Calling a labor team delivered a Duke...?

[Lou the Lou]

Just got Acolyte. Chose the Labor Team permit. Called the four workers. What arrived? Three workers and a Duke who refuses to do any work at all. Then he snaps and goes on an insulting spree due to "royal expectations".

What part of "send me four laborers" translates to "send me royalty that doesn't do any work"?

[HunterSilver]

Just curious if this happened in vanilla? I haven't seen this scenario pop up before but it'd still be hilarious.

[Lou the Lou]

Vanilla. Zero mods, ever.

Funny, yes, because one of the women in my colony wasn't having any of that bs and decked him after he'd gone around and pissed everyone else off. Lights out. No more insulting spree.

But broken. No Duke would volunteer themselves to fill a laborer's 4-day work shift.

[HunterSilver]

Originally posted by Lou the Lou:

Vanilla. Zero mods, ever.

That is still hilarious and great. I hope that gets patched sooner or later.

[mikeydsc]

Originally posted by Lou the Lou:

Vanilla. Zero mods, ever.

Funny, yes, because one of the women in my colony wasn't having any of that bs and decked him after he'd gone around and pissed everyone else off. Lights out. No more insulting spree.

But broken. No Duke would volunteer themselves to fill a laborer's 4-day work shift.

I worked in many a factory and have seen the kids today show up to play with their phone all day, complain when they were told to go home. Royalty sounds about right to me :)

[Lou the Lou]

Originally posted by mikeydsc:

Originally posted by Lou the Lou:

Vanilla. Zero mods, ever.

Funny, yes, because one of the women in my colony wasn't having any of that bs and decked him after he'd gone around and pissed everyone else off. Lights out. No more insulting spree.

But broken. No Duke would volunteer themselves to fill a laborer's 4-day work shift.

I worked in many a factory and have seen the kids today show up to play with their phone all day, complain when they were told to go home. Royalty sounds about right to me :)

Nah. Remember, I have just achieved Acolyte status, and a Duke is going to come do work for me? I don't think so. Plus, this is Rimworld, not real world. And kids on their phones are not royalty.

More evidence it's broken? I just got another quest offered to me. To shelter a royal. A fellow Acolyte wants to stay at my colony. No problem. And this Acolyte wants to stay with their court ally - which happens to be the Duke that was dropped by the laborer call-in. Oookaaay... except it wants bedrooms for them, of course. Which means it wants me to construct a bedroom fit for a Duke. Which has the same requirements as a Count, the highest player-achievable title. Title 7 of 7. And I'm on 3 of 7. I don't even have the ability to craft half the stuff that's required.

Nope. It's broken.

I mean, the rewards are "appropriate"; one of my options is a persona monosword. Cool. Except that those rewards are way above my power level, and they're only being offered because the Duke became involved in the quest because the drop-in made him a part of my game.

[mikeydsc]

I am wondering if its a metaphor for todays youth who show up- do no work, complain all day and then want to be paid a kings ransom for doing nothing.

Humorous attempt.

But yea, its kinda borked.

[TwoTonGamer]

The quests are simply opportunities to trade some risk for a reward. I try not to be too critical. It's easy to see them as, like, being challenged to do something, but they aren't like that at all. If the risk seems worth it for the reward, then go for it. If not, pass it up. I pass most of them, especially the ones that bring raids.

They are random-ish and some of the random may not fit into what you are capable of or interested in doing at the moment. And, that's great. Just let them pass. Not this time.

[ichifish]

Maybe the Duke’s job is just being The Duke, you know? Duking around, telling the rabble what to do, demanding fancy drapes. You know, duke stuff. He was probably working hard showing your pawns what losers they are.

Curious if there was a relations hit because of the social fight.

I’m 50 days in and have gotten two hosting quests that seem similarly out of line (including a count with six retainers, none of whom will work, for 14 days (forget the reward but it included a persona sword and was worth something like 30,000)).

I think my issue is that I have a bunch of tribals (31 and counting) and the corresponding animals, food, and bedrooms, so my wealth is disproportionately high (200k) compared to my capabilities. What’s your wealth like? (My assumption is that quest types are tied to wealth, not just time).

On the other hand, might be that those outlandish quests are just temptations for the foolhardy...

[Lou the Lou]

Originally posted by ichifish:

Maybe the Duke’s job is just being The Duke, you know? Duking around, telling the rabble what to do, demanding fancy drapes. You know, duke stuff. He was probably working hard showing your pawns what losers they are.

I don't buy that. If we're sticking with in-game explanations, again, a Duke is not going to answer a call to fill a slot for one of four laborers. Especially not to some little podunk colony run by an Acolyte that's undoubtedly unable to meet their needs.

As for the quest rewards, no. The only reason I was being asked to accommodate a Duke is because he was already there and existing in my game. It was an Acolyte that wanted to be hosted, but because the laborer calldown inserted a Duke into my game, I had to accommodate him, too - which I am literally unable to do. By a lot - as in, this quest is impossible for me to accept under any circumstances, because it is suited for a game much further along than I am. And this quest was a big jump in difficulty and rewards from what I was being offered just previous to that. In fact, the quest immediately preceding that one offered a maximum reward value of less than $1000, which was in line with what I'd been getting up until that point - then this comes and offers me multiple thousands in reward choices, as well as an option that would have rewarded me something like 13 honor - when my previous quest had rewarded me with 3.

