// Ordinary days in the yard. // // `stage_day`, `ridge_road` and `yard_work` carry no conditions, no cooldown // and no `once`, which makes them this stage's floor: whatever else is // excluded, there is always a turn to play. // // Note what the ungated options give. Corporate Ladder put four of its best // negotiation gains behind a negotiation gate, and its logs show players // bouncing off that wall for thirty turns. Every gate in this pack has ungated // repeatable growth underneath it — see DECISIONS.md #32. export const routine = [ { id: 'first_morning', stage: 'hand', weight: 99999, once: true, description: 'Hollis Vane looks at your hands rather than your face, says the pay is ' + 'twenty-four dollars a run, the room at the Cordwood is eight and the ' + 'feed is what it is, and lets you do that arithmetic yourself. Dutch ' + 'Rennels is already harnessing.', options: [ { id: 'ask_the_rate', label: 'Ask what a man makes on top of the twenty-four.', result: 'He says that depends entirely on you, and goes inside. It is the ' + 'most useful thing anybody tells you all week.', effects: [ { path: 'skills.trade', op: 'add', value: 3 }, { path: 'relationships.hollis.trusts_you', op: 'add', value: 2 }, { path: 'notable', op: 'push', value: 'Asked Vane what the work was really worth.' }, ], }, { id: 'get_to_work', label: 'Say nothing and pick up a harness.', result: 'Dutch watches you do it wrong, then watches you do it right, and ' + 'does not offer a word either time.', effects: [ { path: 'skills.nerve', op: 'add', value: 2 }, { path: 'relationships.hollis.trusts_you', op: 'add', value: 4 }, { path: 'relationships.dutch.wary_of_you', op: 'add', value: 3 }, ], }, { id: 'ask_dutch', label: 'Ask Dutch which of these animals bites.', result: 'He tells you. He also tells you he has driven the Ridge road two ' + 'years, which is not an answer to the question you asked.', effects: [ { path: 'skills.trade', op: 'add', value: 1 }, { path: 'relationships.dutch.trusts_you', op: 'add', value: 5 }, { path: 'relationships.dutch.wary_of_you', op: 'add', value: -5 }, ], }, ], }, { id: 'stage_day', stage: 'hand', weight: 100, description: 'The stage is in and there are nine crates on the platform for a wagon ' + 'that holds seven. The driver wants to be gone inside the hour and is ' + 'saying so at length.', options: [ { id: 'two_trips', label: 'Run it twice. Nobody has to know it took all day.', result: 'It takes all day. Everybody knows.', effects: [ { path: 'money', op: 'add', value: 4 }, { path: 'skills.trade', op: 'add', value: 2 }, { path: 'relationships.hollis.trusts_you', op: 'add', value: 2 }, ], }, { id: 'load_high', label: 'Stack it high and rope it down.', result: 'Seven crates and two more where a man would sit. It holds as far as ' + 'the creek crossing, which is farther than you expected.', effects: [ { path: 'money', op: 'add', value: 8 }, { path: 'skills.nerve', op: 'add', value: 2 }, { path: 'standing', op: 'add', value: -2 }, ], }, { id: 'talk_the_driver', label: 'Talk the driver into leaving two for the next stage.', requires: [{ path: 'skills.trade', op: '>=', value: 12 }], result: 'He leaves two. He also mentions your name at the far end of the ' + 'line, favourably, which you will not hear about for a month.', effects: [ { path: 'money', op: 'add', value: 6 }, { path: 'skills.trade', op: 'add', value: 3 }, { path: 'standing', op: 'add', value: 3 }, ], }, ], }, { id: 'ridge_road', stage: 'hand', weight: 100, description: 'A load for the Ridge camp, out and back in a day if the weather holds. ' + 'The last mile is the one with the bad turn on it, and everybody knows ' + 'which mile that is.', options: [ { id: 'drive_it', label: 'Take it out yourself.', result: 'The bad turn is exactly as advertised. You come back with the wagon ' + 'and the animals and most of your composure.', effects: [ { path: 'money', op: 'add', value: 9 }, { path: 'skills.nerve', op: 'add', value: 3 }, { path: 'relationships.hollis.trusts_you', op: 'add', value: 2 }, ], }, { id: 'go_with_dutch', label: 'Ask Dutch to take the reins and ride along.', result: 'He drives it in silence and points at the bad turn without slowing. ' + 'You learn the road. You do not learn much else.', effects: [ { path: 'money', op: 'add', value: 4 }, { path: 'skills.trade', op: 'add', value: 2 }, { path: 'relationships.dutch.trusts_you', op: 'add', value: 4 }, { path: 'relationships.dutch.owes_you', op: 