Remove ads

Cast-Offs of Divinity - A Merchants of Divinity Quest

Reader mode
JayTar said:
The shopkeeper nods and speaks with the utmost seriousness."Your request, has been anticipated." He then places a tiny bird sized mask and vest on the counter top.
Click to expand...
Click to shrink...
NO NO NO PROPHECY BAD

[X] Plan: live to run away
-[X] Yes (Costs 3 decent dots. Allows moderate exposure outside of protected areas.)
-[X] Yes (Costs 2 decent dots.)
-[X] Low profile protective armor (6 decent dots. Gives +6 armor)
-[X] A Gun (1 Decent dot. Allows the use of Combat (Firearms))

Honestly a financially risky plan and I'm wondering whether to ditch the gun or not. If we do then we will exclusively be running from any potential threat. I suppose we could ditch the protective gear for Kutkh and dump Kutkh on our darling brother.

[X] Plan: hide and don't die
-[X] Yes (Costs 3 decent dots. Allows moderate exposure outside of protected areas.)
-[X] Yes (Costs 2 decent dots.)
-[X] A Gun (1 Decent dot. Allows the use of Combat (Firearms))
-[X] Antitoxin packets (1 decent dot. Consumable. Provide +15 to a single Medicine roll to treat poisoning or other similar issues.)
-[X] Emergency shelter (4 decent dots. Pop up tent. Can be quickly deployed to create a protected area.)

[X] Plan: adventure!
-[X] Yes (Costs 3 decent dots. Allows moderate exposure outside of protected areas.)
-[X] Yes (Costs 2 decent dots.)
-[X] A Gun (1 Decent dot. Allows the use of Combat (Firearms))
-[X] An Explorers pack (4 decent dots. Contains a crowbar, a hammer, duct tape, a can of grease, a lighter, basic climbing equipment, and a large coil of rope)
-[X] Breaching charges (1 decent dot. Consumable. Small explosive, big enough to knock open a door.)
-[X] Expanding foam sachet. (1 decent dot. Consumable. Very sticky and hardens quickly. Roughly enough to seal a door.)

I couldn't decide so I just made three plans.
 
dlwj2000 said:
Ok, but really how in the world did he predict that? Does he have a contract from some sort of merchant god?
Click to expand...
Click to shrink...
Maybe? But in general future telling is problematic. I can totally see a contract that allows anticipating that someone is going to need last minute armor with the expedition happening. Does not even really need a contract, but anticipating that someone has a bird that needs armor seems like a very fancy contract. Seems like it would require tapping into the god's presence and awareness.
 
[X] Plan Protection Only
-[X] Yes (Costs 3 decent dots. Allows moderate exposure outside of protected areas.)
-[X] Yes (Costs 2 decent dots.)
-[X] Low profile protective armor (6 decent dots. Gives +6 armor)

[X] Plan: live to run away

[X] Close down the clinic and tell your brother and Leader? that you'll be unavailable for a week or so. Ask your brother if he knows a Professor Sinter.

The Armor and Gun should be useful no matter what. The Bus feels like a shelter and I can't imagine too many situations where the emergency shelter will be useful with that in mind. For the shopkeep, might it be some kind of contract that turns whatever you made/get into something suitable for the customer? The machines hid what they were making and the shopkeeper was pulling stuff out of our view, two obfuscations on what kind of inventory this shop has.
 
JayTar said:
The only sign of advanced technology in the entire shop is three assemblers churning in the background. The machines are patchwork, built from discarded and replaced parts. You cannot quite see what they are working on, which you suspect is intentional.
Click to expand...
Click to shrink...

The merchant guy probably saw our bird on the way in and has a contract with Steve for speed manufacturing, so long as it's hidden.

[X] Plan: adventure!
 
Last edited:
Math question: So we hit biology 5 exactly do we have enough time left in our course of study to hit biology 6?
 
fictionfan said:
Math question: So we hit biology 5 exactly do we have enough time left in our course of study to hit biology 6?
Click to expand...
Click to shrink...
I don't know the math, but it occurs to me that that the answer might change if we were willing and able to spend standard AP as TAP. Is that permitted?

