Green Flame Rising (Exalted vs Dresden Files)

[X] Try to question the dead (Lydia rolls Empathy+Charisma at -2 DC; Obvious)

We must let our teammates have their time in the sun, even if that sun is green and shinning out of our forehead as we go nuclear hellfire princess and run down the cultists trying to flee.

For those who didn't catch that, this is a real park.
 
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Well Charred Sinner doesn't heal aggravated damage and when exalted fight each other or other exalted level threats almost all the damage is aggravated. I suspect because that is how the meta developed in creation. In DF lethal damage is usually enough and where it isn't having iron/silver/whatever weakness is enough.
Yeah, main function is quick essence restoration. Normally Exalts struggle with that. Healing Agg... Infernals got two other charms for that, Digesting the Great Beast and Pattern Primacy. They are pretty good.

Digesting the Great Beast in particular pretty much gives Lunar regen if you activate it with big enough dice pool. Given that there is a couple of "regen a health level every turn" effects in Linear Magic, I wonder if we could try a regen-soak build...
 
Yeah, main function is quick essence restoration. Normally Exalts struggle with that. Healing Agg... Infernals got two other charms for that, Digesting the Great Beast and Pattern Primacy. They are pretty good.

Digesting the Great Beast in particular pretty much gives Lunar regen if you activate it with big enough dice pool. Given that there is a couple of "regen a health level every turn" effects in Linear Magic, I wonder if we could try a regen-soak build...
Sort of wish we could get permission to talk to bob on the phone whenever we want. A talk with bob basically always recovers essence with us. That skull is a forbidden lore reactor.
 
I am not sure if this rates funny or insightful.

Maybe one day.
Molly on the phone with Bob discussing forbidden lore is oddly practical as well as awesome. Might be able to take on a whole supernatural army that way. Could afford to do perfect defenses every round.

Might want to have the conversation in some completely unknown language though.

Also now you can put funny on one post and insightful on the other.
 
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We do only get bonus essence from forbidden lore once per scene, so there's a limit there, but it still lets us recover pretty quickly. And a hotline to Bob is good for other reasons, since he doesn't have the narrative occult malus for out of date information.

Now if we can only convince Harry that it's a good idea for Bob to have constant access to a cyberdevil hotline directly to us…
 
This feels really weird to ask but does porn count as forbidden lore?

It is forbidden and lots of it is lore.

Self ninja nevermind
Once per scene The Infernal may replenish two points of Essence whenever she learns secretive or forbidden lore of the supernatural world, or binds an unwholesome being into her service.

Has to be supernatural.
 
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This feels really weird to ask but does porn count as forbidden lore?

It is forbidden and lots of it is lore.

Self ninja nevermind
Once per scene The Infernal may replenish two points of Essence whenever she learns secretive or forbidden lore of the supernatural world, or binds an unwholesome being into her service.

Has to be supernatural.
So yes, then. Just get a copy of Lara Raith's Greatest Hits and we're set for an Essence buffet.

(I joke, of course. That's not forbidden at all because she sells it openly.)
 
I found the material on ExWoD-dedicated discord that I found in an old 2020 RPG.Net thread I accidentally found with a google "Exalted Versus World of Darkness" request. A moment, I'll ask for permissions to post the links.
@uju32

Join the The Original ExWoD and Demake server Discord Server!

Check out the The Original ExWoD and Demake server community on Discord - hang out with 181 other members and enjoy free voice and text chat.

docs.google.com

Exalted vs. the World of Darkness: Divine Workings

Exalted vs the World of Darkness: Divine Workings This is a supplement designed for my Healing World homebrew. It is meant to be used in combination with that article, but does not strictly have to be. Any listed differences for the Healing World version will be bolded and have (HW) at the end t...
Workings homebrew specifically. Supposedly unfinished.

Preparations make a big difference. That was everything she had at hand, at that moment. Difference between "just" activating all social charms you got on a short notice, and truly preparing everything you got could easily be 10-15 dice.
Thank you very much.

True. Still, I feel putting Charity in this dicepool range should be a reasonable guesstimate, assuming she is using some form of mysticism.

I still feel that the probability of us disturbing Charity's workings are low enough that we should attempt collaboration. We don't have any evidence that she observes any specific rituals that would be disturbed by our presence, and in general exalted could collaborate with pretty much anyone they wanted.

