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Until she gains some devotion, her fear won't passively drop, it will only drop if something happens that makes her feel safer.
Is the teaching skill leveling just really slow? I feel like I have been stuck on F rank for quite a while now.
If you have a cooperative student and you teach her several times a day, it should level up to D- within a couple of decades.
drebin I did another zero start, and afterwards I made a small adjustment to the overnight fear reduction formula when a slave is devoted (making fear drop slower), which should make it slightly easier to manage a high-empathy slave.
Starting stats:
Ending stats:
Again I took the first contract that was offered; this was for a pet ponygirl. I decided to force the pet rule (with pet suit), thinking I could save some training effort by letting it rise passively. In retrospect, it would've been better to use the silence rule like I did with the previous slave and attempt to keep her temperament low, or perhaps even drop it lower. I didn't make this slave do any sparring; all her temperament gains were from lessons and winning in the arena.
I used a lot of the 2$ academy classes to gain merit so I could build up her awareness with rewards, which is why her skills are so diverse. I wanted her to be devoted, fearless and Tough for the day-49 arena battle, and achieving all three was difficult. I eventually found a solution with some tactical spoiling, and it took 3 more days to get her obedience back up to D- so she could be sold. Ended with only 95$ after turning in the contract, but I bought two expensive (50$) weapons this time instead of the 10$ stiletto: a rapier and a whip. I also learned roundhouse kick instead of battle cry, and with the combination of a stronger weapon and an effective attack for every blocking stance, it was much easier to win the second-tier arena spars.
... I started thinking of the slaver's daily arena sparring as a daily murder routine, because only a couple of fights ended with a zero stamina instead of zero vitality.
She started with low endurance and I was reluctant to spend extra sparks on supplements, thinking I might be able to raise her endurance fast enough just by managing her diet and exercise, but it appears I ended up spending more sparks as a result of that decision, so I think it's safe to say that supplements are usually worthwhile for unhealthy slaves.
The key to being able to make the slave devoted by the fifth arena battle is disabling rules, something that wasn't safe to do without spoiling before 2.2. Once she's fearful (which she will admit even while somewhat disobedient, so you don't need to waste sparks on auspex), you can safely stop forcing her to do things she hates, which makes it possible to raise her devotion with enough successful dates and high-tier rest rewards. You have to be careful with rest rewards, however, when you're still trying to keep her fearful. I underestimated how fearful she was due to her high empathy making her very sensitive, which is why I ended up having to over-reward her (and spoil her a bit) to remove the fear. I think if I had played a bit smarter from the start I could avoid getting into that situation.
I will try to continue this run and see if I can complete a second contract with a smaller budget now that I have some skills:
Of course there's also the option of keeping the slave and living on arena winnings, and eventually turning in a different slave (for zero sparks) to appease the guild and gain access to new contracts.
Starting stats:
Ending stats:
Again I took the first contract that was offered; this was for a pet ponygirl. I decided to force the pet rule (with pet suit), thinking I could save some training effort by letting it rise passively. In retrospect, it would've been better to use the silence rule like I did with the previous slave and attempt to keep her temperament low, or perhaps even drop it lower. I didn't make this slave do any sparring; all her temperament gains were from lessons and winning in the arena.
I used a lot of the 2$ academy classes to gain merit so I could build up her awareness with rewards, which is why her skills are so diverse. I wanted her to be devoted, fearless and Tough for the day-49 arena battle, and achieving all three was difficult. I eventually found a solution with some tactical spoiling, and it took 3 more days to get her obedience back up to D- so she could be sold. Ended with only 95$ after turning in the contract, but I bought two expensive (50$) weapons this time instead of the 10$ stiletto: a rapier and a whip. I also learned roundhouse kick instead of battle cry, and with the combination of a stronger weapon and an effective attack for every blocking stance, it was much easier to win the second-tier arena spars.
... I started thinking of the slaver's daily arena sparring as a daily murder routine, because only a couple of fights ended with a zero stamina instead of zero vitality.
