Yawning Abyss, Soaring Shrike [Exalted]
- Thread starter VagueZ
- Start date
chocolote12
A Penguin Flailing Against The Keyboard Of Life.
She's a crazy murderer who practices her swordsmanship by cutting parts off of people without them noticing. Her regard for collateral damage is less than nothing, and she hurt our friends. We'd have to be an utter moron to even consider helping her up.
[X] Help her up.
She also asked us to help her. I don't want to kill somebody who asked for mercy. (And I can't see an Abyssal exaltation not having some way to make it matter when somebody says that they'll do 'anything'. That's, like, an archetypal Abyssal power.)
[X] Help her up.
She also asked us to help her. I don't want to kill somebody who asked for mercy. (And I can't see an Abyssal exaltation not having some way to make it matter when somebody says that they'll do 'anything'. That's, like, an archetypal Abyssal power.)
- Location
- Bed
I personally am of the view that it's highly unlikely this choice would be offered to us if one of the options is "you die instantly".
It's a bad decision in the long run, sure, but this quest has been a long string of bad decisions - both of these are arguably in character for Vessel, we're just deciding on which one he goes with.
It's a bad decision in the long run, sure, but this quest has been a long string of bad decisions - both of these are arguably in character for Vessel, we're just deciding on which one he goes with.
- Location
- Canada
There are Exalts who can enforce oaths under circumstances like this, with the Moonshadow Caste being the Abyssal version. Neither us nor Clochard is that caste, and I don't think any other Exalt with an Eclipse-type power has appeared in this quest. Also, we haven't demonstrated any social powers of that sort before.
- Location
- Nova Scotia
- Pronouns
- She/Her
Lunars can learn what is more or less a budget version of an Eclipse oath as an Intelligence charm, so I wouldn't rule that out completely. Neither of them are here, anyway, though.
chocolote12
A Penguin Flailing Against The Keyboard Of Life.
*Shrugs* That's in parenthesis because it would make sense, not because I think it's guaranteed. But this is a narrative game, xp debt to buy charms in the moment and pay for them later is a core mechanic, and there are just, like, charms that can do stuff like that, no caste business required.
Consider a variation on the abyssal version of knowing the heart's price, or whatever the one is called where you ask what they can be bought for and if you pay it it's really hard for them to betray you.
- Pronouns
- They/Them
I'm starved enough for attention that I'll take it.
And it wouldn't be the first time something's backfired horribly.
More seriously: if I didn't want that to happen, it wouldn't be a vote option. You absolutely will not annoy me, ever, by picking a vote option I give you, and even if there's a write-in, I'll tell you before it annoys me. Universally.
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- Location
- Nova Scotia
- Pronouns
- She/Her
... I just realised the real tragedy of this situation:
Bony Pony is dead! Well, more dead than before.
Bony Pony is dead! Well, more dead than before.
chocolote12
A Penguin Flailing Against The Keyboard Of Life.
Bony Pony could ride again, if an Exalted desired it. But we know there's only one person who'd want to, and she's hanging over mortal peril.
Raiseth
I Find Your Lack of Memes Disturbing
- Location
- Russia
Bony Pony could ride again, if an Exalted desired it. But we know there's only one person who'd want to, and she's hanging over mortal peril.
Emotional blackmail... why didn't I think of that?
1337Procrast
Fire Emblem Enjoyer
- Location
- Australia
- Pronouns
- He/Him
[X] Help her up.
This is the most fun kind of bad decision.
This is the most fun kind of bad decision.
- Location
- Canada
I read this as "I am giving you the opportunity to make a bad decision, because it would be funny if you made a bad decision". This feels uncharitable, but I still can't see saving the life of someone we literally just chose to kill as anything but a bad decision.
chocolote12
A Penguin Flailing Against The Keyboard Of Life.
A choice between 'suck instantly' and 'get on with the quest' would do bad things to an already anemic voter base. Most killer GMs these days advertise their inclinations because they know that only a certain kind of voter is willing to put up with it. For everybody else, it's better to operate under the basic assumption that the GM would prefer that both they and the playerbase be having fun.
- Pronouns
- They/Them
I'm sorry if it sounded like that. That definitely is not what I was going for. What I was trying to communicate is something more like that I don't want to share the full outcomes, in a playful way.
This quest is a narrative story first and foremost: things may be bad decisions, and bad (or even good) decisions can spawn something that ends with more complications further down the line. But it won't break the narrative structure of it. If the vote swings to save her, I can tell you that the story will go on, it won't be "and then she stabs you and tells you that was really dumb, you die."
That was more what I was hoping it'd sound like.
- Location
- St. Petersburg
Do we have a way to enforce this "anything"?
My first instinct is to help her down with everything I got, because she is the most dangerous of the Waif's enforcers, and a loyal one to boot. The only way this can be more of an asset than a detriment is if we find a way to somehow subvert the latter part. Taking something from the Waif she never considered giving up would be poetic justice.
I suppose I'll just have to trust our character finds a way to not be stupid about it. Even when I can't see one. Hmm, does this sound like a bad rationale.
[x] Help her up.
...I can get behind that.
My first instinct is to help her down with everything I got, because she is the most dangerous of the Waif's enforcers, and a loyal one to boot. The only way this can be more of an asset than a detriment is if we find a way to somehow subvert the latter part. Taking something from the Waif she never considered giving up would be poetic justice.
I suppose I'll just have to trust our character finds a way to not be stupid about it. Even when I can't see one. Hmm, does this sound like a bad rationale.
[x] Help her up.
Okay. So you kill your cousin who did nothing to harm your friend, but leave the one who maimed them alive because she could be useful to you. Sounds like "revenge for Flawed Topaz" was just the latest in the line of your excuses.
...I can get behind that.
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- Location
- Bed
This more or less sums up my angle on this vote (and many of the votes this quest has had). Fundamentally, for all of Vessel's bluster and oaths of melodramatic vengeance, he has always made petty and arbitrary snap decisions based on what feels less bad to do. Hell, we could have pushed through actually working to destroy Creation and staying loyal to the Waif, but we stopped because he got cowardly and had to fight someone he knew to do it. Here, he could just as easily kill her or not, but immediately compromising the plan on a random whim the moment it actually gets up in his face is, like, the most in-character thing for Vessel.
I would say it's the least in-character thing for Vessel.
The way I've always seen it, Vessel will compromise his principles to advance his interests (and rationalize doing so.) He's not petty and arbitrary, he's petty and self-serving.
Helping the Clochard here goes against his interests, because she'll almost certainly become a recurring problem if he saves her. It's dumb and petty, but it's the wrong kind of dumb and petty.
If she was promising him later assistance or items of power or something then it would fit, but she isn't, so the Vessel-esque thing to do here is to kill her and then not feel bad for not stepping in to help Flawed Topaz.
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- Location
- Bed
This is essentially what I'm disputing - having her be properly dead is a concrete advantage, sure, but having her still around as someone he has leverage over? That, too, is a solid advantage, and an opportunity to get more out of this than just "she is now dead". It's pretty much a gamble along the lines of "will she at all care that he thinks she owes him", and considering Vessel's history and way of thinking about things, that is exactly the sort of self-serving gamble that I think he would go for. Even if, from an external perspective, it's a pretty terrible idea.