darkSpyro

I can only manage to save about 100 gems per week. With so many things to buy with gems it's really hard to get everything. You can only activate the alter-ego houses with the alts, but giant houses let you use the variants & legendary. So when I get enough gems, I'll be buying giant houses first.

Good point about use of the variants. I noticed that too with Cupid Flameslinger's hut. I realize its the variant's hut, but still disappointing.

The alt houses that give you a quest for a shrine are very worth it.

But if you have no houses, get Treerex first and get his #1 fan so that you get the additional bonus.

Treerex is the best gold producer in the game.

Pity we couldn't trade gold for gems though.

Quote: Doobrywhatsits

Pity we couldn't trade gold for gems though.

That is exactly that Ruggles allows you to do.

Spend extra gold on energy -> Use extra energy in 2nd/3rd slot for chance at stones and gems.

Now that we have a shrine sale, I was considering getting another shrine. I only have 1. I was debating on which one to get but then I wondered I should get GM Chop Chop's house instead. I only have 362 gems and the house is 350. But I figure I could get more gems, stones, etc. with it. Plus the objective gives me an undead shrine. A 50 gem difference would be worth it, but would it be worth it for an extra 150 (since the shrines are 200, today)? And how often do you collect from alt houses? I have 5 day to collect 10 times.

That would only leave me with 12 gems (plus whatever I get from Orville, today). Considering most of the gems I got recently because I leveled all my Skylanders from 10-12 an they're now maxed out, I don't see much of a chance to get a large number of gems to build them back up. I want to use them wisely. I also considered getting Ruggles, if just to complete the objective, but wasn't sure if he was worth it. If I get the alt house, I wouldn't have enough.

First post! I'm glad I finally found someplace to talk about Lost Islands. I have no idea why I enjoy this game so much!

If you get GM Chop Chop and GM Chop Chop's house, you get a quest that will award you an undead shrine. The quest requires you to collect from the house 10 times in 6 days or so. It's a no-brainer. You get both the house (which is the better investment for gems in my limited experience) and you get the shrine. If that quest triggered already and you won't have time to collect it, then that won't work, of course.

I forget already how many gems Ruggles costs, but I think he's a good investment too if you have sufficient Skylanders (especially if they're Giants or specials that get 25% gold bonuses) to put multiple Skylanders in each sanctuary. It's hard to grow enough energy to completely fill all the Sanctuaries twice a day, though.

I'd probably still get the house first. I have 7 houses now and probably at least once a day at least one of those houses gives me 4 or so gems as a reward. Its one of the best ways to get gems, without paying for them, that I've found.

Houses are on a six hour timer. Its pretty easy to get 3 activations per day.

Dont forget houses give you gold, energy, exp or gems.

The ideal situation to buy houses is when you have two characters from an element that have the 25% gold bonus. This way one is in a house and the other is in your shrine.

The house & shrine combo is really tempting, but I don't have enough gems & the time has nearly run out to complete the guest. I've been waiting for a hidden offer, but nothing in weeks.

I went ahead and bit the bullet and bought GM Chop Chop's house. I should still have plenty of time to get the shrine from the quest. Now I'm left with only 16 gems, so hopefully nothing comes up I want to get. I might try to save up enough to get Ruggles (hopefully before his quest ends as I've already accomplished everything but buying him).

I've decided to save up gems each month to ensure I can buy the house and achieve the house/shrine quests. I similarly save stones so I have at least 200 at the start of the month so I can quickly secure the new Alter Ego quickly. Other stuff is gravy. I might change that policy if they do a 150 gem per shrine sale. Otherwise I still think they Alter Ego house plus shrine quest is the best thing to spend gems on currently...

Quote: midas73

I've decided to save up gems each month to ensure I can buy the house and achieve the house/shrine quests. I similarly save stones so I have at least 200 at the start of the month so I can quickly secure the new Alter Ego quickly. Other stuff is gravy. I might change that policy if they do a 150 gem per shrine sale. Otherwise I still think they Alter Ego house plus shrine quest is the best thing to spend gems on currently...

I'm hoping so. This is the first time I've had enough gems to even purchase a house, and I rarely spend them. I've purchased a companion or two, but only those that are really cheap (like 25-30 gems) and I haven't even purchased any #1 fans (other than Spyro's when he was free). I don't know how you get so many gems without buying them with real money (which I won't do). Maybe, now that I got a house, I'll earn a few more gems.


P.S. I forgot I had purchased Ghost Roaster with gems a while back, but only because I figured I would never get him and he was on sale (although he was even cheaper the next week, so I was bummed).

I bought my first house when they had a 300 gems for 99 cents sale. I figured I get enough enjoyment out of the game that I could at least give them a dollar. I then won another house throwing stones (forgot about that until right now--I've never won anything of that caliber since). Then I bought another 300 for 99 cents and got another house. The houses spit out 1-3 gems on average each day so once you have a few houses you start building gems faster. I now spend gems solely on the houses so it continues to build steam (I haven't and probably won't actually buy any more gems). I manage to get enough gems each month to buy the new house (and some cheap companions along the way, like Ruggles).

Hopefully there's no shame in spending a couple bucks on this game! I play it so frequently I felt it was worth paying a little for it. It's also made it a bit more fun because now I can get enough gems to at least buy new houses.

I wish they would give me a 300/99c offer. The best I've seen is 100 /99c, and I haven't seen a hidden offer for at least 2 weeks now.

Wow, that would be a great deal! Usually they don't cut the price in half AND triple the gems, but I'd buy that for a dollar! (Movie reference anyone?)

I've gotten that deal several times a day for the past month or so. 300/.99

I just got the 300/.99 deal about 2 minutes ago.

I get it several times a day. It's actually gotten annoying, I get it so much (especially when I use Quigley and it randomly pops up while he's collecting), but I'm not interested in buying gems. I wonder if people who don't buy gems get it more often to encourage them to buy them. Once you get in on some of the hidden offers, you don't get them as much.

I thought the opposite. I took that deal twice and so I was thinking they were continuing to feed it to me in the hopes I'll bite again.