People of the Dream Keeper: Lantern Years 1 to 4 – “Crocodile Years” (Patreon)

Spoilers for:

• Crimson Crocodile: L1
• Smog Singers: L1
• Crimson Crockery
• Outskirts
• Chorusseum
• Forum
• Collective Cognition Milestone: 2, 5 & 6
• Philosophies
• Seed Patterns
• Butcher

Note: This is going to be rougher and filled with half thoughts, impressions because there's a lot, a lot and I'm working from frantic notes. I'm aiming for more impressions and feelings rather than precision with writing this series.

Where we left the settlement of Termina previously was after having navigated the challenging situation of too many Perfect Resources, a real first world issue that led me to make the riskier call of saving the resources and going into the L1 lantern year fight against the L1 Crimson Crocodile with a notable lack of weapons that I would not normally accept (I essentially ended up almost as badly behind the curve as someone who innovates in LY1). Our hunt party would have to hope that the Bloodglass Cleaver didn't hit a Parry/Super-Dense hit location too early in the fight and otherwise everyone else would need to lean into Founding Stones or fist & tooth with the +1 strength that Survival of the Fittest would provide.

The hunting party consisted of Fear, Hunger, Darkness, Syr Vival & the imaginatively named Scout on Scouting duties. Scout was already quite badly crippled from the Extinguished Guidepost timeline event and things got even worse for her on the hunt! Poor Scout had an eye plucked from her head when we encountered the Lady in the Blood Lake, she also spent her precious survival on gaining the Inner Lantern innovation, so the survivors could now Surge something that could be incredibly useful during this showdown because when you are behind on defences, pushing ahead on aggression is the best way to focus your goals.

As it turns out, the Crimson Crocodile is a bit more forgivingly designed than the White Lion and Gorm before it as not only do you get access to the Crockery right at the start of the campaign, but also it has a base toughness of 7. This means with Survival of the Fittest on a 6+ fist & tooth is scoring wounds and founding stones are managing it on a 5+. That single point of toughness being dropped makes for a huge difference in the texture of the fight, we'd gone from an uphill struggle to an almost even fight and what was left to sort out was understanding the positioning and balancing  the Croc's terrified mechanic alongside the blood pool providing insanity gains to help stop being terrified. It's not often I have a showdown located around the centre of the board, I normally pull it towards the south edge because that's nearest to where I'm sat, but Cronk the Crocodile changed that a little bit.

The highlights of this first showdown included Hunger going first in the showdown and immediately hitting the Parry hit location with the Bloodglass Cleaver, meaning it was immediately blunted at the end of his first attack. But Cronk gave away very early that she liked to flatten survivors on her left or right flanks so the fight adjusted to most survivors being in the front or rear facings in order to reduce the power of her reactive behaviors.

Despite this loss of the Honed strength, the rest of showdown went relatively smoothly until near the end.  Our Scout, was caught right at the end of the showdown with no survival, no insanity and the terrified status card – meaning the Basic Action was an automatic death. However, Syr Vival had a different plan in mind, using the newly gained surge and the expenditure of a founding stone to drop the croc dead in its flow step.

Returning to the Settlement there was more bad news as the Death event was drawn and Scout promptly expired from her injuries (I chose Scout because she was so badly mauled at this point that it made both mechanical and thematic sense, I also wanted to protect the option to spend endeavours, so picking a survivor with no Hunt XP would have been more harmful). Graves was the Principle chosen here, so I think I'll round it all out with Survival of the Fittest, Collective Toil, Graves and Romantic when I get to LY12. The resource drops from the Crimson Crocodile allowed for building of the Crimson Helm, Crimson Guard and Crimson Slippers. I continued to skip on innovation here as I'd already gained one useful innovation but gear was still a major issue and also I wanted to try out each new armor set as much as possible so I could form a more solid opinion on them.

On the weapon front I chose the Crimson Pearls (Fist & Tooth buff), Bone Darts and a Bone Sword. I wasn't confident that we'd see them. Because Collective Cognition gave us the Stone Plate innovation I also constructed Rawhide Gloves to be able to take advantage of the Clothed & Satiated armor set bonus. An organ was spent on a Lucky Charm to pair with the Fecal Salve + Rawhide (as Fisting was still on the menu) and that was all we had. I did look at the Finger Darts for a bit, but passed on them despite the fact that they'd provide a way for Hunger to increase his observations and also insanity gains. Ultimately not having a thrown weapon proficiency is a deal breaker for me, sad times.

