Trouble Brewing
- For the music track, see Trouble Brewing (music track).
Trouble Brewing is an activity that takes place on the east side of the pirate island of Mos Le'Harmless. It was released on 4 July 2006 along in its own update. It is a non-combat activity. The main goal of the game is to make as much 'rum' as you can as fast as possible. To do this, there are a number of tasks that must be done, from gathering ingredients to taking care of the boilers. A special interface helps determine what needs to be done, but to function effectively, it's helpful to discuss with team members what tasks each will do beforehand.
To play the game, you must have completed the Cabin Fever quest and have at least 40 Cooking. It is also recommended to bring Boots of lightness and other lightness gear, Monkeyspeak amulet, and a good Hatchet (though a Bronze hatchet will be supplied). Even though World 104 is the official world for Trouble Brewing, it is mainly empty due to the requirements of getting to Mos Le'Harmless. To help get a game started bring some friends or make an event rather than wait for people to come or it may be a long wait.
Joining a team
You can choose a team by joining up with San Fan (blue), or Fancy Dan (red). You can also use join team on Honest Jimmy, and you'll be put on a team. You are given a hat when you join the blue or red team. You must deposit any other headgear in the chest near Honest Jimmy. You must also deposit everything from your inventory (but not worn items).
When you join a team you are immediately put in a waiting room. There are copies of the Brewin' guide on the floor. You can read them to learn the rules of the game.
There must be at least 3 people on each team for the game to start. (Note: With 3 players on each team it takes a few minutes wait before the game starts.)
The interface
The interface has several different icons on it. Along the top is amounts of ingredients. The number will be green if there is enough for another batch of 'rum'. The icons are as follow, from left to right:
- The first three icons are the three boilers. They must each have at least 3 logs in them and must be lit to keep 'rum' production going, and can fit 10 maximum.
- Bitternuts - Each bottle of 'rum' requires 1 bitternut.
- Sweetgrubs - Each bottle of 'rum' requires 1 sweetgrubs.
- Buckets of water - Each bottle of 'rum' requires 5 buckets of normal water.
- Coloured water - Each bottle of 'rum' requires 3 bowls of coloured water.
- Scrapey bark - Each bottle of 'rum' requires 1 scrapey bark.
- Production status - When this is flashing green, there is a finished bottle of 'rum' that must be placed in the crate before the arrival of the next bottle pushes it off and breaks it.
The left side has the repair status of your team's equipment. If this shows a number, it means that something has been sabotaged by the other team. From top to bottom, these show the status of the hoppers, the pipes between boilers, and the bridges between islands.
In the lower right of the screen is the scoreboard and time left in a match. Each bottle of 'rum' is worth one point.
The base
The base may seem complicated at first glance, but if you know where you're going, it's not so bad. The ground floor has the three boilers (where you put logs) and the pipes that can be sabotaged. A table nearby supplies you with any tools you might need to play the game. There is also the log store which starts off with a number of logs in it and can be added to, and next to it is a kettle that coloured flowers are put in to make bowls of coloured water. Just outside is a pump for water and a patch of coloured flowers of the other team.
On the top floor are the hoppers. This is where all the ingredients are placed. In the image below, they are, from left to right, normal water, coloured water, scrapeytree bark, sweetgrubs, and bitternuts.
Tasks
Coloured flowers/water
Perhaps the most important task, as coloured water is necessary for both 'rum' production and gathering Bitternuts. To gather these, you must run all the way to the other team's base and pick the flower found there. Each base has the opposite colour of flower, so red flowers can be found at the blue base, and blue flowers can be found at the red base. There is no wait time to pick them, but you can only pick 5 at a time; however, a team-mate can keep picking flowers and trading them to you until your inventory is full. Once you've gathered the flowers, run them back and place them in the kettle in your base.
After there are flowers in the kettle, you can use a bowl to get a bowl of red water or bowl of blue water(depending on your team's colour). Put it in the hopper upstairs or use it for gathering bitternuts (see below).
Tending the boilers
There are three boilers on the ground floor of your base. To light them, you must place one log in it, then use a tinderbox to light it. Once started, more wood can be added. There must be three logs in it to make 'rum', with a maximum of ten. Unlike the ingredients, the supply of wood in the boilers will continue to decline even when 'rum' isn't being produced. A sign in front of each boiler identifies what number it is.
Gathering water
The simplest job. To get water, simply go to the pump outside your base and fill your buckets, then take it upstairs and place it in the corresponding hopper. If the pump has been destroyed, you must either fix it or go to the pond on the middle island, but this one won't automatically fill all your buckets.
