Here’s this week’s thread for Fallen London queries!
Answering Bonny Kate’s question, which ended up in last week’s just before the switch-over.
The Boots (Enlightened Scarlet Egg) are the only +2 BDR boots in the game, as well as the only Bizarre boots in the game (which is becoming more relevant quickly). The Coat (Enlightened Aged Egg) is one of only two +2 BDR Clothing items in the game, with the other being exclusive to Ambition: Light Fingers (even then, mutually-exclusive with a different reward).
The advanced stats are difficult to weight, because the content that uses them isn’t fully released yet, and more items are probably coming that add more bonuses. However, the Coat’s bonus (+Glasswork) already has replacements available in that slot. Monstrous Anatomy is probably the most immediately-useful, especially if you haven’t built out your lab yet.
I’m trying to get Crustaceans from the Finishing School, but after taking more or less a hiatus from Fallen London and coming back just in the nick of time to rush PP, I don’t have either the Lab or Parabola unlocked. As a Correspondent, I have my pot of ink for +1 Red Science, and that’s it, giving me a 10% success chance for teaching about Aged Eggs.
Given this, in the couple of days remaining of the event, what would be the most efficient use of my actions? Can I raise my Red Science quickly enough to increase my odds, and if so what is the best way? Or should I just bash myself against the 10% chance and hope to get blessed by the RNG?
My Ambition is Heart’s Desire but I haven’t gone far in the latest content either, so neither of the +1 equipment items you can get are obtainable within the next couple of days.
[quote=PSGarak]The Coat (Enlightened Aged Egg) is one of only two +2 BDR Clothing items in the game, with the other being exclusive to Ambition: Light Fingers (even then, mutually-exclusive with a different reward).[/quote]Actually there’s a third one from Heart’s Desire with +2D, but again mutually exclusive with other rewards contingent on choices made.
[quote=Dudebro Pyro]I’m trying to get Crustaceans from the Finishing School, but after taking more or less a hiatus from Fallen London and coming back just in the nick of time to rush PP, I don’t have either the Lab or Parabola unlocked. As a Correspondent, I have my pot of ink for +1 Red Science, and that’s it, giving me a 10% success chance for teaching about Aged Eggs.
Given this, in the couple of days remaining of the event, what would be the most efficient use of my actions? Can I raise my Red Science quickly enough to increase my odds, and if so what is the best way? Or should I just bash myself against the 10% chance and hope to get blessed by the RNG?
My Ambition is Heart’s Desire but I haven’t gone far in the latest content either, so neither of the +1 equipment items you can get are obtainable within the next couple of days.[/quote]
Just slamming through the Finishing School is not a terrible option. If you don’t select any mischievous students, you can re-draw cards without consequence and therefore guarantee 5 egg attempts per carousel. The rare success is not that rare, the general impression seems to be maybe 1/3 or 1/4. Even a 10% success rate seems feasible in 2-3 more days of festival. But, y’know… Fallen London RNG.
The best way to raise Red Science (actually, the only way to date unless your Ambition is Bag a Legend) is to research Aged Eggs in the Laboratory. It might (might! not sure!) be worth the action investment to start the lab, level the equipment as much as you can without grinding anything new, and level up Red Science by one level, or maybe two. You can exit the Lab at any time for just an action, so you have a little bit of time to explore and see if it’s worth it. If you can complete the research on just a single Egg, that boosts your success rate in the school from 10% to 20%, so it’s worth it if you can do it in less than a day (which seems feasible). At that point, you can decide if it’s worth the investment to research two more eggs for a 30% chance, but I doubt you’ll want to invest more time than that.
Almost all research options scale by lab equipment level (the only exceptions require stats that can only be leveled in Parabola). Your timeline is too short to invest in Students. Your most-efficient research options for the eggs are probably the ones on the Red Science-specific card. These level with Equipment also, but are generally superior to anything that doesn’t require significant outlay.
