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Green Flame Rising (Exalted vs Dresden Files)

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[x] The curse, you have a feeling your essence would make a hell of a knot of any enemy's fate
-[X]Occult Excellency
-[x]Stunt: Drawing on your knowledge of Kakuri the Night Realm you notice a few improvements to the bad luck charm. Not just giving bad luck, but luck with malice that makes everything feel hopeless and spiteful. Where all the world seems turned against you because it is. Every paper cuts, every tile edge stubs a toe, every drop of water causes a slip and the night does not hide them only blinds them.
-[X] If possible anoint yourself in oil in a ritual fashion to trigger Boiling Sea Mastery
 
[x] uju32
I feel the need to point out that false sun MAY be our start to tapping into Solar Essence. Not guaranteed but a start.
 
The Infernal breathes upon the black mirror of her heart, and becomes someone else. System: The Infernal spends 1 Essence, spends a moment concentrating, and dons a perfect illusion which causes her to appear to be someone else. This can be either a real person, or a fictitious individual of the Infernal's devising. This illusion fools all five senses. Deduction may reveal the Infernal for an impostor, but imperfections in the disguise itself never will. The illusion persists until the Infernal reflexively dismisses it, or until her anima flares.
Can we buy this and save ever having to buy appearance? Yes it is 5 dot, but it is also in a favored hell. Also this and The City Still Stands seem like the only 5 dots charms in our favored hells that might be worth buying.

By Agony Empowered (•••••) might have been, but we have had that discussion.
 
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Getting access to Solar charms would be great, but I don't think we'd be able to before we learn that Solars actually existed.

Infernals have their own associated sun - Green Sun, Ligier. That blocks the easy "What is that sun in my dreams?" sprit quests. Before learning Infernal version of Unconquered Hero's Faith, we'd have to jump through a lot of hoops. That would be looking for remains or heirs of Unconquered Sun, probably, or remaining Solar artifacts.
fictionfan said:
The Infernal breathes upon the black mirror of her heart, and becomes someone else. System: The Infernal spends 1 Essence, spends a moment concentrating, and dons a perfect illusion which causes her to appear to be someone else. This can be either a real person, or a fictitious individual of the Infernal's devising. This illusion fools all five senses. Deduction may reveal the Infernal for an impostor, but imperfections in the disguise itself never will. The illusion persists until the Infernal reflexively dismisses it, or until her anima flares.
Can we buy this and save ever having to buy appearance? Yes it is 5 dot, but it is also in a favored hell. Also this and The City Still Stands seem like the only 5 dots charms in our favored hells that seem worth buying.

By Agony Empowered (•••••) might have been, but we have had that discussion.
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Appearance change charms cannot be used to turn up your app to 5 without buying any dots. You might be able to talk GM into +1 bonus through, essentially, arcane make-up, but no more than that.

BMI is one of the charms that got really shafted in ExWoD. Seeing it in this state... Shame.

BAE is in a complicated place. DP nerfed it, ppl decided that nerfed version isn't worth 5 dots, DP agreed to downgrade it to 4 dots, then 3 dots, other disagreed, DP expressed annoyance and since then it is kind of in the air.

I think it going to become a whole let controversial after we get Murder is Meat + Eye of the Hurricane, or get that Shih power that gets stamina to 9 + some other +soak stuff, given the issue initially was not making Molly sharply invulnerable to mundane at E1-2.

DP ruling, autosux forbidden
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Ah, shame.
 
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If Black Mirror Inccarnation only mentioning 5 senses (even though it does say all) means that our demonlordhood still shines though to mystic senses then it isn't worth 5 dots either. Who gets a 5 dot charm to only fool not clued in mortals?
 
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fictionfan said:
If Black Mirror Inccarnation only mentioning 5 senses (even though it does say all) means that our demonlordhood still shines though to mystic senses then it isn't worth 5 dots either. Who gets a 5 dot charm to only fool not clued in mortals?
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shrug.jpg

Dev thinks "wow, illusion-based shapeshifting is very useful, could be applicable to many situations, prolly should nerf it a little to prevent abuse and then assign 5 dots"...

