Intermission 6 Page 15
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“I think we should check out that farm first. You’re right that it could be a good way to get our own farm started.”
“Sounds good. I’ll lead you there a little later if you like.”
“Oh, and it sounds like our friends here have taken a look around your place and come up with an estimate for what we need to fix up this manor. And how much it’d cost to add some new stuff, too.”
“I brought my packs, so how about we work out what kind of gear you need. I was able to bring a lot of new stuff now that I don’t have to worry about smuggling it all into the city.”
“And if you want you can tell these guys what they should be working on while you’re away crawling dungeons.”
“You’ll be gone for a couple days, so by the time you get back they’ll probably be done with whatever renovations you decide on. And whoever stays behind can get the fields started.”
Ricki thinks carefully about what items she should buy or sell, and what renovations she should consider ordering. She thinks back to a problem she’s been mulling over for some time; maybe if she has some of the manor’s back rooms fixed up special for her friends, they’ll feel a bit more at home. Kamau in particular has been kind of glum since the kobold warrens, and Lara has always seemed a little distant despite the carefree attitude she puts on.
You can now buy, sell, and store items, order renovations, and choose party members and pets for the next dungeon.
From now on, when prompted to do your shopping you can visit Paws’ Packs to see a full list of his stock. Additionally, you can now decide on manor renovations to change the appearance of Ricki’s new home, as well as giving various benefits to her party.
For now, the manor has space to store 10 items between dungeons. When storing items at the manor, their weight doesn’t matter. Additionally, any party members who stay behind can hold as many items as they can carry.
Party members and pets who don’t go to the next dungeon will stay at the manor and contribute 1 Labour each, representing the work they do to grow food or other resources. For each point of Labour the manor has, 1 Gold Coin will be generated at the end of each dungeon.
Finally, although any number of pets can be left behind at the manor, four party members must always go to the dungeon if possible.
There’s no new page tomorrow so you have lots of time to decide all this stuff!
Don’t know what to buy, as I’m not sure how much gold/items we currently have available.
As for Renovations, I would recommend making the Kobold Den first for a few reasons; it would probably help cheer Kamau up (he might be feeling bad and sorta responsible for the family losing their previous home due to the party’s involvement), and it would give the family a proper home. On a more practical level, the additional Labour the family could provide when they’re properly settled in could make future renovations much easier.
We did not place anything inside the manor yet, thus everything we own is carried by the characters: https://dungeoneyes.com/characters/ Currently we have 8 (eight) gold carried by Lohk. We can increase that number by first selling some surplus from the things the characters carry. (Well, we could sell, if we had surplus…)
Kobold Den: Cost: 40 gold. 🙁 Which emperial bank are we going to rob for that first?
The Last Imperial Bank!
(Security’s not as tough as it is at the First Imperial Bank, I hear)
I vote for the Underground Shelter. Not only does it provide Labour, but it’s a prerequisite for other renovations, such as the Kobold Den and possibly other renovations that will be unlocked by things like the Foyer or Living Room. It’s basically a cheaper version of the Kobold Den which *also* makes the Kobold Den cheaper when we get it next renovation.
I think it’s important to get Underground Shelter BEFORE Kobold Den, since we may eventually get all of these renovations but we might as well first get things that impact other things. I know that the +4 Labour right away looks mighty tasty, but we can always get that the very next renovation and save gold in the process, plus we will eventually need to get Underground Shelter before other underground renovations anyway so might as well use its limited advantages now while we can, AND we get some Labour from it even if it’s not as much as the Kobold Den.
Another thing I’d like to add is that Sentry Post implies we will still need to look out for the guard. So having a secret underground place to hide if things go south could be extremely useful. But if y’all don’t want the Underground Shelter, my second choice is the Sentry Post. Not only does it provide just one less Labour than the Kobold Den, but it’s a lot cheaper AND has an *extremely critical* bonus. We need to keep our guests safe above else. I hear arguments advocating for the Kobold Den because it will relieve Kamau’s guilt, but also making the kobold family safer with the Sentry Post should set his mind at ease. Not only is it helping to protect everyone, but Kamau has a past with the guard I’m sure he’d like to avoid.
