Remove ads

A Shaper of Ice and Fire (Geneforge/GoT crossover)

Voting is open
Reader mode
SuperSonicSound said:
I like it, we may also want to start considering some further magic training for Sindri as well in the next few turns. I'm thinking either rudimentary healing or combat magic to unlock the next stage of combat/healing spells as a shaper we ideally want Sindri to be ranged support/artillery whilst his creations take the frontal role.
Click to expand...
Click to shrink...
The magic I want to grab first is Basic Blessing (500) and Burning Spray (800). The first opens up some nice stuff, and the latter removes the annoyance of people in armor. Fuck your armor. As long as it's cloth/leather or other light armor. I also want to get Minor Cure since that's a damn useful ability to have, and Rudimentary Healing is expensive as fuck. All the magic is expensive, but hopefully furthering our set-up will make that less painful of a cost.

What I really want to get next are Pod Bushes and Power Crystals.
 
Last edited:
Personally, I think we should prioritize the Power Crystals over the Chemistry Tools. The latter unlocks some fairly interesting techs, yeah, but the former allows us to solve our bottleneck in regards to the production of more Crystals, which are important in a number of technologies, as well as the production of magical items from what I understand.

Stuff like chitin, decoding the book, or energetic organs are all nice and well, but our real bottleneck remains research and infrastructure.

So, finish the delicate Shaper Tools, then get started on the Power Crystals.
 
Kelenas said:
Personally, I think we should prioritize the Power Crystals over the Chemistry Tools. The latter unlocks some fairly interesting techs, yeah, but the former allows us to solve our bottleneck in regards to the production of more Crystals, which are important in a number of technologies, as well as the production of magical items from what I understand.
Click to expand...
Click to shrink...
Why do we have a bottleneck on production? Because we can't run more vats or growers?
Even if we had more power and more growers, we'd still be limited due to lack of available hands. Our apprentices don't have the proper training to run any of that, and won't for a while.

-Research [75D]
-- Shaper Tools (Delicate) [1753/5000]
-- Chitin & Shells [400/500]
-- Human-like Appearance [0/500]
-- Energetic Organ [205/?]
-- Power Crystals [0/5000]

-Personal Training
-- Creation Control [5D]
-- Ranged Combat (Baton) [3D]

- Salt Brazier optimization [2D]

- Survey island for excavation [5D]
-- Begin construction of Underground Level [30D100 Creature Dice]

- Contact the Givanni to see if they've had any success in acquiring Ironwood seeds/saplings for your use.
Click to expand...
Click to shrink...

Here's a second version of the plan.
I could see removing the Thahd upgrade, for a larger gain to Power Crystals, even though being able to have bodyguards while in town would be nice. I'm not budging on leaving in Chitin and Energetic Organ because they're so damn close to finishing, and the total loss to Power Crystal research is extremely minor. Only 395 points.
 
Last edited:
TheOtherSandman said:
Why do we have a bottleneck on production? Because we can't run more vats or growers?
Even if we had more power and more growers, we'd still be limited due to lack of available hands. Our apprentices don't have the proper training to run any of that, and won't for a while.
Click to expand...
Click to shrink...
The grower run on their own. Our limiting factors up till now were "oh god that costs so much" and some variation of "hm, pools also cost energy, we are basically on the max, need that energy crystal first which are 10 month of one crystal grower.". I don't know about the energy situation atm, but we are on the bottom of the money barrel again concerning additional vats *looks at the people who thought money would be of no concern and we don't need any good income source*.

Concerning Citin, sure the 100 pts to see what is behind look cheapish, but look at biolum. and salt resistant. Both times we dumped 2500 points into it to just get the nature version, then needed an additional project to get anything improved. Let's wait with it till later, when we have exhausted the standard shaper combat options.

Chitin & Shells 400/500: After studying the sea life around the shore and shallows of your home you have seen several examples and variations of both chitin and shells. Perhaps they can be introduced to your creations?

