The Hardcore OxygeNation

[Mr_Crac]

Here is an idea I had. Let me know what you think about it.

You may have read RoyalTonberry's guide to 4-day Hardcore. While this is a good resource and I appreciate that he wrote it, there are quite a few preconditions you need: Namely lots of fancy Mr. Store familiars and skills, and quite a few permed skills too.

Now, there are many players who don't have a hundred million's worth of familiars and other stuff. So I thought it might be useful to write up a guide to 5-day Hardcore No-Path for them, because I think 5 days is something you can achieve without anything from Mr. Store or from the Bounty Hunter Hunter. And with a relatively small amount of skills. Oh, and no slimeling either.

So let's say you have about 20 skills hardcore-permed, give or take a few. That makes about three skills from every class, except maybe from the Seal Clubber (because they suck;-). The setup would be then: "Do a 5-day HCNP run using only familiars like volleyball, baby gravy fairy, leprechaun, sombrero, starfish". Hopefully as any class, which I think is doable. Then you would provide a detailed log for this run, and extract kind of a "how-to" from it, saying why you are going to this-and-that area now and which skills you used where and the like.

While I would do such a run myself one time, I don't really wanna do it six times (once for every class) or at least three times (once for Muscle/Myst/Moxie). Here is where you could chime in for help. Do you think this idea has some merit, and want to help me write up the guide for it? Or provide a complete mafia log with some notes, and let me write up stuff? I think we could do something nice if we went for it, and give something to the community this way. Because we are arrogant dicks, aren't we.

[Mr_Crac]

Proposed minimal skillset (to be discussed):

SC: Tongue of the Walrus
TT: Amphibian Sympathy, Empathy of the Newt, Shieldbutt
PM: Entangling Noodles, Pastamastery, Springy Fusilli, Leash of Linguini, some attack spell (if not from Sauceror)
S : Advanced Saucecrafting, Elemental Saucesphere, some attack spell (if not from Pastamancer)
DB: Advanced Cocktailcrafting, Overdeveloped Sense of Self Preservation, Mad Looting Skillz, Smooth Movement, Ambidextrous Funkslinging
AT: The Moxious Madrigal, Fat Leon's Phat Loot Lyric, The Sonata of Sneakiness

[Shao Mi]

Personally, I'm not a big fan of guides like that, including Tonberry's. Every few months someone tries to do a guide and then realizes that there are too many variables..

Basically, get the useful skills (including olfaction), get some useful familiars, ideally get a telescope, and then use the appropriate familiars in the appropriate places and don't get beat up. Put stat days on 3/4 and save up extra turns to play then instead of on 1/2, beyond what you need to do (like get Liver).

There ya go, 5-day run

(and yes, people were doing 4-day runs before slimelings, banders, and boulders..)

[StDoodle]

IMO, the people who need help with 5-day HC w/ a decent skillset really need more in the way of learning the basics than they need a specific roadmap. 5 days isn't all that difficult under poor circumstances (ie myst w/o a stat day), it really shouldn't be too hard to pull off otherwise (assuming the top 15 or so skills w/ olfaction, at least).

For reference, I just did a 90%+ mafia CLI PM run in 8 days. (& I'm crappy at speed to begin with!) People with >20 skills trying to break the double-to-single digit day wall just confuse me...

[Mr_Crac]

[Shao Mi]

[Whym_]

[Mr_Crac]

[tekDragon]

[Kirkpatrick]

[Shao Mi]

[StDoodle]

I suppose I can get behind this project for one reason; I'd really like to put together a script to run HCNP.

Yes, I'm serious, but no, it isn't going to happen tomorrow.

[rayaquaza]

As a player who is "probably missing some sort of fundamental instinct", my fastest run has been 14 days, I believe, so far. Of course, I have even fewer skills than the "minimum" listed here, but I think 14 days is still quite bad.

Anyway, my question is a rather specific one: "Why do you stay out of the kitchen?" Do you get enough Hellion cubes from the forest to last the entire run? Then again, olfaction combined with a five-day run probably means you do. However, I usually only get enough to sustain me for that day (2 hellion cubes), if even that many. So I'm usually forced to kitchen-farm for reagent pasta ingredients. Sometimes, actually, I just get lazy and eat crap that I find. Nonetheless, I do want to be optimal, or at least more so.

tl,dr: How do you get enough reagent pasta to last yourself a run?

