Thursday, 19 February 2015

Exalted: Against the Slave States V


What happens when a Solar Exalt runs his face into his past, not just his past of centuries before, but of only decades or simply years.  What should he do when he meets people that knew his prior incarnation and had interactions with him.  He was a different person completely.  Whitewall represents a city where a previous incarnation spent decades living and working.  Everytime he walks down a street, it seems familiar to him.  A walk into a tea house stirs a memory or worse, the owner is oddly familiar, a granddaughter of a lover or a friend?  Does he owe something to a child of a previous host, a grandchild?  The Nameless does not want personal attachments, his goal is paramount, but a former host had different desires and here they will slap him in the face.

Looking for Books on:
Healing and building stuff like sawmill, carts and forges the world

Upon nearing the completion of his journey, the Nameless, has a vision, a memory of a time before, two times before.  The first memory is of a First Age city, complete and in perfect working order with it full essence accumulating powers focussing the essence towards the Unconquered Sun.  The Mandela pattern clear as the memory's approach is from the air.  The palace in the center glows with essence funneled up into the heavens.

The second memory is considerably after, when the fore section has been crumpled as if hit by a massive hammer, the wall and the buildings have been repaired but not to the same beauty and elegance as they were in the age before.  The approach is at night and the memory is that of an approach in stealth leaping over the walls and in to the city proper.  The bounding progress of the memory leads to an intact building on the edge of the region that was remade, up to the tallest part, a spire that could have once been a bell tower.  In the belfry a stone is removed and a hollow is made in it.  It is replaced with a package placed in its hollow.  The sense of great importance is placed on this memory, perhaps that is why you remember this so clearly.

The journey to Whitewall was to find an alternate trading partner, acquire essential items, and to acquire books on how to do things.  If all things go well in Whitewall, these things will happen.  But, what are the results?  Whitewall is a relic of the First Age, but not wholly intact and Whitewall was a religious centre and nothing else, so it does not have all the great workings of the First Age.  It has a dedicated artifact manufacturing core, but nothing like what existed before.  They smelt different kinds of Steel, they forge Jade-Steel Alloys.  They have a disused Solar forge.  They have training manuals and repair manuals for the equipments they maintain.  The difference problem with these books is that they are for the maintenance and not for building from scratch.  The process of building some of these items requires a forge to be build to make the forge and foundry to build the items.  If Whitewall was in the business of building up the barbarians around it, it might have tech manuals on how to build from scratch, but that would be counter to the policies of the city, as it is never wise to provide the means to build an army to your enemies.  Whitewall has a working sawmill too; it has several large circular saws powered by a small essence engine.  The complex that includes the Sawmill also includes the Refining smelter, the essence engine provides energy for both.  The finished raw materials, lumber and metal ingots are sent to the city for final processing.  The Nameless can acquire these texts, but they are unhelpful.  The texts on medicine and health can be acquired, but again many of the concepts are advanced and may recquired specialized knowledge to be helpful, but that can be helped too.

The Syndics want to help and they want all Solars to be strong and better.  They want the Solar Exalted back in creation in force.  So they will stretch what they would normally do to meet these goals.  They will extend their powers to affect Nowhere, but only if they can do so secretly.  Since it is a Realm Satrapy, it would do the people of Whitewall no favors to to antagonize them by supporting a foe in their midst.  Good luck and better health is one thing but no other Divine aid will be forthcoming.  

- White Wall, a city that could be any city made of white marble in single blocks the buildings capped in gold.  A city ruin single blocks of marble pulverized and in near total ruin beside intact buildings.

What if The Nameless was not the first Exalt since The Black Sun died.  What if there had been a few and one of them had already been to Whitewall and had already collected the First Age recorder and had moved it.  What if there was an entire life to read in the pages of a diary in the Solar Manse in Whitewall.  

- events of the life of Artful Demise, Dagger of Heaven based in Whitewall RY 657-701
- story of his exaltation fighting a marauding behemoth in 674 as part of the militia.  
- talk about a vision that he received one day while traveling through the Foretown just after Exaltation and the discovery of the strange stone in a box that was identical to that of his vision.  Talking about the strange visions that he got when he committed a mote to it.
- talk goes further about his love for his city that he was born and his commitment to keep it safe and his decision to leave Whitewall when the Wyld hunt had begun to close in on his position.  He could handily evade the Wyld hunt, but there were fears that they would make reprisals on his home and his people if they ever found where he was from.  
- his decision to leave Whitewall in RY 694 and never return with hopes of finding more of the images that he saw from the recording device.  
- return in 697 talk about hitting the Wyld Hunt with hit and run tactics leading them through the north and past Nexus. Into the south.  Commissioning a new artifact from a chunk of Orichalcum found while traveling.

