Quest 8 hearts with Eiland and Juniper :( very bad

[Pikito]

Seriously, do you need 8 hearts with Eiland and Juniper to continue floor 100? That's going to take weeks, ugh.

[Rae Nidae]

You're joking. You have to be.

Between this and having to potentially wait TWENTY in-game days (two charges of dragon fire which is eight days each, then four more days for the seed to grow) just to complete floor 90, I don't think I've ever been stonewalled this hard in a game before.

My motivation to complete the mines just plummeted into nothingness.

[Rustyspoon]

Originally posted by Rae Nidae:

You're joking. You have to be.

Between this and having to potentially wait TWENTY in-game days (two charges of dragon fire which is eight days each, then four more days for the seed to grow) just to complete floor 90, I don't think I've ever been stonewalled this hard in a game before.

My motivation to complete the mines just plummeted into nothingness.

U have to wait for changes in the dragon fire?

[spookycat]

Originally posted by Rae Nidae:

You're joking. You have to be.

Between this and having to potentially wait TWENTY in-game days (two charges of dragon fire which is eight days each, then four more days for the seed to grow) just to complete floor 90, I don't think I've ever been stonewalled this hard in a game before.

My motivation to complete the mines just plummeted into nothingness.

You can use the blue mana potions to fill your stamina, and the growth spell for immediate growth of the plant. That's what I did

[cat_cryptid]

i luckily already had juniper at 8 hearts but just spent ingame AGES getting eiland up from 6 to 8. unfortunately, after going to juniper for the new quest bit, my game crashed mid-cutscene, so i'm taking it as a sign to have a little break bc i've been playing it all day pretty much lmao

[Rae Nidae]

Originally posted by spookycat:

You can use the blue mana potions to fill your stamina, and the growth spell for immediate growth of the plant. That's what I did

But mana potions are extremely rare drops in the mines; I've only ever found like two of them before this. And now I have to either wait it out or grind endlessly and hope that one somehow manages to drop?

Why can't I just buy one with the 10k+ money I've earned?

Why is there no other source of mana aside from a single cooking perk that I'm like 20 levels away from?

This was my main motivation for playing the game and now it feels like my character just has to spend the next two in-game weeks sleeping in just to make some measure of progress here.

[cat_cryptid]

Originally posted by cat_cryptid:

i luckily already had juniper at 8 hearts but just spent ingame AGES getting eiland up from 6 to 8. unfortunately, after going to juniper for the new quest bit, my game crashed mid-cutscene, so i'm taking it as a sign to have a little break bc i've been playing it all day pretty much lmao

okay, i went back to it and i think it was bc i caught juniper mid screen transition and it didn't like thar. is working otherwise

[cat_cryptid]

Originally posted by Rae Nidae:

Originally posted by spookycat:

You can use the blue mana potions to fill your stamina, and the growth spell for immediate growth of the plant. That's what I did

But mana potions are extremely rare drops in the mines; I've only ever found like two of them before this. And now I have to either wait it out or grind endlessly and hope that one somehow manages to drop?

Why can't I just buy one with the 10k+ money I've earned?

Why is there no other source of mana aside from a single cooking perk that I'm like 20 levels away from?

This was my main motivation for playing the game and now it feels like my character just has to spend the next two in-game weeks sleeping in just to make some measure of progress here.

i get that the quest is annoying but i think you've got to meet the game where it's at and not put all your eggs into one basket and rush into solely the mines, needing to take time and engage with the characters/community is part of the fun too :) there's lots of other things to do, and the update hasn't even been out for 24 hours yet, and it seems you've already burnt yourself out on it
mana potions are rare but there are more ways to get them later on. you only need one dragons breath in order to progress, aka just the forge in the bottom corner.

[Rae Nidae]

Originally posted by cat_cryptid:

you only need one dragons breath in order to progress, aka just the forge in the bottom corner.

I tried using it on just the forge and it didn't do anything. The one video I saw had them cast it once on the wall blocking the northwest corner, then again on the forge after interacting with one of the scrolls behind said wall.

