Bad Moon Strategy
From TheKolWiki
Introduction
Unlike other types of runs, there is a formula to Bad Moon because there are are fewer options under this sign. It is, however, only a suggested route. Read through the goals for each day and go about them in the best way. Each run is different, so modify this schedule based on how lucky or unlucky your run is.
Mysticality classes may be a day behind where Moxie classes are a day ahead, but finishing Day 5 with a Liver of Steel is very possible. Do not worry too much about finishing in 13 days - it is a rough way for you to assess how ahead or behind you are. Read the section at the end on skills, survival, semi-rares, and filthy lucre before starting your run. Always read a few steps ahead as it could be beneficial to switch steps around. Once again, every run will be different and choices due to Stat Days, holidays, bounty choices, luck, and personal goals will alter the ascension. This guide will provide the backbone to customize a BM run and get through it in good time.
The guide should help everyone, but is primarily geared towards players who have never done a BM run before. Top leaderboard spots will require deviation from the guide in several spots, but it should help speed players too, if nothing else, as a checklist of things to do and not to do.
General tips
- There are five special meat adventures in Bad Moon, for a total of 15000 meat. You'll want to hit all of these, typically within the first few days. This will allow you to purchase skills.
- You'll want the Pride and Envy Bad Moon skills in every run, and soon. You'll want Gluttony later on, when you have better food available, and when stats from combats aren't so slim. If you're a moxie class, you might want to get Wrath and/or Lust, depending on your playing style. Greed is very bad and should never be purchased, ever.
- If you're a myst class, you will want to maximize dime drops during the level 12 war, and get macrame nets for the NS battle. This is so incredibly important that it needs to be stated now, before you reach level 12 and waste precious, irreplaceable battlefield turns. Failure to get 30 or so macrame nets as a myst class will add at least a day to your run, and cause you vast grief.
- If you're doing a black cat run, the fight against your shadow is the toughest part, and will require a bit of advance planning. Pick up the scented massage oil semi-rare. Non-black-cat runners may still want this, but it's not critical.
Day 1
- Visit the Toot Oriole and open the letter from King Ralph XI. Equip what you can, and use your clan's klaw, selling any prizes for Meat.
- Autosell all the pork elf gems for 2,500 meat.
- Eat to 15 fullness on Brimstone foods, this will get you to level 3 right off the bat. Do this before adventuring so you won't have any offstats for the food to kill. Muscle classes should eat 1 Chicken Sandwich, then 4 Beezleburgers. Mysticality classes should eat 4 Lord of the fries, then 1 Chicken Sandwich. Moxie classes should eat 4 Chicken Sandwiches, then one Beezleburger. NOTE: IT IS IMPORTANT TO EAT THEM IN THIS ORDER.
- Spend 400 meat on Pride ASAP.
- Head to town and visit the Pretentious Artist for his quest and Doc Galaktik for his quest. It doesn't hurt to try, as inadvertent completion is possible.
- Visit your class Guild and speak to the leader to start the guild unlock quest.
- Visit the Bounty Hunter Hunter to pick a bounty.
- The Spooky Forest for the mosquito larva.For the choice adventure, Arboreal Respite, get the items required for the Spooky Temple Map Quest, and then either spices or spooky mushrooms (for the grue omlette later in the game).
- Buy a terrarium and get a volleyball and a seal tooth from The Hermitage and create a blood-faced volleyball as soon as possible.
- The Haiku Dungeon for a fairy gravy boat and a bugbear bungguard (this is for a Baby Gravy Fairy and some early stats), but do not spend more than 10 turns here. If you do not get the gravy boat, come back later.
- The Haunted Pantry to open the Manor.
- Finish guild unlock quest if necessary and get drinks from The Barrel full of Barrels (top only).
- Drink as many mixed drinks as you can, and save one for the nightcap. Try to stay away from Mad Train wine unless you have nothing else to drink.
- Go visit your guild and get the 1,000 meat from your nemesis quest (This becomes available shortly before you reach level 4). Use this money to buy Envy from Meansucker's House.
- Tavern Cellar until you get Of Course!. Be sure to visit the Suspicious-Looking Guy for free goofballs while you're there. The mixed drinks from the barrel and the flagons of Typical Tavern swill from the tavern quest should be all the booze you need for today.
- Adventure in the outskirts of cobb's knob until you obtain the encryption code.
- Turn in rat whiskers for a nice pot of meat.
- The Sleazy Back Alley for Chronologically Pummeled (Mad Train wine and a bum cheek are useful items to pick up along the way). If you are a Myst class, use all 10 adventures of Chronologically Pummeled in the The Haunted Kitchen. you should run from the possessed silverware drawer to get yourself a shiny butcherknife (see the class survival guide far below to see why). If playing a Pastamancer, get scintillating powder.
- If you didn't get the bum's cheek, keep adventuring until you get it.
- Keep adventuring in the Spooky Forest until you get the 1000 meat from the This Doesn't Look Like Candy Mountain adventure. The Missing Kidney effect is unknown - you will just have to deal with it for now, whatever it does.
Your main goal for the day is to get Pride, Envy, a blood-faced volleyball, eat and drink to fullness, and get to level 4.
If you get Beaten Up, do barrels and try to get a fairy gravy boat from The Haiku Dungeon (in order of importance). Try to use HP restorers as much as you can without being wasteful with meat so you do not get beaten up. You only have 1 skill that uses MP, so you might as well use that as much as possible.
You should always find the best use of the daily Styx Pixie Buffs.
| Buff |
Stat |
Bonus
|
| Hella Tough |
+25% Muscle |
+10 weapon damage, +5 damage reduction
|
| Hella Smart |
+25% Mysticality |
+10-15 MP/turn, +15 spell damage
|
| Hella Smooth |
+25% Moxie |
+40% meat drops, +20% item drops
|
If you have questions about a Bad Moon effect or adventure, you can find out more information here.
Day 2
- Check Noblesse Oblige to see what The Daily Dungeon holds. Now match the stat tests with this chart. If you can pass all the tests today, try getting a key. You do not have to do it first thing, but keep it in mind for when you get beaten up, etc. A key in the next 3 days is very important and the key that matches your class is what you want. After you get it, ignore the dungeon until late in the game. You will only need to do the dungeon twice. Skip the first two chests - they are not worth it. Also note that by the end of today you may have a skeleton key or two to use.
