Green Flame Rising (Exalted vs Dresden Files)
- Thread starter DragonParadox
- Start date
- Crossover Fantasy
It seems pretty clear to me that the intent of the majority was to go for all three.
- Location
- washington
That seems damn near impossible after all they only happen every 666 years and I'm fairly no one other than rashid is that old.
I believe I provided reasonable counter-measures and examples for each of the scenarios you mentioned, but they haven't convinced you. I don't actually expect to convince you, or much of anyone else.
We are starting from a much, much better position than original generation of exalted, during the Age of Legends, or during thr Age of Sorrows.
As reasonable people, in a society of their peers, with support from forces of heaven, they'll either reach a reasonable compromise, or agree to disagree amicably, if that's possible, or try both ideas if that's possible to figure out which works best, or face the censure of their peers, and elders. I'll expand on this later.
Every full wizard is capable of summoning outsiders, rapidly raising armies of brainwashed slaves, including magic using slaves, raising armies of undead, in theory breaking time itself. The magic is inherently self-reinforcing and corrupting if used for evil.
Warlocks are a fact of life. You are underestimating them.
fictionfan
Please sir, may I have some Meows?
- Location
- Tempe, AZ
Really that seems like a bigger curse in many ways then the great curse was. Only difference being that the wizards know about it and are therefor able to compensate for it well the exalted didn't know about the great curse.
Last edited:
- Location
- washington
In fairness there's no curse that guarantees one used said things and butchers as much said not everything is equally corrupting it's just white council doesn't take risks.
Oh sure, their source of power is internal.
Learning to manipulate it, on the other hand? Humans cant innately manipulate their own life energy. Is that something any human can learn, or was it a blessing passed down covertly from some spirit or other agent so that its inheritable from Master to Apprentice?I dont know how that works in this AU.
There's precedent for this in World of Darkness; Hunters would suddenly awaken out of the blue due to an alleged blessing from angels.
The Neverborn in Exalted were explicitly part of Creation; they were buried in Creation's Underworld, and connected to Creation's handling system for the dead.
Being dead did not stop them manipulating the Abyssals or ordering the Deathlords around.
The Neverborn in World of Darkness share the same name but arent the same thing.
They also slumbered in the Underworld.
Being dead didnt stop them manipulating and influencing Spectres and Nephandi; didnt stop them waging a war, even.
We dont know the status of the Neverborn in this universe. Or what they are, even.
But based on what we know of their namesakes, and their activity in this universe, I am willing to wager that they are inside the Outer Gates in this universe. Also in the Underworld.
The Abyssals still bear their original programming, up to and including deleting the names of the people they choose.
Only in this setting, they will literally murder people; if they find a candidate they want but he's healthy, they'll possess a dead body, murder him and then offer him Exaltation on the brink of death.
Dont make the mistake that an absence of external coercion means that none exists.
If Ligier The Green Sun or the Viator of Nullspace were walking around in this setting?
I'd be a lot more worried about their capability to kick down the Outer Gates and come in at the head of their armies; I am not sure we'd be able to do anything to stop them.
Im not worried about their sneaking in the back door.
And frankly, both of them know a lot more Ancient Sorcery than we do; they'd not need to wait for someone else to cast Calibration Gate for them.
I dont know. Insufficient data.
Im not afraid to admit it.
We know the Salinan Working doesnt currently exist because we had to buy the Brigid's Heir Merit to buy ancient sorcery spells midgame, which is literally what the Salinan Working was invented to make unnecessary.
The Salinan Working applied to a different Creation ages ago.
One where the sky was a solid surface, the earth was flat, the sun was a cosmic warmachine and the moon hosted a magical fortress.One where an Exalt passively recharged more Essence every hour than we could do each day when the quest started.
The literal physical and magical laws were different.
Even Ancient Sorcery is different in this Age; there's only one tier, when Creation-era Sorcery was three separate tiers of power and complexity.
You are making wild jumps of logic based on scanty data. IMO.
They havent done so yet, have they?
How much of their potentially developing it is literally the White God sponsoring it, or Molly's Exaltation?
There really isnt enough data available.
I dont see how you could possibly make that assertion.
Soulfire, described as the fires of creation in this setting, requires wizardry to wield.
I fail to see how Ancient Sorcery is going to be any less here.