It seems like you have to break down the wall, interact with the scroll, and then use it on the forge. And you can't do both of those things with one cast, because you can't interact with the scroll while you're casting it.

[cat_cryptid]

Originally posted by Rae Nidae:

Originally posted by cat_cryptid:

you only need one dragons breath in order to progress, aka just the forge in the bottom corner.

I tried using it on just the forge and it didn't do anything. The one video I saw had them cast it once on the wall blocking the northwest corner, then again on the forge after interacting with one of the scrolls behind said wall.

It seems like you have to break down the wall, interact with the scroll, and then use it on the forge. And you can't do both of those things with one cast, because you can't interact with the scroll while you're casting it.

with all the rocks blocking the way? you can just use the pickaxe? i upgraded it to the mistril one and it worked fine

[Rae Nidae]

Originally posted by cat_cryptid:

with all the rocks blocking the way? you can just use the pickaxe? i upgraded it to the mistril one and it worked fine

Only had a gold pick at the time and just assumed you had to use dragon fire since it was reacting to all my tools the same way, but if that's the case then that shaves it down to twelve days (at zero mana) at least.

Either way, by the time I have enough mana to cast the rain spell, the seed will have been grown already. Four days isn't nearly as bad, but I stand by the fact that needing this level of relationship with two other characters seems like a bit much.

[jpshieux]

If you talk to the priestess and she asks you how the quest is going, just tell her you don't want to be friends with them, she keeps trying to convince you but if you keep saying you really really don't want to and she'll eventually give you a void gift for both of them which raises a whole heart.

Edit: And you can do it daily!

[cookiedoughmonster]

Originally posted by Rae Nidae:

Originally posted by spookycat:

You can use the blue mana potions to fill your stamina, and the growth spell for immediate growth of the plant. That's what I did

But mana potions are extremely rare drops in the mines; I've only ever found like two of them before this. And now I have to either wait it out or grind endlessly and hope that one somehow manages to drop?

Why can't I just buy one with the 10k+ money I've earned?

Why is there no other source of mana aside from a single cooking perk that I'm like 20 levels away from?

This was my main motivation for playing the game and now it feels like my character just has to spend the next two in-game weeks sleeping in just to make some measure of progress here.

So just advance your cooking skill then? lol it's not that hard. Just make a bunch of bread. If wheat is out of season to grow, use that 10k+ money you've earned to buy flour from the general store. You'll hit 45 cooking in no time.

And just fyi there is another method to get mana potions, but again this would mean you have to participate in other aspects of the game besides the mines lol. Level 60 farming skill perk for the magic seeds, which when grown have a chance to drop mana potions. This is not as reliable as the cooking skill perk, but more reliable than hoping for one to drop in the mines.

ETA: And the in-game reason why you cannot simply buy mana potions is because the existence of magic is kept under wraps. Read the villager dialogues, nobody believes in the existence of magic except for Juniper and Caldarus (and the new bachelorette). Magic powers are very rare in this world, so no one is manufacturing mana potions en masse.

[jewelllbby2]

Originally posted by cookiedoughmonster:

Originally posted by Rae Nidae:

But mana potions are extremely rare drops in the mines; I've only ever found like two of them before this. And now I have to either wait it out or grind endlessly and hope that one somehow manages to drop?

Why can't I just buy one with the 10k+ money I've earned?

Why is there no other source of mana aside from a single cooking perk that I'm like 20 levels away from?

This was my main motivation for playing the game and now it feels like my character just has to spend the next two in-game weeks sleeping in just to make some measure of progress here.

So just advance your cooking skill then? lol it's not that hard. Just make a bunch of bread. If wheat is out of season to grow, use that 10k+ money you've earned to buy flour from the general store. You'll hit 45 cooking in no time.

And just fyi there is another method to get mana potions, but again this would mean you have to participate in other aspects of the game besides the mines lol. Level 60 farming skill perk for the magic seeds, which when grown have a chance to drop mana potions. This is not as reliable as the cooking skill perk, but more reliable than hoping for one to drop in the mines.