No one is going to convince me that this isn't a bug other than a dev - and if this is, in fact, intended, then it's just plain broken. Simply put, when I spend a permit point and a cooldown to call four laborers, I expect four laborers, not a high-ranking royal who not only refuses to do a single job, but causes serious problems in my colony by starting fights. Wtf did I even spend the point for? Isn't it supposed to be helpful? And if I had actually spent honor for the calldown, instead of it being on the first use? That would be ten times worse.

I could handle having a Duke appear as a random event. And I can handle being given a quest that I am unable to accept because I haven't advanced enough. But the fact that the Duke came from a labor calldown is what I see as broken, and that event is what boosted the subsequent quest difficulty.

I get the appeal of the whole emergent gameplay aspect and randomness and "oh no things went wrong - but this is fun!" aspect. I get it. But this is not that. This is not "fun" to me. This feels like I should just reload an old save and never buy or use the labor calldown.

P.S. I didn't check to see if I took a faction standing hit from the social fight he caused. I'll check tomorrow and edit this comment with the answer.

[fractalgem]

Originally posted by TwoTonGamer:

The quests are simply opportunities to trade some risk for a reward. I try not to be too critical. It's easy to see them as, like, being challenged to do something, but they aren't like that at all. If the risk seems worth it for the reward, then go for it. If not, pass it up. I pass most of them, especially the ones that bring raids.

They are random-ish and some of the random may not fit into what you are capable of or interested in doing at the moment. And, that's great. Just let them pass. Not this time.

Did you post that in the correct thread?

This is complaining about making a request for a few laborers and getting a royal brat showing up, not about, say, a 2-3 star quest having a 10 mechanoid ambush or something.

[TwoTonGamer]

Originally posted by fractalgem:

Did you post that in the correct thread?
This is complaining about making a request for a few laborers and getting a royal brat showing up, not about, say, a 2-3 star quest having a 10 mechanoid ambush or something.

Yes, correct thread.

Originally posted by Lou the Lou:

...More evidence it's broken? I just got another quest offered to me. To shelter a royal. A fellow Acolyte wants to stay at my colony. No problem. And this Acolyte wants to stay with their court ally - which happens to be the Duke that was dropped by the laborer call-in. Oookaaay... except it wants bedrooms for them, of course. Which means it wants me to construct a bedroom fit for a Duke. Which has the same requirements as a Count, the highest player-achievable title. Title 7 of 7. And I'm on 3 of 7. I don't even have the ability to craft half the stuff that's required.

Nope. It's broken...

The general theme of the post is quests not living up to the OP's expectations, and then, further down, that they are broken.
The quests are just kind of random is all. Which is good. Randomness adds a little quirkiness to things.

[Astasia]

Originally posted by Lou the Lou:

It was an Acolyte that wanted to be hosted, but because the laborer calldown inserted a Duke into my game, I had to accommodate him, too - which I am literally unable to do. By a lot - as in, this quest is impossible for me to accept under any circumstances, because it is suited for a game much further along than I am.

The only two techs you require to make a bedroom for a duke are Stone Cutting and Complex Furniture, which you start with in most cases and for tribals are techs you can immediately research with no prerequisites. You need a tiny amount of gold for the royal bed, a little bit of textile for the drape, and just 600 stone or cloth for the floor, everything else can be wood/steel. It is entirely feasible for somebody very early on in a tribal playthrough to be able to host a duke, it would require some effort to setup but the rewards might be worth it depending on your situation.

Whether a duke dropping down with some laborers is intentional or not, I don't know. The game is very heavily RNG and to me that sounds like the kind of RNG that might exist intentionally just to create stories like this. Would a duke be entirely useless? I doubt it, if you built a throne they could do speeches, and they have their psycasts which you can probably use to help out (I don't know if you are allowed to use their psycasts in that situation or not, if you are hosting them you can't IIRC, but if they are there to work for you you might be able to).

Getting a quest to host a duke very early in the game though is rather common contrary to what you think. Because that duke already existed may be why they are showing up in that specific quest, but it's not at all unusual to get a quest like that.

[Lou the Lou]

Originally posted by TwoTonGamer:

The general theme of the post is quests not living up to the OP's expectations, and then, further down, that they are broken.
The quests are just kind of random is all. Which is good. Randomness adds a little quirkiness to things.

No, you're missing the point. The quest being janky is a side-effect. It's getting the Duke in a labor calldown that's the issue. Hence why that's the title of the thread...

As for the Duke being useful for Duke things like psycasts: the only non-combat psycast he had was the one that makes one character love another. And since this was a labor calldown, I'm not even going to include any useful combat psycasts he might have had, because combat has its own calldown.

You wanna give me a Duke psycaster in a combat calldown? Cool. But that's not this.

[Swirler]

Originally posted by mikeydsc:

I am wondering if its a metaphor for todays youth who show up- do no work, complain all day and then want to be paid a kings ransom for doing nothing.

Humorous attempt.

But yea, its kinda borked.

Children; they have bad manners, contempt for authority; they show disrespect for elders and love chatter in place of exercise. They no longer rise when elders enter the room, they contradict their parents and tyrannize their teachers. Children are now tyrants

~Plato 423-347BC

[TwoTonGamer]

I do get the point, OP. I see it. You called laborers. But...
Paraphrase Astasia:

Originally posted by Astasia:

...The game is very heavily RNG and to me that sounds like the kind of RNG that might exist intentionally just to create stories like this...

With a little imaginative creativity this unusual Duke situation can add flavor. It kind of already has, because this Duke is now famous (in our little circle) and he is in your game!