As many of you may know, I am a musician and have been a slave to record companies a couple of times in my life. And, I have to say, that trying to figure out all of the math involved in the Homerpalooza update, if you really want to “get it all,” is more difficult than trying to figure out a foreign royalty statement from ASCAP. There are a LOT of moving parts!
But, just like every wanna-be-Pop-star, you gotta believe you have what it takes to break through…and you have to know it is going to take loads, and loads and loads of PRACTICE (if you want to earn the bonus stars…which we’ll talk about in the post).
Easy answer? Just like most of what EA does these days…Log On and Do The Basics every 4 hours! Period. No excuses. We are all busy. If you wanna be a star, it takes dedication.
But, knowing what to do, and when, is the key to maximizing your ROT (Return On Tapping). So…let’s get into the weeds on this one…
The Basics…
First, let’s start with the The Calendar…
The “Target Number for Daily Performances” in Act I (kinda like getting a gold record), is 3450 cuffs per day. That seems overwhelming…but, if you count a day as 24 hours (and last time I looked, there are 24 hours in a day), there are ample chances to tap and to earn the cuffs that earn the stuffs that help you “get it all!”
Act 1 Event Currency:
Cuffs are the Act 1 Event Currency
And tickets are the crafting currency…
First the Cuffs…
You earn them primarily for tapping FANS…
Each Fan you tap will yield 10 
Spawn Rate….
1/ 10 Minutes. Max of 30 in your town at once, bank of 30.
Finding these guys isn’t as easy as finding a snake, or a gremlin…but they DO tend to congregate around the stages and the performers, if you wait for them.
TIP: Go to the Moe’s Stage, or your Main Stage…and clear anyone there…THEN WAIT. Don’t tap or clear anything else…because the fans are drawn to the most recent action. Just wait. It’s like fishing in a lake…the more you move around, the more it confuses “the fish.” Just wait. The fans will come. Once you tap a new “fish” it will attract more…(and yes…for those easily confused, “fish” means fans in this case…and not Phish fans…which is a whole different kettle of PhishFish).
But in short, in a 4 hour period, you will get 24 every 4 hours (more if you have some in the bank from a layoff…like sleeping). So….clearing all of them every 4 hours will generate at least 1,200 Cuffs (5 clearings…24 fans…10 each). And as many as 30 every 4 hours 6 times a day if you don’t sleep, for 1,800. It isn’t easy…But if you follow my “fishing method” it can be done.
Neighbor Visits and Actions
You will also get cuffs when you tap fans in your neighbor’s towns…although, I have to say that EA is really “cheaping out” on the return for these…a mere 5 cuffs per action…and limiting it to just 30 actions (or only 10 neighbors!!) BAH!! So…at best, you’re gonna earn just 150 cuffs per day, for finding fans in your neighbor’s towns…which isn’t as easy as it seems. This may change in the next Acts…but at this point, it is NOT the primary way to earn cuffs…at all. Bad ROT…in regards to time.
HOWEVER… Dropping lawyers into your neighbor’s towns does generate a POTENTIAL much higher ROT…in that if your neighbor clears the lawyers in the 4-hour time limit, you will earn bonus cuffs and tickets, for their efforts. You DO earn 12 cuffs if they don’t clear them…but, I guess it’s all to the bottom line. Every bit helps.
SIDE NOTE: To complicate things… the lawyers are wicked hard to find! (not my experience in the music business, where lawyers are at every turn down a label’s hallway). So…don’t get mad if a neighbor doesn’t clear them. They ARE hard to find…they just wander around, in their grey suits…doing nothing. Kind of like real entertainment lawyers.
Back to Neighbors…and Lawyers. Alissa did a good job of explaining the basics…IN THIS POST Read it. And yes…she does a fine job of encapsulating the frustration of neighbors and lawyers…”This sucks” about sums it up.
Tapping a lawyer in your town, is 12 cuffs and 2 tickets….and you have the POTENTIAL for collecting the same, if a neighbor finds (not easy) and taps a layer you placed in their town.
So…my advice on neighbors and placing lawyers… Pick 10 of your BEST Neighbors…work the system…and place as many lawyers on everyone as you can. Max out the drop in each town…there is no reason to hold back. BUT…DON’T COUNT ON THESE TO BE YOUR PRIMARY SOURCE OF CUFFS AND TICKETS. Consider them a bonus…like getting your song played every year at Christmas in some obscure Scandinavian country. It’s a nice surprise…but you have little control over it.
DAILY TASKS… DO THEM!!
