Green Flame Rising (Exalted vs Dresden Files)

I'll note in its long history wardens being converted by red court is pretty much guaranteed right? Now recently I don't really remember any examples though.
Turning wardens would be exceedingly difficult, what with them not wanting to be turned, death-cursing you in the face if it looks like it might happen, and still needing to get them to kill someone once theyre half infected, when they have lifetimes of mental discipline training that may help them hold it together long enough to get away (or, again, death cursing you in the face).
 
Creatures of Darkness are not unnecessarily unnatural. It is a blurry category that isn't helped by a number of cosmic beings being capable of shuffling arbitrary things into it. Elder Solars had a charm that was capable of declaring absolutely anyone a Creature of Darkness at one point, for example.
 
Anyway, let's discuss what we actually want to do next. Red Court is surprisingly on our side here, or at least they tell their mooks / field operatives (can't be a complete mook if he was tasked with a seduction mission, as I don't think he meant to enthrall us) that they are. This is interesting, as they have been seen summoning outsiders previously. Either outsiders are different from raksha, or it's a matter of "it's ok to use depleted uranium bullets, but if someone is unearthing the nuke, and it's not us, we should stop them".

In any case, working together with the Red Court on this mission opens up a lot of possiblities to gather intel about them (thanks to the crown and our monstrous social against them as creatures of darkness). If we were a social-specialized exalt, I could see us subverting the whole infiltration team and turning them into our cult. We are not, however. So... It's a question of "do we want Red Court to get a chance of observing us in action"? Pros and cons, I guess. I think we should visit his boss and take over the operation. Or at least take the operative control and establish boundaries (like "if you touch the mortals to deny the enemy their goal, I'll burn your whole operation to the ground and then hang you with your own entrails" boundaries).
 
That the red court occasionally oppooses nasty stuff is perfectly logical. They may have little compunction about using outsiders, but they (or at least the vast majority) certainly dont want to see the world or humanity destroyed. Theyve controlled most of a continent and various other holdings for milennia, and presumably have done quite a bit to keep other threats there contained or out, quite sucessfully, given what kind of horrible messes erupted after they were erased.
 
[X] "Take us to your leader" you command imperiously.
-[X] Go meet this Don Phillipe de Leon. Learn what he knows, and establish boundaries on acceptable tactics during your cooperation, brief as it may be. No harming the innocents, no collateral damage, unless it can't be avoided, stuff like this.
--[X] Use excellency for certain and ipm if needed.
 
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It doesn't feel right to kill the dude after we possibly made him soil himself inside his flesh mask. I would be down for it, but Michael probably wouldn't agree.

If we show up at the nest, though, maybe they'll give us a good reason to murder them all without parental disappointment?

[X] Yog
 
Creatures of Darkness are not unnecessarily unnatural. It is a blurry category that isn't helped by a number of cosmic beings being capable of shuffling arbitrary things into it. Elder Solars had a charm that was capable of declaring absolutely anyone a Creature of Darkness at one point, for example.
Yeah, here's the definition from the solar section of ExWoD

creatUres of darkness...?
To formally cover the major supernatural beings of the World of Darkness:
Creature ...of Darkness?
Most vampires Yes
Vampires in Golconda
No
Most werewolves/Fera No
Black Spiral Dancers
Yes
Banes Yes
Fomori
Yes
Most mages No
Nephandi
Yes
Most wraiths No
Spectres
Yes
Most changelings No
Thallain, sluagh, redcaps
Yes
Imbued hunters No
Demons
Yes
Mummies No
Hungry Dead
Yes
In general, mortals "touched" by the supernatu- ral such as ghouls and Kinfolk aren't creatures of darkness. If in doubt, assume that anything that is undead, intrinsically connected to darkness or nightmares, or has been corrupted by or born from forces of cosmic corruption or entropy is a creature of darkness, while anything else isn't. This does, it should be noted, mean that some creatures of dark- ness aren't really "evil" in the conventional sense (Sluagh fairies, for example, are born of nightmares but may want to do nothing more offensive than drink tea in their favorite musty old bookshop and frighten children who are too loud), but intrinsical- ly evil beings are always creatures of darkness (such as Banes). Abyssal, Liminal, and Infernal Exalted are always creatures of darkness
So it probably comes down to if her particular variety of death fueled divinity is considered connected to darkness or not. Since she was probably sired during the period in which her father was fueled by unclaimed death power via high tier necromancy I think there are good odds she qualifies.
So... It's a question of "do we want Red Court to get a chance of observing us in action"?
Definitely not. We might be able to worst with red vampires on an individual basis if necessary or they seem like they can reform from being murder monsters (though I have my doubts about a vast majority of them doing so for any reason other than force) , but the political structures of the court are toxic waste. The more they know about us the worse off things will be when dealing with them going forwards.