For those who just want Pieces of Eight, this is a fast and effective way of getting a lot of them, but it's also a very common task, so it will often have been done already and won't do much good for the team.
Cutting wood
A less needed task since the supply of logs in the store is pretty good to begin with, but should the supply dwindle, you can cut many of the jungle trees down and resupply the wood store. Scrapey tree logs can be placed in the log store and drawn out as ordinary logs.
Sweetgrubs
Around the area are mounds of dirt that sweetgrubs live in. To lure them out, you have to use raw rat meat on the mound. You can get an unlimited supply from the table in your base. If you succeed, you'll get some sweetgrubs. There are always two Sweetgrub mounds on the same side of the base as the coloured flowers.
There is a random chance that when you use the meat on the mound, it will draw out instead a swarm of Sweetflies. This is very much like the swarm random event, causing you to have to run. No one can gather more sweetgrubs from the mound while there are still sweetflies present.
The mound has a limited number of grubs, and when it's empty it will collapse. You'll have to find another mound or wait for it to fill again.
Scrapey Bark
There are a number of Scrapey Trees around the area that can be cut down. They usually yield several scrapeytree logs before being felled. There are always two Scrapey Trees on the same side of the base as the coloured flowers. Once the logs are in your inventory, you must use a knife to cut the scrapeytree bark off, at which point you can put it in the corresponding hopper.
If you are looking to collect Pieces of eight then with a rune hatchet, collecting 100 scrapey bark can be a good alternative to collecting 100 water. While it usually can take twice as long as collecting water, each log cut is worth 25 woodcutting exp, and you are rewarded 40 cooking exp for each bark added to the hopper.
There is a random chance while cutting the Scrapey tree or removing the bark from the logs that you may be diseased.
Bitternuts
The most complicated task. In order to gather Bitternuts, you must first get a few bowls of coloured water. Then, go to one of the islands and catch a monkey (which looks nothing like the Mos'le Harmless monkeys, more like a Karamjan monkey). Dye the monkey with the water to mark it as being on your team, then use it on the Bitternut tree. The monkey will skitter up the tree and, after a little while, will toss you a nut. You may not have more than one monkey up in the tree at one time. If another monkey is in the tree already, they will first fight and the winning monkey will get the nut.
If you have a Monkeyspeak amulet, you can alter the strategy used. You can choose to either make the monkey angry by taunting it, or caution him. By making him angry, he'll be more inclined to get up the tree as fast as possible and start pelting you with bitternuts, speeding up the time before you get a nut. If you tell him to be careful, he'll take a little bit longer, but will be more aware of other monkeys and will be more likely to win in a confrontation.
Sabotage
Sabotage is frowned upon by most players as it is detrimental to both teams, especially when playing with a small amount of players. It slows down the sabotaged team because it slows down 'rum' production. It also slows down the sabotaging team because it wastes time that could be used to collect ingredients.
With a lit torch, you can go to the other team's base and set things on fire. To do so, use the torch on what you want to sabotage. You'll either succeed or fail, and after a random number of attempts your torch will go out. Some things you can burn are:
- Hoppers - Prevents the other team from adding ingredients or the ingredients to be added to the 'rum', though it won't damage anything already inside.
- Pipes - Halts 'rum' production.
- Pump - Forces water gatherers to go to the middle island for water.
- Trees - Prevents the tree from being cut down and makes players go further for resources.
- Bridges - Makes players go around or use the much slower jumping stones to get around. This is a double-edged sword, though, since it also makes it much harder for flower-gatherers on your team to get to the other team's base. You can only burn bridges on the opposing team's side. If your team is being swamped with saboteurs that just burn something, then running back to get another torch and burning your opponents' bridge may help slow down their saboteurs.
Defence
Defence is truly important, if your equipment is burnt, you can't get anything done. If something is set on fire, the first thing you need to do is put it out using a bucket of water. If not, it will eventually burn itself out, but you'll need more supplies to fix it afterwards. Once the fire is out, you can use the appropriate repair item to fix it. Pipes and pumps need bamboo pipes. Hoppers take lumber patches. Bridges take bridge sections. Depending on how long they were allowed to burn, it takes anywhere from 1 to 3 items to fix the problem.
