Hey guys. We need to pay off Cordelia when we get a chance.
Xander [Quest], Thread Seven: Cops and G-Men and Parents, Oh My!
- Thread starter Judge Mental
- Start date
Are you serious? Really? Have you learned nothing about confirming your kills?Nightblade said:
Bando's reaction shows that Heart Containers isn't a common occurrence over in Hyrule. It's likely something that only the Goddesses Chosen / those effected by the Triforce can do. Or it just confirmed that he originated from Hyrule. Either way, looks like a unique thing.
If he does survive he's probably stuck in the monkey's body. And whats your point about heart containers. Did you expect us to get one for killing the sorcerer?scope said:
I really don't think that can be the case. This isn't Ranma 1/2. If appropriate items of great magical power could be bought over the internet, then vampires would have been a trivial obstacle n the face of an off the shelf wand of fireballs, and the entire plot around Gwendolyn Post and the lightning glove would never have occurred.earth-destroyer said:
Shouldn't be a problem. We can go reagent hunting while practising teleportation and sell them on.Nightblade said:
If he's in the monkey's body he's even more dangerous, as the monkey will be a smaller target and is probably faster and proportionately smaller and more resilient.Nightblade said:
No reason we can't get the abilities from the other hearts with the other two elements if we encounter them and they seem attractive at the time.
Of course, on that score, getting all four elements in harmony would probably have been optimal, but the vote was to give the water heart away.
Of course, on that score, getting all four elements in harmony would probably have been optimal, but the vote was to give the water heart away.
[x] Heart of Fire. You're sure that Altria will be so jealous like it.
Aranfan
Team Plasma Grunt
This idea keeps being asserted. But I'm not so sure. Not unless we can cheat by getting hearts from our own summoned monsters.Quincy said:
[X] Heart Container. Be HEALED!
Fire is the single most common energy attack in existence. Anything that can get defenses against it, will.
If you're in favor of trying to brute force bypass resistances, of massive collateral damage, of having our strengths known by anyone who chooses to fight us - sure, specialize in fire.
But being that much harder to kill? There's more than a little to be said for that. Especially if we're going to make use of any attacks or abilities that involve spending HP as MP, or recoil.
Fire is the single most common energy attack in existence. Anything that can get defenses against it, will.
If you're in favor of trying to brute force bypass resistances, of massive collateral damage, of having our strengths known by anyone who chooses to fight us - sure, specialize in fire.
But being that much harder to kill? There's more than a little to be said for that. Especially if we're going to make use of any attacks or abilities that involve spending HP as MP, or recoil.
The evidence of both Buffy and Angel is that fire immunity magic is, at the least, incredibly rare. I can't think of a single case, outside the magic items that gave broad spectrum immunity. This is despite the existence of master vampires with incredible incentives and hundreds of years to track down and acquire such magic.Candesce said:
Based on the precedent from Zelda, the heart container would make us a third more resilient to damage. That's not much harder to kill. Many attacks that would currently kill us with a single blow would do the same with the upgrade.Candesce said:
Absorbing the fire heart to gain related abilities does not in any way from doing the same to an earth related heart.kestrel404 said:
Judge Mental
Stranger In a Strange Land
[x] Heart of Fire. You're sure that Altria will be so jealous like it.
While the idea of using the Heart Container's power to shore up and augment your depleted vital energies is very appealing, you decide that a good part of that is your injuries talking. Briar can get you back to full health and still have a second dose of healing dust in reserve. That still leaves the long-term benefits of a permanent increase in toughness to consider, which you do.
In the end, while it is tempting to go with your first instinct, you decide that absorbing the Heart's elemental nature would be more beneficial. When it comes to mitigating injury, one of the most basic lessons is "don't get hit," followed by various methods of redirecting and absorbing force, so that unavoidable blows which would otherwise be highly damaging end up reduced to stings and bruises. It's hard to do that kind of thing with elemental attacks unless you pull out spells and enchanted items, both of which require investments of time, energy, and other resources that you may not have to spare. Not to mention that Fire - in all its various aspects - is one of the prevalent offensive vectors in the mystical world, second only to supernatural levels of raw physical force. It's pretty common on the mundane side of things, too, for the simple and abiding reason that Fire Kills (Almost) Everything. If it doesn't, you're just not using enough.
