Green Flame Rising (Exalted vs Dresden Files)

If you take that I would say Olivia's higher purpose would be reform in magical enforcement if you take that. Not as useful as 'in defense of Creation', but she barely knows what an Outsider is from that time Molly explained the Laws to her.
Ok. I think that's broad enough. I am guessing her higher purpose might evolve as she learns and does more?
The aimed difficulties for called shots essentially for limbs it's a +1 difficulty to hit, for torso it's a +2 difficulty, for heads it's a +3 difficulty and commensurately you get more damage dice according to that increase in difficulty one two and three. So what Sharpshooter allows you to do is get those bonus damage dice without increasing the difficulty of your shot. You can find the range attack targeting a location table in Mage 20th anniversary page 418.
Hmm, ok.
Psychoportation 2 is 20 + (3*Intelligence) yards, which in Yog's plan is 29. Yards. A. Turn.
Yes. She can also quickly buy it up to 3 or 4 as she goes. It's also useful to bypassing obstacles, and getting into enclosed spaces, when coupled with clairvoyance.
Not to mention that if you fuck it up and botch, like trying to teleport while under attack and eating that malus, or the enemy brings a couple mobile versions of the Teleport Wards (Conveyance 2 Ritual, its the same tier of effect as malcoffee) or someone able to do shaping, you get to eat 8 dice of Aggravated Damage when you teleport into a wall.

Or lose everything you have on you(armor, weapons, clothes) in the middle of an active battlespace.
This, I have an answer for. It uses Perception + Alertness roll. One of the specializations I made my Olivia for is detecting things, oversight and such. Clairvoyance, clear sight, Acute Senses, etc. I am planning on making her a splendor with Perception + Alertness Invincible assertion. She won't be botching, ever.

Also, might I suggest Exchanging your 1 point abilities for
Jack-of-all-trades (5pt . merit )
You've a large pool of miscellaneous skills and knowledge
obtained through extensive travels, the jobs you've held, or
all-around know-how. You automatically have one dot in all
Skill and Knowledge Dice Pools. This is an illusory level, used
to simulate a wide range of abilities. If you spend experience in
any untrained Skill or Knowledge, you must still pay the point
cost for the first level.
It buys you 3 more points.
 
.......
We live in Chicago, a city of skyscrapers, tall buildings and restricted sightlines.
We are coming from Vegas, a city of tall buildings and restricted sightlines. We are going to Boston, a city of tall buildings, narrow streets and restricted sightlines.

We have literally never fought a battle in a place where a sniper would have done any good.

Corpsetaker we fought underground. Kattrin we fought inside a museum. In Cleveland we fought in corridors, underground and underwater. We fought Eiko inside a hotel, and the Will of Kakuri we fought inside an abandoned factory building. Arianna we fought inside an airplane. The Dragon we fought in tunnels underground.

The second Iku Turso fight is literally the only place we have ever fought outside in a broad space, and that happened on a fucking lake.

In none of these places have we ever gotten setup time for a sniper to do any good. OR the sightlines.
Guns? Guns are useful. Snipers? Are not.
There IS no long range.

More to the point, there cant be a long range, because its a quest, and the QM is not going to allow you to merrily kill people of any importance from outside of their own response range.

Thats like a narrative imperative, the same way the QM isnt going to jump you on the loo because it would be unfair and unfun.


Eclectic? These are all responses to threats that we have encountered IC in this quest so far.

Poison gas, hostile environment and the risk of falling we all saw in Vegas. Falling happened in the Chicago Museum, having to dive blind down a submarine chute. And underground, when we had to jump off a twenty foot high tower/staircase thing to rescue Lydia from Corpsetaker. Smoke screen underwater in Cleveland that we couldnt see through.


Molly and Dresden were the only people on malcoffee in Vegas.
Lash and Lydia were not. And while Lash can deal with fatigue poisons as Flesh 1, she cant do tiredness.
And Molly doesnt make malcoffee for more than herself, Dresden and Charity as a free action.

You are apparently missing the point that if a character out of chargen can match mid-tier supernaturals out of chargen.
Then its not especially difficult to shore up the rest. Especially given some of the other Powers available.

Look at Lydia, who basically has a social dice pool of 6 when she's not burning motes on an Excellency.
Look at Lash, even, whose best dice pools are when she uses Appearance 5, and even then caps out at 8 dice.
Otherwise, her best dicepool is 6. They dont do better routinely.

Hell, Molly's best social dicepool without Excellency is 8.

Her core power is Telepathy, but its PLOT.
Her alternative power is Psychic Invisibility. Its mass hypnosis, and it neither works on cameras or electronic surveillance or animals or presumably spirits, nor does it work on anyone with mental defenses. By the canon writeup. Which Yog posted.





