Christmas in the Neath Dénouement: Lacre & Nomen

This whole post can be considered somewhat of a spoiler at a mild level.

When studying the post CHRISTMAS IN THE NEATH: A GUIDE, I followed the link to NiteBrite’s Noman FAQ and Guide (Spoilers). Very interesting. Not in a position to pull off maintaining a Noman to the Feast of the Exceptional Rose; not enough knowledge, BDR, nor items stockpiled as this is my first year in the Neath. With that information, I did get a good level of Taste of Lacre (20) and extra Pails of Lacre (9) so I can get a 5-card residence and many other things. Just descended via Penstock’s Wicket and am mulling over my options.

So my question is what is possible and perhaps best to do with my accumulated Taste of Lacre, Pails, and what I can get for them, including Nomen?

Even though I won’t be maintaining him, I will get a Noman for NiteBrite’s Noman’s Friend Loss data project. What else is possible with Nomen, besides as a temporary Companion? I know if you can maintain one to the Feast in February, you can get The Face in the Snow tattoo.

Speaking of the Feast of the Exceptional Rose, I only started in the Neath at that time last year, so my knowledge of it is weak. I know you can get one tattoo for either a permanent point of Dreaded or Bizarre. Can you get a second tattoo?

EDIT: I also decided to pursue the Fate-locked option with the Duchess, so I need to use 5 Taste to finish that on the Sundered Sea.
edited by Jacke on 1/8/2016

If you get Noman Knows to 15, you get an Elemental Hint, which sells for about 300 echos.

Yes, you can get a second tattoo. It remains to be seen if we’ll be allowed a third this year.

Speaking of Tattoos, is there a guide for Exceptional Rose?

I used 5 Taste of Lacre to complete my Investigation on behalf of the Duchess. And then 9 more and 3 Notability to gain a Spire-Emporium of the Bazaar. (Already have enough MW to raise my Notability back to 4.) Now at that awkward Taste of Lacre, 6. Need to reduce it by 1 (on the Sundered Sea, Take the Air?) so I can use a Pail to get to 8. Would like to get the 5-card residence at the Royal Beth as well.
edited by Jacke on 1/8/2016

I was in the same situation (although I started a little later, in April I think).
After hitting ToL 6, I had two pails still left over, so I got two of the Remote Adresses*, a Longbox so I could sell my other one for the Metaquality, and blew the final point on… Taking the air? I guess so.

*a strange urge to collect… let’s just say, I’m happy this game doesn’t have rare spawns to camp =)

If you have spare TOL (and not buckets of snow - those will melt), there’s always the option of saving it till next Christmas if there’s nothing better to do with it.

But pails have to be spent, as they will start melting soon. Turning your pails into Nomen via the Taste of Lacre and then finally into an Elemental Secret would be a profitable way to convert things. It’d be great if someone tried to make, and pop, as many Nomen as possible.
edited by Cecil on 1/8/2016

I just popped my first Noman and bought a second one, but I was trying to drain its Noman’s Friend as quickly as possible, instead of building Noman Knows up to 15. The latter takes at least 40 draws of the Noman’s Progress card and gets you an Elemental Secret, while the former is around 24 and gets you… a net gain of 2 CP in one of four quirks, up to 15! [Update: net gain of 3 CP, not 2 CP!!]

I’ve decided the net gain of 3 CP is not really worth it, even though it’s one of the only sources in the entire game to go between 10 and 12 for certain quirks. Still, I’m holding onto those precious CP… there are other places to get Elemental Secrets. Not so for these quirks, at least until more Renown qualities come into play.
edited by metasynthie on 1/8/2016

Is it really though? Since making the Noman costs those 2 CPs…

That’s why I said net gain – it costs CP in every quirk to get a Noman, but you get 5 CP when the Noman dies. For instance, &quotWait with a bucket&quot gets you 5 CP of Ruthless. Oh oops – it’s actually 3 CP of net gain because a Noman costs 2 CP to create! That’s a little better – only have to kill 7 Nomen to get from 10 to 12. But still rough, especially if you have high quirks close to the &quotdanger zone&quot or worse still – a legacy quirk above 15 – because you end up draining every other quirk by 14 CP.
edited by metasynthie on 1/8/2016

[quote=Jacke]I used 5 Taste of Lacre to complete my Investigation on behalf of the Duchess. And then 9 more and 3 Notability to gain a Spire-Emporium of the Bazaar. (Already have enough MW to raise my Notability back to 4.) Now at that awkward Taste of Lacre, 6. Need to reduce it by 1 (on the Sundered Sea, Take the Air?) so I can use a Pail to get to 8. Would like to get the 5-card residence at the Royal Beth as well.
edited by Jacke on 1/8/2016[/quote]

Yes, Jacke - Take the Air to lose 1 point of Taste of Lacre, then use your bucket to gain 3. That’ll get your Royal Beth suite.

Did somebody mention that you could get some of the quirks to 12 with the norman somehow?
Do you GAIN quirk from one of it’s possible deaths?

Yep, with the normal death you get options that raise a quirk up a bit.

Right, the quirks you can bring up to 12 are Heartless, Magnanimous, Ruthless, and Subtle.

Subtle and Ruthless, at least, appear to go as high as 15, assuming the usual cap for Quirks – but 12 is the threshold that unlocks certain high-level choices, including one of the most reliable ways to max out a quirk to 15 (at the expense of some other quirk) – using up a Connected item.

Footnote: for most stories involving Quirks, a branch that goes up to 5 usually changes Quirks by 1CP, a branch that goes up to 10 is 3CP, and the ones that go up to 15 are 5CP – except for the Connected Items (aka “Quirk Polishers”) which change quirks by a whopping 15CP.

Has anyone else refused to tattoo themselves? I didn’t notice an extra option for those of us who chose no tattoo at all.

That being said, I don’t know how you could make us even more “untattooed”.

[quote=Blaine Davidson]Has anyone else refused to tattoo themselves? I didn’t notice an extra option for those of us who chose no tattoo at all.

That being said, I don’t know how you could make us even more &quotuntattooed&quot.[/quote]
No, which is kind of unfair. If you choose to be bizarre, you get another point each year. if you choose to be dreaded, you get another point each year. if you choose to be respectable, you lose out.