Between fireballs, volcanic terrain, fire-breathing and/or molten-blooded monsters, a ray of searing heat, and an unexpected lava shower, you've had your fill of being burned. A permanent protection against heat and flame just feels too good to pass up.
So you reach out and take it.
Gained Fire Affinity F+++
Gained Heart of Fire
The Heart Container vanishes with a chime, its energy sinking into your hands and racing up your arms to spread throughout your body. Even through your Resist Fire spell, you feel very warm - it's like a day in late spring or mid-autumn when the sun is shining brightly, the air is only a little dry, and there's just enough of a breeze to keep everything fresh rather than stifling...
The moment passes.
"Feel better?" Briar asks.
"Yeah, kind of." You wince as your back twinges, and add, "Not in the physical sense, though. Would you mind doing something about that?"
"I dunno. Maybe if I let it hurt for a while, you'd think twice about running off into trouble like this..."
"Oh, come on! That's cruel and unusual punishment for something that totally wasn't my fault! I mean, how was I supposed to know that crazy old bastard would be waiting up here?"
"After the way he behaved the first time and running into his monkey earlier, can you tell me honestly that the thought never crossed your mind that he might show up tonight?"
You hesitate, and Briar laughs.
"See? I knew it. No sense of self-preservation whatsoever."
Your argument continues as you make your way towards the halfway point between the rim of the caldera and the main body of the lava bubbling up from the Earth's molten interior. Eventually, Briar concedes and restores you - but only you. There's simply too much damage to your shirt for her to fix without depleting a big chunk of her magic. Fortunately, it's well within the limits of your own talents - a simple spell of Mending (okay, two of them) and a cleaning cantrip has the worst of the damage dealt with. There's still a big spot of missing material where the sorcerer's flame attack simply reduced the fabric of your shirt to so much drifting ash; you can't really reverse that as yet, and your grasp of conjuration magic is too limited to permanently repair the damage. You end up transforming the shirt a bit more, relocating the irrepairable damage so that instead of a single ragged hole, there are several tears; you then cover these with your best effort at conjuration. The patch job won't last longer than two hours, if that, but that's plenty of time for you to slip back into the hotel without drawing attention. And you can much more easily explain a torn shirt to your parents than you can one with a great big hole.
Gained Conjuration F+++
As cleaned up and well-dressed as you're going to get, you get on with the sacrifice.
....
....
Briar sighs. "You have no idea how to do this, do you?"
"Give me a break, will you? Church boy, I'm not."
The fairy disembarks from your shoulder. "It's easy. Just pay attention, and do what I tell you..."
Following Briar's advice, you start out with the sacrifice to Pele. Since neither of you really know how the local volcano goddess is formally worshipped, Briar counsels you to be polite, and properly apologetic for getting into a fight in Her holy place and your intent to use it as the equivalent of an interplanar payphone. The ohelo berries end up consigned to the fire via a telekinetic cantrip. Interestingly, you note that they don't so much as shrivel in the intense heat until they've been entirely engulfed by the glowing river of molten rock, at which point they're consumed instantly and utterly.
You don't sense anything else that might count as a manifestation of the volcano goddess, but you decide that's not necessarily a bad thing. If Pele objected to your stated intention to call Din, you suspect She'd say so.
The sacrifice to Din is more formal, since Briar actually knows how this sort of thing is supposed to be done, even if only by reputation. There's a recitation of Din's formal titles and offices - Golden Goddess of Power, Mistress of Earth and Fire, the whole nine yards - then a declaration on your part of how you obtained the sacrifice by crushing an enemy - your first true enemy, in your first life-or-death battle, with no one but Briar to aid you. You also recount your other victories - the Under Tens Division Finals, rescuing injured friends and allies and helping them fight their way free of an ambush, and now defeating the old sorcerer, while being sure to thank Din for showing such favor as to send Bando to your side - and ask her to look favorably upon your quest to gain further power to protect your family and friends. Then you take up Arrogante's Heart Container and cast it towards the lava with a ki-boosted throw.
Gained Hyrulean Theology F++
As the relic sinks into the molten stone and disappears forever, you feel something. The back of your right hand is burning. Turning it over, you behold the symbol of the Triforce gleaming brightly for a long moment, before it fades away - the topmost triangle being the last to vanish - leaving no visible mark.
Gained Din's Favor E
"Well," you say slowly. "I think we can safely say that Din heard me."
