A Delicious Guide to Fallen London

Chapter 2b: Actions - Storylets
Continued from: Chapter 2a: Actions - Opportunities
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This Chapter is all about Storylets.

Let's refresh our memories of where we left off last time with this image:

Storylets!

Storylet Colors
Storylet colors are mostly the same as the Opportunity Card colors we covered in the previous Chapter - except there are fewer Storylet colors.


White Storylet & White Storylet Action
White Storylets consist of normal, simple, ordinary, everyday, "grindable" Storylet actions. Nothing special about them. Still, sometimes the success in a White Storylet action may e.g. trigger a Living Story or open up a Bronze Storylet.
Top tip: You should try each Storylet in the game at least once (since it's always the first completion that activates the triggers).


Bronze Storylet & Bronze Storylet Action
Bronze Storylets will typically make you raise a certain Secondary Quality (e.g. "Investigating...") above a specific threshold (e.g. Investigating... 10) by repeating Bronze Storylet actions, in order to reach a conclusion. Most of the Bronze Storylets are repeatable.


Silver Storylet & Silver Storylet Action
Silver Storylets are in the middle between Bronze and Gold. They can be recurring Storylets, except with better payouts than the Bronze ones (e.g. "Attend to matters of society and scandal" at your Lodgings) - or they can be once-only Storylets, which focus more on advancing the story than the material rewards (e.g. Ambition)

Some of the Silver Storylets will advance your Ambition. Ambition is a super-long continuous story, which will supposedly last throughout the game. You can only have 1 Ambition. Switching your Ambition later on is costly. Ambitions are available from the moment you enter Fallen London.

There are 4 different Ambitions to choose from:

Nemesis (Watchful & Dangerous)
starts from Ladybones Road (see Chapter 3: Traveling)


Bag a Legend (Dangerous & Watchful)
starts from Watchmakers' Hill (see Chapter 3: Traveling)


Light Fingers (Shadowy & Persuasive)
starts from Spite (see Chapter 3: Traveling)

and finally

Heart's Desire (Persuasive & Watchful)
starts from Veilgarden (which is where we are now)


Gold Storylet & Gold Storylet Action
Golden Storylets are typically the most intriguing and rewarding Storylets. They will often reveal more about the FL universe.


Since we are currently homeless and today's Christmas Day, let's start by clicking the Lodgings-related Golden Storylet.


Options!

I am poor, without any Secrets to spend. Dangerous work sounds too dangerous for me. Also, I don't want to leave Veilgarden until we have reached Chapter 3: Traveling.

It's time to be Charming, then:

"May the odds be ever in your favor." This time, they're not.

With some incredible noob's luck, I succeeded on my first attempt. Picture of the success screen can be found below.

If I had failed in the challenge, the failure would have most likely increased one of my Menaces (Nightmares, Scandal, Suspicious or Wounds). The Menace levels are displayed in the bottom left corner of the screen, below the Primary Qualities. If you can not see the Menaces there (such as my character in the screen shots taken so far in this Guide), it means that the said Menace is at level 0. Most sensible Fallen Londoners will try to actively prevent their Menaces from ever reaching level 8. While you can not get a "GAME OVER" screen in Fallen London, let's just nevertheless say that Wounds level 8 has...some consequences. (NOTE: It's not very bad, really, since you don't lose any items or progress; but you will have to spend a ton of actions in order to return to Fallen London proper.)

For top tips on how to reduce your Menaces, see the last Chapter of this Guide titled "Chapter X: Summary (aka tl;dr) & Top tips".



NOTE: the Action Candle at top left corner has been reduced by 1 action.

After recording this Great Success into my Journal, I click "Onwards"...

NOTE #1: Maximum hand size has been increased to 2.
NOTE #2: "Snowbound" Storylet is a Christmas special seasonal action unavailable at other times of the year.


Lodgings!

...and realize I have landed in my Lodgings.

I will come back to cover the Lodgings Actions in Chapter 4 after Traveling around a bit in Fallen London in Chapter 3. But first off, let's finish this Chapter by fulfilling my earlier promises of looking into the Living Story in the Messages tab:

Living Story notification highlighted in red.

In addition to the Living Story, I have already received some calling cards from fellow Fallen Londoners.
These are visible on the left hand side, marked in orange:



Calling cards are the first step for becoming acquainted with other players. Sending a calling card is done through Lodgings and costs 1 action. Accepting is done through Messages and costs 1 action. More about this in Chapter 4. Deleting a message or refusing an invitation is not an action.

I will delete the Living Story message and accept the cards:

I have received a notification about the new acquaintance.
I have received Making Waves. Making Waves is a quality we don't have to care about before we are a Person of Some Importance (PoSI). One of the many requirements for this is that all of our Main Qualities (Watchful, etc.) should be 100+. So we can ignore the MW increase for now. A weekly trigger called "Time, the Healer", which will be displayed in your Messages tab, always reduces half of your Making Waves every week. This is perfectly normal in the game.

Influence is a mechanic which kind of prevents people from spamming everyone to be their friends on FL. Once your Influence rises too high, you are unable to make new acquaintances until you choose to end some of your acquaintances through your Lodgings (see Chapter 4: Lodgings).

Influence is tracked on the bottom left corner of the screen, below your Main Qualities and below your Menaces (if any):


Next, I will click on the "Story" tab to return to my Lodgings:


I am re-using the old screenshots due to laziness.

Next, I will click on the "A gift!" storylet, which had been activated by the Living Story:

Options!

Here's some additional information and top tips on stuff you can not know based on the in-game information you have seen so far:
1. Switching your Benefactor later will be possible; but it is costly.
2. The Mysterious Benefactor will keep on sending you Second Chances associated with the Quality you choose now, in addition to the item you receive.
3. Second Chances will allow you to attempt a challenge two times rather than once only.
4. To use a Second Chance, expand the Challenge information and tick the usage box BEFORE attempting the Challenge for the first time. Even if the first attempt is a success, the SC is nevertheless spent.
5. Hastily Drawn Warning Notes (= The Shadowy Second Chances) are very difficult to get in the game compared to the other Second Chances. A power gamer should pick the Shadowy option from the Benefactor.
6. For more information how to obtain Second Chances (plus some top tips about them), see "Chapter X: Summary (aka tl;dr) & Top Tips".

Because of the reason #5, I choose to get a Bowler Hat:


I will show you how to equip this Bowler Hat in "Chapter 6: Myself-tab (inventory)". For now, let's click ONWARDS! to get back into the Lodgings:

In the next chapter, we will examine what can be found from behind the "TRAVEL" button

The Delicious Guide to Fallen London will continue soon with a significantly shorter
Chapter 3: Traveling