SporksAreGoodForYou
Posts: 291
2/17/2015
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Fretling wrote:
Well, not everyone's Chelonate is near Kingeater's Castle, remember.
True, but the chelonate is always in the eastern tile set (I believe the north and east tiles are fixed in terms of row and column), so it's never too far.
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Gregg Johnson
Posts: 263
2/17/2015
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Shadow wrote:
By the way, practical example on stories being an expense up until the end (if that): I just blew 450 echoes worth of candles (15) trying to explore the Shattered Citadel in Godfall. Had to pull back after too many failed Mirrors "modest challenges" (stat is 35). Money down the drain. Last time I wasted 10 candles (300e) and nearly died. If I'm lucky, this story's profitability will break even with the accrued losses.
Well, that was because you failed most of the tests though, wasn't it? It only takes about 8 candles if you pass everything. I've only done it once but I recall the reward being worth it, mechanically. The story itself is more of a teaser for the Roof of the Neath expansion (that may or may not happen).
Shadow wrote:
I think the only places left to unveil are the Kingeater's Castle and the Empire of Hands.
Empire of Hands itself feels like it has half the text in the game (feels like, but obviously this is far from true). Kingeater's Castle isn't too special on its own, but it ties into one Officer story and one of the Ambitions. It is, to my mind, unfortunate that most of the long, involved stories are in locations that are farthest from London (Varchas, Empire of Hands, Saviour's Rocks, and very soon Aestival, and a little closer but still outside the usual first voyage, Visage, Isle of Cats, Port Cecil, and Apis Meet), or else they require something from far away to unlock (Station III if you didn't get the tie-in bonus from twitter before launch).
The locations near London are unfortunately filled with mostly repeatable random explore actions (some of which are even shared between locations) or expensive terror reduction actions, each with maybe a little bit of flavour, but not enough to connect to the place, or the world. I expect this is because of the lineage/legacy model, where players are expected to visit these locations repeatedly with multiple captains but... that's just not what happens. As soon as I can I leave London behind, and spend all my time in the East where the actual stories are, resupplying at Aestival or Mangrove College when necessary, dumping terror at the College or Irem, refueling either at Palmerston, Port Carnelian, or at worst, through Beachcombing. With the content coming Thursday I may never return to London except as necessary to fulfil story requirements or if I manage to acquire every last Port Report.
Instead the only people that spend any time at Mutton Island etc. are the new players, and if they don't stick around long enough to reach the faraway places, they may think that's all there is to the game. I think I've said this elsewhere already, but these locations, maybe not all of them, but more than now, need their own multi-part stories on the order of Visage, Varchas, or Apis Meet.
[Mutton Island has some nice random events, but I doubt they are meaningful to anyone that hasn't played Fallen London long enough to either visit Mutton Island itself, or raise their dream qualities to 10 or so.]
edited by Olorin on 2/17/2015
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Kirzen
Posts: 1
2/20/2015
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- SPOILER WARNING - SPOILER WARNING - SPOILER WARNING -
If suddenly having more money than you can ever imagine spending is going to run the game for you, stop here. I love the game, I love the setting, and I honestly believe that there should be a much more complete trading system in place (Uncharted Waters was one of my favorite games when I was younger). But the idea that money is somehow a difficult to obtain commodity is misplaced. So I'm going to tell you how to make a couple hundred grand in a couple hours.
How you make your first few hundred is unimportant. You'll need a small amount of mobility for this and a general idea of where Salt Lions, Iron Republic, Mount Palmerston and Khan's Shadow are. It'll also be helpful if you collect a few Admiralty's Favors at this point, you'll need plenty of them later.
(NOTE - List format on this sucks, so I'm going to paragraph it instead, it'll be fairly longish (its a worthy read I hope) The first section is how to make your first 10k or so. The second section will cover how to make all the money you should ever need through the sunlight trade. This is starting with a fresh game, no handouts, nothing special, just a guy/gal and the starting dinghy).
Firstly, burn your fuel down to get the handout from the bruiser if you haven't done so already, you're going to complete his first quest to transport the contraband souls, but you'll not be coming back to collect the reward right now. Doing this will freeze his quest at the reward step so that you don't have to worry about disappointing him or botching a mission later and having him leave. As far as I know if you disappoint his patron and he leaves you can never get him back and it will seriously hurt your sunlight trade forever.
Complete the bruiser's first quest to transport souls, and raise about 1K echoes in whatever manner you desire. The easiest ways that I've found so far are to complete either the deviless quest on Mt Palmerston (by returning her to the Brass Embassy), completing the quest line at Visage or running sphynxstone to London from the Salt Lions. By the time you finish any of these (and sell the rewards) you should have 1-2k echoes and they can be reliably completed in an hour or so of real time.
(YOUR FIRST 10K)
Start in London. Fill your ship with at least 24 fuel, 2 supplies, and as much coffee as you can hold. You're going to travel directly south down the coastline to Cumaean Canal and make a trip to the surface. You can top up your fuel and supplies in Cumaean, but purchasing fuel there is fairly expensive compared to London and you MUST have enough room on your ship for the fuel and supplies required to make a surface trip.
(Collect news here too every time you return, its good for Moves in the Great Game)
Take the trip to Naples for 1 fuel (sometimes you'll lose 1 crew doing this but it's a fairly uncommon) and then take the train from there to Vienna. You can establish a relationship with a cafe here to provide them coffee, they'll pay you about 80 echoes each. Even in the starting ship this is approximately 6-700 profit per trip.
