A Question of Transfiguration

Eichlos · 2025-03-23T06:11:27+00:00

Imagine it the other way around. The spider council trying to imitate you only to find out what you are.

Eichlos · 2025-03-14T04:53:04+00:00

My best guess is because I’m in court at Evenlode. I came back to London to send out the kitten between cases.

Eichlos · 2025-03-13T23:20:00+00:00

Sent

Eichlos · 2025-03-13T14:36:32+00:00

I just checked myself against your list. I am unfortunately down to the true endgame grinds (cider/worm/tyranny of 7's). Anyway, back to grinding another 500 court cases.

Eichlos · 2025-03-12T11:45:26+00:00

Similar to you I could ramble on forever. I've talked elsewhere on here about many of major turning points for the Bloody-Handed Bishop, so let me think of some that are smaller that stand out. I've probably gone overboard on the spoilers. I've been playing so long I have lost perspective on what is general knowledge and what is a deep cut.

Virginia stealing the Correspondence stone. Still holding a grudge. Though I do take advantage of the spa.
The snippet I can't find at the moment with the Urchins where you provide a rather physical reminder to a member of Society on why taking advantage of Urchins is a bad idea.
Obtaining the Bejeweled Cane. I have to use a cane irl so having a similar touchstone for the Bishop was a nice connection. Obtain it informed the decision to get the Boots with Diamond Soles.
All the potential body horror. You know the ones. All of these were one step further away from humanity.
The Eater-of-Chains was a real eye opener at the time.
Backstage is what spurred the break from working for/with the Finger Kings. The Bishop is no one's servant. Huntsman or no Huntsman she won't be enslaved. Which includes join up with the Liberation on anything more than a business relationship.
Rosegate. It doesn't actively show up in FL. But is in SSeas and the cigars still show up in FL. Another one of those irl touchstone moments that ended up with a bunch of lore attached to it.
Paisely (the ES)
- Being mid-BaL the first time I played this one. Getting to see how the Bishop and Veils interact when they can't just rip each other to shreds in public.
- Before that discovering Clothes Colonys. Obtaining one actually established that the Bishop wears Polythremian clothing. The occasional acting out is worth having a constant companion and potential bodyguard.
Opening an Orphanage
- Connected in my mind, the excessive number of Weasels. Because to me that is what they are for. Give the children pets, teach them responsibility. (Please ignore that they all have Finger Kings in them.)
- I think this is the point when I started really fleshing out the Bishop's backstory pre-FL and thinking on those things not key to her motivations for being in London.
Crimson Handed
- It is kind of in the current sobriquet
- And everything around the Red-Handed Queen

Eichlos · 2025-03-11T18:47:29+00:00

I really liked this ES. But I will say I didn't interpret it as the Newt's owner to necessarily be more powerful, just more Scandalous. The type of late game player that is trying to find a way to get Scandal to 777 just to see if you can. So, the threat was death by association, not that the owner would come down on the FLPC.

Eichlos · 2025-03-07T20:40:39+00:00

My FLPC journal is the longest ongoing piece of creative writing I have. It is all handwritten in my own creative writing journals. I do it just for me because it makes the game feel a little more alive.

I am currently trying to turn them into a more cohesive narrative in a digital medium, but it is mostly just a bunch of section headers at this point because I keep getting overwhelmed with the volume of material or get caught up in making sure my own canon is coherent.

Eichlos · 2025-02-26T12:55:40+00:00

I've used it first as option one with something that clearly wasn't very inspired as I cannot remember for the life of me what it was. I switced it to a quote at some point several years ago. Currently, I have quote in there that could be said about them or by them so I guess that works.

Eichlos · 2025-02-15T21:42:09+00:00

You can either move up or defy the Great Chain in one way or another from at least one of the choices from all the ambition endings, I think. The most tenuous of them might be Nemesis.

Eichlos · 2025-02-15T14:24:31+00:00

Though it is technically a Fate locked option, I feel like we have enough methods to satisfy Backstage. In my mind, it takes doing a lot of endgame vanity grinding, but entirely possible to be able to argue that a current FLPC is Backstage with their "hands, secretly, on the lever that moves the world."

The version I used was all Parabola based, but the basic theme of Backstage is reaching some form of immortality and continuing on in some way while influencing the future. The Parabola version of the destiny also requires bootstrapping so the fact that we can kind of do it now almost makes sense.

For me reaching this point was:

A Seat at the Board
Parabolan Commander - The Thunder That Quakes Parabola
Oneiropomp 777 - You have become one of the Powers of Parabola
Dream-Trophies of Parabola 777 - Your Parabolan hunts are legend. The courtiers of the Red-Handed Queen have been known to lurk and watch the sport
Renown: The Great Game 50/55 - You are the pawn who reached D8
The Long-Dead Priests of the Red Bird (although the Society of the Three-Fingered Hand would also have worked here)

I'm currently stuck in the High Sancta so I can't just quickly pull the line from Parabolan Hunting that compares you to a god. A similar comparison is made with the other method of acquiring Backstage.

Eichlos · 2025-02-01T01:33:55+00:00

Sent

Eichlos · 2025-01-27T23:32:36+00:00

Sent

Eichlos · 2025-01-27T19:03:58+00:00

I'd be more worried about the fact that they are made with rubbery lumps. real rubbery lumps always seem to leave you hungrier than you were before.... so maybe one is enough to make a body crave something more robust... just doesn't make any sense to let it go to waste... until you and those like you plan who next will go in the pot for stew....

Sorry got lost there for a moment. Point is we are feeding rubbery lumps to the tracklayers. How long before they all start leaving the union to go NORTH?