Salt Resistance I 500/500: While most are not immune some of the plants around your home appear to have a very limited resistance to salt water. Perhaps if you unlock how they achieve this you can bridge the gap to the plants with full resistance that live in the seas themselves?
-- Salt Resistance II - 712/?

Bioluminescence I 500/500: You have found a creature capable of producing a soft glow from its body. Perhaps this ability can be acquired for your own use?
-- Bioluminescence II - 2000/2000: You have found a way to artificially recreate the bioluminescence found in some creatures naturally in your own creations.
--- BIoluminescence III - 0/?: Having unlocked the method of how to incorporate the desired trait you now require a more useful variation - a stronger variation.

Energetic Organ 205/?: An idea occurred to you - what if instead of the light emitting chemicals involved in bioluminescence something more… Energetic was introduced instead?
Click to expand...
Click to shrink...
 
Last edited:
Elbrasch said:
Concerning Citin, sure the 100 pts to see what is behind look cheapish, but look at biolum. and salt resistant. Both times we dumped 2500 points into it to just get the nature version, then needed an additional project to get anything improved. Let's wait with it till later, when we have exhausted the standard shaper combat options.
Click to expand...
Click to shrink...
I'm not saying that we need to continue research immediately after we get it.
I'm just saying that we can get it out of the way for a pittance, and it wouldn't make a difference in getting Power Crystals because we can't get them. They're simply too expensive to get in a single turn, barring a good roll and them being the only thing we focus on. We've already got a large research sink in the Delicate tools, and finishing up those two projects will cost two die a piece, maybe three if we get crap. The turn following, I'd say to focus on Power Crystals, full on.
 
Last edited:
TheOtherSandman said:
I'm not saying that we need to continue research immediately after we get it.
Click to expand...
Click to shrink...
You clearly underestimate SVs susceptibility to sunk cost.
Edit:
But as long as you leave in Human Appearances, sure I am for it. Explody organ could very well stray from the pattern because it is a derived research, not a copy from something found in nature.

Edit2:
@Leoric what level do our assistants need to reach for that teaching modifier to change?
 
Last edited:
Elbrasch said:
You clearly underestimate SVs susceptibility to sunk cost.
Click to expand...
Click to shrink...
We put points into the Coded Book, yet we haven't touched it in a while.
We've put 2500 into Biolum, and yet that's sat on the shelf collecting dust.
We invested 712 into Salt Resistance II, and that's had nothing done with it.
Artila's have 200 points in them, but haven't been expanded on for a long time. Same with the Cryoa, except that was 600.

I think we can avoid pushing this one, once it's finished. I'm not looking to continue it. I just want to finish two projects that are within spitting distance of completion, and whose costs are so small that it wouldn't matter to the next large project we want.
 
Except; what reason would we have to finish it? What does it gain us that's more important than improving our infrastructure or research capabilities?
Those 100 points might not be much, but if we do that with every project, they'll quickly stack up. A hundred here, two hundred there, and so on.
As far as I'm concerned, stuff like that can wait until we've finished the Delicate Shaper Tools and Power Crystals. After that, we can focus on "side projects" for a bit, while our infrastructure grows itself, more or less.
 
Except these are the only projects we have that are close to completion.
If we had a bunch of half-finished projects, I would agree with you.
But no, it's just these two.
I just want to finish them. That's it. Everything else that we have available to research would require a significant amount of time and research to complete. The necessary research to complete both barely breaks the halfway point on the next smallest research project.
A single die could finish Chitin, and two could finish Energetic. Power Crystals is going to take two turns to complete regardless of whether we have Chitin and Energetic on the docket or not.
 
Last edited:
Kelenas said:
Except; what reason would we have to finish it? What does it gain us that's more important than improving our infrastructure or research capabilities?
Those 100 points might not be much, but if we do that with every project, they'll quickly stack up. A hundred here, two hundred there, and so on.
As far as I'm concerned, stuff like that can wait until we've finished the Delicate Shaper Tools and Power Crystals. After that, we can focus on "side projects" for a bit, while our infrastructure grows itself, more or less.
Click to expand...
Click to shrink...
Depends how accurate the economics document is. We have 5 crystal units atm, we need 1 for the delicate tool research and then 10 for the power crystal. Finishing Power crystal early is also not an optimal investment of research points.
We are atm on the power max (4 small vat in shaper workbank + 2*2 Crystal grower/10), so production is limited to 2 crystals per month...