Not particularly.
Sapphire Circle Exorcism takes an hour and a ton of power. It does not help when you are facing off against a superior opponent. I dont see any particular utility in Dresden's toolkit, not enough to balance the risks.
Not to mention that you are forgetting that magic required metaphysical weight.
Mortals and Dragonblooded and some spirits had access to Terrestrial Circle/Emerald Circle Sorcery.
Lunars and other Celestial Exalts had access to Celestial Circle/Sapphire Circle Sorcery, along with some very high tier spirits.
Only Solars and the Celestines(and some akuma of the Yozi) had access to Solar Circle/Adamant Circle Sorcery.
If we were operating along the old laws of Ancient Sorcery, Sapphire Circle Exorcism would only be available to Molly, as the only Celestial-plus Exalt here. Maybe any Lunars or Sidereals.
Certainly not a mortal like Harry.
Last edited:
It was taught by spirits to Yi the Excellent Archer and yes technically any human can learn it, though practically speaking most would not pass the grueling mental and physical trials needed to manipulate one's chi.
The neverborn are outsiders We learned this when we did the ritual for Lydia, the creator deity Behind the black Court it was labeled an outsider and it was a neverborn. So that means oblivion is outside of modern creation, which makes it abbysals would have to reach out towards them So they can try to wage their endless war. All they want, it doesn't actually change the calculus if the abyssal of exaltations Are on this side of the gates. Then the modern abbysals probably wouldn't even lose their name. They would just be exalted as a abbysals. Without montrances, they have no reason to ever go back to oblivion. All the mortals are here and there is no cabinet or anything to contain them. So they would just exult another abbysal.
Edit: It wouldn't Surprise me to see Odin turn up with his own chosen of the slain.
Edit: It wouldn't Surprise me to see Odin turn up with his own chosen of the slain.
Last edited:
1) We know that Great Old Ones cannot just pass the Outer Gates despite being more powerful than normal Outsiders. We know that walkers had to sneak in somehow. It's possible that the Gates have a perfect defense effect that cannot be broken from outside. CCG has no such limitation.
No? If books with the lore exist, I don't think Salinan working would trigger to spread the knowledge. If we didn't buy Brigid's heir, we would have had to find the books / cave drawings / ancient spirits who knew this magic (you don't need to be able to use it in order to be able to teach it). The basic assumption of ExvsWoD and I assume this setting is that such sources exists.
We have WoG why they haven't developed it yet - because they only interacted with Molly for a couple of months. They didn't have time yet.
Soulfire, an opposite of hellfire, is a linear path magic, which is covered by a separate feat from being able to use Ancient Sorcery. This is perfectly logical on both narrative and mechanical level.
Ah.
So someone taught them how to manipulate life energies.
Mysterious ways in full effect.
Thank you for the clarification.
Thats not true.
*checks again*
No thats not true. Your very basic premises are wrong. Perfect Principle of Consumption was not an Outsider, and the ritual that invoked it was mortal death;
n for a penny in for a pound. For some reason Usum seems to find the expression very amusing, but you cannot pay attention to that now. A thousand eyes whirl and dance around you, they cannot see they cannot know, they cannot peer within. Their light sharpens without brightening, it pierces without illuminating and in the darkness beyond darkness something painfully new bears witness to something infinitely old in malice.
I have to... oh fuck.
Lost 1 Essence
The rationalization comes a moment later. It's not like they are using it anymore and their souls are at peace anyway.
"This is a ritual of consumption right. I think I can do something to help, to mark the boundaries and sharpen the divide..." Deep breath Molly, you decided to do this, this.
Harry is looking at you funny, pretty soon he might be looking at you another way.
You jump back into the submarine and with a thought spin a strange sort of tool from the depths of your anima, one never meant for any mundane purpose. At first glance it looks like some combination of vacuum cleaner and grotesque syringe, humming under your hand. Gingerly you set it onto the bloody floor, the sheets, there is a lot of blood in here, blood spilled in malice and surrendered in agony, blood already spent to empower mortal necromancy. For most magicians it would be of no real worth, but there is power in absence, in lack, in want... in void.
Lost 1 Essence
Distantly you remember something from a documentary you watched a few years ago, it was a physics thing, zero point energy, power from literal empty space that would supposedly be even more powerful than the nuclear furnace at the heart of stars.
