The strength of the Solars, as far as I can tell. Isn't so much that they can do the things they do, which are pretty bullshit, but that there are a lot of them that cover a pretty wide base of talents. When coupled with the help of the Dragon Blooded, the Lunar, and the Sids it's enough to overthrow and more or less kill things that are probably a lot stronger then Yukari, and should have been impossible to kill.
That being said, one Solar, in this case an E5 that seems to be specked more for research and dialog rather then combat, would be more then able to give more then a good showing in Touhou. But it would hardly make them the strongest ever seen.
Power levels in Touhou don't matter, because they're never used directly in combat. What really matters is how artfully you can express your power in a hail of bullets and lasers.
So, the real question is, how does GLORIOUS SOLAR POWER translate into danmaku? Maybe something like Toramaru Shou's spellcards - radiant bursts of lasers, bright gold colors, and attacks that are total bullshit.
Technically possible? Yes. But technically. Look at the first spell card of the first day: How were you supposed to know that there's a hole on the top of the caster the first time around? That didn't violate the spell card rules, somehow, so I'd say that it must be technically possible for the specific person it's used against to be dodged.
Hey guys, here's the next snippet of the Tourist for you. I have some notes after this, so stick around.
-=-
While the Scarlet Devil Mansion was most famous for the great library in its underground levels, it also possessed a magnificent, well-tended, garden that covered the entire area between the mansion proper and the outer walls. Consisting of a variety of rare flowers and other exotic plants, all carefully arranged by Meiling to bring out their full splendour, it was a real pity that so few in the Eastern Wonderland actually had the opportunity to see it.
Once Remilia and Sakuya had retired indoors, Meiling had lead both Reimu and Renko out onto the garden to show them around. The gatekeeper, overjoyed that someone was actually around to actually pay attention to her hard work, led the pair around with more enthusiasm than Reimu had actually seen of the gatekeeper.
"This is the mansion's… well the common name is a 'Middlemist Camellia'. It's a very rare plant that I recently managed to cultivate on the grounds," Meiling said proudly as she gently motioned to the delicate red flower that was the centrepiece of one of her displays, "I brought it with me into the mansion when I entered milady's service, and it's been here ever since."
"Holy cow, this plant? Are you kidding me?" Renko regarded the flower with wide eyes and a shocked expression, looking torn between wanting to touch the flower and staying clear of it for fear of accidentally damaging it, "We call it a different name where I'm from, but… wow, just wow! I thought this to be extinct! Meiling, how…"
"I'm from China. It was one of the treasures I brought with me when I moved into the mansion." Meiling explained proudly. "It's been with me for well over two hundred years. This little girl here is practically my baby."
Renko could only nod excitedly as she took out her note book and quickly made a few notes into it. "Hm, pardon me if I'm mistaken, but don't things that old get fairies and stuff around here? I mean, if the Gensokyo Chronicle is any indication, even an Umbrella can become a supernatural creature, let alone a two hundred year old priceless flower."
"Normally they would, but our resident magician's put a few safeguards in place to make sure that doesn't happen." Meiling replied, "The last thing we want is for this priceless flower here to sprout a pair of wings and fly away somewhere."
"Ah, that's a relief," Renko nodded in agreement, then paused as a thought came to her. "If that's the case… could I touch it?"
"Sure. Just be aware, that Patchy, our resident magician, has put up a whole lot of powerful wards on this flower," Meiling informed them, "The second those wards pick up any ill intent to the flower… zap!"
"I'll keep that in mind." Renko said as she leaned forward to gently caress one of the petals.
Reimu on the other hand, wasn't so impressed.
"I don't get what's so amazing about a flower," Reimu sighed as she looked around the garden for some form of stimulation. Unlike Renko, who seemed to be very interested in botany, Reimu wasn't couldn't find it in herself to be interested in a bunch of plants.
Her nonchalance to the subject quickly drew reactions from the other two companions.
"Reimu-chan, it's one of three known specimens of the flower in the entire world, two of which are outside Gensokyo," Meiling explained with a sigh, "This flower is basically priceless."
"It's also a very potent reagent for all sorts of things I believed to be completely extinct where I'm from."
Meiling's head snapped around to Renko so fast that Reimu thought the poor gatekeeper had been a hairs breadth away from getting whiplash.
"Not that I'm going to take it away from here of course!" Renko quickly backpedalled, with her hands held out and away from the rare Carmellia to show her sincerity, "Sun's grace, I would never think of taking such a rare specimen off you, let alone risk damaging it! You think I want to harm such a treasure? No one would be that crazy!"
