Salutations Stats & Strategy Specialists
(Today’s post is sponsored by the letter ‘S’)
A couple years ago, I wrote a post about KEM farming (which can be found here) and how it yields donuts. Since that time, many of you like myself have gone on to grow your KEM farms to over 100 KEMs, earning over 100 donuts every 4 hours, as you have raised your XP bonus percentage into the thousands.
At this point, some of you may wonder is it worth always going for 3 donuts when you fill an XP bar? Or are you better spending that money on additional KEMs?
Let’s take a look and see…
ALWAYS GOING FOR 3 DONUTS
There are 5 possible outcomes of those donut boxes if you always go for three donuts:
- 3 donuts on first try
- 2 donuts on first try, 3 donuts on second try (Cost $50,000)
- 1 donut on first try, 3 donuts on second try (Cost $50,000)
- 2 donuts on first try, 1 donut on second try, 3 donuts on third try (Cost $100,000)
- 1 donut on first try, 2 donuts on second try, 3 donuts on third try (Cost $100,000)
If we average these 5 probable outcomes (taking into account the first possibility is twice as likely as the other 4), you’ll earn 3 donuts at a cost of $50,000.
18 donuts at a cost of $300,000 / 6 = 3 donuts at a cost of $50,000
So “Always Going For 3 Donuts” cost $16,667 per donut.
$50,000 / 3 donuts = $16,667 per donut
THE QUESTION?
Now the question is are you better off spending that money on more KEM instead of going for 3 donuts? Another way to put it, can you earn a donut for under $16,667 by buying extra KEMs?
SPENDING MONEY ON KEM
Unlike the 5 outcomes that exist if you always go for 3 donuts, there are only 3 possible outcomes of those donut boxes if you stop at the first choice:
- 3 donuts on first try
- 2 donuts on first try
- 1 donut on first try
So the average of these 3 outcomes is 2 donuts when you fill a 1,000,000 XP bar. So 1 donut would require 500,000 XP.
6 donuts / 3 = 2 donuts
1,000,000 XP / 2 donuts = 500,000 XP per donut
With $16,667, you can buy 1.157 KEM at a cost of $14,400. [For the sake of simplifying the math, I’m ignoring the fact that the first 24 KEM are cheaper, resulting in a slightly lower average KEM price than $14,400 depending on the size of your farm. However, the more KEM in your farm, the closer the average cost gets to $14,400.]
$16,667 / $14,400 per KEM = 1.1574305555555555555555555KEM
So the question is how can we earn 500,000 XP with 1.157 KEM. Or alternatively, that comes down to 431,991 XP per KEM.
500,000 XP / 1.157 KEM = 431,991 XP per KEM
To earn 431,991 XP per KEM with the XP collider on, we divide by 5 for the XP collider resulting in 86,398 XP per KEM.
431,991 XP per KEM / 5 = 86,398 XP per KEM
When we divide this by 2,000 (the base XP of KEM), we get 4,320 as the XP multiplication factor.
86,398 XP per KEM / 2,000 XP per KEM = 4,320%
Minus the 100 that just naturally exists gives us a required 4,220% XP bonus in order to earn 431,991 XP per KEM with your XP collider on.
CONCLUSION
That means you need an XP bonus of 4,220% to make it wiser to spend your money on more KEM and just stopping at the first box, rather than keep going until you get to the box with 3 donuts.
4,220% is the magic XP number.
What is your XP bonus? Is it over 4,220%? If it is over 4,220%, have you been stopping at your first choice? If it under 4,220% have you kept going until you get 3 donuts? Sound off in the comments below. You know we love hearing from you.
At 0% it takes $1.5M to earn enough XP selling RTT to generate one box of donuts (B)(Depending on your strategy B is 1, 2 or 3 donuts).
Lets say it takes (T) time for you buildings and characters to generate (I) income to generate (X) XP to earn (D) donuts at 0%.
At 100% bonus it will take T/2 to generate I. I will generate 2X. So in T you will generate 4X. OR 4B.
At 200% bonus it will take T/3 to generate I. I will generate 3X. So in T you will generate 9X. OR 9B.
So 1+n(100)% bonus will take T/(n+1) to generate I. I will generate (n+1)X. So in T you will generate (n+1)(n+1)X. OR n^2+2n+1B.
(So we see the benefits of adding bonus is exponential!)
N=0 -> B, N=1 -> 4B , N=2 -> 9B, N=3->16B
So for each 100% added we add (2 plus what was added before),
i.e. 3,5,7,9,11,13,15,…
or in T we generate B:
1,4,9,16,25,36,49,64…..
for example, if n=40, 1681 B=boxes are produced in T time.
