# D&D.Sci GURPS Dec 2021: Hunters of Monsters

Intro (skippable)
=================

"Are you really the smartest member of the Hunters' Guild?"

"I'm the smartest at fighting! What's the difference?"

"Well, you're just about smart enough to write, at the very least"

"And you're just about short enough, and just about annoying enough, that if you don't shut your nerd mouth you'll find yourself flying out of that window"

The master hunter shoves a heavy leather-bound journal towards you. You look inside, and see just-about-legible scrawlings:

'Dear Diary, this week I took a big fiery flamu club to the thunderwood peaks. Even though I was wearing the nicest icemail in the armory, I got beaten up and came home with nothing :('

The junior research intern biologist hands you a meticulous-looking sheaf of parchments. The first - he insists - contains the sum total knowledge of all the creatures they've ever observed. The rest are a log of all the tracks the guild have found in the past five years. Somehow the handwriting is even worse than the hunter's.

You shoo them out of your office before they come to blows. The statistician's guild has been tasked with forging an alliance between the hunters and the biologists. The former typically see the latter as "a bunch of nerds who should go and get their own samples if they want them so much", and in return they're seen as "a bunch of thugs who would rather skin monsters for weapon parts than understand them".

Data and Objectives
===================

The master hunter has given you [a list of her hunts](https://raw.githubusercontent.com/jemist/dndsci-2021-dec/main/Hunter's%20Log.csv) from the past five years. This consists of the time and location of the hunt, the weapon and armour she used, and what (if anything) she successfully hunted. You've managed to get your interns to clean up the data a bit and annotate it with information about the weapons and armour mentioned.

The biologists guild have given you a [list of their expeditions](https://raw.githubusercontent.com/jemist/dndsci-2021-dec/main/Biologist's%20Log.csv) over the past five years. They also send out one foray, consisting of three biologists per week, to look for monster tracks. On top of this they've given you "[all their knowledge of monsters](https://raw.githubusercontent.com/jemist/dndsci-2021-dec/main/Biologist's%20Notes.csv)".

*   It's currently the start of Year 6, and you'll be able to advise the hunter what gear to take, and where to go, from weeks 6-15.
*   The Hunters' Guild want to maximize their total haul, i.e. they want as few hunts as possible to return with nothing, and they want to return with the largest monsters possible.
*   They've agreed to let the Biologists' Guild take a look at their specimens for the duration of the collaboration.
*   The Biologists' Guild also want as many specimens as possible, but would prefer rarer ones (i.e. ones they see the fewest tracks of).
*   **EDIT: I'll add that each repeated monster will be worth 1/2, not stacking, so getting 3 Dull Vipers would be worth twice as many "points" (from the Hunters and Biologists) as getting 1.**

Bonuses
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*   Both guilds would also like any advice about patterns of monster fights and sightings you can find.
*   The biologists use "ancient rules" to decide where to explore and would like to understand why on earth these rules are the way they are.

I'll be posting an evaluation of answers in a week or so unless people ask for extra time. As always feel free to collaborate in the comments but use spoiler tags for the benefit of people who want to work alone.

[Evaluation is up here!](https://www.lesswrong.com/posts/ie7PTxxPH3Rd5Me93/dnd-sci-gurps-evaluation-and-ruleset)