"Yeah," Briar answers in the same tone. "I think we can."
You stand there for a time, and then turn and walk out of the caldera, paying a bit of due respect to Pele by waiting until you're well clear of the sacred site to pull out more magic. On the way out, you glance around to see if you can find the broken-off end of Searfang's horn - and lo and behold, you actually find two of them. They're large enough that you have to magically stow them, but that's okay; it just means more material for rituals!
Gained Searfang's Horns (x2)
With no further delays, you make your way up the rim of the caldera and back down the stairs to where you arrived. Only then do you teleport away. Weary from the night's events and no longer terribly concerned about being followed, you skip a certain amount of paranoia-induced precaution and just go straight back to your room. You arrive to find your father still sound asleep, and set about following his example.
The next day, you catch the plane bound for L.A.
Is there anything you want to do in the city before heading back to Sunnydale?
[ ] Yes. (Write-in.)
[ ] No. Let's just go home.
OOC: The only things I can recall being suggested are a) arranging to store the reagents somewhere off the Hellmouth to avoid contamination, and b) looking up local magical merchants to offer summons for cash.
And we're on Page 97, so try to keep the number of posts down, and I'll see you all in thread eight.
While the idea of using the Heart Container's power to shore up and augment your depleted vital energies is very appealing, you decide that a good part of that is your injuries talking. Briar can get you back to full health and still have a second dose of healing dust in reserve. That still leaves the long-term benefits of a permanent increase in toughness to consider, which you do.
In the end, while it is tempting to go with your first instinct, you decide that absorbing the Heart's elemental nature would be more beneficial. When it comes to mitigating injury, one of the most basic lessons is "don't get hit," followed by various methods of redirecting and absorbing force, so that unavoidable blows which would otherwise be highly damaging end up reduced to stings and bruises. It's hard to do that kind of thing with elemental attacks unless you pull out spells and enchanted items, both of which require investments of time, energy, and other resources that you may not have to spare. Not to mention that Fire - in all its various aspects - is one of the prevalent offensive vectors in the mystical world, second only to supernatural levels of raw physical force. It's pretty common on the mundane side of things, too, for the simple and abiding reason that Fire Kills (Almost) Everything. If it doesn't, you're just not using enough.
Between fireballs, volcanic terrain, fire-breathing and/or molten-blooded monsters, a ray of searing heat, and an unexpected lava shower, you've had your fill of being burned. A permanent protection against heat and flame just feels too good to pass up.
So you reach out and take it.
Gained Fire Affinity F+++
Gained Heart of Fire
The Heart Container vanishes with a chime, its energy sinking into your hands and racing up your arms to spread throughout your body. Even through your Resist Fire spell, you feel very warm - it's like a day in late spring or mid-autumn when the sun is shining brightly, the air is only a little dry, and there's just enough of a breeze to keep everything fresh rather than stifling...
The moment passes.
"Feel better?" Briar asks.
"Yeah, kind of." You wince as your back twinges, and add, "Not in the physical sense, though. Would you mind doing something about that?"
"I dunno. Maybe if I let it hurt for a while, you'd think twice about running off into trouble like this..."
"Oh, come on! That's cruel and unusual punishment for something that totally wasn't my fault! I mean, how was I supposed to know that crazy old bastard would be waiting up here?"
"After the way he behaved the first time and running into his monkey earlier, can you tell me honestly that the thought never crossed your mind that he might show up tonight?"
You hesitate, and Briar laughs.
"See? I knew it. No sense of self-preservation whatsoever."
Your argument continues as you make your way towards the halfway point between the rim of the caldera and the main body of the lava bubbling up from the Earth's molten interior. Eventually, Briar concedes and restores you - but only you. There's simply too much damage to your shirt for her to fix without depleting a big chunk of her magic. Fortunately, it's well within the limits of your own talents - a simple spell of Mending (okay, two of them) and a cleaning cantrip has the worst of the damage dealt with. There's still a big spot of missing material where the sorcerer's flame attack simply reduced the fabric of your shirt to so much drifting ash; you can't really reverse that as yet, and your grasp of conjuration magic is too limited to permanently repair the damage. You end up transforming the shirt a bit more, relocating the irrepairable damage so that instead of a single ragged hole, there are several tears; you then cover these with your best effort at conjuration. The patch job won't last longer than two hours, if that, but that's plenty of time for you to slip back into the hotel without drawing attention. And you can much more easily explain a torn shirt to your parents than you can one with a great big hole.