This post made me feel like I was in a calculus or physics class. 😂😂😂 I so couldn’t read it all. But you make a valid point. I also have a question I no longer receive the email articles even though it tells me my email is already subscribed
It’s probably some WordPress issue. I’m not getting the emails either.
What an incredibly helpful post and thread- thank you very much to all.
Would this change at all if you are only choosing twice? If you select one donut, you can select the left box and always get three donuts. If you select two donuts, you can select the right box you will automatically get three donuts.
This doesn’t work for me – I’ve never seen consistent results when tapping again.
Why do you need to hold back a big cash stash if there’s rarely an opportunity to spend it ? I’m at 640% bonus and yield around 500 donuts per week, however, I use ALL of the cash I earn to buy KEM’s, 2 -3 x per weekday and more often on weekends.
Forgot to mention that since I’m always cash-strapped, I only tap again if I receive 1.
I spend everything myself too, I always try to hold back enough so I can have the 100k on hand to tap twice to get 3, and if i have to I will sell kems back as I tap
511% and get roughly 75 a day if I can get 4-5 sets in a day
Why do people hold back large sums of cash? Some of us players have been playing TSTO for a very long time. We’ve played the game before there was the XP Collider and regular level updates were still a thing. Back then, between level updates, each round of donuts required increasing amounts of XP, maxing out at 10 million XP points. That’s not a typo. 10 million XP points and NO XP Collider.
Speaking only for myself, I don’t want the game to go back to those times but I’m preparing for the worst case scenario that the game does revert back.
At some point large reserves of cash become inevitable. When I was in the 640% range I was in the same boat as you, farming as many KEM as I could while using up all of my cash. Now I’m closer to 1500% bonus and I make more cash than I can spend. Also at some point you just can’t farm all day. (At least for those of us with jobs and responsibilities.) So while I can log in and quickly collect at least some of my earnings from jobs and buildings I don’t have time to also play farmer. I rarely even get to log in every four hours. It’s more like once or twice a day. I usually get through the events even though I don’t log in that often because I use every advantage they give us with premium characters and buildings. Since I don’t farm every day and my bonus percentage is relatively high I make so much cash that I just can’t spend it with the time I have to play. Usually I build 500 or so KEM’s at a time and clear a few of them every once in a while until they are all cleared or when I do have some extra time to play I farm RTTs and build up a large donut pile. I get about 1 chance at donuts per RTT. (RRT Hint: don’t buy too many at a time. Every time I get greedy/lazy and build 100 or so at once I get through about 20 of them and get the dreaded Bart screen. The other 80 or so RTT’s are wasted. I now build a max of 15 at a time and sometimes I still get taken for the proverbial ride.)
.
Aren’t you overlooking the fact that farming KEMs inevitably includes selling them back for 25% of value? If you farm regularly, the long term cost of each KEM is not $14,400 but something closer to $9,600 ($14,400 minus 3,600 minus 900 minus 225 down to the vanishing point). So, your $16,667 actually buys you more like 1.74 KEMs, 286,794 XP are needed per donut, and the breakeven bonus point is 2,768% (without 5x collider).
Very strong point and one I clearly overlooked.
Wait, you guys sell them back?
Lol
I want to be clear that I do, indeed sell them back and just wanted to be funny. And I think I was. So there.
I always go for the 3 donuts. My KEM farm is around 100 KEM. My bonus % is a little over 1000. Cash isn’t an issue because I have over 300,000,000. But now that I have a nice stash of donuts I KEM farm maybe once or twice a day.
Here’s a math problem for our whiz kids.
Pretend I’m new to the game and I need advice…
I want to make 875 donuts a month (800 donuts clear, after the collider is paid) by RTT farming. (No KEM farming is part of the goal.)
What would be the optimum cash income and bonus percent needed to acheive this (and not accrue bunches of extra cash) while minimizing my donut purchases on the way to get there?
Assume income is 3 parts from characters to one part properties (we’ll pretend they’re all 12 hr incomes, just so it doesn’t get completely off the rails). Characters cost 120 donuts, properties cost 60 donuts (and we have to have a minimum of 100), combos cost 200 donuts (no bonus, but the buildings count towards the 100 pc minimum and also earn at the 12 hr rate) and bonus items average out to 8% per 100 donuts spent (Mystery Box purchases).
I’m sure there are thousands of ways to acheive the goal, but what way minimizes donut spending and eventually acheives a stable cash income amount and bonus percent?
How many properties vs characters will be needed?
How much cash will we need to bring in each day?
What bonus percent will be needed to buy the 875 donuts and not deplete our cash over the last month’s earnings.
Keep in mind, we want to minimize our overall donut spending to acheive our goal.
