As a final writeup on the most insane plan we could possibly do: Ultimate Hammertime.
Why stop at 2 chill pills? They're so cheap, why not just buy 20 of them and make a super chill pill? Why not just merge 100 cancer cures with 1 super demon cancer pill? If the latter is anything even approaching a reasonable pill, we could just spam that for powers. Or even sell the new product to the corporation at increased price!
Why stop at one expensive pill when you could have it all, why settle for any of them to be individual pills when you could Frankenstein warp them into chimeric combinations of bits and pieces?
Basically what I'm saying is, this hammer is fucking broken and if we wanted to we could abuse it to great effect on these cheap ass miraculous items (some of which they are literally paying us to take).
As a final writeup on the most insane plan we could possibly do: Ultimate Hammertime.
Why stop at 2 chill pills? They're so cheap, why not just buy 20 of them and make a super chill pill? Why not just merge 100 cancer cures with 1 super demon cancer pill? If the latter is anything even approaching a reasonable pill, we could just spam that for powers. Or even sell the new product to the corporation at increased price!
Why stop at one expensive pill when you could have it all, why settle for any of them to be individual pills when you could Frankenstein warp them into chimeric combinations of bits and pieces?
Basically what I'm saying is, this hammer is fucking broken and if we wanted to we could abuse it to great effect on these cheap ass miraculous items (some of which they are literally paying us to take).
I'll do you one better: We can hammer pills into masks. We have a bunch of blank masks. Dorian can assess the powers of a mask by examining it.
We don't even have to guess how many stacks of the cheap pills will successfully counter the appropriate downside pills, we can get Dorian to do it for us.
That is not how Hammer works, its function is fusing different functions by abstracting away all in between steps, not empowering thing by mixing it with more of itself.
That is not how Hammer works, its function is fusing different functions by abstracting away all in between steps, not empowering thing by mixing it with more of itself.
No, it specifies it's about destruction and creation. Destroying two chill pills and combining them into one should provide the net power of both combined in one. You'd need to provide me an exact quote on this to convince me in any way that this is explicitly just about identities.
Let's get the original description of the Hammer in here for reference. Also I added a conditional incase the double chill pill plan blatantly wouldn't work so Dorian and Linneas just take 1 regular chill pill instead.
[ ] The Hammer - This simple claw hammer is more than a craftsman's tool. Properly wielded, it acts as an unparalleled tool of destruction and recreation.
A sufficient amount of repeated strikes can undo even the most curmudgeonly of matter, shattering titanium ingots into scattered shrapnel. This can be done to virtually anything and used offensively to great effect. However, if a craftsman holds a piece from a broken item over another and hammers it, as one might hammer a nail in, it can fuse these fragments with the object. This is always done per the wielder's intent and desires, completing engineering work even they couldn't do; a simpleton hammering a computer into a suit of armor will form a wrist PDA that interfaces with other technology, not distribute random circuitry under the armored plates.
This can be done successfully even with relics and other magical artifacts and was tested on a couple of your masks to good results. The worth of the ability to combine masks and their identities in such a granular fashion surely doesn't need to be stated.
My gut says there are diminishing returns from combining large amounts of items into one (in fact I don't think we're actually 100% sure if combining 2 identical items results in any improvement at all. Though I would bet on a 95% chance it at least somewhat works for at least a basic 2-to-1 combo)
and in any case, for cheap items at least, since the hammer is guaranteed to give a "good" result, the worst possible case is that you waste one cheap pill which means it's worth trying
My gut says there are diminishing returns from combining large amounts of items into one (in fact I don't think we're actually 100% sure if combining 2 identical items results in any improvement at all. Though I would bet on a 95% chance it works for at least a basic 2-to-1 combo)
Possibly! As I said this was the mad science balls to the wall insane break the quest route. Possible in theory, a pain to explicitly write out and plan, and likely to result in an unsatisfactory extreme power boost even in the chance that it works.
