Green Flame Rising (Exalted vs Dresden Files)

[Degorium]

Makes it clear that Half-Castes can only Exalt into the Caste of their parent.

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That is very explicitly not the claim you are making and is Shifting the goalposts and is all so not relevant to the starborn in general or Wizards exulting as with what happened in the beginning of this Quest.

So why do you think Mab was giving Harry Dresden advice on being an immortal on the eve of a major battle right after telling him his own people have been keeping information from him?
Do you think she is the sort to make idle chitchat?

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Harry has at that point multiple means of actually acquiring immortality if he so wished to never mind the fact that Wizards are insanely long lived by their lonesome.

There is a variety of reasons she could have said that it's not that starborn are inherently immortal because the only other star born that is still alive other than fucking Harry is dracul and he's turned himself into some kind of abomination.

So forgive me if I don't take in starborn's are Immortal as fact because that's insane why would I do that.

I have repeatedly stated that I do not believe that Harry is a candidate for Exaltation.
That there are narrative reasons why he would not be a candidate in this story.

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This is fine yet again I'm not disagreeing with a narrative beat or a narrative role for Harry and that in relation to exaltation but you are making claims about eligibility and capability of exultation that are not backed up by The Story So Far and you do it with absolute terms like Wizards cannot be exalted when the quest starts with a wizard exalting it's just insane to me.

You are making mechanical assumptions about Starborn Exaltation eligibility and demanding that I prove that they arent true.

We have no data demonstrating any of your assumptions because there were no Starborn back in Creation, and even if they were, this is not Creation That Was.

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You are assuming that starborn is a condition on the level of being a mummy a vampire a full on Mage with a attached Spirit a hunter with a full-on attached spirit being a full-on fairy because the kithane are fairies they just have flesh suits on.

That requires proof because it's just not true Harry is a person, a wizard of flesh and blood, he doesn't have any particular bonuses except Against The Outsiders and even then those bonuses are in telling them to fuck off or come in.

He doesn't have any innate power other than that everything stems from him being a wizard and being a wizard isn't enough to prevent you from exalting you are assigning too much metaphysical and general Width to starborb that isn't proven in this Quest, isn't proven in Dresden Files proper and makes no sense

Never mind that starborn is literally another name for the Sidereals so it's like completely orthogonal to reason to believe that that is enough. The fact that the starborn get whittled down every 666 years and that Harry is one of the few starborn's left in this cycle and there's only a fellowship of 100 Sidereals total makes it seem like there might be something to that.

In this Quest we know that they are souls from creation so it's like immediately if you're assigning immortality to them you are making a weird off base assumption based on things that haven't been said in this Quest and are only kind of vaguely hinted at in your own interpretation of the queen of air and darkness.

I literally agree that it doesn't make sense narratively for Harry to be an exalt it very least not in this moment but you made the assertation that he can't be and there's literally nothing to back that assumption.

 

[Yog]

However, you cannot be both Awakened and Exalted in ExWoD.
So Harry is not going to Exalt.
He's a wizard; that's his niche in this setting, and its an already scary class.

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Harry was and is viable candidate for exaltation:

... Is Harry eligible for Exaltation? Or, as a full trained wizard he counts as a mage in a way that Molly didn't? Because if he's eligible, this is almost guaranteed to happen.

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Who is reaching beyond themselves and yes wizards are technically eligible. Just be aware that this is the warrior exaltation, fighting against a foe beyond human abilities is generally required

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1)Scroll of Heroes p108
Makes it clear that Half-Castes can only Exalt into the Caste of their parent.
That makes it clear that Exaltations do have, and respect some limits about mortals.

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Not caste, but the type of exaltation (different, more broad category). But ok, that's pedantry.

That's almost certainly a political decision enforced on and by Litek. Like how Solar Deliberative prevented Slave Races from exalting by political decree (Exalted 2E - Dreams of the First Age - Book 2 (Lords of Creation) [revised], p. 137) :

SLAVES R ACES AND EXALTATION
During the High First Age, the rulers of the De-
liberative forbade Lytek, the god of Exaltation from
Exalting any of the slave races. Also, Dragon-Blooded
were forbidden from having relations with slave races.
As a result, during the High First Age, slave races almost
never became Exalted. Naturally, these rules broke
down during the Shogunate and decayed completely
shortly after the beginning of the Second Age. In the
Second Age, members of former slave races can become
all varieties of Exalted.

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Still, thanks for the quote, I'll remember it and add to my pile of evidence for "it's possible to guide who exalts"

 

[taovkool]

[X] Harry is silent, asking nothing

 

[BoredMan]

Still, thanks for the quote, I'll remember it and add to my pile of evidence for "it's possible to guide who exalts"

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Oof. Please don't start that argument again guys.. Even I'm getting tired of the constant "we need more Exalted, no we don't" debates. It'd just be a derail.

 

[Artemis1992]

Honestly, going from a very capable Mage to a fresh Exalt can be called a downgrade.

 

[Degorium]

Honestly, going from a very capable Mage to a fresh Exalt can be called a downgrade

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A temporary downgrade if that. There's nothing stopping Reclamation of wizard magic by an exalt at least in this Quest.

To use magic at the cost of Essence? Interesting thought. On the one hand it would make you a worse wizard than an equivalent talent since Essence has to be spent in 1 mote packets, which is vastly overkill for any magic a beginner might use, but magic is very, very flexible once you get a grip on it. So I am going to say it is a path of research you guys can take, but you should be very certain you can deal with the XP expenditure, there is a considerably higher investment to get powerful effects, more than any single path.