Anybody who solves this can sell the solution to thousands of Tappers and retire! 👍😄🤗
My cat’s breath smells like cat food…
😂😂😂
Too complicated. “while minimizing my donut purchases on the way to get there?” what do you mean by that? “(and not accrue bunches of extra cash) ” – why include that? “New to the game”? Are you starting a new game, with 0% bonus?
Sorry Charles, it was a joke😜. I didn’t really expect anybody to attempt the solution, just poking fun at how we (myself included) seem to need to “find the perfect formula” for a game that was simply designed for people to have fun. 😁
Uhm…Charles is REALLY serious about KEM farming…and the percentages…and how best to guess at something that really has no real pattern. I have found that out every time I do a post about any of it. But, we still love him…right?
I guess I just have too much time on my hands. I like interesting problems that test me.
I admire your inquisitive spirit…compute on! 👍😊
Let’s assume you are at the level to get the 3 donuts box. If you have 0% bonus, it would cost you $1.5M to get a box. At the level you would spend to get 3 donuts for an average of $1.575M per 3 donuts. To run your collider you would need to earn $39+M a month. At 1900% that income would earn you over 850 donuts. But you would generate 20 times the income with the same number of characters and buildings, thus extra cash. Therefore, your question is unsolvable.
Ok, first thing to consider: Does your regular (non-farming) income over 10 days (with the collider) earn more donuts than the cost to charge the collider for 10 days? If not, STOP. Either farm KEMs or hybrid farm, using KEMs and supplement with RTTs, but going RTT only is a bad idea at this point.
Now, if you insist on RTT-only farming when your non-farming income doesn’t cover the cost of the collider, you’ll be better off burst-farming. Charge the collider for 1 day, and burn almost all your cash on RTTs. Then take a few days off of farming, and let your cash rebuild. THEN repeat.
As for how much farming to make 800/month, that depends on your strategy at the donut game. For the sake of simple math, let’s assume you’re taking the first choice every time, so you’ll average 2 donuts per level. 800/2=400 levels, which means 400M experience points. Make note of your cash and experience levels, but 1 RTT and sell it immediately. Again, make note of your cash and experience, and calculate the difference between before and after for both.
400M / (Exp after – Exp before) * (Cash before – Cash after) = How much money you’ll need to spend on your farm each month, which you can divide by 30 to get the daily amount. (This number will decrease slightly as your bonus % increases over time.)
There are several other factors that can influence the decision of whether to try for additional donuts, as well as more strategies to consider. There may come a time when your bonus % becomes high enough that more time-efficient, space-efficient, or tap-efficient strategies become more attractive.
One of these strategies involves short term, intensive bursts of farming, using more time-efficient but less money-efficient items, like Tiki bars. While they cost more per donut than KEMs, they build INSTANTLY, which means instant donuts whenever you need them. Also, the instant build for tiki bars uses MUCH less space than KEM farming, as the space is used for a few minutes per round, instead of 4 hours.
When playing the donut game, there are a few other strategies worth consideration, as well. When going up a few dozen levels at once, tap-efficiency isn’t much of a big deal. But when going up a few HUNDRED levels all at once, tap-efficiency becomes worth consideration.
In addition to the taps necessary for building, the donut game for each level involves 2-4 taps, and several seconds of your time and attention. If you take the first prize offered every time, you’ll average 1 donut per tap, with a predictable 4-count rythm–(tap, wait, wait, claim)–that endlessly repeats. With a little practice, you can do this without even looking at the screen, churning out an average of 1 donut per tap, as you watch a favorite episode.
Another option would be the increasing gains method. If your initial tap yields 1 donut, tap again. Otherwise, take what you got on the first try. If the second tap is 2, you know the third tap will be 3, so go for it. Using this method, you’ll still average 1 donut per tap, but you’ll spend less game cash in the process. This method is also a bit more engaging, so you’ll feel more like you’re playing the game and less like a donut machine.
Depending on your bonus level, however, when you factor in the taps to buy your tiki bars, you may find that one of these strategies becomes slightly more efficient than the other, particularly when you start gaining more than one level per tiki bar purchased.
As with everything TSTO, do whatever method appeals to you. None of these methods are universally better or worse than the others, they each have their benefits and drawbacks.
Agreed, with the slight exception that my method is universally better than the others. 🙂
😂😂😂
Excellent post, Safi, although I will admit that math is not exactly my favorite subject.
I’ve been at Level 939 for some time now and currently at around 525% XP Bonus. My Springfield Heights buildings are maxed up (including the Beach Hideaways). I farm somewhere between 60-80 KEMs every 4 hrs (except when i go to sleep). I get 3 or 4 chances for bonus donuts. I always go for 3, meaning I get around 12 donuts every 4 hrs. However, if my in-game cash goes below $10,000,000, I stop KEM farming until I get back to around $20-30 million in-game cash.