You can also use the pump near the boilers on the first floor to gather pressure in the boilers. To do this, you must have over 50% run energy, and takes 10% each pump. It can hold up to 10 pumps worth of pressure. The reason to do this is defensive. When someone is trying to sabotage your boilers, you can right click the pump and select the vent option. By doing this, a burst of steam will run through the pipes. This will put out any fires currently burning and cause damage to opposing team members standing near a damaged section of pipe. You can continue to vent the pressure even if no fires are lit, and continue to damage any enemy team member standing near the pipe. If they die, they will return to their base with no loss of items. There's a negative side effect to this method, though. While it does put the fires out, it will damage the broken pipes further, taking as many bamboo pipes as if you'd let the fire run its course. Because of this, it is almost always more effective to use buckets of water to save bamboo pipes.
Another defensive course is to resupply the repair items. You can do this by taking logs and using them on the workbench in your base. You can either use them yourself or use them on the table to resupply it.
Bottle packing
When everything has been completed, a bottle of 'rum' will slide out the end of the line. This must be collected and placed in the crate, or it will be broken when the next bottle arrives. The bottle indicator in will blink green when a bottle of rum is ready to be packed. If the indicator turns red and stays red, the current bottle of rum will be destroyed by the next bottle of rum should it not be packaged quickly. The next bottle will come shortly if a bottle of rum is in production. Players who haven't contributed enough won't be able to see or collect it. Once the bottle has been placed in the crate, your team will get 1 point.
Strategies
It is a good idea to organise the team.
Four players in a team
- Player 1 collects Sweetgrubs and repairs and tends the boilers.
- Player 2 should collect Scrapeytree bark and collect water.
- Players 3 and 4 go together to the other team's base. Since an individual player can pick a maximum of 5 flowers at a time, one player should pick flowers and trade to the other player till their inventory becomes full. Flowers should then be taken back to the base to create coloured water. For every 4 bowls of water, 3 should be placed directly into the hopper and one used to obtain bitternuts. The monkeys will not give you more bitternuts when you have 2 in your inventory already, so be sure that both players 3 and 4 are collecting bitternuts to maximise efficiency. When all of the available coloured water has been used up, players 3 and 4 should repeat the process.
- Due to the majority of points coming from depositing items into the hoppers, it is advisable for each player to make sure they've put at least 100 ingredients in before the game ends. This is best done late in the game via buckets of water. Player 2 will no doubt have reached their 100 ingredient mark when others start to do this and should use this time to collect ingredients that there are a lack of (if there are any).
Five or more players in a team
- Player 1 collects Sweetgrubs and repairs and tends the boilers.
- Player 2 should collect Scrapey Tree Bark and collect water.
- Players 3 and 4 go together to the other team's base. Since an individual player can pick a maximum of 5 flowers at a time, one player should pick flowers and trade to the other player till their inventory becomes full. Flowers should then be taken back to the base to create coloured water. For every 4 bowls of water, 3 should be placed directly into the hopper and one used to obtain bitternuts. The monkeys will not give you more bitternuts when you have 2 in your inventory already, so be sure that both players 3 and 4 are collecting bitternuts to maximise efficiency. When all of the available coloured water has been used up, players 3 and 4 should repeat the process.
- Player 5+ catches Pirate Implings, if they can't, they get other ingredients (Bitternuts and Coloured Water are produced more slowly, so they're higher priority).
- Due to the majority of points coming from depositing items into the hoppers, it is advisable for each player to make sure they've put at least 100 ingredients in before the game ends. This is best done late in the game via buckets of water. Player 2 will no doubt have reached their 100 ingredient mark when others start to do this and should use this time to collect ingredients that there are a lack of (if there are any).
Unorganised team
Since most of the players will do easy tasks, it is recommended to get the flowers and bitternuts. However, one should listen to common sense and collect any other ingredients that there are a lack of if need be. Collect the coloured water and bitternuts by doing the following:
- Take 5 bowls.
- Get the flowers.
- Use the flowers on the kettle to get the water.
- Warning: Some players will stand near the kettle to take the water of others, since when someone puts a flower, everyone can take it. For that reason, it is recommended to put 1 flower in and quickly get the water out.
- Note: Sometimes there may be some leftover water from another player.
- Put THREE bowls of water in the hopper.
- Catch 2 monkeys and colour them.
- Get the bitternuts and place them in the hopper.
Pirate implings
There are about four Pirate Implings in a game. They can be caught using a butterfly net and an Impling jar, which are provided in the supply area (level 76 Hunter required). A magic butterfly net can also be used or they can be caught barehanded. A Pirate Impling gives 30 experience in Hunter each when caught and give some items that can be handy during the game, such as bitternuts or coloured water. They cannot be taken out of the game.
You will also need to have done Rocking Out before catching these implings.