So…one may ask, “If this is so hard, how are you staying up with the daily minimums?? (which I am…). #1 reason I am “getting the bump” from completing the daily tasks. On each day so far (and I am going to assume it will continue) the daily tasks rewards you for completing something that you are most likely going to do anyway. Today, it is “Send Performers on Sessions” …yes…it took two complete 4-hour cycles to complete…but earned 1,000 cuffs. That is more than six times the return from tapping in neighbor’s towns...a hellofalot EASIER! Doing the daily task is the difference between flailing away, searching for neighbors and lawyers, and getting a nice BOOM!!! I like the booms…
Playing Sessions to Earn Currency
Ok…so this is where the “practice” part comes in. And from what I am hearing, there is no end to the strategy that people are coming up with (or imagining) to maximize this part of the game. It is the most fun…as the animation at the Main Stage ROCKS!!! So 80s retro!
In short…you will select all of the available players you have for each of Three Potential Sessions (Rock Stage, Moe’s, Kwik-E-Mart). They will earn cuffs for each session played…and it will increase as each player becomes “more proficient” at their craft…Raising the stars of each potential player incrementally.
Here are the basics…straight from Alissa…
Each full star adds 25 event currency to their payout. But half stars split it, the first earns 12 the second half goes to 13. (so at 1 star rev lovejoy earns 25 cuffs, at 1.5 stars he’ll earn 37 cuffs/performance (in first slot) at 2 stars he earns 50).
Same for ALL characters, just premium start at higher stars. But when they’re maxed they’ll all earn 125 Cuffs. (or act 2/3 currency)
And to level up…
80 per half level. There are 5 stars, but technically 10 levels. 80 will fill the star half way
Each performance counts as 5 of the 80
So…to break that down… You will need 16 sessions to move the Star Rating 1/2 Star. Yes…that is a LOAD OF PRACTICE…but, nobody said getting good at an instrument was easy…right? So…to MAX OUT (five stars) you may need to play as many as 160 overall sessions (Premium Characters Less…as they start with more stars). 160 x 4 hours each…640 hours of dedicated practice (and you still won’t be able to play a diatonic scale on a sax). So…just keep the sessions coming…and be happy with the returns they bring you.
And yes…I bought Murphy…you really had to ask?
THIS IS WHY LOGGING ON TO DO SESSIONS EVERY FOUR HOURS IS SO IMPORTANT!!!
And yes…there is a bonus for filling the full stage (so don’t just spread them around to all three if you don’t have enough players..AND There is a greater payout for the “First Position” of the sessions (the band leader?)…so place your highest earners in FIRST position on the session. OK? Clear as a skat? (dweep-dooodly-zap-a-doodly-boom!)
There will be another post from SAFI (our resident math wiz and numbers freak) soon on this. Watch for it.
Tickets…oh…the tickets…
Yes…getting tickets for crafting is simply not as easy as getting the cuffs(imagine a Dead Head standing outside of the stadium hoping for “a miracle”). You get them randomly when tapping fans in your town (about 25% of the time at best), and you earn them from tapping lawyers (when you can find them) and for playing sessions. You will also see them as prizes, and daily challenge rewards.
I’m not going to go into a ton of detail on this, as we are working on a “Crafting Post”...but suffice it to say..to get EVERYTHING in this act, you are going to have do more tapping than John Bonham during a Jimmy Page guitar solo…almost as much as a Grateful Dead “drums and space” segment. They come. They are prizes for both the Weird Al segment, and the main prize track. So just be patient.
Weird Al Earning Rates…
This is simple. Just DO IT… keep all of the available characters who can craft Al coins doing so…EVERY FOUR HOURS (starting to see a trend here??).
I’ve never been a fan…he is weirdly talented…just not a fan. Kinda like my opinion of Captain Beefheart. Weird. Talented. But, not for me…even though I know his old guitar player personally, as he lives in Eugene.
TO SUMMARIZE THE MATH
1. CLEAR YOUR FANS for 1,200-1,800 cuffs per day.
2. Play Your Sessions for at least 1,500 cuffs per day (300 per double stage session x 5…six if you don’t sleep)
3. Clear the lawyers if you can find them…and tap your neighbor’s towns fans if you have the time. HINT…it’s WAY easier to drop lawyers than it is to tap fans). You should earn at least 350 a day for this…plus your paltry 150 neighbor taps.
4. DO THE DAILY CHALLENGES…they won’t all yield cuffs…but the BOOM you get when they do will be a nice kick to the beat of your “tapping song.”
Basics…1200+1500+450 is the minimum…which leaves just a handful of extras and bonuses to earn every day.
Nobody said being a star or a concert promoter was easy. This update is proving that. But…I got Bleeding Gums Murphy…so I am more than content!!