- Also check the bounty. If you can get it in a few turns, finish yesterday's bounty. If not, try a new one. Do not use the lucre yet. You will need 2 lucres on day 4.
- Get Degrassi Knoll shopping list from guild, visit The Untinker's Cottage.
- Degrassi Knoll to get bitchin' meatcar. If you get the meat maid outfit parts, it is worthwhile making a maid for your campground. If you just get the frilly skirt or an extra frilly skirt, do not autosell it (it may be useful much later).
- Adventure in the Degrassi Knoll until you get Flowers For (Familiar Name) for 2,000 meat. Buy Sloth from Meansucker's, this will help you survive in South of The Border, and the bat chamber.
- Adventure in South of The Border until you get The Beaten-Senseless Man's Hand. While you are beaten up, adventure in the The Spooky Forest trying to unlock the hidden temple, and get mixed drinks from barrels.
- Guano Junction until 2 sonars. Briefcases should most likely be opened since you need the meat, but if you can manage to save one, it may save you some turns much later.
- Adventure in the beanbat chamber for enchanted beans, and eat Enchanted bean burritos for all food.
- Use meat to buy tenderizing hammer from Nervewrecker's Store for 500 (not 1000 from market) and make the epic weapon.
- Get to level 5, Outskirts of Cobb's Knob for chef's hat and Knob Goblin encryption key - don't forget a Knob Goblin lunchbox for your semi-rare.
- Cemetary as much as you can to open tower
- Use the Styx Pixie buff to help you defeat the boss bat.
- Get the elite knobs guard uniform. Also, DO NOT adventure in the treasury so you don't trigger the Animal Exploiter buff, which you will need tomorrow to kill the Goblin King and Baron von Ratsworth.
- If you're a Pastamancer, Sauceror or Disco Bandit, buy a Dramatic™ range (from Nervewrecker's Store). All classes should consider a class specific skill. Healing skills are really nice early on unless you are a Muscle class, in which case you can use medicinal herbs.
If you get beaten up, do barrels, spooky forest until The Hidden Temple is open or try to get fairy gravy from Haiku dungeon (in order of importance). If you are lucky enough to get the maid outfit, getting a meat maid is worth it. Otherwise, it is not worth farming in Degrassi Knoll.
Your main goals for the day are to get the epic weapon, meatcar, eat & drink to fullness, and get to level 5.
Day 3
- The Haunted Billiards Room to open The Haunted Library. Make sure you have an extra Handful of hand chalk after the library is unlocked.
- If you haven't already, get the Elite Cobbs Knob uniform. Wear it and adventure in the harem for a nice 75 substat bonus.
- Adventure in the Typical Tavern until you find the Baron Von Ratsworth manor. DO NOT fight yet, as you will likely lose.
- Adventure in the Kitchens in Elite uniform for the cake.
- Adventure in the treasury until you obtain the Animal Exploiter adventure.
- Use the Styx Pixie buff, the Handful of hand chalk, and fight the Goblin King. Make sure you are full health, as the Goblin King will hit hard (20+ damage for non-moxie classes). Thanks to your high strength, you should be able to kill him in 2 hits.
- While you are still buffed, fight and kill Baron von Ratsworth, the monocle is a really nice item to have the whole game and worth the trouble to get.
- The Kitchens for a knob mushroom to make a gravy fairy ASAP.
- The "Fun" House for 2 boxen, good equipment, epic weapon, and Bugbear Costume.
- Sell your tenderizing hammer once you have the Legendary Epic Weapon (unless you are a Muscle class and wish to use the respective smithing skill).
- Beanbat Chamber for spicy enchanted bean burritos (your diet for the day).
- Cemetery for a smart skull and opening Fernswarthy's Tower, hopefully a dead guy's watch. If you get the Braaains effect, the highest meat drops will be from the Misspelled Cemetary and Fernswarthy's Tower, so do not waste these turns.
- Fernswarthy's Tower to complete the Wizard of Ego quest and get a disembodied brain, two if you are a Disco Bandit for a Bartender-in-the-box.
- Once you are out of adventures and have not eaten, make a chef-in-the-box, then make burritos and pizzas, eat, and backfarm for what you are missing.
If you get Beaten Up, do The Barrel full of Barrels, The Spooky Forest until The Hidden Temple is open (once you open the temple, do a few more turns to get Torso Awaregness), go to sewer from trinkets (need 5 total), or go to temple for awesome stats (in order of importance).
Your main goals for the day are to get a fairy gravy boat, a chef-in-the-box, and to eat as best you can. You should be level 6 by now.
Depending on your class, consider eating the following foods (in order of adventures): knob pasties, tasty tarts, spicy noodles, spicy bean burritos, boring spaghetti, pizzas, lemon pie / strawberry pie / ghoul egg pie / lihc eye pie / brains casserole, and tacos. Avoid eating anything other than these foods. Farm where you need to and get just enough to get you through today and tomorrow. A good way of knowing what it is best to eat can be found here.
You should have the Elite Uniform by now from the semi-rare. The outfit itself is useful, but you can now use seltzers as MP restorers, and you have some very nice items to use. Although meat is scarce at the moment, consider using pet-buffing spray when you are farming (it equals about an 8% increase in item drops) in areas with few non-combats and can stand to lose 10% stats. Learning pills are not really worth the stats they give.
The epic weapon is useful in every class, but the Legendary Epic Weapon is not useful as a Pastamancer and optional for Muscle classes. It should be mandatory for Moxie classes and Saucerors, which will not find better weapons until very late in the game if at all.
Day 4
- Get Gluttony as late in the day as possible (for extra stats).
- You need 2 filthy lucre: one for an odor extractor and one for some Oreille Divisée brandy. You should also have a dungeon key (most preferably the one for your class). Buff up and head to Menagerie Level 1. Use the extractor on the Fruit Golem. By now, your fairy should be ~7-8 lbs. Now drink your brandy to get the Hoity Toity effect (+30% item drops), equip your monocle, and use some pet-buffing spray to farm some cherries and limes. It may be hard for you to survive this zone so early so you may want to consider first going to the Knob Treasury or Harem for a +40 Muscle or Moxie buff, respectively. Note that this has the disadvantage of cutting down the weight of your fairy, but it may be a necessary tradeoff. Also, if you have not used it yet, the Minioned effect (+20 Muscle) from the Outskirts of Cobb's Knob can be used. Do not forget your pixie buff, cans of hair spray, and Ben-Gal™ Balm, as well.