On a rare occasion, I would farm Tiki Bars instead of Ratmobiles & Ambulances because they are cheaper. I’m trying to be a more effective KEM farmer and my XP is not large enough where I could fully take advantage of using Ratmobiles or Ambulances.
I used to do the Monorail everyday to get 5 donuts, but I don’t do that anymore. However, I still play the Where’s Maggie mini-game. If I get 1 or 2 donuts after the Maggie game, I keep them instead of trying to gamble for 3.
Once one gets to a 3400 or 3500 bonus percentage, this all becomes moot, because you are printing money faster than you can spend it.
My biggest problem with KEM farming is placing them. I see you have water presumably to keep them from randomly placed all over
An effective KEM farm allows you to place and sell them quickly, which usually means a straight line down. Surround the farm with items that can’t be sold. Certain walls work and premium bonus items, e.g. Billboards and Vans, also work. Placing them on the edge of your screen works bests. If you have multiple lines, try placing bonus items between the lines.
I made a box at the edge of my screen with land I bought (4×4, 16 total) specifically for kem farming … blocked it off with a roadway so I can keep it apart from my town.
In all I can place 16 KEM down by 8 across (if I have extra cash I can do 9 sideways too at the edge) …
most of the time i start placing them by zooming in and starting at the bottom left corner and following the roadway up (it auto travels placement) and just keep dropping them as they move up the screen to the top left corner and then they head to the bottom right corner and then back left until this area is filled in, not sure how many this is but its my usually placement of kems if I have extra cash I will do more at the top, but I find this easiest as I can group sell them with 3 group highlights after I finish them.
I made a grid of fences, with each fence piece separated by a few squares (i.e. not a solid fence) to cut down on fence pieces used. Each KEM is thus separated by 1 space in each direction. I can place down 32 KEM’s in only 5-10 seconds with no need to reposition any of them. The key thing to remember when it’s time to sell the KEM’s is to make the fences invisible so you don’t accidentally sell them too (Which I have done. Twice).
Try using hieroglyph walls instead of fences – they can’t be sold. That’s what I did.
Nice idea, thanks!
Very cool post Safi!
I am not at a point where i can build alot of KEMs so i was wondering, what are the actual numbers if you grind with 100 KEMs?
And how big is the difference if you actually do calculate with the first 24 KEM being cheaper?
Here is the result:
The first 24 cost 75770$ in total, buying 100 costs 1170170$ in total, that’s an average of 11702$ / KEM. For 16667$ (going with the ‘always 3 donuts’ strategy) you can buy 1.424 KEM. Therefor, 1 KEM will have to result in 351123XP, dividing that by 5 and then by 2000 results in 3511%.
Until you reach 3411%, it is cheaper to go for those 3 donuts than to spend the money on more KEM (Assuming you have enough money and you are always farming 100 KEM).
Calculating with 150 KEM results in 3968% as breaking point.
(This does mean, the less KEM you buy, the faster you get to the point where buying more KEM is better. This might be confusing, for example: no matter your bonus %, you get more donuts per $ by farming with 5 KEM than by spending it on always getting those 3 donuts. Why? Because mathematicaly speaking, this is not a linear problem but a ‘dynamic optimization’ problem, advanced math is indeed a fitting term here).
But…..
there are more strategies than just ‘always go for 3 donuts’.
A. Go for 2 or higher:
-If you get 2 or 3 donuts, fine.
-If you get 1 donut, respin until you get 3.
This will give you an average of 2.66 donuts per spin, with an average cost of 9375 $ / donut.
B. Respin once if you get 1 donut:
-If you get 2 or 3 donuts, fine.
-If you get 1 donut, do 1 respin.
This will give you an average of 2.5 donuts per spin, with an average cost of 6666 $ / donut (I usually go with this strategy).
Doing the above calculation with strategy B and 100 KEM results in the following:
It is more effective to spend 50000$ on 1 respin (if you get only 1 donut) than to invest it into more KEM (assuming your max KEM is 100) UNTIL you reach a bonus % of 8672%. After that point, even the most efficient strategy B is less efficient than simply buying more KEM.
There are really three different decisions, all with different price points.
When you get 1 donut on the first try…
Here you’re paying $50k for an expected return of 1.5 donuts.
When you get 2 donuts on the first try…
Here you’re paying $50k for an expected return of 0.5 donuts.
When you have tried twice already…
Here you are paying $50k for an expected return of 1 donut.
Thanks for doing the math for us. I really appreciate the information.
