Rumpelstiltskin's Home For Children

Rumpelstiltskin's Home For Children is an area in the Distant Woods unlocked when you use a grimstone mask and choose to become a gnome.

This area is a mini-game in which you try to save as many children as possible from their horrible parents.

The mini-game lasts 30 turns, during which time your portal will allow you to visit 5 families. You have 6 turns to gather ingredients (clay, leather and straw) in the village while the portal charges up. Once you have acquired ingredients, you can go to your workshop to craft them into various objects.

When the portal is charged, you may look through it to observe the family's behavior, and then walk into it to open negotiations with the parents. You may barter the things you've collected/crafted for children, if you can guess what the parents will accept.

Looking into the Portal

Before entering the charged portal, it is wise to do some surreptitious reconnaissance by peering through it. Doing so will provide you with three clues about the various vices of the horrible parents on the other side. Each clue indicates one or two possible vices. If an individual clue suggests two vices, one — but not necessarily both — of those vices will be true.

Two clues will be about one parent, and one clue will be about the other. Each parent has exactly two vices, and they will always have exactly one vice in common. As such, one of the clues for the parent with two clues will actually apply to both parents, though you can't tell which one until you start bartering.

The following table lists clues and the vices that they potentially indicate:

Gr	Gl	Va	La	Lu	Vi	Clue text
						...counting his/her possessions.
						...gold-plating a lily.
						...studying a treasure map.
						...writing a contract to make a high-interest loan.
						...chowing down on a fistful of bacon.
						...eating a chocolate rabbit.
						...putting a fried egg on top of a cheeseburger.
						...sprinkling extra cheese on a pizza already dripping with the stuff.
						...checking his/her reflection in a spoon.
						...plucking his/her eyebrows.
						...putting in a teeth-whitening tray.
						...telling everyone that the song on the radio is his/her.
						...asking one of the kids to find the remote control.
						...collapsed deep in an easy chair, stifling a yawn.
						...lying on the floor
						...sleeping soundly.
						...eyeing his/her spouse lasciviously.
						...flipping through a lingerie catalog.
						...moaning softly.
						...peeking through the blinds at the attractive neighbors.
						...kicking a dog.
						...punching a hole in the wall of the house.
						...screaming at the television.
						...stubbing his/her toe on an ottoman then kicking it across the room.
						...cutting a huge piece of cake to eat alone.
						...opening a family-size bag of Cheat-Os, not planning on sharing them.
						...putting a golden ring on each finger.
						...shining a golden chalice to a reflective finish.
						...reclined in a chair, ordering stuff from the Home Shopping Network.
						...trying to shortchange the maid who is washing the dishes.
						...admiring a solid marble nude statue.
						...admiring a valuable collection of artistic nudes.
						...polishing a collection of solid silver daggers.
						...loading a jewel-encrusted pistol with golden bullets.
						...checking for stretch marks while downing a huge chocolate shake.
						...trying to squeeze into a girdle.
						...calling the dog over to lick french-fry grease off of his/her shirt.
						...reclined in an overstuffed chair eating a bag of bacon-flavored onion rings.
						...licking an all-day sucker.
						...licking his/her lips sensually over a rack of ribs.
						...tearing apart an entire roasted chicken so hard the bones snap.
						...throwing a bag of chips on the ground and stomping on it to open it.
						...collapsed in an overstuffed chair, curling his/her eyelashes.
						...using the remote control to turn the TV to the Beauty Channel.
						...checking out own his/her body and licking her lips seductively.
						...practicing pick-up lines on his/her own reflection in a window.
						...angrily plucking stray eyebrow hairs.
						...kicking the dog, then making sure the kick didn't scuff her shoes.
						...lying on the floor, calling his/her spouse to come give a kiss.
						...reclined on the bed, idly peeping through the window to the neighbor's house.
						...half-heartedly kicking at the cat when it comes too close.
						...sleepily swiping at a whining kid.
						...aggressively kissing his/her spouse.
						...tearing down the blinds to peep out of the window.

Crafting

Tinkering in Rumpelstiltskin's Workshop lets you make things that help with general adventuring (potions, consumables, etc.), but these items do not help with the portal mini-game. You can also make advanced materials (glass, filling and parchment) which can greatly increase your mini-game score -- however, you must practice creating these items first.

Each of the three advanced materials requires a number of practice trials (each of which consumes three raw materials) before you get any. Your progress toward these "skills" is saved through ascension.

Raw crafting materials (straw, leather, clay) and advanced materials (filling, parchment, glass) are quest items. In addition, they disappear when you open a new instance of Rumpelstiltskin's Home For Children, so you cannot save materials from one instance to use in another.

Bartering

You may use the materials you have collected and crafted to convince those horrible parents to release their children from their irresponsible clutches into your loving care. You use your magic on the spot to craft enchanted items for trade.

You must appeal to the parents' vices to liberate their children. You will use your basic and advanced materials to magically craft enchanted objects that are dearer to them than their own flesh and blood. If you can tempt both parents simultaneously, you will receive a bonus of two children. If you try the parents' endurance by bartering more than six times, you will be penalized by two children per trade for the next six attempts. Materials required to appeal to the six vices are shown here:

Magical Temptation	Vice	Straw	Leather	Clay	Filling	Parchment	Glass	Children
Gold of Inherent Valuableness								1
Spaghetti of Al-Dente Deliciousness								1
Mirror of Airbrushing								1
Full Throttle Wall-to-Wall								1
Un-uncanny Valley Girl								1
Multifinger Ring of Knuckledusting								1
Creel of Constant Cashfulness								5
Dice of Unbelievable Ultrafairness								5
The Gourmand's Glory: A Cookbook								5
Oven of Bodacious Brickliness								5
Circassian Coiffure Controller								5
Portrait of Flattering Likeness								5
Lid of Leisurely Libation								5
Chesterfield of Comfortableness								5
Field Glasses of Furtivity								5
Well-Written Articles of the Unrelated Photo								5
Porcelain Throwing Discs of Frangibility								5
The Batterer's Brutality Battery								5

Rewards

• At the end of the mini-game, your score (the number of children saved) earns you rewards:

After a hard day's work you can finally relax, so you conjure up a little muscle relaxant for yourself.

You acquire an item: mid-level medieval mead

• With a score in the (all-time) top 80% of runs:

Wow. X kids! That's really good! You decide to reward yourself with something extra nice.

You acquire an item: Rümpelstiltz

or, with a score in the (all-time) top 90% of runs:

Wow. X kids! That's amazing! You decide to reward yourself with something extra nice.

You acquire 2 bottles of Rümpelstiltz

• Being in First Place on the Rumpelstiltskings (Largest New Gnome Families) leaderboard at rollover rewards you with a spinning wheel, if you have not received one in the past.
  • If First Place has already received a spinning wheel, Second Place will receive it, and so on.
  • The spinning wheel is delivered in a kmail from Mother Goose, which states:

    <playername>,
    
    

    Well done, dearie! Your performance was top notch! Please accept this gift -- a small token of a mother's pride.
    
    

    Love,

    Mother Goose

    You acquire an item: spinning wheel

Reference

• This is the antagonist point of view of the fairy tale of Rumpelstiltskin.