The universe is vast beyond human understanding and it is mostly empty be it the great voids of intergalactic space where single atoms of hydrogen can travel light years without touching another spec of mater or the secret spaces inside matter itself, each atom only a spec of mass at its core and a cloud of electrons offering the illusion of physicality as they brush against each others.
Words come to you, old and terrible words clawing at the edges of your mind yet bound in a net of adamantine will. The pumps quiet, the blood had been gathered. A little more stiffly under the weight of that which you now bear
"Where do you need this?" The words come out as a hiss between clenched teeth.
"Molly what are you doing?" Harry had gone from looking concerned to downright alarmed. Hopefully he won't think to open the sight, something tells you he really doesn't want an eyeful of what you are holding.
Deep and black runs the water of the Grave
For his part Arawn seems if not unphased than at least quick to take advantage of the opportunity. He motions to the ground where the 'stone' had been. There was still a circle there ringed in in copper pulled from the electrical wiring.
Nodding you turn on the... device, the drill now part of it now wet with blood as it hammers into the floor, pressing sign after sign, ideograms that are a uncanny melange of Egyptian, Mayan and Chinese, a cypher writ in lines of white hot flame. So lies the Perfected Principle of Consumption writ palely upon the living world.
The air tastes foul at first with the fumes of burning blood, then it grows sweet yet somehow more unnerving, the scent of graveyard flowers. Following Arawn's instructions you carve inside the circle the image of a tree with branches curving down and roots curving up, such as almost to make a circle. Among its branches and among its roots you write yet more, spells and invocations, once-prayers to a lost god. Grey mist drips into a rain light quicksilver, bright upon the tip of root and branch. The Corpsetaker who had used so many for so long now made a tool in another's working, there's a sort of justice to that, cruel though it may be.
I have to... oh fuck.
Lost 1 Essence
The rationalization comes a moment later. It's not like they are using it anymore and their souls are at peace anyway.
"This is a ritual of consumption right. I think I can do something to help, to mark the boundaries and sharpen the divide..." Deep breath Molly, you decided to do this, this.
Harry is looking at you funny, pretty soon he might be looking at you another way.
You jump back into the submarine and with a thought spin a strange sort of tool from the depths of your anima, one never meant for any mundane purpose. At first glance it looks like some combination of vacuum cleaner and grotesque syringe, humming under your hand. Gingerly you set it onto the bloody floor, the sheets, there is a lot of blood in here, blood spilled in malice and surrendered in agony, blood already spent to empower mortal necromancy. For most magicians it would be of no real worth, but there is power in absence, in lack, in want... in void.
Lost 1 Essence
Distantly you remember something from a documentary you watched a few years ago, it was a physics thing, zero point energy, power from literal empty space that would supposedly be even more powerful than the nuclear furnace at the heart of stars.
The universe is vast beyond human understanding and it is mostly empty be it the great voids of intergalactic space where single atoms of hydrogen can travel light years without touching another spec of mater or the secret spaces inside matter itself, each atom only a spec of mass at its core and a cloud of electrons offering the illusion of physicality as they brush against each others.
Words come to you, old and terrible words clawing at the edges of your mind yet bound in a net of adamantine will. The pumps quiet, the blood had been gathered. A little more stiffly under the weight of that which you now bear
"Where do you need this?" The words come out as a hiss between clenched teeth.
"Molly what are you doing?" Harry had gone from looking concerned to downright alarmed. Hopefully he won't think to open the sight, something tells you he really doesn't want an eyeful of what you are holding.
Deep and black runs the water of the Grave
For his part Arawn seems if not unphased than at least quick to take advantage of the opportunity. He motions to the ground where the 'stone' had been. There was still a circle there ringed in in copper pulled from the electrical wiring.
Nodding you turn on the... device, the drill now part of it now wet with blood as it hammers into the floor, pressing sign after sign, ideograms that are a uncanny melange of Egyptian, Mayan and Chinese, a cypher writ in lines of white hot flame. So lies the Perfected Principle of Consumption writ palely upon the living world.
