CHRISTMAS IN THE NEATH: A GUIDE

As someone who has collected far too many pets, that rare bag draw companion taunts me. I hope there’s another way to get him later like there was in Flint with most of these items.

I got ToL at 3 now I changed my poetry alingment with that melancholy will I be able to get enough to get the box?

I think you should be set to get a long-box. There should be a few more snow falls too before the seasonal event ends to help you out.

btw I got an exceptional friend nowand have acces to the house of chimes what there are many options there wich one is the monthly story one?

This month’s exceptional story, Flint starts with “A Truly Exceptional Story: The Mask-Stall”. If you’ve played that it disappears and a Flint related story should appear in the house of chimes. You’ll need to do it soon though, new stories generally start on the last Thursday of each month. You have to move stories out of the house of chimes before the new story/new month begins otherwise you lose them. But if you do start them and move them out of the house of chimes, you can play them at any time.

There are two short storylines exclusive to the House of Chimes, those of the Soldier and the Silken Expert, so make sure to do those at some point too. Those are permanent content though so as long as you’re an Exceptional Friend you can do them, but unlike the monthly stories they cannot be completed without access to the House of Chimes.

So I looked into this further with the assistance of a friend’s notes – and it looks like the 12-fate stories all give you…

7 ToL partway through the 12 Days, and then cost 5 ToL at the end, for a net gain of 2. (Not sure where the 4 comes from – maybe that includes gain from other days?) Here’s the thing, though – you don’t HAVE to finish these storylines. You can just keep the 7 ToL and not lose 5, since losing 5 just gets you a valuable (312.5 echo) reward and 100 CP of connection you get at the Sundered Sea. If you don’t have the Duchess’ reward, that’s the only one that can’t be obtained without Fate elsewhere. The Docks fate story, however, will make you miss one opportunity to get a pail.
The 8-fate stories, on the other hand, aren’t quite as worth it. Urchins gives you 1 extra ToL, a Storm-Threnody and 140 CP of Urchins connection, which might be handy if you’re buying pails from them. Benthic gets you 3 ToL, but on days when you can get ToL from non-fate choices. And Revolutionaries gives you no ToL.

I know there might be a 12 Days guide coming, but I’d love to know if this quick rundown seems off at all:
Day 2: various options give +1 ToL; you can play the Consonant Violin, hand over a Greyfields First Sporing or just have some connections at 20
Day 5: +1 ToL option if you are a Celestial (can change this for 2.5E and a Vision of the Surface in the Singing Mandrake) or +1 ToL if doing the Benthic fate story
Day 6: +7 ToL if doing the Duchess fate story
Day 7: +1 ToL if doing the Urchins fate story, or +7 ToL if doing the Widow fate story
Day 8: +1 ToL if you invite Silas in without calling him Silas
Day 9: +1 Pail of Snow option… or if you’ve spent 100 Fate on a Boneless Consort, you can get +2 ToL (and lose some of your Peculiar Enhancement)… or +1 ToL if doing the Benthic fate story… or +7 ToL if doing the Docks fate story
Day 11: +1 ToL for Notaries and Doctors
Day 12: +1 ToL and 1 Pail of Snow for taking advantage of disintegrating Sacks, or +1 ToL if doing the Benthic fate story

Max you can earn without fate: 5 ToL (most seem to be uncapped) and 2 pails of snow, if you are a Celestial Notary or Doctor
Max you can earn with fate: 14 ToL and 1 pail of snow for Celestial Notaries or Doctors with Peculiar Personal Enhancements helping the Widow or Duchess

One other question if anyone remembers: does the Noman cost some of all of your quirks… even at the very beginning of the season?
edited by metasynthie on 11/9/2015[/quote]

Could someone PM me the reward for the 5 fate + magnificent diamond option for Mr Sacks Day 3?

can a side of the numinatrix help me with taste of laquer like getting one of the items to trade with the urchins? what side should I pick can I change it?

@NiteBrite: That’s still a bit confusing, though. Suppose one has not yet done Part I of Flint, if that is moved out of the House of Chimes but Part II not started before the 31st, will Part II still be available? Maybe one should finish Part I ASAP just to mak’ siccar?

– Mal

You’ll be fine, Mal. You just need to get the tracking quality (Seeking a Prison of Flint) - everything else ties together.

