The Settlement Phase #4: Events: Irrelevant doesn't mean irrelevant. (Patreon)

Now we are onto the Irrelevant category of settlement events. As mentioned previously, these events are not truly 'irrelevant' but they are more prone to doing nothing of interest or impact than most.  The reasons for this are either they have low impact effects or they require good timing to have some impact because of things like say, resource costs. 

The Irrelevant category is very much about taking advantage of these where you can and not worrying about it when you can't. So here are the usual suspects and we'll discuss each one!

Weird Dream 

Threat Rating: I want to give this  ★★★★★ because of how cringe inducing it is, but I can't it's a poor attempt at grubby fantasy humor and it is harmless.   So: ✰✰✰✰✰ it is.

Initial Impact: Sigh. If there was any one card I could remove from the Settlement Event deck it would be Cracks in the Ground, but Weird Dream comes close to the top of the list because of the sheer awkwardness it has ALWAYS caused around the table. 

I love the lampshading that the solo play text has (though it should be 'giant person' thank you very much for assuming one's gender KDM, I do not appreciate it) - however this alternative function disables the promo content of Infernal Rhythm and Corsair Coat for solo players, this feels like an oversight on the part of the design team.

The multiplayer text however, it's very off brand for what the rest of the game is doing. Now what we h ave here is what is known as 'humor as a defense' which is a key part of 'grubby fantasy' (the genre that Kingdom Death belongs to, it's 100% not true Dark Fantasy, sorry about that). And yes, Grubby Fantasy is a genre, it was birthed by Warhammer Fantasy Roleplay and Kingdom Death has its roots deep in that genre because of its ancestry.  

The issue here is, much like Cracks in the Ground, this card breaks the covenant between the game and the players. But instead of breaking the cardinal deal of 'hey your survivors may die, but your gear is enduring' this one suddenly lands a roleplaying/storytelling situation right square into the laps of the players and puts them in an awkward situation if they're not comfortable with that (most people are not). 

In addition, the outcome of the event is entirely democratic, which is unusual, in essence the players get to decide if they want +1d5 endeavors or to have Nickname hit next year. Given that Nickname is an absolute pain in the ass of an event to deal with, most groups are very generous with the storyteller and slam the 'Well told' result.  

In all, it's a waste of time and the only leverage to get from it is triggering Infernal Rhythm by mentioning the Devil's Symphony. The other trigger (for the coat) requires a Savior to be in the settlement, if you're murder baiting, then this is likely to happen, but then you can't really make much use of the reward because it is Ethereal (aka one of the most obnoxious abilities in the game).

Lingering Effects: None unless you unlock the above mentioned Strain or gear.

Mitigation Strategies: None needed, it's harmless.

Heatwave

Threat Rating:  ✰✰✰★★ most of the time, could be really bad if you have all heavy armor survivors. Don't be that gal.

Archived permanently by the Christmas promo strain 'Atmospheric Change', One should "enjoy" Heatwave while you can. 

Initial Impact:  The main impact of this card is survivors "with" heavy gear or fur gear suffer heatstroke and must skip the next hunt. I'd like to take a moment here to admire, once again, the lack of consistency in the equipping mechanics used in Kingdom Death. We have 'worn/wearing', 'carried', 'equipped' and now 'with' as wording. Only 'equipped' has a glossary definition, but 'worn/wearing' is directly referenced in the armor rules. UGH! I have fed this back to the design team, multiple times, but we'll have to see what happens. I don't know if they are just happy with this 'fuzzy mess' of definition, or if they simply don't see what the problem is. But it is very frustrating.  

I would be fine with the following definitions:

• Equipped - All gear in a survivor's gear grid
• Worn/Wearing - Equipped gear that has the armor or jewelry keyword
• Carried - All other equipped gear.

And then only these three categories are referenced, in the rules.

As it stands, Heatwave causes a survivor carrying a King's Spear to suffer heatstroke, I don''t know how you can manage to make sense of that one, but if you can, congratulations you have a vivid imagination.

Lingering Effects: Outside of that, the main impact of this event is to punish those "with" (that word again) heavy gear when they depart, stripping all their survival. Which, as I'm sure you are aware, is in essence a possible death sentence on the hunt due to the multiple 'spend a survival or die' situations that phase generates. So if you absolutely need to depart with heavy gear you are going to be forced to endeavor at 'Find Fluid'

The Breathe Fumes endeavor is a great one to spend spare endeavors at. Outside of skipping the next hunt, this table has zero downsides to it, You are at 50% chance of +1 understanding (plus skip next depart), 20% chance of Intimacy (+1 disorder) and 20% chance of getting the Extra Sense fighting art. I recommend that you have Plebs or Potentials endeavor here - but you can also use this activity to try and cycle Fear of the Dark off a Retired survivor (while also generating population).  

