NEW CONTENT: the Fruits of the Zee festival!

[quote=squiggle]I think Going Fishing is the first time I’ve ever seen quirks being really important, and then it kind of turns out the other way, that Going Fishing has a much bigger impact on the quirks than the other way around. Going fishing changes people. Like war does.
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This line amused me greatly… And to think, we never understood why those gentlemen fussed about fishing so :P

[quote]
(EDIT: Was this part from Gillsing, I think??)

Hmm, looking closer at the regular Mutton Island cycle, it does contain plenty of Whispered Secrets after the first part, and with Nightmares being easy to reduce at the festival it looks like low-level characters who’ve found all the items they want should probably just start a cycle of island secrets, listening to children’s song and then get stuck at the wind that chills the heart until they succeed. Or investigate a crashed steamer. Wow. This Fruits of the Zee festival is even better for low-level characters than I thought it was. And I already thought it was unbelievably good. Also quite fun and with cool prizes, but such things are of course subjective. (I like the compass a lot.)[/quote]

Being one of those lower-level types, I have already made a fairly substantial gain in Shadowy from spending more time in the island secrets for a couple days. I kicked my Docks connections up with the rescue event, though I have no idea when I’ll need that… And I have enjoyed the take in Whispered Secrets as you mention. To top it all off, I have four of the lady’s items, and all of the ones I really need for stats. They are an amazing boost at this level, particularly as I look toward building abilities that I haven’t bothered with thus far (and had almost NO equipment for in my inventory previously). So in that sense, yes it’s a quite rewarding event.

At the same time, it’s clearly had its own repertoire of likely frustrations. I found the fishing more entertaining early on. I think I would have enjoyed it more later if there were some other repeatable questing sort of activity to focus on as well. Knowing that it was the only way to obtain the treasures OR to reduce menaces raised in the process (and it had to be one or the other each time around), made it start to feel extremely grindy. Personally I did reasonably well fairly early and had I simply quit trying after my third or fourth item, I could still say I had a reasonably smooth time of it. But I could see how anyone more interested in quirks who didn’t attempt to use some maps or sea stories early on, might get completely lost. Somehow I alternated options enough, rolled well enough, and hit the timer in the right places until it didn’t really matter that much. But I was also putting in quite a few actions on those days, too.

I rather wonder how many people would prefer to simply have a long but definite grind toward more certain rewards, and not face the randomness of the Strange Cove modifications each time after a long outing followed by lots of waiting around. But perhaps that is just the overall tendency of Fallen London? I can’t say yet. It has to be difficult to find a balance between staggering things through repetitive carousels, and making enough curiosities or rewards pop up in between.


edited by Lavessa on 9/6/2014

[quote=]Well, you CAN reduce menace via the Messages system also for the regular -3CP, which could be handy if you also have an alt.

I don’t think you can accept messages on Mutton Island. I think you need to be in London to do that.[/quote]

As long as you are both on Mutton Island AND you have issued the invitation earlier from your lodgings it’s entirely viable. And why wouldn’t it be? You’re both in the same place after all. Of course, you can’t issue new invitations to alleviate menace so what I do is stack them up by the dozens and use them when I need them

Does me exchanging menace reducing favors with my alt qualify as a &quotgame-mechanical advantage&quot, I wonder? I would like to hear a developer’s opinion about that. By the way, both characters are using plenty of Nex in the game so it’s not that one is just freeloading or anything. Not sure if that counts for anything but it would reduce FB profits if I only played with one character.

In my personal opinion, the randomness doesn’t add that much to the game, especially not when paired with stat requirements. When the entire purpose of an action hinges on randomness like the tail part of fishing it can quickly get from quirky, to silly, to outright frustrating and annoying. It is my personal opinion the game would be better for it to force a certain outcome after a set number of turns. &quotAnti-RNG streak&quot code has been implemented in games like Civilization (battle RNG) and WoW (quest loot droprates) and they are better games for it. Seriously, way too many people rage about the randomness in this game.

Edit:
On a technical note, for this kind of code to work, the server needs to store say, the last 10 action outcomes and this will increase server overhead. In a quick guesstimate, it would probably equate to about 32 bytes of data per player on the server in addition to a few lines of code that need to fire each turn. Going way of topic…sorry about that.
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edited by dharthoorn on 9/6/2014

nothing to do with fishing strategies but there is some really exotic/weird storylets in this festival

“He has pulled his lower lip up over his nose, while his eyes bulge like mushrooms and his ears - dear God! His ears! - flex and squirm on either side of his head like agitated hermit crabs. ‘Gurning,’ the villagers call it.”

This is definitely something that many players have gone through. It is possible to come out the other side, though this board can sometimes feed that &quotOCD&quotish or frantic sensation. I have been playing Fallen London for around two and a half years and am still not bored with it, and for me, that invested time has given me a kind of perspective on trusting the developers and enjoying what’s been created for my amusement.

Miss Perative is a prissy, arrogant character who would like to do the right thing more often but generally defaults to acting in the best interest of her purse. I did not know that about her when I was a beginner player. I would like to see her behave a bit more nobly in her endgame, but her actions over time have made her this way. Her neck is likely forfeit if the Masters… well. Her neck is likely forfeit either way, but she would like a festive spray of diamonds to accompany the spurt of blood when that stroke falls.

