Estival (Guide)

Early MYN Content and Onwards

This content is only available during Summer festivals! For the history of this holiday see Summer festivals (historical)

Estival is Fallen London's event that takes place towards the end of July; uniquely among the game's festivals, it features a completely new storyline every year in addition to new mechanics. As such, it's impossible to offer precise guidance for each year's event (though look out for specific event guides to pop up on the wiki during the event!), but there are a few general tips to keep in mind.

Estival replaced the previous summer event of Mayoral elections.

How does Estival work?

The Estival makes heavy use of World Qualities, which means that actions across the entire player base heavily influence the event and its pacing. The story will unfold over the course of multiple days and there will be multiple qualities over that time that will need to be filled to advance the story.

Don't worry if you have other projects you also want to pursue during the week of the Estival, such as conducting Railway Board meetings, taking advantage of Bone Market Fluctuations or other world qualities, etc. There's generally downtime during the event where you will be able to pursue any other activities you wish without missing out on the festivities, or catch up on story progression that you missed because it advanced while you were away.

How do I contribute?

Progress the story

There will be a universal starting storylet available everywhere in London which starts the event's story. This one is usually not a World Quality, and is instead tied to your character's personal advancement in the event. That being said, progressing it is usually gated on progression in the World Qualities.

Gain and Spend Estival Tokens

Every player gets an allowance of 30 x Estival Tokens for free during the event, which can be spent either in a storylet which only contains this year's new items, or in F.F. Gebrandt's Hall of Recent History, which contains items from previous Summer events. In addition to the free ones, you can acquire more tokens by spending FATE, or gift them to other players. Any acquisition of the Tokens at all will advance a World Quality related to diegetic funding. Tokens you don't spend this year can be spent in future Estival events.

For a list of items available to purchase and discussion of their merits, see Estival (Guide)/Item Comparison.

Volunteer Your Time

At certain points in progression, the event will have one or more storylets where a player can contribute Actions towards a World Quality. These are usually tuned to the player's level and will offer a reward commensurate with it, so everyone can contribute in this way, even if they just started playing yesterday.

Donate Your Stuff

At certain points in progression, characters may want items in order to advance the story. This is a sort of optimization puzzle based on your character's progression: what's your best source for these items? How many can you get before the World Quality fills?

These are usually also tuned to player progression: a player with their own Ship, access to Parabola, and a completed Railway will obviously be able to obtain more than a new player, but generally completely new players will still have something to contribute. Check out Item Grinding (Guide) or individual pages if you want to strategize.

Solve Mysteries

The event may involve the developers giving hints to the players about some lore mystery behind the proceedings, or there may be various clues hidden in mysterious, hard-to-reach places. Or something new and completely different, but no less enigmatic! Get together with your friends to figure these out, or join the broader community in the official Discord.

Obtain Rewards

In addition to the rewards you will get from the event's story, the event will often offer some kind of quality, such as Curator's Gratitude, that tracks your contributions. Eventually there will be a storylet where you can redeem this for normal economic items, as well as potentially additional unique items only available during the course of the event. Participation often also rewards unique Boons and the opportunity for unique Burdens that last the length of the festival.

Furthermore, there are items tied to Estival completion, such as the Vestige of a Starlit Reverie and Sample of Lacreous Affection, which have no use but serve as mementos of the event.

Change London, Forever

One of the unique features of Estival is that it adds permanently accessible content to the game. After the event is over you'll still be able to access certain parts of it, such as spelunking in the newly-discovered ruins of an embassy of Old Hell or dealing with an infestation of Second City crocodiles.

What if I missed it?

Eventually, Estival events will end up in The Sacroboscan Calendar, where anyone with access to the Waswood will be able to replay the events, albeit they may not be able to obtain all of the rewards available to people who played the event live.

Previous Estivals

If you want an idea of what happened during previous Estivals, check out the following guides:

• Mr Chimes' Grand Clearing-Out (Guide) - 2021
  • For a write up see: Mr Chimes' Grand Clearing-Out (historical)
• F.F. Gebrandt's Prelapsarian Exhibition (Guide) - 2022
  • For a write up see: F.F. Gebrandt's Prelapsarian Exhibition (historical)
• The London Horticultural Show (Guide) - 2023
  • For a write up see: The London Horticultural Show (historical)