No sword sadly, there is only one of Usum.
Green Flame Rising (Exalted vs Dresden Files)
- Thread starter DragonParadox
- Start date
- Crossover Fantasy
No sword sadly, there is only one of Usum.
She's a fey; manipulating the truth is what they do. Unless they specifically make a statement binding two clauses together it's unwise to assume connection from simple proximity. That sort of thing is one of their classic tricks.
Incidentally, Harry actually does have a cheap super coffee. It doesn't do as much as the potion you're posting does, but it isn't expensive to make. From the wiki it takes coffee, a beam of dawn sunshine, a cock's crow, soap, a washcloth, a doughnut, a todo list, and some bright music.
While potion making can be expensive or weird, a significant amount of that isn't strictly necessary. Like a lot of other things in DF wizardry, in most cases the ingredients are props rather than containing power themselves.
Theoretically a wizard tier alchemist could skip them entirely and basically enchant water to do whatever they want, including stuff they usually can't cast directly like transforming into wind for a brief pseudo-teleport, but in practice most don't have the ability to mentally and spiritually contort themselves in the right way to generate the correct magical construct without props.
The relevance here being that it seems like being a good alchemist is in part being good at arguing with yourself about the interpretations of various symbols, and that substitution shouldn't be much of a problem until you get into the really esoteric stuff.
I think the real reason that Harry doesn't use them more is that they don't fit the feel of the stories, so Butcher just sort of ignored them outside of specific Mcguffins that show up for individual plots.
Goldfish
Friendly Spider-Fish Abomination
- Location
- Formerly of the Far Realm
It could also be that Harry just isn't really all that good at alchemy and doesn't trust it in comparison to his more practiced abilities. He's very young by wizard standards, after all, and his education was kinda spotty compared to most of his peers. Between that and just not having much time to focus on more than a handful of disciplines, it makes sense that some of them, like alchemy, fall by the wayside.
"Less sleep" potions could be refluffed as as efficient sleep aids, and such. Although generic example is stylized toward super-turbo energy drink, that doesn't have to be so, especially given that we cook on essence with Exalted dicepools.
But by far least controversial sleep minimization method is one dot of healing, tbh. It is a standardized "you sleep well" ritual. That's as good as it gets.
As a general rule, the only thing to concern yourself with is mental health. Physiology of a Celestial Exalt just... Doesn't care. Molly can soak aggravated damage and heals from major chronic illnesses and genetic defects in weeks. She breaks herself on the regular for Shih training and is fine 15 minutes later.
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Vote closed, let's go see Thomas.
You're not wrong, but there's some places where the oversight seems dramatic. Potions not keeping well is part of it, but given how cheap his escape potion is and how he brewed it in like half an hour or something not having one on him on a regular basis seems strange.
Using it up and not having time to make another within the context of a single high tempo investigation sure, but now many times would being able to flee a building through physical obstacles have saved him crucial time and from significant injury?
Winning Vote
Arc 4 Post 11: Bitter Brews and Broken Fate
Bitter Brews and Broken Fates
8th of August 2006 A.D.
If there is one word you do not normally associate with Starbucks its 'fancy'... that if obvious because you have not been taking your coffee on the Gold Coast where one can enjoy a promenade on the sandy beech enjoy historic mansions, designer boutiques, celebrated restaurants, and historic hotels or if the mood takes you for a coffee in between looking upon the sweeping vistas left behind in the wake of the Great Fire a Starbucks that is build like a love letter to coffee itself. Copper tubes coil down from the polished wood fittings as gleaming steel pistons press down on the various glass vessels each filled with a different grade of bean, with its own handwritten note beside it even. One might mistake the Roastery Reserve & Tasting Room for some alchemical laboratory if you were not actually and alchemist.
Well OK alchemist in training, you allow recalling the viscous silvery sludge filled with eye-like bubbles you had produced just this morning in an attempt to cure the common cold, but really science had been trying to cure the common cold for centuries. It's bound to take you more than a week.
