Green Flame Rising (Exalted vs Dresden Files)
- Thread starter DragonParadox
- Start date
- Crossover Fantasy
BoredMan
Salutations thou who beds thy own mother
Funny but seriously though if it's a three day thing we may get better results saving those hours of travel time.
We saw Dresden open a Way directly into the Erlking's halls in Changes, and almost directly to the Greek afterlife's entrance in Skin Game. We see Cowl open a Way directly into Tartarus from Chicago to free the Nemean Lion in the short story Fugitive. I dont foresee Lydia having any issue opening one directly out of Yomi Wan into the real world.
No assumptions.
Im old enough to remember the events of the last two decades in the Middle East in bleeding technicolor. I remember the fall of Siad Barre in Somalia and Gaddafi in Libya, and the death of Houphouet Boigny in Ivory Coast, and the consequences thereof.
The fall of systems centered around solitary tyrants and strongmen inevitably leads to chaos in the absence of vigorous contingency planning and investment.
If you hear advice that boils down to "Dont attempt anything resembling regime change without contingencies for handling the aftermath" and you think that its anything but a warning?
Then I think the problem is with you, not me, mate.
Change is often necessary.
Instigating change without a plan and the resources to see it through is stupid.
And I certainly have full confidence in the ability of Exalts to make a bad situation worse.
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It is canon that the death of Yen-Lo was engineered by Emma-O and Rangda, and they alone would have split the spoils if Yen-Lo's continuity of succession plans hadnt kicked in.
The only named major Yama Kings who border Mikaboshi were Pika Don and Emma-O.
Pika Don has been unconscious/comatose since the nuclear bombings that ended WW2; he tried to gorge on some of the tainted chi thereof, and either poisoned himself or is still digesting it. No other Yama King has dared check.
If Mikaboshi falls tomorrow, I would expect essentially all the spoils to fall to Emma-O.
Noone else major is close enough, and noone minor would risk the aggro.
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The whole point of the Outsider intervention in both the ongoing Vampire War and the later Fomorian War is chaos.
The disorganized disruption of existing power structures and order.
Nemesis admitted that to Dresden's face while under magical duress.
And while I would not take anything it says without corroboration, it does fit the pattern for everything its done thus far.
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Saddam Hussein maps quite well to what Mikaboshi is in this AU: a tyrannical regional power with external Ambitions.
He started wars with Iran and Kuwait to expand his oil reserves and thus his influence on world affairs.
He had a nuclear weapons program, a chemical weapons program, a ballistic missile program, and was funding Gerald Bull's long range artillery development before the Mossad murdered the man.
1) Lydia cant move much faster than Michael without activating an obvious charm. And that charm would move Michael as well anyway. Not an issue.
2) Of course we can. Thats what Mind-Hand Manipulation is for. This entire plan is predicated on the fact that, once we find the target, Molly can pick up her entire party with MHM and head for an exit point faster than any possible pursuit can follow, even if it involves cutting or blasting an egress hole in the side of Mikaboshi's Tower several hundred meters in the air.
3) Thats just untrue. We literally took him to Sanctuary during Molly's first visit.
4) I have repeatedly pointed out that this claim is not true. Its been demonstrated not just in canon, but also in this fic.
Nobody can track or detect a Sword that doesnt want to be tracked, else it would be trivial for the Denarians to avoid the Knights, and impossible for a Knight to ambush a Denarian.
The entire Ursiel sequence in Death Masks is proof of this.
As is Thorned Namshiel not noticing Amoracchius approaching until it cut off his head in Small Favor.
Molly didnt even know there was an angel inside until she crossed blades with Michael despite living in the same house. Dresden's very first onscreen encounter with angels had him walk past Uriel in his guise as janitor without seeing or feeling a thing. The stories about angels have them walk unseen among us.
I find it mindboggling that you acknowledge that kuejin can sneak into the Wicked City, and that a five dot Infernal charm will allow us to walk into the Wicked City unnoticed but think that a holy artifact imbued by the White God's faction and possessed by an angel cannott hide itself.