- At this point, you may still have some loose ends to tie up - no Legendary Epic Weapon, Bugbear Costume, dungeon key, disembodied brain, smart skull, etc. If you have the turns, work on acquiring these.
- Put together your bartender-in-the-box if you can.
You should not get Beaten Up anymore. Keep your HP up and do not fight things that are beyond your ability to hit.
Your main goals for the day are to get a supply of food, a bartender, and some meat for a new skill. You should be at or close to level 7 now.
From now on, you should be eating 3 key lime pies plus a 3-fullness pie each day. If you eat a fortune cookie, eat 2 tasty tarts/Knob pasties with it instead of having a pie. Consider that you will need to farm the Menagerie again to have enough food for the rest of your run. You should do it sometime in the next 3-4 days.
Day 5
- Use all the buffs you can (Styx Pixie, cans of hair spray, etc.) and do the Friars' quest. You should switch to your volleyball for the heart and elbow. You will likely get a bunch of hot wings - if you have a frilly skirt, put it along with 3 hot wings in your closet because you will need them much later.
- Use Brother Corsican's Blessing (You should always use this choice unless your fairy is at 20 lbs or you are farming goat cheese).
- Obtain the steel margarita. Use as many buffs as you can and finish this quest. It is critical to get this done by the end of day 5.
- Whitey's Grove to open The Road to the White Citadel. Choice adventures worth getting include a white collar, boxed wine, and jars of white lightning. Get a catgut if you are a Pastamancer.
- The Road to the White Citadel to finish the quest and hopefully acquire the hippy outfit. The lucky rabbit's foot you get as the quest reward is very nice to have in Bad Moon. You also now have access to Cloaca Colas for MP restoration, although seltzers from the Laboratory are still more cost efficient if you have the Elite Guard Uniform.
- Whitey's Grove again for the bad moon adventure (gain 5000 meat, -20% stats for 10 turns).
Your main goal is to get the the Friar's quest done and get Steel Margarita. It is a simple, but very important goal. Try to get through as much of the White Citadel Quest as you can, but it is not critical to finish it today. Consider stat days and follow the order of progression, but days at this point may blend into one another. You should end the day at or close to Level 8.
Day 6
- Take 5 trips at The Shore, Inc. to open island. You can now drink shots using fermenting powder and fruit and this should be all you drink before getting drunk until you get to level 11 because you get more turns than from regular mixed drinks. DBs are an obvious exception.
- If you still do not have the dungeon key of your class, go to The Dungeons of Doom to get a wand, potions, and hopefully a ring of aggravate monster or two. The main purpose of the wand is zapping dungeon keys, but also consider zapping outfits, rings, and class specific food and booze. Only use one zap a day. If you already have the right key and the outfit pieces you need, this can wait a day.
- Finish day 5 tasks that you have not completed. You might still need a hippy outfit piece.
- Knob Harem for harem girl outfit and perfume.
- A Barroom Brawl within the Tavern to get a Leprechaun if you did not get one earlier. You will only use him once, but he will make a big difference and perhaps, at this level, you can pick up some nice stats in the tavern.
Let's assess where you are at this point. You have food (key lime pies and stir fries/lo meins), drinks (shots from hippy store & market), and high item drops (20 lb fairy, Envy, Baron's monocle, and a rabbit's foot). What you may be worried about is the number of quests you still have not completed. Do not worry too much about this. Your goal is to now start leveling faster and completing some quests along the way, but do not go back to fight at lower levels just yet. You should be level 8 now.
Day 7
- Throne Room to finish Knob quest (use volleyball).
- Itznotyerzitz Mine for outfit and weapon (hopefully chrome).
- Haunted Library to open both upstairs and get 1-2 scrolls of unspeakable evil. If you are a Disco Bandit, the scroll will save you 6 turns much later, but a second is unnecessary. Other classes save at least 9 turns for the first scroll and about 6 for the second. If you are a Mysticality class, try to get the Cookbook of the Damned.
- The Goatlet for 6 goat cheese & sabre teeth (do not forget Brother Flying Burrito's Blessing).
- Stop playing once you finish up with the Goatlet, you want to use burrito blessing for a task first thing tomorrow.
That is probably all you can handle for the day. You should be able to reach level 9. Do the Strange Leaflet Quest to get the house, grue egg (for an omelette), and the stat boost.
Day 8
- Do not drink too much. You will use some drunkenness in the Barrr.
- Use the Burrito blessing again. Farm limes in the Menagerie using an odor extractor and all your item drop gear.
- The Pirate's Cove for the outfit.
- Barrrtleby's Barrrgain Bookstore to buy the dictionary and the book of insults.
- Clear the Cyrpt. Remember to use the non-combats well: always pick your mainstat, always choose the second option in the cranny, and ignore the rest. Use your fairy to get a dead guy's watch and skeleton keys. Otherwise use your volleyball in the nook and niche and your leprechaun in the alcove and cranny. You can finally replace that shiny ring with a badass belt.
- The Orc Chasm to finish quest. Don't forget to get the semi-rare first. If you get extra scrolls, going for a 31337 scroll is worthwhile. You also need at least one lowercase N. A meat vortex, f3d0r4, and pr0n legs are good to have too. You can sell the dictionary or, if you are a seal clubber, make a sword behind inappropriate prepositions.
- Barrrney's Barrr using insults until you get 6 insults. If you get choice adventures, always go with stats, even if they give you drunkenness. The exception is the A Test of Testarrrsterone, in which Moxie classes should chose option 3 and other classes option 1 (option 2 usually gives less stats at this level and yields drunkenness). You should get enough bottles of rum to restock your booze. Use Cap'm Caronch's Map with leprechaun equipped. One last turn for the blueprints.
- If you happen to have the Frat Outfit or a frilly skirt and 3 hot wings, you can finish up the Barrr and move on to the F'c'le (see start of day 9).
- Bedroom to open ballroom. Get spectacles if you can. This may be tough, so avoid combats and choose meat or your mainstat.
- Ballroom until you get quartet adventure. Choose second option for -5% combats. This is almost always helpful and the few spots where it is not helpful barely make a difference.