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So essentially you could be like broken seeker and but with essence instead of Gnosis and wizard magic but your wizard magic is not quite as strong as it was before.

Which considering most Wizards can't use their magic to directly affect certain outcomes might be seen as a not inconsiderable trade.

 

[Artemis1992]

A temporary downgrade if that. There's nothing stopping Reclamation of wizard magic by an exalt at least in this Quest.

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Yes there is.

You can't be two major splats in WoD, and you really shouldn't be.

And even if you were, trying to spend your XP on Essence, Arete, Spheres and Charms would lead to a pretty weird build and likely condemn one of the two splats to being a minor thing on the side.

 

[Degorium]

Yes there is.

You can't be two major splats in WoD, and you really shouldn't be.

And even if you were, trying to spend your XP on Essence, Arete, Spheres and Charms would lead to a pretty weird build and likely condemn one of the two splats to being a minor thing on the side.

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I mean we're literally a sorceress on top of being an infernal exalt which by definition means we are two splats.

If we were willing to invest the time Essence and XP into getting wizard magic we would be a Wizard and exalt that quote is like from near the beginning of the quest.

We don't spend XP on Essence in this Quest I'm unsure it can be spent on Arete considering it seems to be a function of actual Literal time, lineage or Investment with a capital I.

Though that kind of avoids what I was getting at of you don't actually lose your wizard magic completely when you become an exalt and you don't lose the knowledge that you have of wizard magic when you become an excellent either so in the intervening time you can reclaim it even if you are a bit weaker than you were before and you also have exalted charms on top of that.

It just seems like the downgrade is in the time between Loss and Reclamation and then you are just in a good or thoroughly better position because you're no longer a mostly squishy human who can Branch out and study their magic and completely new ways especially interactions between your wizard magic and your now plentiful Essence that literally burns the universe around you when it flares up.

I can't speak to the balance of it but the balance of it really isn't my concern for lack of a better way to put that.

Though the main reason you shouldn't be multiple Splats in world of darkness is because for the most part they're completely different creatures with completely different Origins and understandings.

All of which depend on being in world of Darkness proper we have three different flavors of vampire that are all essentially modeled by world of Darkness vampires but they operate in completely different ways broken Seeker did have wizard magic and so did the war God he used wizard magic to peel back our charm. So it's not without both example and previous beings that have their own power stats that are using wizard magic.

 

[Artemis1992]

I mean we're literally a sorceress on top of being an infernal exalt which by definition means we are two splats.

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Sorcerer is a minor splat.
No power-stat like Essence or Arete of its own and we can get by with having it as a little sideshow to our bigger investments in being a good Exalted.

All of which depend on being in world of Darkness proper we have three different flavors of vampire that are all essentially modeled by world of Darkness vampires but they operate in completely different ways broken Seeker did have wizard magic and so did the war God he used wizard magic to peel back our charm. So it's not without both example and previous beings that have their own power stats that are using wizard magic.

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Yeah, I'm perfectly fine with having different rules for PCs and enemies.
I don't care how Broken Seeker is build mechanically, in-story it makes sense for him to have real Magic because he eats mages, and that comes in addition to his natural gifts.

 

[Degorium]

Sorcerer is a minor splat.
No power-stat like Essence or Arete of its own and we can get by with having it as a little sideshow to our bigger investments in being a good Exalted.


Yeah, I'm perfectly fine with having different rules for PCs and enemies.
I don't care how Broken Seeker is build mechanically, in-story it makes sense for him to have real Magic because he eats mages, and that comes in addition to his natural gifts.

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Okay if eating Wizards is enough being a wizard before you're an exalt is enough. The fact that work needs to be done to reclaim it is enough for me both in story and generally to be fine with it. It's apparently also enough for this Quest so I'm unsure of what exactly you're getting at.

We do have a passive benefit in essence generation because we were a wizard before as well so it's not like we aren't also still a wizard Talent. So I don't know what else to say.

 

[Artemis1992]

Okay if eating Wizards is enough being a wizard before you're an exalt is enough. The fact that work needs to be done to reclaim it is enough for me both in story and generally to be fine with it. It's apparently also enough for this Quest so I'm unsure of what exactly you're getting at.

We do have a passive benefit in essence generation because we were a wizard before as well so it's not like we aren't also still a wizard Talent. So I don't know what else to say.

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I said I'm fine with it for enemies.

I think it would be a mechanical mess for a character we'd have to assign XP to.
I think it would damage the narrative role of both splats.

If Dresden became an Exalt, he should loose all Arete and Spheres, have those XP available for retraining and then over the next months learn Sorcery and Ancient Sorcery up to what he had originally invested in Mage-only things, while using his normally gained XP for Charms and stats as normal.

 

[Degorium]

he should loose all Arete and Spheres, have those XP available for retraining and then over the next months learn Sorcery and Ancient Sorcery up to what he had originally invested in Mage-only things

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Okay I get the enlightenment that is a particular wizard stat but he is trained in sorcery flat out he's a wizard of a tradition being turned back into a sorcerer would just limit how he could use his information so he would just get sorcery paths up to that point probably a lot of them if we go through this method.