These are not peer powers.
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No, it f*cking doesn't. Saddam's reign didn't have "maximize suffering of his people" as one of the mission goals. Very few people in history map to MIkaboshi at all. Fewer still came to power. You are extrapolating your real life human-limited experience to dealing with inhuman monsters, who are evil in a way that mortals just aren't. Who twisted themselves into beings that are evil. Real, tangible evil.
No, the problem is that you are trying to apply your limited life experience regarding dealing with human nations to dealing with immortal god-beings of as close to absolute ideal of evil as they could get.
Mikaboshi is not a tyrant in a way human tyrants are, and Wicked City is not a nation in a way human nations are. MIkaboshi is a self-made god-being, and Wicked City is his personal, almost hand crafted hell. He doesn't rule because certain parts of the population enjoy his rule (and that's how all tyrants rule, ultimately). He rules on the basis of his personal magic, pacts, and evil.
And he would have to leave Amoracchius behind.
- Pronouns
- She/Her
I'm pretty sure the Hope Plague we're brewing up is about as dangerous to Kakuri as it is to the Wicked City. Emma-O is going to want to quarantine the place, not eat it.
The Greek afterlife comprised both their heaven and their hell. There were different parts, and allegedly judges decided where you ended up(at least according to Plato). The Elysian Fields and Tartarus were both in Hades jurisdiction as god of the dead, IIRC.
Such a definition would exclude Molly's Hell, which is described AS a Hell.
The very method by which Kuejin emerge is in itself supposed to be a curse by the August Personage in Jade, whoever he is supposed to be in this setting. And its inverting a blessing.
That kuejin continue to rise is in itself evidence that no, no hell is beyond the touch of the divine, for good or for ill.
I dont really agree with any of this.
The Christian definition of hell is being beyond divine grace. Not being beyond divine power.
Christian theology/mythology, which Butcher draws on, is that Christ descended into the lands of the dead for the three days he was dead, before ascending back to the lands of the living, and thence to Heaven.
Travelling to a physical location in the line of duty isnt going to do anything to a Sword IMO.
Anymore than they have to worry about corruption from stabbing a demon.
1) Doubt it.
Like I said above, Christian myth is that hell is beyond divine grace. Thats not the same thing as being beyond divine power. Subtle difference.
We get a look at one of Uriel's black ops offices in the lands of the dead/Shadowlands/Between in Ghost Story, staffed by Murphy's father and former partner. There was an angel on guard named Amitiel, and he appeared to have no issue hanging out at the place, any more than Uriel had walking through.
I think you are assuming an equivalence between supernatural factions that isnt supposed to exist in the Dresdenverse.
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2) I dont think I agree.
The Angels have never been shown to have an issue with force calibration. Michael and Amoracchius slew the Great Dragon Siriothrax without breaking reality, and Siriothrax is supposed to be way older and mightier than anything calling itself a Yama King.
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3) I dont think there's ever been a suggestion about the Fallen getting any sort of circumstantial bonuses against Angels working in their duties, regardless of the environment.
There's a reason only 3x Swords were judged to be a sufficient counter as opposed to 30x Coins.
They're not equal players.
Not since the Fall.
Of course, all this depends on whether the White God even recognizes any of these places as Hell, instead of simply another stopping point. Inmates break out of Yomi Wan all the goddamn time, and we even see breakouts out of Tartarus, though Hades has an actual fugitive retrieval service for escapees.
Nobody who goes to Lucy's joint, however, gets to come back.
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- Location
- Germany
Nah, hope is unfortunatly not Emma-O's weakness at all.
Kakuri is a vast and empty world, where tortured souls run through the dark until they freeze to (temporary) death, starve to death or are torn apart by demons.
Hope would make them run longer and die harder, but it wouldn't change the situation at all.
The only reason why the Wicked City is relatively vulnerable to an uprising of the victims, is because it is modeled after a city, with the people being concentrated in relatively little space and vastly outnumbering their tormentors.