As a long time bonus addict I have just got to 4265% with a big jet bike buying spree over Xmas. If these come into your vault these are an easier way to build up your bonus ( am not be as cheap an misery boxes but easier!). When you start to get your bonus up to around a 1000% collecting donuts and therefore buying items that increase your bonus gets a lot easier. I went from about 600% to a 1000% really quickly using mystery boxes but since then have bought more jet bikes and snow cats to increase %.
One item which I recently noticed gave a good xp payout for the amount of cash spent was the book burning mobile, it’s only 5000 in game cash but gives me one visit to the donut box for each one bought. These could be a compromise between the cheaper but slower KEMs and quicker but more expensive Blood / rat traps?
This great! Thanks for crunching the dunkers and figuring out the % needed to make it worth it 🙂
I only run like 80 KEMs at ~650%… this, using my accept/gamble strategy yields around 12 donuts/4 hours. My strategy has clearly been proven above to not be the most profitable but I do as follows:
If 1 donut, I always gamble. If 2, I typically accept. If I get 2 from the gamble of 1, I sometimes gamble to get 3. The last gambling depends on how my fortunes have gone for the last day or so and also just based on gut or annoyance 🙂
It’s interesting to see the math though – will be a long time before I get to a profitable % so I have to stick with my current approach based on habit and also how satisfying it is to gamble and walk away with more donuts 🙂
I go for the 3 donuts. When I farm, which is not every login, I do 100 KEMs.
That Money is the root of Evil comment is always misquoted. It’s from the bible and it’s the LOVE of money that’s evil, not the money itself. Money is just money. It’s how it’s used as to whether Evil is done or not.
As far as this discussion, thanks for the breakdown. Always fun to read your math! I do both. Save up tons of cash then turn on my collider for five or ten days depending on how I feel at the time and farm KEMs while doing RTTs here and there throughout the time frame. But I only do a small amount of KEMs that don’t bog me down in time spent.
I utilize my railroad a lot to farm donuts. I tend to use my collider in between events so I’m only having to log into the event for it’s own purposes and not trying to juggle both KEM farming and event stuff.
Thanks again Safi!
No problem Reverend Carol Lovejoy. 🙂
It could also be the love of acquiring money that leads people down a not so righteous path not how it’s spent that is evil.
I got my bonus % to 1000 without SH buildings I didn’t want on show. at this I % I don’t Kem farm but buy rat traps once a day. I get between 50 and 60 a day. I like to play with a little anticipation, just like Christmas it’s more fun to wait for what you want. Plus, it opens up a lot of land when you stop farming!!
I was told there wouldn’t be any math.
😑
You were grossly misinformed. Math is going to pick up a notch in 2019. 🙂
WOW! How does one get to 4,220% I finally understand KEM Farming, thanks Safi, but I think my 298% Bonus Percentage is nowhere near enough to justify attempting to farm. Of course I am a Freemium player, so have not invested too much real $ into the game yet, maybe $10-20 total since starting to play 3 years ago.
I see all this talk about KEM farming but don’t truly understand how a freemium player can ever get to the point where the multipliers really work for them to start earning more than 1-3 donuts every couple days or so.
The best way to increase your percentage (next to getting all 5 Springfield Heights beach hideaways and accessories) is by purchasing Mystery Boxes for 6 donuts. Typically for every 100 donuts you spend on Mystery Boxes, you’ll get enough Itchy & Scratchy Billboards and Channel 6 News Vans to raise your XP bonus 8-10%.
So what I would do in your case if you were looking to increase your XP bonus and get to the point where you are, as the title says, an “Advanced” KEM farmer:
First, cut down the number of KEMs you are farming if you are running out of in-game cash.
When you cut it down, you may find you’re only earning fewer donuts/4hr for now.
After a few days or a week, you’ll have earned 100 donuts.
Now spend those 100 donuts on Mystery Boxes raising your XP bonus 8-10%.
Now when you farm, you’ll earn more XP per KEM and start earning more donuts/4h without losing in-game cash.
Eventually, as you keep repeating this sequence, going up 8-10% every few days, you start decreasing the number of days it takes to get to 100 donuts.
Pretty soon, you’ll be earning 100 donuts/4h.
Safi – thanks for doing this – really great. I want to explore the % boosting a little more: you believe that mystery boxes are the most economical (as well as visually okay – we have to have towns we like looking at, after all!) expense of donuts? I
have just been hoarding until something like time bikes or whatever they’re called where the %/price/size/attractiveness seem good and then pull the trigger in a big way. I understand that if you are constantly upping your percent with bonus boxes rather than waiting for the one score every once in a while, you certainly earn more in aggregate.
Interested to hear if you or anyone else has any more thoughts than you’ve already posted in your incredibly patient/nice others on this….