Sorry, was on the impression that we get one crystal per update, not one per month=3 per update (6 now with two grower). Full steam energy crystal ahead. Esp. because tools + crystall = 8300 points, way to close to the average of two phases then and possible three phases.
 
Last edited:
The main problem with the freeform research is that each level looks like it requires 4x the RP to unlock and sorry but 8k to get an improved biolum light source is absolutely crazy and a complete waste of research potential, we could finish a bunch of incredibly important things with that. Also getting those research topics completed at the first level unfortunately does literally nothing. It's a burned level.

I mean look at this

Bioluminescence I 500/500: You have found a creature capable of producing a soft glow from its body. Perhaps this ability can be acquired for your own use?

We really needed to spend 500 points of research to go "Glowy thing glows!" I don't actually get what this is supposed to even represent in terms of insight because that's something that shouldn't require any shaper esque research at all to pull off.

Especially when you look at other research options and note that burning spray is a spell we could have picked up for the same cost. :p
 
Last edited:
SuperSonicSound said:
The main problem with the freeform research is that each level looks like it requires 4x the RP to unlock and sorry but 8k to get an improved biolum light source is absolutely crazy and a complete waste of research potential, we could finish a bunch of incredibly important things with that. Also getting those research topics completed at the first level unfortunately does literally nothing. It's a burned level.

I mean look at this

Bioluminescence I 500/500: You have found a creature capable of producing a soft glow from its body. Perhaps this ability can be acquired for your own use?

We really needed to spend 500 points of research to go "Glowy thing glows!" I don't actually get what this is supposed to even represent in terms of insight because that's something that shouldn't require any shaper esque research at all to pull off.

Especially when you look at other research options and note that burning spray is a spell we could have picked up for the same cost. :p
Click to expand...
Click to shrink...
It was from the start of the game were we flopped around looked for a way to make money/have a positive budget and one idea was to replace the lighthouse fire with something quick and dirty biological. In retrospect foolish, but we were kinda panicked that we could be enslaved if we run bankrupt and get some fines leveled against us.
Would have been probably more a concern if we would have set shop inside of the city, not way outside.
 
Last edited:
Elbrasch said:
It was from the start of the game were we flopped around looked for a way to make money and one idea was to replace the lighthouse fire with something quick and dirty biological. In retrospect foolish, but we were kinda panicked that we could be enslaved if we run bankrupt and get some fines leveled against us.
Would have been probably more a concern if we would have set shop inside of the city, not way outside.
Click to expand...
Click to shrink...

Yea but back then we didn't actually know what the cost of researching that stuff would be, I had presumed it would be a fairly small research project given the nature of the shapers and the level of bullshit they get up to. :p
 
TheOtherSandman said:
Except these are the only projects we have that are close to completion.
If we had a bunch of half-finished projects, I would agree with you.
But no, it's just these two.
I just want to finish them. That's it. Everything else that we have available to research would require a significant amount of time and research to complete. The necessary research to complete both barely breaks the halfway point on the next smallest research project.
A single die could finish Chitin, and two could finish Energetic. Power Crystals is going to take two turns to complete regardless of whether we have Chitin and Energetic on the docket or not.
Click to expand...
Click to shrink...

Better tools might mean considerably better research multipliers. It is simply more efficient to do the tools first and leave all the other research after them.
 
Elbrasch said:
Full steam energy crystal ahead. Esp. because tools + crystall = 8300 points, way to close to the average of two phases then and possible three phases.
Click to expand...
Click to shrink...
Let's do the math. Assuming 80D for research, and setting 10D aside for training and other.
  • Delicate Tool + Power Crystal + Chitin & Organ = 8742
  • Average Research on Good Tools, post tax = 4536
  • Research Remaining to finish Power Crystal = 4206
  • Turn 2 Research Surplus on Average roll, post tax and after Power Crystal cost= 330
Assuming an average roll, we'd have a surplus of research on the turn after next, and that doesn't even account for the likely increase in our Research Dice for having Delicate Tools.

