If it actually progressed Mareinette's friendship, I'd be all for picking her options. But right now? We need to guarantee Glory. Handle the Wake issues with massive Progress, get AP to use on Sacraments, and MAYBE get Bits for the upcoming turns as a buffer. Mareinette can definitely get MORE, but it's been explicitly stated by Bird that "She will try to extract value out of them in another way that is not listed in the options." That means no Bits, no AP, and no Bureau relationship. While it could MAYBE be more AP/Bits, that is not likely given the Word of Bird. What exactly it could even BE I don't know, other than 'valuable', but it's an UNKNOWN.
I suspect it might be minions or income-per-turn. I think we need AT LEAST some actions to convert in Velvet APs, but we can probably make do with just one option worth of those.
I'm with Pit on this. Noble to Bureau, the other two for AP, OR Public Servant for AP and Merchant for Bits. None of the other options are worth giving to Mareinette when the opportunity cost is so high, compared to what we could get with the known quantities.
Bits-AP-Bureau is definitely a good combo.
I'm now also fine with Mareinette-AP-Mareinette though, or even AP-Bureau-Bureau.
We NEED either first or second options to be APs, I'm willing to compromise on basically everything else.
Though if we don't get at least one BIT options it means we most likely won't be able to do Canterlot Part 3 before turn 23. WITH bits I think we could manage it turn 22.
Mareinette will extract MORE. Of course that more is a mystery box, which is why we shouldn't do it for things we can't afford risking. As you said, if she gives us minions or artifacts or reagents we might not be in the best position to use them. and we REALLY need at least the APs.
Other options could be possibility of buying books/artifacts/reagents at a discount or better aimed. maybe a chance to SELL things easily too. The Noble could be blackmailed to give us the name of other traitors. There's interesting possibilities.
So MAYBE one or even two Mareinette options, but definitely not 3. We need the APs too badly.
With 2 servant actions, we can add 3 more (Fluttercomet, House Servants and one more probably from Biedde/Selene) for 2 Velvet APs, and with 5 servant actions we can add 4 more (FlutterComet, House Servants, and two more probably from Biedde/Selene) for 3 Velvet APs.
Both are acceptable, though I'd rather get the 5.
Maybe we'll even get Filthy and/or Spoiled as confidants, in which case we can use THEIR actions as well.
Maybe we get a minion. Maybe we get a Level 6 artefact. Maybe we get a Level 7 book to secure Baldomare's friendship.
lvl 7 book feels very unlikely. I COULD believe she'd get a lvl 6 artifact out of the noble though. Something like a family heirloom that just so happens to be a lore artifact.
If anyone could have ancient artifacts of that tier it would be a great and wealthy noble family.
The main thing is that, as we can't predict what it will be, we need to satisfy our minimum requirement. Which to me means either the 2 or 5 servant actions.
Once we have the bare minimum we NEED, we can bet on Mareinette.
It's a similar argument to what I'd make for Baldomare's special ability. She's guaranteed to give us something good if we give her lots of bits...
but we NEED lots of bits already, so I'd avoid sending her on searching stuff for us UNLESS we've run out of expeditions and rituals needing bits.
We cannot pre-plan the action as well. We cannot cross the box or tick the checkmark saying we will get bits, or we will get action. But you forget yourself. We cannot plan what will happen till the time comes.
To be fair, we also can't pre-plan on what we'll get out of expeditions.
Which is at least part of why, for the longest time, we BOUGHT books with our bits instead of going on expeditions, because we had the bits for them, we could partially control what we got, and it costed fewer actions.
Now instead we're planning to do more expeditions instead, because books cost too much.
I see Mareinette in a similar light. It's probably BETTER, in absolute value, than what we'd get
directly. But we might need the certainty of knowing, or we might need something that's technically worth less (servant actions for example, or bits), because we need them for something specific (Velvet actions, funds for an expedition).
So I repeat, as I said multiple times: We need AT LEAST one actions-reward. Rest is debatable.
Wow, that's pretty sweet! I wonder if an occult war with Windy would be so profitable.
well, potentially, if he established a new cult. If he's acting on his own probably not.
Ugh. So artifacts are kind of bottlenecked right now. This is good info though, thanks.
There's been a question to Bird about using Baldomare to study at least "X lore levels worth of artifacts" with her action, and Bird basically replied "maybe, we'll see on follower turn".
If we could do it for the low-tier artifacts it would be fairly nice.
Even if not that way, we NEED a way to deal with low level artifact study. Otherwise they'll just gain dust, we can't afford using one full action for two lvl 1 artifacts with everything else we need to do.
Lvl 4, sure. Lvl 3, probably worth it.
Lvl 2? MAYBE, just because we don't yet have a Knock artifact and that can help if we have followers summon stuff.
But the lvl 1s? Probably not worth it.
I salivate at the thought. A wide playthrough that never was. Or Copper!Quest.
In our defense Cover Your Bases was introduced only recently. If it had been there from the start we might actually have tried for a wide playthrough.
Rarity: Made her dreams come true by negotiating a contract with a noble family where we paid all of the initial costs(300 bits if my memory is right).
which, by the way, was narratively basically just a symbolic way to express we wanted our family to keep control of Rarity or something, because that's peanuts to noble families.
reminder that 80-100 bits is an
average wage. Velvet is possibly the poorest noble in all of Equestria in terms of bits. Her father is very stingy with her, though he AT LEAST gave her a good mansion and servants... but I'm guessing that's mostly a matter of image.
Velvet not having disposable income is not as
apparent to other noble families as her living in a not-up-to-par-house.
The Leash also has it's uses and we should keep that in mind if it is free(no way I'm letting another Element out of our sight) OR we could have Selene order her to help using her authority as a Princess.
Leash is there for if we REALLY need to use it at this point.
also hey, maybe we got Filthy and Spoiled all the way to confidant this turn! The obvious way to do that narratively would be to fix their marriage, and it's not out of the question Mareinette managed it...
if not in the way Velvet would have gone about it.
So how about we gift this to Steppes?
Why would we give our "honest businesspony uncle" documents about criminals in Manehattan?
This is likely an expedition site, I'd rather keep it to ourselves.
-> Send 17 Risen after Windy next turn to prank him.
-> ????
-> Probably not profit.
...that's kind of tempting
But... can you imagine, narratively, using all those Risen to get Velvet APs?
How would that even work?
Do we get stealth-zombies doing all of our chores while NOBODY notices them?
And She may convince Stormchaser to let us bring Comet hoof and Shining in for a six-way pony love affair with Cadence and Fluttershy.
wait, that's an option? You're NOT doing a good job of arguing AGAINST Mareinette now you know!
You know, a true Esquestria speedrunner would've probably rejected the Bureau position to begin with. Didn't we used to have, like, 6 AP as a forgotten backwater noble? And much more time to spend in Ponyville. And no commute all the way to Canterlot.
a true Esquestria Speedrunner would have not betrayed the cult, killed our dad and maybe our brother too to get the family under our control, probably killed Selene...
You know, if we keep following our current tentative plans, it's very likely that our first three Sacraments will be Secret Histories, Knock, and Moth (not necessarily in that order). I think that'd be a very appropriate combination of Lores for an Hour Velvet
and after that PROBABLY Lantern. we have one artifact for one scrap already, and can get 2 from an influence from Baldomare whenever we want. We just need one more scrap!
Winter and Edge are also close, though they come with their own problems.
We'll likely be wounded AGAIN after Edge, if hopefully NOT Dancing With Death, and Winter requires us to willingly doom 3 random ponies to death.