Fear & Hunger and Darkness all reached their philosophy milestone upon their return, Hunger got Impermanism (promptly causing him to not be allowed to be our Crimson Pearls user), Darkness picked up Survivalism and Fear got Faceism. To fill the missing slot we took a new survivor called Treasure. The early stages of these philosophies isn't something I felt worth talking about too much as for the most part they needed to be developed to achieve much and I was concentrating more on not missing the observations over leveraging benefits from the individual knowledges. Also on doing my best to minimise mistakes, but oh boy are there spots in the GCE Rulebook where the rules are not clear to me, or they're in the wrong place, or the wording seems to be missing specific elements. I'll be honest, I love the new layout used and the concepts behind the GCE rulebook's design ethos are excellent, however the specifics could have done with another look from a professional outsider for a few spots.

Death of Song gave us a new Pacifist survivor “Whimpy” and two hide based resources from the Smog Singer he had butchered during the event. Because Scout had died the hunt party we would plan to take Treasure instead of this new guy, because Treasure would have no qualms slaughtering crocs and prawns. Not too much detail here I'm afraid as the second L1 Crunk fight went far smoother than the first two. This was thanks to my being very familiar with the ebb and flow of the showdown. As such I'm going to gloss over that one because the only really important points that came out of it was yet more Perfect Resources (I had received 7 of them by Lantern Year 3) and enough resources to complete the Crimson Armor set and start innovating with the gain of Symposium (huge hit to get the best possible starting. The goals at this stage were now to pivot to the Smog Singers and see what they would provide as we already had a good headstart thanks to getting those drops.

I also picked up this weapon for whomever ended up training Fist & Tooth as it's just a better version of a Lion Beast Katar in most situations.

However, there was a bit of a sad moment that landed before we got to the crafting, the settlement event drawn was Death. Again, so because once again we needed our Endeavors, Fear shuffled off this mortal coil.

I learned why this was more likely than not later on during this campaign as I sat down with the resource and settlement event decks to do some testing based on basic card based magic tricks (cutting, forcing cards etc). So, it turns out that the new settlement event and resource cards (and all cards) are thicker than my older ones and have less give in them than the older cards I own, so I was unintentionally cutting them to a place where the new cards were because of the increased weight of the card that would now be "on the top". This had the impact of increasing the odds of drawing the new stuff. Around halfway through the campaign I ended up switching sleeves on the resource deck to GameGenic thick ultra matt ones, and that helped solve that problem with the basic resources. However I didn't have a sleeving solution for the Settlement events. Eventually I switched to using a table and RNG app to generate my settlement events, but I couldn't change what had happened already, sorry Fear. RIP, you will not be the last one to die to this constant parade of new settlement events.

The L1 Smog Singer hunt continued to be generous, giving us more Smog Singer resources on the way in via the Flat Corpse hunt event. The rest of the hunt was a little rough on the survivors and when we arrived there was a lot of wear and tear on the survivors. With Fear, Darkness, Treasure, Syr Vival and Hunger being a bit battered I plumped for the frontal attack rather than gaining the guilt tokens for arriving behind them. I'd rather not gain guilt tokens when I wasn't experienced with what the Song Cards and Guilt Status would do.

Due to the Smog Singer's low toughness and the somewhat ineffectual/memeish way the L1 version seems to act this fight was honestly a disappointment. I was hoping for something on the level of the L1 Spidicules, which is a threatening and challenging showdown at all times, instead here were dead within 3 rounds thanks in no small part to the loadouts having a very effective set of weapon options between Crimson Pearl Fist & Tooth, a Bloodglass Saw and Bloodglass Cleaver on three of our hunters. This resulted in several extra resource drops and that plus the normal rewards combined with the Death of Song and hunt event meant we had a complete Smog Singer set in a single year and a Hamfluter to boot. This was a clear signal that it was time to move away from L1 monsters after facing the Butcher, which was a good thing because we'd also exhausted all the Collective Cognition milestones for the L1 early game monsters. 