AND by starting with renovations like Underground Shelter and Sentry Post, we score massive points with Lohk, who is very safety-oriented.
There’s no particular reason to think the Sentry Post has gameplay mechanics. All the other Manor items have both flavor text and actual mechanical benefits. The non-paranoid reading is that the “A small shelter where the three friendly sentries from the Abandoned Chapel can keep an eye out for the Guard.” part is flavor for describing what we’re building (and a story-based reason for why) while
Provides +3 Labour.is the actual mechanical effect. Absent any hints from LSN that there’s something special in that interaction, it doesn’t seem worth prioritizing.Underground shelter: Cost: 25 gold. 🙁 Which emperial bank are we going to rob for that first?
+labour upgrades seem really unattractive right now. 10 gold per labour pays off after 10 dungeons and we have done 6 in a year.
Also Den (+4 gold per dungeon) looses to Shelter (+1 gold per dungeon and -4 discount) only if we cant afford Den, but will get it after one or two more dungeons (one dungeon if labour becomes more useful).
Nice to see Lara embracing her new Palaradin identity! 🙂
I guess it’s up to me to start posting builds.
Leave: Lohk.
Kamau: Squirrel. Plate, magma shield, enchantment scroll of shocking, swiftblade, (free cheese). (5+1+2+1+1+1 = 10/12)
Ricki: Greataxe, leather, purse (free tools). CRoP (2+1+1+1 = 5/9)
Lara: Greataxe, bat hide, (free cigarettes). Copper ring of protection (CRoP), CRoA. (2+2+1 = 5/10)
Maca: Daisy. Wolf hide, shield, silver ring x2, spear. Copper ring of aggression (CRoA) x2 (2+1+1+1) = 5/5)
Sell: leather (6.5), 1 shield (10), spiked buckler (6.5)
Buy: 1x silver ring (10), greataxe (19).
Left: 2 gold
Stuff left behind:
Double crossbow
Rat fang dagger
Oxidicer
Fire dragon robe
Potion of rage
Rat tail
1 Shield
Greatsword
Owlbear cowlwear
EXPLANATIONS
There’s no getting around the problem that Lohk is quite weak. She has some limited-use utility, but the shortest dungeon we fought in went for 20 rounds. Limited use *sucks*. This build makes all characters strong combatants. It doesn’t have a pack mule, but Lara has six more slots than Lohk counting her cane, so whatever.
We can make *one* of our small characters really scary with swiftblade + Daisy, but only one.
Two characters are down to 4 def from 5, but we get +4 (average) atk in return.
We’d swap the swiftblade onto Maca as soon as it’s enchanted:
Kamau: 12 def, 4 atk
Ricki: 4 def, 5-7 atk
Lara: 4 def, 7-9 atk
Maca: 6 def, 6 atk (+shocking enchant)
Leave: Lara.
Kamau: Squirrel. Hilt, plate, magma shield, enchantment scroll of shocking, swiftblade, (free cheese). (5+1+2+1+1+1 = 11/12)
Ricki: Bat hide, greataxe, purse, (new tools). Copper ring of protection (CRoP). Copper ring of aggression (CRoA). (2+2+1+1 = 6/9)
Maca: Pack mule. Spear, leather, greatsword, helmet, 2x silver ring. CRoP. (1+1+1+1+1 = 5/5)
Lohk: Daisy. Cane, wolfhide, shield, (new healing potion). CRoA, CRoA. (1+2+1+1 = 5/5)
Sell: leather (6.5), 1 shield (10), spiked buckler (6.5)
Buy: 1x silver ring (10), pack mule (20).
Left: 1 gold
Stuff left behind:
Double crossbow
Rat fang dagger
Oxidicer
Fire dragon robe
Potion of rage
Rat tail
1 Shield
owlbear cowlwear
EXPLANATIONS:
If we’re going to leave Lara behind for a dungeon, the outdoor one with lots of light sounds like the right one.