Spheres in the same way that paths are in this instance you are saying exchange one thing for the same thing and then reimburse XP for power stat. Which I agree with but if he became an exalt and pursued a path to get his wizard magic back what in-story reason would he not be able to do that.

I don't care about watering down themes of a Splat that isn't actually present in this story. There is exactly zero world of Darkness Splats here and there's one white wolf Splat here.

Wizards are not Mages they are not nascent Demi urges who can command to the very fabric of reality they have very specific understandings that are teachable and repeatable across all of them they are exactly like Sorcerers except more so unlike Mages which are completely different existences despite Mages being able to teach Sorcerers.

A exalt who used to be a wizard in this Quest is still a wizard Talent except their exaltation is in the way. If they go out of their way to fix that I see no reason why they shouldn't be able to not narratively or balance wise because either they would be half as strong because their Essence would become their power stat or they would become even less than that as they're relying on some kind of artifact or artifice to do it.

If you mean that they shouldn't because that's a waste of time effort that could be spent more wisely investing in ancient sorcery regular sorcery exalted charms that's perfectly fine. I just don't agree.

 

[Dmol8]

[X] Harry is silent, asking nothing

We're still at the Second Anchor most likely because this is just too pathetic to be the Third which means that this no will be followed up most likely by Harry getting assaulted by visions of his future failures to urge him to use the power of the Outside to prevent them. I fully expect Murphy's death in Battlegrounds to show up.

 

[Yog]

We're still at the Second Anchor most likely because this is just too pathetic to be the Third which means that this no will be followed up most likely by Harry getting assaulted by visions of his future failures to urge him to use the power of the Outside to prevent them. I fully expect Murphy's death in Battlegrounds to show up.

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I expect a variation of one or more of these:

Whispers in the ears of hounds—a thousand-thousand
dragon-hounds bay the hunt. How shall the mighty be dragged,
bloodied and furious, from their thrones? Darkness cloaks the
hound, and the keeper of the kennel watches beneath fi ve bloodied
stars. Weep for the hounds that must put down the mad, and
catch up the mad to never again taint the world. Hounds are ill
suited to sit thrones, but in so doing, the estate is preserved.
...
Three hundred golden swords, raised above the heads of
men. Cautious star-etched hands must touch the swords, must
hold them, must wield them. One slip, and the blades shall cut
away those hands, and loose carnage and war—the ringing of
blades against blades shatters the palace of glass. Wielded deftly,
the blades of gold uphold the palace of glass forevermore.
...
Woe! Woe to humankind, and to all Heaven and Earth.
Poison drips from a blinded Sun, and its pestilence taints all
things. The wells of the world are made vile, and poison creeps
into all things living and dead, until all are rotted from within.
Even the stars drop from the pestilent firmament, cutting a
burning swathe through a venom-clouded sky.

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Harry is not a sidereal, is likely to never become a sidereal, but he is a Starborn, and the history rhymes. Putting between him a choice of what to do with the terrible, terrible power he can exert power upon is a good temptation. And turning him against Molly is also a good idea for Outsiders.

 

[Earth-Destroyer]

We asked this way back during character creation, no being an Exalted and a Mage at the same time. Sorcery is not an exception as all splats can learn it, it just sucks compared to all the other powers. Sorcery is great for mortals, trash for everybody else apart from certain rare things that only the ultra high levels 4+ give, so a massive XP sink for 1 or 2 useful things, which is not a good trade when you can get 7-9 better powers in you own splat for that same XP.

 

[BronzeTongue]

In any case it's unlikely for an exaltation to be here for him to take in the first place. They're not exactly supposed to be accessible to hand out for the powers of this age. Not everything is or should be exalted in a rubber mask either, and this is a trial of spirit for a wizard.

It should result in him getting some wizard related buff. Potentially an Arete improvement, but it'd be fun if it was something a little more distinct too.

One potential option would be a high dot conditional magic merit that has an otherwise banned condition for the bonus, like "being inside creation". A 3+ difficulty reducer on Arete rolls at pretty much all times would be a sufficiently tempting prize for walking into the closest thing the setting has to a Caul.


If we're going super bullshit there's also the immunity merit:

Immunity

(Variable points) [Guide to the Traditions - Physical Merit]

There is one peril to which your character is completely immune, even to the magical versions. Perhaps, like Mithridates, your mage slowly built up an immunity to all poisons, even those concocted by the Euthanatos. Perhaps he had an accident in the lab and now all metal phases harmlessly through his body, even magic swords and comic-book alloys - or it bounces off his chest. Perhaps it still cuts, but the wounds don't bleed and they seal up immediately.

However, this invulnerability is only to the particular thing, not to any secondary or tertiary effects - Fenris may have blessed your character so that he is unscathed by the teeth and claws of wolves, even werewolves, but that does nothing to stop the silver sword or even the damage when the werewolf pounds your mage's head into a wall. (Fenris, after all, said you'd be unharmed by wolves, not by architecture.) Likewise, even if metal doesn't exist for your mage, it does for his lab coat, and a bullet's going to pack quite a wallop before it shreds the cloth. And even if the faeries at your christening said that no mortal man could ever harm you, that proviso doesn't apply to vampires, or the magics that mortal man might command, or even - for that matter - to his 1957 Chevy Bel Aire.