Also I was now able to spend a perfect Hide and 3 Hollow Stones (I had been picking one up every lantern year) to get the Stone Faced Cloak. Whoever was going to be my Scout in this upcoming Butcher fight was just going to interact with any terrain they could and then hide for the rest of the showdown. I'm pretty sure the optimal Scout Grid is going to be Grim/RipJaw, Stone Faced Cloak, Scout's Lantern and one other card (I'll try the Vermin Belly Boots) because those cards seem significantly stronger than anything else other than the scout specific knowledge gear cards (whenever they turn up).

This is a really impressive weapon with its inbuilt Abyssal Survivor.

On the other hand, the Peace Dagger looks very situational/unimpressive and basically exists for the Pacifist support survivor build – not something I'll be constructing in this first exploratory run of the GCE. The Razor Cymbals do have an interesting mechanic and potential but I am not looking for Katars at this time. The Harpy Harp seems like the item the weapons were designed/balanced around. The other Chorussem gear card I could see myself crafting is the Spear of Life.

Hunger developed Apathy during this hunt and ended up pseudo-retiring by sitting in the settlement despite having +5 strength waiting for the Barber Surgeon, Treasure developed from strength to strength but had the absolutely frustrating Directional Dyslexia (btw APG, the name would have be more accurate if you called it Directional Dyspraxia or Orthagonal Compulsion - however it's a fun and frustrating disorder, so I love the mechanics it has). I did open the Barber Surgeon during this time, but due to there being so much to think about I promptly forgot about Hunger's existence. In part this is because I got distracted by the Scavenger Kit and First Aid Kit. I also brought up to the front ranks the survivors Ballad (for Singing Armor + Hamfluter), Cring Kimson (Axe + Crimson Armor) and a Birth settlement event occurred, so I stuffed 3 perfect resources into that bab and called them Prismatic.

The Bone Eaters started to hunt the survivors, though to date I have still not seen them, I think they got lost somewhere, or they found a good Kingtucky Fried Survivor restaurant and are enjoying all the bone wings. Innovations gained during these years were Paint for Dash and Ammonia for Tools + Leather, I'll certainly be leaning into Leather Shields when I can get that settlement location open.

We also got our first 3+ Understanding survivor (I've been very lacking in situations where understanding or courage can be gained) and that triggered the start of the Seed Pattern deck. My first patterns were. Drum Roll Please. Drdrdrrdrdrdr. Death Defier (which requires King resources) and Elder's Aegis (which needs Protect the Young). Womp womp.

As for facing the Butcher itself, I picked Bandages before going into this fight. So I was running three armor sets (one being Clothed & Satiated), bleed mitigation and two very good weapons. This is over prepared when compared to most times I reach the Butcher in People of the Lantern and I think we can thank the design of the new monsters for that. Our angry little slasher did the best he could, but despite facing all fresh new survivors (I wanted to get Axe Proficiency on a bunch of options, angle some new survivors towards gaining Philosophies and not risk anyone who'd been out on hunts to gain other proficiencies). The Butcher delivered a lot of Frenzy and Bleed, but ultimately Buchie was overwhelmed before getting too far into the showdown - which is how it goes when things go well, if your showdown runs long then you're like Ralph Wiggum, in Trouble.

During this showdown it was clear that the newly crafted Hamfluter is a legitimate and  impressive weapon. I also want to give the Pipa a go as it is a flat +4 strength when activated and has a very relevant Ballad (Super turbo. As for Singing Armor? Honestly I'm so impressed with the it that if the L2 Smog Singers give me all the resources for a second set before I reach Atnas in LY9, I'll craft it over Leather without hesitation. We'll see.

The core hunt party has now become; Treasure, Ballad, Prismatic, Syr Vival and a Bone Sword loving scout called Jigsaw (Impermanism). Next time it's going to be preparing for Atnas Swalc coming to town by upping the risk and rewards by hunting some L2 Crunks and Prawns! I am going to really wish I had Song of the Brave at this point. Also I've only seen Dreamism, Survivalism and Faceism so far and I have no idea what the other options in my deck are. I think in future runs I might play with “choose” rather than random philosophies, but it is to early to say which way I'll end up enjoying the most.

Random Thoughts:

Clothed & Satiated is one of the best designed cards in the entire game and easily my favourite design that I've encountered so far in the GCE. Not only does it give some armor points for partial sets while you're working towards a full set, it also gives a set bonus for mixed sets, thereby encouraging innovation of mixing and matching for various options. I'm not going to work on mixed sets in this PotDK run, but I will in the future because there's some good gear to mix and match. It's clean, it's something the game needed and it's strong without being brokenly powerful.

