I like the idea of taking the farm resource and getting ranks in spring summer and winter lore to cast the farm rituals on myself (Autumn would need a group, 15 magnitude!).
I am wondering if this is actually efficient, or if the cost of mana would just cancel out any profit?
If you have a farm where would you get the crystal mana to cast the rituals?
Youād have to buy it, which would come out of the money earned by boosting your farmā¦
A bit pointless IMO
-edit-
So the Spring ritual gives you 10 rings each event for spring, summer and autumn. The Winter ritual gives you 18 rings over winter. All in all itās not a huge amount of money, and not really enough to buy more than a few mana crystals.
Really the Spring ritual is intended to link up with the Summer and then Autumn rituals, making them much more powerful. Alone itās just a little boost.
The spring and winter ones only take 1 crystal if it is mastered though, and the summer one costs two and adds 50 rings.
Is that any better?
Or are they just useless rituals?
Theyāre good if cast in sequence. The Spring one gives 10 rings, then the Summer one yields 50 rings, then the Autumn one yields 400 rings.
that would be the plan, to take ranks in spring, summer and winter and master those rituals.
Ah sorry, I missed you said summer in your first post! That would earn you a decent amount then. Bear in mind though that mana is quite expensive and the total rings you gained from all the rituals (128 if my maths is correct) might get you only 1-2 mana crystals.
Of course the farm gives 9 crowns per event as well.
Also remember that they get more āefficientā if youāre able to do more than one farm during a casting, Blessing of New Spring can do 3 farms at Mag 4, Strong Ox, Golden Sun could do 3 farms at Mag 8 and Gathering the Harvest could do 2 farms at Mag 27.
Also a Straw Mask grants people ranks in these rituals so going in with a crafter who can make these masks and who has magician and a rank of Spring and Summer Lore to start with could be a viable character.
What Iāve been told is the Winter ritual doesnāt get cast much due to the cost of mana.
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It is starting to seem that being a self buffing farmer isnāt that plausible. Hmmm
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I understand they may be in line for a re-work over this Winter, so keep a look out on the wiki.
Adding additional targets always costs less than starting a new ritual, so itās almost always more profitable to contribute to someone elseās ritual. With the added bonus of āyouāll get paid for helping buff all the other people tooā. Most rituals are designed to be a team sport, or to allow expert casters (lore 3+) to solve single specific problems. There are a lot of fun cheap ones, but those too tend to be much more efficient cast with mates.
Where solo casters do well is for rituals where you want the effect right now. Or where a resource is so uncommon in our nation you canāt easily do mass casts. If you want to be a solo caster, Iād look at the āproblem solverā rituals of magnitude 2-8, and remember that at Anvil thereās a Regio that gives you +1 Lore to any lore you like.
NUMBERS NARG
As a general line, the ābaseā price of mana is about 26 Rings, as thatās what you get if you divide the income of a Farm (180) by the number of crystals you get from a Mana Site (7). So solo-casting the Winter ābuffā that gives 18 Rings loses you a minimum of 8 Rings compared to selling the mana.
Mana prices on field are FOIP, but unless thereās some sort of absurd mana glut, theyāre not going to go below that baseline because mana is useful at every level from āreplacing wains of mithrilā to āhealing someoneā to āMaking your buddy hit super hardā.
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Often it can make sense to look at this sort of thing on the scale of a group of people with farms or whatever. As a simpler example of the same principle, imagine four people with forests: each forest produces 10 measures of stuff, for 4x10=40 total.
But if one person has a mana site instead, then at each event the 7 mana can be used to enchant the three forests so each one produces five measures extra, so the total production is 3x15=45 total: an overall gain of 5.
The farm ones are a bit more complicated because of the way one seasonās ritual depends on the previous seasonās ritual having been done, so you have to look at it all over the year as a whole.
Quick thoughts:
- Changes are coming, donāt settle yet, watch the wiki.
- Donāt do the Winter one.
- Hereās some calculations done from the wiki if you want.
- Talk to a Landskeeper or Mummer.
Remember that you donāt have to spend all your character points, choosing what lores to put points into or what rituals to master before entering play. Itās wise to get to an event and chat to people about what would be useful ie you could be in demand to help people cast a big ritual. Or see who you get on with and want to role play with within the nation. Or you could discover thereās a gap in the market and be a specialist in something no one else really does.