There is something soothing about the sound of grinding beans, the faint bubbling of pots underlying the dozens upon dozens of voices, young and old, English Spanish, French and even a smartening of Japanese. A bit of a tourist trap granted, but a nice one to hang out in and it's not like you do not have money to overpay for coffee these days.
As you take your third sip of said decadent beverage you feel a paradoxically foreign and familiar sensation well up; something between opening an immense eye and the beat of a vast heart, but with elements that don't truly belong to either. Guided by some instinct just as strange you turn your head to look towards the door and there you see the dark haired man whom you had last met in the dark hart of winter looking just as put together as one might imagine him in a simple pair of jeans and a white T-Shirt that stretches out fascinatingly over muscles you could model a Roman Lorica off of.
His eyes are up there Molly, you chide yourself, hiding a smile. Said blue-grey eyes however are open in shock, looking like nothing so much as a man who's last step ended with a gut-wrenching click.
"It's good to see you under better circumstances Thomas. I can't promise this won't be a little strange for both of us; but it should be a little less, well, Harry than how we met."
And just like that the tension is broken with a faint huff of laughter as he reaches out a hand to shake yours. Something tells you he is more used to kissing a lady's hand than shaking it.
"You have changed Miss Carpenter," there's a slight catch in his throat as he actually manages to miss your hand and almost knocks over the cup of a middle-aged lady on the table beside yours, not that she seems to mind. Her boyfriend or husband or whatever he is on the other hand... Maybe Thomas does not have those muscles just to show off, you think, maybe they are a way to keep the daggers of jealousy being cast his way purely metaphysical.
"All shall love me and despair?" You try for the reference. Alas it does not seem to land even as you manage to grasp his hand with minimal awkwardness into a brisk shake. "Oh come on you do not know Lord of the Rings? Didn't even watch the movies, they are really good you know."
"I've met enough elves to know they are not kindly and the less said of dark lords the better," he says the last is said more softly, more to himself than to you almost.
Lost 1 Essence -> Now at 10/12
There's your opening, you know it with the cold certainty of a hunting hawk in sight of a rabbit, though you know hardly anything else about Thomas Raith at the moment you know that he is miserable in whatever arrangements his elders had made of his life. You did not want to talk to Harry about it too much, in case he'd start worrying about you being chummy with vampires, but you do know the White Court and the white Council do not see eye to eye on much and yet he had been willing to come to Harry's call to rescue you from Winter's heart.
Maybe not all the vampires that need saving are in the sewers, you think, but caution yourself not to rush into anything. "I have a project in Undertown." You pause.
"Yes?" Thomas asks, obviously working to reel in his composure
"I was waiting for you to warn me that it's not safe or something," you admit sheepishly. "Had my arguments all lined up and everything."
"I think you will be fine Miss Carpenter." His laughter has an edge of wonderment to it.
"Why thank you kind sir oh and please call me Molly. Miss Carpenter sounds like you are doing row call and you are way too young for that." And handsome, the not very helpful part of your brain notes. Objectively you are aware his looks like the lure of an angler fish, but it's such a pretty light and you are pretty sure you are the giant squid in this analogy not whatever anglers eat.
He nods and takes as seat as you consider how to explain your ability to ease the lives of your subordinates without sounding like you are trying to make him into one. At the very least you do not think he will doubt you have the powers you say you have even if you have never used them before.
How do you explain Mercy In servitude to Thomas?
[] My shadow swallows up the shadows of any who serve me, allowing me to lift from them the burden of hunger, want and pain
[] It seems I have the powers of a general or a despot and so it it within my reach to proclaim an pause on certain curses upon those who serve me so long as that service is true
[] Write in
OOC: For anyone wondering I stole both the picture and the name of the Starbucks from one in Seattle which opened in 2014, but this is an AU with vampires and wizards so I think it works fine. When you guys visit Seatle I'll be sure to give them something from Chicago in exchange.
- Location
- Brazil, São Paulo, Cunha
[X] My shadow swallows up the shadows of any who serve me, allowing me to lift from them the burden of hunger, want and pain
[X] So, you know how I'm a kickass girl now? I'm apparently a kickass metaphysical tyrant girl with magical girl powers that work on funny concepts. More seriously, I got a new tyrant employment policy. I can give special health benefits for my employees! Including things like easing all sorts of hunger, want, and pain. All sorts.
