Not sure what I should be doing

[Drillbert]

I understand things about this game:

I have health, reason and passion. All upgradable using vitality, erudition and glimmering respectively.

I can get funds by going to work.
I have to regularly go to my job to keep it.

I can get books and study them to get lore. I don't know how to find the bookshop in some character starts.

When time passes, I can see what the next season will bring, and plan what I need to rid myself of.

I can talk to people but I don't know what to talk about.

I can pause the game to read everything and keep track of comings and goings.

But I feel like all I've experienced so far is my stats. I don't know what I'm supposed to actually DO. I know that my temptation card needs to be upgraded, but I'm not sure how. I made it into a dedication card once, so maybe it's that. No idea what did that though.

Cards decay before I can figure out how to use them. Sometimes I get something that seems really good like "subtle fracture" or "buzzing in the brain", but it's gone so quickly that I've never known what it is. The wiki and videos don't help, because they will say something like "it's a level 4 moth influence" or something and I feel like I need some really bare bones instruction. I'm aware that I'm missing out on learning the game the "proper" way, but at this point the game is frustrating and impermeable.

Please help me at least understand why I might need a cult and what the lore fragments are for.

[cswiger]

If you don't have a cult founded, talking to an acquaintance with lore will let you create it.
You then use the cult card to promote other people into followers. Your cult followers can be promoted to higher levels, which makes them more useful to expeditions and they will be more helpful in the rite needed to win the game if your cult's lore matches your Dedication.

In order to upgrade the temptation card into Dedication, you have to Dream with it and the appropriate lore. For example, Dedication: Enlightenment needs Lantern. You will then need to Dream to reach the Mansus until you learn the Ways for the Wood, the White Door, and the Stag Door. You will need to obtain lvl-6 Lore to pass the Stag Door's riddle.

High level Influence cards are very useful for promoting advanced followers and for rites which summon things. They decay rapidly over time, and some of them will decay into Dread or Fascination, so you need to pay attention to those kinds.

If you want more details, you can find them on the wiki:

https://cultistsimulator.fandom.com/wiki/Actions (spoilers, obviously)
https://cultistsimulator.fandom.com/wiki/Talk

[mhm_cake]

What you should do at the very start is get some money and find the library, "Morland's shop". You can find it easily enough by using your Explore verb with a Health. (Explore being the purple one with the telescope.) After you find the shop, you can buy books there by putting the shop in the Explore Verb with Funds. After you obtain the books, Put them in your Study Verb to obtain Lore. (Study being the yellow one with the light bulb.)

Lore is essentially what the entire game runs on. You'll need Lore for EVERYTHING. Accumulating a lot of Lore is important, and will help you throughout the entire game. If you put Lore into the Talk Verb, (Talk being the pink one with the lips) you will get an acquaintance. You can then talk to this acquaintance to establish a cult. You will need Lore to establish a cult, and the Lore used will effect you for the rest of the game, because you will need Tools, Ingredients, and Lore of the same principle you use in order to promote your followers. so choose wisely! It's usually a good idea to establish a cult under the same Principle as your Temptation, as it will make ascending a lot easier.

After you establish a cult, it's time to start ascending. Use your Dream verb for that. I recommend trying to ascend without help, but if you need it, here it is: Dream with passion, and Lore of Knock, Lantern, or Moth. There are five ways, and you must ascend them one after the other. Once you obtain higher level Winter, Knock, or Lantern Lore, you can use those to ascend beyond The Wood to the White Door. Once you reach the White Door put your Temptation in the slot instead of the usual Health. This will allow you to reach the Stag Door which will require the answer to a riddle. I should note that you can change your temptation at any time before this using the Dream Verb, but once you ascend to the Stag Door there's no turning back. You will be fully dedicated and unable to change it.
The answer to the riddle is always in the description of one of the Lore fragments. There are several questions it may ask, so I can't tell you the answer. This should be enough to get you started on dreaming, so I won't tell you the rest.

Secret Histories Lore fragments work differently from the rest, in that it's not needed for most things. It IS however, needed to find Vaults. Put the Secret Histories Lore into the Explore Verb and it will turn into a Vault. (The level and difficulty of the Vault depend on the level of the Lore sacrificed.) Vaults will be your main source of Lore, Tools, and Ingredients for the mid to late game. Each vault has a set of obstacles that need to be defeated in order to beat it. You will need to put Followers into the Vault to overcome the obstacles it poses, and Funds to sustain your followers. Each obstacle requires certain Principles to overcome, that you must meet with your Followers. Each Follower belongs to a certain Principle, and you must use that in order to finish a Vault. After finishing a Vault, you will receive a large number of rewards, that will give you a great boost in the steps towards ascension. Now that you know how to complete vaults, you can figure the rest out on your own.