Speaking of functions, we might potentially combine a pill with a Mask to create a way to permanently consume a Mask. So i.e. combine Theater Child with Cure for Cancer to get ghetto cure for creativity. Naturally this would mean that we can't improve that Mask anymore, but the upside would be quite something.
Although this is somewhat of a longer term thing, and it might just fail to work or cause issues due to personality aspect of Masks.
It's not like we can just combine armor and pill to create pill of iron skin. Surely?
Birdsie specified in Discord that merging copies of a pill into each other for stacked effects is "Very possible!" Which is about as much of a green light as I can imagine for something like this. So yes, this plan is in fact, as insane as it sounds, viable.
[] Plan UltraGreed
-[] Absurdity®
-[] OverL®
-[] 2x X-ray
-[] 5x Silver Edge
-[] Dorian takes 1 X-ray (you can't win if you don't gamble right?) and 3x silver edge, linneas also takes one silver edge. Before linneas can protest, Force-feed Japhris one X-ray and one silver edge
-[] Hammer both OverL and Absurdity into The Artificer's Mask. Goal is to be able to rapidly craft any and all masks that exist in drethirian fiction at full power
-[] ???????(x625)
-[] Profit!
[] Plan Mad Science
-[] Combine Re:Birth with Cancer cure, then the result with OverL. Lastly combine the result with Super Demon Pill. Goal: The demon kills us, but once we are dead (& reborn) the demon should be satisfied with inhabiting our corpse. hope very hard that it is now friendly, as it should have dorian's viscerality supercharged with OverL, it is now a crime against God that rapidly evolves into a Viscerality arch-master due to its inherent evolving capability and highly synergistic nature with viscerality.
-[] take some random drawback pills to round out the 20k points required idk
[] Plan Supplement Extra-Strength War Crimes
-[] Combine the Demon Pill with The Icarelian. Instead of exerting control over Contamination, it makes it way worse. Infect enemies with the demon cancer! Skip the middleman and spring up horrible omnicidal (if sometimes surprisingly reasonable due to enlightened self-interest) demons straight from the ground! Guaranteed control over any battlefield (as long as you are a tactical genius)!
So we know that the Hammer can plausibly beneficially fuse different pills and/or multiple of the same pill. I say it's time for science. Thankfully all science requires is any kind of pills and there are two very cheap pills on offer.
In addition, Birdsie has confirmed via Discord that our companions can open their own accounts at the store. These would start empty, and have the following properties:
"basically they mostly can't access any pills over 1,000 Credits, or the ones they can are inferior variants / less metastable variants that stress one's physiology after consumption limiting how many you can intake. Their clinical trials yield significantly less Credits (sums of 50-100) but are also less far less hazardous and fantastic.
These are pills whose effect is meant to be stuff like, 'you grow antlers,' or 'your eyes should become green but we want to make sure it works.'
removing antlers or warts safely, etc, should be at most an afternoon's (Visceralist) work."
These in-store Credits can't be transferred between accounts, but it'd still be ~225 credits just from Linneas, which is enough to do a little research without it impacting existing budgets. This means even plans that use every last credit intentionally can also afford to append research, though most plans have more overhead than that.
0. Linneas opens an account, takes all viscerally fixable testers. (~+225)
1. Hammer two Chill Pills into blank mask(A), in series.
2. Hammer two Chill Pills together, hammer result into blank mask(B).
3. Compare (A) with 1 Pill, (A) with 2 Pills, and (B).
4. If neither 2 pill mask is stronger than the mask with 1 pill, skip 5-7.
5. If (B) is substantially stronger than (A) and close enough to linear scaling to justify it: Buy 6 more Chill Pills smash them together and take Fused Chill Pill x6
6. If (A) is close to equal to (or somehow substantially better than) (B): Fuse extra Chill Pills into (A) one by one until it's strong enough to handle spontaneous combustion (with other effects).
7. Take X-Ray Vision Pill, using all available effects (Chill Pill, Able Pawn, Viscerality, Crimson Lost/Chill Pill Mask) to mitigate risk.