Many people have looked into this.
The Beach Hideaways cost 40 donuts each and generate a whopping 20% when fully upgraded. That’s a ridiculous 2:1 ratio, unparalleled in this game.
A good ratio is 20:1, where for every 20 donuts you spend, you get a 1% XP rise.
There are a few regular priced premium items with a 15:1 ratio, like the Jet Engine Bike. Even on sale, these items never drop below 10:1.
As two of it’s prizes are 10 donuts and 30 donuts, the Mystery Box on average yields about a net 8:1 or 9:1 ratio, making it the second best item.
As many people have mentioned, you can also plop all your Channel 6 News Vans or Itchy&Scratchy Billboards in one are and group store them when not farming if you’re worried about aesthetics.
This distillation is incredibly helpful!! Thank you so much for the considerate and comprehensive reply.
Play the Old Ruins mini game from this years halloween event. One possible prize is a flame street lamp that has a bonus of 0.2%. This prize is somewhat rare but I’ve collected 16 of them since I started ( it was giving them out more frequently when I first started to play, but it still pays out one about every other day). So this means you can probably increase your bonus about 1% each month. For FREE. The down side is, of course, it takes time to play the game, but if you have the time it’s worth it.
Yes, you’re right, it has slowed down since the event. I have 27 now, but only 3 in the past week.
It also gives a CRAZY amount of XP per find. I get just under 20k of XP whenever I find the … the … … whatever it is we’re digging for.
If you aren’t already, go to the neighbors’ screen and then back to your town you will get even more XP, it should be around 20x what you get for finding the relic. You don’t need to actually go to any neighbors Springfields. Just pop in and back out. It even stacks, so I play two rounds, go to the neighbor screen and back…I don’t want to risk server crashes.
Is this true? I couldn’t tell if it worked or not. I did a dig, found the relic, stored the prize, tapped the neighbor icon, then back into my Springfield, which opened up at the Simpson’s house. I couldn’t see any extra XPs floating in.
You won’t see the XP floating like you usally do when you tap buildings or a charachter. Next time look at your XP bar before you tap the neighbor icon and then again when you come back to your Springfield. You should see a significant XP gain.
Interesting flaw. I went from 215790 to 675310 just by hitting the friend icon and then the home icon.
Woooo – nice! Gotta admit, was skeptical at first. I just mined (successfully), hit the friends icon, hit the home icon, and landed an additional (approx.) 250k XP. NICE! Thanks for sharing!
Also — HUGE thanks for this! I had no idea there was a percentage involved … just pulled 31 out of inventory. Thank you thank you! Also – I’ll share this for anyone that doesn’t know, I found a good strategy for mining. Move in the shape of an ‘L’ (like a knight in chess). I found that somewhere and it has been magical … … might even have been somewhere on this site … not sure. It seems to be the most efficient way to mine.
We have a post on best strategies for digging, which can be found by clicking here.
Safi will there be a breakdown on the rate of flaming torches in the near future?
Yes, there will be a minigames post about it.
I didn’t know torches gave a percent bonus either so thanks! I had 24. Are there any other mini games that give items with bonus%?
Yes, quite a few. Do a search on this site for “Minigames”. I ran a series of posts the last couple years about all the Minigames.
It is never too early to KEM farm. The first one is only $220. I have never spent a dime on the game (that money went to Patric’s village). I have 5 games running, the least with now over 1000%. A recorded my progress on a test game (now over 4000%) that show how in less than a year you can earn enough donuts to buy everything available for donuts. My anonymous game started out as not going for bonus, but right before THOH I decided to go for the bonus and quickly went from 400% to 1000%.
With my test game after I went above 2000%, I started using my donuts for buying bonus items like tree and benches and whales. In most of my games I didn’t farm until I couldn’t buy all the event mystery boxes. But it only took a few days to earn the needed donuts. Now I just do a casual farm (under $14,400) to build up my reserves. No grinding necessary at those levels.
Thanks Super Safi ❤
We were actually having a chat about this over at TOuk the other day and what the ultimate bonus is for buying rats or bloods where buying just 1 gives the exact xp needed to get a bonuts box at level 939.
What’s your opinion on this?
The confusing element is that your xp bonus conformity meter doesn’t actually exactly match up to the amount of xp recieved because it doesn’t show the true amount only reflects the bonus % on cash. True? False?
🤔
Well it takes 1,000,000 XP to get a bonuts box. With the XP collider on, you’d have to earn 200,000 XP to fill the XP bar.