I think we could afford to buy at least Alchemy 2, maybe Alchemy 3 this purchase turn. That would give us more actions per day (the "sleep one hour per week with no consequences" potion is 2 dots), and at 3 we start making magical materials (that give inherent magical armor protection).
You're still missing the point. I'll try and explain the problem one more time.

Faith magic is at best, only partly the provenance of the human practitioner. In the Dresdenverse magic system, most of the examples of Faith magic we've seen have been empowered and guided by the White God or his agents. You are dealing with magical two-factor authentication, and the second factor is botn a little more potent than a mortal human, and under no obligation to do things like you specify.

And Molly has no way to perceive, persuade or compel Divine actors to invest their mojo.
Or any idea of the potential consequences.

To reuse my analogy, you are doing the equivalent of a low to mid-tier DnD wizard assuming that they can get a DnD cleric's Divine patron to do something just by involving the cleric.
Which is not how it works narratively.

I see where you're coming from, but I don't want to get bogged down in dips that eventually become outdated if we can avoid it.
We don't need to min-max, but getting too spread out makes for a weaker character both mechanically and thematically.
Eh.
Not sure I agree.

Where Laughter Stills
COMMENTARY
Darn!" you shake your head looking at the guard. One more question had gotten you the 'doctor's' number, but the guard did not have enough of an affinity to whatever magic was done here to tell you what Way Niemi would have taken out of here. At least you learned one thing out of asking it. If you try to use a focus that is not good enough to set the eyes upon your crown upon it's just like grabbing for something that isn't there, momentarily confusing, but without any higher cost.
1)Point of correction: The question about Ways was in reference to this:
Next you start to draw out tools from the boundless pit of your shadow. First an incinerator of brass and black stone though before you make use of it you ask of the corpose what are the identities of the Pathfinder members. A mental list of eighty seven names is not what you had expected, nor the addendum 'those who open the way..'The way to what?
No harm done though; we'll just assume this guard wasnt a sufficiently strong arcane link for it.
The sorcerer would have been though. So would Niemi.

2) If Niemi used a Way to escape his office, it would mean that he has access to at least five Sorcery Paths:
Summoning/Warding/Binding, Hellfire, Fascination, Illusion AND Conveyance.

A sorcerer strong enough to be involved in Summoning Iku Turso, with the Fascination/Illusion to put up perceptual wards around the nursing home, the Hellfire to use entropic magics as essentially demo charges, and the Conveyance to open a Way from his office to a meet point? Is genuinely impressive. And rare.

Or, he could be a straight up wizard-tier talent. Or just using Sponsored Magic, of course.
Luckily for you, and unluckily for the fleeing Pathfinders not all of them had the chance to flee along the Ways and their path on the streets of Cleveland is easily tracked to the shores of Lake Erie, to a place called Euclid Beach Park, a former amusement park according to the internet, emphasis on 'former'.
Okay. *Googles Euclid Beach Park*
I assumed they'd have a safehouse, but if they are gathering in the open on a shoreside abandoned park at 8/9pm on a summer night, then there's good odds they are just going to attempt to open a Way from that location and run away.

The fact they keep ending up on coastlines suggests their patron has strong aquatic links though.
Could be Fomor, which would mean Ethniu, and links to Celtic mythology.
Could be Outsider instead; at least one Old One is supposed to sleep underwater.
 
This feels really weird to ask but does porn count as forbidden lore?

It is forbidden and lots of it is lore.

Self ninja nevermind
Once per scene The Infernal may replenish two points of Essence whenever she learns secretive or forbidden lore of the supernatural world, or binds an unwholesome being into her service.

Has to be supernatural.
Just watch movies starring Lara Romany.
You're still missing the point. I'll try and explain the problem one more time.

Faith magic is at best, only partly the provenance of the human practitioner. In the Dresdenverse magic system, most of the examples of Faith magic we've seen have been empowered and guided by the White God or his agents. You are dealing with magical two-factor authentication, and the second factor is botn a little more potent than a mortal human, and under no obligation to do things like you specify.
A lot of this is your supposition.
And Molly has no way to perceive, persuade or compel Divine actors to invest their mojo.
Yeah, that's Charity's prerogative. Molly could only compel infernal actors.
To reuse my analogy, you are doing the equivalent of a low to mid-tier DnD wizard assuming that they can get a DnD cleric's Divine patron to do something just by involving the cleric.
1) Why low-to-mid? As my calculations show, we can be throwing 10+ successes easily. That's not low level in Dresdenverse. At all. When making stuff like thermal underwear for our dad, we could be getting close to 20 successes.
2) Why are you assuming that Michael's and Charity's patrons wouldn't be interested in helping? Uriel wants Michael alive, healthy, and successful. We are allies. We are helping the good guys. I see little to no reason for them to spur us.
 