The air tastes foul at first with the fumes of burning blood, then it grows sweet yet somehow more unnerving, the scent of graveyard flowers. Following Arawn's instructions you carve inside the circle the image of a tree with branches curving down and roots curving up, such as almost to make a circle. Among its branches and among its roots you write yet more, spells and invocations, once-prayers to a lost god. Grey mist drips into a rain light quicksilver, bright upon the tip of root and branch. The Corpsetaker who had used so many for so long now made a tool in another's working, there's a sort of justice to that, cruel though it may be.
Molly had actually seen and shanked lesser Outsiders by that point, well enough to tell the difference.
We straight up know that there's a connection between the Black Court of vampires and the Neverborn, yet noone prevented them expanding. If their sponsors were Outsiders, they would have survived long enough to become a Court.
Seriously, Queen Mab walked in on the aftermath of Arawn's ritual.
Do you think she'd have been courteous with us if she thought we were summoning or using Outsiders?
Or that she'd have accepted Old Man Mathews into her Court?
If this was true, the Gates would not need defenders; theyd just lock the Gates.
If this was true, the Outsiders would not be able to pin down Winter's armies during Battle Grounds by intensifying attacks at the Gates, preventing Mab from bringing some additional forces back to Chicago.
The Winter Court does not send hundreds of thousands, maybe millions of troops out to fight in front of the Gates because they enjoy watching their own people die. Neither does Summer.
If they are fighting and dying at the Gates, it suggests that its necessary.
No, thats not what the Salinan Working is.
The Salinan Working was a procedure that altered Reality to give anyone who was in Creation and could wield Essence the tutoring to learn sorcery and sorcery spells. It encoded the very knowledge in the sky and the winds and the brooks and everything about the world, so that you could lean sorcery by cloudwatching, or whatever modality you chose.
And it automatically backed up any spells that were invented, so they couldnt be forgotten.
You didnt have to go to a school, or buy books, or get anyone's approval, or even be able to read; you could learn it in the middle of the bush while illiterate. You just needed to be able to wield Essence, and to have the correct metaphysical weight for the Tier of Sorcery you were trying to learn.
If the Salinan Working existed,we wouldnt have needed to spend 3 dots on the Brigid's Heir's Merit.
We would have been able to learn spells at will as long as we had the XP.
We will see.
Soulfire is not a linear path magic.
Soulfire was canonically only available to, as far as we know, angels, Dresden and Odin.
None of whom are linear path practitioners.
Hellfire required that you had a direct hookup with Hell, and that you were a sorcerer; multiple Denarians werent good enough wizards to have access to Hellfire.
See Cassius.
Last edited:
- Location
- Germany
Soulfire can be a linear magic path, as we have seen from some insight during Odin's use of it.
That's not all it is of course.
- Location
- washington
Eh you know the gates aren't even literal gates right? Like that was just dresdens mind trying to comprehend things. As for if that was true your putting assurances over magical bullshit why is it guaranteed that because footsoldiers exist coming out of the gate that this means the old ones and such aren't far stronger? Like you don't know the rules your making assumptions with things like normal logic instead of the eldritch, divine, and beyond comprehension stuff that this is.
No. "Beings more powerful / significant/ greater than X cannot pass" =/="there's no need to defend the gates". Smaller outsiders can pass the gates. Greater ones cannot. It's a conclusion perfectly consistent with the data presented.
Even in the second age, where exalted people where running around past life memories of solar circle sorcery, and the Salinan working at full capacity people still needed to go out and find the spells and such. Brigid's Heir's Merit Surpasses what even Infernals got, and they are still the best at sorcery.
And the Salinan working only insured you had a chance of becoming a sorcerer, and of eventually find-in or rediscovering a spell. It makes no promises that you yourself will make the billion to one chance of succeeding just that you will have a chance.
- Location
- washington
I mean the idea that the gates prevent and don't allow the uber powerful outsiders out is like obvious isn't it? Otherwise whats the fucking point of the gates. I think Ujus been really underplaying how powerful the outsiders are.
Also @uju32 you never replied to my quote about outsiders being multiversal in nature in canon. Like why?
Also @uju32 you never replied to my quote about outsiders being multiversal in nature in canon. Like why?
Winning Vote
Its referred to as a Path. And also as a Power.
But it's not ever called a linear magic path.
It doesnt even use the same power sources that linear magic uses.
Yes? They are still focal defenses for reality.