Loadout is for the typical Kamau tank approach. Lohk will get the enchanted swiftblade ASAP. Maca may smif the greatsword. Maca has a spear for a second ranged option, when he isn’t acting as a general errand boy. We were warned that we will start needing ranged attacks soon. Having the packmule means he can do most of the fetching, while other characters handle combat.
Stats after swiftblade swap:
Kamau: 12 def, 4 atk
Ricki: 5 def, 6-8 atk.
Maca: 5 def, 2 atk (3 ranged)
Lohk: 6 def, 7 atk (+shocking enchant).
[EDIT 1: fixed encumbrance to include Kamau’s hilt, and Ricki’s total capacity]
This seems like a solid basii for the Farm and I do like getting the Mule.
However, since fire damage will be usefull in the Farm we should consider bringing torches& maybe the Fire dragon robe (which should work, especially with the increased Enc we expect from the Mule). Also I’m not sure if its worth to bring two silver rings, without having anything we know we can use to enchant them with. We could consider buying a longsword for +2 atack ring, though we can only bring one non-enchanted ring then.
Therefore I would propose these changes:
Yes, please, these are extremely sensible adaptions to the plan.
Also, I prefer this option to the one taking Lara with us, because both Macadamia and Lohk can still gain bond level with Ricki (Lara and Kamau are maxed out). And leaving Macadamia behind would deprive us from being able to find out what he can do with silver rings asap (and also 2 more magic rings).
Besides, Lara was so awesome last dungeon, she deserves a little break. 😀
Definitely buy the second silver ring. “What if we don’t find something to smif” sounds like how worried people were about whether dungeons other than the Jail would have locks. There’s consistently too much loot to carry, let’s make better rings. Selling Potion of Rage in place of leather would make cash for a torch.
I’m not convinced the fire robe is useful for offense. The dungeon will likely have some amount of fire damage like how the undead dungeons had grave flowers, though there weren’t spare rings in the Warrens that Paws recommended rings for.
Thought on Squirrel, since both loadouts here have it on Kamau: Trap Savvy is far more valuable on the others at risk of causing Remorse when hurt by traps. However, Tiny requires a large character to carry the pet for full safety. We’ve only ever seen pet trap damage from Daisy falling on the explosive pressure plate and Squirrel can be revived with cheese on hand. That said, agreed that Daisy and Pack Mule (Bill, from Lord of the Rings) are good choices on small characters.
Night, you may want to make it explicit we aren’t doing renovations this time around, because of how LSN counts votes.
I think enc calculations are slightly off on this.
Kamau should be at 11/12 for enc because of his hilt, which isn’t listed but obviously he’ll have.
I think using a mac enc slot on the silver rings is wasteful. Better to have him wear those with the intention of enchanting one immediately, then shift the copper ring elsewhere.
Personally I think this puts the swiftblade on a character we are unlikely to use for attacks most of the time, since Lohk has decent utility options available to her in the form of healing and fireball. It’s only a difference of 1 atk on the Daisy character versus the natural movement of Ricki or Mac, which I don’t think is a super strong argument for putting it on someone that won’t usually be attacking, and it means that Lohk’s inventory is completely full. She already has a cane to use if she needs to attack, and although the swiftblade is stronger than that, it makes almost as much of a difference for Mac vs using the spear as it does for Lohk vs using the cane.
I think we should consider what we might do to add the robe for Lohk, and how we might bring a weapon for Mac in case he needs to smif both of the spear and greatsword. Haven’t noodled on that much myself though. Will probably post a similar build to this later, but I think this is a totally workable suggestion even without any changes.
Good catch on encumbrance.
Mac is going to need to smif both silver rings eventually anyway. And should have spare inventory slots on the mule. Moving them off of him just forces us to waste turns trading later on.
> Personally I think this puts the swiftblade on a character we are unlikely to use for attacks most of the time, since Lohk has decent utility options available to her in the form of healing and fireball.
