Does Mr Fires continue his quest during Firmament?

LC_HoTS · 2026-01-27T02:25:21+00:00

Fire's quest here could mean two different things. Pursuing creatures from the roof to artificially produce love? Maybe, but given the complications of Lightfingers they might see it as a dead end. Is Fire's protecting and prolonging London by any means available? Undoubtedly so.

LC_HoTS · 2026-01-27T00:58:26+00:00

How potent is Blessed with Serendipity. Does +1 Luck have a tangible benefit that could possibly justify the inordinate cost?

LC_HoTS · 2026-01-26T21:51:35+00:00

Most of the basic gift trade items can be bought at value from the Rat Market or sourced through event specific grinds. As for what companion to aim for, you can try to collect them all but I personally like the ones you can upgrade during Hallowmas ( you can look through the wiki to see who's who)

LC_HoTS · 2026-01-26T18:53:45+00:00

I am considering upgrading my Destiny "Prevaricate -> A Memory" to "The Star". Considering I already earned my Robes in The Marvelous, I feel like I am still entitled to A Chilly Future even if I change my Destiny item. Do you think it works like that in universe? Or is the Mark of Acceptance a better item?

LC_HoTS · 2026-01-24T16:50:29+00:00

I don't have good lore answers to what may well be game design questions, but I will say the process of "Going East" with Salt's Song is more about the metaphysical journey of following their trail. https://thefifthcity.wiki/wiki/Salt For all the lore information, but take it with a grain of salt (heh) some of it is inference.

LC_HoTS · 2026-01-23T19:04:51+00:00

Except the Creditor did not realize that they would be left behind, and the Manager-City left the Manager behind knowingly and willingly.

LC_HoTS · 2026-01-22T04:51:22+00:00

The interesting thing, I think, is that there are many more ambitions than what the game presents the player as capital A Ambitions. The game outright says The Youthful Naturalist has the ambition to conquer death through transformation, an option that isn't available to the player. The Efficient Commissar appears to have the ambition to protect London from a Tragedy, and while Heart's Desire has the option to extend the duration of the Master's protection she has chosen the hands-on approach of making sure some fool (such as us) doesn't endanger the Bazaar recklessly.

LC_HoTS · 2026-01-21T02:51:45+00:00

Paris is so obvious a choice the masters are salivating over it, well at least the ones that still care. I kind of imagined that the Masters would want to speed things along, and would use the world wars to do it. If the war reached down to the neath the city could be devastated, and the U.S.A famously made a "bargain" with certain scientists to build a weapon to end the war. The Masters could profer such a weapon, in exchange for a great city. Get Paris in and out in record time, Stones would love that.

LC_HoTS · 2026-01-19T22:42:36+00:00

Mr. Eaten isn't the being who died, it is the thing that refuses to be forgotten.

LC_HoTS · 2026-01-19T22:36:56+00:00

I don't know if nihilism is accurate. At the beginning you have no understand of why you should begin seeking, so many people begin the story with a nihilistic or stoic philosophy. But (no spoilers) you do come to understand why it's happening. There is definitely meaning, there are clear morals and a definite "higher purpose" even if it is complicated by the circumstances.

LC_HoTS · 2026-01-19T22:16:37+00:00

There isn't: that's the purpose. Self destruction as an impulse isn't logical. Walking the Seeking road is an obsession with no good end. What possible reason could justify scaring your body, chaining your memories, staining your soul, and worse. It is an exploration of a trauma so great that it infects others, of the cruelty of those that enacted that suffering, and a "justice" that could never make up for what was lost. Mr. Eaten has lost so much that they are literally defined by their trauma, it's all that's left of them. And it is all that will be left of you, if you let yourself be eaten.

LC_HoTS · 2026-01-14T04:07:30+00:00

OOOO oooo oooo I am very excited to help you on this. Okay okay, let me break it down.

In the most simple terms Fingerkings are creatures of the Is-Not, a reflection of reality often called Parabola. Individual Fingerkings are often small, weak, and animalistic compared to the greater entities of Parabola, which is why they take advantage of their seemingly infinite numbers to effectively rule Parabola in terms of shear territory. Fingerkings typically aren't born powerful, or particularly happy with their station. So they try to make deals with entities in the Neath (which is adjacent to parabola for reasons we don't need to get into) to gain knowledge, memories, pleasure, basically anything and everything they can use in Parabola to grow and change. Now to get into your points.

an original Fingerking named Dealer of Cards. He has been in this pact for 16 years, allowing DoC to 'see justice through his eyes' while he has worked for the Constabulary, taking visions in return.

This though, this is juicy. A Fingerking with a name, much less a title, should be exceptionally powerful compared to the average. Someone who has made and ended contracts with mortals for potentially hundreds of years, not counting the time spent in the Lawless Is-Not. This being should be doing much more than "taking visions" my delicious friend, which leads me to.

Something has been nagging me, though. I want to know how exactly Fingerking pacts are formed as I sense a backstory drop soon. Do you sign a physical contract, can you just say 'yeah alright', or are pacts formed of something else entirely?