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I would hope so, but I dont think thats actually true.
Not in the Hell that Jizo-Bosatsu calls home, and walks freely in, talking to and inspiring people.
And where he allegedly does free shikome.
Emma-O is a lot better situated at managing this sort of thing.
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fictionfan
Please sir, may I have some Meows?
- Location
- Tempe, AZ
There are at least a hundred denominations of Christianity with different views on the subject and many people within the same church don't share the same view. Saying "Christian Myth says" like there is any sort of actual standard isn't helpful. Now maybe you can reference the church that Jim Butcher goes to and that might mean something, but considering some of the WOG he has said and that this is already a crossover I am inclined to do Death of the Author.
If we regenerate only 1 mote per three hours in NeverNever, and the Mothers' cottage doesn't count as a Dragon Nest, then we definitely lose more time by using the Gate. Because I think we will need to use everything we have.
@DragonParadox sorry to bother you, but, seriously, are Tiffany and Lydia getting their own travel arrangements, or are we handling those?
It should also be remembered - this is a test. Everything Mothers do will have double, triple and more layers.
@DragonParadox sorry to bother you, but, seriously, are Tiffany and Lydia getting their own travel arrangements, or are we handling those?
It should also be remembered - this is a test. Everything Mothers do will have double, triple and more layers.
It's more fair to say that Hope is not Kakuri's weakness. It is, however, Emma-O's, I think, as a god of Ainu. Also, isn't it hope that leads his shikome we encountered in trying to redeem him?
Oh sorry for missing the question, they will be coming along regardless of what you choose.
- Location
- Germany
Point.
Enough Shikome being infected might be a problem for him.
But given the geography of Kakuri it's still a bad place for plagues, real or metaphorical, to spread.
And this is aimed at the lower end of the totempole, tortured souls and numberless cyberdevils, so we can't be sure it even works on Shikome or other higher-ups, such as Demons and Akuma in general.
That's just not our design-goal here and with 3 days work you can't expect everything at once.
Yeah, the problem with Kakuri is that it does not have much of a population, certainly not compared to the Wicked City, its defenses are more hungry darkness and killing cold rather than the armies and traps of the Wicked City. One would think that makes them weaker, but it is worth keeping in mind that they get Lord of the Land too and it is a lot easier to use those kind of large scale effects when all the Hell is aligned to a handful of concepts as opposed to being an intentional patchwork of conflicting energies.
For all the purposes of the geopolitical power balance, it very much does.
Please. These arent incomprehensible god-monsters of unknown motivations.
Even the non-human Yama Kings have entirely mortal aspirations, and Mikaboshi is one of the most mortal of them all.
Japanese!Kemmler is of mortal origins. His ambitions are mortal ones of conquest and control. A lot of his servitors are mortal. His methods exploit mortal society and borrow from mortal organizations, and he imports mortal ideas and inspiration, with explicit parallels being drawn to the worst excesses of Japanese megacorps.
Its a very human evil that we are looking at in the Wicked City, not something beyond mortal comprehension.
Thats why we recognize it.
This is the White God's faction.
You arent dealing with an organization that has limited resources, when you're in a setting where even the Fallen can teach a mortal host to summon a Coin.
Sanya literally received Esperacchius from the hands of the Archangel Michael. Yes, an archangel went and got it from wherever it was. I dont think home office ever loses track of the Swords, or has any trouble getting them where they need to be, assuming the Swords dont do it themselves.
I mean, Nicodemus has explicitly killed more than two hundred Sword-wielding knights.
I dont think that there were survivors most of the time that he managed it. And yet the original Swords are still around; two of them have been reforged with changing times, but they are all still here.
That suggests that the Swords, with the help of home office, can take care of themselves at least as well as any Coin can.