Lohk can do that three times. Total. For us to *not* use her for attacks most of the time would imply she attacks with a weapon twice. In the entire dungeon.
Maca has a similar problem, but he has two Mov, which I suspect will useful more frequently than three-times-a-dungeon channel abilities.
On closer consideration, I think the hardest thing about this plan is that it relies on Mac being able to store a bunch of items on the pack mule to do anything useful. We had a hard time last dungeon finding good things for Mac to do once he had smiffed/while we were waiting to find things to smif. I think we are better off frontloading damage on him than on Lohk, since Lohk seems more likely to have non direct attack combat actions on any given turn than Mac would.
I think this here:
means that the companions will get their first “remove bond cap quest dungeons” made available, once we have built them their own rooms. Might also explain why there atm is no option to build a room for Lohk and Macadamia (who both still have “room” in their bond level bar) yet.
Both rooms for Kamau (ground floor appartment) and Lara (tower) cost 50 gold each, so that is still a ways off, unless we hit some major payload in the next dungeon.
Especially if we want to build smart and e.g. unlock stuff first that makes other stuff cheaper (e.g. the underground shelter 25g), brings in money (e.g. the kobold den 40g -> will bring back the money invested within 10 dungeons!) or provides security (e.g. the Sentry post 30g).
Personally, I also find the kitchen and the library unlocking more upgrades super interesting (the foyer and the living room do, too, but I’m imagining something along the lines of eventually getting perhaps books or spell scrolls from the library and possibly food from the kitchen, especially when/if we get the garden going), too, so it’s really a pain to have to decide what to renovate. Or it -would- be, if we actually had enough money.
Quintessentially: getting more loot/money back to the manor is even more important than it was before. So buying the pack mule is a great choice. (I’m assuming it will count as pet?) Thanks for making that part of your (second) suggestion, @Night. 🙂
I don’t think that a room will break the bond cap. The text says “feel more at home”. I think preparing a room for them will merely unlock a scene, and some lore, and unlock an option for a related quest. But of course, that’s all guessing.
The Pack Mule. 1 in stock. Just like Rabbit’s Paw. I wonder, can we use a Rabbit’s Paw to buy a mule ad hoc while we’re in a dungeon? Sounds like a nice hack, but I don’t see why it would be not possible. Still, I think adding 5gp to get a Mule is interesting option. We know RabbitsPaw is always lost at the end of the dungeon, but a Mule will probaby stay (until killed in action or something).
He didn’t say it would break the bond cap, he said it would unlock the quest to do so. Which I agree, it sounds like it will.
I expect Macadamia’s room will also be underground, which makes an early Underground Shelter more valuable. The passive income isn’t great though, it’s a good cash sink but only after getting options which benefit us. Remember that it took a year to do 6 dungeons.
I think Kamau and Lohk should get priority on personal rooms, since Kamau needs another 3 Bond before the second threshold and Lohk needs another 4. Starting on those early would maximize our growth. That said, the fact Lara only needs 5 Bond total would give us the fastest look into what it means to max out a social link (or, more actually, get some hints about what will be needed to unlock the second threshold).
Leave: Lara
Renovations: None, because we are too poor atm.
Pets:
Squirrel: Kamau
Daisy: Mac
Pack Mule?: Lohk or Ricki, once we know what it actually does.