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This is damn close to FOIP, particularly as my character sells this advice IC, butā¦
A (primarily-Autumn with a couple of ranks of Spring and Summer) coven, with a mixture of farms and mana sites as resources, whose game is focused of buffing their farms and the farms of others would be quite profitable, around the same profitability (amortised over a year) as a comparable coven that focused on Rivers of Gold
(the proof of this is left as an exercise for the student. Assume a perfectly spherical coven capable of casting magnitude 30 rituals and mana at the price that [REDACTED] will pay for it. Write on both sides of the paper, but not at the same time)
However, the fleet-buffing rituals leave them both in the dust in terms of profitability, because you can use the mana generated by the fleet to cast the next iteration of the ritual
Matt has a better view of the game than I have, but Iām guessing that, with the rise in the value of mana, we are seeing fewer non-fleet buffing rituals being cast (āI can spend time and energy herding the coven and the ritual targets together, and keeping them all in the queue at the regio. Or I can just sell the mana to [REDACTED] and get almost the same amount of rings. Decisions, decisions.ā)
So I think itās highly likely that all of the non-fleet resource buffing rituals are going to see some tweaks over the winter. But then I think that Golden Voyage should have a basic magnitude of 14, so what do I know?
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Itās worth noting that (the widely variable) in-field prices are not used to make this sort of game-balance decision.
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If you can cast those rituals yourself without standing in a regio, your casting rate is limited only by how fast you can get hold of refs and mana.
Why not try to buff THE WHOLE OF THE MARCHES?
@tea: Obviously. But it works out that the profitability ratios stay roughly the same regardless of the cost of mana. And fleet trading buffs are always going to be better if trading with the right territory can get you more mana out than you put in
@Iulian: given the magnitude of Blessing of the New Spring, the hardest part would be getting the farmers organised by territory and into the regio. I suggest leaving a pint of mild and a plate of Pie and Peas (for Mitwold), Jugged Eels (for Bregasland), āMutton in Cider with all the trimmingsā (for Upwold) or whatever they eat in Mournwold (āUndying Hate towards the Jotun with mashed neepsā, I suppose) and wafting the scent towards the Marcher encampment
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Please excuse me while I gently giggle to myself in the corner for a moment.
sounds of only faintly-quashed laughter echo around the room
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@RichardFannon: What kind of mummer canāt get an audience to sit down for 8 minutes and tell four distinct jokes? Charge admission for farmers and non-farmers alike, making your money on the non-farmers, taking citizenās ID on the ticket stub. Make the entertainment good. Sell refreshments. Perhaps a prize draw.
Or if youāre doing it solo, itās a series of 2-minute standup acts.
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Just doing basic maths for cheap farm boosts.
āEveryones minimumā income 18 rings.
Level 1 Farm gives 180 rings.
198 rings per event with 4 events a year.
Farm total income is 792 rings a year.
(Non modified by plot or outside situations/ magic)
According to the wiki atm:
Blessing of New spring is 2 mana for 10 rings for three seasons.
Strong ox and golden sun is 4 mana for 50 rings for two seasons.
792 +10+50+50 = 902 rings
Mana guesstimated cost 1 and half crowns = 30 rings.
Mana required 6.
6 Ć 30 = 180 rings.
902 rings - 180 mana cost = 722 rings left.
722 ritual modded rings output
792 unmodded rings output
Its a seasons worth of āfarmā rings to boost to less than originally got. This is without ritualist fees.
Although the cost is possibly rp value better quality crops than the bloke next door probably isnt worth it in my opinion but mixing and getting to know people is probably a bonus, specially if you save them later and they say āill give your farm a cheeky little boost for freeā at minimum thats 30 rings you didnt pay forā¦
Iāve only calculated on a worst case situation,
Main thing to apply are mana could be cheaper, mates rates mages, other rituals going on and can hop in if ask nicely, or one man casting band who mastered everything and want to make a name for himself " Ye Olde One Stoppy Farmer Shoppy" trademarked.
Not currently calculated with Autumn gathering the harvest (15 mana) or Winter fallow fields and dried meats (2 mana). Or rings to crowns or thrones convertion.
If ive calculated this wrong let me know, im only going by wiki and when trying to buy mana in field.
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I guess this does illustrate that these rituals work best as part of a group with someone supplying the mana for āfreeā.
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