In order for a Rat Trap Truck to go from a baseline 15,000 XP to earning 200,000 XP, you’d have to have an XP bonus percentage of 1,233.33%
In order for a Bloodmobile to go from a baseline 13,200 XP to earning 200,000 XP, you’d have to have an XP bonus percentage of 1,415.15%
So at an XP bonus percentage of 1,233.33%, you could spend $150,000 on a rat trap truck to earn a trip to bonut box land or at an XP bonus percentage of 1,415.15%, you could spend $132,000 on a bloodmobile to earn a trip to bonut box land.
So when my bonus reaches 6,166.65% I can buy a rat trap truck and get a bonuts box WITHOUT the collider on?
(Just multiplied your base by 5)
Same for bloods 7,075.75%…
Ultimate goal! 😉
Also did you find discrepancies in the amount your xp bonus meter shows as to what it really is?
No, I believe they got rid of the “hidden” XP bonus a few events ago.
And no, you’re off by 400%, as you’re not accounting for the XP multiplier being applied to the natural 100% that just exists outside of the XP bonus percentage. Without XP collider, you can just divide the base line XP generated from the 1,000,000 required to fill an XP bar.
Rat trap trucks = 1,000,000 XP / 15,000 XP = 6,666.67% (- 100% for the baseline)
Bloodmobiles = 1,000,000 XP / 13,200 XP = 7,575.75% (- 100% for the baseline)
So at an XP bonus percentage of 6,566.67%, you could spend $150,000 on a rat trap truck to earn a trip to bonut box land without the XP collider activated or at an XP bonus percentage of 7,475.75%, you could spend $132,000 on a bloodmobile to earn a trip to bonut box land without the XP collider activated.
You are AWESOME! 😍
But what on earth is natural about a 100% that just exists outside of the XP bonus percentage!
All a bit Star Trek! 🙀
Let’s say you just started the game or tucked away all your bonus generating items. So your XP bonus percentage is 0%. Now let’s say you placed a rat trap truck? Would you get 0 XP? No. You would get the natural 100% inherent to that object.
Oooooh!
I agree! Totally awesome Safi! I haven’t been around as much this holiday – so glad I landed on this conversation! As you’ve prolly guessed math’s not my best subject either…🤪 RachelS
Excellent, Thanks for that mathematical explanation.
I think it then becomes an issue of time at a certain point, which is why I was say “easier” rather than more efficient….ie $$ per XP/donut.
Plopping down 15 RTTs and reaping 145 donuts at will is a better use of time but not money. But time is money…so…2 different forms of efficiency?
How do we determine time usage and what it’s worth?
Let’s say I reap 145 donuts in 10 minutes with RTTs at 4500%. And let’s compare that in terms of what that will buy in KEMs. 15 RTTS = 2.25m = 160ish KEMs…which take fooooorever to lay down, collect, resell.
How many donuts does 160 KEMs yield? Is it 1 vs 1.39? So 1.4 times as much? If I’m understanding correctly, the XP payout you mentioned above. I’m rounding up as the majority of KEMs at that point are bought at 14,400. So 222 donuts…ish
It’s a good chunk more but back when I KEM farmed, 160 KEMs took forever to farm. I mean I get it, more donuts but also waaaaaaay more time. So is it more efficient? If I need 300 donuts for a Gil deal, I just buy 15 more RTTs. Easy Peasy, another 10 minutes, and no waiting 4 hours either.
Also, the whole Bart Screen of Death…there’s your X factor. Which is why I only buy 10 or 15 RTTs at a time.
So KEM farming is more efficient with money/XP/yield but not time I think. The money doesn’t really matter if you have $3B let’s say. You can farms tens of thousands of donuts with either KEM or RTT at that point. Even a few hundred million will go a long way.
Anyway, just my thoughts.
Thanks to you and this blog I KEM farmed for a year. But once I hit 2000% I switched to RTTs and have never looked back.
Appreciate you figuring all this out for us and for all that you do.
Well you can also look at it like this:
KEM Farming and Rat trap truck/Bloodmobile Farming
– Require Time x Money
– But we know Time is Money
– So it requires Money x Money
– Which means it requires Money ^ 2
– But we also know Money is the root of all Evil
– So KEM Farming and Rat trap truck/Bloodmobile Farming are Evil
The love of money is the root of all evil.
Sorry King Paul, Queen Carol beat you to this one.
But I have absolutely nothing else to do with my time…which is why I downloade TSTO in the first place. So, my time is invaluable while at the same time being worthless. Plus, I like the nice neatness of math over the messy unknowable-ness of philosophy so…..*sticks fingers in ears and skips away humming a tune*
~MIB👤
So you must HATE Quantum Physics…where the math only produces “we think this works this way most of the time…except when it doesn’t” results!
Too many Theory’s involved!….sends me screaming and running outside so I can calm down by staring at the infinity of space.