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A twisting, turning wooden half-cylinder with no rails rose over a field long since colonized with chickweed and crabgrass the yellow heads of dandelion and the white cups bindweed flowers looking out from among the half rotted posts of what had once been a popcorn stand. Everywhere bright colors are peeling to dirty browns and greys like half withered flowers. Only the two story brick arc of the park gate seems to have survived the passage of time strangely intact.

As the wind blows out from the lake you can hear, or think you hear at least the faint tinkle of bells on the breeze. The hint of childish laughter is definitely your imagination though... definitely.
Thats a Way gate.
The termination point of a path through the NeverNever.
What do you do?

[] Try to question the dead (Lydia rolls Empathy+Charisma at -2 DC; Obvious)
[] Try to find the Pathfinders within the park the old fashioned way (Lydia and Michael roll Intelligence+Investigation making use of the maps Clippy downloaded for you)
[] Use the Crown on the park itself to find out if they are still here or just passing through (-1 Essence)
[] Write in

VOTE
[X] Try to question the dead (Lydia rolls Empathy+Charisma at -2 DC; Obvious)

If successful, this option gives us the most information of all three options.

Lydia questioning the dead at -2DC is a DC4 action.
Pros: it gives us numbers of cultists, any allies, if they are humping gear, if there are any stashes, tells us if they've used this place before, and gives Lydia a chance to shine. Literally.

Cons: It's obvious.
On a summer night; 24th July is a waning moon, so glowing girls will stand out a long way.
 
Oddly I think he's the last person we should give any direct powerup to. The nature of the swords is to even the odds. They don't provide a specific powerup. They make him a match for whatever foe he faces. We can't change that fundamental nature. If we give him a powerup the sword is just going to do less because there is less it needs to do before things are in "balance".
What about if it's less a case of trying to improve the Sword as weapon and more trying to broaden it's potential utility?
What I'm thinking is giving it the ability to shapeshift or mould its mass so that the Weapon of God becomes a Tool of God; let it suture wounds, bend into pretzels to lighten the hears traumatized rescued children, act as a climbing tool, and shackle captured foes who Dad shows mercy to. Not purely to help dad, but also to help lift the faltering spirits of Amoracchius itself.
 
Thank you very much.


You're still missing the point. I'll try and explain the problem one more time.

Faith magic is at best, only partly the provenance of the human practitioner. In the Dresdenverse magic system, most of the examples of Faith magic we've seen have been empowered and guided by the White God or his agents. You are dealing with magical two-factor authentication, and the second factor is botn a little more potent than a mortal human, and under no obligation to do things like you specify.

And Molly has no way to perceive, persuade or compel Divine actors to invest their mojo.
Or any idea of the potential consequences.

To reuse my analogy, you are doing the equivalent of a low to mid-tier DnD wizard assuming that they can get a DnD cleric's Divine patron to do something just by involving the cleric.
Which is not how it works narratively.


Eh.
Not sure I agree.


COMMENTARY

1)Point of correction: The question about Ways was in reference to this:

No harm done though; we'll just assume this guard wasnt a sufficiently strong arcane link for it.
The sorcerer would have been though. So would Niemi.

2) If Niemi used a Way to escape his office, it would mean that he has access to at least five Sorcery Paths:
Summoning/Warding/Binding, Hellfire, Fascination, Illusion AND Conveyance.

A sorcerer strong enough to be involved in Summoning Iku Turso, with the Fascination/Illusion to put up perceptual wards around the nursing home, the Hellfire to use entropic magics as essentially demo charges, and the Conveyance to open a Way from his office to a meet point? Is genuinely impressive. And rare.

Or, he could be a straight up wizard-tier talent. Or just using Sponsored Magic, of course.

Okay. *Googles Euclid Beach Park*
I assumed they'd have a safehouse, but if they are gathering in the open on a shoreside abandoned park at 8/9pm on a summer night, then there's good odds they are just going to attempt to open a Way from that location and run away.

The fact they keep ending up on coastlines suggests their patron has strong aquatic links though.
Could be Fomor, which would mean Ethniu, and links to Celtic mythology.
Could be Outsider instead; at least one Old One is supposed to sleep underwater.