I've spent the better part of two days making time to do the research and actually try to copy paste what I was doing, because I understand that not everyone has the book access to do so. Only to find out that noone besides Yog has actually been interested in the numbers or the details, and its been a vibes vote all along.

This is not fun anymore.
You I think you might be taking sniper too literally. When people say sniper they just mean someone who is standing behind Molly and Lydia they don't mean someone who's actually hundreds of feet away perched in a building.

The fact of the matter is teleportation is better than movement in most cases no matter the range of the teleportation if for no other reason that you immediately break a line of sight. I agree that the distance gained through using psychopotation is a bit lackluster but there's the thing 30 yards is 90 ft which one paired with Clairvoyance can literally allow her to appear Within the last Corridor or a room directly adjacent or just a corner nearby instantly without having to be seen a moving into that hidden spot which allows her to snipe again from a different position.

On the people not caring about the mechanics front. I admit I am inherently unfamiliar with the fomori as either a playable or enemy faction way more familiar with the kuei jin despite the fact the wan kuei shouldn't show up in games that often. Part of that familiarity is I know the path forward or very least the disciplines involved in advancement of ability Iron Mountain to increase her durability shintai for an actual God form that might be reminiscent of her Masters, Black Wind for a extra actions ect. Which on top of being familiar allows for future planning of how she will evolve.

I only know the fomori as the enemies of the werewolves and that's pretty much all I know they're a bunch of freak Abominations made from implanted devils in food and goods by Pentax and that's pretty much it. So I don't know where or how the future would look for her as a formach so it is difficult to get invested in your plan. I actually rather like your plan it's just that on top of being a flavor I'm deeply unfamiliar with I don't know what that would look like going forward.

Realized it after I'd finished typing it but that really does sound like a business plan rejection
 
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I've spent the better part of two days making time to do the research and actually try to copy paste what I was doing, because I understand that not everyone has the book access to do so. Only to find out that noone besides Yog has actually been interested in the numbers or the details, and its been a vibes vote all along.

This is not fun anymore.
I understand that it must be annoying, especially because it seems like you're well invested in the subject, but from the beginning I thought you knew it was going to be a vote about vibrations because (from what I understand) that's how most votes where the PC isn't in risk.

Furthermore, this was a very technical and complicated vote, so I knew from the beginning that it would come down to the aesthetics and vibe of each plan and not which one is the most efficient.
 
I've spent the better part of two days making time to do the research and actually try to copy paste what I was doing, because I understand that not everyone has the book access to do so. Only to find out that noone besides Yog has actually been interested in the numbers or the details, and its been a vibes vote all along.

This is not fun anymore.
For what it's worth, I am sorry to hear this and I do like your design. I'll freely admit that you did more work than I did (for one, I haven't actually looked through the fomori gifts, didn't have time), and in general I like your design. To summarize my suggestions:
1) Take out Seldom Sleeps - as a circlemate Olivia would have access to Malcoffee
2) Swap Drive, Larceny, Computer and Medicine for Jack-of-all-Trades. I think the numbers work in your favor here, but that'll need to be checked.
3) Maybe remove cybersenses? I mean, they make sense a bit, but they can be learned later as a Path of Sorcery (well, Psychic, but you get my point)

As I said, as I read through your vote, it is actually quite interesting. Different from what I am going for, but interesting and good.
 
I've spent the better part of two days making time to do the research and actually try to copy paste what I was doing, because I understand that not everyone has the book access to do so. Only to find out that noone besides Yog has actually been interested in the numbers or the details, and its been a vibes vote all along.

This is not fun anymore.
Sorry m8. In all honesty, I loved your vote but went with Yog because of the choose Demon Arts OR Fomori powers. If Regeneration was allowed, I would go Fomori but as it is, I feel Demon Arts have better long term viability and synergies with MA better.
 
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So, since there has been a lot of people who already voted for my plan, and they voted by name, there has been a suggestion that I find myself liking, but would like voters to weigh in on.