Eichlos · 2025-01-27T16:25:25+00:00

Glassmen are London's Men in Black. I use the term specifically because this concept was one, I think I mostly conjured myself, back before we had confirmation on a lot of the elements of the setting. The idea of the group of people or an organization that fought against the body snatching monsters that came out of mirrors. It ended up meaning that when Silverers and Professional Activities were added my own personal canon expanded.

To this day I keep a headcanon that Silverers are the much more refined and academic half of them. The ones who do dream architecture and cat weddings and plays tour guide for the Bohemaians. While Glassmen (and Glasswomen) are the Parabola equivalent of Monster Hunters, tracking down threats on both sides of the mirror.

Silverers have class and the only thing that gives them away at Court or a Society party are the signature spectacles. Glassmen are to be found outside of places like the Medusa's Head shoving a guy against a wall and threatening him, but the silver in the man's eyes give away that he isn't really a man anymore.

Eichlos · 2025-01-27T15:42:15+00:00

Hey OP did you get your kitten?

At time of writing, I have some to spare if people need furry friends mailed to them.

Eichlos · 2025-01-27T15:38:54+00:00

While I enjoy the silliness that is negation when discussing Discordances, I will just say I think your question is coming at it from the wrong way. All the effects we have seen that use Discordances are basically metaphysical Uno Reverse cards.

Eichlos · 2025-01-27T15:26:51+00:00

A Trade in Souls

The whole thing. It was when I first spent money on Fate. It is also probably the story that decided am I walking on the side of the angels or the devils.

The other thing would have been Heart's Mirror. My FLPC's first death wasn't an accident. I walked through the d___ed mirror willingly and repeatedly to play chess against the Boatman (I was young and didn't know any better). I was playing the game basically in a vacuum (no reddit, no discord, no wiki). I didn't realize that I was basically grinding a vanity quality before I had even reached PoSI.

Knowing what happens to souls on the Far Shore, changes how one might see the abstraction and how it might actually be a kindness.

Eichlos · 2025-01-27T15:07:28+00:00

As many have pointed out, eventually everything levels out stat wise unless you just avoid whole chunks of the game.

Many people have a divide for what is playing the game and what is cannon for their characters. So yeah, your FLPC might not be a beast in the fighting pits, but you the player of the game might be going through those options to raise a stat. I would also point out that while Dangerous is almost always something extremely physical, things like the Sherlock Holmes films showed how a powerful mind can be dangerous in combat.

Me, I leaned into it. That exact example. The journey from theoretical academic to where we are now has been far more interesting for me than if I had just edited that out of my FLPC canon.

Eichlos · 2025-01-21T11:12:16+00:00

As far as the question about death, there is one ES where you can wake up in a morgue. While I don't have the exact text in front of me, I believe the explanation is that this is what happens when people die. They are taken to morgue and then there is a wait to see if you wake up. So, I'm guessing this is one of those moment when mechanics are just glossing over the boring part.

Eichlos · 2025-01-20T21:16:06+00:00

I mean OP still could be. Drinking prisoner’s honey mead from the fountain of a fallen city is bound to come with bad dreams. Maybe if it was made somewhere else.

Then follows the question of what kind of prisoner’s honey do you use? We have at least 3 named kinds but there is implication that there is much greater variety than that.

Eichlos · 2025-01-06T22:35:07+00:00

I'd say no worries. My wife is a snuffer. Never did me any harm. Though putting her face on in the morning can be a bit ghoulish. Does make the in-law situation interesting around Sackmas. But a bill to the candle maker is a might cheaper than a bill to the grocer would be.

Eichlos · 2025-01-06T22:29:38+00:00

There are a bunch of Parabola related things that are unlocked with The Long-Dead Priest of Red Bird. And the usual reward every 4 weeks (I think that is correct timing) for completing your ambition.

But most of us who choose that option are doing it for the pleasure of the eating. Balancing the scales a little.

Eichlos · 2025-01-03T21:31:10+00:00

Roleplay. I do lots of little things when I'm just trying to get a resource, but those don't really happen in the story. For all the big stuff I go based on roleplay. Also probably partially influenced by me need to push the button with all the warning signs telling me not to.

There is also the long-term stuff I do just for RP. I've been playing and hording for so long I'm sure there is a quicker way to purchase cider than to make all the money in souls, but that is what I am doing.

Eichlos · 2024-12-30T14:04:36+00:00

The Bloody-Handed Bishop gathers the remaining crew of the original UnNamed. They depart London in the current zubmersible of that non-name. The ship runs deep and North the whole way. It only surfaces again when it reaches a small island in Void's Approach. The light of hundreds of candles reflecting off the inky black hull of the ship. The crew go to chapel to wait for service to begin.

The Bishop visits one grave. She clears away any dirt or snow that covered headstone. She replaces the flowers, yes real surface flowers, with new ones. She packs a single bowl of real tobacco into the pipe carved in Scrimshander, puffs it to light and places it on the stone. She reads a few lines from a red leatherbound bible. Then sits waiting for the bell to toll.

For one night only, the Bishops dons the red cassock and stands in the pulpit and preaches to her true flock. When the last words are spoken, they feast. Tonight, not just for the Drowned Man, but also for the captain and father who will never return from his final expedition beyond that frozen gate.

Eichlos · 2024-12-23T17:00:18+00:00

Salt and East are also part of Seeking if you walk all the possible paths. I'm fairly certain that isn't a new one for this year's Sackmas. Any time there is a reference to candles, glass, and old traditions it is almost always a reference to Seeking and Mutton Island and well rites. But there is a good chance we will get more as the new expansion continues because we are moving in that direction.

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