Draft:Shiren 5 Vita:Trading Items

There are multiple ways for players to trade items with other players or give items to other players. Most (but not all) of these methods involve one player rescuing another. Regardless of who rescues and who is rescued, both players involved in a rescue have the opportunity to send an item to the other player.

Most methods of item exchange require both players to be physically adjacent—within Bluetooth or WiFi range—and must occur in real time. This presents a problem for Shiren 5 players in 2018 and beyond, as the community of players (at least the English-speaking community) is small and sparsely populated geographically. But there is at least one method of exchanging items that (a) works over the internet and (b) doesn't require a synchronous connection, and there are enough Shiren 5 players worldwide to take advantage of this excellent feature.

Prerequisites

You can't use this method on a new profile. Both players must have advanced their game state a bit. Here are the prerequisites:

• Be able to join your PSVita to the internet (e.g. via your home WiFi network)
• Be able to use the Sparrow Transport to directly jump to the Lost Well
  • Why Lost Well? It's convenient, most players have access to it already, it's reachable via the Sparrow Transport, but most importantly it lets you take items in -- critical for internet trading via rescues.
• Be able to access the Points Shop
• Have a Points Card with at least 200 points on it (500 is more comfortable)
• Have at least 3 open spaces in your 80-space menu-based storage in Hotel Nekomaneki
• Have read an Escape Scroll in the past, so you can write Escape on a Blank Scroll
• Nice-to-have: Have read a Pot God Scroll in the past, so you can write Pot God on a Blank Scroll
• Nice-to-have: Have read a Blessing Scroll in the past, so you can write Blessing on a Blank Scroll
• Additional prerequisite for the rescuer only: have very powerful equipment, such that you can dominate a monster house in Lost Well on floor 1F

Setup

This method lets you trade at most 1 item for 1 other item. It is assumed that you only stock items can be traded, never new items, though this has never been verified. However, the items traded can be Preservation Pots filled with other non-pot stock items, so it's possible for players to trade 5 non-pot stock items with each other in a single exchange (6 items total counting the Preservation Pot itself). Note also that it's not possible to edit your inventory once the exchange has begun, so agree in advance with your trading partner what you want to trade, prepare the items, and store them directly in your menu-based storage in Hotel Nekomaneki. (You can't trade items in your main inventory or from your dungeon-based storage units in Nekomaneki Village, Hermit's Hermitage, or Sparrow's Inn.)

It's slightly more convenient to be the rescuer than the rescue-e. The rescuer gets an achievement if this is their first rescue. The rescuer gets rescue points which can help them advance on a rescue leaderboard (though it's doubtful anyone is actually competing on this leaderboard given how rare rescues are these days). The rescuer also gets a random item for their troubles, though this item is laughably poor compared to the items being exchanged and compared to the effort of doing the rescue. But none of this really matters compared to the main difference, which is that the rescue-e is very limited in what they can do with their game until they are rescued, which is not true for the rescuer. (There are at least a few things you can do while dead and awaiting rescue, but it's nowhere close to the full range of normal activities you can do while not dead.) Because of this, it's good to agree in advance on a specific date/time on when you'll do the exchange, so that both players can get their games into the proper state at the agreed date and time, keeping in mind differences in worldwide time zones. The actual exchange is asynchronous, but if you don't coordinate date/time, the rescue-e will have to leave their game in a bad / less-usable state for a longer time.

Because the gameplay penalty is worse for the rescue-e, one party can make it easier on the other party by offering to be the rescue-e. If one party is doing a favor for the other party (e.g. donating valuable items), the recipient can offer to be the rescue-e. OTOH, if one player doesn't have the rescue achievement yet and the other one does, maybe that should decide who is the rescuer and who is the rescue-e. Regardless, decide what to exchange, decide who will play the rescuer and who will play the rescue-e, decide when the exchange will take place, then prepare the items you want to exchange and store them directly in your menu-based storage in Hotel Nekomaneki.

Performing the Exchange

Step 1: Performed by the Rescue-e

Get an Escape Scroll. If you don't have one, buy a Blank Scroll from the Points Shop and write Escape on it. Store all your other equipment, store the item for trade in your menu-based storage, and make sure you have at least 1 spot still open in your menu-based storage. (I think the rescue-e doesn't actually need any spots open in their menu-based storage but it's a good idea to leave at least one open just in case.) Store your gitan as well. You should now have just an Escape Scroll on you and no money. Don't ask any allies to join. Use the sparrow transport to travel directly to Lost Well. Find a monster and let it kill you, which won't be hard. You'll be offered a chance to request rescue—say yes. Choose to be rescued via the internet. You can also associate a message with your rescue request—I like choosing the name of the item you want in trade just as an added reminder, but you can choose another message or no message at all. Your game will register the rescue request and give you a rescue ID #. Write it down and communicate the rescue ID # to your trading partner, saying you're now ready to trade. (In practice, you don't actually need to bother with the rescue ID # because there are usually so few rescues pending that it's obvious which is the real rescue—it's the only rescue on Lost Well 1F! -- but using the rescue ID # guarantees you're both talking about the same rescue.) Note that you *must* have the ability to escape the dungeon else you will *not* be able to collect the items exchanged, and you can't use an Undo Grass for this because the Undo Grass will trigger automatically when you die. So, *always* have an Escape Scroll on you or else the item(s) you're trying to get will be lost!