Your mage might be immune to all physical harm, save one thing, like beheading, incineration or being stabbed through the heart with a dagger thrice blessed by three separate Popes; or he might be immune to all things save in one spot, like Achilles' hell or Siegfried's shoulder. However, this will not prevent him from being turned into a rutabaga, having his soul stolen, being sealed in Lucite or sent into orbit, though his body (if not his sanity) will withstand all these things. He'll merely be an invulnerable soulless rutabaga orbiting the earth in a Lucite block while his enemies look for a third Pope to bless a dagger.

Immunities vary in price, depending on their lethality and their frequency, much as Vulnerabilities do. You must buy each Immunity separately, although a Storyteller may allow a number of similar Immunities (basilisks, snakes, toadstools, iocaine powder) to be packaged as one more common Immunity. Total immunity continues to go up in price depending on the size of the chink in your armor.

Alternately, for half the price of any given Immunity, your character may be Resistant to a particular bane - taking only half damage, rounded down, or reducing your soak roll difficulties by 3... your choice. Anything doing only one die of damage, you ignore.

Points	Condition
2	A minor nuisance (poison oak, common cold) or a very rare threat (basilisks, the Ebola virus.)
4	A major threat (disease, hunger, supernatural evil gook) or a moderately rare threat (poisons, extreme heat or cold, raw magic Levin bolts, death spells.)
6	A terminal threat (asphyxiation, drowning) or a common threat (fire, metals.)
8	Invulnerable to all physical threats, but with one large weak spot (the head, the neck, the chest) or one common bane (fire, edged weapons, drowning.)
10	Invulnerable to all physical threats, but with one tiny weak spot (Siegfried's shoulder, Achilles' heel, the spot where the third eye would go) or one rare bane (silver bullets, mistletoe, deadly nightshade one common bane in one large spot (edged weapons vs. the neck, i.e. beheading,) or one common bane in a specific circumstance (a gun fired by a woman.) Or immune to all physical threats save those which inflict aggravated damage, or immune to all physical threats save oneself - can be strangled with a rope made of own hair, mentally commanded to gnaw own arm off or destroyed with own Phylactery. Alternately, mage is invulnerable until Phylactery is destroyed or Phylactery is invulnerable until mage is destroyed.
12	Invulnerable to all physical threats, but with one very rare bane (the bite of an Egyptian asp, nuclear radiation, a specific ritual cast by a master mage,) one rare bane in a tiny spot (a stake of twisted rose briars through the heart,) or one rare bane in a very specific set of circumstances (poisoned with belladonna by a beautiful woman.)
14	Invulnerable to all physical threats, but with the bane being an extreme rarity (a dagger thrice blessed by three Popes, the elixir of eighty evil essences,) or one very rare bane in a highly specific set of circumstances (dragged through the streets of Baghdad by wild horses during the month of Ramadan.)
16	Invulnerable to all physical threats except one unique bane (the Holy Lance of Longinus, the Sword of Roland,) or invulnerable until Phylactery destroyed, requiring an equally unique bane.

This Merit may also be taken in conjunction with the Vulnerability Flaw, especially if the Vulnerability is something common and not usually deadly, such as water. Thus, it costs only three points total to be the Wicked Witch of the West, Immune to every variety of harm except being doused with a cleaning bucket. ("I'm melting! I'm melting! Oh who would have thought a good little girl like you could destroy all my beautiful wickedness!")

Objects, especially Phylacteries, may also have Immunity to physical perils, but Storytellers should impose some limit on size so min-maxers will not use this merit to create invulnerable dreadnoughts and impenetrable fortresses. The larger the object, the less of it can be invulnerable. You can have an indestructible moped, but your '57 Chevy won't have puncture-proof tires, and your Winnebago of Doom can have the tires blown out and the windows smashed even while the rest of it remains unscathed. Likewise, your cozy witch's cottage will just need to be re-thatched after the dragon attack, but your mansion will be gutted with nothing left but smoke-blackened walls. However, you can have the last laugh by making your Phylactery your castle, and making the one way to defeat your castle's Immunity being your own death. That way, if your enemies ever sneak into your sanctum and kill you, they get to deal with the castle collapsing on their heads - a common staple of sorcerous fiction.

Need we even mention that this merit can be phenomenally abusive?

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Cite
But not for physical harm, more like the effect of one of our splendors baked into his soul. He stood unbowed by the temptations of the Outside, and so becomes immune to direct attacks on his mind or soul. A mirror to how when the stars align the Outside can offer immunity to mortal magic.

Guess we'll see, assuming we don't screw up.

 

[Degorium]

no being an Exalted and a Mage at the same time

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To use magic at the cost of Essence? Interesting thought. On the one hand it would make you a worse wizard than an equivalent talent since Essence has to be spent in 1 mote packets, which is vastly overkill for any magic a beginner might use, but magic is very, very flexible once you get a grip on it. So I am going to say it is a path of research you guys can take, but you should be very certain you can deal with the XP expenditure, there is a considerably higher investment to get powerful effects, more than any single path.

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I feel like that meme from The Simpsons of the bus driver. The signs right here guys like a quote from the quest master.

I really don't understand why people are like authoritatively saying there is no crossover when we have met beings that are also just completely other things and also Wizards like white vampires and possibly black vampires and broken Seeker who is a God and also a wizard and the war God who is a fairy and also a wizard because they could use wizard counter Magic on our charms.

 

[BronzeTongue]

I feel like that meme from The Simpsons of the bus driver. The signs right here guys like a quote from the quest master.