"…I suppose. You probably wouldn't be able to past Patchy's wards anyway." Meiling said with a small measure of relief. To be safe, she quickly ushered her guests onto the next exhibit, leaving the priceless flower behind them…
…Just as the petal that Renko had touched began glowing.
-=-
Reimu gave a long yawn as Meiling continued to prattle on about some other plant, some delicate little white thing called a 'Silene tomentosa', to an entranced Renko. It was now early in the evening, and the sun was slowly beginning its descent below the horizon casting the world into twilight.
"This is going on forever." Reimu complained as she waited for the pair to finish.
While Reimu was laid back, the sheer boredom and disinterest she was having towards this tour was really giving her second thoughts about the whole tourgide thing. If she were at home, she could catch a nap on her futon or have a nice drink of sake to calm the nerves, her current job meant she had to wait around, completely sober and more or less alert, while Renko finished up her little talk with Meiling. It was an exercise that was far more boring than she had expected it to be!
"Why can't they hurry it up some?"
"You think this is bad, you should try waiting hand and foot for the mistress."
"Not a chance. That's you kind of thing, not mine, Miss 'head maid'."
Reimu turned to regard Sakuya, who had materialized seemingly out of thin air right next to her. The perfect elegant maid had an impeccable appearance as always, and was looking on at Meiling and Renko with a serene, if curious expression.
"So, Remilia waking up any time soon?" Reimu asked hopefully. The sooner the vampire woke, the sooner that dinner, and the escape from this exercise in utter boredom, would come.
"Not for another hour, at least," Sakuya replied with a shake of her head, "The mistress went to bed much later than usual today. It is unlikely she will be up until after the sun has set."
"Well, isn't that just wonderful," Reimu groused, "Sometimes I wonder how Yukari manages to talk me into these things."
"So, she is Yukari's friend, huh?" Sakuya said as she settled in to wait beside Reimu, "I didn't think that Yukari would take interest in an ordinary human like her."
"Sakuya. This is Yukari."
"Ah, you do have a point."
Reimu wondered if it was a good idea not to warn Sakuya about the mansion's new guest. She was pretty confident at this point that there was definitely something odd about Renko, and perhaps giving the head maid of the mansion they were visiting a heads up might be a good way for Reimu to head off some potential problems down the line. Sakuya was notoriously efficient at cleaning up after the other residents, so if anything happened it having Sakuya on her side would be great.
Unfortunately, Reimu was also aware that Sakuya was completely devoted to Remilia. If Reimu were to even hint of her suspicions about their tourist to Sakuya, there was a very good chance that what she'd said would wind up being passed onto the vampire.
If that happened, trouble would definitely ensure, and Reimu didn't want that!
"I find it strange though," Sakuya thoughtfully said, "Miss Usami's reactions are very different from what I'd expect of an outsider."
"How so?"
"When I stopped time before, she didn't react in a way I would expect someone to," Sakuya explained, "She noticed me disappear when I stopped time, but when I checked back in later she didn't seem afraid of it."
"You checked back in? I didn't see you earlier after you left." Indeed, Sakuya had merely snapped her fingers and disappeared from her sight, reappearing with an umbrella in hand only when it was time to take Remilia back indoors.
"Merely a matter of perceptions. I can move freely when I stop time," Sakuya shrugged, "when I was making your rooms, realized I might have startled our guest, I quickly returned in the odd chance I was needed. As it turned out I wasn't, so I returned to my duties."
"I see."
"Most humans and youkai, who visit my time stop ability for the first time tend to grill the Mistress about it. Miss Renko didn't. I find it odd that she didn't press the issue more. It was like what I did wasn't that unusual for her."
"Well, your ability isn't a secret and she was reading the Gensokyo Chronicle before she came here," Reimu pointed out, "The practically read the entire thing cover to cover before coming here. She knows you can stop time."
"Perhaps," Sakuya reluctantly agreed, "But I would think that a normal human would react more when they saw something truly amazing with their own two eyes."
Reimu froze for a moment as something very, very odd occurred to her. Renko HAD acted amazed earlier… but to seeing Sakuya's time-stop ability.
The bubbly traveller had been going completely bonkers… over Meiling's flower. Between Sakuya's ability to stop time at will and Meiling's flower, apparently Renko had thought the flower the more interesting sight.
"Okay, there is something really wrong with this girl."
"Hm? Did you say something?" Sakuya said.
"Nothing. Nothing at all." Reimu sighed as she wondered just what had caused Renko's odd reaction.
-=-
A/N - Just to clarify, Renko does find Sakuya's time stop ability interesting, however the magical medicinal properties of a rare, two hundred year old flower are much more attractive to her given her current woes with the Great Curse. She'd get around to grilling Sakuya eventually, but at the time she found the flower most fascinating.