If we work with the team here we need to kill everyone we can't completely subvert.

… think god will stop smiting them if we convince them to convert and join a Catholic monastery? Then we could just make them Uriel's problem. :V

Edit; dropped double quote
 
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How inherently evil are red court vampires in Dresden lore? Like can they drink blood without killing the donor? How many humans does it take to sustain a red court without anyone dieing?
 
How inherently evil are red court vampires in Dresden lore? Like can they drink blood without killing the donor? How many humans does it take to sustain a red court without anyone dieing?
It takes killing someone to become a red court vampire fully. However, afterwards you can sustain yourself without killing anyone. As a whole red court is definitely evil, though perhaps not as completely evil as black court. As individuals I would guess ot varies at least a bit, but one has to remember that the Red Court is a hierarchical totalitarian organisation. There are no "renegade independent red court originated vampires", or at least none that we see in canon. There's also a question of how much the court as a whole is infected / in league with Nemesis.
 
"I know he's a bad boy, daddy, but I can reform him, I swear!". I.e. the classical argument rebellious daughters trying to date bad boys make. More seriously, I regret not having Mercy in Servitude or other servitude charms to make him not need blood and to fully take him into our service.

I can reform him with the power of love! And by love I mean ancient magics that bind him utterly to my will!

How inherently evil are red court vampires in Dresden lore? Like can they drink blood without killing the donor? How many humans does it take to sustain a red court without anyone dieing?

Per our new servant, red court could theoretically not kill people from blood drinking. Realistically lmao no, they dont have the empathy to care and rampire spit is like supernatural meth in terms of mental and physical effects on human thralls
 
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Per our new servant, red court could theoretically not kill people from blood drinking. Realistically lmao no, they dont have the empathy to care and rampire spit is like supernatural meth in terms of mental and physical effects on human thralls
I know this is maybe going off topic a bit, but does anything stop a rampire from drinking blood from a cup? Like, Thomas and other white courts needs to feed off of emotions, so that messes up the donor. In principle can a "good guy" red court "embezzle" at a blood bank and in principle be a functional member of society?
 
I know this is maybe going off topic a bit, but does anything stop a rampire from drinking blood from a cup? Like, Thomas and other white courts needs to feed off of emotions, so that messes up the donor. In principle can a "good guy" red court "embezzle" at a blood bank and in principle be a functional member of society?
That might be possible, but generally most supernatural predators are more interested in "Life" then the substance that carries it by itself.
 
Also, I noticed that the top 2 stunts aren't mutually exclusive… although in hindsight I'm glad the HMP vote didn't win, since I just realized that, between the Crown and the Occult Excellency, the Intimidate Excellency will be our third spent mote this scene. Adding a fourth with HMP would cause anima flare, and we aren't ready for that right now.
Different scene.
We moved from Nieminen's gravesite to a bench outside the burial grounds proper but still on the cemetery grounds.


What Darkness Dreads
COMMENTARY
-Traffic cameras.
Something for the Cyberdevils to hack into while we're asleep tonight. I'd worry about his being tracked, but Im reasonably sure that when necessary coincidence makes it so that his license plate isnt seen.

-Looks like we're lodging outside Cleveland.
A place with a subverted police department is not somewhere to book a hotel room.

-Called it on the Reds being interlopers. So there's at least two factions we know about: the Reds and the Pathfinders. And Im reasonably sure they arent the only ones in play, just the ones we've seen signs of.

Cleveland has a population of around 350k, and the metro area has around 3 million people.
Thats large enough to support a significant supernatural scene, and I doubt either the Pathfinder op or the Red infestation has gone unnoticed.

-Assuming dude is too terrified to lie to us?
Going to note that while Andre certainly seems to believe they are here to shut this down? His boss probably has contingency plans to see if he can attempt to take control of this thing, if it can be done.

I mean, Reds can infiltrate law enforcement and make thralls with hypnotic mind control and their spit.

The most straightforward strategy would be to thrall some of the home staff to commit health violations, used the cops they infiltrated to trump up charges and shut the entire nursing home down and disperse the residents.
One week, maybe two.