I really don't understand why people are like authoritatively saying there is no crossover when we have met beings that are also just completely other things and also Wizards like white vampires and possibly black vampires and broken Seeker who is a God and also a wizard and the war God who is a fairy and also a wizard because they could use wizard counter Magic on our charms.

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Vampires don't do mortal magic in the DF, they have their own thing going on. I also don't buy that a god needs to use magic themselves to be able to teach a wizard about how to use it. Teaching a physics course for engineers doesn't necessarily require you to be capable of doing whatever they do with that knowledge.

Broken Seeker is something of a special case because he's taking something out of mortal souls to give himself the ability, which he can only do because of the type of spirit he originally was before falling.

Most supernatural creatures have some magical abilities, but they aren't able to act with the flexibility of a wizard. Lea, for example, can play evoker with the best of them. As long as you're asking for Winter theme stuff. A Winter fey is completely incapable of summoning enough warmth to heat a can of soup, much less set people on fire.

The counter magic stuff from Iku doesn't make him a wizard, he was using the mechanics because it's already defined.

A GM quote about how we could potentially research a way break the default rule after exalting isn't the same as there actually being innate compatibility. Which the ExWoD explicitly bans as a starting condition for exalts. Molly probably had at least Mind 1 when she exalted, and what we saw happen was that she completely lost it.

 

[Degorium]

GM quote about how we could potentially research a way break the default rule after exalting isn't the same as there actually being innate compatibility.

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I actually completely am in agreement and acknowledgment of that fact but people aren't saying "generally you can't in circumstances be two different Splat creatures" every single one of those I've replied that quote to are like absolute statements that are immediately falsifiable. That are made in such a way as to close possibilities for no actual reason.

To be honest I don't think we should go down that road Molly at this point is infernal exalted Alchemist Maybe and she was barely a wizard as far as instruction goes anyway to begin with.

If Dresden exalted his whole life is being a wizard that shit's not going to leave his mind at all and these people that are like claiming that it's like completely impossible one are just completely ignoring the word of the quest master.

Two why? why would you close the possibility if it would make good story and trials and tribulations for a character to go through if it's not narratively restricted and it's not system wise restricted and it might make a good or cool narrative Point why close the possibility.

On some level it just screams I don't know I was going to say something there about being bound by largely arbitrary rules that are very explicitly meant for the context the initial crossover was set it you don't want exalts using Mage Powers because either you have to edit in Paradox for them or you have to keep them from you know completely fucking over the narrative role Mages actually serve but in Dresden Files Wizards don't serve that purpose at all.

Reality isn't on the brink from within it is from without there is a God here that actually administers everything that goes on with it they are not Demi urges or anything like that so what niche of theirs are you protecting that isn't already completely trampled by the exalted being here already.

As it stands in Dresden Files as far as projecting white wolf / world of Darkness Splats onto the setting the exalted, the Imbued, the sorcerers and the Mages are all the same thing in Dresden Files humans with magic. There is no larger thematic push for wizards in Dresden Files.

Hell Dresden says it best when he challenges Ethnui when a wizard is at their best they can force someone bigger to look you in the eye and have to address you. That's the exalted whole bit. From the lips of the main character of the series we're crossing over into we are already eating up the Wizards whole bit.

I don't know just absolute terms that close off avenues for no apparent reason other than arbitrary restrictions that don't actually apply to the crossover setting we're in just doesn't make sense to me and is actually kind of vaguely irritating because well I like leaving options open even if they never are likely to be explored.

Holy hell that came out way longer than I thought it was going to.

 

[DragonParadox]

Vote closed.

Adhoc vote count started by DragonParadox on Oct 20, 2024 at 1:47 PM, finished with 93 posts and 21 votes.

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  [X] Harry is silent, asking nothing

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  1 people have voted

  [X] Harry asks one of the myriad of questions he has about Molly and her nature
  -[X] "Who created the... crown Molly is wearing."

  • NinjaOfOrthanc

 

[firefrog600]

if you think about it isn't the true prize of the labyrinth the friends we made along the way?

 

[uju32]

That is very explicitly not the claim you are making and is Shifting the goalposts and is all so not relevant to the starborn in general or Wizards exulting as with what happened in the beginning of this Quest.

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It is the claim Im making.
If you missed it due to a lack of clarity in my messaging, my apologies.

Harry has at that point multiple means of actually acquiring immortality if he so wished to never mind the fact that Wizards are insanely long lived by their lonesome.

There is a variety of reasons she could have said that it's not that starborn are inherently immortal because the only other star born that is still alive other than fucking Harry is dracul and he's turned himself into some kind of abomination.

So forgive me if I don't take in starborn's are Immortal as fact because that's insane why would I do that.

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Thats not true.
Harry has no method of acquiring immortality. He has the Darkhallow ritual in his head, but that is only guaranteed to give him a power up, with no guarantee of extending lifespan, let alone immortality.

Furthermore, Harry Dresden lived in Arctis Tor for six months at the beginning of Cold Days. He saw Mab every day during that time period, in part because she was training him(and by that, I mean throwing daily assassination attempts at him) to help his physical recovery.

If she wanted to talk about immortality in the abstract, she had ample time to do so.
She didnt.
Not until Battle Ground, when whatever it is Harry is begins to become relevant

Mab doesnt do idle chit chat, not with Dresden at least, and she cant lie.
When she calls a person an elemental of destruction, and starts going on incidental tangents about immortality, she is speaking what she believes to be true. And its conspicuous how McCoy, his grandfather starts acting shifty right then.