The Singing Cap is ridiculously wonderful and Singing Armor as a whole is so amazing that I don't even think you need Ballads to make this armor effective because of how well designed it is. 4 armor points to all locations is correct for the crafting cost involved in this piece of gear and both Screaming Armor plus Silk Armor look a bit wonky in comparison (love for them in Campaigns of Death please?. I also really like the Hamfluter ability, Abyssal Sadist on a Stick? Yes please.

The Smog Singers I am still unsure of however; I prefer the Spidicules fight for Node 2 and I think that only the Screaming Antelope showdown feels easier at L1. We'll see, the gear seems worth it though most of the non-armor stuff will become less and less relevant and more risky the higher the level of the target quarry monster becomes. I hold judgement until I've fought all levels of these monsters, but initial impressions are mixed.

First Aid Kit + Crimson Armor is a bit of a nonbo (non-combo), but I am living with that because Overwhelming Darkness is going to shred my Survival when I don't have access to Song of the Brave (where are the drums, the drums?)

The Crimson Crocodile selection of gear remains really interesting and impressive, as does the showdown fight, I think I am provisionally going to rank the Node 1 monsters Crunk > Gurm > Lion-O. You can expect reviews of the Crockery and Crimson Crocodile sometime soon. The armor set in particular is the best node 1 armor set we've ever had.

I greatly adore how this armor set supplies a set of affinities without asking for any itself, this means it's very useful/flexible and it is clear that Team Death have learnt lessons from the 1st Generation monster armor designs.

I do really like the Philosophy/Knowledge system, I think that Collective Cognition overall is a step up from the original 3x Fighting Arts, it remains overwhelming for me at this point and I definitely need a reference sheet because there's too much text to write and remember all the time. It's a good system, it just needs me to adjust and internalise the text.

Contrastingly I am becoming less and less interested in the Scouts of Death system as time passes. I think I'll mainly use it only for 5 player games in the future – I do really like the Scout Lantern design though, that might be tempting enough, but I'm stuck at 2 Broken Lanterns after the Butcher fight, need to find more or get the Weapon Crafter open for Scrap Scavenging. I also really want to get the Vermin Bellyboots crafted, but I've not seen many vermin resources around so far, perhaps Overwhelming Darkness will be generous and supply one. I might even see the Fiddler Spider Crab which I am never removing from my resource deck, sacrificing an entire campaign for that unlock isn't something I want to do again, though losing to the GSK is something that can just happen naturally.

Some of the Seed Pattern cards that came in various white boxes don't have orange backs despite having the seed keyword, I'm not using them here, but that seems like an oversight that needs to be corrected. I wish I could save for the Giggling Scythe, but I suspect that'll take many Crimson Crocodile showdowns and I want to spread my experiences around all three quarry monsters in this campaign.

The Forum is a really interesting and wonderful aspect of this while campaign and I REALLY want to see an alternative version for Fighting Arts in non-Arc campaigns because it lets you craft strategies and builds by providing options, but there is still some randomness and a price to be paid. I guess normal Romantic does the job, but it is a shame to be forced into picking that every campaign if you want options to help better curate fighting arts. I'm not missing Fighting Arts with this campaign - so far I've gained only Giant Blood via the Strain Milestone unlock and my opportunity to gain the Infernal Rhythm Strain Fighting art resulted in a Vaultless failure. It's not a big deal overall as Knowledges are covering so many bases, but I really would have liked to see what Infernal Rhythm did with Smog Singer gear.

Good impressions all round continuing to be maintained. I am noticing the survivors are a lot stronger than their normal non-arc counterparts, but one can only guess the L2+ monsters and The King should help rectify that. I am concerned about the middle part of the timeline, that post Phoenix/pre-King portion of the campaign looks a little dry for my tastes, perhaps I will grind Crimson Crocodiles for the Giggling Scythe after all!

If you want some video playthroughs of the Gambler's Chest on YouTube I recommend the following channels:

• https://www.youtube.com/c/ForgedbyGeeks
• https://www.youtube.com/@bigdenopaints 
• https://www.youtube.com/@TWISTGaming

I will be watching these fully myself when I've finished my first run through of the GCE!