Currently, I am taking Clear Sighted Merit for 5 points:
Even without employing your Arts, you have a preternat-
ural gift for seeing things as they are, not as they appear to be.
Illusions, disguises, cloaking spells, and other forms of trickery
rarely deceive your eyes.
In game terms, you can make a Perception + Awareness
roll to see through metaphysical deception powers: vampiric
Disciplines, faerie cantrips, werecreature Gifts, Sphere-based
illusions, and other powers that are based on deceiving a wit-
nesses' perceptions. This roll works only against powers that deceive
the target's perceptions, not against any other form of Gift, Discipline,
cantrip, and so forth. (Vampiric Obfuscate, for example, but not
Presence or Dominate.)
The difficulty for that roll is generally 5 + the highest Sphere
Rank or other level involved in that power; a Forces 2 /Prime
2 illusion, then, would be difficulty 7, while a vampire's Mask
of a Thousand Faces (Obfuscate 3) would be difficulty 8. If a
character could normally get a roll to see through the illusion
(as shown in How Do You DO That?, pp. 129-132), then your
character subtracts -3 from her difficulty when trying to do so.
Your clear sight also reduces your difficulty by -3 when you
try to see through a disguise, a cloaking spell or device, or other
attempts to conceal the truth from an onlooker. It does not,
however, allow you to see through darkness, notice stealthing
or invisible characters, or otherwise perceive something that
you would not be able to see without this Merit; combining this
Merit with the physical Merit: Acute Senses, however, could
make you a formidably perceptive character.
This merit allows Olivia to attempt to see through the illusions (and I assume hear / smell too, actually). If she could have tried seeing through the illusion normally, then she receives a -3 DC adjustment. Acute Senses merit also gives a -2 DC additional adjustment.

It has been suggested that I swap this merit for these two:
Graceful (2 pt Merit)
You move with uncanny agility and efficiency. Coordination and balance come naturally to you. Even when you fail to achieve some feat, you avoid embarassing yourself. In game terms, your Difficulty for Dexterity-based actions is one less, while botches, even serious ones, fail to affect the finesse of your movements. You may die trying, buy you will never, ever appear ungainly.
Crack Shot (2pt. merit)
Whether pointing a gun, arrow, or dart, you hit your target with great accuracy. You receive no increased difficulty when targeting any specific location and reduce the difficulty of rolls not involving specific targeting by one.
I like those. In combat they would give Olivia a -2 DC adjustment to shooting, and outside of combat, when performing, she's likely to roll Dex + Performance, because she's a dancer, meaning she gets a -1 DC to combine with a -2 DC from artistically gifted.

As this leaves me with 1 point free, I am super-tempted to go for
higher purpose (1pt. merit )
All changelings have some vision of their path, but you've a
special commitment to it. You don't concern yourself with petty
matters, because your higher purpose is everything. Though you
sometimes behave in ways contrary to the needs of survival,
your purpose grants you great personal strength. The difficulty
of any roll that has something to do with this higher purpose is
reduced by two. Decide what your higher purpose is, and make
sure you discuss it with the Storyteller.
DragonParadox said that the higher purpose will be
reform in magical enforcement
I like that, because it actually gives Olivia more ability to act independently of us, and have her own adventures. We could form a B-team of sorts with her, Murphy, and sometimes Harry doing stuff related to Order of Cauldron, magical law enforcement and human magical crime. That actually neatly solves the irrelevance issue, if she isn't constantly with us, but also acts independently, on her own volition, solving issues we don't have time for while we are out battling Ctulhu and reforging Atlantis.

What do people think? I am really, really tempted. The shortfall in senses might be compensated with splendors, as Perception+alertness roll and perception+awareness are something we'll want a splendor for anyway.
 
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Adhoc vote count started by Anaja on Mar 7, 2024 at 2:14 AM, finished with 406 posts and 22 votes.
 
Worth noting that for all that Black Wind is a primarily aggressive Discipline, it can also be used to enhance the movement-speed.

Spending 1 Demon Chi per round to activate it (unlike V20 Celerity it doesn't need 1 Ressource per extra-action, just one to activate), Olivia can quadruple her movement with Black Wind 3.
 
I've spent the better part of two days making time to do the research and actually try to copy paste what I was doing, because I understand that not everyone has the book access to do so. Only to find out that noone besides Yog has actually been interested in the numbers or the details, and its been a vibes vote all along.

This is not fun anymore.
Sorry about that, but that's pretty common on mechanical votes.

I do like the vibes of the Demon Arts much better than those of Formor Powers/Gifts.
So that's what I vote for.

Personally I think it's window-dressing anyway, Olivia will have her useful niche, but shouldn't try to fight on Molly's level.
She's not up to it and the mass-minion Charms Infernals get should, thematically and practically, not turn a nearly normal human into something capable of competing with Exalted, Wizards and ancient monsters.

But in that I'm not really arguing with you, but rather with the QM I guess. Sorry @DragonParadox, I really believe you are stretching this Charm and its effects far beyond what it is supposed to do.
If Olivia dies, goes to Hell, makes the nigh-impossible journey back and then spends a few decades as a Wan Kuei mastering her powers, then she might be able to compete with the lower end of Exalted. This shortcut doesn't work for me at all.

And we aren't even at that lower end of Exalted where that would be relevant anymore, we eat non-Methuselah Elders for breakfast.
 