To answer your questions about Influences, they're basically only used in Rites. Rites are special items you can use for various means, but most often it's summoning a temporary follower. Once you obtain a rite, putting in certain cards with certain aspects will do certain things. It's fairly complex, but I should note that every summoning ritual takes at least a little Knock. You can figure out how to use Influences when you get farther in the game, but for now, you can probably just ignore them.

You mentioned that you can talk to people, but you're not sure what to talk about. If you talk to your cult, and put in an acquaintance, you can recruit them by putting in Lore and/or a Tool with enough of your cults respective Principle. If you talk to your cult about someone who's already recruited, you can promote to strengthen their Principle even further, but this will take a higher intensity of your cults Principle. If a Follower's Principle is the same as your cults Principle, you can then promote one last time to increase their Principle to an even higher degree, but this takes a VERY high intensity.

If you talk to your followers about your cult, they can perform various tasks depending on their Principle. I'll let you figure out what all they do, but I will caution you that they can sometimes fail, and if they fail they can sometimes be wounded from it.

If you look at your job, it may have the aspect "an annoyance". If you talk to and Edge or Grail follower about your job, they may be able to remove that annoyance for you, allowing you to get promoted in your job, or have a more lenient timer. I don't remember what happens if they fail to remove the annoyance for you, but I'm sure it can't be anything good, so be careful.

Lastly, always check the aspects of things. If you click a card, you can see its aspects at the bottom of the card window. You can then click on the aspect to see what it is. This may help you realize something you didn't know before. If you click on an empty slot in a verb, it will show you what can go in that slot in the card window. Again, this can help you come up with more solutions.

I hope this really long comment helps you out!

[Drillbert]

Sort of getting it, thanks. I've been health-exploring a little as the dancer but no shop yet. I guess I have to keep trying. I also upgraded the temptation card to Change Leaf, which was a cool little moment. I want to like this game but I underestimated the grind.

[Kovgun]

Its probably useful to note that 'the dancer' is part of a DLC and is therefore a bit more difficult than most other paths. So that may cause a bit of confusion for you. You can also get your cult members to explore for you. As for the grind... pretty much. A lot of fun but it can take a while to get a character properly set up. One suggestion I might have is that you don't have to pay a whole bunch of attention to time passing thing unless you're worried about something specifically(for example, if you have multiple dread cards.)

[Nakos]

Originally posted by Drillbert:

But I feel like all I've experienced so far is my stats. I don't know what I'm supposed to actually DO. I know that my temptation card needs to be upgraded, but I'm not sure how. I made it into a dedication card once, so maybe it's that. No idea what did that though.

I am not ... *Unhappy*
I worked, I slaved, I lived a sort of life.

What you are supposed to do, is breath in the discomfort, to harness your Restlessness, to explore the hidden corners of the world and gnaw at the mysteries of life.

Seek out the secret Histories of the world, gather knowledge, friends, resources.

Strive! Seek! Find! .... and never Yield.

[Drillbert]

Originally posted by Kovgun:

Its probably useful to note that 'the dancer' is part of a DLC and is therefore a bit more difficult than most other paths. So that may cause a bit of confusion for you. You can also get your cult members to explore for you. As for the grind... pretty much. A lot of fun but it can take a while to get a character properly set up. One suggestion I might have is that you don't have to pay a whole bunch of attention to time passing thing unless you're worried about something specifically(for example, if you have multiple dread cards.)

yeah I realised. Money in, money out. So long as you don't have fascination when the check comes by or restlessness when the dread check is coming, you can just tick up your stats.

[mhm_cake]

Originally posted by Drillbert:

Originally posted by Kovgun:

Its probably useful to note that 'the dancer' is part of a DLC and is therefore a bit more difficult than most other paths. So that may cause a bit of confusion for you. You can also get your cult members to explore for you. As for the grind... pretty much. A lot of fun but it can take a while to get a character properly set up. One suggestion I might have is that you don't have to pay a whole bunch of attention to time passing thing unless you're worried about something specifically(for example, if you have multiple dread cards.)

yeah I realised. Money in, money out. So long as you don't have fascination when the check comes by or restlessness when the dread check is coming, you can just tick up your stats.

To add a little, you can Dream on Funds to buy drugs, which will give you a contentment, which counters Dread. Additionally, Buzzing in the Brain (which you can get by Dreaming on Passion and Moth, Lantern, or Knock Lore) decays to Restlessness which decays to Dread, which can automatically counter Fascination. Lastly, if you put Fascination and Dread in your Dream verb together, you can use them to counter each other, and delete them both.

[citablekettle]

Originally posted by Drillbert:

Cards decay before I can figure out how to use them. Sometimes I get something that seems really good like "subtle fracture" or "buzzing in the brain", but it's gone so quickly that I've never known what it is.

Ability to Pause should help, makes time to decay less restricting. Inspect properties of cards and slots, figure out what currently missing thing would match.