In turn, I can answer any questions you may have about the mindset of someone who struggles to break the one-digit barrier.

[Exactor it]

[Mr_Crac]

[Lizm3]

Firstly I think you guys are confusing Kitchens. You should never enter the Haunted Kitchen except for the tower item (or in BM myst for the shiny butcherknife and spice ghost?). I personally do farm the Knob Kitchen with a slimeling and +item buffs if I get beaten up or something just to get a couple mushrooms etc. Without olfaction I think its tricky to get enough hellion cubes and the kitchen just seems easier. (I know that's not purely optimal but seeing as I can manage 7 days easily now I think its a good start )

And whoever said it was learned behaviour is exactly right. I know not to go to the Sleazy Back Alley because you guys told me to. I know I should wait to finish the trapz0r quest until I have cold protection another way because you told me to. I know to finish the tavern quest asap because you told me to! Other people in shitty clans don't know this stuff and I think even a guide to that kind of stuff at the very least could be useful. I'm still doing stuff that I'm sure you guys would look at and say "noooooo don't be doing that." Like the kitchen.
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[Exactor it]

Oh that kitchen. That can be a decent idea when you are muscle class I suppose. But it's still essentially wasting turns in a non relevant zone. Make sure to run a fairy in the Neck even sans olfaction. (Perhaps even popper the one guy you don't want to meet.)
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Sig by the Curiosity

[Lizm3]

You're going to cry when I tell you this, but sometimes the hellions beat me up. I'm thinking with madrigal permed this will be less likely in future. But still.

Also remember that you're collecting enough hellion cubes for a 4 or 5 day run (or a 3 day run :p). People with double digit runs need 15+. They're not going to get that out of the Friar quest without olfaction. At least, I never have. And I run a slimeling in the hellion section and then at least halfway through the azazel quest.
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[Exactor it]

[tekDragon]

I have distant memories of clovering the knob kitchen a long-ish time ago when I had very few skills and/or the mushroom plot was out of my reach. My first 2 perms were sauce and pasta.

[WeatherWarrior]

[Shao Mi]

Started to post and then read down and realized all my points had already been made

"Having the basic skills" also means you don't need to buy skills mid-run.. that's important. If you're buying significant skills, that slows you down. Having the basic skills also means having basic familiars (I'd say if you have a llama and a slimeling, you're covered for that, even if you don't have a boulder, bander, etc etc etc. Though the boulder really is awesome )

[WeatherWarrior]

[Light Ninja]

Hi. HCT noob here. Even when olfacting Hellion you can still get incredibly shafted, I almost always run a fairy there because it makes my life hell otherwise.

If your runs really are that long then yeah shelling for a mushroom plot will help. If you get a chef in the run you can make reagent pastas to feed to the GGG for MP which is also very nice. Generally I would skip the mushroom plot unless i'm really shafted on food these days because A) I don't get a chef anymore, just run Inigo for crafting. B) My runs are short enough that I don't need that much extra food.

Bandersnatch runaways are used in the Spooky Forest with +NC while scouring for the Hidden Temple items. Chance at spice for Spooky Lo mein fun!

Grue Egg Omelette = nice yum yums.

Knob Lunchbox? Yes yes yes.

If you're really against mushroom plot you could always hang around at the Goatlet a bit after you finished Mt. Trapz0r. I wouldn't but that's another easy source of food if need be. Well easier than hitting the Knob Kitchens.

With a bit of luck or well... unluck you can use the limes obtained from Sonofabeach for key lime pies. There is also war food that can be obtained by trading in nickels/quarters.

Edit: /me is way late to the party
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[Shao Mi]

[Mr_Crac]

[Shao Mi]

[stannius]

I don't think getting food from the kitchens, doing the painter quest, level-grinding in the gallery etc are the difference between runs less than and more than 10 days. Of course what do I know, I haven't done a single-digit hardcore run since NS13.

[nodens]

Not individually, but when you combine the painter quest with harold's bell, farming your cold resist gear to get to the peak, getting the rabbit foot from your guild, and making sure you have that clover for your skeleton key... turns really can start to add up to days

[Shao Mi]