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This is fine yet again I'm not disagreeing with a narrative beat or a narrative role for Harry and that in relation to exaltation but you are making claims about eligibility and capability of exultation that are not backed up by The Story So Far and you do it with absolute terms like Wizards cannot be exalted when the quest starts with a wizard exalting it's just insane to me.

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1)It is backed by the source documents that I just provided to you.
We dont know if the QM made an exception for Molly, or if the rules are different here for wizards.

2)Wizards are not synonymous with Starborn.
2 of the 3x known Starborn in canon Dresdenverse are not wizards.

You are assuming that starborn is a condition on the level of being a mummy a vampire a full on Mage with a attached Spirit a hunter with a full-on attached spirit being a full-on fairy because the kithane are fairies they just have flesh suits on.

That requires proof because it's just not true Harry is a person, a wizard of flesh and blood, he doesn't have any particular bonuses except Against The Outsiders and even then those bonuses are in telling them to fuck off or come in.

He doesn't have any innate power other than that everything stems from him being a wizard and being a wizard isn't enough to prevent you from exalting you are assigning too much metaphysical and general Width to starborb that isn't proven in this Quest, isn't proven in Dresden Files proper and makes no sense

Never mind that starborn is literally another name for the Sidereals so it's like completely orthogonal to reason to believe that that is enough. The fact that the starborn get whittled down every 666 years and that Harry is one of the few starborn's left in this cycle and there's only a fellowship of 100 Sidereals total makes it seem like there might be something to that.

In this Quest we know that they are souls from creation so it's like immediately if you're assigning immortality to them you are making a weird off base assumption based on things that haven't been said in this Quest and are only kind of vaguely hinted at in your own interpretation of the queen of air and darkness.

I literally agree that it doesn't make sense narratively for Harry to be an exalt it very least not in this moment but you made the assertation that he can't be and there's literally nothing to back that assumption.

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I am not assuming anything.
I am stating that we do NOT know. There is no precedent for it that we know of. You are the one making assumptions that its something that will comfortably co-exist with the causality vortex that is an Exaltation


This is not true.
We are explicitly told by Lash in canon that being Starborn comes with power over Outsiders

Spoiler: White Night c41 Lash and Harry

Then a look of almost childish resentment came over her face, and she looked over one shoulder before turning back to me. "I…" She shook her head and said, very softly, wonderingly, "She… doesn't deserve you."
Deserved or not, the fallen angel wasn't getting me. Not ever.
Lasciel squared her shoulders and straightened. "You're right," she said. "It is my choice. Listen to me." She leaned closer, her eyes intent. "Vittorio has been given power. That is how he can do this. He is possessed."
I wished I could have raised my eyebrows. Possessed by what?
"An Outsider," Lasciel said. "I have felt such a presence before. This attack is drawn directly from the mind of the Outsider."
Gosh, that was interesting. Not relevant, but interesting.
"It is relevant," Lasciel said, "because of the circumstances of your birth—because of why you were born, Harry. Your mother found the strength to escape Lord Raith for a reason."
What the hell was she talking about?
Thud-thump : 1:26.
"There was a complex confluence of events, of energies, of circumstances that would have given a child born under them the potential to wield power over Outsiders."
Which didn't make any sense. Outsiders were all but immune to magic. It took power garnered only from centuries of study and practice, wielded by the most powerful wizards on the planet, even to slow them down.
"Strange, then, don't you think, that you defeated one when you were sixteen years old?"
What? Since when? The only serious victory I'd had over a spiritual entity when I was that young had been when my old master had sent an assassin demon after me. It hadn't turned out the way DuMorne had been hoping.
Lasciel leaned closer. "He Who Walks Behind is an Outsider, Harry. A terrible creature, the most potent of the Walkers, a powerful knight among their ruling entities. But when he came for you, you overthrew him."
True. I had. It was all still a little blurry, but I remembered the end of the fight well enough. Lots and lots of kaboom, and then no more demon. And there was a burning building.
Thud-thump : 1:25.
"Listen," Lasciel said, giving my head a little shake. "You have the potential to hold great power over them. You may be able to escape the power now held over you. If you are sure it is what you want, I can give you an opportunity to defy Malvora's sending. But you'll have to hurry. I don't know how long it will take to throw it off, and they are almost upon you."
After which, we were going to have a long talk about my mother and these Outsiders and their relation to the Black Court and exactly what the hell was going on.
Lasciel—Lash, rather—nodded once and said, "I will tell you all that I can, Harry."
Then she rose and stepped past me and toward the oncoming ghouls and Vitto Malvora. Her clothes made a slow, soft rustle as she stepped away from me, and Marcone's stopwatch went thud —

Harry banished He Who Walks Behind at the age of 16; he didnt even know what it was.

Its not a wizard thing either; of the three confirmed Starborn in the series that we know of, Harry is the only wizard.
The other two are Listen, a Fomor minion who is an augmented mortal with no magic whatsoever.
And Drakul, who has never been human and isnt a wizard.

===
Starborn is not another name for the Sidereals.

They have NEVER been called that in Exalted to my recollection, and there is nothing here in this quest so far that in Dresden Files or in World of Darkness. The basic arithmetic would tell you that its not plausible, since there are only around 100 Sidereal Exalts, and we know that ~40,000 Starborn were born in this cycle alone.