Thanks for the advice, sounds like a good idea. I’ve opened up the lab and I’m gonna research some eggs.
Research seems pretty easy - given the infinite deck, at 76% watchful success rate on the red science card, and being a Correspondant for the initial boost, it takes 7-8 actions to research 1CP. Even if I only spend 40 actions in Sinning Jenny’s school, the extra 15 actions to get 2 more CP Red Science will pay off (as opposed to spending 55 actions teaching about eggs). So thanks for pointing me in the right direction.
In fact, even if I go for an extra 3CP, returns are about even after 60-70 actions teaching about eggs, so my next question is - is Red Science currently used a lot outside of this challenge, e.g. in Parabola? It might well be worth it if so, even if it’s not strictly optimal for purposes of Crustaceans, given that it’s never certain when exactly FBG will expand this particular content with other ways to increase it.
>>>The best way to raise Red Science (actually, the only way to date unless your Ambition is Bag a Legend) is to research Aged Eggs in the Laboratory
You can research your illegal augmentation device for 1cp of Red Science (device is not consumed). For now its fate locked, but you can save hapennies for next year.
edited by Waterpls on 5/20/2020
Good point, I forgot about The Device. And unlike the Eggs, it will stick around permanently.
In addition to the Lab and the Base-Camp there’s another (or possibly more than one!) batch of content that’s going to be released Soon®. Something related to the Bone Market is getting released end of this month.
The majority of Red Science content is likely in the unreleased content. So it’s hard to tell right now what the value is of doing research. In the new content, Red Science could be trivially grind-able for 1cp/action, or the best non-Whitsun source could be a 350-research project like Shapeling Arts. And uses are even more speculative (aside from profitably grinding Theorems).
Either choice may end up not having been optimal, but I don’t think the regret will be too large either way. If another level of Red Science is 25ish actions now, maybe it will only be 3 actions in a month, or maybe it will be 40. I wouldn’t lose sleep over that. My advice is to prioritize the Crustacean first.
Makes sense, I’ll do that. Cheers for the info and good advice.
Why are the University and the Tiger Zoo missing from the map?
Are you zoomed all the way out? Both of those are not top-level "regions" like Spite or Ladybones, and only because visible when you zoom in at least once. The University looks like it’s part of Veilgarden, and the Labyrinth looks like it’s part of Ladybones.
Zooming in worked. Thank you.
I’m trying really, really hard to not hate the map update, but it’s been weeks, and I still find it aggravating on a daily basis.
[quote=Nepeta]Zooming in worked. Thank you.
I’m trying really, really hard to not hate the map update, but it’s been weeks, and I still find it aggravating on a daily basis.[/quote]
Consider enabling the "compatibility" map - which, in my opinion, makes it more compatible with sane UX first and foremost. Ever since they allowed zooming it out properly so most of it can fit in a window, and I can click on almost every location except for Mahogany Hall and the Labyrinth without having to click and drag, I find it’s become quite usable. I still believe it’s a regression over the old map, but it doesn’t make the game unplayable anymore.
[quote=Nepeta]Zooming in worked. Thank you.
I’m trying really, really hard to not hate the map update, but it’s been weeks, and I still find it aggravating on a daily basis.[/quote]
It just took me over a full minute to load the damn map, so I finally gave up and tracked down the compatibility map setting. It is significantly better in load times and ability to find things. Would recommend.
Compatibility map settings! At your prompting, I found them, and now navigating the map is so much more straight-forward!
I missed the March ES, and it’s not listed on the Fate page. Will it be?
Eventually it’ll get added, yes.
So I’m finally playing the Empress’ Shadow to completion, and as always wish to get throughly spoiled before I make my final choice. But I can’t find the discussion thread for that story on this forum, if there ever was one. Any chance someone has either a compilation of what the different endings do and give, or a link to a thread where I could find those if such exists?
5 seconds in google
https://community.failbettergames.com/topic23722-a-new-festive-tale-available-for-fate.aspx
Cheers!