I know Collections of Curiosities can be traded to the Tomb Colonists on their card but I don't remember seeing an option that uses Contraptions.

As far as I know Whirring Contraptions are used to start the presses if you have a Newspaper; crafting a Zubmarine or to play a certain fate-locked option on the Decommissioned Steamer card.

I don't remember anything implying that a story, even EFs, a festival or anything else will have a great reward at the end.
Pity to see that the reward is more important than a story! There are enough (repeatable) Fate options which have a big EPA. So there's always an option!
Let's enjoy the stories and worry less about Echoes!
edited by Skinnyman on 8/26/2016

Robin Alexander wrote:

Like, I have nothing against using action points, but . . . it all felt like filler here. 2/3 of gameplay was spent basically using action points unnecessarily, without any new content or in-game reason in the process ('new content' as in customised Zee voyage, or changes to building up the route to the wreck, just the same monotonous grinds).

Yeah, that's the other thing I found frustrating. It's one thing to spend actions experiencing new content with a tiny EPA return. It's another thing to have to slog through grinds with nothing new to read and still not be earning any meaningful EPA. I'd feel a lot better if it had been possible to just burn through the new content without spending so many actions on repetitive grinds, or -- if the grind on the lifeberg was necessary for pacing and atmosphere -- if the story paid out commensurate to the actions spent.

I wonder, though, if one of the problems here is balancing the story for both new and late-game players? I couldn't fail any of the stat checks on the lifeberg, so there wasn't any element of balancing risk against how long to stay, just a frustrating grind to see each new section of the story. At the same time, playing the regular storylets in the game has a regular return of >1 EPA for me, and I don't have much to do in the regular game right now but grind Echoes for an Ubergoat, so getting hit with "okay, you spent a huge number of actions on this, here's your 6 Echo item" was painful. A starting player who's used to a tiny EPA, who's struggling to pass the stat checks and racking up Terror in the process, and whose game isn't mostly focused on grinding for expensive items might have a very different experience.

On the other hand, I don't get why there's a big difference in rewards for the different choices in this story. That wasn't signaled anywhere, and I'm not sure it particularly makes sense that the option I chose would be less lucrative than the other two. Oh, well.

Blaine Davidson wrote:

A lot of them have been fairly forgettable for me, like the one where you bombed the embassy. I couldn't even remember the name of it or the unique item from said story.

There was a unique item from that? As in an actual bit of equipment?