---

Vampires don't do mortal magic in the DF, they have their own thing going on. I also don't buy that a god needs to use magic themselves to be able to teach a wizard about how to use it. Teaching a physics course for engineers doesn't necessarily require you to be capable of doing whatever they do with that knowledge.

Click to shrink...

To be fair?
We know Odin taught the Merlin, and Dresden has canonically seen Odin use magic three times in canon: Chitchen Itza in Changes, Demonreach in Cold Days, and Chicago in Battle Ground.

He was also at ground zero for the throw down between Ethniu, the Erlking, Titania and Odin.
He simply describes it as them throwing Power at each other. Not something unfamiliar, just something beyond him

Spoiler: Battle Ground Ethniu vs Titania Odin Erlking

And standing ten feet off, facing away from me, the Queen of Summer, Titania, faced Ethniu, eye to eye, standing as tall as the Titan. The Summer Queen wore leather armor, all in flickering shades of green, like sunlight passing through fluttering leaves on a warm spring day. Her silver-white hair was braided with ivy and flowers. She carried no weapons, and she stood alone—but the legion of the Fomor, it seemed, could hardly bring themselves to so much as look at her, much less approach.

Titania's voice rang into the night like a silver bell. "Clever of you, Ethniu, to attack my sister at midsummer, when she is at her weakest." A growl of thunder added punctuation to the end of her sentence. "But it was shortsighted to assume she would stand alone."

There was a thrumming in the air, a quivering sensation of nauseated terror that went through me like a bullet, and suddenly the silver-grey eight-legged steed whom the legends named Sleipnir thundered out of the night sky, its hooves digging up mounds of earth to arrest its momentum. The great horse reared, kicking the scorched air with all four forehooves, and the terrible shadow upon its back lifted a hand that suddenly clasped a bolt of lightning.

When the Erlking landed, he did so in total silence, despite the heavy faemetal plate he wore over his usual hunting leathers. He landed in a crouch, flanking the Titan opposite the terrible rider, and drew his antler-handled hunting sword as he faced Ethniu.

I wanted nothing at all to do with this fight, and I started trying to worm out of the immediate blast radius without being noticed.

"I give you this single opportunity," Titania continued. "Withdraw from the mortal world. Return to your sanctuary. It will end here."

"As if you could offer or deny me anything I chose to take," Ethniu snarled. "Petty little demigod."

And with that she unleashed the power of the Eye.

Titania was waiting for it.

The torrent of destructive fire struck out at Titania—but rather than trying to oppose or endure it, she did the opposite. She spread her arms wide, rolled at her hips and lower back in a peculiarly dancelike motion, and rather than striking her, the torrent of energy bent and twisted, sending all that heat and hate spiraling up into the night sky.

Up into the sky that had, only a moment before, been full of freezing air and sleet, courtesy of the Winter Lady.

To call what happened next "rain" is something of an understatement.

Great, grinding thunder raised its voice in a throaty roar, and the air turned to falling water.

Water and magic are awfully finicky around each other. Enough running water tends to disperse and ground out magical energy, so much so that entities whose existence most depended on magic dared not cross even a running stream.

Titania didn't so much summon a thunderstorm as she created an improvised waterfall.

Down smashed the rain so thickly that I had to cover my mouth with a hand in order to be able to breathe.

And I felt the shift in power happening.

The terror of the city and its hovering magical potential in the air began to melt away like a sandcastle before the tide. The water sluiced down over the city, washing the air clean once more. Magic began to bleed out of the air and sink back into the earth, drawn along by the heavy rain.

It couldn't come down that hard for very long. It was maybe thirty seconds. Definitely no more than sixty. And then the rain abruptly stopped, as if a switch had been thrown, and only a few light, sporadic raindrops continued to fall. The city went from a roar to almost complete silence. The quivering reservoir of concentrated dread, ready to be collected and used, had withered and melted away.

And with its energy supply abruptly missing, the sullen fire of the Eye guttered and nearly went out.

Ethniu let out a short, sharp exhalation and lifted her left hand to the Eye.

Titania lowered her face, gleaming from the flood, and focused bright green feline eyes upon the Titan, her expression as set and immovable as the earth.

Sleipnir screamed and reared again, the great beast straining against the reins, eager to fight, while the blue-white fire of the living lightning in the hand of its great rider cast flickering nightmare shadows upon the ground all around them.

The Erlking gave her a wolfish smile.

And then the immortals went to war.

It happened fast. Everything was a blur of motion and energy. Sounds tumbled one upon another so rapidly that it was impossible to pick out or identify any given portion of it. Lights flashed so brightly that I had to cry out against the intensity.

None of them bothered with physical weapons. They all threw Power at one another. They all had been using it for century upon century. They were all better than me, with minds capable of shaping and forming multiple workings of Power simultaneously. I couldn't have tracked that duel, not even if I'd been at one hundred percent and had signed guarantees of safety. Participating in it? Laughable.

There was so much power there that my Sight started picking up images, like a light so bright that it hurt even through closed eyelids. Each of the combatants blurred, as if multiple layers of the same image had suddenly started performing multiple separate actions. I was struck by the sudden overwhelming perception that I was looking at potential realities, possible realities, all overlapping while immortal minds fought to see into the future and adjusted and counteradjusted their actions based upon what they could perceive there. So not only were they all doing multiple things at once; they were all thinking through every available possibility. That was like . . . simultaneously playing an entirely mental game of 3-D chess while juggling a running chain saw, a lit torch, and a bowling ball, all while balancing on a slack rope.