Yzarc
The Spark of Madness
[X] So, you know how I'm a kickass girl now? I'm apparently a kickass metaphysical tyrant girl with magical girl powers that work on funny concepts. More seriously, I got a new tyrant employment policy. I can give special health benefits for my employees! Including things like easing all sorts of hunger, want, and pain. All sorts.
Good enough for me.
Good enough for me.
The issue is that it's involuntary.
[X] So, you know how I'm a kickass girl now? I'm apparently a kickass metaphysical tyrant girl with magical girl powers that work on funny concepts. If someone is recognized by... I don't know, the universal laws? to work under my authority, they are automatically put under the aegis of my protection. This includes protection from supernatural maladies, such as various types of vampiric hunger.
Can we tell him to get us a cup of coffee, consider that loyal service, and let him experience a moment without the hunger for the duration it takes for him to get our coffee?
Because I can't think of another way to demonstrate our power to him.
Because I can't think of another way to demonstrate our power to him.
[x] It seems I have the powers of a general or a despot and so it it within my reach to proclaim an pause on certain curses upon those who serve me so long as that service is true
Oh, I like it. I like it a lot!
[X] "Let me give you a demonstration, please? Could you grab me a refill? I swear, it's not dangerous" you say, indicating to your almost empty cup. When he returns, you explain further: "Did you notice your hunger quieting while you were helping me? Apparently, being a scary and powerful being comes with a sort of authority. And that authority extends to those who follow me, even in such minor things. Think of it as a health benefit package to employment. It's an automatic incentive program, not anything incurring any sort of debt or cost"
[X] "Let me give you a demonstration, please? Could you grab me a refill? I swear, it's not dangerous" you say, indicating to your almost empty cup. When he returns, you explain further: "Did you notice your hunger quieting while you were helping me? Apparently, being a scary and powerful being comes with a sort of authority. And that authority extends to those who follow me, even in such minor things. Think of it as a health benefit package to employment. It's an automatic incentive program, not anything incurring any sort of debt or cost"
If he wants we can give him a follow order to not be a dick.
If he wants we can give him a follow order to not be a dick.
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[X] "Let me give you a demonstration, please? Could you grab me a refill? I swear, it's not dangerous" you say, indicating to your almost empty cup. When he returns, you explain further: "Did you notice your hunger quieting while you were helping me? Apparently, being a scary and powerful being comes with a sort of authority. And that authority extends to those who follow me, even in such minor things. Think of it as a health benefit package to employment. It's an automatic incentive program, not anything incurring any sort of debt or cost"
That dings the recruitment bell, which Thomas might react poorly to. He should be intimately aware of the "first one is free" principle.
Ye gods and little fishes, Thomas might as well have had subtitles with those rolls. Getting smacked with the doom aura and then legendary positive social successes must be a trip from his perspective.
It's like watching a werewolf toss milkbones to a golden retriever.
Which is why I specify that this incurs no costs or debts. It's an automatic health benefit bonus.
EDIT:
The funniest possible thing to happen in this quest would be if we overprepare for Mab, and she also botches her rolls. Like, Etiquette and Empathy 7 (5 dots + 2 from alchemy potions), Perception and Charisma 6 (5 dots + 1 dot potion), excellency, CCC, BSM, WHWH, stunt, the perception difficulty modifier, a Fortune path difficulty modifier, all rolled together. With like 20+ successes as a result.
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- Location
- Hive City Ares, Armageddon, Segmentum Solar
[X] "Let me give you a demonstration, please? Could you grab me a refill? I swear, it's not dangerous" you say, indicating to your almost empty cup. When he returns, you explain further: "Did you notice your hunger quieting while you were helping me? Apparently, being a scary and powerful being comes with a sort of authority. And that authority extends to those who follow me, even in such minor things. Think of it as a health benefit package to employment. It's an automatic incentive program, not anything incurring any sort of debt or cost"