...While forgetting that Infernals can accomplish 80% of everything it does with a cosmetics case + Excellency.

Ooops.

It get worse if Infernal actually gets their hand on professional film-theatre-etc make-up artist kit. It gets significantly worse if QM allows Illusion path from various sorc books.

Although now that I re-reading the text of the charm, "Deduction may reveal the Infernal for an impostor, but imperfections in the disguise itself never will." might point toward the intent being it covering supernatural senses too. IDK.
 
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Ah yes, the old problem of "forgetting what mundane skills can accomplish when escalated to the level of Exalted dice pools." A classic of charm balancing problems. So many things that can be accomplished with high dots and an Excellency, it's easy to make a clever Exalt into something ridiculous right out of the gate.

To be fair, just the limits of what ordinary humans can accomplish with ordinary human skills in real life is pretty ridiculous and hard to believe. I remember reading about one magician that was famous for pickpocketing the president's secret service detail of their badges and the president's itinerary in the middle of a conversation without any of them noticing until he started handing them back. If that's just what peak human 10 dots looks like, I can hardly imagine what a proper Night Caste rolling 22 dice can pull off.
 
uju32 said:
1) BSM is of marginal use here.
We're throwing 20 dice at a Key ability, which due to TLF will be at DC4.
We are guaranteed Legendary success even if the rest of the coven contributes zero successes.
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And as I said, I want to go beyond legendary. I want 15+ successes. And every bit helps. Does BSM help here? It does. SO it should be used.
uju32 said:
2)I am not worried about the Ordo Lebes as a direct threat.
I do however care about who they talk to, willingly or not, and what those people do with that information.
Just like I care about who might be eavesdropping on us right now, which is something Anduriel, Master of Shadows is known for.



3)I will draw your attention to the fact that literally noone else here has told us what they can do.
Abby cant hide she appears to be a Divination Path primary, but every other initiate here has remained cagey about their capabilities, even the one with the invisible magic guardian.
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And we aren't telling them anything. We are participating in magic ritual with them. They will be doing their magic before our eyes. We will be free to draw our own conclusions, same as they are. I am not proposing to sit down and say "so, I have this ability to become better at all things when wet, and it also gives me ability to breathe underwater, and run on water, etc." I am proposing that we upend a bottle of water onto our head and do casting while wet. The most they can conclude based on this is... what exactly? That our magic is somehow liquid related?
uju32 said:
4)Two out of the three elements of this crossover are urban fantasy settings, where information security is a key element of the setting and where often small details can prove critical.

Case in point: Do you know how human magic users are contained in Dresden Files?
Option A: Antimagic bracelets if available
Option B: Hold them under running water. Because water dissipates most magical energies.

Critically, this was part of how Nicodemus held Dresden after capturing him in Death Masks.

I would rather keep everyone not in our close confidence under the impression that water is a weakness for us unless its actually necessary otherwise. And not just for an unnecessary flex.
Please.
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We are not a mortal magic user. At all. No one of any importance will ever mistake us for a mortal magic user. This is unnecessary and useless. And this ship has sailed already, see the underwater battle with red court vampires. We did blatant magic while submerged in water there. Upending a water bottle on our head and doing magic while wet isn't revealing anything new. And Anduriel was far more likely to have been looking then, than they are now, since they are likely to be spying on Michael during his "official" missions.
 
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Right now we are sort of interviewing the Ordo Lebes to see if we feel comfortable introducing Rosie to them.
 