Instead they are setting up a local base where they have access to lots of humans nightly, and subverted part of the police department so any missing person investigations come into contact with human thralls.
Something smells.

-Andre La Blanche is a French name, which makes him less than a hundred years based on likely Red Court demographics.
Probably less than fifty. Nowhere near the actual circles of power.

Philippe de Leon otoh is Hispanic, either original Spanish from the conquistadorial era or a convert from after colonialism.
Which makes him no more than five hundred or so years. We are probably looking at one of Paolo Ortega's deputies and replacements after McCoy asteroid dropped his estate.

Someone with competence. And ambition.
And at least a working knowledge of magic, if hes riding point on something like this.
He's either a sorcerer, or he has a sorcerer in tow.


I'll note in its long history wardens being converted by red court is pretty much guaranteed right? Now recently I don't really remember any examples though.
No recorded successful case. Its a fear, but there is no indication that its ever actually happened.
Plus, Rampires have to first capture you, then infect you, and get you to drink someone's blood until they die in order to become a Red Court vampire yourself.

Wizard death curse makes attempting to take a Warden captive a very perilous endeavor.

I mean, we showed kindness to little data demons, I don't think this guy is intrinsically different.
But circumstances are very, exceedingly different.
The same arguments that apply to not executing death penalty cases probably apply here.
But the options available to Molly change when she has a Hell/Kingdom in which to throw people on probation.
And when she gets fomor/bakemono charms to simply change a Rampire.
 
Adhoc vote count started by Goldfish on Oct 31, 2022 at 1:22 PM, finished with 36 posts and 6 votes.

  • [X] "Take us to your leader" you command imperiously.
    -[X] Go meet this Don Phillipe de Leon. Learn what he knows, and establish boundaries on acceptable tactics during your cooperation, brief as it may be. No harming the innocents, no collateral damage, unless it can't be avoided, stuff like this.
    --[X] Use excellency for certain and ipm if needed.
    [X] The vampire has served his purpose
    -[X] Release him
    -[X] Storm the Soul's Rest tonight before the vampires are ready.
 
[X] "Take us to your leader" you command imperiously.
-[X] Go meet this Don Phillipe de Leon. Learn what he knows, and establish boundaries on acceptable tactics during your cooperation, brief as it may be. No harming the innocents, no collateral damage, unless it can't be avoided, stuff like this.
--[X] Use excellency for certain and ipm if needed.
You dont walk into a vampire's base in the nighttime without preparation or a Go To Hell plan.
You especially dont do so when said base is a nightclub with hundreds of civilian attendees nightly, representing a shitton of potential collateral damage.

And it would be nice to determine the extent of the police department's infiltration before jumping into a situation that culd have us having to duck law enforcement fire or an APB.

And like I pointed out above, Andre is telling the truth to the best of his knowledge.
That does not say anything about his bosses ultimate goals, which are unlikely to have been shared with a lowlevel scout
The Reds could want the Pathfinder thing shut down, and still have their own plans for the chtonic entity uderwater.

Get external verification.
 
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You dont walk into a vampire's base in the nighttime without preparation or a Go To Hell plan.
You especially dont do so when said base is a nightclub with hundreds of civilian attendees nightly, representing a shitton of potential collateral damage.

And it would be nice to determine the extent of the police department's infiltration before jumping into a situation that culd have us having to duck law enforcement fire or an APB.

And like I pointed out above, Andre is telling the truth to the best of his knowledge.
That does not say anything about his bosses ultimate goals, which are unlikely to have been shared with a lowlevel scout
The Reds could want the Pathfinder thing shut down, and still have their own plans for the chtonic entity uderwater.

Get external verification.
For a moment, the vampires seem to be interested in secrecy of their operations. The guy was sent to delay us because the vampires aren't ready (which implies that "Knight of the Cross rides into town and the eldrich thing is destroyed / prevented from being released" is not the acceptable solution, meaning that the vampires do want to take advantage of the situation). I honestly do not expect this to come to a fight at the moment. Moreover, I do not expect the vampires to start a fight with a large collateral count.

The other factions are almost certainly venatori, up to and including Archive (depends on what sort of the creature this really is).

I guess that the alternative is to send this guy to his boss and establish a meeting at some neutral ground, to, again, set some ground rules for your possible cooperation. Or we go full "purge the xeno" and annihilate them.
 
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