8. Mix a Chill Pill and a Cure to Cancer into blank mask(C), to try to determine whether mixing pills generally is a good idea. (Does the strength diminish? Can the effects be made more synergistic via hammering?)
I feel like Sonic & Knuckles is a good candidate for Hammering, given that it was already about picking 4 things that synergize well. As a result, I've updated it to include Hammer research. I'd be interested to see what else people come up with in light of this information.
[X] Plan Science & Knuckles
-[X] 1. Hammer two Chill Pills into blank mask(A), in series.
-[X] 2. Hammer two Chill Pills together, hammer result into blank mask(B).
-[X] 3. Compare (A) with 1 Pill, (A) with 2 Pills, and (B).
-[X] 4. If neither 2 pill mask is substantially stronger than the mask with 1 pill, skip 5-6.
-[X] 5. If (B) is substantially stronger than (A) and close enough to linear scaling to justify it:
Buy 6 more Chill Pills smash them together and take Fused Chill Pill x6
-[X] 6. If (A) is close to equal to (or somehow substantially better than) (B):
Fuse extra Chill Pills into (A) one by one until it's strong enough to handle spontaneous combustion (with other effects).
-[X] 7. Mix a Chill Pill and a Cure to Cancer into blank mask(C), to try to determine whether mixing pills generally is a good idea. (Does the strength diminish? Can the effects be made more synergistic via hammering?)
-[X] 8. If mixing was bad, Feed Japhris a De-Mar, wake her up and give her Cure to Cancer, De-Mar, and The Silver Edge. Take CogniSpark and Soldat-Stero, then X-Ray Vision, then Quick-Fix yourself. Grab extra Chill Pills, Silver Edges and Cures to Cancer to barter. Skip remaining instructions.
-[X] 9. If mixing was good, try to mix another Chill Pill and Cure to Cancer into another mask[D] to see if you can generate a new effect from the same material by varying intention or order of operation.
-[X] 10. If second mix was unique, keep making new Chill Cancer Cure masks until you're comfortable mixing pills or would need to dip below 14568 in Dorian's account to continue. (get Linneas to open an account and do testing if it would help here)
-[X] 11. Take X-Ray Vision Pill, using all available effects (Chill Pill, Able Pawn, Viscerality, Crimson Lost/Chill Pill Mask) to mitigate risk.
-[X] 12. Use results of mixing multiple pills to determine if De-Mar would be more valuable than a second Soldat-Stero. If so, Take Silver Edge here. If not, acquire 2 Cure to Cancer and 2 Silver Edge for trade.
-[X] 13. Hammer together CogniSpark, Quick-Fix, Soldat-Stero, and either De-Mar or Soldat-Stero #2, depending on 12. Aim to maximize synergy with each other and Viscerality, take the result.
Does anyone think Linneas with buffed Chill Pill or a chill pill mask may be especially effective at keeping us from lethal combustion due to able pawn?
I'd just like to take the credit for being ahead of my time with Insert Plan Name Here, which included 87 Chill Pills and the fusion thereof. Though it also thought we could get the same downside multiple times on different people
Observation: Rather than test Chill Pills, we can just test Downside pills! The Silver Edge is probably viable; it shouldn't kill faster than we can take off the mask.
[X] Insert Plan Name Here
-[X] Look at all Downside pills, and Chill Pill, with commentary, and make any obvious corrections accordingly. Try looking at multiple copies of the same downside pill if the results seem like your commentary knows which ones will work and which ones won't.
-[X] Then, test the fusion of pills and Masks in various ways (1 pill in blank mask; 2 pills in blank mask; 1 Hammer-doubled pill in blank mask; 1 Hammer-melded two-type pill in blank mask; 2 pills in blank mask), using Silver Edge (and, where a second pill type is needed, The Amazing and Bombtastic Infimedica X-Ray Vision Pill® or the downside pills Linneas has access to on his account.)