Votes as they stand.
Adhoc vote count started by Yzarc on Dec 27, 2022 at 2:04 AM, finished with 107 posts and 15 votes.
  • [x] The curse, you have a feeling your essence would make a hell of a knot of any enemy's fate
    -[X]Call Lydia since she's running late, and get an ETA on her arrival
    -[X]Occult Excellency
    -[X]STUNT: Pursing your lips, you cross the room to take a second look into the corridor outside, then come back into the room, stomping on the floor repeatedly. "Wooden floorboards, here and in the corridor. Wooden doorframe. Wooden doors too." you say to yourself. Ash makes an unladylike grunt of realization, but Pauline and Abby both look visibly confused. "Enough power to give people full body burns through their clothes" you continue, addressing the group "is going to be enough power to set that entire corridor on fire, and trap the intruder AND occupant in a burning building." At their dawning looks of comprehension, you continue. "There's other civilians living here. Children too. Collateral damage." You see Beckitt flinch at the term, and file away that datum for later. "My opinion" you stress the word "is we go with the curse option. More precise. Also less likely to bring the police looking for who set off the bomb."
    [x] The curse, you have a feeling your essence would make a hell of a knot of any enemy's fate
    -[X] Occult and Leadership (if appropriate) excellencies
    -[X] Upend a bottle of water onto your head to trigger Boiling Sea Mastery
    -[X] Use tool transcending constructs (ideally limited to handheld ones) to prepare the physical anchors for the wards.
    -[X] Call Lydia and check when she's going to arrive. Ask others to wait for her, she could probably aid at least somewhat. Use the spare time to prepare the ritual site.
    -[X] Make it clear that, if possible, you'll be helping with both rituals, you are just starting with the curse one.
    -[X] STUNT: "... Ok, we'll wait for you to arrive before starting. Thanks, bye!" you close your phone, having finished talking to Lydia. In your hands, still wet from the bottle of water you upended on your head, brushes and other painting tools manifest, as, guided by your power, you draw symbols on the floor to make a ritual circle, all the while taking into account the input from Hellen and others, so it works best with how they do magic.
    [x] The curse, you have a feeling your essence would make a hell of a knot of any enemy's fate
    -[X]Occult Excellency
    -[x]Stunt: Drawing on your knowledge of Kakuri the Night Realm you notice a few improvements to the bad luck charm. Not just giving bad luck, but luck with malice that makes everything feel hopeless and spiteful. Where all the world seems turned against you because it is. Every paper cuts, every tile edge stubs a toe, every drop of water causes a slip and the night does not hide them only blinds them.
    -[X] If possible anoint yourself in oil in a ritual fashion to trigger Boiling Sea Mastery
    [x] The curse, you have a feeling your essence would make a hell of a knot of any enemy's fate
    -[x]Stunt: Drawing on your knowledge of Kakuri the Night Realm you notice a few improvements to the bad luck charm. Not just giving bad luck, but luck with malice that makes everything feel hopeless and spiteful. Where all the world seems turned against you because it is. Every paper cuts, every tile edge stubs a toe, every drop of water causes a slip and the night does not hide them only blinds them.
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[x] The curse, you have a feeling your essence would make a hell of a knot of any enemy's fate
-[X]Call Lydia since she's running late, and get an ETA on her arrival
-[X]Occult Excellency
-[X]STUNT: Pursing your lips, you cross the room to take a second look into the corridor outside, then come back into the room, stomping on the floor repeatedly. "Wooden floorboards, here and in the corridor. Wooden doorframe. Wooden doors too." you say to yourself. Ash makes an unladylike grunt of realization, but Pauline and Abby both look visibly confused. "Enough power to give people full body burns through their clothes" you continue, addressing the group "is going to be enough power to set that entire corridor on fire, and trap the intruder AND occupant in a burning building." At their dawning looks of comprehension, you continue. "There's other civilians living here. Children too. Collateral damage." You see Beckitt flinch at the term, and file away that datum for later. "My opinion" you stress the word "is we go with the curse option. More precise. Also less likely to bring the police looking for who set off the bomb."
 
uju32 said:
3)I will draw your attention to the fact that literally noone else here has told us what they can do.
Abby cant hide she appears to be a Divination Path primary, but every other initiate here has remained cagey about their capabilities, even the one with the invisible magic guardian.
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True, they didn't outright tell us, but they also didn't activly hide it.
Here's what I can find in the update:
Abby Douglas: Divination
Pauline: Curses
Anna: Enchantment
Hellen: Propably Mana Control if she thinks she can draw our Essence into the working
And we do certainly know that at least one of the three above, propably more have basic Warding and Binding or Via Geniorum to even start making wards in the first place.

From discussing options for the wards we found out quite a lot about their magic.
They did not reveal things needlessly, but they did say their relevant abilities for the project they are doing.
 