It is impossible to get the Power Crystal next turn, but barring a complete botch on our rolls, we will have it the turn after.
So there's no point in not doing a little housekeeping on our projects. Since either way, we cannot have Power Crystals until two turns from now.
And that's why Chitin and Energetic are in my plans.
Zero Gravitas said:
Better tools might mean considerably better research multipliers. It is simply more efficient to do the tools first and leave all the other research after them.
Click to expand...
Click to shrink...
See above calcs.
 
Last edited:
SuperSonicSound said:
Bioluminescence I 500/500: You have found a creature capable of producing a soft glow from its body. Perhaps this ability can be acquired for your own use?

We really needed to spend 500 points of research to go "Glowy thing glows!"
Click to expand...
Click to shrink...
SIndri: "Do you have the faintest idea how hard it is to reverse engineer an entire chemical substance with only the smallest of samples to work from when your tools amount to little more then some alembics and good intentions?"

Seriously though Biolum I nets you a functional formula for glowy stuff - technically speaking you could make weak glow sticks right now. To qoute you what the steps give you thoough...
Leoric said:
Currently updating the research document. But for the record...

Biolum 1: "How does this work?"
Biolum 2: "So how do I apply this in the shaping arts?"
Biolum 3: "How do I improve this to the point of usefulness?"
Biolum 4: "How do I make this even better... Or weaponize it?"
Click to expand...
Click to shrink...
And to expand on it...
Step 1: Luminescent chemicals.
Step 2: Luminescent creatures upgrade.
Step 3: Creatures that can briefly grow bright enough its hard to look at them.
Step 4: ????
 
TheOtherSandman said:
Let's do the math. Assuming 80D for research, and setting 10D aside for training and other.
  • Delicate Tool + Power Crystal + Chitin & Organ = 8742
  • Average Research on Good Tools, post tax = 4536
  • Research Remaining to finish Power Crystal = 4206
  • Turn 2 Research Surplus on Average roll, post tax and after Power Crystal cost= 330
Assuming an average roll, we'd have a surplus of research on the turn after next, and that doesn't even account for the likely increase in our Research Dice for having Delicate Tools.

It is impossible to get the Power Crystal next turn, but barring a complete botch on our rolls, we will have it the turn after.
So there's no point in not doing a little housekeeping on our projects. Since either way, we cannot have Power Crystals until two turns from now.
And that's why Chitin and Energetic are in my plans.

See above calcs.
Click to expand...
Click to shrink...
Nobody argues that power crystal will finish this turn. But 300 points safety margin doesn't sound like much, but It was some time that I had a statistical course, so I can't give you the percent chances on that yet.
Flipping the argument around, surely having the benefit of "Biolum 1: "How does this work?"" for Citin one turn earlier isn't worth delaying the power crystal for a full three month?
 
Elbrasch said:
Nobody argues that power crystal will finish this turn. But 300 points safety margin doesn't sound like much, but It was some time that I had a statistical course, so I can't give you the percent chances on that yet.
Flipping the argument around, surely having the benefit of "Biolum 1: "How does this work?"" for Citin one turn earlier isn't worth delaying the power crystal for a full three month?
Click to expand...
Click to shrink...
That 300 point margin is only for our current set-up.
A margin that, once we complete Delicate Tools, will jump considerably.
-edit-
Assuming a 20 point increase in our dice size, from d180 to d200, that would cause the safety margin to increase from 330 to 794. Again, this is accounting for the apprentice tax.
 
Last edited:
Leoric said:
Seriously though Biolum I nets you a functional formula for glowy stuff - technically speaking you could make weak glow sticks right now.
Click to expand...
Click to shrink...

Oooh. Wonder if we could make little lantern fishbowls that people just drop some food material in now and then? That would be cool and functional, no oil or electricity needed for lights!
 
Reader mode
You must login or register to reply here.
Voting is open
Remove ads
Back
Top