The memory stone has a series of images and memories loaded on to it.  The images are the region of his manse and the Manse itself

another is of a different Manse in a wide pastoral valley, green feilds covered with thick fresh snow and another manse, identical at the bottom of a clear dark sea, but with a prodigious quantity of sea flora growing around it. Wood manse that provides a hearthstone that grants bonuses to agriculture or something.  The manse is located under the icy sea not far north of Gethemane.  It is under thick polar ice and nearly 100 meters of water.  

  A memory of a study in a foreign location, a martial setting with slave pits and chambers of murder and death.  Constantly overcast skies and deathly sick vegetation.  Odd beasts being tortured and killed, torn limb from limb.  

A hardwood forest in bloom, flowers everywhere with a small city in the background and pastoral hills with bright sunshine everywhere, a smell of sweetness.  

A fleeting glimpse of a young petite woman in a suit made from black feathers. 

A tall stone building covered in vines with intricate statuary carved in relief.  

A shallow grotto under the sea, bright blue water oddly hot water jetting up from a fissure in the sea floor and a manse built into that chasam.

The location of four manses, his lunar manse, a wood manse, a fire manse under the sea, and a Solar Manse in a warm forested location.  Two memories, one of a Deathlord–The Princess Magnificent with Lips of Coral and Robes of Black Feathers, and another of death camp 17.  A puzzle to be solved.  Each manse has a memory stone to be found or a location where one can be found to add to the puzzle that his first incarnation wished to have solved.  As a way to regain his memories to regain his purpose as a Deathlord.

Exceptional Smashfist and God Kicking Boots matched pair
With the appearance of fine meshed gloves with maximum flexibility with the back discrete plated gauntlet with each knuckle forming a rigid protuberance.  The fist when formed has a particularly bony look (+1 damage) and several short blades extend (+1 defense).  The scale mesh is fashioned so that it naturally provides a defense to losing ones grip making disarming more difficult and climbing easier (+1 die)
The boots are made of articulated plates, for maximum mobility, with a solid reinforced foot guard with a rigid toe guard protruding forward and from the heel (+1 damage and +1 die for all climbing rolls and allows for heads free stability on vertical surfaces).  In addition, these boots diverge from the standard by having a hearthstone setting in each boot.  Both boots and gloves come with a set of black bear fur coverings to disguise their nature.  
 
God-Kicking Boots Speed 5, accuracy 2, damage 9B, defense 0, rate 3 attunement 6 two hearthstone settings
Smashfist speed 5/6 accuracy 1, damage 8/7B, defense 4, rate 3/1 attunement 6

Trying to figure out the motivation of my player.  He might be looking to pick up a hearthstone or two.  He can gain access to the Solar Manse there but the Solar that currently has the Hearthstone is out on a Mission further afield, to The Bull of the North, and can't be reached to grant permission to attune.  The Syndics don't see any reason he should not take over the rooms that he held in a former incarnation though.  The Outcaste dragon blooded also moved on to Nexus.  

The Syndics are anxious to draw additional Solar Exalted to Whitewall's sphere of influence as such they point out there is a claimed Manse located quite close to the city in the foothills near the jade mines.  That the only problem is that there are several small shadow lands in the area and a Domain of one persistent Rakasha who seems intent causing trouble.  The manse provides a safe bastion to keep both threats in check but this winter it was invaded by two large Wyld Creatures.  If the Manse could be cleared, it would allow the city to re-open additional mines and increase the safety of the city.  In exchange, the Sydics would allow the Nameless to attune to the Manse and lend him its hearthstone and gift him additional supplies, not to mention expertise and minor artifacts.  

••Stone of Earthweb p90 Oadenol's Codex.  Know everything within 10m on ground, effectively darkness/surprise removed if they are on the ground within 10m

Mated pair of Giant Ice Hollows:
Str 6. Dex 4. Sta 6.  Per 4. Int 3. Wits 3 Valor 4.  Join battle 8.  PDV 5. DDV 4.  Armour 3.  Nat soak 6B/3L.  