-[X] Also test fusing a Mask into a Pill, IE taking a fairly-safe drawback pill Linneas has access to and using a Hammer to mix a Mask(one Linneas is fine maybe being stuck with for a while) into it and make a Pill rather than a Mask, and Linneas takes the pill. See if Linneas can wear other Masks while benefitting. The intention to guide the Hammer is 'pill with the kind of effect this Mask had', rather than 'Pill that forces you to wear this mask'.
-[X] If Dorian believes he can accelerate Mask-Making given he is accelerated mentally and physically, and that this plan would work...
--[X] New Soldat-Stero® (-2899)
--[X] CogniSpark® (-7770)
--[X] Craft an appropriate Mask (to be worn by Linneas) to either bend probability or divine which way luck would fall in advance.
--[X] The Chill Pill® x41 (-861)
--[X] Cure to Cancer® x19 (-950)
--[X] use The Hammer to fuse various Chill Pills, granting yourself intense immunity to Fevers, and intense cosmetic cryokinesis. Only some Chill Pills should be used for this; leave an ample supply for later usage.
--[X] take The Amazing and Bombtastic Infimedica X-Ray Vision Pill® (+2000)
--[X] feed The Silver Edge® to Japhris, as she is immune to mental degradation(, assuming this is correct. If she would be harmed, drop to 29 Chill Pills, 4 Cure To Cancer®.). If Dorian doesn't care enough to cure the cancer, use a Cure To Cancer on it (+1000, optional.)
--[X] If and only if the Mask's divination confirms it will definitely go well, take the AnyPill. [If so, and if testing showed Masks can be made into pills using Hammer and a Pill, drop to 1 Chill Pill, and buy OverL instead of all the below, else get Bioshift if Kaijus are animals, else get another Soldat and drop some Chills or Cures to pay.], else replace the following with InspiraVive. (In the extremely unlikely effect the safety Mask's probability-manipulation is definitely strong enough for the Any Pill, it can be taken, but if believed so it's probably just a mistake.)
--[X] Red and Blue® (-1820)
--[X] The Quick-Fix®(-3000)
--[X] 2B / N2B® (-700)
--[X] Also, take a few dozen copies of The Amazing and Bombtastic Infimedica X-Ray Vision Pill® and The Silver Edge®, mostly the former, for later usage. As poison. Also take quite a few for later experimentation in general, and take quite a few of the drawback pills Linneas's account has access to for the same purpose.
-[X] If Mask-Making cannot be accelerated, perform the same plan, minus the Mask-crafting step and any dependent actions. If Dorian can think of an equivalently-viable safety measure with the theater child and/or Linneas's support, do that.
I'm not opposed to science, but I feel like even the most reasonably optimistic combination of cognispark, demar, quick-fix and soldat is going to underwhelm compared to just... OverL + Soldat. OverL is that good. Perhaps we could hammer OverL + Quick-Fix + Soldat and see if it gets us true super-speed?
I'm not opposed to science, but I feel like even the most reasonably optimistic combination of cognispark, demar, quick-fix and soldat is going to underwhelm compared to just... OverL + Soldat. OverL is that good. Perhaps we could hammer OverL + Quick-Fix + Soldat and see if it gets us true super-speed?
Given that we're likely to fight Veronica soon I'd rather go for immediate power over a potential focused pick like OverL.
Personally I'm also not a fan of taking Quick-Fix without cognitive enhancement, but it does sound tantalizing in the reasonably optimistic case.
I still think that just fully healing Dreamless is probably the best course of action. It directly gains us long term fix we want to get, and fixed creativity can immediately be translated into considerable power by using Hammer and shards of Arcanist we have laying around. That should be just enough to deal with Lieutenant while also gaining whole slew of opportunities going forward.
Dreamless (Near-Absolute)
*Your Second Aspect is severed from the oneiric. You cannot experience dreams.
*Your Second Aspect is heavily drained of creativity and innovation; difficulty of non-iterative action is raised dramatically.
Remaining Duration: Perman
ent.