'add', value: -2 }, ], }, { id: 'take_the_gun', label: 'Ask Hollis for the scattergun and go alone.', requires: [{ path: 'skills.nerve', op: '>=', value: 12 }], result: 'He hands it over without a word, which is the first time he has ' + 'agreed to anything you asked for.', effects: [ { path: 'money', op: 'add', value: 14 }, { path: 'skills.nerve', op: 'add', value: 3 }, { path: 'flags.carries_iron', op: 'set', value: true }, { path: 'relationships.hollis.trusts_you', op: 'add', value: 5 }, { path: 'standing', op: 'add', value: 2 }, ], }, ], }, { id: 'yard_work', stage: 'hand', weight: 100, description: 'No stage, no run, and a yard full of things that are nearly broken. ' + 'Hollis is in the office with the ledger and the door shut.', options: [ { id: 'mend_harness', label: 'Mend the harness that keeps parting.', result: 'You find where it parts. It is not where anybody has been mending ' + 'it, which explains the last two years.', effects: [ { path: 'skills.trade', op: 'add', value: 2 }, { path: 'relationships.hollis.trusts_you', op: 'add', value: 3 }, { path: 'relationships.dutch.wary_of_you', op: 'add', value: 2 }, ], }, { id: 'shoe_the_team', label: 'Walk the team down to the smith and stand for the bill.', result: 'Eleven dollars of your own money on Vane’s animals. The smith ' + 'writes your name in his book, and so, eventually, does Vane.', effects: [ { path: 'money', op: 'add', value: -11 }, { path: 'skills.trade', op: 'add', value: 2 }, { path: 'relationships.hollis.owes_you', op: 'add', value: 12 }, { path: 'relationships.hollis.trusts_you', op: 'add', value: 4 }, ], }, { id: 'idle', label: 'Sit in the shade until something needs doing.', result: 'Nothing needs doing. It is the first hour of the week that has been ' + 'yours, and you notice it going.', effects: [ { path: 'skills.nerve', op: 'add', value: 1 }, { path: 'relationships.hollis.trusts_you', op: 'add', value: -3 }, { path: 'relationships.dutch.trusts_you', op: 'add', value: 2 }, ], }, ], }, { id: 'broken_axle', stage: 'hand', weight: 55, cooldown: 5, description: 'The near wagon comes back with a cracked axle and a driver who says it ' + 'was cracked when he took it. Dutch says it was not.', options: [ { id: 'fix_it', label: 'Get under it and put a splint on.', result: 'It will hold for a season, which is longer than the last three ' + 'repairs on the same wagon.', effects: [ { path: 'money', op: 'add', value: 3 }, { path: 'skills.trade', op: 'add', value: 3 }, { path: 'relationships.hollis.trusts_you', op: 'add', value: 3 }, ], }, { id: 'back_dutch', label: 'Say Dutch is right, because Dutch is right.', result: 'The driver takes it badly and the yard takes note. Dutch says ' + 'nothing, and writes something in his book.', effects: [ { path: 'standing', op: 'add', value: -3 }, { path: 'skills.nerve', op: 'add', value: 2 }, { path: 'relationships.dutch.trusts_you', op: 'add', value: 8 }, { path: 'relationships.dutch.owes_you', op: 'add', value: 6 }, ], }, { id: 'stay_out', label: 'Stay out of it, and take neither side about the axle.', result: 'Both of them decide, separately, that you are no use to them.', effects: [ { path: 'relationships.dutch.trusts_you', op: 'add', value: -4 }, { path: 'relationships.hollis.trusts_you', op: 'add', value: -2 }, { path: 'skills.trade', op: 'add', value: 1 }, ], }, ], }, { id: 'the_store', stage: 'hand', weight: 60, cooldown: 4, description: 'Everything in Cold Fork that is not freight is in this one building, ' + 'and the book on the counter is where the town keeps its real accounts.', options: [ { id: 'buy_plain', label: 'Buy what you need and pay for it.', result: 'Coffee, a shirt, and a second blanket. The nights are turning.', effects: [ { path: 'money', op: 'add', value: -6 }, { path: 'standing', op: 'add', value: 2 }, ], }, { id: 'on_credit', label: 'Put it on the book.', result: 'He writes it without looking up. Being in the book is not a ' + 'disgrace here; being in it a long time is.', effects: [ { path: 'owed', op: 'add', value: 14 }, { path: 'flags.owes_the_store', op: 'set', value: true }, { path: 'standing', op: 'add', value: -1 }, ], }, { id: 'haggle', label: 'Argue the price of the coffee on principle.', result: 'You win eleven cents and an hour of your life goes into it. He ' + 'enjoys it more than you do, and remembers you afterwards.', effects: [ { path: 'money', op: 'add', value: -4 }, { path: 'skills.trade', op: 