I agree with everything 👍
(1) If you have/earn lots of cash go for 3. Your time is worth it.
(2) If you building bonus (by buying Mystery Boxes) go for 3. The sooner you increase the better.
(3) Only if you are not buying KEMs for $14,400 would it be worth it not go for 3. This means you need the money.
By the way, I have games with bonus of 1031% to over 4000%.
Good point with #3 for those just starting out. But that would be more specific to a post for “Beginner KEM Farming”. Shouldn’t (hopefully) apply to “Advance KEM Farming”.
I have a headache.
Thanks for this Safi. I am nowhere near advanced, but knowing how high my multiplier needs to be to stop on the first my is very helpful. I only started KEM farming a month ago. I am just under 300% and will hit level 939 this week, so this is just the post I was looking for. Got some mystery boxes to open.
This is a magnificent post and all the comments are equally magnificent, or do I mean insane? I am a dedicated bloodmobile farmer, but at last thanks to Safi I understand KEM farming. I think I still prefer the quick targeted approach of blood mobiling to the extended KEM grind. With a % of 757 and two character workshifts per day of 12 hours in the daytime and 8 hours at night Plus income from buildings I can accumulate at about £2.5 million per day. I only farm when I need to, say when my stash gets below 1,000 donuts. I try to keep my £ at around £150 million for a rainy day, and farm when it gets a bit oppressive eg £350 million. I get about 12 donuts per million. Resources are a bit low at present due to excessive gambling on the Black Friday lucky boxes. I like the idea of using mystery boxes to increase XP but how do you hide all the surplus Channel 4 vans? Surely they must clamp down on all this fun soon?
Aye, there in lies the rub.
I have a giant Channel 6 News Van parking lot. As for the billboards, they line my monorail track. Gives my rides something to see. 🙂
You can always group-store any multiple bonus items (like signs and news vans) and pull them back out only when you farm RTTs or Bloodmobiles. You really don’t need a super high bonus for daily game play…you’re probably already earning enough donuts and cash every day to run your collider 24/7 and build up a cash surplus…and the extra stuff gets cluttery pretty fast. Also, all those multiple items really boost your piece count, which has become more of an issue lately.
I used to have all my bonus items hidden everywhere in my town, but realized that they really weren’t neccesary unless I was farming. I group stored 800% of them and now run my daily game at 850%…more than enough to pile up daily donuts and cash for normal game play. My extra bonus items are available to me when I need them for farming RTTs, but I don’t have to look at them everyday. 😁
Hi Safi – love a maths post! Have you tried the calculator which an EA Forum user designed? It’s at http://lwshost.com/tsto/kemcalc.pl and it is quite useful. I confess I am plugging it in part because one of the strategies there is one I developed a couple of years back (which is effectively your stop at 2 on the first go, and which has a narrow window of being the optimal strategy). Anyway it is fun to experiment with!
I would like to add that I always go for 3, whether it is through rat trap truck farming or just day to day collection – once I had enough cash then time spent tapping became more important (or, more accurately, time not spent tapping did).
Is that 4220% base or with the 5x multiplier on? So 840% pre multiplier?
I’m at 4514% and have the multiplier constantly on.
Here’s my big question. At what point is it just easier to buy Rat Trap Trucks (RTT) than mess with KEMs? I feel it’s around 1500% base but I’m not sure.
At this point I get 87-90 donuts when I buy 10 RTTs. So at 1500% it’s around 30. It’s way easier to just buy RTTs to get donuts than KEM farm in my opinion . Of course it’s all about the in game cash but at this point, many of us should have hundreds of millions in savings as there’s nothing else to do with it. Clearing everything even once a day should give you a ton of surplus cash in short order.
That’s the thing I’d talk about. KEM farm to get donuts to buy stuff to get your percentage up high enough to not have to KEM farm, just buy RTTs to get your donuts. So what’s the magic number? There has to be a Delta where RTT is better than KEM.
The 4,220% is without your XP multiplier. It’s the amount showing as your bonus when you click on 5 stars.
As for KEM versus RTT, you will never reach a point where RTT yield more than KEM. KEM yield anywhere from 9.09 XP per $ (at the initial price of $220 in game cash) to 0.139 XP per $ (at the hishest price of $14,400) XP per $. Simply put, these are ratios that no other item in the game approaches.
The closest are RTT and BM that both have a 0.1 ratio with rat trap trucks yielding 15,000 XP for $150,000 and bloodmobiles 13,200 XP for $132,000.
KEM is always the most efficient bang for your buck and no percentage will change that. But if you’re looking for speed and to avoid the 4 hour lag, rat trap trucks and bloodmobiles are equally the best.