I liked this one too! Feels like they’ve gotten a balance of strange happenings and clarity that works for me, at least. Already mentioned I enjoyed the atmosphere of the Catacombs, but the Sous in general did a good job of feeling different from what’s come before.
The various preparations for the attack were satisfying, and I thought the use of an existing carousel worked very well; even though it meant a lot of actions, there was enough interesting new text within that it kept me engaged. Making poor Tatterdemalion have to behave with Summer!
Really liked getting to see some alternate Calendar Council individuals humanised a bit in Parabola, before this they felt atmospheric as hell but so evil I hated making any choices to work with them. But then I paid for my softened feelings in guilt when my prior actions betrayed them. Felt guilty enough to try and spare the remainder. Still felt guilty at losing Whitsun, St. Margaret and Beltane (especially Beltane, he felt like a little point of familiarity, though much less friendly-feeling than our Manager, in the darker Calender). I don’t know why I have so much guilt about videogame characters , I’m not like this IRL But, feeling things about it all is a good thing.
And then at the end the fire coming and grabbing us unexpectedly, and that shock mention of Queeneater Castle! I actually said “WHAT” out loud when I saw that. Intriguing stuff coming up. I imagine we’ll get back into the more esoteric and confusing side of things next episode, but I feel like they’ve done a really good job the last two chapters of taking our feedback and making things much clearer and more pinned-down, so I feel more confident delving back into the mystery now.
Suddenly, the pilot and engineer are in a quarrel and for some reason are looking for my approval like they are 5 years old.
Suddenly, The Last Dumbest appears in Bone Zone to play the last part of her petty drama with her lover/competitor. Aren’t Burgundy under siege by enemies? Come to think of it, we could also fly back and forth too; very strange siege/battle for existence.
Suddenly, Vulgate from chapter one appears to help massacre all his kind and saves the day.
Suddenly, flames appear to guide us to the next quest location.
Also, we are using a magical drill-train to defeat the invading army. For some reason, it has OP guns. And we have to launch it through the air from a location hundreds of miles away.
Hmm, I had the impression that the engineer was erased during the battle, yet I can talk to her in my flying ship. Strange.
On the mechanical side, they added a location where you can exchange useless bones for roof coins. Hooray? Nope. These bones were deemed useless because their opportunity cost was too low to justify adding them to skeletons. In that new location, it’s even worse. Zero EpA at best and you could easily go even lower, so it’s still better to keep all those pincers, human arms and so on, rather than dispose of them. Why. Just why.
Actually, there is a contingent of players who really, really don’t like the Bone Market, so this reasoning never crosses their minds. For them, it’s “Finally, a way to get rid of this stinky stuff without having to fiddle with it first!” (And I speak as someone who has spent many happy days on Jurassic beaches in RL.)
I like the sous for the simple way of disposing of bones, that’s for sure. It’s super finicky building specific skeletons, so I do like the way of just offloading them here for stuvier. I do wish that either there wasn’t as much of an action sink, or that the actions didn’t feel as purely pointless as they do. Repeatedly picking directions that don’t matter at all is boring as hell, and really makes this grind more of a drag because all of the actions I’m using are just my PC deciding to go different directions. Some flavor of some sort there wouldn’t go amiss, or maybe just an entering and leaving cost rather than having to click through all the labyrinth directions each time? I’d really love that. Chapter was cool! After the Zenith chapter, if I can understand what’s actually going on, I’m pretty happy. This is the second war train I’ve gotten to build, and that’s hilarious.
I know, I know. But Sous does not solve anything. These players still should avoid any bones.
Perhaps I should provide example for clarification. Imagine some player was involved in one of World events at Zee and got some pincers from it as past of the payoff. What rationally she should do? Keep them forever in the inventory. Why? Because sacrificing them in Sous generates less then 2 EpA, while doing any other endgame activity will bring 4, 5 or even 6+ EpA. And it is if we value pincers as freebies.
So there’s something else going on in those bones and I don’t know what. The types matter. The Wiki’s lagging, only a few pages here that aren’t connected yet, and I can’t see where the cycle starts.
Looks totally weird, from the few bits I can tell. Cherubs.
Quite enjoyed throwing a train at things. A little frustrated that there wasn’t a way to mitigate ‘A Bad Month’. It feels like a lot of choices in this story have come way way before you get context for them (supporting the Duke or Duchess, choosing how to enter Zenith the first time, sparing the Vulgate in the first chapter inserting bad months into the calendar) and that makes it feel less like I’m compelling actions and more like I’m being constantly punked in small ways by my crew ('No! June! I didn’t want you to do that! I just learnt these guys are cool(ish)). I’m still enjoying the central plot though, flying Parisian trains feel about right for things and it’s nice to be out of Burgundy and onto new places.
I’m still looking for ways to do that – any hints welcome. They pop up in the strangest of places, including Jericho, where they’re the price/reward of some favours. The Bohemians – really? And some cards are a no-no for the same reason.
Incidentally, the pincers make a lovely soup in my famous kitchens…
You can sell the Ivory Humeri directly for Scrip anywhere in the Hinterlands.
All the ribcages you get from Calling in Favours at Jericho are valued at 12.50 € and can be deposed reasonably at The Sous when the time comes.
The Wings, you’re stuck with. Though we could start a petition to make them usable in the kitchen. Contemporary Chicken Wings are fairly young, but I can’t imagine that bird wings were not commonly consumed in the Victorian era.
I need to take this back after playing through the Sous some more and paying more attention. Unlike the Bone Market, the Sous requires two actions per bone. That makes extracting bone value from 12.50 € bones through the Sous not actually reasonable. Even if we ignore sourcing the bones, it’s 62.50 € from bone value over 12 actions (I think?) in the best case and 50 over 10 actions in the bad case. That’s just straight up worse than just running stacks even if just disposing piled up bones.
Edit for clarity: in the Sous we’re not actually extracting Echo, but Stuiver from the bones. I just used the Echo values because I referenced them in my original post.
Ultimately, I feel it might be more enjoyable to play after it’s all been finished and released, with a wiki guide to hand. There’s many Important Decisions to make and I never feel like I understand the situation well enough to make an informed choice.
My earlier choices did not leave me much option for an outcome with less casualty. I tried to maintain equal distance from both Summer and my pilot, and it cost me the opportunity to spare the Calendar from total annihilation. In the end, I chose to accept the fact my pilot reminded me: that I can’t fix everything.
I can see that. I’m enjoying it, but when it’s all done I certainly wouldn’t mind having an option to Fate-Reset it to replay it all knowing what everything is.
I’ve been waiting to kill Maximilian and take members of the Calendar off the board for a long time. My only regret is the game felt like it was really REALLY trying to get me to reconsider.
I even spared the Vulgate just to make a point of who my real enemies were all along.
But, feeling things about it all is a good thing.