Nenjin can you post what cargo etc. you move on the route in the post above?
I’ll just post what I wrote on another forum. This is all very much spoiler territory. [spoiler]You want to get both a Strategic Information mission and a Blind Bruiser mission somewhere in the mid to upper north of the Zee. If either one is at Polythreme, Cumaean Canal or Godfall, you’re not going to make maximum profit doing it.
You’re going to want 15 fuel and 10 supplies. (-250 echoes, some of which you’ll already have.) You’ll want to grab the Tomb Colonists and Recent News as well.
Head to Venderblight. Sell news and Tomb Colonists and get Port Report. (65 echoes.)
Zail north along the coast to Wither. Engage Lifebergs at your own risk. They’re occasionally worth it IMO. Their loot seems like mid-tier with a small chance to be high-tier item. You get always get a Zee Story, at any rate. Get the port report from Wither. (20 Echoes)
Zail east to Codex, bypassing it and heading due east toward the Chapel of Lights. Get their port report (20 echoes).
From the Chapel of Lights zail East/South East toward Mount Palmerston and get the Port Report (40 echoes.) Buy more fuel at 9 echoes a piece (-90 echoes) and buy a handful of Eoliths for 35 a piece (-105 echoes.)
Now zail south to the Principles of Coral. When you hit them zail through them headed South/Southwest until you hit Port Cecil. (30 echoes for the port report.) You can occasionally find Colossal Flukes here.
Head west out of Port Cecil and hug the coral going south. You will eventually hit the Corsair’s Forest. Bear South/Southeast until you hit Gaider’s Mourn. Get the Port report. (30 echoes.)
Gaider’s Mourn is a big ??? in profit. The Corsair frigates, when killed, drop between 1 and 3 fuel and supplies every time, in addition to a medium quality loot drop. Hunting Corsair’s alone can easily repay the entire trip. I can 2-3 shot them with Irons 103, and the tramp steamer. They will pretty much 2 shot me. Not the best strategy for hardcore players, but softcore players can have a field day.
When you’re done hunting Corsairs, head south out of Gaider’s Mourn and bear South/South East to the edge of the forest. Break out into open waters for a little bit headed south until you hit Khan’s Heart. The port report there will get you 75 echoes (although it gets harder and harder to do.)
Then head to the light bouy at the very northwest corner of the Khanate, and go back the way you came. Sail west along the southern edge of the Corsair’s Forest, kill another corsair or two, until you reach Station III (no port report but it has a ton of storylets and is a convenient stop along the route to save.)
From Station III, head west from the northern end of the island until you reach Abbey Rock. Grab their port report (20 echoes) but DO NOT DO THE STORYLET THERE IF IT’S AVAILBLE.
From Abbey Rock head west from the southern end of the island and hop over to Mutton Island. Cross your fingers and do the storylet there, and get the port report. (5 echoes.)
From there sail west until you hit the coast, and the back north to Fallen London.
Here’s a spoil-y map: http://imgur.com/pF5D9BQ In final release with shift map tiles, it won’t always be so straight forward.
Totals
Fuel & Supplies (~ -200 - -340 echoes)
Strategic Info and Blind Bruiser Missions (+350 echoes)
Venderlbight (+10 echoes)
Venderblight goods (+55 echoes)
Wither (+20 echoes)
Chapel of Lights (+20 echoes)
Mount Palmerston (+40 echoes)
Port Cecil (+30 echoes)
Gaider’s Mourn (+30 echoes)
Khanate (+75 echoes)
Abbey Rock (+20 echoes)
Mutton Island (+5 echoes)
That alone gets you a profit of ~+325 - +465 echoes. But those are just the fixed profits and costs. Along that route you can:
-Get a Judgment Egg from Mutton Island (Rare) that sells for +500 echoes.
-Kill a Colossal Fluke in the Principles of Coral and get a Colossal Fluke Core that sells for +500 echoes.
-Farm Corsairs at Gaider’s Mourn to not only pay back your fuel and supplies cost, but get oodles of drops from them. (Everything from trade goods like Parabola Linen (on average between 40 and 60 echoes per) to Curiosities like Outlandish Artifacts (100 echoes) and more.
-Storylets from each island can always have a chance to be one of the monetarily profitable ones.
-Identifying theEoliths you bought in Mt. Palmerston at the University will get you between a loss of ~100 echoes, or a profit of ~100 echoes, for 3.
Doing this circuit I always come out ahead. And sometimes, I come out way, way ahead. I’ve made as much as 2000 echoes from one run. I usually have a few more costs though. You pick up around 20 to 40 Terror depending on your route, so that’s a couple hundred to pay down depending on Terror increases or decreases from storylets. I also use Torpedos to take down the biggest monsters and ships, and those run 50 echoes a pop. Still, it’s very easy to be profitable.[/spoiler]
The long and short of it is: there is little stable trading right now. No one sells anything that someone else will buy at a big mark up. Trade Goods and big money Curiosities come from monsters and storylets. Missions and port reports pay for trips and then some, and then the RNG gods of the zee determine how much more you can make. Best money is made by having a lengthy but well managed travel route, killing as much as possible, and visiting as many ports as possible.
edited by Nenjin on 7/6/2014
Thanks a bunch! Where do you get Genial Magician?
