Dungeon 5 Turn 23
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Ricki takes a moment to speak with the kobold.
“Hi again! We beat up all the Reds in the room above, if you wanted to move back in up there.”
“Nah, I’m good here. Besides, if I went back more of them would just show up later and kick me out again.”
“Are you sure? You didn’t leave some stuff behind up there that you want back?”
“I said I’m good. It’s nice right here.”
Ricki thinks this is strange behaviour, and wonders if it might be a symptom of dungeon madness, or maybe something else. She decides to drop it for now but keep it in mind in case it becomes relevant later.
“Oh, also, there’s a heavy-duty metal safe up there. Those things are basically impossible to break into. Do you happen to know the combination, or what’s in it?”
“No, that belonged to another guy who moved out a long time ago. I have no idea what’s in that safe, or if anyone around here would still know the combo.”
“So it doesn’t belong to any of the gangs?”
“Probably some of them would say it does, but no. I doubt any of them could open it either.”
With this new information in hand, Ricki returns to the room above.
While the spider finishes off the bugbear (taking 1 more damage and causing a longsword and cracked shield to drop), Kamau hurries to the left. He meets up with Ricki as she’s picking up one of the discarded thieves’ tools and they both head to the right again while Lara pulls on the lever. This causes the steel partitions to change positions, allowing access to the safe and the chest but blocking the hallway to the next room.
Okay. We’re probably not going to make much progress this turn. But there are things we gotta try.
We did learn some useful info. Namely, the ring isn’t in the safe. Also, the safe isn’t part of the dungeon, so it can probably be moved. We don’t need to open it right now but we should make it accessible.
EDIT: Stupid me just noticed Ricki saying it can’t be broken into.
Kamau: push safe to the left. If you know that’s impossible before trying, go attack rats upstairs with a longsword if it looks like the room’s other occupants won’t attack you for that.
Ricki: Help Kamau push the safe if needed. Otherwise, when Kamau does his pushing, you follow him and do yours if you can, pushing the safe down the ladder with your action and moving down with it. Drop the lockpicks with others on the way, and fill your inventory with all the rusty items you can so you can them drop down near the monster when you get to the room below. If you know you can’t push the safe by yourself, do the moving and item shuffling listed above, drop all rusty items near rust monster and loot the bottom chest while it is distracted, retreating to near the kobold when done.
Lara: drop longsword, and rat tails and loot the chest that was behind the steel partition. Either take the items or ensure they’re all on the lever-side of said steel partition, with the help of the spider, if needed.
I really like trying to move the safe to other side of doors.
I think we can (and should) do some research.
1) Lara can send the spider to try to open the chest.
2) Lara can command the spider to pull the lever
3) ……………………………………… to push some stuff.
The first one is important because if a spider can open a chest we can send the spider to reach and open a chest in the Rusty monster room (by the ceiling).
Upd. It is impossible to check all options during one turn, of course.
I think we shouldn’t drop ALL rusty items.
If we need to distract it again to reach another chest we need other rusty stuff (one or two items more).
I agree with that sentiment, but in the worst case we would still have the rusty plate. At worst Ricki brings and drops the two daggers and the greatsword.
The monster eats metal, not rust. There are plenty of spare weapons we can’t carry and won’t need, so if it ever comes to the point where we need to distract Rusty for a few more turns, we can simply drop a regular dagger or longsword down to the monster. Rusty will rust the new item before eating it.
Most likely (I also think that is true), but not 100%.
Also, if we face new gangs (after turn 30) and we manage to get another teammate, the rusty greatsword can be given to them for the fight.
I think we’ll find that whatever is in the puzzle chest will be better.
Edited to reduce text and conditional actions that are likely to be ignored.
Ricki – Move left to pick up a rusty dagger into your inventory and drop your lockpicks. Go down the ladder and drop the rusty dagger to distract the rust monster while you loot the chest you can access. Retreat to the kobold after looting so we can make a safe exit next turn if necessary.
Kamau – Try to move the safe to the red hideout or at least safely past the moveable wall it was hidden behind. After moving(or trying to move) the safe, if you aren’t at the red hideout yet, move there.
Lara – go loot the newly revealed chest. Consider rewarding your spider pet with some delicious delicious stray dog fluids (NOT THE GUARD DOG) since they’re already dead and the spider has been a good pet thus far.
Spider – Chill out, maybe sip on some fluids while Kamau isn’t looking.
Ricki should drop the lockpicks somewhere before going to the chest, so she can for sure Cary all (potentially eatable) loot away from the monster
That is in there. By the by, how did you get a profile picture?
Eons ago I signed the email I’m using here up at gravatar.com (kidding, but I have now clue how long it was). Somehow this works automagically with quite a lot of websites (likely included in some common authentication/commenting/… library?)
Bad idea. The safe could be possibly feed to Rust bug (so we get its content) and if it falls to the Reds hideout that won’t be an option.
