darkSpyro

Forgive me as I am new to this type of gaming.
I've reached level 33 and things are progressing if a little slowly.
The hold up is slow Gem production, I've bought a few with cash but I have decided that I'm not donating any more of my hard earned coinage to Activision.
I see there are others out there with lots of houses etc. that are gem purchases, how do you achieve this? I'm not generating anything like enough. I have 50 skylanders in game and most are level 12, 13, 14.
I need gems to buy more efficient houses as I'm running out of room/gold.
help! Please!

Well you are level 33 so i am not sure what advice i can offer that you dont know already .

Gem advice

Mabu Companion Hyde ,

Swop Force Skylanders of each elemental type on standby linked with Mabu Companion Soft paw. SF skylanders have a tempting 25 percent gold bonus . "KEEP THEM DOING NOTHING" . I have lost tons of gems because the right swopper was doing some stupid chore at the time . Each bat is worth 2 gems .

Capybara King linked with Captain white claw .
Giant skylander to open a gold chest that has 3 gems < four with capybara king >

Each Skylander you have is worth 1 gem when they level up. buy a toy or spin for a skylander.

Efficiency is really ALL about character houses. As I mentioned in the other thread, each house translates to roughly 5 per cent game completion. Each house is 100 per cent profit. No gold required - no energy required. Just free experience, gold, energy and GEMS. Every house you buy and operate is more free profit. Once you've got all the houses, you'll have all the resources you will ever need. I'm sitting on more than 200 million gold, 20,000 kudos, 10,000 gems and 10,000 wishstones with nothing to spend them on. And I've never purchased one single gem for real money - you simply don't need to.

You don't even need to buy any companions to obtain everything else - they'll simply allow you to progress faster. With every character house you operate, you'll notice the game gets easier and easier - around 5 per cent easier per house. That doesn't mean there aren't companions worth buying - but character houses take MASSIVE precedence over the insanely priced Flynn, Cali, Arbo and Ol' Mac. You can purchase EVERY character house for less than the price of these four companions alone.

Even shrines, which I constantly rave about, are merely a stepping stone towards character houses. Shrines give you LOTS of free resources - but no gems. Gems are where this game is at, and character houses and Halls of Legends are where you get the bulk of them - every day - for free.

Woz, how would you rate Swap houses? I can see giant houses, alt houses, halls of legend, dark & dragon...but I'm wondering if the Swap ones are worth getting, at least in terms of the others. Seems like they are the last ones you'd want, since Swappers are so powerful to run as gold generators via adventure ships.

You summed it up well. They're better used as gold generators, and then to ensure all bats give two gems. By the time you no longer need gold, you no longer need the Swap House either.
Adventure airships are better investments than Swap Houses imo - particularly if you have a lot of skylanders to level up.

Where do you find character houses to buy?

In the same section as balloons, swap house, HQs. The character houses limited time items, but they bring them back several times throughout the year. I'd look toward Memorial Day (US - 4th Monday in May).

Great -- thanks for the info.

I have no interest in buying the Swap Houses. I have one and never use it. I'd much rather put them elsewhere. Debating on a Dragon's Lair or two while they are on sale. I already have two of them (one from a wishing well grand prize and the other as a reward, so I've never purchased one). I'm sure I can find enough free dragons to put in them, especially since I mainly use Swappers for my balloons and such. I'm just not sure I need anymore. I do have around 4700 gems, and don't know what else I'd use them on, though. I know gold isn't a necessity, either, but if they keep adding islands at 25-30 million a piece, gold may come more of a need. Plus I have been thinking about finally re-doing my islands now that they have raised the max kingdom level, so buying different houses might help with that (or throw in a bunch of stones into the well in hopes of getting some B&Bs or other items that might be good). The only thing in the game that I don't have, yet is a Dark House. Now that they've marked the Dragon's Lair down to 600, I wonder if I should just wait and see if they bring the Dark Houses down as well.

They also limit dragon houses to 8. I'm not sure if that limit was there before considering how many dragons there are.