult, but I have no intention of being some sort of messiah."

"Ahahahaha! That's fine, that's fine. Honestly I wouldn't be here either if it wasn't the family business," He says taking you completely by surprise while clapping you on the back and gently steering you to the the door, "But hey, if you reconsider we do a lot of good here. We give hope to people and a place to belong that's not with the gangs. Jenny's always got her ears to the ground so we always know where things are going down, and James is a jerk, but I can strong arm 'im into showing you a trick or two. Anyways, it was nice meeting you Taylor, sorry about the whole kidnapping thing, but we couldn't let the PRT lock you up in some sort of laboratory, ya know? Our door's always open if you change your mind!"

With that you step into the crisp February air. The mid morning sun shines brightly down on you. What do you do?

[]Head home, your dad has to be worried sick about you.

[]TO THE LIBRARY! You need to catch up on everything you missed while cocooned.

[]Head to School. Your education is important to you (and your dad.) Plus, you have a few… surprises ready for the trio.

[]Head to the Boat Graveyard. So you've got shiny new powers now. Time to try them out! FOR SCIENCE!!! (Also because it's fun)

[]Bum around the Boardwalk relaxing after the stress of everything you've gone through. (Random Social Encounter.)

[]Patrol. You're a Super…. Er, something, it's expected that you go around looking for trouble. (Random Cape Encounter)

[]Write In
 
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[X]Head to the Boat Graveyard. So you've got shiny new powers now. Time to try them out! FOR SCIENCE!!! (Also because it's fun)
 
Reposting my vote from SB:

[X]Head home, your dad has to be worried sick about you.
--[X] You have no money or transport, no telephone or identification. Thankfully, three months of training prepared you for this kind of situation. You take off running, ducking into alleys and avoiding public places as you navigate your way home, relying on both your training and ingained familiarity with the environment, developed over the course of your life and carefully nurtured in the last year of getting ready to be a hero. You are going to get home, and give your father thre greatest gift he would wish to get right now - yourself, free and safe. Hopefully he'll be happy enough to let you talk him into not calling PRT.
 
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