What? The red hideout is on the way to the rust monster. Moving the safe one screen left is the first step in trying to feed the safe to the rust monster, and even if we don’t have time to do that right now, it insures we have the ability to do so later by getting out from behind the lever moved wall.
A-ha, I understand you now. You don’t want to drop it into the first ladder hole (I think that is what you propose to do). Sorry for misunderstanding.
I am a bit wary LSN might not understand the fluids jokes…
I think it’s worth to try breaking the safe by using doors. Slide it to stand on top the doorway and flip switch.
Other option is that we need the Jeweler on our team. I assume whatever skills are used to put gemstones into rings could be used to operate safe. Some advanced lockpicking? Considering that each Gang had one quest item it wouldmean ring is in Animals Gang.
for the rest. Dunno. we are kinda wasting time
I wonder if the Jeweler knows the combination to the safe. Or if the Rust Monster could be used to open it if the safe can be moved.
Both are possible.
We need to determine if it is possible to push the safe above the first ladder (to Reds hideout) to the second ladder to Rusty monster. Maybe we need to cover the first ladder hole with something?.. I think that characters can tell if it is possible to push it so that it don’t fall into the first ladder hole.
Also Ricki can try to detest if the metal the safe made of is stainless. If it is then (possibly) Rusty monster won’t be able to “rustify” and eat it.
Edit: corrected mistakes
If we throw it down to Rusty then we will never be able to use doors to smash it open.
I don’t think this will work.
But I don’t mind trying the smashing thing first.
Also I think we should postpone the safe thing for now as the ring we need (urgently, I think) is not inside it.
Also, we can use magic lens to get all info about the Rusty monster.
If we can move the safe at all, then we should be able to move it all the way to the rust Monster – dangerours if there’s anything made of metal inside, but at least a way to get it open
Also potentially dangerous if our only option to get it down there is dropping it like 4 stories. Hopefully it’s well padded inside!
At least accomplished that.
Don’t steal a dolly lest the (Ex-)Arachnomancer and her spider would get you!
What about the ball quest?
Provided we go with my plan or Siv’s plan we will be able to loot every chest except the crow chest, get the dog, turn in all quest items we’ve found thus far, and have all characters at the entrance to respond to the thugs on turn 30. The plan even allows for a few spare actions on Kamau and Lara in case of double moves or additional quest items. The brief outline of how this works, leaving out inventory management, is below. Actions based on my plan but Siv’s works too with minor alterations.
24 – Ricki loots bottom chest of rust monster, Kamau tries to move safe, Lara loots last chest in blue hideout
25- Kamau boosts Ricki to top chest in rust monster hideout, Ricki loots chest Lara flips switch
26- Kamau takes shield if he can for free, Lara kills rat on chest, Ricki loots chest, everybody except Lara moves closer to the entrance (Kamau and Ricki end turn at blue hideout)
27 – Ricki triple moves to entrance, Kamau and Lara move to ringsmif picking up needed quest items and equipment along the way.
28- turn in doll quest, turn in ball, Kamau and Lara move left, Ricki double moves with bad ball to ringsmif screen
29 – Ricki moves up to dog, tames dog, moves back down to ringsmif. Lara snd Kamau move to entrance and have a free action each
30 – first wave arrives, Ricki and dog are two screens away so can move and attack, everybody else is there.
While this is an overal good plan, I think it does not give us overly good chances at recruiting Macadamia: I agree with other posts above that her ring is most likely somewhere with the Animal gang. if we start fighting a returning gang at turn30 we might get stuck there and have to leave before too much remorse or damage piles up. Maybe it’d be better to try for some of the chests up there first? (The crow and maybe the the Ape guy are also likely to talk, so maybe we could even trade for the ring)
That being said if we DO plan to make a stand at the entrance we should pile up the combat consumables (all potions, meat for doggo & the wanted poster) there, so we have extra ressources available
I’m just worried about our ability to take out the owlbear or have Kamau tank it and the ape and the crow to get to the chest in the first place. We would have to not open the last chest in blue to get Lara over to help with the owlbear before turn 26. So I suppose an alternate plan would be to flick the lever this turn and have Lara deliver the lens to Ricki to use on the owlbear turn 25. That lets us start that fight turn 26 if it’s doable and possibly loot the chest that turn. If instead the ring is in the last blue chest or any of the rust monster chests we won’t get it. It would have to be in the crow chest for this to be a good use of time and we would likely need to decide THIS turn to go for it. We could just say we will send Kamau in with 11 defense and hope he can tank all damage for two turns while Ricki loots the chest but that’s a big risk that could leave Kamau unable to handle the crowd at turn 30.
Maybe it is better to show up (one character), scream something like “oh, s***t, we need to find another way out” then run to the ringwif room where bats are sleeping and seeing dreams about fighting bad guys (gangs), what do you think?