Are there any meaningful ways in which to spend Connected: The Duchess?
Like, I know when you play Pass The Cat, that connection decreases slightly. But at the moment my C:tD is at 320 with no sign of slowing down, mainly because it increases whenever I grind Bohemian reputation for my Salon, and it just feels like I might as well be collecting confetti. Or not even that, because at least if I had a substantial amount of confetti I could put that to some use.
I don’t mean this to come across as me having a whinge, but I’m not sure if there’s something I’ve missed or if maybe this is the game’s way of telling me I should be attempting to flirt with The Duchess sometime soon. :-p
(If any of the folks at Failbetter are reading this, could there please be a useful way to spend that Connection?)
It’s useful on Heists, where an opp card gives you the option to progress by spending connected: duchess, without having to depend on luck or spend appalling secrets.[li]
It’s mostly used to come and go from the Court. Once you’re kicked out, it’s just lagniappe from the Bohemian action.
I say it’s better to have it and not need it, than need it and not have it.
I mean, it doesn’t hurt to have it. It’s not like it causes an extra card in your deck or anything. I think most people would rather have a high Duchess connection with no ready use than an extra Standard frequency card.
However, I keep all of my Connections at the descriptor limits(150 for The Duchess) because you never know when it might come in use later.
And for in-character reasons. Just because something doesn’t directly translate into Echoes doesn’t mean it’s not worth having.
But if you really think FBG should add a way to spend the Connection, you can always recommend it at: feedback@failbettergames.com
The other time I’ve been grateful to have the Duchess as a friend has been when exiled to the tomb colonies, where a slight erosion of our friendship could effect a much briefer stay in that doleful place.
@fortluna - I haven’t done heists in a while, largely because I was converting all my Casing into Connected:Criminals and then converting that into Souls via opportunity card. I’ll keep it in mind though. :-)
@Nigel - I used to keep my connections up about 50ish, but lately I haven’t had any use for them whatsoever so I’ve been burning them off as best I can to help thin out my Opportunity deck.
I can get to the Empress’ Court using Duchess rep but I raise the connection so much faster than its spent, that my only concern there is clicking the wrong thing and spending Society connection instead of what is essentially free entry.
[Note: I’m marking your as the Accepted Answer, partly fort the email link, and also for increasing my vocabulary with the word “lagniappe”. :3 ]
@RandomWalker - Despite being A Legendary Charisma, I still have yet to visit the Tomb Colonies in any capacity (though I’ve just progressed through the Labyrinth of Tigers that I finally have a reason to go.) Good to know that the Connection can be helpful there.
In some situations it might be a lot easier for you to just get exiled to the a Tomb Colonies, grab a lion, have the Duchess clear your reputation, and sail home, rather than deal with Scandal in the more traditional ways.
For that to be a useful option, you should not have both hedonism and austerity above 11, no qualities that get junked when you get exiled (casing, investigating, a few others), and no valuable cards in your hand.
[quote=Kittenpox][Note: I’m marking your as the Accepted Answer, partly fort the email link, and also for increasing my vocabulary with the word "lagniappe". :3 ][/quote]As a non-native English speaker, I’ve learned the word "lagniappe" from Fallen London itself, by buying Fourth City Airag from the Portly Sommelier.
[quote=dov]…increasing my vocabulary with the word "lagniappe". :3 ]As a non-native English speaker, I’ve learned the word "lagniappe" from Fallen London itself, by buying Fourth City Airag from the Portly Sommelier.
(Also: the word "airag" :-))[/quote]
As a native English speaker, I can say the same. This game does wonders for your vocabulary! Your average London market trader will happily offer ‘free’ extras when selling something expensive, but they sure won’t call it a "lagniappe")
And as a keen alcohol enthusiast, I was already familiar with "Airag", though I have never tried it. Probably ought to. While the idea seems inherently disgusting (booze, made from…milk?) it’s not a million miles away from cheese or yoghurt, and they are fine.
Oh, and I’m pretty sure grinding Society connection for Salon scheme is a better use of actions.
[color=rgb(0, 153, 0)]And in turn, I learnt the word lagniappe from the novels of Barbara Hambly, who is very well acquainted with the more recondite bits of English.[/color]
[color=rgb(0, 153, 0)]And in turn, I learnt the word lagniappe from the novels of Barbara Hambly, who is very well acquainted with the more recondite bits of English.[/color][/quote]
"Recondite" is a beautiful word. As is "fuligin". I recently discovered that one having starting reading Gene Wolfe’s New Sun books, and, combined with "pelagic", I think I see where Sunless Sea’s "peligin" comes from!
I can only assume Mr Pages’ dialogue is a result of all these word ideas that…didn’t work out so well;) edited by yetanotherone on 7/16/2015
sorry if I go slightly off-topic here but I didn’t want to open a new thread for this question: in general, are the “Call in favours” storylets a good source of income? at least for those connections you can raise easily?
Generally speaking, they’re not that good – they get you 2.4 Echoes worth of stuff for 120 CP of Connections, which will take at least 4 actions to earn. Society is probably the most profitable for a long, reliable grind, if you have access to and just sit in court; you can grind via "someone else’s scandal," cash in for London Street Signs, but even then you’re making only a little bit more than an echo per action.
The exception is Revolutionaries, which has a disproportionately huge reward, but can only be cashed in via the Calling in Favours in the Flit card. If you grind Revolutionaries in the Forgotten Quarter ("reaping the academic benefits") and then wait for that card in the Flit, you end up with a whopping 3.2 Echoes per action – but it also means you have to forego the biggest source of Certifiable Scraps, which uses up the same card.
[quote=metasynthie]The exception is Revolutionaries, which has a disproportionately huge reward[/quote]This also has the downside of advancing a certain… Liberation.
You can use the Duchess Connection in the Tomb Colonies and there is a Fate-locked card from Theological Husbandry that takes Duchess and Urchins on a failure.