Zee-Voyages

[color=#0066ff]Zee-voyages have undergone a raft of mechanical changes, and procured a few choice morsels of new content.
[/color][ul][li][color=#0066ff]Voyages take fewer actions to complete: in most cases, less than a single candle.[/color][/li][li][color=#0066ff]Captains can plot quicker routes by using Cartography items while still in port.[/color][/li][li][color=#0066ff]Opportunity cards behave a little differently. There’s no limit on how many you can draw from your deck, but your hand size will be fixed at three, regardless of the opulence (or modesty) of your lodgings.[/color][/li][li][color=#0066ff]Most Fury of the Unterzee cards have new branches. You may wish to keep a few Cartography items on hand.[/color][/li][li][color=#0066ff]Completing a voyage now requires Approaching Journey’s End 10. Troubled Waters becomes troublesome at the same level.[/color][/li][li][color=#0066ff]As an exception to the general rule, you may travel between the Southern Archipelago and Sea of Voices at Approaching Journey’s End 7.[/color][/li][li][color=#0066ff]Monster-Hunters may enjoy certain advantages when pursuing their profession.[/color][/li][li][color=#0066ff]Numerous smaller alterations, which we leave it to our avid players to discover.[/color][/li][/ul]

Drat. And just after I did all my Heart’s Desire zailing.
This sounds like a lot of fun! Thanks for the update.

Just came in to ask about this. It’s certainly an interesting change, though I’m not one to speak on it, since I’m just barely familiar with its earlier incarnation.

I was, however, shocked to see the infinite card draw. That, and the 5 action cost for Steam Prudently. Mayhap I’ll need a new way to raise waters high enough for a seal.

[quote=Hannah Flynn][color=#0066ff]Zee-voyages have undergone a raft of mechanical changes, and procured a few choice morsels of new content.
[/color][ul][li][color=#0066ff]Voyages take fewer actions to complete: in most cases, less than a single candle.[/color][/li][li][color=#0066ff]Captains can plot quicker routes by using Cartography items while still in port.[/color][/li][li][color=#0066ff]Opportunity cards behave a little differently. There’s no limit on how many you can draw from your deck, but your hand size will be fixed at three, regardless of the opulence (or modesty) of your lodgings.[/color][/li][li][color=#0066ff]Most Fury of the Unterzee cards have new branches. You may wish to keep a few Cartography items on hand.[/color][/li][li][color=#0066ff]Completing a voyage now requires Approaching Journey’s End 10. Troubled Waters becomes troublesome at the same level.[/color][/li][li][color=#0066ff]As an exception to the general rule, you may travel between the Southern Archipelago and Sea of Voices at Approaching Journey’s End 7.[/color][/li][li][color=#0066ff]Monster-Hunters may enjoy certain advantages when pursuing their profession.[/color][/li][li][color=#0066ff]Numerous smaller alterations, which we leave it to our avid players to discover.[/color][/li][/ul][/quote]

This is great news!
(I kinda gave up on zailing for a while there because I was sick of saving up a full 20 actions and still not making it most of the way to my destination. When I first travelled to Polythreme, it was even worse as I wasn’t expecting the extra part of the voyage.)

This is going to take some getting used to - a bit surprised that Steam Straight through the Beechey Currents on a Wily Zailor doesn’t lower troubled waters anymore.

Sounds fun! A bit silly since I’ve completed my last voyage an hour ago and didn’t plan to travel anywhere else for a while. Also a bit sad that the hand got reduced (my hard-working super-expensive 5-card lodgings are now useless! crycry)

Didn’t really feel that the voyages had to be reduced in length. Felt like a proper amount of AP to appreciate all the different opportunity cards and make it feel like a real journey.
edited by Danko on 7/23/2015

Huh… and I was just about to set off on my FIRST zee-journey ever, to capture a Plated Seal more than out of a need to go anywhere in particular. Has it gotten harder or easier to reach the necessary level of Troubled Waters? >_>

So, how many cartography items does one need for a shorter trip? Because I may stock up on some maps while I’m in Port.

Also, this will make my goal of going for 100 Successful Terms as Governor a little more bearable since I can go home quicker. Good show!

This is fantastic. We’ve been talking about wanting the ability to front load Zee voyages in London by using the currently mostly useless cartography items for months.

It’s useful for a number of reasons but really it increase access to the more profitable London opportunity cards while grinding travel progress and it makes Zee voyages less punitive/demanding on notability players. I’m glad this suggestion got picked up. It’s nice to see some of my ideas have value haha.
edited by NiteBrite on 7/23/2015

You can use 1 Puzzling Map and then 5 Zee-Ztories (or do the ZZ option a few times - the PM one cannot be used more than once per trip) - when I tested it, my Approaching Journey’s End reached 7 (which is great for 2 actions available even without leaving port).

I like it! I just did a quick trip (unaided) myself and appreciate the changes.

The only disappointment was loosing the four card slots. Simply because I like the aesthetic of cards going from one end, to the other, on the content box; and the reason I haven’t gotten a 5 cards lodging… not that it matters. The Three cards don’t seem too limiting, and if aesthetics is my only gripe, I don’t see a problem.

As for Troubled waters, it seems to go up faster then it did before, yet oddly seems more manageable given the Opportunities I took.

Wonderful news! I wonder if this changes the profitability on the Carnelian Coast…

Oh, this is exciting. I may have to zet out to zee soon just to try this out.

I hope if this goes well we may see similar deck changes to, for instance, the Pickpocket’s Promenade.

Your house not affecting your hand size while on a ship feels good thematically; perhaps the clipper and zubmarine will offer a larger hand in the future to reflect that they grant more options than a tramp steamer or a luxury yacht.

Hmm. I wonder if the Cave of the Nadir and Heists are going to have their hand size reduced as well. Would defeat the purpose of getting 5 card lodgings for me.

Wouldn’t imagine so. Cards as zee are a faster riskier way of travel than the fixed storylets, so having infinite draw makes sense there, and, as much as I lament their loss, a fixed 3-card slot also makes sense.

Whereas in the Nadir the cards are how you make echoes, so infinite draw would negate their purpose.

Anywhere that all cards are Can’t Discard and you only get a limited number of cards could have infinite draw without breaking things too much, although Nadir doesn’t really need the boost.

The question was about hand size reduction, though. Lodgings only giving you a hand size boost for the regular London deck would be on-theme and open up the opportunity to sell other limited-area hand-increasers, giving players more goals to work toward.

But all the cards in the Nadir are undiscardable anyway; the only real effect of infinite card draw is that it no longer punishes players who like Heists/zailing/the Nadir/other similar content, but also don’t log in constantly.

I will say it’s disappointing that the update hasn’t added Dreaded to the Swift Zee-Clipper. One day. One day my dream will come true.

I can already say I love the new update, with maybe the exception of a fixed hand; that said it does make more sense considering I typically don’t bring my entire lodgings with me on a voyage across the unterzee…
(That said, it would be interesting if the ship you had altered the number of cards you could hold-perhaps that will be available in the future?)

Hehheh… a RAFT of changes? New boat confirmed!

…I’ll let myself out.

(Also, I was going to make the same suggestion Koenig just did, about better boats having more card slots. But it was probably considered and decided against already. :)