And then they took all of that vision and Power and potential and condensed it into a single instant. When they cut loose, the immortals fought one another all at once: They brought the totality of their being to the table, expending their energy all in the smallest area and time frame possible, concentrating their enormous Power with inhuman precision.

So there was light that tore at my eyes and sound that clawed at my ears, a nauseating ripple in the air caused by so much energy being unleashed in so small an area, and a clap of thunder.

And then there was a smoldering crater in the ground where the four of them had been standing faced off against one another.

Where the Erlking had been there was only a burned shape. Half of it was a skeleton, charred black. The other half looked like a lot of melted metal and cooked meat.

Sleipnir lay on his side, stunned, several yards away. Beside him lay his rider, his dark cloak and hood smoldering.

And Ethniu stood in the center of the smoking crater, her feet planted wide and confident, holding a limp, apparently unconscious Titania by the throat, the Summer Queen's feet dangling six inches off the ground. Ethniu's Titanic bronze skin-slash-armor had been scorched but not dented. She was breathing hard and looked unsteady, her eyes wide.

 

[DragonParadox]

The Essence of Things ​

18th of February 2007 A.D.

I wanted to tell Peepers Creepers down there to shove his question where the sun doesn't shine, but something told me anything I might say in here would be taken for agreement. Sometimes, as a great director once put to film the winning move is not to play. As soon as the thought crossed my mind time the silence grew oppressive, the blood that had been beating in my ears slowed, time itself stretched taunt into eternity. Why isn't he saying anything? I was suddenly struck by the horrifying idea that in here time was at the warlock's whims, he could just leave me like this for months, years, decades of subjective time until I choose something or went mad. That's not making an unsolvable labyrinth is it, just a long one.

I stepped closer to the wall and tried to tap my foot against it, but there was no sound, no sense of hitting something even. I snapped my fingers, nothing again, clenched my fist until it should have hurt. No pain. Nothing at all. Soon I couldn't feel the floor under my feet or the air going through my lungs.

I had do...Fuck that, are you a wizard Dresden or some conjuror of cheap tricks?

Thinking about it there were two ways this could be happening, either thing was in my head, even deeper in my head than Lash used to be, able to edit out all my senses until I did what it wanted or... this was normal, this was the true shape of the realm Molly had called the Labyrinth, formless shapeless nothing with only the Eye from Outside looking in, lies and visions stretched taunt over top. Exclude option one for the moment what did that mean for me? If there was no floor for me to stand on how did I have feet?

I 'looked' down to find I did not in fact have feet. It is at this point that most people would panic, being a wizard I saved the panic for later and tried to figure out what it meant. If I wasn't my body that I was my soul and I do not recall giving Evil McBland or his bosses back there any rights to hold my soul in place. So I picked a direction and...

Wyldfire trapped in a prison of Jade... So tragic... So lonely... So afraid... Don't be afraid...

The words swirled around me, rising to sharp peaks of worry and then falling to long valleys of calm. They reminded me of nothing so much as someone trying to shush a cranky baby.

So I screamed, not with my voice, but with my will, not with my lungs but with my soul.

The emptiness shattered around me like glass into a billion pieces, every sense rushing back in a cacophony of chaos. "Harry, Harry are you alright?"

Molly wavered in my sight like a heat mirage and then there were two of her, and then there were more, an endless parade down mirrors of brass.

"You know how you can taste food better when there's salt?" I heard a distant voice, like something in a dream.

"Yes..." she sounded worried. She sang, but wasn't part of the chorus.

"I think you're salt and everything else is... is... tasty."

There between my hands was a piece of... a light of... Everything the dark place had not been, earth, air, fire, water and life. It was a part of me and a part of the world, magic in its purest form.

Then I blacked out.

Harry Dresden has Awakened Essence (Equivalent Essence ●● Max Mote Pool 5)​

He must weave his mote pool though extended Arete roll at Base DC 7, each roll requiring an hour; 1 Success = 1 Mote. A Botch renders him unable to acess Essence until the next Sunrise or Sunset

• Can Learn Supernatural Martial Arts up to Terrestrial
• Can Study (Terrestrial) Ancient Sorcery
• Can freely gift motes to Exalted, though not the reverse
• Can freely convert his motes back into successes to any spells he casts

Harry has demonstrated Essence manipulation then collapsed from the strain?

[] Sophia can heal him, you still need to find the Merlin

[] Harry has already pushed himself too much, get him to safety then continue without him

[] Write in

OOC: The trials were in order Compassion: forgiving Ebeneezer, Conviction, not falling the the cruelty of thinking he knows best or the cruelty of using the Labyrinth to drag the vampire in, Valor: resisting the terrors the Hollow Man unleashed and Temperance: knowing when not to speak. Saying anything even to be a wiseass there at the end would have been bad.

 

[DragonParadox]

Rolls
Dealing with the silence... not good
Rolling Prime Sphere to use his magic affinity to get himself out of this
HOW MUCH DOES HE SEE?... Quite a lot as it happens.
Molly to catch him... if you failed this he would get dropped at random in the catabombs

 

[Alectai]

Well, that's a significant boost to Harry, yeah, easily on par with Soulfire from canon.