Practically the downsides are no creativity and inability to continue the dream questline we got with good rolls. The former is relevant in this case as Hammer especially works the best with high creativity - in our particular case we have access to fragments of Arcanist, which can be mixed with another mask to produce immediately powerful Mask to tackle on the upcoming challenge.
The true reward, of course, is that we keep benefiting from lack of Dreamless later on, so the option is an excellent mix of handling current issues and long term potential. And there is no need to take on a convoluted plans or some such, you just pop the pill and use items we have at hand, that we can fully utilize items now that we are not crippled anymore.
Practically the downsides are no creativity and inability to continue the dream questline we got with good rolls. The former is relevant in this case as Hammer especially works the best with high creativity - in our particular case we have access to fragments of Arcanist, which can be mixed with another mask to produce immediately powerful Mask to tackle on the upcoming challenge.
The true reward, of course, is that we keep benefiting from lack of Dreamless later on, so the option is an excellent mix of handling current issues and long term potential. And there is no need to take on a convoluted plans or some such, you just pop the pill and use items we have at hand, that we can fully utilize items now that we are not crippled anymore.
Spitballing an Inspiravive mega plan that takes advantage of our current understanding
1. Dorian Buys a cure for cancer for himself/linneas(Remaining credits:14900 Credits)
2. Dorian buys four chill pills and fuses them into two double chill pills for himself/linneas(Remaining Credits:14816 Credits)
3. Dorian tests silver edge(Remaining Credits: 15816)
4. Dorian buys inspiravive mega(Credits after consumption: 816)
5. Linneas subjects Dorian to whatever cryokinesis a double chill pill gives as Dorian tests the X-Ray Pill(Credits after testing: 3816)
At this point we'd have room for any pill of Demar Medication or cheaper, with the potential for Dorian to buy and Red and Blue for himself and Linneas. This plan might be improvable further by incorporating Tetras approach/science addendum
(Edit: Now that I've mathed some stuff out myself to help me grok things, it almost certainly would.)
Edit 2: Just do Tetra's science addendum then take Cure for Cancer/ Silver Edge and Inspiravive Mega afterwards.
0. Linneas opens an account, takes all viscerally fixable testers. (~+225)
1. Hammer two Chill Pills into blank mask(A), in series.
2. Hammer two Chill Pills together, hammer result into blank mask(B).
3. Compare (A) with 1 Pill, (A) with 2 Pills, and (B).
4. If neither 2 pill mask is stronger than the mask with 1 pill, skip 5-7.
5. If (B) is substantially stronger than (A) and close enough to linear scaling to justify it: Buy 6 more Chill Pills smash them together and take Fused Chill Pill x6
6. If (A) is close to equal to (or somehow substantially better than) (B): Fuse extra Chill Pills into (A) one by one until it's strong enough to handle spontaneous combustion (with other effects).
7. Take X-Ray Vision Pill, using all available effects (Chill Pill, Able Pawn, Viscerality, Crimson Lost/Chill Pill Mask) to mitigate risk.
8. Mix a Chill Pill and a Cure to Cancer into blank mask(C), to try to determine whether mixing pills generally is a good idea. (Does the strength diminish? Can the effects be made more synergistic via hammering?)
Observation, then: rather than take Demar, wouldn't it be better to take a second Soldat? Assuming pill-fusion combines their power, it'll have benefits, and Demar only gives a bit past peak human rather than +300% to our already-past-peak-human physique.
Observation, then: rather than take Demar, wouldn't it be better to take a second Soldat? Assuming pill-fusion combines their power, it'll have benefits, and Demar only gives a bit past peak human rather than +300% to our already-past-peak-human physique.
This is a good point. I think since a lot of the immediate power of the picks is coming in on the cognition side De-mar should be viewed as more than just a stat stick, but it could still be worse than one. It depends a lot on scaling, of course (for example if Chill Pill turns out to scale substantially sublinearly then that's a point against doubling Soldat). Added an extra step to account for this.