And the name Outer Gates was chosen for a reason, as opposed to Outer Walls.
They open. They are designed to open. We see some of them open in Cold Days, where the sally ports are in use.
I presume there is a reason they are designed that way.
Again, the defenses have defenders for a reason.
If the footsoldiers cant threaten the defenses and the bigger guys cant approach the Gates because of a perfect effect, then the Fae would just lock them up and stay behind them and lob attacks from there.
The fact they have to go out and fight them in front of the gates suggests one or more of those assumptions are wrong.
There is no indication that any such restriction is in effect.
If the bigger guys couldnt threaten the defenses, then it would make sense for the Fae to stay behind them and throw whatever the equivalent of rocks and arrows are at the footsoldiers.
Instead they go out to fight them in front of the Gates to keep them away from the Gates, and have done so for so long that the ground is carpeted in bones.
Which suggests that no, they dont want the footsoldiers or the bigger guys near the Gates.
1) We have seen Dresden eyeball Sharkface in Cold Days.
We have hard caps for how powerful any of the Outsiders weve seen onscreen are, both explicit from Dresden and indirect from their performance onscreen. All the speculation about the power of the Elder Things behind them are just that: speculation. No evidence, not even Word of Butcher.
2)I have answered that, multiple times.
There is no indication that the Sharkface at Timeline 1 is the same person as the Sharkface at Timeline 2, even tough they are both Outsiders. Outsiders do not appear to be multiversal.
Not the way, say, Uriel is supposed to be in canon.
Arc 11 Post 11: When Knowing's Half the Battle
When Knowing's Half the Battle
4th of January 2007 A.D.
Essence Restored to Full
In the end school loses out to a meeting in a bar, not that there had ever been a question about it given the stakes but still. Daniel gives you the stink eye as you pull out of the driveway, though that may be for getting to hang out with his girlfriend when she is done up to the nines for a diplomatic mission: black suit and heels crisp white suit that says less staid business formal and more musketeer out on the town, though that is probably at least in part the steel knuckles masquerading as rings. Lash by contrast had gone with a bright red jacket with a hood and on the shirt beneath it printed in bold Gothic lettering too apropos not to have been printed with a purpose:
A mind not to be changed by place or time.
The mind is its own place, and in itself
Can make a heav'n of hell, a hell of heav'n.
The mind is its own place, and in itself
Can make a heav'n of hell, a hell of heav'n.
Mac does not seem to notice or care, he gives a kind of greeting grunt to your father and Harry and motions with the cloth he had been using to wipe glasses towards the back, a pair already seated: a man of middling years, wearing tactical gear just scuffed enough that most people would miss it and gloves missing just one finger out of ten, the trigger finger. His posture, his face, his eyes, none of them give anything away, you may as well be trying to divine the thoughts of a gargoyle perched on a church spire for all you learn of him.
The girl sitting next to him, studying the common room though a haze of steam from her chocolate, marshmallows bobbing up and down looks like she is about Amanda's age, straight blond hair curling just a little at the ends framing an olive complexion with just a bit of red in her cheeks from the Chicago winter. She gives a bright smile to Harry, perhaps noticing you all in order of height then her eyes slide from your dad to Tiffany. her expression freezes, pupils suddenly widening as the black swallows up the dark blue, a reflex of in eyes of flesh to turmoil much deeper.
"Hi," Lydia reaches out to shake the bodyguard's hand with deliberate nonchalance, to which he seems briefly bemused before shaking, a quick almost mechanical gesture.
Meanwhile an entire silent conversation takes place between the former demon and the vessel of all human writings. Cup raised in the direction of the bar, nod, raised eyebrow, finger motioning at the shirt. Finally a shrug, far too expansive and world weary for a kid that young and Lash speaks aloud. "Hey, I have to get my kicks somehow."
"Do I want to know what's going on?" Harry asks, only half in jest.
"No."/"Likely not," they answer at the same time. The Archive has a faint British Accent, not like she is from the UK, more like someone who learned English as a second language and went all out to do it 'properly'. All languages would be learned from books for her wouldn't they? There are written pronunciation guides after all.
