Stalkers RPG General Chat Thread (Emissary Clubhouse)

[Shruikan]

Doing the autopsy is a free action- you can do it AS WELL as talking to sebbit! Go chat up that scrap dealer! Good luck! I think you should do it, because you'll have more specific questions for him since you're interested in DeeMangs storyline.

But yeah most likely he wont teach exorcism... which is a skill I haven't seen mentioned anywhere in the game yet ...and im not sure actually exists in this current game... but all the players who have played in the past seem to think it's a very important thing to find and use and learn....
Hmmm.
Am I just missing a vital piece of gameplay information?
Here's what I know, as a new player;

We have our kill skill to outright squish stalkers.

There are only two things left undescribed as (???) in the gameplay manual, and they arent skills- they're default actions.
One of them is clearly going to be [[Restrain Pokemon]] once we build a cell.
I expect the other one will be [[Conduct Sin Purge Ritual On Pokemon]] because that has been mentioned by PCs in game and it'll surely take an action to do.

Is there any other option we even need? Why not just work on unlocking the sin purge ritual, and assassinate if things get dire?
Why is exorcism important? Does it actually exist? Has anywhere in the rules mentioned it? Have any GM posts mentioned it apart from Orins diary, wherein he clearly never found an exorcist?

I mean, if you've got evidence, shoot me down, but I feeeel like theres a pretty strong case that searching for an "exorcism teacher" wont work out, and we should work on putting together a sin purge ritual, which DOES DEFINITELY exist.

In past games completing the Sin Purge Ritual was essentially winning. It wasn't a thing you used on specific pokemon, it was a wipe out alll the stalkers in one shot thing that didn't use an action or anything, so unless it's changed drastically it shouldn't take up an action slot.

Exorsism however was essentially Assassinate but without damning the host's soul. Essentially Assassinate is the "bad guy" version of Exorcise, hence wanting to unlock a version which helps pokemon iinstead of dooming them to eternal torment is kinda a priority. Assuming it exists, of course, but I feel that the slot you think is for the Ritual is more likely to be Exorcism, especially with the new battle system. (Using Exorsism was one of the only ways actual fights happened in the older games)

Regardless, going after someone who we know is going to teach us Scavenging seems like a waste, when unknown pokemon could give us both Exorsism or more of the Sin Purge Ritual, which we know will actually help.


EDIT: Another thing from past games is that Exorsism was a learned Ability like Protect/Escort and Investigate, so it might not even be on the actions list until unlocked.

[Truly]

Regardless, going after someone who we know is going to teach us Scavenging seems like a waste, when unknown pokemon could give us both Exorsism or more of the Sin Purge Ritual, which we know will actually help.

I was under the impression that Scavenging allows us to come up with some materials -- included, Iron Ingots used to make the Holding Cell we just got blueprints for.

EDIT: Another thing from past games is that Exorsism was a learned Ability like Protect/Escort and Investigate, so it might not even be on the actions list until unlocked.

If that's the case, wouldn't it be on the list, either as [Exorcise (locked)] or as "???" or something? I thought I remembered SF even saying that we had found all the Ability Actions, but now I can't find where, so I might've dreamed it.

In any case, we have nothing to go on. Looking for something that may or may not exist in lieu of taking action on a concrete plan is foolish. There are a lot of unquestioned Pokemon -- for instance, the ones I laid out as Stalker-relevant in my other thread -- but we're not questioning them, either.

Regardless, going after someone who we know is going to teach us Scavenging seems like a waste, when unknown pokemon could give us both Exorsism or more of the Sin Purge Ritual, which we know will actually help.

We had like two or three players take the Resourceful trait, a trait only useful for scavenging, then refuse to unlock scavenging. That's wasteful.

Anyway, @Lychee makes a good point about the autopsy being a free action to complete and now I'm going to go do both.

[EmeraldSky]

Is there anything I can use Clairvoyance on in an attempt to get a lead?

[Truly]

Is there anything I can use Clairvoyance on in an attempt to get a lead?

Yes, I think so! can you wait a few minutes for me to look through our stuff?

---

At (45) Salvage Keep Library there is a {Impenetrable Shack: Mounted Speaker} that is very curious to me, I have no idea what that's for.

At (50) Jeek and Zundy Leisure Centre there's a {Hidden Room's Basement} which requires a "GAMMA Code," which could be helpful to know where it is.


[Large Tooth] - Found embedded in Stalker's first kill.

[Severed Tail], [Mangled Paw 2/2] - I have no idea what these are for.

[ALPHA Key Card] - Would love to know what this goes to, my hunch is it's the {Solid Underground Door: Scratched Pattern Scanner} in (14) Delta's Den

[Melted Toy Cleffa] - ???

