The usefulness of high-end items: sell or hoard?

Fallen London
1

I have a dilemma: I want to make money fast, and a solution that hhas come to my mind is to sell some of those items that cannot be used for crafting other items, and sell for 12.50 Echoes, like Storm Threnodies and Puzzling Maps. But I also fear that I will need them in the future and selling them would be an awful waste. As a character with 72 Watchful (up to 93) and 66 Dangerous (up to 86), are my concerns justified? What should I expect?
Also, could some of the more experienced players tell me what is the most efficient way to grind Echoes?

2

You’re correct in both directions. Selling the rarer, higher-tier items is a good way to get money but it’s also good to hold them for the occasional moments something needs them. My general approach is to only sell items that I’m sure I can get back, and only to sell right when I need the money.

You won’t have access to the most effective ways to grind echoes for a while. If you’re willing to pay Fate, the best method is grinding Souls through Unfinished Business in Spite and selling them though the Soul Trade as a Spirifer (the Fate-locked part). This has an EPA (echoes per action) just under 1.80 but requires modified Shadowy 167 for 100% success rates. The best method without Fate is the Affair of the Box, which has a 1.64 EPA but requires modified Shadowy 217 for 100% success rates. The wiki has a detailed list of grinds here.

Don’t worry about grinding though, or trying to get the absolute best equipment, as there’s a lot of stories left for you. If you run out of obvious avenues of progression, you could start towards being a Person of Some Importance. Among things that requires having all four stats at 100, counting equipment, though not at the same time (so you can use the best equipment you have for each stat). You can start that story through a card drawn with a stat at 100 or by talking to any of the local gossips in your lodgings with the relevant stat at 100.

3

So I guess at least Puzzling Maps and Storm Threnodies are fine. Thanks

4

I recently came across a Searing Enigma. 62 Echoes are still a big deal for me, but I have an hunh that it would be more useful to me in more advanced storylets. Is that so?

5

Yes, they can become coveted items when you get further in, depending on what goals you’re pursuing. (An Impossible Theorem requires 49, not to mention all the ones you lose on many, many failed attempts before the RNG shows pity.) However, you have to balance that out against moving forward now; there are sources later on.

Personally, though, I’d hang onto it.

6

Searing Enigmas are one of the most common 62.5 items. You get them monthly from Trade Secrets.

7

Well, you can get them monthly from Trade Secrets if you follow this procedure:

  1. Save up your Professional Perks each week for a month (Professional Perks are referenced in the first of two storylets you see after TtH has come and you go to get your pay).
  2. Once you have Professional Perks at 4, choose the Professional Perks storylet, and select the last one–it will give you 1 Trade Secret.
  3. Once the Trade Secret is in your Inventory, click on it. This will reveal another bunch of storylets, the last of which will give you 1 Searing Enigma and 5 Antique Mysteries (each worth 12.5 Echoes, by the way).
8

Trade Secrets are probably the best use of Professional Perks. Second chances aren’t very hard to come by (especially for a forum-goer, as there are threads for social actions) and likewise social actions and the tonics are more accessible menace cures.

9

At present, blackmail material is not hard to attain through item exchanges: honey-romantic notions-surface visions-elder mysteries-incendiary gossip-identities uncovered-blackmail material. I use this exchange method to raise making waves and then sell the end product blackmail material to help afford more honey, beginning the cycle anew.

10

Thanks, chaps and chapesses.

11

Why do you want to make money? For equipment? or for something else?

12

To finance my expedition in the Tomb of Seven, and to buy fancy stuff

13

I recommend holding onto everything.

Personally, I like to design rules for myself so I don’t have to decide what to sell every time I get items. My rule is as follows:

If I have less than 2000 of an item, excluding equipment, don’t sell any of it.

If I have more than 2000, but I can convert it into something that I have less than 2000 of, sell half of whatever I gain on the spot.

If I can convert it into something that converts into something that… etcetera, and get something I have less than 2000 of, sell half of whatever I gain on the spot.

If I have more than 2000 of something, and it cannot be converted directly or indirectly into something I have less than 2000 of, sell all of it.[li]

As for equipment, I sell anything I have more than one of, unless there is something that uses up the equipment entirely (Lucky Weasels and Nodules of Warm Amber, for instance). If that is the case, I usually hang onto it.
edited by Saklad5 on 4/4/2017

14

  1. Get as many supplies as you can, because they aren’t consumed if you don’t use them. So either have a good source for Docks Favours (the cheapest way) or hold on to your Whispered Hints. There’s pretty much no reason not to go in to the Tomb of the Seven without a full 99.

  2. Watchful equipment is one of the more uniformly useful types at least! The best in class for Watchful can be found here, though you may not be able to afford it yet!
    http://community.failbettergames.com/topic21265-a-brief-guide-to-couriers-footprint.aspx
    As a note, you’ll definitely want the Semiotic Monocle as your top Watchful hat as it has further uses than its excellent stats if you’re buying hats at all.

  3. Don’t forget that you can always start an expedition and not complete it for awhile, particularly if you find that you’re having trouble and you don’t want to run a risk of running out of supplies. I definitely did that myself on this particular trip.