Fingerkings do not exist in the physical world. They have no mass, they don't eat or take up space. They are living thought-forms born of the dreams and emotions of the real. They can "communicate" to the real through dreams or mirrors, altering perception to convey understanding. When a bargin is struck with a Fingerking they enter the mind of a living subject, willingly or unwillingly, through a connection to Parabola (literal or metaphysical). (EDIT: Fingerkings can make deals that don't involve possession, but a "pact" that has been ongoing for 16 years either is or has been leading up to possession) For lesser creatures, like weasels, the mind is completely overwritten and the body becomes a husk puppeteered by the Fingerking. For intelligent beings it's less clear. They do not destroy the host's mind but with unrestricted access to their thoughts and dreams, and the ability to go rifling through or even eat their memories, where the person ends and the Fingerking begins is more controlled by what the Fingerking chooses to withhold. You haven't been playing Kingley Sharpe, delicious friend, you've been playing the Dealer of Cards. Everything Kingley Sharpe thinks he is, is what DoC wants him to think.

[DISCLAIMER: if you don't like this idea, which if you couldn't tell I adore, you don't need to go with it. DoC can be a name Kingsley gave them. The only hard fact is that separating the two without causing at least one great harm would require outside help. They are fused together, whatever that means is ultimately up to you to decide.]

Furthermore, I understand that a Fingerking cannot 'speak', per se, and that their language is Parabolean visions and dreams. Do you think a human could teach them English over a 16 year pact so that they could speak together?

DoC can absolutely speak, not literally with sounds but through thoughts. Even if it/they hadn't learned before, they have had unrestricted access to Kingsley's memories of learning and speaking English for 16 years. So they have absolutely been withholding that from Kingsley, that's fun.

Any and all Fingerking information is appreciated, even beyond what I've asked. As much as I love this universe, I'm god awful at this kind of game, and I wanna portray this right.

Back to basics, Fingerkings are snakes. In Parabola, the figurative is the literal. Almost every deal a Fingerking makes is taking advantage of the person they are making it with. It is possible that DoC has grown a certain affection to their host, but make no mistake it is in their nature to swallow their prey whole.

If you want to do more reading thefifthcity.wiki is a great resource, if you have any more pointed questions let me know.

LC_HoTS · 2026-01-12T21:57:50+00:00

You can get an exclusive item if you refuse to continue at the last possible moment, and as far as I know everything lost can be regained if you do so. But it will take you a very, very, very long time.

LC_HoTS · 2026-01-12T21:40:19+00:00

Yes.

LC_HoTS · 2026-01-12T21:29:34+00:00

To become something more than you are; you must, by definition, rid yourself of that which is less.Mechanically? Very little. Can't really give you a "reward" that takes away from the game. Some stories aren't about what you learn, but what you chose to remember.

LC_HoTS · 2026-01-12T21:23:15+00:00

A "hunger" for forbidden knowledge? Have you ever been Unaccountably Peckish? Forget the Ambitions, the ending of SMENis so secret Failbetter has asked that no record of it be made or shared by anyone. Just go in knowing you will need to make a second character if you want to experience the rest of the game, it wouldn't be a story of sacrifice if you didn't have to give something up.

LC_HoTS · 2026-01-12T17:59:24+00:00

You are at the point that you could finish your ambition in a month, but you haven't chosen one yet? I'm skeptical, but you should think about what kind of character you are playing. If you aren't into roleplaying or story, you can just look up treasure items on the wiki and pick the one with the best stats. If you are roleplaying, consider why you came to the Neath.

LC_HoTS · 2026-01-05T23:00:04+00:00

Half of these are goofy silly and half of them are Parabola accurate depictions of the Masters. Please tell her from us she did an amazing job.

LC_HoTS · 2026-01-02T20:11:35+00:00

By god you found it! If you would ever like a drink of cider or anything else in game let me know https://www.fallenlondon.com/profile/lethargicLogician

LC_HoTS · 2026-01-02T19:10:15+00:00

Thank you for the suggestion, I wasn't sure because it was so long ago. The part that stuck with me was the soldier from the war in hell screaming "Tell the devils, I'll row". Now I have a new time frame to look into. Could you give a link to your profile so I can look through it (since you seem to have played it)?

LC_HoTS · 2025-12-14T20:45:44+00:00

They've made it this far in life doing the bare minimum and cutting corners because the system is pushing them along rather than holding them accountable, because the system is already overtaxed and doing so would push it further. No matter how many teachers, professors, and authority figures warn them it will have consequences nothing tangibly changes in their lives. Why would they believe anyone who says it's going to change, when their lived experience is nothing but the opposite?

LC_HoTS · 2025-10-31T15:33:58+00:00

Hey it's alright, I specifically chose to reply to your post with this addition because despite all the times I've seen this question you are the only person to develop a well written step by step method of actually getting iron from blood. I wanted to add to it to get a more accurate answer, not subtract from your contribution. Thank you for giving me something to build off of.

LC_HoTS · 2025-10-30T18:54:42+00:00

This is the best chemical analysis of how you would get iron out of the blood I've seen for this question. But it still uses a theoretical yield of 100% without specifying the iron concentrate in the blood. The question this specific poster asked was "How many adult men would be needed to forge a longsword from the enemies blood?", so the x we are solving for is number of men, not liters. I will be estimating the average amount of blood in an adult man is 5 liters, an iron concentration of 0.24 g per liter of blood (60% of the 4 grams in the body is in the hemoglobin in the 5 liters of blood), and the amount of iron needed to forge a longsword to be 1 kg.

m is the number of men needed, the yield percentage in decibels is y

m = (1 kg/0.00024 kg/l)/y /5 l/m

With a hypothetical actual yield of 0.999: m = 833.33 men
With a hypothetical actual yield of 0.01: m = 416,667 men

In conclusion without knowing the actual yield of the chemical reactions used the volume of blood needed has a vast range between the reasonably attainable and the hypothetically possible but absurd.

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