Also, even if we aren't able to get all the way there, it's probably worth continuing to keep pushing for it, to really squeeze as much of the juice out of the class as we can. Like, we'll want to get to 6 eventually anyway, right? If we can even get close with the time still left to us, it's probably worth pushing for it now and then dragging ourselves across the finish line once the class is done.
 
Sirrocco said:
I don't know the math, but it occurs to me that that the answer might change if we were willing and able to spend standard AP as TAP. Is that permitted?

Also, even if we aren't able to get all the way there, it's probably worth continuing to keep pushing for it, to really squeeze as much of the juice out of the class as we can. Like, we'll want to get to 6 eventually anyway, right? If we can even get close with the time still left to us, it's probably worth pushing for it now and then dragging ourselves across the finish line once the class is done.
Click to expand...
Click to shrink...
I actually disagree here.

If we can't make it then we're better off just starting a new uni course to raise other skills instead. Half of biology 6 gives us nothing, and our learning speed is only going up anyway as time passes. I'd rather instead get mechanical engineering (to reverse engineer Angela's stuff for infinity points and FUN), academics or academics (gods) to better investigate contracts


Let's see... Assuming best case that the expedition only lasts one turn (turn 18) we have turn 19, 20 and 21 to train (and exam on 21, but we're already over prepared).
We might want to create something to help with the test though, if possible and not counted as cheating.

3 turns... 6d7 per tap, 6 tap per turn, so 4*7*6*3*2= 1008 on average in 3 turns of full effort. We need 2430.

I think it depends on if we want to go for biology 6 immediately or not. We could reach it with another course. Half a course, in fact, it should take the 3 remaining turns of this and 5 turns of the next one.

Alternatively we drop it for now, we go for lower hanging fruits, and come back to this later on.

Oh, and this is assuming our current course still gives the same bonuses for skill 6, which it might not
 
Pittauro said:
3 turns... 6d7 per tap, 6 tap per turn, so 4*7*6*3*2= 1008 on average in 3 turns of full effort. We need 2430.
Click to expand...
Click to shrink...
I think your math is off.

6d7 is avg 24. 24*6 is 144. 144*3 is 432. I'm not sure where you were getting some of those numbers from. Is there a training multiplier that I'm missing?

That said, if going hard is going to get us slightly more than 1/6 of the way, I'll agree that it isn't worth it yet. That most certainly doesn't qualify as "even close".
 
Last edited:
Sirrocco said:
I think your math is off.

6d7 is avg 24. 24*6 is 144. 144*3 is 432. I'm not sure where you were getting some of those numbers from. Is there a training multiplier that I'm missing?

That said, if going hard is going to get us slightly more than 1/6 of the way, I'll agree that it isn't worth it yet. That most certainly doesn't qualify as "even close".
Click to expand...
Click to shrink...

Pittauro said:
4*7*6*3*2= 1008
Click to expand...
Click to shrink...
4 progress on average per dice, 6 dice (not 7, my mistake there), 6 taps per turn, 3 turns, double progress when training biology.

So it's actually less than I said, but you didn't apply the last *2 multiplier. 864 progress.

We COULD reach biology 6 with another course, but I'd rather raise another skill instead. As I mentioned before, either mechanical engineering to reverse engineer Angela's stuff and complement our biology skill, academics and/or academics (god's) to fins the best contracts to pick ans know how they work.... Maaaaaaaybe teaching If we wanted to unlock the teaching contract anytime soon, but it's not really that good a pick right now
 
Pittauro said:
We COULD reach biology 6 with another course, but I'd rather raise another skill instead. As I mentioned before, either mechanical engineering to reverse engineer Angela's stuff and complement our biology skill, academics and/or academics (god's) to fins the best contracts to pick ans know how they work.... Maaaaaaaybe teaching If we wanted to unlock the teaching contract anytime soon, but it's not really that good a pick right now
Click to expand...
Click to shrink...
The value of academics(gods) is pretty directly dependent on whether or not we're locked into the base 4. Like, if other gods are also potentially available, then developing the skill that opens up those possibilities is very strong. If it's just a matter of knowing more about the four that we currently have unlocked... we can discover most of that stuff just by waking the roads, you know?