Gained Conjuration F+++
As cleaned up and well-dressed as you're going to get, you get on with the sacrifice.
....
....
Briar sighs. "You have no idea how to do this, do you?"
"Give me a break, will you? Church boy, I'm not."
The fairy disembarks from your shoulder. "It's easy. Just pay attention, and do what I tell you..."
Following Briar's advice, you start out with the sacrifice to Pele. Since neither of you really know how the local volcano goddess is formally worshipped, Briar counsels you to be polite, and properly apologetic for getting into a fight in Her holy place and your intent to use it as the equivalent of an interplanar payphone. The ohelo berries end up consigned to the fire via a telekinetic cantrip. Interestingly, you note that they don't so much as shrivel in the intense heat until they've been entirely engulfed by the glowing river of molten rock, at which point they're consumed instantly and utterly.
You don't sense anything else that might count as a manifestation of the volcano goddess, but you decide that's not necessarily a bad thing. If Pele objected to your stated intention to call Din, you suspect She'd say so.
The sacrifice to Din is more formal, since Briar actually knows how this sort of thing is supposed to be done, even if only by reputation. There's a recitation of Din's formal titles and offices - Golden Goddess of Power, Mistress of Earth and Fire, the whole nine yards - then a declaration on your part of how you obtained the sacrifice by crushing an enemy - your first true enemy, in your first life-or-death battle, with no one but Briar to aid you. You also recount your other victories - the Under Tens Division Finals, rescuing injured friends and allies and helping them fight their way free of an ambush, and now defeating the old sorcerer, while being sure to thank Din for showing such favor as to send Bando to your side - and ask her to look favorably upon your quest to gain further power to protect your family and friends. Then you take up Arrogante's Heart Container and cast it towards the lava with a ki-boosted throw.
Gained Hyrulean Theology F++
As the relic sinks into the molten stone and disappears forever, you feel something. The back of your right hand is burning. Turning it over, you behold the symbol of the Triforce gleaming brightly for a long moment, before it fades away - the topmost triangle being the last to vanish - leaving no visible mark.
Gained Din's Favor E
"Well," you say slowly. "I think we can safely say that Din heard me."
"Yeah," Briar answers in the same tone. "I think we can."
You stand there for a time, and then turn and walk out of the caldera, paying a bit of due respect to Pele by waiting until you're well clear of the sacred site to pull out more magic. On the way out, you glance around to see if you can find the broken-off end of Searfang's horn - and lo and behold, you actually find two of them. They're large enough that you have to magically stow them, but that's okay; it just means more material for rituals!
Gained Searfang's Horns (x2)
With no further delays, you make your way up the rim of the caldera and back down the stairs to where you arrived. Only then do you teleport away. Weary from the night's events and no longer terribly concerned about being followed, you skip a certain amount of paranoia-induced precaution and just go straight back to your room. You arrive to find your father still sound asleep, and set about following his example.
The next day, you catch the plane bound for L.A.
Is there anything you want to do in the city before heading back to Sunnydale?
[ ] Yes. (Write-in.)
[ ] No. Let's just go home.
OOC: The only things I can recall being suggested are a) arranging to store the reagents somewhere off the Hellmouth to avoid contamination, and b) looking up local magical merchants to offer summons for cash.
And we're on Page 97, so try to keep the number of posts down, and I'll see you all in thread eight.
[X] Yes:
-[X] Ring Cordelia (or ask our father to ring her parents) and see if she's in LA or arriving soon, so that if so we can give her a lift home with some friendly faces, rather than being on her own with a chauffeur.
- [X] Take some time to meditate and do some comparison of energies off of the Hellmouth. The last time we looked at magic, this time we want to get a good grasp of how ki and ki respiration feels when we're not in a corrupted land. Do the same when we get back to the Hellmouth, so we can know if there is an effect on our spiritual side like there is an effect on our magic.
Edit: Cytokinesis has a good idea.
-[X] Ring Cordelia (or ask our father to ring her parents) and see if she's in LA or arriving soon, so that if so we can give her a lift home with some friendly faces, rather than being on her own with a chauffeur.
- [X] Take some time to meditate and do some comparison of energies off of the Hellmouth. The last time we looked at magic, this time we want to get a good grasp of how ki and ki respiration feels when we're not in a corrupted land. Do the same when we get back to the Hellmouth, so we can know if there is an effect on our spiritual side like there is an effect on our magic.