The only thing I am not sure of is if you started Part I in Novemeber (before Part II was out) there is a new storylet to start part II. I don’t know whether you need to do that too to open up the January story. But in any case, that’s at worst 1 extra action you need to spend

I don’t think the sides will help that way, as far as I know. I believe that your choice of sides will only affect which faction’s Opportunity Card will be able to give you &quotCounting the Days…&quot and &quotA Pocketful of Loose Change&quot (qualities used for the Numinatrix storylet carousel). Also, some other storylets that are not on the faction opportunity cards will only be open to people from certain groups (e.g. on the opportunity card that lets you clear wounds a bit, you can only choose to use a certain Rubbery cure if you are siding with one of the ‘underdog’ factions, e.g. Rubberies, Urchins, Criminals).

You can change your &quotClosest to&quot on opportunity cards, or by selling the location of the cave of the Nadir, but the former is usually costly in terms of Connections and items, and the latter is one-off and only works for some sides (Urchins, Devils, Great Game and Revolutionaries, as far as I can remember).

I’d advise picking a side that you like and find interesting, first and foremost. If you can’t decide between two or more, then look at their Opportunity cards. Some sides have options on their cards that can be quite profitable (e.g. you can get Criminal favours from the Criminals card), so you might want to pick a side with not many/no profitable options on their card (The Great Game, for example). I don’t think it makes very much difference otherwise-- correct me if I’m wrong.
edited by Sestina Valdis on 12/23/2015

The only reason why your choice of Closest to might be significant is because if you are Closest to the right factions (namely, The Great Game or the Bohemians), you can grind Counting the Days from 0 to 14 without relying on opportunity cards. Considering how unprofitable Marks are, though, that’s usually only a good strategy if you want to get the Consonant Violin or Iron Republic pass on a faster timeline (or you want to farm First City Coins to give to other players).

Unless there is something invisible going with the qualities that can’t be true. Part I is not a separate standslone story. It ends in the same storylet as Part Ii starts. The end of part I and beginning of part II are literally branches of the same storylet. The only qualities that are necessary to pick the part II branch are gained in Part I (some level of Seeking a Prison of Flint and getting your Deputy)

ETA: The starting storylets for November Part I and the December combined bundle are indeed different but they both just send you to the House of Chimes to gain Seeking a Prison of Flint.
edited by genesis on 12/24/2015

But the way it was presented from the start was that to play both parts you need to either be a subscriber for the two months of November and December, or you can have access to both parts just by subscribing to December.

I haven’t tested it, obviously, but it was presented such that even if you’ve played part 1 in November, you need to be a subscriber in December to continue. I have no idea which quality tracks out controls this.

I don’t think that that’s how it ended up working (though you are right that was the original perception) but the point isn’t whether you need to be subscribed in December but whether you need to play through the entirety of Part I.

So, as I said two posts above, it may well be that you need to play the December version of Mask-Stall storylet to get the Exceptional Friendship quality to the right level, but even if that’s the case that is only one extra action.

I doubt you need to complete part 1. The salt will be very real if you do need to because it says that nowhere and people are super tied up in Sacksmas time limited grinds. It’s one story, there’s only one starting it. The mask stall didn’t give any new or different starting quality.

Basically, it would be extremely bad practice to require a player to play through part 1 to keep part 2, which they paid for, and to also not tell them about such a restriction existing in any way. For this reason I very much doubt you need to complete part 1. Failbetter know better than to make such an error of omission.
edited by NiteBrite on 12/24/2015

Hopefully this will help clear it up:

From the official tumblr

Wow, how the heck am I failing to get Night Whisper out of the Fidgeting Writer story so much? Last 30ish Tales of Terror wasted. It’s as if the difficulty was secretly raised.

Especially at the Room of the Bethlehem. It fails.

Every. Single. Time.

[quote=Robin Mask][quote=Starmiya]Wow, how the heck am I failing to get Night Whisper out of the Fidgeting Writer story so much? Last 30ish Tales of Terror wasted. It’s as if the difficulty was secretly raised.

Especially at the Room of the Bethlehem. It fails.

Every. Single. Time.[/quote]

I feel you . . .

I need four, too. I think I can get one from scraps, but I’m dreading doing the Fidgeting Writer run . . . luckily, I’m not doing too bad on deja vu, and still have around 80 tales to convert, so I’m keeping my fingers crossed XD Good luck, though! Here’s hoping the RNG treats you well soon :)[/quote]

Down to 6 Tales of Terror here…

Oh well, I’ll have to find a way to effectively grind them again.

[quote=Starmiya]Down to 6 Tales of Terror here…

Oh well, I’ll have to find a way to effectively grind them again.[/quote]

The best way is to steal them in flit. I didn’t take too much risk and went with 100 tales at once. Excess is not a problem but shortage is really problem. RNG did balance itself and I got my needed night whispers plus four really pretty souls with the excess.