Oh yeah, the fundamantal nature of the Pathfinders is not something you can get off random goons.
 
What about if it's less a case of trying to improve the Sword as weapon and more trying to broaden it's potential utility?
What I'm thinking is giving it the ability to shapeshift or mould its mass so that the Weapon of God becomes a Tool of God; let it suture wounds, bend into pretzels to lighten the hears traumatized rescued children, act as a climbing tool, and shackle captured foes who Dad shows mercy to. Not purely to help dad, but also to help lift the faltering spirits of Amoracchius itself.
It already ensures that he has what he needs. Maybe not what he wants, but really actually needs to fulfil his mission from god. It is already one of the most powerful artifact weapons in the setting that is in mortal hands.
 
If Niemi used a Way to escape his office, it would mean that he has access to at least five Sorcery Paths:
Summoning/Warding/Binding, Hellfire, Fascination, Illusion AND Conveyance.

A sorcerer strong enough to be involved in Summoning Iku Turso, with the Fascination/Illusion to put up perceptual wards around the nursing home, the Hellfire to use entropic magics as essentially demo charges, and the Conveyance to open a Way from his office to a meet point? Is genuinely impressive. And rare.
You are putting a lot of weight on one man.
Maybe they had more Sorcerers and others contributed to the wards and some aspects of the Raksha-feeding machine.

Edit: Actually we definitly know they had more Sorcerers, we killed one after all.
 
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Oddly I think he's the last person we should give any direct powerup to. The nature of the swords is to even the odds. They don't provide a specific powerup. They make him a match for whatever foe he faces. We can't change that fundamental nature. If we give him a powerup the sword is just going to do less because there is less it needs to do before things are in "balance".
While we probably shouldn't do stuff like giving Michael combat regeneration, giving him better armor should absolutely be fair game. If better equipment resulted in worse performance, then Charity wouldn't be making him armor, and he'd be going out naked.
A sorcerer strong enough to be involved in Summoning Iku Turso, with the Fascination/Illusion to put up perceptual wards around the nursing home, the Hellfire to use entropic magics as essentially demo charges, and the Conveyance to open a Way from his office to a meet point? Is genuinely impressive. And rare.
He could well be a full wizard, having bartered "no techbane" bonus from powers of hell / raksha / outsiders. We should beware of his deathcurse. In fact, that the sorcerer Lydia killed didn't use his is interesting.
 
A lot of this is your supposition.
We've seen Faith magic in Grave Peril, in The Warrior, in Small Favor.
It does NOT function like wizard magic. They are almost invariably invoking the White God or asking him to do something; they arent doing stuff of their own power.

Yeah, that's Charity's prerogative. Molly could only compel infernal actors.
Point of order: Charity cannot compel aid.

1) Why low-to-mid? As my calculations show, we can be throwing 10+ successes easily. That's not low level in Dresdenverse. At all. When making stuff like thermal underwear for our dad, we could be getting close to 20 successes.

2) Why are you assuming that Michael's and Charity's patrons wouldn't be interested in helping? Uriel wants Michael alive, healthy, and successful. We are allies. We are helping the good guys. I see little to no reason for them to spur us.
1)Because, like a young DnD wizard, we have potential, but we are a medium size fish in a colossal sea.
There are much greater Powers out there playing games over thousands of years.
This is a reminder that Michael's backers include literal archangels. Craft has never been the issue.

2)Why are you assuming that they would? Why are you assuming they have the freedom to?
Or that their doing so would be consequence free?

Remember when Lasciel indulging her spite to get Dresden to commit suicide freed Uriel to take consequence-free countermeasures? Or how when Lucifer exerted himself to help the Denarians with the plot to corrupt the Archive allowed Uriel to give Dresden soulfire, and potentially intervene elsewhere?

Molly is an Infernal Exalt. That blurs the lines enough that we dont know where day to day considerations would fall.
There's a reason Uriel did not contact us directly but rather through an intermediary.

You are putting a lot of weight on one man.
Maybe they had more Sorcerers and others contributed to the wards and some aspects of the Raksha-feeding machine.
Maybe I am.
But full wizards are very rare, and I think sorcerers arent all that much more common either by population standards.