Edit: Cytokinesis has a good idea.
[x] Yes
-[X] Take some time to meditate and do some comparison of energies off of the Hellmouth, both magic, ki, and spiritual. Do the same when we get back to the Hellmouth, so we can know if there is an effect on our spiritual and magical abilities beyond the absence of an oppressive aura of terror.
-[X] Take some time to meditate and do some comparison of energies off of the Hellmouth, both magic, ki, and spiritual. Do the same when we get back to the Hellmouth, so we can know if there is an effect on our spiritual and magical abilities beyond the absence of an oppressive aura of terror.
Alratan cordelia left before us. I'm pretty sure she's home already.
King Arthur
The Once and Future King
I just had an idea. Over summer break we should meet up with Altria, go to a large and isolated area, and summon evil monsters to fight. This enables us to get more experience fighting monsters, get more experience fighting as a team, kill evil beings, gain materials from their dead bodies, and get a whole bunch of power ups via heart containers. Let's say we kill one monster a day for a month, that's fifteen heart containers each, 10 each if we bring Cordy.
I wanna do this with Altria cause A) she is awesome, B) doing this with her makes this whole process safer, C) she is our rival and making her stronger drives us to be stronger, C) I wanna get used to fighting as a team, and D) it's a good friendship building exercise.
I wanna do this with Altria cause A) she is awesome, B) doing this with her makes this whole process safer, C) she is our rival and making her stronger drives us to be stronger, C) I wanna get used to fighting as a team, and D) it's a good friendship building exercise.
- Location
- California
[x] Yes
- [x] Take some time to meditate and do some comparison of energies off of the Hellmouth. The last time we looked at magic, this time we want to get a good grasp of how ki and ki respiration feels when we're not in a corrupted land. Do the same when we get back to the Hellmouth, so we can know if there is an effect on our spiritual side like there is an effect on our magic.
- [x] Take some time to meditate and do some comparison of energies off of the Hellmouth. The last time we looked at magic, this time we want to get a good grasp of how ki and ki respiration feels when we're not in a corrupted land. Do the same when we get back to the Hellmouth, so we can know if there is an effect on our spiritual side like there is an effect on our magic.
Oh, well, I'll edit my post to add that in when the server cooperates.earth-destroyer said:
Uh, I don't know about you but summoning things just to kill them sounds evil to me. Using a regular summoning spell to get some monster sparring partners, sure, those kinds of spells don't actually affect the creature in question, but actually calling it and killing it is probably not cool.luckybreak91 said:
One other option. Could we raise wards around us to shield us from the Hellmouth's effects?
Something we should have done in Japan, in retrospect, is some form of ritual cleansing - entering a temple through a torii after ringing the bell 108 times, that kind of thing. We should look at finding some where with similar purification rituals we can work with while we practice teleporting.
Something we should have done in Japan, in retrospect, is some form of ritual cleansing - entering a temple through a torii after ringing the bell 108 times, that kind of thing. We should look at finding some where with similar purification rituals we can work with while we practice teleporting.
King Arthur
The Once and Future King
Eh, I figure if we are summoning evil creatures it's probably fine. Beside, it's not really any different from hunting is it? I mean, no one would call us evil if we hunted and killed a deer, so why should an evil Hydra or some other evil monster be any different. As long as we don't summon anything with intelligence like a person and the creature is evil, I don't see why it shouldn't be fine.Cytokinesis said:
It's basically just hunting monsters, except we skip the looking for them part.
I would still like to hug Briar, before we end up leaving for the Hellmouth...
But seems there's not much interest in that?
Both Ayane and Kahlua don't exactly have that many other friends besides us (I think Kahlua would have none).
Plus we could introduce them to our Sunnydale friends.
Could be a fun little summer break thing, especially from a friendship building perspective.
But seems there's not much interest in that?
I would prefer to do something with the whole expanded group of contacts we've made, if we're going to do anything; I wouldn't want it to just be Altria since that seems unfair to everyone else.luckybreak91 said:
Both Ayane and Kahlua don't exactly have that many other friends besides us (I think Kahlua would have none).
Plus we could introduce them to our Sunnydale friends.
Could be a fun little summer break thing, especially from a friendship building perspective.