- At this point, you will want to do some leveling up. How you do this depends on your class and how you want to play. You will need to decide now how you want to get +5 familiar weight for the giant familiars (the other +15 will be taken care of). There are three options:
- Spend time setting up the Guy Made Of Bees to finish the arena sidequest easily and maybe get a guy made of bee pollen for +6-10 turns and some nice stats,
- If you are a Pastamancer or Turtle Tamer, you can spend 11,000 and 1,800 respectively on class specific skills,
- You can do the arena sidequest by slapping fliers on leftover quests like the pyramid chambers.
As a Mysticality class, the best place to level at this point is actually the bedroom if you fight for every non-combat (Avg.=33 Mysticality per turn), but you will find this very difficult. The next two next best options are the gallery and the bathroom. If you consider that is takes an average of 10 turns to open the gallery using the conservatory, you will average 28 Mysticality per turn. Again, you may find this difficult at such a low level, but this is clearly the best place if you need to level later in the game. The bathroom gives 26 Mysticality per turn, is easy to survive, gives some nice items (towel = cape for +5% items and a tower item), and you can say the guy made of bees 4 times to set up an easy way of completing the arena sidequest. Pastamancers are guaranteed the guy made of bee pollen because of entangling noodles, but other classes should have a good chance to get it, too. It will cost about 5-10 turns to get the antique mirror and another 5-10 to get the bathroom adventure you need, so you actually lose turns from the guy made of bee pollen, but you do not lose much and it makes your life pretty easy. Go the bathroom route, but the gallery route may end up being more optimal if you can manage it.
As a Moxie class, the most optimal area to level up is clearly the ballroom. It will require surviving the bedroom (29 Moxie per turn if you chose combats or 18 Moxie per turn if you chose meat instead). You do have to do this eventually anyway and it is worth playing the quartet song this early. If you do not use an extractor in the ballroom, you get 36 Moxie per turn. If you spend the extra turns to get an extractor, you average 48 Moxie per turn. Even if it takes you 40 turns to get that lucre, you still come out ahead in stats if you use the extractor. The bathroom only gets you 17 Moxie per turn. You may later find it easier if you set up the guy made of bees now, but it is clearly most optimal to head to the ballroom.
Turtle Tamers should always buy Amphibian Sympathy since it is cheap, skip the arena sidequest, and open the gallery.
Seal Clubbers have a tougher choice. The gallery will initially give 44 Muscle per turn on average, but will require wasting 10 or so turns in the conservatory. There are some nice weapons in the gallery, but surviving here may be tough. The next best option is Barrrney's Barrr with an average of 26 Muscle gained per turn. Survival is not hard, but item drops are not great. After this, the peak is the best option with an average of 22 Muscle gained per turn. The meat gain and items (burritos and cheetos) make the peak a great place for seal clubbers, but cold resistance is not easy to get. If you get really lucky, you might zap a ring of cold resistance, but otherwise this option is pretty much out for now. Last on the list is the bathroom with 17 Muscle gained per turn. This is not a great return compared to the gallery, but it is much easier and can be used to set up The Guy Made Of Bees.
One way to weigh your options is to estimate how many turns it will take to level up. Let’s say you are a Seal Clubber and you see that you need 4 Muscle to reach level 10 in your character pane. You look at your Muscle at it takes 277 to gain one Muscle. Add a few points because they will increase, so 280x4=1120. Using the average gains per turn, you can figure out about how many turns it will take for you to level up and therefore weigh your options. For instance, in this case, it will take about 26 turns in the gallery if it is open, 43 in the Barrr, and 66 in the bathroom. If you have not opened the gallery, you might consider the Barrr. If you are not worried about losing 40 turns and you want an easy way, try the bathroom.
You may also want to look ahead at the section of leveling up at level 10 and beyond to help in your decision on what path to take now.
You should be close to or at level 10. You should enough food via limes to last until better food becomes easily accessible in a few days.
Day 9
- Finish getting to level 10.
- There are three ways to get through frat house blueprints:
- equip the Frat Boy Ensemble (option 1),
- equip a mullet wig and have a briefcase (option 2), or
- equip a frilly skirt and have 3 hot wings (option 3). Option 3 is the easiest - if you do not have the frilly skirt, it drops in the orcish frathouse. Option 2 is difficult because it most likely means waiting until late level 11 for a briefcase. Option 1 may just require a wand zap or may require farming in the Orcish frathouse. At level 10, the non-combats show up quickly to drop your missing parts.
- Barrrney's Barrr for 2 turns (Insult Beer Pong).
- The F'c'le with maximum item drop equipment and fairy. Hopefully you will get a barrrnacle. Some other nice drops here too like the curmudgel. Finish the quest to get pirate fledges.
- The Penultimate Fantasy Airship for an A. Use your fairy here for many other useful items that can drop. Get the S.O.C.K.
- Use umbrella, Oil of Parrrlay, or some other form of cold resistance to finish the Tr4pz0r quest.
- Cook a cocoa egg and get yourself a cocoabo. Once you hit level 11, this guy is going to be really helpful. He will heal you, let you use more spells to kill things, attack, let you keep your buffs running, and even give you some meat every so often. He should basically replace your volleyball once you get to level 11 because stat gain is based more on noncombats.
- Use a few bang! potions after getting drunk. If you get teleportitis, you can use eyedrops to get rid of it. You want to find the potions that causes drunkenness and also figure out your other potions since these are useful for boosting stats and item drops. Just use them wisely and keep 1 of each for the tower.
You should be level 10. You have plenty of nice equipment by now. Do not get beaten up here! You may be getting hit hard, so keep your HP up at all times. If you do manage to get beaten up, time to farm a few pixels with +ML gear on. This is the reason you waited to go there until now.
Day 10
- Castle, keeping the wheel turned to your main stat. You can use a volleyball here. Try to turn it a second time just before hitting level 11. Do not go to the council to finish the quest before the second turn of the wheel or it will trigger a BM adventure that is a waste of a turn.
- Level up to level 11. This should not take too long, but here are your options for leveling beyond level 9. Because of caps on the maximum amount of stats you can get based on your current stats, some things have changed since level 9. Also, you are strong enough to easily fight monsters in places that were difficult before. Although the numbers change a little, the order of best places to go does not change at higher levels.