Oh there's also a cooking recipe. It's not worth the cost, get your strength via other sources such as the Dark Dentist.

Mitigation Strategies: Don't wear heavy armor or furs unless they are worth the price (Screaming Armor). If you do get hit, Heat Wave does not punish departing survivors in furs, just those with heavy gear. (Poor White Lion Armor).

Haunted 

Threat Rating: ✰✰✰✰★ 

Initial Impact: Despite being in the Irrelevant category, I am never really upset to draw Haunted, this is because it targets (a) survivor with the lowest hunt XP, this should be a Pleb, Potential or Janitor. That's wonderful, you get something interesting happening that could have impact on your settlement's story without having it hurt your hunting survivors (unless you're down to four survivors, then you've got other problems on top of the haunting).

This event can hurt your endeavors, but there are mitigation available, for the worst possible result (30%) you can exile the survivor (and get that Death bonus) and the category above (40%) is mitigated by Song of the Brave. It's even not that bad if you do not have Song of the Brave (but that innovation is a high priority one for most settlements). 

The last category (30%) is the most interesting of the three, it is one of the few places where you are really rewarded for having an incredibly low impact innovation (Momento Mori) and the result there is really cool. Both for the thematic nature of it (crying while making a small memento of a felled monster, not survivor) and then the display of the memento isn't noticed and the survivor gains +2 understanding, +1d10 Insanity and the rather good Zero Presence SFA. Nothing but good stuff there.

Without Memento Mori you gain the Possessed Ability and +2 strength, +1 accuracy.

While that is quite a significant drawback, it is important to notice that the survivor can still gain weapon proficiency ranks, they just do not personally benefit from them. This means with those stat boosts they can be a solid Fist & Tooth survivor (and most improvements to F&T are abilities, not fighting arts). So you have someone who can run support and punch the monster once a game to get F&T Mastery online for the settlement right here (if you want). Otherwise, they're just a stat monster in the making.

The other option is to demote this survivor to the position of Janitor and not worry about their existence anymore. Eventually the job of dealing with all of the horrible rolls will get them out of your hair.

All in all, it's not a bad event, but correct mitigation means that has minimal impact.

Lingering Effects: None

Mitigation: It is self mitigating as long as your population hasn't been gutted, make sure you ALWAYS keep trying to grow population, under 20 should not be enough.

Dark Trader

 Threat Rating: ✰✰✰✰★ (You might roll bad)

Initial Impact: Nothing

 Lingering Effects: The quintisential 'do nothing' Settlement Event. This one is often a relief to draw not because of its impact, but because it doesn't have anything negative and represents a break, a lull, the calm and quiet.

I want to be absolutely clear, while this card is here in the Irrelevant category and often is not interacted with, it is close to perfection as is. You do not need to draw a Settlement  Event that does something every single year, and there are positives to this one if you want to take the risk. So lets look at the wares on offer and discuss if the price (and risks) involved are sufficient to make it worth getting involved.

Strange Brew - 6x Resources (Plebs & Potentials only)

20% of death, 70% chance of Rageholic disorder + Intracranial Hemorrhage, 10% chance of +1 accuracy. 

This one is not great, but Rageholic is a not an exclusively negative disorder and it has synergy with Intracranial Hemorrhage. You end up with a survivor who gains Frenzy whenever they suffer a severe injury (which disables survival spending) but they cannot spend survival anyway. There are uses for a survivor like this, but you are taking a huge risk when they go out on hunts because the hunt phase devours survivors without survival. Nemesis monsters though, they don't have hunt phases.  

So you can promote this survivor to the Nemesis team especially if they have access to Gorment Armor/Regeneration Suit and they are an effective, if unusual, build.  Also, you can just straight up cure an Intracranial Hemorrhage with the Barber Surgeon location 30% of the time. 

Conclusion, might be worth the risk for a very rich settlement. Shame that the 3-9 result doesn't have some additional upside ability to support it.

Pink Stone - 2x resources (Hunters or Potentials)

This one is really good, 20% of the time you're slamming this for nothing, but 2 resources is not a big loss. 70% of the time you're getting a founding stone, which = a monster resource in a future showdown (great deal, turning 2 basic resources, probably bones, into a monster resource + wound + possible persistent injury) and 10% of the time you get the Immortal disorder (which is one of the best disorders in the game). 

This one is often worth the gamble once you have a lot of spare basic resources (probably bones) kicking around, and is really great when you have Otherworldly Luck skewing the odds in your favour.

Shiny Sexy Jeweled Thong - x7 resources (Potentials and DPS Hunters).

20% -1 Evasion +10 Fashion, 70% nothing, 10% +1 Luck.