Anyway, I was thinking about the discussion over the abilities of the Touhou characters in relation to the Exalted, and this is how I plan to proceed:
In this story, I'm going to buff the Touhou characters quite a fair bit so that they can 'compete' with Exalted by interpreting their powers quite broadly: the Spell Card system keeps them in check, but if the youkai/magicians/immortals/whatever cut loose they can achieve some impressive results.
Granted an E5 Exalted will still wreck most them in a real fight, but some of the stuff the denizens of Gensokyo can do will blow Renko's mind. For example:
Yukari: Manipulation of boundaries, including ones at a conceptual level. While Renko can fend her off using charms and sorceries, some of the crap Yukari can pull (instant gender change) is shocking.
Sakuya: Perfect time stop at on call, with no restrictions and no limitations. She uses this utterly broken ability to do housework. She is also the one who makes the mansion bigger on the inside.
Keine: In her Hakutaku form, she has the ability to create history at will. Renko is going to take one look at that ability and start thinking about ways it can be used to screw with her 'old pal Ivory'.
Mokou: Renko, while long lived, will eventually die… like most other things in creation. Mokou cannot die (and in some fan works, survives even the death of Earth itself). Same goes for Kaguya.
And cause this is pretty widely known back over on the original SB idea thread (warning ending spoilers below to those who haven't already seen it)…
Hina: Despite being one of the lesser goddesses in the realm (and the least respected one if some sources are to go by), Hina's entire shtick is about how she can remove misfortune… AND CURSES. Someone link the Miracle∞Hinacle video!
That's enough for me today. Thanks for reading, folks!
There's always the option to buff their speed into the ones calculated in OBD... which is somewhere around low-relativistic (Reimu IIRC) to high-relativistic (Aya IIRC)...
Hina: Despite being one of the lesser goddesses in the realm (and the least respected one if some sources are to go by), Hina's entire shtick is about how she can remove misfortune… AND CURSES. Someone link the Miracle∞Hinacle video!
Not sure that it's kosher to have a goddess be able to remove the death-curse of an unspecified number of Primordials. I felt that such an epic curse should require an equally epic solution, and having a comparatively minor spirit wave a wand and make you better doesn't seem right.
Not sure that it's kosher to have a goddess be able to remove the death-curse of an unspecified number of Primordials. I felt that such an epic curse should require an equally epic solution, and having a comparatively minor spirit wave a wand and make you better doesn't seem right.
Technically possible? Yes. But technically. Look at the first spell card of the first day: How were you supposed to know that there's a hole on the top of the caster the first time around? That didn't violate the spell card rules, somehow, so I'd say that it must be technically possible for the specific person it's used against to be dodged.
14.3 is a specific exception to the spellcard rules. Seiji is a wanted fugitive for causing all the trouble(s), and thus the spellcard rules don't apply outside of the 'no kill' rule. So pretty much all bets are off except they can't openly kill her. Sad thing is, her whole point is that the more they hate her the happier she is.
There's always the option to buff their speed into the ones calculated in OBD... which is somewhere around low-relativistic (Reimu IIRC) to high-relativistic (Aya IIRC)...
You are aware that One at Sufficient Velocity doesn't work on exalts, right? Perfects don't care how powerful the attack is. Or whether it even makes sense - a Solar can block a gigaton nuke they are sitting on with a plastic spork.
Personally, I'm also leery of her being able to do much of anything to the Great Curse. Frankly, I'd have a problem if she was even capable of alleviating the relatively minor 'auto-botch when it matters most' from breaking an Eclipse oath to 'auto-botch when it would be inconvenient'. I could see her having a similar effect to hanging around with an Alchemical, but not the weakening of an exaltation that the removal of the Great Curse would entail.
I like Hina, and its not a deal breaker or anything. This story looks to be more 'Renko's Excellent Adventure' than focusing on the Curse, so it wouldn't really detract from the story.
I think she is there to basically identify what the problem is.
Because as I said earlier most likely a part of the Curse is to make those underneath it not be able to see or detect it.
Yukari: Manipulation of boundaries, including ones at a conceptual level. While Renko can fend her off using charms and sorceries, some of the crap Yukari can pull (instant gender change) is shocking.
I would place Yukari as a high end god with very flexible panopoly charms. That said most of the things Yukari can do would count as shaping which is fairly available to Raksha, and can be blocked by anti-shaping charms. That said I would consider Yukari's hax on the same scale of hax as Sidereal Martial arts.
Sakuya: Perfect time stop at on call, with no restrictions and no limitations. She uses this utterly broken ability to do housework. She is also the one who makes the mansion bigger on the inside.