She started with low endurance and I was reluctant to spend extra sparks on supplements, thinking I might be able to raise her endurance fast enough just by managing her diet and exercise, but it appears I ended up spending more sparks as a result of that decision, so I think it's safe to say that supplements are usually worthwhile for unhealthy slaves.
The key to being able to make the slave devoted by the fifth arena battle is disabling rules, something that wasn't safe to do without spoiling before 2.2. Once she's fearful (which she will admit even while somewhat disobedient, so you don't need to waste sparks on auspex), you can safely stop forcing her to do things she hates, which makes it possible to raise her devotion with enough successful dates and high-tier rest rewards. You have to be careful with rest rewards, however, when you're still trying to keep her fearful. I underestimated how fearful she was due to her high empathy making her very sensitive, which is why I ended up having to over-reward her (and spoil her a bit) to remove the fear. I think if I had played a bit smarter from the start I could avoid getting into that situation.
I will try to continue this run and see if I can complete a second contract with a smaller budget now that I have some skills:
Of course there's also the option of keeping the slave and living on arena winnings, and eventually turning in a different slave (for zero sparks) to appease the guild and gain access to new contracts.
- Nov 7, 2018
- 55
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Found a bug, My slave can still use whip moves while it's unequipped if I chose "use previous" with her after taking the whip back.
- Nov 7, 2018
- 55
- 19
Update to this, other weapons work and it works with the master as well.
Considering we're still finding issues daily, that's unclear. But there weren't many today, which is encouraging. I've been able to play-test instead of coding, also a good sign.
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- Nov 7, 2018
- 55
- 19
Any features still to add to 2.2 or is it just bug catching and polishing at this point?
I would've said just bugs and polishing, but I'm just now adding a small end-of-day event. 
If they like it, punishing them that way will make them fear you less, spoil them, and improve their mood.
- Aug 1, 2017
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I think his idea is to use the punishments when she feels merit, and have it work like a "secret" kind of reward.
I think it's a good idea, tho not certain yet (it might create some description inconsistencies for exemple)
Seems like it would likely need to be either a differently placed option or a conditional event switch on the presence of merit. Those differing descriptions seem important for indicating to the player that they're doing something wrong (punishing with a bad choice) or right (rewarding with an unconventional yet successful choice)
unless you try to just cover both cases with a catchall description (You try to bind her harshly... but due to her love of confinement, she feels comfort and security instead).
unless you try to just cover both cases with a catchall description (You try to bind her harshly... but due to her love of confinement, she feels comfort and security instead).
The slave's reaction already varies. You'll get quite different responses to punishment from a devoted slave, for example. The effects of lowering fear, raising spoil and improving mood reflect the fact that you aren't punishing the slave in a way that actually registers as a punishment. One punishment like that won't be enough to raise the overall level of spoil, and with high devotion it will quickly fade away. So you could for example regularly spank your devoted masochist slave without making her spoiled. However, currently that would not clear her merit. She still feels that she deserves a "real" reward.
- Aug 1, 2017
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I will put in the roadmap to make it feel like a real reward. But I will put it for 2.3, and we'll add up to that design in due time.
And if you want to tackle it before because you think the implementation is simple, as a last minute thing, why not I'm saying the current implementation essentially gives you "punishments as rewards", from a roleplay standpoint and a gameplay effects standpoint. Even some of the things that are classified as rewards cause spoiling. Having merit after the punishment can be cleared with a simple tier-1 "sparing approval" verbal praise, if you want. You aren't penalized for giving her a reward below her merit level, and her still wanting a reward after being spanked doesn't bother me. It just says she still wants something, which she's fully entitled to want, and be disappointed if she doesn't get.
- Aug 1, 2017
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That's the last obstacle to what you call the "roleplay standpoint". It should act EXACTLY like a reward, and thus not necessitate a reward mediation; invisible results like "not causing spoiling" are only a small part of what the player consider as being the effects of a reward.