Dr. Hieronymous Alloy
Posts: 228
6/19/2014
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I posted a thread like this a few releases back ( http://community.failbettergames.com/topic8259-tips-and-tricks-thread-zucceeding-on-the-zee.aspx ) and it went well but enough has changed that it seemed like time for an update, especially since no brave soul has put together a wiki yet that I'm aware of.
Consider this a SPOILERS thread -- in here I'm just looking at the game tactically.
1) The best way to reduce terror is to prevent it. Stay close to shore and when going offshore follow lighted corridors -- use lighthouses and travel from buoy to buoy, and plan your routes in advance to minimize travel time through the lightless drowning dark.
2) Another good non-obvious way to minimize terror gain is to upgrade your engine. Pursuing the Genial Magician's storyline as early as possible can result in a very significant engine upgrade, meaning much less travel time in the dark, meaning much less overall terror, and with a little luck you can complete that storyline fairly early in a playthrough.
3) Even though Mutton Island isn't as effective a way to reduce Terror any more, it's still a reasonably effective (if expensive) way to raise your Veils and Iron up to 50. Before taking your drinks at the Cock and Magpie, un-equip all your officers and ship gear (except possibly you glim-lamp, if it reduces Veils? untested), so that you can raise your base Iron and Veils scores up to the cap at 50. Then re-equip your guns and officers afterwards.
4) If you need drowning pearls for the khanate, you can get them from exploring on the Funging Station.
5) In combat, you've got one or two rounds to act before they get you illuminated; after that, you probably want to be evading for two or three actions for every attack or illumination action you take. Monsters and opponents hit hard and damage is permanent and difficult to repair, so the best strategy is usually staying alive and waiting for the perfect shot, rather than trying to tank damage.
6) When upgrading your guns you're best off going straight for the Caminus Yards top of the line gear and not bothering with the intermediate stuff. It doesn't take *that* much longer to save up 1000 than 500, and you'll lose so much as you resell your old gear that it's just much more efficient to make the straight leap.
7) You can wait on making your first Blind Bruiser delivery to Mount Palmerston as long as you want, but after that he'll send you just about anywhere, so don't make that run until you feel confident enough to travel the whole ocean.
There are a few other tricks I'm aware of but they mostly involve exploiting Alt-F4 (ex. the infinite Pages trick at Port Cecil) so they aren't really "fun," at least for me. None of the above is gospel (obviously) and I'm probably missing a lot, so please share other successful strategies and tactics!
edited by Dr. Hieronymous Alloy on 6/19/2014
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http://fallenlondon.storynexus.com/Profile/Doctor~Hieronymous
Please, no photographers.
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Nenjin
Posts: 171
7/6/2014
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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
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Mordaine Barimen
Posts: 670
7/7/2014
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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...
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I'm sorry, but due to policy clarifications, I will no longer be giving detailed mechanics advice on the forums.
If you still need help, try the IRC channel.
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Zee-Bat
Posts: 140
7/11/2014
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Well from the text lore Lifebergs have mouths. I always assumed that at 40 meters and closer it could just open it's jaws and crush you. It is a giant living iceberg after all. They're also related to Mt. Nomad judging from the infro from Observations.
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It's rather like eating a trout, if the trout had tried to kill you a few hours ago. Take that ersatz trout.
I didn't do it, wouldn't know how to do it, and I was in Paris at the time it happened Officer.
Shiro Kuroba is a Person of Some Importance and many bats.
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TyrrelDuckard
Posts: 69
7/14/2014
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Got something I wanted to post: Observations.
I have observed all that can be fought on the Zee and I have all the values here.
So, first of all:
-Auroral Megalops: 1 Fragment, just observe it once and save you the time.
-Bats Swarn: 5 Fragments
-Pirate Steam-Pinnace: 5 Fragments, not worth it much.
-Albino Moray: 10 Fragments.
-Bound Sharks: once I got 6 Fragments, other time 13/14, always give you 5 Terror.
-Angler Crab : 10 Fragments.
-Placeholders: 10 Fragments.
-Pirate Frigate: 10 Fragments, I get a bug that prevent me from choosing what to do with the ships when I cash in the Observations.
-Lifeberg; 15 Fragments, attempt only if you can stay far enough from it.
-War Trimaran: 15 Fragments.
-Unfinished Pirates: 15 Fragments.
-Mt Nomad: 25 Fragments, hoped for more.
Lorn-Flukes: 30 Fragments, again hoped for more, especially since they are so difficult to find.
So, as of now, this is all you can observe, and a buff for observations could really be welcome.
Anyway, that's all.
EDIT: damn, wrote secrets instead of Fragments for the Lifeberg. Thanks for noticing that Aximillio.
edited by tyrrelduckard on 7/14/2014
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MrDuckard is how I'm known in this dark city.
If you wish to make my aquitance, fell free to send me a card.
I'm mostly disponible for most social actions, especially cats.
http://fallenlondon.storynexus.com/Profile/MrDuckard
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Jack Vaux-Harrowden
Posts: 245
6/22/2014
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In combat, I usually alternate Flare-Evade-Flare-Evade until I have the enemy illuminated, then alternate Salvo-Evade-Salvo-Evade; if it looks like my illumination is going to hit 50 or above, I can cancel a salvo or flare action and skip right into the queued Evade.
It works like a charm against Steam-Pinnaces, anyway.
Also, Spacemarine9 has started a sister tumblr to the FL hints blog (at http://saint-beau.tumblr.com/), so if anyone comes up with something really good they should pass it that way so it's likely to be seen, since Spacemarine is internet-famous and all. I liked his suggestion to hit Pigmote Isle early; it's a bit of a trek for a captain just starting out, but the payoff is pretty impressive.
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IHNIWTR
Posts: 346
6/22/2014
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I'll be honest though, the Venderbright-London route, while profitable, is also slow and grindy as all hell; and the profitability isn't all that great. When you consider that ships cost as much as they do, and the only established port offers such low-profit options, the grind you have to go through becomes ridiculous.
I guess what I'm saying is I hope we get more robust trade ports implemented sooner rather than later.
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https://www.fallenlondon.com/profile/Daniel%20Vaise
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