@JayTar are you willing to comment on this matter? Is it possible for us to get contracts from any gods who aren't the basic 4? If it is, would developing a higher skill in academics(gods) help with that?

Regardless, with the numbers as they are, yeah, I'm willing to accept that it's time to switch to other things. We'll probably want to go for that 6 in biology later, but putting a partial investment in it now really isn't worth it. If anything, it might be time to nudge up some of our side skills a bit.
 
Last edited:
Sirrocco said:
The value of academics(gods) is pretty directly dependent on whether or not we're locked into the base 4. Like, if other gods are also potentially available, then developing the skill that opens up those possibilities is very strong. If it's just a matter of knowing more about the four that we currently have unlocked... we can discover most of that stuff just by waking the roads, you know?

@JayTar are you willing to comment on this matter? Is it possible for us to get contracts from any gods who aren't the basic 4? If it is, would developing a higher skill in academics(gods) help with that?

Regardless, with the numbers as they are, yeah, I'm willing to accept that it's time to switch to other things. We'll probably want to go for that 6 in biology later, but putting a partial investment in it now really isn't worth it. If anything, it might be time to nudge up some of our side skills a bit.
Click to expand...
Click to shrink...
oh, of course it's allowed. the starting 4 were basically the "best" gods according to Levi, and thus the ones she focused the most on (because their the gods closest to her mad science focus).


INFINIUM: we have the first contract, we're not ready for the second (a 30 points creation. we need more skill AND more infinity points for it!

MD BONES: we have the first contract, we're not ready for the second (beyond peak human feat. We don't know how it's counted, but we can safely guess it requires AT LEAST 4 gen 5 spec skill, minimum, probably more (or much higher weight), and we don't know how equipment interacts with that).

PROFESSOR TWEED: mostly considered not worth it right now. We'd need higher teaching skill and a student to bring to 3+3 to unlock the first contract (I'm leaning teaching medicine to one of the mercenaries if we do it), and it then takes 1 AP each week on teaching actions (which we can probably cheese like we do "experiment actions", and then we get minor illusions "as teaching aids" (deliciously vague and abusable. I'll TEACH THEM ALL TO FEAR US!)).

in any case, it's not that bad, but we're probably not going to work on it soon.

STEVE

We're considering the challenge (build something with 3+3 skill and destroy it before anyone might notice it), but we don't yet know what the contract is like.


So right now it's really "recheck Steve" and then we can go for other gods.



I'm all for the academics or academics (gods) course before rechecking Steve and then going for other gods. It even gives us a good IC excuse for why we'd start looking at other gods right now.
 
Pittauro said:
oh, of course it's allowed. the starting 4 were basically the "best" gods according to Levi, and thus the ones she focused the most on (because their the gods closest to her mad science focus).
Click to expand...
Click to shrink...
Well...

JayTar said:
Gods Research. Roll Academics (Gods) to learn more about the god and what contracts they offer:
[] Doctor Infinium – The Mad scientist. The obvious choice. You just need to review your notes. You know you left them here somewhere. (1 AP)
[] Professor Tweed – The Teacher. Hmph. Probably a waste of time. (4 AP)
[] Steve – The Builder. Dispute the unfortunate association with (ugh) manual labor, you can see the merit in a god of building grand works. (4 AP)
[] MD Old Bones - The Physician. A medical doctor is still a doctor you suppose. (4 AP)

[] Perhaps there are some other gods you could look into? (4 AP)
You have no use for second rate gods.
Click to expand...
Click to shrink...

"You have no use for second rate gods" looks a little more intense than just "not the ones she focused on" to me. Like, Leviathan might be just straight-up uninterested in pursuing other gods and not particularly inclined to change. That's a plausible read of the text. In order to actually contract with other gods, we'd need to have her be potentially interested, and just taking the class might or might not do that... which is why I ask.
 
