Lifeberg whaling for fun and profit (noobs esp.)

Sunless Sea
1

Just a quick note on an early game strategy, as getting over cash and resource constraints early in the game can be very tough.

Lifebergs are otherwise fairly scary monsters that populate the Boreal Reach, the far northwestern corner of the game. If you get too close to them, they’ll chew through your ship. But that’s the key – don’t get too close, and there’s nothing they can do.

This will probably change up when the Steel combat updates come out, but for now, there’s a relatively fool-proof way to get a potentially big boost early on, although it requires some patience.

The system works basically like this – for distances greater than 40 yards, the only action that a lifeberg can do is a &quotsearch,&quot which in addition to boosting your illumination, will move them 10 yards closer to you, and takes 8 seconds to warm up. Your &quotflee&quot option, however, only takes 5 seconds to warm up, and moves you 10 yards out. This basically means that as long as you’re 50 yards or more out, you can &quotflee&quot twice and get a free 5-second action, and there’s nothing the lifeberg can do about it. Among the 5-second actions available are Flare, Salvo, Flensing Salvo, and Observe – all you need!

Unless your Veils is extremely low, the following recipe works fairly well:

First six moves:
Flare
Observe
Flee
Flee
Flee
Flee

This gets a few things out of the way early. Somewhere around the second or third flee, the lifeberg might start warming up a Crush, but it won’t have time to finish it before you move out of range. After these opening moves, play triples of Observe-Flee-Flee until your Observations are above 10 and the lifeberg’s illumination is above 50. For me, those usually happen about the same time – after four Observes or so. (If need be, mix in a Flare-Flee-Flee combo to get it up there.)

Once you’ve got full observations and the lifeberg is illuminated, fire Salvo (or if you have harpoons, Flensing Slavo) and then Flee once or twice, just making sure that your distance stays at 50 yards or greater. Even if it takes 7-8 shots as a brand new character, you’ll eventually take the lifeberg down.

Once that’s done, cash in the observations for 15 fragments, pick up a guaranteed Zee Story (good for one unit of fuel in Whither or 10 echoes at the University) and then open the treasure. At worst you’ll get a couple of drowning pearls or some 10 echo item. At best you’ll get a Captivating Treasure, worth 1000 echoes at the University.

This can of course be done in concert with picking up port reports from Venderbight and Whither, as well as running Tomb Colonists up the shore, and you can hug the mainland the whole way, in addition to shooting down zee bat swarms to boost supplies. In fact, when in the Boreal Reach, there are several buoys against the shore where you can shut down the engine and turn off your light and just sit and wait for them, without Terror increasing.

Happy whaling!
edited by Trodgmey on 8/3/2014

2

I was wondering if the same tactics could apply to Mt. Nomad. It’s a beast of an enemy (I’m not even sure whether it’s a one of a kind or if it would respawn after a while) and since I’m playing just with the autosave, I don’t want to risk my captain’s fortune there. But I’m going to need some serious secrets if I’m to write the Song of the Zee at some point.

By the way, the new update introduced the option to get a trade license in Khan’s Heart, but for that you need the approval of the nobles over at Khan’s Glory and to get their approval you need drowning pearls, so Lifebergs are even more important now.

3

No, Mt. Nomad functions more like a Lorn Fluke than a Lifeberg so it’s really quite risky. Best option is to take it out as fast as you can. The other thing is that it can’t be destroyed, according to the lore you just manage to make it sink for a little while.

4

So, I suppose with 72 iron it’s out the question? I managed to get an elder crab with 200 points, and I was about I second from getting hit, I don’t see how I’d be able to get 500 points of damage in while avoiding Nomad’s attacks…

Needless to say I haven’t tried the Lorn Fluke either, though I suspect those two might hold some of the items the Curator asked for.

5

[li]eh, regarding Ol’ Mt. Nomad there, if one WAS caught up in a pitched fight with the grand doom buggy of the north, is the abhorrent abomination more susceptible to +harpoon (as a critter) or +cannon as a &quotboat&quot?

6

I’d think that harpoon attacks would be more damaging, it’a living creature (albeit mountain-sized)

7

Harpoons do more damage and you don’t want to bother with a Full Salvo with how quickly it can destroy you. Best thing to do is hit it with harpoons then evade and don’t let your illumination get passed 75. Also with Iron at 75+ you can do 50-100 damage if you get lucky.

8

Mt Nomad is doable with 75 iron if you have a good enough ship (cargo or battlecruiser), little terror and possibly an obscure energies for an emergency move. Get ready for a long battle though.

Personally I waited until I was 100+ until I started doing Mt Nomad.
edited by lord1box on 7/30/2014

9

I think Mt. Nomad actually scales up every time you fight it. I got caught out once by it and applied lifeberg tactics (with an Iron of 99 and a beefy harpoon gun), and took it down, getting a Captivating Treasure. A bit drunk with power, I went out hunting it again hoping for the same result. Card/moves I’d never seen before suddenly started hitting me (“Hypothesize”), at distances of 100 yards, and at that distance it pulled out a card which was something like, “The End,” which in one fell swoop sent me and my crew to Davy Jones.

I don’t know if I got really lucky the first time around, or if on successive fights it gets exceptionally harder.

10

Huh, that certainly sounds like it would fit the lore for Mt. Nomad to get stronger every time you fight it. I just imagine that at first it thinks you’re no threat but then it gets pissed off and pulls out the big guns.

11

I’ve fought it once or twice, mostly because the thing trapped me in the Avid Horizon. I dont think ir gets stronger: the DANGEROUS thing is like many high level enemies, its CRUSH attack is the least of your problems. Desolation or whatever the red squiggle power says will take alternately 50-100 of your health right off, repeatedly, and it takes as long as your harpoons, and very little illumination. Mt. Nomad has 300 HP, so that’s very bad. Even worse, it does variable damage to crew and nightmares, so even if you limp away, prepare for a net profit of maybe 200 echoes on a bad bad day. What I did? Save fighting for when you have an unclear device. Potent Flares-Flank-Potent Flares-Flank-Get in a few harpoons, use the device, repeat. And cross your fingers.

12

Desolation also kills crew(!)

Best way to fight it is load up on fuel and swarm it with potent flares, flensing salvos, and flanking speeds.
edited by nameless on 7/31/2014

13

I remember I beat it once when I was trying to suicide a Captain. Basic ship, almost out of fuel and supplies, 60+ Terror….why didn’t it sink me?

14

Mount Nomad’s attack pattern is just random; sometime’s it’ll just seek indefinitely, other times it’ll use Desolation the moment its able to. (Lorn-Flukes have the same attack set (Malice/Hypothesize/Desolation), except they don’t have the crush attack as far as I know, which makes them mildly easier.

Either way I wouldn’t attack them with permadeath on unless you WANT to die, although about 50% of the time when I try to do that I end up managing to kill them just by spamming flensing salvos because of the inconsistant AI.

Does it actually do much hull damage? I haven’t farmed Mount Nomad as much as the Lorn Flukes but I know the Lorn-Flukes desolation doesn’t actually do much hull damage (usually only a couple points), it just can kill ten crew in one hit. (Of course Mount Nomad’s might work differently, so.)

(also all my experience is before emerald, so if that changed anything it’s obsolete)
edited by WormApotheote on 7/31/2014