Dad did not know for sure how long the girl before you had been invested with the purpose and the insights of the Archive, not beyond 'too young'. Tiffany on the other hand had been able to fill you in, her grandmother had died in a car crash, either a genuine accident or one staged so well even Lasciel herself could not be sure of foul play and then her mother, overwhelmed by both grief and the weight of millennia of memories had taken her own life letting that sea of knowledge crash down in her own infant daughter.
'Pythia' was often described as mad by her contemplates, not knowing if she was herself or any among hundreds of other women down though the long ages, but the child before you does not look erratic or the confused, if anything she seems filled with a dreadful clarity, her every move precise, her every word carefully calculated as she greets each of you in turn by name. But that smile lingers in the mind's eye— "Hi, my name is Molly and I guess I'm the sheriff of this pose on account of being the one to sniff out the outlaws"— and so too does the giggle that comparison drew linger in the ear.
Lost 1 Essence -> Now at 14/15 (Empathy Excellency)
"Hear that Kincaid, we're going to have to get you a ten gallon hat," the Archive glances up at her stoic companion.
"That will cost you extra," he answers without looking away from the door.
The moment's levity is soon past though, she turns to Tiffany. "How much did you tell them, how much do you even know?"
"Well that is a very tall question," she raises an eyebrow. "I am tempted to echo the tall dark and handsome over there, but in the interests of goodwill and peace on Earth...." The bodyguard, Kincaid, does not snort, but his nostrils flare which is enough for Lash to notice and correct herself. "In the interest of there being an Earth then, they know about the Enemy of Many Names, the infection and they know your purpose is not to restore human knowledge from catastrophe but instead to prevent one from which there can be no recovery."
The child's small hand tightens a little on the handle of the cup then looks at all of you left to right around the table. "Welcome to the True Venatori, your mission, should you choose to accept it, is to prevent the Fall of the Outer Gates, the Rise of the Forgotten Ones, the corruption or dissolution of all Creation. Should any of you be caught or killed and subsequently interrogated the organization will disavow any knowledge of your actions. There are no tapes and if anyone makes them that should be the first thing you burn."
Everyone briefly stares then Harry asks: "Killed then interrogated?"
"Yes," the little girl replies, without any inflection to her voice.
"What if we choose not to accept?" Lash asks, sounding like she already has a guess about the answer.
"Then you are part of the reserves," she shrugs. "There is no staying neutral in this once you know, only the question of how bad are you willing to let it get before you get involved one way or the other..."
"Some of us need to be paid for active service though," Kincaid notes. "Don't be shy if you have a price, they're good for it. I got a hell of a raise two months ago."
"Two months?" The way these two sit together, the way Kincaid pushes her plate away from the edge when she tugs it a little too close, the only nervous gesture she allows herself, all indicate a far longer acquaintance.
"It was not necessary for him to know the details before, the hike in pay is to compensate for greater danger," the Archive says calmly before returning her gaze do you. "What is this advantage your father said you have Miss Carpenter and how did you acquire it?"
How much do you tell the Archive?
[] [MINIMUM DISCLOSURE] About the infiltration in Winter and Summer and what you found out about the changeling your father had rescued, the dark rites and attempt to make another mask for one of the Old Ones
[] [MEDIUM DISCLOSURE]: Also mention the what you learned about the Starborn, your insights into Iku Turso and the darkness that birthed the Black Court
[] [FULL DISCLOSURE]: Explain your crown and its limitations
[] Write in
OOC: Every level of disclosure includes the one above it of course. And yes the Archive did paraphrase Mission Impossible at you, she finds it funny.
Last edited:
- Location
- washington
I posted the literal quote "are the outsiders the same outsiders for every universe or is there a different set of outsiders for every universe?"
I'm pretty sure the outsiders are the outsiders and they just sort of look different depending on which universe they are trying to get into and destroy.
This is butchers exact wording how would this mean anything except the outsiders are always the same beings? Hes said separately for Odin and Mab that they have different version but made it clear outsiders are always the outsiders.
[X] [MEDIUM DISCLOSURE]
I agree with Zoolimar; we shouldn't discuss the Crown anywhere outside our soul.
I agree with Zoolimar; we shouldn't discuss the Crown anywhere outside our soul.
[X] [FULL DISCLOSURE]: Explain your crown and its limitations
Tbh, Molly has already discussed the crown in far less safe locations then this one.
Tbh, Molly has already discussed the crown in far less safe locations then this one.