Khaganian Intrigue (Guide)/Opportunity cycles

This is a list of interesting cycles in An Opportunity in the Khanate.

Here is a gist of the python networkx code used to do the following analysis/plot.

Red edges yield local currency
Green either local or echoes
Other colours yield echoes only.
Pink gives Hillmover,
Blue gives Faction Favours.

Moving along a node is assumed to take 12 actions: one to start the intrigue, ten to grind, and one to finish it. It also takes one Emetic Revelation, which cuts into profits a bit. (For simplicity, we will assume that the player character has a surplus of these they would otherwise sell for 12.5E, if they have to be grinded, I would first have to get the Emissary running again.)

For brevity, cycles are given as a list of nodes/vertices, $(n_{0},n_{1},n_{2},\ldots ,n_{N})$. This means: go from $n_{0}$ to $n_{1}$, then from $n_{1}$ to $n_{2}$, ..., and finally return from $n_{N}$ to $n_{0}$.

Note that 1 x Bottle of Airag, 1 x Salt Steppe Atlas, Much-Needed Gap, and 1 x Oneiric Pearl are considered better than 125 x Khaganian Coins, as they can all be sold for that.

Also, Khaganian Coins (and Oneiric Pearl, Much-Needed Gap) can not be traded for Echoes efficiently without spending actions. The best route is probably Purchase a box of lightbulbs and Sell lightbulbs to Londoners, but the action cost of these options lowers the efficiency from 4.16EPA to just 3.3EPA. On the other hand, this is one of the few reliable ways to grind Emetic Revelations which fuel the opportunities.

Some options yield Favours for Hell, Society or Revolutionaries and only 60E worth of items. However, none of them are in good cycles. The shortest cycle for Warn the Eagle (Hell) is (1, 2, 4, 11), the shortest for Warn the Revolutionaries is (5, 7, 9, 6) and the shortest for Leak their identities to the Khagan (Society) is (1, 3, 9, 10). All of these are of length 4, so you will spend some 48 actions per favour gained. Furthermore, all of these cycles pay out a suboptimal mixture of Khaganian Coins and Bazaar-sellable items.

(3, 5, 4): Echo Grind

Obtain the codebook, and sell it for 62.45E,
Distract the Navy's investigators for 62.5E,
Snap him out of his daze for one Oneiromantic Revelation (or also 62.5E)

A reasonable simple Echo grind.

(2, 8, 6): Echo Grind with a hint of Hillmovers

1 x Bottle of Airag

1 x Vital Intelligence
1 x Hillmover
5 x Perfumed Gunpowder
25 x Correspondence Plaque
5 x Mourning Candle

1 x Searing Enigma

You miss out on 25E, but gain a Hillmover plus some Gunpowder. Given that a Hillmover otherwise takes six actions in Parabola (which you could spend to earn some 31E here), this looks like a winner if you need huge quantities of coins and the odd Hillmover for some reason.

(2, 4, 3, 9, 6): Longish Echo Grind

2. Tell the Forlorn Captain the truth: 1 x Salt Steppe Atlas

4. Distract the Navy's investigators:
3 x Vital Intelligence
5 x Extraordinary Implication
5 x Vienna Opening

3. Alert the Leopard: 1 x Parabola-Linen Scrap

9. Vouch for the Foppish Revolutionary: 1 x Bottle of Airag

6. Leak this information to the Tortoise:
1 x Vital Intelligence
1 x Hillmover
5 x Perfumed Gunpowder
25 x Correspondence Plaque
5 x Mourning Candle

If you want to diversify a lot, this might be the way to go.

(5, 7, 9, 6): Imperfect Khaganian Coins Grind

This will yield one Airag and one Oneiric Pearl, which can be sold for Khaganian Coins, plus 125 x Khaganian Coins. You will also pass Warn the Revolutionaries once, earning you 60E of items not sellable in the Khanate.

Warning: following this path advances the Liberation of Night.

(1, 2, 4, 3, 9, 10, 11): Hinterland Scrip Grind

This guide is incomplete. You can help by expanding it.

What needs work: Needs review and update due to Rat Market rework. Crackling Devices are no longer sellable for Rat-Shillings.

This yields 757.7 for 85.9 actions (8.7 SPA), assuming use of the Rat Market. The rewards consist of the following:

• Items that can be directly sold for 345 on the Upper River Exchange
  • 12 x Vital Intelligence
  • 5 x Vienna Opening
  • 20 x Moves in the Great Game
• Items that can be sold for 3301 x Rat-Shillings at The Rat Market (Bazaar)
  • 1 x Parabola-Linen Scrap
  • 125 x Khaganian Coins
  • 1 x Salt Steppe Atlas
  • 1 x Much-Needed Gap
• Rewards that cannot easily be converted into Scrip: 2 x Extraordinary Implication, 1 x Favours: Society and 1 x Favours: Hell

The Parabola-Linen Scrap can be sold at the Rat Market for Rat-Shillings during the right season. The Khaganian Coins, Salt Steppe Atlas, and Much-Needed Gap can exchanged at the Khaganian Markets for a Crackling Device, which can be exchanged at the Rat-Market during different seasons. Rat-Shillings can then be used to purchase Solacefruit from the Extramurine Trading Company, which can be sold for Scrip on the Upper River Exchange. This chain of arbitrage ends up with an overall loss of about 20%.

(5, 7, 9, 6): Advancing the Liberation of Night Grind

If you need to grind Advancing the Liberation of Night, perhaps for RP or Paramount Presence reasons, this is a pretty good grind for it. It yields 16 CP/Cycle or 0.33 CP/Action.

5. Leave him in his state: 1 x Oneiric Pearl

7. Proceed as planned; let the Bazaar have these books: 125 x Khaganian Coins

9. Vouch for the Foppish Revolutionary: 1 x Bottle of Airag

6. Warn the Revolutionaries: 2 x Vital Intelligence, 2 x Blackmail Material, 4 x An Identity Uncovered!, 1 x Favours: Revolutionaries

This yields 250 x Khaganian Coins, 122.5 and 1 x Favours: Revolutionaries per cycle of 48 actions.

Closing Remarks

There is no Hamiltonian cycle for An Opportunity in the Khanate. The longest cycles have length 10, (1, 3, 9, 6, 5, 4, 11, 8, 7, 10) is one of those.

As all of the nodes have even in-degrees and out-degrees (both are two for every node), and FBG thankfully made the graph strongly connected as well, the existence of an Euler circuit is guaranteed. Visiting the vertices (1, 3, 5, 7, 10, 11, 8, 7, 9, 6, 2, 8, 6, 5, 4, 3, 9, 10, 1, 2, 4, 11) in that order is an example of such. It should take 264 actions to traverse, longer than writing the initial version of this article did.