To be fair, the one Vadderung made was on-the-fly.  It proves it's possible, but it should be significantly easier to enchant a magic doorway with months or years or generations of work put into them.

That being said I agree that it might be easier to just treat it as an aspect on the location and not get too intricate with it's function.  Saying it works via Ley Lines keeps it from being a star trek teleporter, so the DM still has ways to steer the story without the "why dont we teleport in/out" question always throwing a wrench every story.

Yeah, having a ley line superhighway would probably be a good bet.  I would probably also consider requiring the doors to be "tuned" for each destination along the lines of having a thaumaturgic-style connection.  That way in the narrative, you can put the heavy magical lifting of opening a few NN gates and zipping between them aside as being powered by the ley line.  Aiming your NN catapult would get handled each time by the "tuning" and would be reasonable for a party to do during a campaign without much issue.

I was under the impression that free will is required to break a circle, even with a physical object.  Bob didn't seem to break Harry's circle in StF when he threw the escape potion to him.  Do ghouls have free will enough to break a circle? 


TC also has a lot about the basics of a circle.

I shook my head. “Breaking the circle isn’t just a physical process. It’s an act of choice, of will—and these things don’t have that.”

I had to restrain myself from smacking my forehead with the heel of my hand. “Because someone summoned them from the Nevernever,” I said. “Their summoner, wherever he is, is giving them orders.”
“Could he break the circle?” Murphy asked.
“Yeah,” I said. “Easily.”

Circles of power are basic stuff, really. Practically anyone can make one if they know how to do it, and learning how to properly establish a circle is the first thing any apprentice is taught. Circles create boundaries that isolate the area inside from the magical energies of the world outside. That’s why Binder’s minions couldn’t cross the plane of the circle I’d drawn on the ground—their bodies were made up of ectoplasm, held into a solid form by magical energy. The circle cut off that energy when they tried to cross it.
As it sprang to life at my apprentice’s will, Molly’s circle did the same thing as mine—only this time the grey suits were inside it. As the energy field rose up, it cut off the grey suits from the flow of energy they needed to maintain their solid forms.
And suddenly the next best thing to forty demonic thugs collapsed into splatters of transparent gook.
Binder let out a cry as it happened, spinning around desperately, mumbling some kind of incantation under his breath—but he should have saved himself the effort. If he wanted them back, he would have to get out of the isolating field of the enormous circle first, and then he would have to start from scratch.

It kicked and struggled wildly—and then changed tactics. It rolled up to a desperate crouch, extended a single talon, and swept it around in a circle, carving a furrow into the rock. It touched the circle with its will, and I felt it when the simple magical construct sprang up and cut off the noose spell from its source of power: me. The silver cord shimmered and vanished.

Also, beings on the level of the Erlking and Titania seemed to be able to break circles with force of will in a pinch.  Somewhere in SmF, Harry talks about the Archive being able to break free if there was a small flaw in the greater circle on DR.



As a general rule, I would say that circles aren't great catch all defense strategies.  They're only effective in limited circumstances.  That being said, it would probably be a good idea to make sure everybody is on the same page about those limits beforehand if possible.  Differences in expectations and understanding can be harder to handle after the fact.

And I think that blandness has more to do with my general impression of overly-polite people than with the way the characters themselves were presented.  Though I will say I enjoyed the hell out of Bridget's dry sense of humor.

Possibly.  It's hard to put my finger on.  I should note that bland isn't the same as bad in this case.  I don't think there was anything wrong with them; they just didn't excite me as much as other characters.

Murphy having Japanese swords above her fireplace in SK should probably count as foreshadowing.

Im not even sure she'll reach that level.  I mean, one thing all those Respected Enemies have in common is that they are good to their word, which makes the solid foundation that the rest gets built on.  Ransom doesnt really have that right now, the main thing for her presently is that he can trust anything she says or does.  No, if I had to make a prediction on her Fate, Id say she's got redeeming self-sacrifice in her future, contributing to the emotional baggage Grimm has to carry.

I remember she cheated at the airship race, but isn't that the only major thing we've seen so far?  I need to go back and do my own reread.

Grimm did something like hide the valuables when she came on board, but I don't know if I would consider that extreme enough for the reader to never be able to trust her actions.

Edit: Given the number of losses Albion took at the shipyard at Habble Landing both economically and populace wise. Aurora definitely has the upper hand. I hope Albion gains the support of Olympia. I don't think ALbion could take on both Aurora and Olympia.

There's a WoJ somewhere that Aurora is a little worse off as far as the decay of their spire life support systems go.  It's one of the reasons that they're so warlike.  Albion and Aurora may not be so outmatched post-AW after all.  Olympia could definitely sway the fight either way.

Maybe the wizard can do something about summoning a guide?  After that, enchanted items to make travel/running away easier may be useful, say something like Harry's parachute potion from Changes.  It depends on what kind of environments you're expecting to run into.

What did it?  If it wasnt Iron (which most bullets arent, at least) I'd say that's still reasonable mythic healing outside of the applicable Catch.

He got stabbed with a machete from Marcone, then his arms chopped off by Thomas and Lara's swords besides getting huge chunks of him blown off by bullets.  He also uses a chain as an improvised weapon without it catching his hand on fire, but that could be an artistic mistake since the storm of bullets catch his torso on fire.  This guy is on a similar scale as the naagloshii pretty easily.