Step 2: Performed by the Rescue-r

Store the item(s) for exchange in your menu-based storage unit. If you don't have a reason not to do this, it's a good idea to send a Preservation Pot with the item(s) for trade and to include an Undo Grass in it. This is an extra safety precaution to make sure that your trading partner can definitely get their items out of Lost Well in case they forgot to take an Escape Scroll in with them. Gear up for Lost Well—make sure you have a strong sword, strong shield, and whatever bracelet(s) you want. Make sure you have your own emergency gear including at least one Undo Grass. Be aware that you'll be facing a guaranteed monster house on Lost Well 1F, and you'll be level 1, so don't go in with half-baked equipment because if you die, you *will* lose your equipment. (I don't believe you can request rescue if you yourself were performing a rescue!) Store your item(s) for trade in your menu-based storage in Hotel Nekomaneki, making sure to leave at least 2 spots free, maybe 3 to be on the safe side. (You need at least 1 space to accept the trade item + 1 space for the lame rescue reward item. Presumably if your storage overflows you should have the opportunity to discard an item of your choice, but it's best not to take this risk, and you may not have anything you're willing to discard. So make sure you have plenty of open space available so you don't have to make bad choices when the most valuable trade items are on the line.) Save your game and go to the top menu. At the top menu, look for someone to rescue over the internet. If there are multiple rescue requests, look for the one on Lost Well 1F. If there are multiple rescue requests on Lost Well 1F, look for the one with the correct rescue ID # that your trading partner gave you. Once you've accepted the rescue request from the top menu, start your game again and go to the rescue desk in Hotel Nekomaneki, and begin the rescue. You'll now be in Lost Well on 1F. It may or may not have the same layout as the Lost Well 1F that the other player faced, but it will definitely have a monster house, and inside the monster house will be a collapsed Shiren! Talk to the collapsed Shiren to rescue him. This completes the rescue, so loot the monster house before talking to Shiren if you want the stuff. (I assume if you were to hit a Pitfall Trap here, it wouldn't let you fall through and miss the rescue, but this has not been verified.) After talking to Shiren in Lost Well, you'll be back at the menu and you'll have the option to send an item. (Note that you can only send items to dungeons that allow you to take items in, and Lost Well is one such location.) Chose the trade item from your menu-based storage. Multiple players have reported problems trying to send both a message and an item, so if you were trying to send both and sending the revival spell failed, try again and this time only send the item. Communicate to your trading partner that they have now been rescued.

Step 3: Performed by the Rescue-e

At the top menu, receive the revival spell. This should work and revive you. Before leaving the top menu, you have the option of sending a thank you—say yes. As with the rescuer, you will also have the option to send both a message and an item. If you can't send both, just send the item. Don't leave the thank you screen and don't start playing Shiren again until you've successfully sent whatever item you were supposed to send in trade, if any, as this is your only chance to send an item! Now revive and start playing Shiren again. You'll be back in Lost Well on 1F in the same place you were before, but, there will be no monsters around. Do not escape from the dungeon yet! The item you were given in trade will be at your feet, not in your inventory, and not in your menu-based storage back in Hotel Nekomaneki, so make sure to pick up your trade item from the dungeon floor before doing anything else. Don't even move a single square, in case you hit a Pitfall Trap, Explosion Trap, or other horrible thing that destroys your trade item, just pick up the item directly from the Feet menu. Then read your Escape Scroll to escape the dungeon.

Other Considerations

Trust with near strangers across the world can be nerve-wracking. In the experience of this author, there's no reason for concern. The community of players is small, and everyone seems to be pretty cool, etc. etc.. If you are worried about a 3rd party interfering with your rescue, you can lock your rescue to be performed just by friends, but IMO this is way overkill. You can also talk in a private channel to arrange a specific time and make sure to use the specific rescue ID #, though again, this is more effort than it's worth.

That being said, one thing that is low effort and a good idea is to take multiple screenshots that show you performing all parts of your end of the bargain in good faith and showing what item(s) you are sending. Shiren 5 doesn't have a ton of bugs, and the game goes to extra lengths to safeguard items in transit, but still, the game has at least one crasher bug that affects dungeon play and it's possible something could go wrong with your trade. It's probably not worth the effort to send screenshots every time, but having them handy could help you demonstrate that you didn't screw over your trading partner if something does go wrong.

It's also a good idea to positively confirm that the trade was successful on both sides after step 3 is concluded. If you took screenshots as "proof of performance", it should be safe to delete them after your trading partner confirms receipt of the item(s).