Treat the soil

A player-created Guide is available for this content: Vertiginous Horticulture (Guide)

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ID: 266019

Spoiler warning! This page contains details about Fallen London Actions.

From: Vertiginous Horticulture

Very gently – the rhizome can smell fear.

Unlocked with Nurturing a Rooftop Growth 1-150

Locked with The Airs of London 26-75

Challenge information

Broad, Shadowy 65

• 45 - very chancy (41%)
• 56 - chancy (51%)
• 67 - modest (61%)
• 77 - very modest (71%)
• 88 - low-risk (81%)
• 99 - straightforward (91%)
• 109 - straightforward (100%)
  

Each point of Rooftop Growth, Difficulty: increases the base difficulty by 5 points.

Success

Gentle confidence

[...] There; a perfect furrow, and a little rivulet of water from a water can in preparation. Perfect conditions for your [Growth].

Description summary:
The description varies with Rooftop Growth and Having Recurring Dreams: The Burial of the Dead.

Growth	Description
1: Singular Cuttings	These plants seem to prefer soil similar in composition to grave-dirt. The literature is silent on the implications of this fact.
2: 'Dawn-Yodeller' Mandrakes	These mandrakes are very picky […]; the soil can't be too acidic or too base, or it will scream in upset. Being able to tell these screams from the normal screams that indicate all is well is the mark of an experienced mandrake-handler.
3: Prize-Winning Peppercaps	They grow best in ashy soil, flourishing after forest fires. You don't have any forests to hand, but a Wizened Botanist offers you the cinders of her cigarette.
4: Recusant Marigolds	Soil seems to matter less to Recusant Marigolds than layout and competition. They'll grow anywhere, but only in regimented rows, and smaller blooms will twine their root systems together to strangle taller blooms of their resources.
5: False-Cantigaster Hybrids	These foul hybrids will grow anywhere. Never have you seen a plant or fungus so adept at turning neutral soil into vile toxin.
6: Millennium Roses	London soil is not lively enough for these roses. They pull hungrily from the earth, as if used to much more generous ground. But you do what you can.
7: Tomorrowspore Ortcaps	Botanical hearsay is that Tomorrowspore Ortcaps grow best in soil that either has been extremely nutrient-packed, or will be. It is, by its very nature, a difficult rumour to disprove.

TBotD	Description
7 - 9	You see the echoes of old nightmares in the soil. Dreams of dead and dying men, and being buried alive. You pull yourself together.
10 - 20	The soil reminds you of a bad dream – of a deep grave, and an uncooperative body, and a city lost to smoke and bandages. You pull yourself together.

[Find the rest of the story at https://www.fallenlondon.com]

• Shadowy is increasing…
•  You've gained (9 + Growth Difficulty) x Nurturing a Rooftop Growth
• [The Airs of London change…] (random)

Rare Success

And a little extra too

[...]

You catch a pungent whiff as you work. It seems something has been using this allotment for its ablutions. You check your preparations again, but come to the conclusion that this is nothing worse than free fertiliser. Not far away, an alley cat yowls.

Description summary:
The first paragraph and variant texts are the same as regular success.

[Find the rest of the story at https://www.fallenlondon.com]

• Shadowy is increasing…
•  You've gained (11 + Growth Difficulty) x Nurturing a Rooftop Growth
• [The Airs of London change…] (random)

Failure

Oops

A little spilled soil is no great matter— wait. That distant horn. Could it be the battle-bellow of the Fisher-Kings?

[...] war-band of errant children, led by the Guttersnipe Princeling himself, surges over the rooftops. They [...] trample all through your soil.

• Shadowy is increasing…
•  You've lost (1 - Growth Difficulty) x Nurturing a Rooftop Growth
• [The Airs of London change…] (random)