[] Stick close to Madrigal, as the only Raith in the conspiracy it would be particularly problematic if he were to escape
Lara asked us to start with him and we did sort of throw a minor headache her way tonight, so I'm inclined to grant that request and kill him first.
@DragonParadox just to confirm, do whamps count for MiM? I figure they probably don't because they're too human, but wanted to get clarification to avoid confusion. Also, while I have your attention, are the locked doors and armed guards enough for CCC or are we too close to being on their side for that?
Going with the assumption that what we have is all we're going to get, we should activate what scene long stuff we can with willpower in advance. MHM won't be as strong, but we can't turn on our obvious buffs like Steel Skin and VLE before the first round so we're going to have to deal with the spending bottleneck.
… Actually now that think about it, how many people are actually watching us right now?
It might be too risky, but just to put it out there for consideration; what if we slink off with Lydia and use CSR to return in her drink? Then we can activate whatever charm we like as long as it doesn't flare our anima too soon.
Supposing we don't do that, I think we should start by flipping on IPM with willpower, then Occult Excellency + MHM + ATB with essence during the speech because they're not obvious till we use them.
Which is a lot of essence, but doing it that way brings us right to the line so we'll flare and get RR for free on the first round.
Then once the signal hits and combat starts we immediately trigger VLE followed by steel skin. The order is important because the former is reflexive and the later a moment of concentration, so our protection will kick in sooner within the turn.
That leaves us with 1 mote to play with inside the bottleneck. Personally since we already should have MHM going strong I'd favor just smashing Madrigal with it and going in for the kill without another excellency, but I can see the argument for using it just to be safe.
Results:
Turn 0:
Motes: 15 -> 12
Willpower: 8 -> 7
Active Buffs: Immune to mind magic, telekinesis at maximum strength, +3 dice to initiative, -3 difficulty to perception.
Turn 1:
Motes: 12 -> 10
Willpower: 7 -> 7
Active Buffs: Immune to mind magic, telekinesis at maximum strength, +3 dice to initiative, -3 difficulty to perception, soak in the 17 dice at dc 4 range. Flight, TA, possibly melee excellency.
I also really want BSM, but I don't want to give an obvious hint to anyone.
I think the solution is to deliberately get messy with the first close quarters kill we make. Cut some arteries and make sure we get in the splash. We've bisected people before, maybe we could pull some horror movie shenanigans and step through someone as we spit them in half?
For Lydia it's simpler. Her only relevant scene long buff is FHE, since her mental defenses are target limited. So she should pop that, then excellency + HB the first round.
Her spirit killer explicitly slurps up vamps, so she should break out the feeding funnel and go on a binge as soon as possible, mowing down adds to get essence so she can spam excellency and Agg blasts at anyone in range.
Ideally the whamps won't be able to look at Lydia without remembering that her preferred unit of measure for vampires is "Golden Corral load" after this is done.
Honestly, Should we just buy an Apartment Complex? near the Station, (maybe link the two physically or magically?), create a Guardian Spirit for the place to compensate for the low Threshold levels, lock the rent prices to for low income renters and give the option to our vassals, cult, gang, minions Buddies to live there.
Better a urban commune than a suburban one, imo.
Feels like something Molly would prefer, being around people, I mean? Ya know, Building Communities. Ruling Them With An Iron Fist
Resources 4 isn't enough for that. We need 5 or better to start buying that sort of thing.