[Box of Offal], [Bottle of Blood], [Cup of Pus] - Probably for an Indulge Recipe.

[%Ring of Vitriol% 2P DMG], [#Bow Tie of Suffocation# 3H DMG, Grass, [%Infernal Spear% 2P DMG], [@Bloody Bone Spike@ 2S DMG] -- Dangerous handling. No idea about any of them or what they go to, personally. Maybe they need to be cleansed into Utopian items?

[Rectangular Bomb], [Leaf Crown], [Bag of Coals] - Seems like random junk.

[EmeraldSky]

@Truly

I'll try using Clairvoyance on the tooth after investigating the crime scene

[Shruikan]

I was under the impression that Scavenging allows us to come up with some materials -- included, Iron Ingots used to make the Holding Cell we just got blueprints for.

Ok, I conceed that you have a point there.

If that's the case, wouldn't it be on the list, either as [Exorcise (locked)] or as "???" or something? I thought I remembered SF even saying that we had found all the Ability Actions, but now I can't find where, so I might've dreamed it.

Ahh, yes she did say that. Post #215 My bad. So yeah, if Exorcise exists it wouldn't be a learned skill.

In any case, we have nothing to go on. Looking for something that may or may not exist in lieu of taking action on a concrete plan is foolish. There are a lot of unquestioned Pokemon -- for instance, the ones I laid out as Stalker-relevant in my other thread -- but we're not questioning them, either.

Ok yes, it may not exist. But even if it doesn't, we get more info and possible leads at the same time, while your plan may be concrete, it is also far less likely to be useful. Have you ever heard the term "calculated risk"?

Also, if you have suspicions, why aren't you questioning them instead then? Or you know, bringing them up more frequently so people with better typing can?

We had like two or three players take the Resourceful trait, a trait only useful for scavenging, then refuse to unlock scavenging. That's wasteful.

Your're thinking too short term. Those traits last the whole game. They will be the same use if we unlock scavenging in two turns as if we unlock it now but don't use it for two turns.

[Lychee]

I feel like a lot of us have short term goals that arent the same, and that's ok! Overall the goal is finding one of the many win conditions, and everyone's helping in their own way.

It seems like Truly wants to gather materials and create a cell, then interview and cage various Pokemon in order to confirm who is a stalker and stop an attack.

I WAS keen on interviewing everyone but I realize that's not something that has happened in previous games where players have won-- at least to me it looked like there was a lot more searching and finding stuff to complete the ritual! So, that's my goal going forwards. Doing interviews only if I have to, and possibly teaming up with a clairvoyance pokemon to search, convince, and battle in order to collect everything, with a tilt towards taking social actions over searching ones.

What are everyone else's short or long term strategies? How do you all like (or want) to play?
Shruikan, you seem to be keen on doing a lot more interviews? Noble seems keen on using investigate to confirm stalkers so we can decide what to do with them?
I feel like the person playing umbreon(wow my memory pooped itself soz) is keen on using seinaru as soon as its needed, to help collect utopian articles?
Also I gotta say, our healers are REALLY staying on top of things! Thanks so much! Great use of skills! Thankyuu withoutyoulillianwoulddieeeeee♡

I feel like we could use some more coordination, and I wanna help facilitate! How can I help us move more as a team?
We are 1/4 of the way through to the end of the game (if we play though to 20 kills) or potentially more of the way through if we win sooner!


That is; numerically, if a stalker kills someone every night, we have about 30 turns left 0: ((coz the game has 1day1night [around 44 turns max?] intead of 2days1night [62 turns max] as it started)).
With 16 players doing something every turn, that's a maximum of 480 more actions! Woo!
Except... there are over 100 individual locations which we often have to visit multiple times, and about 65 townspeople who all give different responses in each interview! We have a lot to do!

[Noblejanobii]

Personally, I'm actually more leaning towards doing interviews than anything else. I've just been really busy with life the past few weeks so investigating allowed me to have the free time I needed to finish homework.

[EmeraldSky]

I've set myself up more for searching, and I have Clairvoyance--so I can help find a lead to pursue.

[Shruikan]

Honestly I'm after a balance. Interviewing can get leads for where to search next and vice versa, so ideally we'd have a balence.
As for me personally, I only have like two pokemon in the game that I am any good at interviewing, and apart from them I'm mainly here to try and keep everyone else alive...

My long term goal would be finding the Sin Purge and taking out all the Stalkers in one shot, while my short term goal is to asertain if Exorcism exists, and if so how to access it, which is more likely to be achieved via talking than searching.


Honestly I'm having second thoughts about Interviewing Jhuruni today, mainly because I'm not sure what would be best to ask Jhuruni about at the current time, and I don't want to have to waste time with a second interview later... Maybe I should hold off until the next day and heal the Mudbray at the Graveyard now instead?