@DragonParadox
Minor question unrelated to the current issues, how did Emma-O actually use our Exaltation without a human host?

Assuming Usum can remember any of it.

I could see it as something like an Essence-battery, but the ability to actual use the Charms propably requires a human host.
Or in rituals to increase the effect like we are trying to do here?
 
Alratan said:
CCC is trivial to apply with a modicum of prep time for crafting. We should be able to apply it to anything we make at home. It's not tricky at all.
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The issue is not so much ability to apply it as a significant part of the playebase going "no, that's abuse, that's cheese, I hate it, nonono" even as DP actually approves using CCC that way.

That's a significantly harder problem to overcome.
 
Artemis1992 said:
@DragonParadox
Minor question unrelated to the current issues, how did Emma-O actually use our Exaltation without a human host?

Assuming Usum can remember any of it.

I could see it as something like an Essence-battery, but the ability to actual use the Charms propably requires a human host.
Or in rituals to increase the effect like we are trying to do here?
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As a focus for rituals of ruin and destruction, it was basically a siege weapon for him, a conceptual battering ram that worked at a level more fundamental than any of his akuma servants.
 
Prospalz said:
The issue is not so much ability to apply it as a significant part of the playebase going "no, that's abuse, that's cheese, I hate it, nonono" even as DP actually approves using CCC that way.

That's a significantly harder problem to overcome.
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For my part it's less the cheesiness than it is the risk. "A wizard notices something funny about your powers and exploits it" is a classic way to get murked in the Dresden Files.

It seems to me most people are on board with abusing it in a lab, but that trying it in an unknown or potentially adversarial environment is a nonstarter.
Yog said:
And we aren't telling them anything. We are participating in magic ritual with them. They will be doing their magic before our eyes. We will be free to draw our own conclusions, same as they are. I am not proposing to sit down and say "so, I have this ability to become better at all things when wet, and it also gives me ability to breathe underwater, and run on water, etc." I am proposing that we upend a bottle of water onto our head and do casting while wet. The most they can conclude based on this is... what exactly? That our magic is somehow liquid related?
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People aren't stupid, they won't pick out the charm, but it does give more data; at minimum that water is a material component for us. Something that will become easier to map as we continue to casually make use of it.

"What's the harm?" Is never the question for stuff like this; if you ask the world will be delighted to show you.

Their secrets aren't as valuable as ours; a one to one exchange isn't even close to balanced.

Taking a modicum of effort to conceal and confuse the issue is just good business.

[x] The curse, you have a feeling your essence would make a hell of a knot of any enemy's fate
-[X]Occult Excellency
-[x]Stunt: Drawing on your knowledge of Kakuri the Night Realm you notice a few improvements to the bad luck charm. Not just giving bad luck, but luck with malice that makes everything feel hopeless and spiteful. Where all the world seems turned against you because it is. Every paper cuts, every tile edge stubs a toe, every drop of water causes a slip and the night does not hide them only blinds them.
-[X] If possible anoint yourself in oil in a ritual fashion to trigger Boiling Sea Mastery

[X] Uju32
 
Yog said:
Sorry, I'll be frank. No, it's not good business. It's a counter-productive paranoia that potentially costs lives of innocent people for marginable, if any, gain.
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Using bottles of olive oil mixed with some additives or similar as our working material functionally masks what we're doing with a plausible explanation rooted in normal magic. I fail to see how it actually limits us in any real way.

As to the general principle; note that everybody from Bob, to Harry, to the Pauline have basically said "you really shouldn't just be sharing stuff". The traditions of the supernatural aren't just fun flavor, they're rooted in the fact that these guys live in a world where people eat each other and knowing the right secrets can make even the very powerful incredibly vulnerable.

Hell, the white god indulged in effectively the same behavior on his own behalf by almost immediately cutting a deal to keep us from looking at his stuff. Presumably he's not vulnerable, but the wrong information getting into the wild could make a mess that even he finds annoying to deal with.

Shrugging that off as stupid isn't rising above paranoia, it's an invitation to learn why everyone else we've ever talked has been cautious.
 
BronzeTongue said:
Using bottles of olive oil mixed with some additives or similar as our working material functionally masks what we're doing with a plausible explanation rooted in normal magic. I fail to see how it actually limits us in any real way.

