"Best strategy" 15843th draft...
Not with perfect knowledge ; but to ppl wondering what level of devotion to go for etc this is what I would tell them. Many thanks to the delicious ppl doing the google spreadsheet linked below.
THE CHECKLIST
-> 1 of each coral (or 3 of each coral if you want cosmetic copies of the same item)
-> All the equipment listed in the above Wiki
-> Either 1 storylet quality, or 5* the storylet quality if you think you’ll get an extra bonus; or 0 if you think it's a vanity quality and can't be bothered to get it. As of 9 Sept there are people quite confident it's just vanity and others that it's a unique item.
-> favours to get a new ship (max needed 2000, the trade-in value of your current vessel is considered, you don't need a ship to buy one but presumably must be POSI, you can only have one ship still)
-> favours to buy other old festival items (max 2000 needed, max cost per item is 250 favours)
THE STRATEGY TO COLLECT EVERYTHING (skip steps for the equipment you don't want)
DIVING FOR EQUIPMENT STRATEGY:
It's minutely better to target lower depth items first; because if you are "forced" to dive deeper when you get a poor draw, you might come across a more rare item at the next depth. For that reason I'd start with corals, then Wrecking boots+ Nuncian Watch, then Effluvia + Mary Lloyd, and target the Scrimshander last.
1) Get all your corals with 5 Devotion 1 depth. If you don't get the coral you want, 100 favours is a decent FPA but rerolling with a 50% dive is a good option too + pick up Jillyfleur here too.
2) 8 devotion depth 2, if not then “reroll” 90% to depth 3 until Wrecking boots + Nuncian watch (or maybe devotion 9 for Nuncian watch if it's really evading you). Pick up max favours if you can’t find them.
3) 10 devotion depth 4 until Mary Lloyd + Effluvia; if at depth 4 you get terrible pickings, go depth 5 and maybe pick up Scrimshander instead; if it’s horrific (<300 favours) you can always get the storylet quality.
4) 11 devotion depth 5 until Scrimshander (worst case do storylet or pick up max favours if you don't see it)
Once you have all the items, there are a few favour grinds to choose from. Nb we are saving collecting the storylet until last
PURE FAVOUR GRINDING STRATEGY:
5a) The expected return optimal strategy = Devotion 9 = 15.4 FPA. Target the Effluvia at depth 3, if not target 300 at depth 4, if not go depth 5, you drown 13% of the time. The highest FPA although also the most drowny.
5b) 10 devotion depth 3-5 = 14.6 FPA. Target 300 favours at depth 3 or 4; if not go do depth 5. You drown 8% of the time. Or you can ignore 300 favours and dive always to depth 5 for 14.7 FPA and drowning 10% of the time.
5c) 11 devotion, 14.3 FPA, 0% drowning.
Why we "save" the collecting the storylet quality is because during favour grinding we will probably reach depth 5, and at that point you might get a horrific draw. You can avoid this unluckiness by taking the storylet at that point. In a reply below I go into more detail of the math. The boost to FPA is greatest for the 11 devotion grind where you'll be at depth 5 100% of the time (as opposed to the 9 devotion grind where you'll be at depth 5 9% of the time); and the FPA boost to the 11 devotion grind depends on the amount of times you intend to dive/collect stories and will probably be in the range of +0.1 to +0.8 for most ppl.
SUPPLICATION ANALYSIS QUICKIE; bc I was tickled by the fact many players could get two 4-card lodgings from this event :)
You could aim to get 1250 memories of distant shores -> 250 collated research --> Premises at the Bazaar ** ONLY IF YOU HAVE ACCESS TO THE TEMPLE CLUB ** although there is currently an active promotional code that gives you three invitations to it, that should work for everyone then right? Outside the festival it's 25 actions to convert to research, not sure the actions to buy at temple club.
You could also aim to get 900 tales of terror -> 180 extraordinary implications --> 35 uncanny incunabulum --> 6400 rat shillings --> 6250 amanita sherry --> 1250 brilliant souls --> A guest room at the Brass Embassy. 25 actions upconvert to uncannies, 32 actions to get shillings = 57 actions outside the festival. Due to rounding you need 900 tales; but you'll have 5 implications, 3 uncannies and 150 rat shillings left over.
Want maniac prayers? Because of rat market conversion it's likely better to get tales of terror than maniac prayers (I think, I wrote a comment with calcs below)...I think if you get <8 tales of terror per action; better go rat market, while 8 is break-even-ish.
Want Zee-stories? You can get Zee-stories via rat market conversion as well and for some it may well be better to get Tales of Terror (especially if you want MW) and convert than Zee-stories; but the break-even point is lower. I suspect if you get 6 Zee-stories per action, it might be break even-ish? I daren't calculate more...but the calc is:
Let's say someone is gettin 5 Zee-stories per action = 80 actions to reach 400.
VS you'd get 5 tales of terror per action; 50 actions to reach 250 tales of terror, 5 actions to upconvert to 50 extraordinary implications (+2 actions of getting back the uni reputation); then 2 actions to upconvert to 10 uncannies (and an action to get uni reputation) then 10 actions to convert to 2000 rat shillings = 2000 partial maps -> 420 Zee-stories in 4 extra upconverting actions; so you get 20 extra Zee-stories plus tales of terror method is 74 actions instead of 80; PLUS you get 5 strangling absinthes, 54-114 making waves and other minor bonuses of nevercold brass, rare successes, and I overbudgeted uni reputation so it's probably an action less. There are Flask of Abominable Salts costs of uni reputation; but I think at least for the stats here, it's not going to change the story.
Nb pls note Rat market only accepts Uncanny Incunabulum from 3 November so it is a bit of a wait to cash in / convert...
Anyway; just food for thought, hope helps somebody.
///// edit: there is a table! showing estimated favour per depth and things of that sort //// <a rel="nofollow" class="external free" href="https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1aNr8KvFoEY_woKy21_ET82KwKIpNfO0mBaTsD7QB9-I/edit?pli=1#gid=2052195837">https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1aNr8KvFoEY_woKy21_ET82KwKIpNfO0mBaTsD7QB9-I/edit?pli=1#gid=2052195837</a> /////
Nb the Monte Carlo as of writing doesn't take into account the logic of "if I get a bad draw, I'll just reroll" which will hurt the overall expected FPA that the spreadsheet outputs at depths lower than 5; or the logic of "if I get Effluvia at depth 3 I'll not dive deeper" which I think hurts the overall expected FPA of certain higher depth strategies.
edited due to changing data, new ideas, correcting mistakes etc. Corrections/suggestions welcome, to see my mistakes in this logic problem as much as anything :)