OK so first things first, this is one of the damn best things you can possibly dress your survivor in. Fashion Hunting is the only true end game that matters.  However, the really, really important thing to consider is this; unless your survivor is an evasion based class such as the tank or bruiser. Losing Evasion is a mostly irrelevant result (not ideal, but you will manage). If the monster hits you on a 2+, -1 Evasion still means that is a 2+ and even if it goes from a 3+ to a 2+ that is not a significant % improvement in its accuracy. 

That 10% of gaining +1 Luck for 7 resources however is very, VERY significant. Luck is the strongest offensive stat against most monsters (apart from ones like The Butcher who are very resistant to critical wounds) due to its combination of reaction canceling, persistent injuries and resource generation. It is HARD to gain luck for some very good reasons, so the price here and the odds are absolutely fair.

Yes, it is expensive, yes you are not always in a position to take advantage of this, but for a resource rich mid/late campaign settlement with Otherworldly Luck to skew the odds (and lifetime rerolls to spend) the gains from this one are very strong. 

Yup, Dark Trader is better than it looks, it's just awkward to leverage at times because of the costs, but eventually you can and do end up in a situation where you have mountains of bones piling up and there are some sweet options here, especially for the gamblers and the players who stack the odds in their favor.

Mitigation Strategies:  Don't roll, don't risk anyone that matters, Otherworldly Luck and Lifetime Rerolls.

Dark Dentist

Threat Rating: ✰✰✰✰★  

Also known as the "better" Dark Trader. If you happen to have the resources spare this event can assist your F&T journey a great deal. It is one of the cards that was updated in the CE and I did not agree with it being changed because it is a very powerful event that is almost out of the irrelevant category and in the good one (in fact I very nearly moved it today, but I wanted to write about it now rather than wait). 

The options are, heal Shattered Jaw for 1x skull/3x bones - a useful ability because of how that injury disables consume and encourage (shattered jaws also happen more often in People of the Stars). Gain +1 strength for the ridiculously low price of 4x bone or 1x large flat tooth. Or gain Sharp on your fist and tooth for 2x Iron (also really good).

Now the last two options require rolling on a table, the results are:

• 20% Die, gain +1 skull
• 30% failure, gain shattered jaw (just failure if you already have a shattered jaw)
• 50% success

Usual mitigation applies, you can get +1 via Otherworldly Luck on the targeted survivor and reroll via lifetime rerolls.

Those odds are in fact, great if you are performing this procedure on a Potential (or in People of the Sun where they rarely get to Encourage). That means all you are risking is the resources and to be honest, some of these resources are very low value. The +1 strength for a large flat tooth in particular is a phenomenal trade, but having Sharp on a F&T trainee is nothing to be scoffed at, especially if the settlement doesn't have a F&T proficiency user yet or the Potential is from a F&T Family.

Yeah, now I've written all this, I would definitely promote this event into the good category, the prices are just too good to scoff at.

Lingering Effects: See above.

Mitigation Strategies: If you don't want to risk the downside, don't roll.

Phantom

Threat Rating: ✰✰✰★★   

Initial Impact:  This Slenderman Event is a mostly negative one that has variable consequences depending on what innovations you have (which is an interesting mechanic in itself). It is unfortunate that its nastiest result is tied to the Language Innovation, 50% of the time you're going to end up losing a point of armor on each departing survivor, that sucks but it is not something which will automatically cause a hunt loss.

The upside to Language is likewise bad. Phantom Friend is one of the weakest fighting arts in the game, you are required to trade a resource you gained during the showdown to get a temporary bonus. Ugh. 

Bed is kind of a nothing result when "bad" because there are few high priority Home endeavors, you can't use the Bed, Shadow Dance or Partnership for a year. Shrug, whatever.  The upside is great, maxing out survival when departing is nothing to scoff at.  Still Bed is a low priority endeavor for many settlements (except for unlucky ones who keep breaking a leg).

Storytelling's downside is not too bad either, losing all insanity on returning survivors can be problematic for a few insanity based builds, but most survivors will cope (having Storytelling disabled is not an issue either). The positive upside gives you a bonus to the storytelling endeavor, making it a good opportunity to try and trigger White Speaker in order to gain the Cult Speaker Knife or Story of the Young Hero. 

Yeah, there are some negatives in this one, and some small positives, but overall you can see why I class it as "Irrelevant" you need the innovations for this to happen and outside of Language most of these innovations are low priority for most situations, so they may not be present. Even when they are, the downsides to having them are relatively minor.  

 Lingering Effects: None

Mitigation Strategies: Don't innovate Bed or Storytelling? You do not need to mitigate this one to be honest. The worst effect is linked to Language, so unless you want to trash language for some reason (i.e. You are required to archive an innovation and you have F&T Mastery) You don't need to work hard here.

Next up it'll be time to look at 'The Bad' cards, those which are mostly negative, but not as much of a disaster as 'The Ugly' were. Until then, may your trading for thongs be fruitful!

Fashion Matters!