To more fully express my question: what is the most brainlessly simple yet tolerably profitable echo grind?
I’m in need of a reliable standby grind to dump actions into when my actions fill up and I don’t have anything in particular that I want to do, as is the case right now. The lab research mechanics absolutely do my head in, with the card draws and discards, and it seems the profit form lab research has recently been cut anyway.
Generally speaking, my lack of tolerance for extended clicking exceeds my hunger for profit, so what is the best way for me to make money with the least amount of fiddling around? The ideal would be a single storylet I can replay over and over with the "try again" button, but I’m willing to entertain slightly more effort if the difference in payout is substantial.
For a single action, I don’t know of anything better than the Ealing Spa. Attending for a treatment gives 2.875 EPA, while designing a treatment gives 3 EPA if you have 10 Kataleptic Toxicology and Mutersalt (Assuming the rare success rate is 5%, which is what I’ve heard. Rare successes also give a Hell Favour).
I think the Attar lab research and Helicon House Fascinating grind are both easy and substantially more profitable than the ones listed above.
The long-term benefit of the Attar grind (if you have Kataleptic Toxicology 10) is that you’re in London and can flip cards there. All other options are inferior because it takes you away from the… uh… Attar card and Docks favours and a few other valuable cards.
The Attar grind, like most of the lab, was massively nerfed a week or so ago and is now “only” ~3.2EpA unless you have the magic combo of profession, completed ambition, and Fate spend. So it’s not all that much better than the spa, and definitely a bit more involved. Helicon House grind is still slightly higher than that (checks wiki: yes, 3.6EpA - 3.8 if you have the right companion) but also requires extra concentration and fiddling from the player to do things at the right time.
You good sink all your actions into gaining Casing in Parabola, then reduce the nightmares you get that way in your basecamp, and then use your Casing for robberies in the Clay Highwayman’s camp.
I second the use of Ealing Spa (if a Spirifer anyway) which is what I use if I’ve only seconds a day to play. Helicon is too many differential clicks to work. If you don’t have a noman tattoo, grinding moonlit as the background grind and then later converting to paintings for airag when you do have time is just within my personal threshold for mindlessness, though it does require some ancillary conversions (for touching love stories, etc.) to keep going from time to time. edited by Shaerys on 3/2/2021
If you will have some time for fiddlier grinding, mindlessly stocking up on whirring contraptions in Wilmot’s end is only slightly more complex than honey from the lab and eventually pays out 3.74 EPA instead of 2.5.
The responders in this thread suggest very good and reasonable grinds. By the way, you can always check the Money-Making guide in the wiki for those. However, most of these grinds do not reduce the number of clicks so much.
Of the grinds already covered, sending the Artist for Honey seems the best suited for your purpose, as it doesn’t require you to change outfits or really do anything other than tap. Gaining Casing in Parabola and spending it in the Clay Highwayman’s Camp is MUCH more profitable (in fact, I believe, it’s the most profitable grind at the moment), but it requires some concentration and changing the outfits (Glassworks <–> Shadowy).
If you really want to save on tapping and don’t care about EPA so much, you can just grind Casing through Setting your gang of hoodlums to business in Prepare for Big Score… in Flit. This will allow you to burn all 20 actions in just 4 taps (8, if we count "Onwards") for 72 Casing. When you have a lot of Casing (a few days worth?), you can cash it in with the Highwayman’s gang. The EPA won’t be great (2.75-2.85), but your screen time would be much lower than with any comparable activity. edited by Wojciech on 3/2/2021
Another slightly more complex option, but still somewhat less clicky than many others, is alternating skeleton assembly using Thorned/Human/Flourishing Ribcage and then breaking up your skeleton in the Bone Market. With endgame-grade Dangerous levels, this translates into EPA of ~3 in Whispered Hints and occasionally Bone Fragments. No gear changing required, but you need to scroll and there’s an additional click to open the “Assemble your skeleton” storylet.
Just putting it out here for the sake of completeness - and for those players who have Bone Market already but still haven’t set up the Railway. Although the Wilmot’s End/Doubt Street grind is probably more useful there…
Good to know. I wasn’t sure how much it had gotten nerfed. So basically Helicon with enough actions to flip cards in London is easily the best grind. Thanks!
Not quite the same, but I highly recommend Fallen London Favorites for pinning storylets/options to the top. Makes a lot of mid-complexity grinds much more bearable.
It’s probably not the best grind overall, but I’ve been using finding an enemy’s weaknesses in Parabola to grind up to…around noon every day, then spending it in the Flit to gain Antique Mysteries, then spending any and all remaining time in Parabola to once again hoard Casing.
Among other reasons, it does deprive me out of a lot of cards.
[quote=Tyrconnell]If you will have some time for fiddlier grinding, mindlessly stocking up on whirring contraptions in Wilmot’s end is only slightly more complex than honey from the lab and eventually pays out 3.74 EPA instead of 2.5.[/quote]I can’t believe I’m reading this! :))
Can you please share what exactly do you do with it to hit such a nice EPA? :)
[quote=Skinnyman]I can’t believe I’m reading this! :))
Can you please share what exactly do you do with it to hit such a nice EPA? :)[/quote] Wilmot’s End now pays out 2 Whirring Contraptions per lap (no Dramatic Tension needed!), making a 104-stat Newspaper payout of ~70 Echoes fully funded and performed in… 17.5 actions? The Newspaper bit is definitely too frustrating for me, but your mileage may vary.