- Mysticality classes are best off in the Gallery (average 42 Mysticality per turn). The Castle and the Bedroom are only slightly worse (40 Mysticality per turn). If you did not open up the gallery earlier, do so now. Do not bother keeping the wheel in the castle on your mainstat because you can get just as good of a return in the bedroom.
- Muscle classes that have opened the Gallery gain an average of 54 Muscle per turn. Next on the list is the Castle (40 Muscle per turn), followed by the Bedroom (35 Muscle per turn). Again, it is probably not worth keeping the wheel on your mainstat in the castle, especially since it starts on Muscle. If you have a lot of stats to gain, it may even be worth it to open the gallery if you have not done so already.
- Moxie classes have no hard choice to make – always go to the Ballroom. Without an extractor, you gain 48 Moxie per turn, with one you gain 63 Moxie per turn. You probably do not need that much leveling, so it should not be worth wasting a lucre at this point.
- The Black Forest to open The Black Market. Picnic baskets and blackberries (for schnapps) can be quite nice drops. Don't forget to buy your black paint in advance.
- Shore for MacGuffin diary.
- Test a few more bang! potions.
Again, avoid getting beaten up by keeping your HP high and farm pixels or use a tiny house if you do happen to get beaten up. Avoid using soft green eyedrops, they are far too valuable to be used now on removing beaten up effects. You should reach level 11 today.
Day 11
Do not drink anything yet.
- The Arid, Extra-Dry Desert until you find Gnasir.
- Get rid of bad effects by going to Hidden Temple for a few turns.
- An Oasis until you get the stone rose and a drum machine. Use your fairy - there are lots of great items to be had here.
- Finish desert quest. If you have extra turns of ultrahydrated, use then in the extra-dry desert with a fairy because you may get lucky with some awesome items. Use spleen items if they drop (with usual caveats for muscle classes needing spleen for herbs). Turn every 5 handfuls of sand into a brick.
- Open Spookyraven Manor Wine Cellar.
- Wine cellar buffed up as much as you can to get some glyph 4 wines and finish that part of the quest. Use Smothers's Blessing. You should get enough glyph 4 wines to get you through today along with Supernova Champagne and blackberry schnapps.
- If you have a scroll of ancient forbidden unspeakable evil and 3 thin black candles, kill Lord Spookyraven. If not, wait to kill him for when you kill other bosses. If you kill him and have the items, say Ak'gyxoth in the chamber. You get 3 advanced cocktails which you can use for nightcaps.
- Open The Hidden City.
- The Poop Deck to open Belowdecks. Use volleyball. Only item worth using later is the booty chest charrrm. Keep track of how many turns you spend here. If you spent 10 turns and do not get the O Cap'm, My Cap'm adventure, you might consider going back here to level if you need to later. You are guaranteed to get the adventure after 30 turns and if you get it in the next 10 (for instance) your average gain will be 45 of your mainstat, which rivals the best places for stats at your level.
- Belowdecks with fairy until you can make the talisman. Good items here include grungy bandana, buoybottoms, acoustic guitarrr, and the grungy flannel shirt.
- The Palindome until you get stunt nuts & put items on shelf.
- While beaten up, you can manage the lab and 3 turns at Whitey's.
- The Hidden City until you have all the spheres and the temple open. Killing protector spirits in BM can be tough. The items that help the most are the grungy bandana, obsidian dagger, tarrrnished charrrm bracelet, happiness, and cannonball charrrm bracelet. Using combat items like bottles of alcohol or cocktail napkins may also help. You can also try stunning items and just waiting for the cannonball charrrm to kill them. Finally, you can try some effects like summoning the demon that gives +30 elemental damage or some BM damage effects by visiting Guano Junction or the goatlet. These BM adventures show up pretty fast. One last option is farming scrolls of ancient forbidden unspeakable evil for instant kills.
- Finish getting Mega Gem.
There are two reasons for doing the level 11 quest in this order: getting useful items early and fighting easier monsters before moving on to tough ones.
If you get beaten up today, place spheres on altars, get wet stew ingredients from Whitey's, finish farming pixels, and as a last resort, farm for 1 goat cheese, the barrrnacle, the potato sprout in the conservatory, a magic whistle, or for seal clubbers - a bar skin (bar whip component). You should be more than halfway to level 12.
Day 12
- Eat the rest of your best food and drinks. Remember to save 1 lime for a possible sabre-toothed lime at the tower. Your goal is to make it to level 12 and finish the filthworm quest so you can get some of the best food and drink you can find in BM.
- Buff up and kill Dr. Awkward, Protector Spectre, and Lord Spookyraven. Consider Barrrgain Bookstore, Black Market, Blood of the Wereseal, cans of hair spray & Ben-Gal™ Balm, known bang! potions, and anything else you may have in your inventory, but hold off on using the Styx Pixie buff just yet. Do not forget to use your volleyball here.
- The Upper Chamber to get wooden wheel.
- The Middle Chamber to open The Lower Chambers.
- The Hole in the Sky to start farming stars and lines until you reach level 12. Do not make Richard's star key until you have all your stars and lines or else it will trigger a BM adventure that is a waste of a turn.
- Put on your hippy outfit and get the War Hippy Fatigues by adventuring in The Hippy Camp. The problem in BM is that surviving combats at high levels may be difficult and you want to save resources for when you must fight. By choosing this route, you get the outfit in about 20 turns, the stats are pretty good, and if you get beaten up a few times by the only combat adventure, it is not such a big deal.
- Put on your war hippy fatigues, buff up, and start the war by adventuring in the orcish frat house.
- Complete the filthworm side quest as a hippy. Maximize item drops (fairy, Object Detection, monocle, rabbit's foot, miner's helmet, pet buffing spray, Knob Goblin eyedrops, etc.). Now you can eat pies and drink schnapps from the store.
- Equip your leprechaun and complete the nun's side quest as a hippy. Maximize meat drops (pet-buffing spray, nasal spray, bag of Cheat-Os, Mick's IcyVapoHotness Inhaler, Preternatural Greed from the Summoning Chamber - the reason you farmed a 2nd scroll earlier, Hella Smooth buff from Styx Pixie, white collar, booty chest charrrm bracelet, box, acoustic guitarrr, etc.). Buying Greed at this point only saves about 4 turns, but if you have the meat to spare and you are going for a speed run, it may be worth it to you. Preternatural Greed saves about 6 turns if you have 2 inhalers.