As to the general principle; note that everybody from Bob, to Harry, to the Pauline have basically said "you really shouldn't just be sharing stuff". The traditions of the supernatural aren't just fun flavor, they're rooted in the fact that these guys live in a world where people eat each other and knowing the right secrets can make even the very powerful incredibly vulnerable.

Hell, the white god indulged in effectively the same behavior on his own behalf by almost immediately cutting a deal to keep us from looking at his stuff. Presumably he's not vulnerable, but the wrong information getting into the wild could make a mess that even he finds annoying to deal with.

Shrugging that off as stupid isn't rising above paranoia, it's an invitation to learn why everyone else we've ever talked has been cautious.
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Every case has to be evaluated on its own basis. In case of cyberdevils, yes, there is a point to keeping them secret. Them not being secret limits their utility strongly, harms our reputation, and opens a number of ways to counter them. In case of BSM... Ok, let's model the situation - people observe that Molly periodically dumps water on her head to no visible effect. Assuming this gets back to our enemies (that's already a strong assumption), what can they learn from it, and what can they do about it? They can hypothesize that water / being wet is somehow either necessary for us (false), or beneficial for us (true to an extent). What can they do about it? They can try to deny us access to it - very hard to do in a way that's not already an attack anyway. They can try to poison the water / substitute it for something else - useless against us, and likely cost. They can... I am drawing blank on further suggestions.

My point is - not only is it unlikely that us using BSM will leak from this specific incident, even if it does, it doesn't give our enemies actionable intel that harms us.
 
Yog said:
Every case has to be evaluated on its own basis. In case of cyberdevils, yes, there is a point to keeping them secret. Them not being secret limits their utility strongly, harms our reputation, and opens a number of ways to counter them. In case of BSM... Ok, let's model the situation - people observe that Molly periodically dumps water on her head to no visible effect. Assuming this gets back to our enemies (that's already a strong assumption), what can they learn from it, and what can they do about it? They can hypothesize that water / being wet is somehow either necessary for us (false), or beneficial for us (true to an extent). What can they do about it? They can try to deny us access to it - very hard to do in a way that's not already an attack anyway. They can try to poison the water / substitute it for something else - useless against us, and likely cost. They can... I am drawing blank on further suggestions.

My point is - not only is it unlikely that us using BSM will leak from this specific incident, even if it does, it doesn't give our enemies actionable intel that harms us.
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At the very least they will not think that water is hindering our magic like it is for most Dresden Files mages.
They won't try to trap us under water and be surprised and shocked when we get stronger rather than weaker.
 
Artemis1992 said:
At the very least they will not think that water is hindering our magic like it is for most Dresden Files mages.
They won't try to trap us under water and be surprised and shocked when we get stronger rather than weaker.
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As I said before - this ship has sailed already. We fought entirely submerged while doing obvious magic (sword conjuration, flight, and I think the aura) in the presence of a number of red court vampires while on an official Knight of the Cross Mission, i.e. the event that was likely spied on by Anduriel, against fomor. All the people that are our enemies and are likely to be our enemies, save maybe for white court, know of our immunity to running water already. And that's assuming they grab an idiot ball and think that we are a mortal mage and have the same limitations as they do, which is blatantly false at even the most cursory of glances.
 
BronzeTongue said:
For my part it's less the cheesiness than it is the risk. "A wizard notices something funny about your powers and exploits it" is a classic way to get murked in the Dresden Files.

It seems to me most people are on board with abusing it in a lab, but that trying it in an unknown or potentially adversarial environment is a nonstarter.
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I don't really feel like any of this is true, given how previous debates about CCC went. Or how the votes went.

At this point, I think we'll just have to wait until DP allows custom charms; then we'll patch sux banking and difficulty adjustment charms into then charmset with homebrew. It'll end up 20ish xp more expensive, but such is life.
 
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Water really doesn't hinder magic over much. Sudden unexpected deluges does, like breaking a major water line. Little Chicago would be completely unviable if water was an actual problem. Hell the first book is all about a minor talent exploiting storms power to super charge their magic.
 
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