Rewards
After each game (which ends after 20 minutes of gameplay), you will get an amount of experience from the tasks you performed and some Pieces of Eight based on ingredients contributed and how many bottles of 'rum' were successfully made.
Each bottle equals 2 Pieces of Eight, 100 Crafting experience, 250 Cooking experience, and 150 Firemaking experience. In addition, you gain 1 Piece of Eight and some experience for every ingredient contributed for up to 100 additional Pieces of Eight.
In order to gain rewards from 'rum' production, for each bottle of 'rum' you must have supplied at least:
- 1 bitternut,
- 1 sweetgrubs,
- 1 scrapeytree bark, or
- 3 bowls of coloured water.
If you entered the game at the midpoint, you will receive less Pieces of Eight. Each bottle equals one Piece of Eight. In addition, you gain 1 Piece of Eight and some experience for every task you complete up to 50 additional Pieces of Eight. However if you come into a game of Trouble Brewing after the midpoint, the rewards will be the same as if you started from the beginning of the game.
Action Experience rewarded Buckets of water added None Coloured water added 40 Cooking Sweetgrub added 40 Cooking Scrapeytree bark added 40 Cooking Bitternut added 80 Cooking Log added to boiler 40 Firemaking Equipment sabotaged 50 Firemaking Repair item created 12.5 Crafting Item repaired 12.5 Crafting Burning object doused 50 Firemaking Monkey captured 15 Agility Boiler pressure increased 10 Strength
Honest Jimmy
You can also talk to Honest Jimmy to use your Pieces of Eight and get some unique items such as naval clothing, special Pirate banners, The stuff (which increases the chance of getting a mature ale from personal brewing), and 'rum' (which acts as a teleport to the Trouble Brewing area).
You may also buy a treasure map from Honest Jimmy for 5,000 Pieces of Eight. It is a medium level clue scroll map.
Honest Jimmy's House of Stuff
| Item | Price (in PoE) |
|---|---|
| Naval shirt | 100 |
| Tricorn hat | 50 |
| Navy slacks | 100 |
| Cutthroat flag | 200 |
| Guilded smile flag | 200 |
| Bronze fist flag | 300 |
| Lucky shot flag | 400 |
| Treasure flag | 500 |
| Phasmatys flag | 600 |
| The stuff | 5 |
| Mos Le Harmless 'rum' | 2 |
Notes
- The Trouble Brewing uniforms (Tricorn hat, Naval shirt, and Navy slacks) are available in 7 different colours: blue, green, red, brown, black, purple and grey. These 7 sets of uniforms can be stored in the Armour case of a Player-owned house.
- The Mos Le Harmless 'rum' is available in 2 colours: red and blue. Both are untradeable and have the same effect- teleporting the player to near Honest Jimmy. Keep in mind that using the rum is a one time teleport - you will have to buy another each time.
Personalities
- Honest Jimmy
- San Fan - leader of the Cutthroat team
- Fancy Dan - leader of the Gilded Smile team
- Blue and red parrots - They tell you what to do in the game
Music
Music tracks unlocked:
Trivia
- The prices of all rewards (the clue scroll being the only exception) were reduced by a factor of 10 with the personalised shop update. This angered some players who had previously obtained them at the much higher and therefore more time consuming prices.
- Pieces of Eight are a reference to the Spanish dollar (also known as peso de ocho). However, the connection between pieces of eight and (fictional) pirates comes from Robert Louis Stevenson's book Treasure Island.
- It has been confirmed that Trouble Brewing will have a future update.
See also
| Team games |
Barbarian Assault • Blast Furnace • Castle Wars • Clan Wars • Fishing Trawler • The Great Orb Project • Pest Control • Shades of Mort'ton • Soul Wars • Stealing Creation • Trouble Brewing • Vinesweeper |
| Solo games |
All Fired Up • Archery competition • Barrows • Burthorpe Games Room • Conquest • Flash Powder Factory • Gnome Ball • Gnome Restaurant • Impetuous Impulses • Mage Arena • Mage Training Arena • Mobilising Armies • Pyramid Plunder • Ranging Guild Activities • Rat Pits • Rogue Trader • Runespan • Sorceress's Garden • Tai Bwo Wannai Cleanup • Temple Trekking • TzHaar Fight Cave • Fight Kiln • Dominion Tower |
| PvP games |
Castle Wars • Clan Wars • Duel Arena • Fist of Guthix • Soul Wars • Stealing Creation • TzHaar Fight Pit • Crucible |
| Former games | |