Kamau: Hilt, (Spawned Cheese), Plate, magma shield, enchantment scroll of shocking, swiftblade, torch, Copper Ring of Aggression (1+5+2+1+1+1 = 12/12)
Ricki: (Spawned Thieves Tools), Bat Hide, Helmet, Greataxe, purse, thieves tools, thieves tools Copper ring of protection (CRoP). Copper ring of aggression (CRoA). (1+2+1+2+1 = 8/9)
Maca: Wolf Hide, Spear, shield, 2x silver ring. (2+1+1+1 = 4/5)
Lohk: Cane, (Spawned Healing Potion), Fire Robe, shield, torch, Copper Ring of Protection, Copper Ring of Aggression (1+1+1+1 = 5/5)
Sell: leather armor (6.5), shield (10), spiked buckler (6.5), potion of rage (7.5), greatsword (6) for 36 gp total
Buy: silver ring (10), pack mule (20), 2x torch (2), 2x thieves tools for 44 gp
Left: 0 gold
Stuff left behind on Lara’s person:
Leather Armor
Double crossbow
Rat fang dagger
Oxidicer
Owlbear Cowlwear
Rat tail
EXPLANATIONS:
Idea here is that turn 1, assuming we aren’t immediately in combat, Kamau enchants the swiftblade, Lohk heals Kamau, Mac smifs the spear with a silver ring and Ricki can hopefully do something useful while the rest are busy. That clears out two inventory slots (three once Kamau gets a chance to drink Lohk’s healing potion). Lohk will have the least defense and movement of anyone here, so she’ll stick with Kamau the entire time. Hopefully this is a straightforward dungeon since it’s outside, so it shouldn’t be too much of a problem.
The swiftblade then goes to Mac. Lohk has spells and utility that’s likely to exist throughout the entire dungeon, while Mac is only good for fighting once he’s smiffed. Lohk is also set up to buff her fire defense and damage, which means she’ll need the help of Kamau’s interpose and won’t be a viable stand-alone fighter.
Since Mac can only fight once he’s smiffed, we want him to have a strong weapon. Additionally, although this is an outdoor dungeon, I’m still expecting there’ll be some component involving small spaces that big folk can’t enter, so we need to build a couple of characters to have sufficient defense and power to do that. I’ve put Daisy on Mac to help buff his defense and the swiftblade attack, since he lacks the inventory room to safely use a two handed weapon and carry sufficient defense.
Kamau: 12 def, 5 atk
Ricki: 6 def, 6-8 atk.
Maca: 6 def, 6 atk (+shocking enchant)
Lohk: 4 def, 4 atk (2 fire with robe, fireball will be 4-7 dmg)
EDIT: Last minute change to sell the potion of rage and buy two thieves tools. It’s an outdoor dungeon, but there’s still the possibility for locked chests and doors. We could find a barn or farmhouse, and given our goal is maximizing loot and we have no mid-dungeon way to buy tools, it’s important we walk in with as many tools as we could possibly expect to use. This is super last minute, so if it doesn’t get implemented, or we think it’s unfair that I edited after getting upvotes (really sorry), then that’s fine.
Thanks to Night for most of this initial layout.
For the bystanders: The stats on this plan are only better than my plan because it’s counting the newly smiffed silver ring of aggression and I’m not. Counting my stats the same way you’d get:
Kamau: 12 def, 4 atk
Ricki: 6 def, 6-8 atk.
Maca: 5 def, 4 atk
Lohk: 5 def, 7 atk (+shocking enchant)
Mostly it’s pretty similar though. My main objection is that I kinda wanted to keep the spear for a second ranged option. In exchange, this plan gets fire damage on Lohk (until her torches break), and fractionally better fireballs. My other objection is that it means our weakest combatant has 1 Mov instead of 2, which may slow us down a bit when we need a character to do utility things.
I checked “items” vs “paws-packs” and it seems that these items, that Paws is currently selling are unknown to us:
BATTLEAXE
BOW
BUCKLER
CHAIN ARMOUR
CROSSBOW
CROSSBOW, LIGHT
DAGGER, PARRYING
DAGGER, RAZOR
DAGGER, SPRING
DAGGER, VENOM
MAUL
PACK MULE
PIKE
POTION OF GREATER HEALING
SHIELD, HEAVY
SHIELD, TOWER
WAND OF MAGIC MISSILE
WAND OF MEND
WARHAMMER
We’ve got a pretty good idea what the buckler, chain armor, and heavy shield are because we’ve seen the cracked, rusty, and gold version of them respectively. The changes for being cracked, rusty, and gold are consistent across items (see gold helmet vs helmet, gold longsword vs longsword), so we can derive their stats even without seeing them. Good list though!