ETA: And the in-game reason why you cannot simply buy mana potions is because the existence of magic is kept under wraps. Read the villager dialogues, nobody believes in the existence of magic except for Juniper and Caldarus (and the new bachelorette). Magic powers are very rare in this world, so no one is manufacturing mana potions en masse.

Leveling cooking really doesn't do much to fix the games terrible mana economy. Only 4* dishes and above have a *chance* to get the mana infusion. 4 star dishes and above, at minimum, require 4 ingredients and there's always some sinker ingredient you can't easily get bundles of to make sure you don't produce large quantities. You basically don't use spells in regular gameplay because the natural recharge amounts to a few uses a month while mana generation perks are onerous, expensive and unreliable. What incentive do you have to jump through hoops gathering ingredients to make dishes to maybe get some more mana when the spell effects overall are pretty mediocre. Assuming mana stays the same as it is they should unlock buying mana potions with the end of the mines quest. If you know you know.
I think each spell should have it's own recharge instead of a blanket mana cost. IE The light spell should be castable once a day minimum, at 4 days charge in cost it's a laughable waste.
On the point of the magic seeds. You have to farm forever to get the skill to get a chance to get seeds which then have a chance to give 1 useful thing, the mana potion. Not counting cosmetics because they're one and done. Why on god's green earth does the magic seed drop the same potions Valen sells or a nickels worth of tesserae? If you're in deep enough to get magic seeds you aren't poor enough to feel good about getting those.
Outside of cosmetics the only use for magic seeds is to get mana potions which they aren't reliable for and frankly that's insulting given how much you have to chip in to get there. It's a late game skill that has a niche to fill and could easily provide long term benefits but it just doesn't.

[Inoblitus]

I suddenly feel like the only person who never uses my mana, I forget it exists most of the time. With all the food, it's so easy to do everything without relying on it. My magic seeds always drop cosmetics right now. I'd rather the game work consistently right now than be annoyed about a mine delay. Why are you upset about having to play the rest of the game? That's what I think I'm most confused by. Just bring gifts on Fridays and Saturdays (the tavern meet up and the Saturday market) and you can get everyone to 8 hearts incredibly fast. Most of my characters are there, and I don't even care about half of them.

[GuineaPrince]

I'm a simple guy. I get to a lower floor and the rocks get harder to break again, my first upgrade is pickax to break rocks fast again. By the time I got to 90, that was 9 floors over a few days and plenty of time to create mistril pickax.

The line of rocks to smash apart was self-evidence, they are rock-shaped after all, then instruction to fireball the forge and plant a key.

That part wasn't too bad for time. After doing my rush for 85, rush for 90 to just try to reach elevators, it was actually nice having a little break in between floors to come back for the forge (all my magic goes to rain babeyyy) and water a seed for a few days. Time to update things around the farm, time to do things around town with my lovers.

Course now that I'm at 100, the big barrier is grinding the floors until the right fish and the right forage drops.

As for getting Juniper and Eiland to 8 hearts, you just gotta talk to them and gift them every day and their hearts will rise fast in no time. The first year of my playthrough, I got sweet on March and perfect ore were plentiful in the mine, so he became my main squeeze fast. But towards Autumn or Winter, I wanted to start romancing Juniper, and it just took a few weeks of talking to her and gifting her each day to raise her hearts to 8 before year's end.

Fields of Mistria is a game that wants to be laid back, but we as gamers have the compulsion of seeing a challenge and wanting to complete it Right Now. It's important to take a step back and chip away at something like the mines - even if you get Eiland and Juniper to 8 hearts in 1 hour, you'll still need to grind the materials to open the seal, as you've done for every seal prior. So consider a simple change of schedule: in the morning you might do farm chores, by around 9 or 10 you take a bath, and either you make a daily visit with Juniper and Eiland before starting your day in the mines to build up more Mistral and find more rare materials, or you're visiting them at night on your way back home. In seemingly no time, you'll make pretty big progress on their hearts while also making yourself mightier.