darkSpyro

I am almost done finishing level 39 and managed to save some precious gems, a bit over 2000 now.

I was wondering if it's worth buying Ol'Mac when he's 50% of or the Dragon Lairs (today's sale), or Cherry when on sale. I have 3 legendary houses, 1 shrine and that's it....

My first thought is buying Ol'Mac when he's on sale this weekend (too bad I had not enough gems when he was more than 70% off for "only" 1000 gems). Then I can send my balloons to no matter where, as well as filling up all sanctuaries easily every day. Then again getting more wishing stones rapidly with Cherry is tempting as well.

What are you thoughts on this?

P.S. I do have some free friend spots left, you can add me iNiekie!

Hmm.....interesting question. Personally I'd lean towards Ol'Mac for a couple of reasons.

1) As you continue to add shrines Cherry becomes less and less valuable as you don't need to rely on totems to get to the magic 200 stones to start the month.
2) Assuming you don't have all the Skylanders unlocked Ol'Mac significantly increases the amount gold you earn which in turns increases the number of Spin for Skylander attempts which can then be put to work to make more money to get more spins.
3) The Dragon Lairs have pretty much turned out to be a bust for me. It's hard managing the large number of Skylanders to reserve enough dragon types to put in the shrines. Plus the shorter window to complete the mission means they typically sit unused for a period of time. I thought I would have gotten a lot more use out of them but I'm getting a little lazy.

If it was me, I;d get at least 1 shrine of every type, this will generate plenty of cash and lots of wish stones, in turn, you can buy a stack of halls of legends, this will lead to a nice income of gems/etc, but, then you can smash the wishing well and gaurantee your getting the alter ego, but, wishing well can be kind at times, my sons account got fireworks zooks house, I was flaberghasted! then I also won ninjini's house! You get the odd shrine also, although rare. I also have a stack of Fisheries, BnB's and Taverns. I'd avoid the Dragom house or Dark House, the payouts are barely better than regular houses sadly. I only own dragon house. Dony even consider Scouts . Cadettes HQ, worse purchase ever. I'd wait till this weekend, see whats on offer. 50% off wheelock maybe worth a buy? I'm keepingmy stash of gems now for all the new houses that come out, for 350, they're a great investment as they're free to run. Adventure Airships are 75% off next tuesday I read, worth buying a couple of those? See what offers come up over the weekend, might some nice surprises! I bought Arbo ages ago and he's pretty good.

I think you can equal or better the benefits of Ol' Mac by buying radiant fields on sale (and cheaper too). I'd also make sure to save those gems for shrines when they are on 50% off sale. Especially any shrines that are of the element of crops you plant (ie, undead, earth, tech and maybe fire shrines are the best) since you get crop bonuses from the shrines on the matching element days. Shrines also generate stones, which can be used to more rapidly acquire additional legendary houses, which are the absolute best bargain in the game.

With a full contingent of the relevant shrines and a fair number of radiant fields (I buy 1-2 every time they're on sale, so long as I have the gems and have 13 so far (plus the 31 regular fields)), I now generate enough energy to keep my fully loaded sanctuaries and balloons going around the clock.

Cherry is a waste of gems once you have a fair number of shrines, and the shrines are the better investment given their crop and gold bonuses.

I generally like to collect every 2 hours so the dragon house seems like a good deal for me and I'll probably buy one here shortly.

I also like (and bought) Flynn and will buy Wheellock this weekend since I hate leveling my characters and want to speed that up. But that's me.

I'm probably wrong in my thinking somewhere and am constantly learning from others on this board...

Definitely shrines. After Capybara King, shrines are THE most valuable item in the game. They give wishstones. They give gold. They give a gold boost to your skylanders AND a boost to your crops. You are limited to buying three shrines, but you can win extra shrines from quests IF you've already obtained three. So I tend to prioritise getting three shrines of the same element rather than trying to get one of each element.

It is possible to play through virtually the entire game without ever touching a wishstone or kudos - the entire game really hinges on gold and gems. The gold will take care of obtaining every single skylander except the alts via 5 million gold spins, and will also buy every building you need to complete the game. You save the gems for EVERYTHING ELSE: giant houses (100 per cent profit - no energy required), shrines, companions.

Wishstones are the dark horse of the game. They can give you massive progress by winning things you don't have gems for - if you're lucky. However, the closer you get to completing the game, the more worthless they become. So if you are going to use wishstones at all, they are best used early in the game to try and win shrines and giant/alt houses to save you forking out thousands of gems.

So shrines. Absolutely.

I don't have Ol' Mac because I couldn't see him being worth the cost. I agree about Radiant fields adding up, plus load up on Sheep Topiaries with your kudos, then plant based on element of the day/time you will be checking. I struggled with energy for a while, but now I have plenty. Ol' Mac would be a waste for me at this point and I just hit level 39. Specialty houses help too by earning coins, gems, energy, and experience without costing you energy.
Shrines are also nice to collect wish stones and boost crop and adventure payout on elemental days.

My opinion would be shrines also. As Woz said, they bonus energy and adventures/sanctuaries, plus give wish stones. Couple this with radiant fields and topiaries, and ol Mac is overpriced, and eventually he becomes irrelevant. Houses and well produce enough energy that I don't even plant anymore.