Can recruit him randomly in Fallen London.
An enterprising zailor can expand the loop slightly depending on where they are in the storyline and where they have business like so.
edited by IsaacSumizone on 7/7/2014
The ones I’ve excluded I generally have done so for a reason. Usually that the port report payment isn’t high enough to justify the visit. In Shepard’s case, it’s a pretty tough challenge on whether you get that payment in full.
I appreciate the stops at the Shepards Isles because you can get zee stories and the like out of them, which are always in short supply.
Zee stories are nice, but you can get 1x Tale of terror, 1x Memory of Distant Shore, and 1x (something) from the monks in Godfall for 1 hunting trophy.
Try to resist the urge to chase enemies into the blacker areas.
Don’t think of terror as a separate stat number. Instead, think of 5 terror as 30 echoes EACH in the early game, and adjust accordingly.
Don’t fight Lorn-flukes without enough fuel to use Potent Flares, and without the equipment to use Obscure Overload. They, as well as Lifebergs, can and WILL one shot kill you if you let the wind up. If the first Potent Flare doesn’t work, cue up Obscure Overload again and again, because you won’t be able to Flense in time most times to get in the two-three hits you’ll need to get the kill.
And if you see Mt. Nomad, run. Also, if it boxes you in at the Avid Horizon like I was…well…I don’t know what to tell you.
edited by friendshipranger on 7/7/2014
I think it had the Avid Horizon built as a sort of pantry where it can stop in and grab a quick snack.
It’s gotten me there as well. I try to look for the evil thing before getting near AH, and only go there when the Admiralty sends me…
Don’t bother upgrading your engines on the tramp steamer, more power = more fuel usage, and since you get to ports quicker often Something Awaits You hasn’t had time refresh so you end up missing out on storylets you otherwise could have.
Also, when transporting the Wistful Devilless from Palmerstone to FL, she’s in your officers tab, wine and dine her to get secrets.
Upgrading your engine can make a significant difference in terror reduction, just because you spend less time in the dark. There’s a reason people who have the Serpentine tend to post about how terror isn’t a problem, and people who don’t do.
Oh it is definitely worth getting a more powerful engine, you can always slow down in the safe zones between ports so that a SAY message appears before you get there.
Upgrading the engine is the most important upgrade after officers.
The terror reduction is a huge aspect.
Being able to consistently outrun enemies that can kill you is another huge bonus. It makes exploration significantly more viable.
You burn fuel faster, which makes it self defeating from that standpoint, but you use supplies at the same rate, which makes long expeditions cheaper (and since you don’t have to take as many supplies, your movement speed increases).
Most importantly, it halves the time you spend on repetitive missions when you run out of cash after exploring.
I can honestly say I would have quit the game until release without an engine upgrade.
edited by internet on 7/7/2014
Does anyone have any advice on hunting the Flukes? (like recommended equipment, qualities, battle strategies, ect.)
I did not start hunting Flukes until I had a fully upgraded dreadnaught; on the other hand they are now significantly downgraded from their peak.
MOST important is to have enough Veils that you can Evade effectively whenever needed. The most damaging attack is slow - 8 seconds I think? - so you have time, always, to stop whatever you’re doing when it gets launched and Evade; but you MUST do this effectively or die.
The other Fluke attacks are fast and hence unavoidable but really incremental: small amounts of terror and hull damage. Ignore those and concentrate on getting flensing attacks off, devastating salvos if you get >100 illumination, but remember to always pay attention for the need to Evade. You will then want high Pages to have the best chance of obtaining Secrets from the corpse :-).
Desolation is only 5 seconds now, but the last content update seems to have totally broken it somehow coz’ it only deals 1 damage for some reason (Mt Nomad has the same problem, and it’s also dropped down to only 300HP for some reason, which makes it super easy to farm for Captivating Treasures). When Desolation does work it’s easily the strongest attack in the game; enough to murder your entire hull and all of your crew on anything short of a Frigate (and even then you need to luck out to avoid getting wrecked in one hit)
edited by Spacemarine9 on 7/7/2014
I’ve taken them down the tramp Steamer, Irons 103. Took two torpedos, a lot of fleeing and a salvo or two. So I don’t know if it’s sustainable at that level, because one landed attack would have finished me.
Thanks for the help everyone. ^^ I think I’ll do a test hit then maybe hold off Luke hunting for now. My highest stats are veils and pages at 105 each with everything else much lower. I’ll probably get slaughtered. ^^
105 Veils is enough to dodge practically everything under the world in one evade. And, hey, Iron is easy to boost if you can save up 2000e for both Caminus Yards guns (they can both be equipped at once). A lacking Mirrors stat can be compensated for using Potent Flares instead, but you’d need to have plenty of extra fuel so you don’t get stranded far from home (still, Mt Palmerston is right there if you’re in the territory Lorn-Flukes prowl)