I don’t know if I would call my gameplay fun. I consider it more a maintenance of Miss Perative, since new content is rare. When events like this Festival occur, I expect a certain amount of frustration even with my capped stats and experience, because the devs have been watching us play for years. I don’t think they’re surprised when people are frustrated by one of their mechanics. Many of the forum regulars have been doing this far longer than I have been. They have war stories they could tell you about frustration from earlier days of the game. It is part of the family bonding for us as players, and it breeds loyalty. Failbetter do know what they’re doing. I think it’s delicious (!) that they frustrate us this way. And it’s become fun, in that way, for me.

I have derailed the discussion thread here and apologize for that. dharthoorn, I hope you continue to play and that you come to a kind of peace with it.

Miss Perative, gramercy for sharing that. I feel considerably less disheartened for it.

Perhaps there is hope. Salvation in the sweetness of accepting that which cannot be changed, in spite of itself. Much like a person may come to terms with having a pet dog which develops a mean streak, a character flaw which unfortunately was not evident in the sad gleam of the starved puppy’s eyes when it sat on your doorstep so many years ago. Perhaps there is joy in the display of snarling ungratefulness as it wolfs down its dinner from its bowl day after day only to retire under your table, farting indifferently as you try eat yours.

I…I will hold on little longer. Hopefully our paths may cross somewhere down the alleys of Veilgarden and with your permission, I would like to buy you a spoonful of honey whilst swapping yarns of woe and despair.

I’m just delighted to have snapped up a little cavy from the cove. I’ve become a bit of a pet collector, so even though he goes in my weapon slot, I just had to try to recruit him.

I, too. I honestly grinned and murmured something approving when I got hold of it.

Cor, I hadn’t noticed that. And you don’t seem to be able to get new ones from the Bazaar, or I’m looking in the wrong retailers. I’d better be more careful with my wounds situation; I hate losing/using unique items…

The compass is hilarious. An admonition not to do what the admonisher is, at that moment, doing… coupled with a tool that clearly shows the forbidden path to follow by pointing at every alternative path, which cannot be usefully followed except to the very thing it’s pointing away from.

[color=#ff9900]It’s certainly not a metaphor for parenthood, or anything. Absolutely not.[/color]

I appreciate the compass, i am a bit less appreciative of the fact that the rng has giving me picking through wreckers cover 6 like 200 times now XD (oh well i do not really stand to benefit from the guinea pig)

Also i noticed one of the options mentions silk for Parabola’s clothes colonies and I’m wondering if that’s supposed to be Polythreme?
edited by WormApotheote on 9/9/2014

Yay, finally got the mutersalt for the full set! A very satisfying holiday indeed.

I noticed this too, and was wondering the same thing. I am sure you’re correct given the reference to voices.

[color=#ff9900]It’s certainly not a metaphor for parenthood, or anything. Absolutely not.[/color][/quote]

Errr…that’s a 10/10 on the Cryptic Clue scale.

[quote=Lavessa]
Being one of those lower-level types, I have already made a fairly substantial gain in Shadowy from spending more time in the island secrets for a couple days. I kicked my Docks connections up with the rescue event, though I have no idea when I’ll need that… [/quote]

I’ve been doing the same, and using the Docks connection to buy expedition supplies; finally got the Cave of the Nadir opened up!

I’m now utterly broke, of course, but it’s been enjoyable.

[quote=sparklecat][quote=Lavessa]
Being one of those lower-level types, I have already made a fairly substantial gain in Shadowy from spending more time in the island secrets for a couple days. I kicked my Docks connections up with the rescue event, though I have no idea when I’ll need that… [/quote]

I’ve been doing the same, and using the Docks connection to buy expedition supplies; finally got the Cave of the Nadir opened up!

I’m now utterly broke, of course, but it’s been enjoyable.[/quote]

the festival is actually highly profitable for persons who have maxed out at least one of their stats. with 250+ dangerous, and depending on the RNG, i could gain up to 5 echos worth of items in 1 turn! but the menances really accumulates after a few days of hanging out at mutton isle.probably more effecient to sacrifice a catch to reduce menance on in the festival instead of going back and forth to london. took me over 40 actions to reduce 7 wounds and 7 nightmares back in london. personally more tedious for me to reduce nightmares because of my addiction to laundrium(sp?)

Going back to London to take care of menaces is a terrible idea unless it’s a dire emergency. Sacrificing catches to the Curate and Chef will take care of your Nightmares/Wounds extremely well.

And giving a 5 catch to the Curate or Chef gives a more than reasonable return, around 10 echoes of cartography items (there is some variation), for a fishing trip on top of a menace reduction.

Did the festival just end? I just finished catching a Level 9 fish and I was going to free the Clay Man. But my Festival option disappeared.

Yep. Caught me unawares also - no guinea-pig for me, O well.

There was a warning on twitter about an hour earlier I think. But who checks twitter every hour? I mean, apart from people who have actual twitter accounts and don’t just visit individual twitter pages.