Hi everybody,

Wow I thought I figured out everything in the game, but eh I did get some interesting comments here.
Too bad I just missed the 50% off of shrines yesterday.....

I guess I'll keep looking for shrines then and some extra radiant fields (for now I got 5) for a starter.

What about this companion that reduces the time of your sanctuaries by half? Ermitt I believe, he pops in on special occasions. I guess the only way he makes sense, is if you have plenty of energy to fill your sanctuaries 1 or 2 times extra per day. And then I'll need some radiant fields.

Thanks all for the replies, it helps a lot!!

Just bought my dragon lair and am already regretting it, even at 600 gems. It seems to pay out less than a regular house, which despite paying out every 2 hours, doesn't really make it much of a bargain.

If you don't have other things you're looking to get with gems, I think they're worth 600 to turn a regular skylander into a gem producer. It'll take longer to make those back from the house, but it's the perspective of the long term payouts.

After saying that, I agree with your assessment - I don't regret buying it, but I probably won't buy another one until I have a stockpile of gems. And that may not be far off if I keep getting the 300 gems offer; I've had it 3 times this week.

I must have bought 150 for .99 once and now that's the only offer I get. I will never accept that deal again though.

The lairs have a better gem payout and a 2 hour turn around. The gold payout seems lower but energy is the same. It really comes around to how many times you can clear them per day.

I'd totally ghet the last couple advisors I haven't gotten, the most recent one. After that, I still need a dark house. MOney is too tight this go round, plus borked account, but yeah, those are what I need most!

I guess I'll get ermit and Arbo, 1750 for Ol'mac is still a lot, and then throw in some extra radiant fields. I am not sure if i should get weellock though.

So which ones are you getting?

Thxs again for all input!

I see Ermit is not on sale this weekend.... Thought all companions would go on sale. Bummer! That makes a huge difference....

Oh man Ermit is back. I didnt anticipate that and now I am 180 gems short.

Need to figure out a way to earn 90 gems a day....

Really!?

Damn, I just thrown in gems for Wheellock and Arbo.... On the good side, I got a specialty balloon when getting Wheellock and can earn 10 gems for finishing the goals.

But 1200 is stil a lot...... it should be on 75% then, haha

I'm bummed I'll miss Ermit this time, as I'm getting close to being able to use him. But I'm short about 800 gems so looks like a no-go.

Now I produce 3*7 hrs of crops daily which is ~150k energy a day, and would need 8x3x5000 = 240k for the sanctuaries only.

If I'd have TWICE the crops, I could fill the sanctuaries every time AND still have some energy left. And gold would flow with full speed.

So I'll buy Ol' Mac for sure. Cherry and Dragon's Lair aren't worth it IMHO. Shrines are a bit better but only after maxed out energy.

I am having a heavy debate with myself on Ermit. I am trying to decide if hes worth one extra sanctuary run per day or if I even need a second run. Maybe a mitigating factor is that I already hit level 40 and my gold machine in place kicks out 3 mill per day. I am missing three skylanders at this point. Another sanc run would add 700k.

I think my problem is that even cutting times in half you would only get 1 more sanctuary run in per day. To get two in would require being too focused on timing every day. If you sleep 8 hours thats 16 hours left to try to get in 15 hours. Thats just not gonna happen for me.

So Ermit is 1 extra sancturary run per day.

Re Dragon houses/ energy and houses in general. Houses contribute a ton of energy each day with dragon lairs being the best at this. Th more houses you have, the less you even need fields. I can skip planting my fields cartain days.

Since the 50% off sale ends today, I have to decide between Arbo and Ol' Mac.
I have 1000 gems, Arbo costs 750, Ol'Mac 1750, I can't buy the latter obviously.

But if I don't spent almost all of my gems, I will have a chance to get Mac sometime. It's a lot easier to collect 750 gems than 1500...

With Arbo, I could close the actual gap between my actual and the "should be" crop level. But it would cost more gold. With Mac, the price would be cut in half.

I think I buy Arbo now, and we'll see.

Arbo does depend on how often you can collect per day, the only crop that is 50% faster is Grave Diggers, now 1 hour, so, if you can collect hourly, then cool. Here's the list.

Floats: 45s
Ambrosia: 2m
Cloudlings: 7m
Luminaries: 22m
Eurfirbia: 45m
Grave Diggers: 1hr
Moss Stash: 3hr
Domedlion: 5hr

So you can also get 3 Domedlion is one day also now. I bought him last time he was on sale, he is cool, but, really only if you can smash grave diggers to the max.

I ended up buying Arbo and Wheellock. No regrets.

Wheellock is nice to speed things up, and I got this free airship with it. Excellent. Today I also bought 4 airships with 75% off.

Arbo is just great as well, I end up getting so much energy that I can fill all my sanctuaries and all the airships (8 special and 14 regular) and collect a lot of gold. I start saving for Ermit, and when the radiant fields are on sale I will get some more of those. Offcourse the grave digger 1 hour collection time is my favourite as well. When I have less time during the day I do the 5 hour runs instead....

Where would this take me? Skylander spins, selling cheap houses/buildings and replace them for the more expensive ones. Why, because I am running out of space! My top wish: expansion pack with one or two islands...... then I can think a bit more about the architecture on the islands, haha!