Doing the level 12 quest as a hippy has three big advantages in bad moon and it should always be done this way.
- The food and drink from the filthworm quest will be wanted as early as possible and with a 20+ lb fairy, it should take just a few turns to complete.
- By doing the arena sidequest as a hippy, you get Optimist Primal, which adds 5 lbs to your familiar, which saves you from leveling your familiars at the tower.
- The sidequests as a hippy are all relatively painless compared to the frat ones. You should however check the level 12 optimizer created by AFH to have a sense of how long each sidequest will take and based on what items you have possibly do an extra quest or avoid one quest. It can be found here:
http://www.yfont.info/optimizr/
You now have access to unlimited food and drink and an extra source of HP restoration.
If you did not set up the guy made of bees and you are not going to buy a +5 familiar skill, you will want to level up instead of doing the upper and lower chamber, killing Ed, and farming the Hole in the Sky so you can use flyers here. Do realize that using flyers during a BM run is really painful, although if you can manage it, it may give you a faster run.
Day 13
- Eat and drink from the hippy store. Get to 18 drunkenness.
- The Hole in the Sky for key, starfish, hat, and weapon. Again remember to make the key last.
- Kill Ed.
- Complete duck quest (remember to use chaos butterfly and do fence, lantern, drums to get shortcut).
- Start killing frat boys until Arena sidequest opens (gremlins are costly to beat in BM and the rewards are not that great and Sonofa Beach takes too many turns, but check AFH website anyway).
- You can use a Frat Army FGF for a 1 drunkenness drink.
- If you have a chloroform rag, a sausage bomb, a brick of sand, or are a Pastamancer, you should go get an antique hand mirror from The Haunted Bedroom. It will be worth it.
- Bathroom until you get The Guy Made Of Bees. Use a stunning item or entangling noodles if you can. Use flyers. Use antique mirror. If you stun the GMoB, you can complete the arena quest and get a guy made of bee pollen in just a few turns. If not, you get beaten up and you do not get a guy made of bee pollen, but you still finish the arena quest quickly. Use a soft green echo eyedrop antidote to get rid of the beaten up effect.
- Go to the arena to complete quest (this is suggested if you do not have a skill for +5 lbs for your familiar).
- Clear the Battlefield.
- Hand in your dimes in exchange for filthy poultices and ferret baits (in about equal quantity).
- You should be at or close to level 13 without a need to level up, but if you need to, do so before killing The Man.
- Buff yourself to the max and kill The Man with everything you have to throw at him. Do not underestimate how tough this fight can be. There are many ways to beat him. Here are a few methods that seem to be very effective:
- Get your Moxie up to about 250. He will barely hit you. Plink away at him with a ranged weapon or combat items and if you can manage hitting him for 50 damage per round, you will win.
- Use delevelers and stunners. Pastamancers can use gobs of wet hair and their spice ghost. The drowsy sword and moxious maneuvers works for Moxie classes or just the drowsy sword for Muscle classes. Knob Goblin stink bomb, patchouli incense sticks, roofies, and ferret bait are just a few other delevelers that you may have extra of. Chloroform rags & bricks of sand make great stunners if you have them, but only use them if you really need to since they also help against the NS. You may need to use HP restorers too, but again use them as a last resort. Using one massage oil is worthwhile if you are about to die.
- Kill him fast. This works well for Pastamancers with a Staff of the Black Kettle. With max spell damage, you can do 500 damage per hit, so you only have to last 4-5 rounds. Up your HP as much as you can so you can sustain 2 hits. Using entangling noodles, you have a good chance of killing him before he kills you. If you get worried, you can use one massage oil to make it a sure victory.
- Other things you may consider include using bang potions, Mick's IcyVapoHotness Rub, goofballs (all-purpose cleaner will remove the negative effect if you do not kill the NS today), the cannonball charrrm, or even a shrinking powder if you have one.
- Prepare for the tower: use canopic jars, buy hair spray, make Wand, make NG, make tambourine/bone rattle, make skeleton key, and make sure you have a banjo/guitar. If you need to farm something, the Orange Star of Sacrifice helps you have a pretty good farming outfit.
- Enter gates. Use keys. Zap 3rd key. Use high HP to pass skeleton key test eventually. Hedge Maze. Tower Monsters.
- Killing your shadow requires either 3 red pixel potions and 1 poultice or 1 massage oil and 3-4? poultices. If you go the first route, try to have about 250 HP. If you go the second route, use max HP.
- To get 20 lb. familiars, use the arena buff (+5), Knob Goblin pet-buffing spray (+5), and pet snacks (+10). Equip a magic whistle (+1). Seal Clubbers can craft a bar whip (+2), two (+4) if Double-Fisted Skull Smashing was purchased. You can get away with not having the arena buff as a TT or P class. You should see what your first familiar is before using these buffs because if you need to farm, you may get screwed. You should have managed to get 3-4 of the 5 familiars, so your chances are not too bad. If you have to use the arena, it will cost you dearly. Hopefully you can get the second familiar under 10 turns if you do not happen to have it.
- Kill the Naughty Sorceress. All the regular advice applies. Use Ben-Gal™ Balm before the fight to absorb her first hit. She can be really hard to beat in BM if you are not used to fighting her with almost no skills or items. You might want to lose first and let her lose her blocking ability some before going in for the kill. You may need to buy skills just to be able to kill her. The cannonball charrrm can be amazing against her. It does lots of damage independent of her blocking what you do. It is like having a second chance to hit her each round for 100 damage! Use HP restorers and let the cocoabo do his thing when you are down on HP. Use deleveling items like the ferret bait and any stunning items you have. Finally, when you get low on HP, use massage oils to get back to 100% HP.
Skills
Listed in order of importance with cost noted
Seal Clubbers
Pride (400) - Get ASAP (after eating on day 1). More stats for fewer turns.
Envy (800) - Item drops are worth far more than meat drops throughout the run.
Sloth (1600) - Damage Reduction really helps against tougher monsters early in your run.
Thrust-Smack (1500) - Best combat skill for class.
Gluttony (3200) - Use before eating. More turns from food, less stats.
Super-Advanced Meatsmithing (2500) - for + adventures from sword
Eye of the Stoat (3500) - may not be worth it, but if you have meat to spare?