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As long as the swords are not damaged by mortals, which can happen the angels inside them can get them to where they need to go. That said it is not without cost, the Knights are encouraged to be careful where they put them because every time a Sword gets moved by direct angelic agency Lucy gets to move a coin by direct diabolic agency. The point of both the Swords and the Coins as far as Molly is able to understand is proxy war that is rigorously enforced while at the same time being tokens in a kind of wager about the nature of mankind since both hang on mortal agency.
Of course the fact that Swords can lose their power, it is a thing the Knights are warmed about, would imply that under the right circumstances Coins would be voided and the Fallen inside sent to Hell, but no one has ever been able to figure how how that might be done.
- Location
- washington
Is it against our promise to not look into angels to look in on how to banish a coin permanently?
No... but you would need to have a coin for that. Also coins are in that category of beings that might notice you looking, so it depends on if you want to take that risk.
1) Lucy gets to move Coins by direct diabolic agency anyway.
If they are put anywhere they cant tempt people, whether its tossed in the sea, a volcanic caldera or the like, action gets to be taken.
I mean, its not been that long since Sanya tossed Magog in a canal; he was 21 when he left the Denarians, and he was still in his early to mid-20s when we first saw him.
Magog is back in circulation.
2)Swords can be physically damaged under the right circumstances. We've seen it happen.
We've also been told that both Fidelacchius and Esperacchius have been reforged multiple times, changing sword styles, with the only exception being Amoracchius.
They can also be temporarily depowered by misuse by someone who has the right to them.
Thats presumably why Dresden using Amoracchius against Lea depowered the blade(Dresden had an apparent right to it, having been given it by Michael), but Father Douglas using a Sword against Michael did not.
But I dont think there is any evidence that Swords can actually permanently lose their power.
I mean, sure, Michael moved to stop Mavra using Amoracchius to kill an innocent, but he was going to do that anyway. Thats the kind of person he is.
The Leanansidhe wouldnt have drawn the sort of aggro involved in giving a Sword to a Red Court member otherwise.
It would not have been in the interests of Winter.
Destroying the Coin frees the Fallen inside.
And a Fallen inside a Coin is a lot less dangerous than a free Fallen.
I can't really say more on the matter without spoilers, just that Michael believes that a grave enough misuse to the swords will cause them to lose their power and he was given no guarantee that they would be fixed afterwards.
- Location
- Germany
Maybe Lucy had a move left from one of those 200 times Nic killed a Knight and then probably tried to hide the Sword?
That or the other Denarians did wizard magic on the 'lost coins'. Correspondence would be particularly good at finding something that was just thrown into a canal for instance, certainly if the caster had a focus to use in the form of their own Coin.
Fair enough. No point if you cant talk.
I will point out that Michael also thought that getting his hands on ten Coins after the Shedd Aquarium fight meant that the hunt for the Coins was almost over, which Butcher has made clear OOC was never possible.
Knights dont necessarily get briefings of information other than what they need immediately. Faith, you know.
Maybe. But Lucy cheats whenever he can.
I dont think he would bother, or that he wouldnt save it for other things. Plus, I remember Butcher saying part of the deal with the Coins is that they are always in circulation.
I don't really think so, simply because the paradigm is different. They're not held as different realms in the authority of the same person or qualitatively different entities, but as towns in the same province for lack of a better term.
We already got a ruling that it does matter, but not enough to harm the swords.
We got definitions about what our hell is and why, so barring additional rulings I don't think that can be dismissed.
There's a reason I said without breaking a rule; hell is where god isn't, where he chooses not to be. Choosing to start being there is a significant difference because we know his absence was as well.
It's not about equality of power, or even about them winning either, it's about relative advantage and the consequences of them trying stuff. The white god could theoretically easily win the war without consequences to anyone else. He isn't though, and even if the tally ends up in his favor eventually we'd still need to deal with things as they stand in the moment.
So if we made a prodigy to let knights draw their swords to them like that we could save them some points long term?
Knights very rarely lose their swords while alive, that leaves the issue of how you would get the prodigy in the hands of the next knight. That is a problem that the Denarians to not have since they always have potential hosts in mind and even an imperfect host is better than no host.