We've only seen Victor Sells(Storm Front. Alchemy, Summoning, Enchanting, Hellfire), Leonid Kravos(Grave Peril. Summoning, Oneiromancy,???), Mortimer Linquist(Death Rites. Ghost Story. Summoning, Channelling), Binder(Turn Coat.Skin Game. Summoning), Aristedes(Ghost Story. Kinetomancy, nonstandard Path) and the Korean kid warlock(Proven Guilty. Fascination, maybe Illusion)in canon as serious human sorcerers.

Kim Delaney(Summoning/Warding/Binding) was one as well, but died early.

So odds are if there's a magic user in the vicinity of a magical effect, he was the one responsible.
Dresdenverse version of Occam's Razor.
Also, if there had been more than two sorcerers on site at the nursing home, I'd have expected more of a fight.

While we probably shouldn't do stuff like giving Michael combat regeneration, giving him better armor should absolutely be fair game. If better equipment resulted in worse performance, then Charity wouldn't be making him armor, and he'd be going out naked.

He could well be a full wizard, having bartered "no techbane" bonus from powers of hell / raksha / outsiders. We should beware of his deathcurse. In fact, that the sorcerer Lydia killed didn't use his is interesting.
Possible. But I doubt it.
You're more likely to have a sorcerer barter for wizard power and knowledge WITHOUT techbane, than to have a wizard barter for relief from techbane. IMO.

IF he is prepared to use it. Getting oneshotted by a teenage girl doesnt give you the time to do that. Dude didnt even have shields.
Neither Grevane nor Corpsetaker were prepared to use theirs.
Neither was Aleron LaFortier.
 
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If better equipment resulted in worse performance, then Charity wouldn't be making him armor, and he'd be going out naked.
The sword might equalize things, but I doubt that it makes Mikelle weaker. So armor is very useful against any non-supernatural threats his might face. Same logic likely apply to boosts we give him. We are doing it out of love after all.
 
So odds are if there's a magic user in the vicinity of a magical effect, he was the one responsible.
Dresdenverse version of Occam's Razor.
Also, if there had been more than two sorcerers on site at the nursing home, I'd have expected more of a fight.
The dead guy might have been the expert on warding, for example.
Even two can share the load.

And a sorcerer that has to fight unexpectedly like this one dies easily, no matter how good they are at their speciality.
Might have made any smarter minor practicioner run from the commotion, rather than towards it like the dead idiot.

As for minor practicioners, there are more in the backround than the named ones.
Enough to seemingly make up most of McAnally's business, if everyone in there knows to leave the house when feuding Fey Ladies enter.
 
1)Because, like a young DnD wizard, we have potential, but we are a medium size fish in a colossal sea.
There are much greater Powers out there playing games over thousands of years.
This is a reminder that Michael's backers include literal archangels. Craft has never been the issue.
We might be a middle of the pool fish in the global cosmic scale, but in the mortal realms we are distinctly not.
2)Why are you assuming that they would? Why are you assuming they have the freedom to?
Or that their doing so would be consequence free?

Remember when Lasciel indulging her spite to get Dresden to commit suicide freed Uriel to take consequence-free countermeasures? Or how when Lucifer exerted himself to help the Denarians with the plot to corrupt the Archive allowed Uriel to give Dresden soulfire, and potentially intervene elsewhere?

Molly is an Infernal Exalt. That blurs the lines enough that we dont know where day to day considerations would fall.
There's a reason Uriel did not contact us directly but rather through an intermediary.
If Charity can use faith magic (an asuumption) to make supernaturally good armor when working alone, what is stopping her from using same faith magic when working together with someone else?
 
Thinking about the knights swords ability to equalize. The biggest advantage of that likely is reputation. No sane knight is going to gamble on a 50% chance if they can at all help it. God helps those who help themselves after all. They stack the odds in their favor whenever possible. However since all the supernatural nasties out there know that no fight against a knight can ever be a guarantee for them and they very much appreciate their own hide they avoid fighting or attacking a knight if they can at all avoid it.

Even if you are very upset about how this good gooder is going around ruining your plans it still makes more sense to keep track of where he is generally (like knowing his license plate number) then to force a confrontation that you can never be sure you are going to win.
 
On the matter of how good Michael's armor is you guys could just take a look at it and see if Molly feels like she can improve on it, that would be perfectly IC to check and Michael himself certainly would not mind.
 
Faith magic doesn't rely on a god, let alone the White God, intervening at all.

Harry's use of his pentacle medallion as a symbol of his faith in magic itself is explicitly called out as a form of faith magic that repels red and black court vampires in exactly the same way as a cross wielded by a devout Christian.
 
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