For clarity’s sake –
Bucklers should be Def +1 with no break chance, Weight 1, cost 8
Cracked items have half the value and a 30% break chance (this is the same change that rusty items have and we have the stats for cracked bucklers)
Chain Armor is Def +3 with no break chance, Weight 3, Cost 11
Rusty items have half the value and a 30% break chance (this is the same change that cracked items have, and we have the stats for a rusty chain armor)
Heavy shield should be Def +3 with no break chance, Weight 2, Cost 26
Gold items have the same value, a 30% break chance, weigh 1 more than their default counterpart, and have the Treasure attribute. We have the stats for a Gold Heavy Shield, which means we have the stats for a heavy shield. (The above changes are consistent for the gold helmet vs the helmet and the gold longsword vs the longsword, so I’m assuming they’ll be consistent for the gold heavy shield vs the heavy shield).
Guesses:
Battleaxe: One-handed axe weapon, +1-3 Atk. Similar cost to longsword.
Parrying dagger: +1 Atk, and +1 Def vs targets you attack. Mirrors spiked buckler.
Razor dagger: +1 Atk and x% chance of +y damage. A pick but in dagger form. Pick is 20% for +2, unlikely to be actively better as they’re the same price.
Venom dagger: +1 Atk, deals poison damage. Not impossible that this instead lets you apply venom glands, but venom gland wording calls out “a character with Poison Use”. Costs less than a longsword, so probably not consistent 2 damage. Maybe 1-2 poison damage.
Maul: Mentioned in wrap up as a two handed hammer-type weapon. Unsure what the hammer schtick will be. Possibly bonus damage against targets with armour, but that’d get weird with enemies which have armour in their costume/stats vs as an item (like the kobold miner helmet).
Pack mule: Pet with Enc stat.
Pike: Upgraded spear, and more expensive than a greatsword. Two-handed, Weight 1, +3 Atk +1 Def. Probably not throwable, but maybe some reach effect… No, we’d likely have seen that on the Whip.
Tower Shield: +4 Def, two-handed, weight 2.
Warhammer: One-handed hammer weapon. +2 Atk with a hammer ability
Wands are probably the same as the Bent version but without break chance. Magic Missile and Mend don’t look like they’d have charges.
Drawing a blank on the spring dagger. Sounds like a spring-loaded dagger like a switchblade, which might be easier to carry… Perhaps they’re stackable, so Ricki with Improvisation could carry several in one slot to unlock things? If they’re also throwable that’d work well, but traditionally you have a set of throwing daggers, not switchblades.
Venom dagger could be consistent 2 damage (or 1 damage plus variable poison damage) but it’s less valuable because some of the damage is poison based, which undead (and presumably other) enemies tend to resist.
I also feel like the battleaxe has to be better than the longsword to justify even the 1 extra gold it costs. 1-3 dmg would give an EV of 2, so it’s unclear why we’d use it over a longsword when it costs more and yields the same average results. That being said, it’s not like it can do a consistent 3 or there’d be no reason to ever use a greatsword.
Point, poison immunity does make it risky. For 5 gold and working with Poison Proficiency, might be worth checking out.
Expected value isn’t a great way to rate weapons. Ricki with a longsword always takes 2 turns to kill a dire rat (3 HP 1 Def), while Ricki with a 1-3 battleaxe could kill in 1 turn but in practice would get the 1/9 chance of taking 3 turns by rolling low twice in a row. This is biased towards the axe being better because the longsword deals extra wasted damage, plus in general you get more out of getting extra damage in one turn than you lose from dealing less damage. Ricki with a battleaxe can eventually kill Def 3 enemies while the longsword does nothing.
Damage isn’t nearly as important as number of actions spent, and it’s the outliers that you need to worry about.
I guess. I just feel like there are enough times where we need to know nearly exact totals to accurately distribute attacks and actions, so I’m biased against unpredictable damage totals.