Bite S5. Acc 10. Dmg 7LP
Shriek intimidation MDV only. S6.  Acc 8. -1 die for 2DV refreshes
Ice Spray spray of ice to targets.  S6.  Acc 20 -1/meter distant. Dmg 4LP

Health 4x0, 5x-1, 4x-2, -4, I.



Fair Folk in the neighbourhood:
Three in the North, the West and the East.  There is another to the South along the Travelers Road, but he is detailed, Lios, he is the leader of The Winter Folk, based in the north west.  The Nobles of the North and West are Winter Folk.  They owe fealty to Lios.  Each is in command of five cataphract and many hobgoblins.  Lios commands twenty-five himself mostly to keep the others in line and remind them who's who.  The Eastern noble is an independent who preys mostly along the roads to the north 


The Guild

The Nameless is anxious to meet his Guild benefactors.  This is important for him because it will determine how he deals with them. He has a name and he wants to meet him.  The truth of the matter is a little complex though.  The Nameless is suspicious and does not trust anyone.  Benefactornamehere is a Merchant Prince whose father made a fortune in the Slave Trade and Benefactornamehere is not proud or pleased with this past and has determined that he will devote his time to righting that wrong.  He is determined to free slaves and provide them with work that they might buy their own price and thus recoup their cost and provide a profit.  It is a long term goal but the young merchant prince is determined to prove his point.  

He managed to secure an island in the distant west that is far from the shipping lanes and thus far from pirates and slavers that has a unique set of resources with two problems.  They are a rare form of clam that needs a lot of labour intensive work to crush and prepare, but once done can be combined with a local kelp to create a dye that is a startlingly beautiful deep purple.  By adding it to the kelp, the dye can even adhere to mundane metals and can even be used to inhance Black Jade artifacts.  It is really quite valuable, but also labour intensive and currently only supplied by the Realm and then only to their citizens.  The second resource is mine that produces Phosphorous.  The rare mineral is only known to be mined on the Island of Coral and most of this resource is consumed again, the Realm, making it another valuable resource. 

The quantities that this island could produce of both of these materials would be small, but that just means that they could be sold at a premium.  Benefactornamehere. thinks that even given the expense of transporting slaves that far from the hub of creation, they would be able to refine enough of these materials to buy their contract in a year or less.  The island is remote, but the winters are temperate and the summers are not too hot either.  The only problem that he has had is that the Guild Slave trade is quite profitable and there is resistance to his ideas and while he could buy slaves directly from the slavers, that would just be him providing more of a market for slaves and increase the number of slaves taken, and that is something he wants to stop.  So the plan developed to figure a way to take slaves from slave owners, to relocate escaped slaves and thus hurt the people who buy slaves and reduce their resources.  Increasing their costs and thus undermining the trade.  His longer term plans include using profits to teach resistance techniques to populations that see a lot of slavers, to dissuade the slavers.  

He is true to his desires and his goals, but he is a patsy.  The West is a very dangerous place filled with horrible dangers.  The island has been known about for centuries.  And the products that it produces are valuable, but the expense has always been too high.  There are storms that sweep out from the Pole of Water that meet with winds from the Pole of Air and they come up suddenly and are deadly to any out at sea and these storms are very rare.  What is not known too well is the domain of Rakasha that live a few dozen miles further to the West.  Well, that is not true, it is known Hierarch Artemisia Sapphire, who made her vast fortune by procuring the best of the best Glamour stuff.  The best deals for Glamour are made by selling slaves to the Fair Folk and selling the used hollowed out husks as galley slaves to dishonest traders.  She dealt originally with Ragara Dinyacout, before he decided to cut her out of the deal.  Her new plan is to use the naïve Merchant Prince Benefactornamehere to do most of the work of acquiring product for her to sell.  A new hierarch, she still has many pokers in the fire all over creation; this is just business, but very profitable business.  



Re: artifacts current bow and armour add perfect to them
Bow add speed dropped to 4, rate up to 4 and a mystical power of obscuring, remote viewing is impossible.
Armour hardness up two to 8, self healing, no mobility penalty 

Orichalcum additional bonus, hearthstone settings eat into attunement cost by the value of the hearthstone.  Second hearthstone half rounded up, third by a third minimum 1.

Or do what my friend does and make Personal Essence pool equal to essence x willpower and Periferal Essence pool equal to essence x sum of virtues and willpower.  This results in about fifty present more essence.  



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