Double-Fisted Skull Smashing (15000) - may be needed to kill NS easily
Turtle Tamer
Pride (400) - Get ASAP (after eating on day 1). More stats for fewer turns.
Envy (800) - Item drops are worth far more than meat drops throughout the run.
Sloth (1600) - Damage Reduction really helps against tougher monsters early in your run.
Amphibian Sympathy (1000) - Get ASAP.
Gluttony (3200) - Use before eating. More turns from food, less stats.
Kneebutt (5000) - Advanced combat skill with ability to stun. Get this or Shieldbutt.
Shieldbutt (10000) - Advanced combat skill that hits 100% of the time. Get this or Kneebutt.
Empathy of the Newt (6500) - May consider for tower, although not really needed.
Pastamancer
Pride (400) - Get ASAP (after eating on day 1). More stats for fewer turns.
Envy (800) - Item drops are worth far more than meat drops throughout the run.
Ravioli Shurikens (250) - Cheap spell for Friar's. You can use it your whole run doing 60 damage per hit when you have the staff and a spell book.
Entangling Noodles (500) - Very useful, especially for Baron and Guy-made-of-bees.
Sloth (1600) - Damage Reduction really helps against tougher monsters early in your run.
Pastamastery (2500) - Good foods like lo miens become available. Especially useful when you have a spice ghost.
Lasagna Bandages (1000) - For cheaper healing.
Gluttony (3200) - Use before eating. More turns from food, less stats.
Spirit of Rigatoni (5000) - Needed for Staff of the Teapot Tempest and Black Kettle.
Fearful Fettucini (free) - For high level combat & NS.
Leash of Linguini (12500) - May consider for tower but really not needed.
Sauceror
Pride (400) - Get ASAP (after eating on day 1). More stats for fewer turns.
Envy (800) - Item drops are worth far more than meat drops throughout the run.
Saucy Salve (500) - For cheaper healing.
Sloth (1600) - Damage Reduction really helps against tougher monsters early in your run.
Advanced Saucecrafting (2500) - for making hell broth, serum of sarcasm, and tomato juice of power.
Gluttony (3200) - Use before eating. More turns from food, less stats.
Expert Panhandling (1000) - It will pay for itself.
Wave of Sauce (6500) - For high level combat.
Saucegeyser (12500) - Unfortunately needed for NS.
Intrinsic Spiciness (8000) - May be needed for NS.
Elemental Saucesphere (skill) (1500) - Not needed, depends on run. Might be useful for level 8 quest and daily dungeons.
Disco Bandit
Pride (400) - Get ASAP (after eating on day 1). More stats for fewer turns.
Envy (800) - Item drops are worth far more than meat drops throughout the run.
Advanced Cocktailcrafting (2500) - Good drinks. Make sure you can get this as soon as you hit level 5.
Gluttony (1600) - Use before eating. More turns from food, less stats.
Disco Nap (1000) - Cheaper healing.
Lust (3200) - Helps with pickpocketing.
Mad Looting Skillz (6500) - More items is always good.
Nimble Fingers (3500) - It will pay off in the long run.
Accordion Thief
Pride (400) - Get ASAP (after eating on day 1). More stats for fewer turns.
The Moxious Madrigal (250) - Great skill ever for price.
Envy (800) - Item drops are worth far more than meat drops throughout the run.
Gluttony (1600) - Use before eating. More turns from food, less stats.
Lust (3200) - Helps with pickpocketing.
The Polka of Plenty (2500) - It will pay off, start using after Whitey's Grove.
Fat Leon's Phat Loot Lyric (5000) - Very useful.
Skills not worth getting ever
- Wrath - You may think it sounds pretty useful for Mysticality classes, but because other skills are more worthwhile, you cannot afford it until late in the game where that plus damage is not that helpful.
- Actually, a good skill for Disco Bandits who need extra plinking power and don't care about the penalty. Cheaper than Disco Fever, usually, and about as effective. It definitely helps against the NS, letting you plink her down faster than she can heal herself (hopefully).
- Greed - Item drops are always going to be more helpful than meat drops. Even for the nun quest, it only saves a few turns to have this skill.
Semi-rare Adventures
When you start your ascension, eat a fortune cookie about 10 turns in. Semi-rares occur every 160 to 200 adventures, so narrow down when yours will occur and pick up a consumable most times. Remember that the special Bad Moon adventures have priority over semi-rares, so keep track of which Bad Moon adventures you have encountered. You may want to trigger an area's BM adventure in advance to keep it from overriding your semi-rare. Remember that you cannot encounter the same semi-rare twice in a row. Keep track of when your semi-rares occur, and you'll only need to eat 1 fortune cookie to predict the next occurrence. If you plan on spending the 40 adventure window in a desired semi-rare area, you may not need to eat a fortune cookie at all. The Orc Chasm and Castle are good examples of this.
You will likely encounter only about 8 semi-rares during your whole run. Here is a list of semi-rare rewards worth considering in Bad Moon:
A suggested yield for an 8 semi-rare run would consist of 2 consumables (wine, lunchbox, or tarts), the guard uniform, bad ASCII art, 2 inhalers, pet snacks, and a set of 3 massage oils. For a longer run, consider shrinking powder, another massage oil set, and another consumable.
Filthy Lucre
Plan to get a few lucre during your run by choosing bounties in areas that you need to go anyway. Do not go out of your way for them, except to have an odor extractor in Menagerie 1 to get limes and cherries on day 4 and again later in your run. Check each day and if there is a choice that you might get on the next day, pick it in advance. Expect to get a lucre every 3-4 days. An odor extractor is nice (but not essential) for the kitchens, meat maid, bugbear outfit, and ballroom, but otherwise, bowls of Bounty-O's are usually the best use of lucres. Food is generally harder to come by than drinks (unless you are a Pastamancer). Using an extractor on a blooper to get white pixels is a good idea. Using one at the goatlet is a bad one because you need sabre teeth and whiskey, it is not a bad area to get meat and stats, and you do not save that many turns by using an extractor.
Do not suggest normally going for around-the-worlds. The rationale is as follows:
The Whitey's grove / citadel route potentially gains you 2/2 hippy outfit parts, 2/3 orcish fratboy parts, 1/3 cold weather gear parts, a rabbit's foot, a white collar, some drinks, meat (remember the 5000 meat BM adventure), and cheaper MP restorers. It is also easy to fight there early.