Last edited:
Sirrocco said:
"You have no use for second rate gods" looks a little more intense than just "not the ones she focused on" to me. Like, Leviathan might be just straight-up uninterested in pursuing other gods and not particularly inclined to change. That's a plausible read of the text. In order to actually contract with other gods, we'd need to have her be potentially interested, and just taking the class might or might not do that... which is why I ask.
Click to expand...
Click to shrink...
I don't have the quote with me, but I actually remember Jaytar say that we would be allowed to search for other gods later.

I THINK he said/meant "after the end of the prologue/tutorial", which ended when we got our first contract.

Admittedly we didn't IMMEDIATELY see a new "search for more gods" actions, but maybe he forgot? Or, you know, we were already focused on the medical contract...

right now I think that both IC and OOC it makes no sense to restrict us from more gods. I suspect we'll unlock the option after the expedition, especially if we take the academics (gods) course to help us in finding the perfect gods.
 
Pittauro said:
I don't have the quote with me, but I actually remember Jaytar say that we would be allowed to search for other gods later.

I THINK he said/meant "after the end of the prologue/tutorial", which ended when we got our first contract.

Admittedly we didn't IMMEDIATELY see a new "search for more gods" actions, but maybe he forgot? Or, you know, we were already focused on the medical contract...

right now I think that both IC and OOC it makes no sense to restrict us from more gods. I suspect we'll unlock the option after the expedition, especially if we take the academics (gods) course to help us in finding the perfect gods.
Click to expand...
Click to shrink...
Maybe we will find some ancient forgotten holy books during the expedition. Unknown gods are always great they tend to give better deals on average to gain a foothold and since they are unknown people are less prepared for the powers that they give.
 
Last edited:
Sirrocco said:
The value of academics(gods) is pretty directly dependent on whether or not we're locked into the base 4. Like, if other gods are also potentially available, then developing the skill that opens up those possibilities is very strong. If it's just a matter of knowing more about the four that we currently have unlocked... we can discover most of that stuff just by waking the roads, you know?

@JayTar are you willing to comment on this matter? Is it possible for us to get contracts from any gods who aren't the basic 4? If it is, would developing a higher skill in academics(gods) help with that?
Click to expand...
Click to shrink...
Can you get contracts form other gods? Absolutely. This would hardly be in the spirit of merchants of divinity if you couldn't.
Will academics(gods) help with that? It depends, but often yes.

The main 4 are just the most well known and socially accepted gods in the city. Other gods will require more work to figure out.

I've been sprinkling hints of other gods here and there already. Once you get back from the expedition I'll include some more vote options to chase them.
 
JayTar said:
Can you get contracts form other gods? Absolutely. This would hardly be in the spirit of merchants of divinity if you couldn't.
Will academics(gods) help with that? It depends, but often yes.

The main 4 are just the most well known and socially accepted gods in the city. Other gods will require more work to figure out.

I've been sprinkling hints of other gods here and there already. Once you get back from the expedition I'll include some more vote options to chase them.
Click to expand...
Click to shrink...
Excellent!

In that case, I'll agree that a class in god-bothering is worth it. In particular...

Well, Leviathan isn't anything special. I mean, we like her, and she's definitely upwardly mobile in good ways, but at this point there are probably thousands of people in the city who either are about where she is or who've already passed through that stage and look back on it fondly. She's not likely to get the custom contracts, is what I'm saying... and given that, a lot of the gods that we find are likely to have first contracts that are like Infinitum or tweed - permanent ongoing dedications of time. I'd be surprised if any of those are worth it... which means that we're going to want to dig into the lore on a bunch of less-well-known gods looking for the ones who have first contracts that we are willing to fulfil... which means that we need to roll well enough to at least get the info on their first contract. So yeah. academics(gods) is definitely worth investing in.
 
Reader mode
You must login or register to reply here.
Remove ads
Back
Top