But in that I'm not really arguing with you, but rather with the QM I guess. Sorry @DragonParadox, I really believe you are stretching this Charm and its effects far beyond what it is supposed to do.
If Olivia dies, goes to Hell, makes the nigh-impossible journey back and then spends a few decades as a Wan Kuei mastering her powers, then she might be able to compete with the lower end of Exalted. This shortcut doesn't work for me at all.

And we aren't even at that lower end of Exalted where that would be relevant anymore, we eat non-Methuselah Elders for breakfast.

I get the concern but... peak behind the curtain you guys managed to avoid triggering the Exaltation that could have gone off in Vegas which means you are rather missing a Circlemate still, hence me being more generous with this instance of the charm's usage so we can get a full party together without absolutely needing Harry or Michael to fill things out.
 
I get the concern but... peak behind the curtain you guys managed to avoid triggering the Exaltation that could have gone off in Vegas which means you are rather missing a Circlemate still, hence me being more generous with this instance of the charm's usage so we can get a full party together without absolutely needing Harry or Michael to fill things out.
The only thing that worries me is the development ceiling. It is lower for Olivia than for Lash or Lydia
 
1) Take out Seldom Sleeps - as a circlemate Olivia would have access to Malcoffee
We can't make her that without using additional AP as far as I understand it. Not without dropping Charity or Dresden from the Mal-Coffee list.
I really believe you are stretching this Charm and its effects far beyond what it is supposed to do.
I was under the impression that Olivia only got all of this because of her hidden power. I don't think we should expect all of these gains everytime someone gets upgraded.
 
I can see Olivia being a bit special and more powerful than others as a combination of her ancestry, and being the first ever modern human to receive this power, which has magical significance.

And I am still hesitating on changing the merits. I very much would appreciate advice on this one. I'll leave it up in the air for two hours (time to get to work, have a meeting, and get to a computer), then probably switch in a new edition of the vote if no advice comes.
I get the concern but... peak behind the curtain you guys managed to avoid triggering the Exaltation that could have gone off in Vegas which means you are rather missing a Circlemate still, hence me being more generous with this instance of the charm's usage so we can get a full party together without absolutely needing Harry or Michael to fill things out.
I hope this doesn't mean that said exaltation is going to disappear for reasons? Because while I expect it to take a lot of work to get it to release safely (multiple actions points, crafted splendors, arranged deals and expended favors), I sincerely hope that it's doable.
The only thing that worries me is the development ceiling. It is lower for Olivia than for Lash or Lydia
I think the correct / plausible way to handle this would be for Olivia to work with us as a circlemate for some time, while also doing her own things with her motivation, then split off, forming a B team with people like Alphas, Murphy and others, as we shift to more and more grandiose things, and possibly get more exalted party members. She would remain a specialist we take with us on specific missions, but if she peaks in power, and we far surpass her, that's ok too.
We can't make her that without using additional AP as far as I understand it. Not without dropping Charity or Dresden from the Mal-Coffee list.
I thought we still had some slots left? I might be mistaken about that.
 
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@uju32 for all it's worth (I know it's not much), I think your plan is great, and it would make perfect narrative sense for a variant of it (remove all of paths except mental shields, change narrative merits) to apply when IDUing Murphy and other people like her, i.e. non-practitioners. "Vibe wise" Olivia gets more out of her soul, whose power she was already using, while Murphy, other special investigations personnel, maybe Alphas, i.e. pure mortals, get mutations and transformations. In fact, I would very much vote for your pattern to be the default / assumed effect where it comes to awakening pure non-magical mortals in combat roles, like Murphy (who I want to approach about IDU).

We should probably think about it, if maybe not now. IDU is mass producible, if Olivia turns out great with no obvious downsides, I expect us to approach order of Cauldron, Murphy, maybe SI police personnel, mortal Jade Dogs, etc, about gifting them power. We obviously won't have this kind of characer designs each application, but working out a couple of patterns (ie one for magicians, one for martial oriented mortals, one for mental-oriented mortals, one for social-oriented mortals) seems logical.
 
I hope this doesn't mean that said exaltation is going to disappear for reasons? Because while I expect it to take a lot of work to get it to release safely (multiple actions points, crafted splendors, arranged deals and expended favors), I sincerely hope that it's doable.

Of course not, it is still inside the idol and the other is... wherever it is.
 
I get the concern but... peak behind the curtain you guys managed to avoid triggering the Exaltation that could have gone off in Vegas which means you are rather missing a Circlemate still, hence me being more generous with this instance of the charm's usage so we can get a full party together without absolutely needing Harry or Michael to fill things out.
I'd rather wait for another opportunity at a new Circle Mate, I think.

I think compared to say D&D non-PC support is more helpful and you have fewer bases to cover.
The three of us, plus occasionally Harry or Michael as their time permits works.
 
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