The orcish frat house / pirate's cove / hippy camp route potentially gains you 2/2 hippy outfit parts and some drinks, including around-the-worlds. The problems include no meat gain in the hippy camp, having to survive a few turns in the cove, and low drop rates for the hippy outfit.
Go for the around-the-worlds only if the BHH wants greasy dreadlocks. After 40 turns, you should get about 3 around-the-worlds. Unless you are a DB, you should wait and only use these as nightcaps because there are no other 4 drunkenness drinks available to you. The 3 around-the-worlds will translate into 18 extra turns and the bowl of Bounty-O's, another 4. With some luck, you should get the hippy outfit in the process. Also, don't forget that this is a good place to use learning pills and perhaps pet-buffing spray. The only reason to get an around the world is for Pastamancers wishing to create a Staff of the Black Kettle.
Class Specific Survival
The main class difference in a bad moon run is how you kill things. Here is how it works:
Seal Clubber
Start off using combat items like a seal tooth to plink. You may want to get the seal tooth as soon as you have the meat. Focus on increasing HP, damage reduction, and melee damage. Increasing initiative is also good, but you see less of a difference than you might expect. Thrust-Smack and heal with Medicinal Herb's medicinal herbs. Too bad it no longer hits 100% of the time, but it should still get you through the game. Don't forget to use blood of the Wereseal for tough opponents.
Turtle Tamer
Start off using combat items like a seal tooth to plink. You may want to get the seal tooth as soon as you have the Meat. Focus on increasing HP, damage reduction, and melee damage. Increasing initiative is also good, but you see less of a difference than you might expect. The first available skills are pretty worthless because of the lack of good gear, despite having so much extra MP. Just be careful and wait until Shieldbutt becomes available. Shieldbutt totally rocks and will last you the whole game. No need for combos most of the time. Heal with medicinal herbs. Alternatively, you might choose to buy Kneebutt, which is cheaper, is available sooner, and stuns your opponent. The disadvantage with Kneebutt is that you need to have a high enough Muscle to hit, whereas Shieldbutt hits 100% of the time no matter what and also delevels. For really tough opponents, you can always try Blood of the Wereseal. Also, the changes to Turtle Taming mean that some good equipment can be cheaply obtained without spending extra adventures - for example, the Turtlemail hauberk.
Sauceror
Start off using combat items like spices or salsaball to plink. Eventually you should get a shiny butcherknife from The Haunted Kitchen. You will need a spell book and the kickback cookbook is your best option although it costs 4000 meat. You may try using a tomato juice of powerful power and going to the library to get a free book (no good for sauceror spells, but sells for 2000 meat), but that adventure is not a sure thing. Do it only if you have the turns to burn before getting Liver of Steel. With the cookbook and a few tomato potions, you should be able to get through the friars. Try to use reagent potions sparingly until level 10. You can use wave of Sauce once you get it, but only use it when necessary. Once you hit level 10, you have 3 options. You can up your HP and spell damage, use ointment of the occult, and use Wave of Sauce or your weapon, which is not the best option because it is expensive in healing and does not always work. Your 2nd option is to max your Moxie with serums of sarcasm and use a ranged weapon to plink. This is the best option although you may not have a very good ranged weapon. Lastly, you could go in the middle and use tomato potions. If you can get enough Moxie that the monster will not hit you and enough Muscle that you can hit the monster with your weapon, this is a great option. As you increase your level, you will want to switch between these option to optimize the amount of extra MP you have with the cost of each option. You should have enough reagents to get through level 12 using serums 100% of the time. You can get a star crossbow and eventually a good ranged weapon from the battlefield. Out-Moxie-ing your enemies at high levels is your best option.
Do not get a special sauce glove as a Sauceror. You can survive without a staff, the only one you can make is the Staff of the Teapot Tempest, it costs a lot of meat, and you lose one accessory slot.
Pastamancer
One of the harder classes to play. Start off using combat items like spices or spaghetti spear to plink. Eventually you can get a shiny butcherknife from the Haunted Kitchen. Now spaghetti spear actually does some damage. This will last until you need to do the friar's quest. You will need a spell book soon. Try for one of the free books in the library (get the Cookbook of the Damned) before buying the kickback cookbook for 4000 meat. Entangling noodles plus Ravioli Shurikens will get you through the friar's and up to level 10. Focus on increasing Mysticality, spell damage, and damage reduction. The epic weapon is useful, but what you really want is a Staff of the Black Kettle. It makes a huge difference at both low and high levels and it increases MP regeneration by a lot. Of course, it requires meat and a little extra farming. If you use Harold's bell in the Boss Bat Lair, you can get the Staff of the Teapot Tempest at level 7 (as soon as your can get Spirit of Rigatoni). If not, you will likely not have the meat until level 9. Remember to save one concentrated magicalness pill from the council quest, get a catgut from Whitey's Grove, get a jug-o-magicalness from the barrels on your last day there, save a bat guano, and go for an around the world. These things do not waste that much time to get and will save you the frustration of getting beaten up again and again a high levels. Around level 10, you should be able to do the mansion quest and get Fearful Fettucini, which is like Weapon of the Pastalord except it's free. This will get you through the rest of the game, doing 200 damage per hit when used with the staff and the spellbook.
Pastamancers also get to have a ghost fight with them. In a BM run, the most useful is the Spice Ghost. If you get a scintillating powder, use it and do not switch ghosts. You can sell extra scintillating powders or other ghost summoning items for some early meat. The spice ghost is useful because spices can always be used for extra turns from lo meins, extra-spicy bloodies mary, and eggnogs. The other ghosts are useful early on, but lose their usefulness by the middle of your run. If you do not get a scintillating powder, but do get another ghost, you should certainly use it, but the spice ghost is by far the most useful throughout your run.
Accordion Thief
Use Madrigal 100% of your run, get a ranged weapon and plink. Focus on equipment that increases Moxie. You will not get hit and you should be able to win every fight with ease. This is the easiest class to play because of this. Also, do not forget you have access to MMJs and medicinal herbs at level 9. Until then, HP restoration may be difficult, so do Doc Galaktik's quest since it does not take many extra turns.
Disco Bandit
Similar to the Accordion Thief, but you do not get the madrigal or access to guild stores. Combat skills are a waste of meat. Use your Moxious Maneuver if you need a big hit.
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