(Choose which way to handle the revolution here as well. I choose to increase Iron supremacy, this unlocked a contact here that will have dinner with you in exchange for news from London, there's a very good chance doing so will grant a Moves In the Great Game each time).
Return to Naples on the train from Vienna. Take the time here to make sure you have enough fuel and supplies to reach either the Iron Republic or London, you should have about 14-15 fuel (including the 10 that is required to make the journey back underground). You can buy fuel here in Naples for 15 echoes (which is less expensive than Cumaean's shop, but more expensive than London or IR), you should however buy 35 or so supplies here (you can buy them for 5 echoes each here, the cheapest source in the game).
Take the supplies down to Iron Republic and sell them to the House of Milks market (25 echoes each - Keep 3'ish - 20profit x 30'ish = 600). The House of Milks is not always open however, and you may have to idle outside Iron Republic for a couple of days and push the market forward. Don't worry about your Horror levels, your Horror will be reset to zero every time you visit the surface. House of Milks ALSO sells coffee even less expensively than London does... so stock up once again with 24'ish fuel, 2'ish supplies and fill the rest of your hold with coffee.
You can repeat these steps for 1200+ profit per run (even in the starter ship), each run takes only a couple days. Follow the coast, run with your lights off (your Horror is set back to zero every time you return to the surface. You should be able to make 10-12k doing this before the coffee shop in Vienna burns down. You can make even more profit in a merchant vessel, just keep in mind that as you get closer to the coffee house in Vienna burning down (I believe it's a set amount of coffee you're allowed to trade) your final trade will trigger the cafe's destruction... regardless of the size of said final trade... so make it a good one.
(SUNLIGHT FOR PROFIT)
Now set out across the Zea and head for Khan's Shadow (Approach from the SW if you can, less Khan Cruisers) and buy 20 mirror lined boxes. Return to London and make sure that you have at least FIVE Admiralty's Favors (you've been turning in your Moves In The Great Game, right?) Head to the surface and fill all the mirror lined boxes with sunlight (unlike in Aestival, there is no chance of wounding yourself doing this up here).
Take your 20 boxes back to London (If you run into customs, blow 5 Favors to have them look the other way).
Visit the bruiser and sell your sunlight to him at four hundred echos a pop. But the best part is that he RETURNS THE BOXES to you. You just made 8000 echos. You can now immediately return to the surface and repeat this as many times as necessary. If you start running low on Admiralty's Favors make sure you're trading your Moves in the Great Game to him (always nets one favor) and if you betray the revolution in Vienna you can have dinner with your contact there every time you return to the surface for a pretty good shot at another moves. Doing this will keep your favors high enough that you can do this forever. Once you have enough echos, buy the merchant ship, buy the supression item that allows you to overload engines for free. You now can travel nearly double speed with no chance of failure.
You can now go to Khan's Shadow, load up on 40-50 MORE mirror boxes and continue trading for tens of thousands of echos with every trip over a journey that takes less than 2-3 minutes. (London <> Cumaean).
(EDITED for readability ~K)
edited by Kirzen on 2/20/2015
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+1
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username
Posts: 10
2/20/2015
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Fretling wrote:
It explicitly tells you not to play it safe when you load the game up. Which is, of course, terrible advice, since if you don't play it safe, you die, and your effort was wasted. Of course, optimal strategy is to intentionally kill yourself first thing when you start the game.
[spoiler]otherwise it becomes nigh-impossible to unlock Labyrinth of Tigers[/spoiler].
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penknife
Posts: 85
2/20/2015
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username wrote:
Which is, of course, terrible advice, since if you don't play it safe, you die, and your effort was wasted.
The intention is for you to die multiple times and play multiple captains. It's not "nigh-impossible" to get the spoiler you mentioned, it's just one of a number of things your first captain can't have.
edited by penknife on 2/20/2015
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http://fallenlondon.storynexus.com/Profile/Penknife
Most social actions welcome, no SMEN or Boxed Cats please.
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username
Posts: 10
2/20/2015
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Well, no, it says that your first captain will die. What they really should have said is that your first captain SHOULD die, otherwise you're missing that feature. Of course, since if you're any good at games in general, you probably won't die except early on by pure chance, and even if you die later, it won't count because it is bugged, you basically have to intentionally kill yourself. Not that this is a bad strategy, since it gives you a significant boost for about 30 seconds of play. If you don't kill your first captain, you're setting yourself up for a lot of annoyance and frustration later.
edited by username on 2/20/2015
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Rocket Heeled Jack
Posts: 311
2/20/2015
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Everyone dies, the only question is how long it takes...
And this isn't a game about single life stories (well, not for me it isn't...), it's a story about dynasties...
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http://fallenlondon.storynexus.com/Profile/Rocket~Heeled~Jack
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username
Posts: 10
2/20/2015
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The thing is, though, dying of winning doesn't count for purposes of unlocking the thingy. As for it not being a game about single life stories, well, it's not really a story of dynasties, either. There is very little continuity between incarnations. Aside from the legacy boosts, basically nothing is carried over. Your previous actions have no impact on the world. If you want a game about dynasties, play The Guild. Dynasties in SS are basically a footnote achievement and the option to skip some tedious early-game grinding.
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