Indeed. That said IPP should protect Renko from direct attacks with this.
Keine: In her Hakutaku form, she has the ability to create history at will. Renko is going to take one look at that ability and start thinking about ways it can be used to screw with her 'old pal Ivory'.
Retroactively fucking with history isn't unheard of in Creation but it is normally the domain of Sidereals and Infernals (Ebon Dragon). She has more flexibility and range than they have as well.
Mokou: Renko, while long lived, will eventually die… like most other things in creation. Mokou cannot die (and in some fan works, survives even the death of Earth itself). Same goes for Kaguya.
For the sake of giving both sides respect for their abilities you should allow them to be killed with Ghost-eater technique. Exalts were made to kill the truly immortal. Not that forcing them to stay still long enough to kill them that way is easy. Them they would probably become something like a smaller version of the neverborn. In other words they have Primordial grade immortality but the exalts are the one thing that makes that imperfect.
And cause this is pretty widely known back over on the original SB idea thread (warning ending spoilers below to those who haven't already seen it)…
Hina: Despite being one of the lesser goddesses in the realm (and the least respected one if some sources are to go by), Hina's entire shtick is about how she can remove misfortune… AND CURSES. Someone link the Miracle∞Hinacle video!
That's enough for me today. Thanks for reading, folks!
She shouldn't be able to cure it. She has the right kind of power but lacks the narrative weight to fix something that big easily. That said she could be one step of the epic quest to fix it. I wouldn't put it past her to notice the curse and be able to remove limit. Which itself is a setting shaking revelation.
Hm, since people seem to be talking about the great curse, I might as well copy paste my original notes from SB on how I want to handle it.
Most sources of Exalted that I know of actually note that the Great Curse is serious shit. The First Age fell because of it, and since then it's had a hand in many of the worst calamities in Creation's history. It is a pivotal aspect of the setting, and actually curing the curse is a goal worthy of an entire campaign due to the sheer difficulty in doing so and the repercussions that such a feat would cause.
The steps needed to life the curse are all very difficult.
1. Figure out that the curse even exists in the first place, which is actually a problem since in universe it is so secret not even the Neverborn are aware of it (at least, the last time I checked). EDIT-I was corrected on this point later in the thread, as the Neverborn ARE aware of the curse
2. Do research out the true nature of the curse, understand how it affects the Exalted and in necessary determine its cause to understand how it came about.
3. Actually devise a cure for an immeasurably powerful death curse from dying primordials that is so potent it ended an age.
4. ???
5. Profit!
Renko actually is stuck on step 2.
A thousand years after the disappearance of the Scarlet Empress (in this timeline), some among the Exalted have figured out via observation that there is something wrong with them. This strange affliction caused all these problems in the past and, if left unchecked, could cause future tragedies in the future. They don't actually know that it's the Great Curse, they only do know there is something in them causing them problems that shouldn't be there.
Only a small minority of Exalted (a mixed group of like-minded Solars, Lunars, Sidereals and the odd DB) actually recognize the danger this poses and are trying to rectify it. However they are a minority: most other Exalted have just shrugged it off as paranoia and got on with their daily lives as the lords of the new Solar Deliberative. Renko, having been convinced by Wind of the threat, is one of these few Solars who are trying to figure out what is wrong with the Exalted.
Right now, all she knows is that the problem exists, it is real, and it affects the Exalted by getting them to act in destructive or dangerous ways, oftentimes without them even realizing it. What she doesn't know is the nature of the problem (a death curse) and all her (and her colleagues) efforts to find this have failed thus far. If they can't even find out what it is, they can't devise a cure.
Then there's another problem: the some members in the Solar Deliberative are slowly making 'worse and worse decisions' in their hubris and refusing to see this as a problem, a sure sign something is terribly wrong. Renko and her colleagues are getting 'a bit worried' that a repeat of the Usurpation might have to happen again at the rate things are going, hence Renko's research.
Then Renko ends up in Gensokyo and meets Hina Kagiyama.
Humble Hina is a minor power in Gensokyo who really is overshadowed by all the other characters who are more powerful, influential or just more prolific… how ironic it would be that this humble curse goddess who leads a doll army is the one being in Gensokyo who actually holds the key to this massive breakthrough in Renko's research?
That's my plan at least: humble little Hina inadvertently holds a key aspect to curing the Great Curse.
EDIT - It should also be noted that people in the thread suggested that once Renko discovers Hina's value after having the limit drained out of her, the revelation is so mind blowing for the Solar, she limit breaks anyway and starts chasing down Hina in a way that would make Aya Sahmeimaru blush in order to do SCIENCE! to her.