'add', value: 3 }, { path: 'standing', op: 'add', value: 1 }, ], }, { id: 'pay_down', label: 'Pay the book down, up to twenty dollars.', // Hidden rather than greyed out when there is nothing owed. A locked // door is worth showing when it is a door the player could open later // by playing differently; "pay down what you owe" shown to a man who // owes nothing is not that. It was the most-locked option in a real // 181-turn session, six times, and told the player nothing each time. whenLocked: 'hide', requires: [ { path: 'owed', op: '>', value: 0 }, { path: 'money', op: '>=', value: 20 }, ], result: 'He crosses a line through it and turns the page back over.', // What is owed, up to twenty, and never more. A flat -20 against a // four-dollar balance took sixteen dollars for nothing in a real // session. Money comes first: both effects read `owed` before it moves. // See DECISIONS #38. effects: [ { path: 'money', op: 'add', value: { from: 'owed', times: -1, cap: 20 } }, { path: 'owed', op: 'add', value: { from: 'owed', times: -1, cap: 20 } }, { path: 'standing', op: 'add', value: 2 }, ], }, ], }, { id: 'weather', stage: 'hand', weight: 45, cooldown: 6, description: 'It has been raining since the small hours and the creek crossing is ' + 'four feet up. There is a load for the camp that was wanted yesterday.', options: [ { id: 'wait_it_out', label: 'Nothing moves today.', result: 'The creek is down by evening and the camp waits a day. It is the ' + 'right call, which is not the same as a popular one.', effects: [ { path: 'skills.trade', op: 'add', value: 2 }, { path: 'relationships.hollis.trusts_you', op: 'add', value: -2 }, { path: 'standing', op: 'add', value: 1 }, ], }, { id: 'ford_it', label: 'Ford it.', result: 'The wagon floats for about six feet, which is six feet more than a ' + 'wagon should. The load gets there wet and on time.', effects: [ { path: 'money', op: 'add', value: 16 }, { path: 'skills.nerve', op: 'add', value: 4 }, { path: 'standing', op: 'add', value: 3 }, { path: 'relationships.dutch.wary_of_you', op: 'add', value: 6 }, ], }, { id: 'long_way', label: 'Take the long road round the head of the creek.', requires: [{ path: 'skills.trade', op: '>=', value: 12 }], result: 'Eleven extra miles and a dry load. Dutch did not know that road was ' + 'passable, and now has to know that you did.', effects: [ { path: 'money', op: 'add', value: 11 }, { path: 'skills.trade', op: 'add', value: 2 }, { path: 'relationships.hollis.trusts_you', op: 'add', value: 4 }, { path: 'relationships.dutch.wary_of_you', op: 'add', value: 4 }, ], }, ], }, { id: 'road_agents', stage: 'hand', weight: 30, cooldown: 8, requires: [{ path: 'turn', op: '>=', value: 8 }], description: 'Two riders come out of the rocks a mile short of the camp and sit their ' + 'horses across the road. Neither of them looks like he has done this ' + 'often enough to be calm about it.', options: [ { id: 'hand_it_over', label: 'Give them the box and remember the horses.', result: 'They take it and go. You give Marshal Ward a description of two ' + 'horses that is better than anything he has had in a year.', effects: [ { path: 'money', op: 'add', value: -8 }, { path: 'skills.nerve', op: 'add', value: 2 }, { path: 'relationships.ward.trusts_you', op: 'add', value: 8 }, { path: 'notable', op: 'push', value: 'Was stopped on the Ridge road, and gave Ward the horses.' }, ], }, { id: 'talk_them_down', label: 'Tell them what is actually in the box.', result: 'It is a crate of hinges and forty pounds of nails. The older one ' + 'laughs. They let you by, which is worse for them than it is for you.', effects: [ { path: 'skills.trade', op: 'add', value: 4 }, { path: 'standing', op: 'add', value: 4 }, { path: 'notable', op: 'push', value: 'Talked two road agents out of a crate of hinges.' }, ], }, { id: 'bring_it_up', label: 'Bring the scattergun up off the floorboards.', requires: [{ path: 'flags.carries_iron', op: '==', value: true }], result: 'Nobody fires. They go back into the rocks and the story is around ' + 'Cold Fork before the wagon is.', effects: [ { path: 'skills.nerve', op: 'add', value: 5 }, { path: 'standing', op: 'add', value: 8 }, { path: 'relationships.ward.trusts_you', op: 'add', value: 6 }, { path: 'relationships.dutch.wary_of_you', op: 'add', value: 8 }, { path: 'notable', op: 'push', value: 'Brought the scattergun up on the Ridge road.' }, ], }, ], }, ]; export default routine;