Improving Map Drop Yields (Quests)

[Nayeon]

Hey everyone,

I'm trying to figure out the best way to improve the drop rate for Excavation destinations, e.g. Ancient Rome, Stonehenge.

Even when I use bonuses like Sky Captain paired with Dice it doesn't seem to make any difference, which is highly disappointing as I'm trying to close out a few last stars.

Has anyone else noticed this? Is there a better path to help improve drop rates for these flights?

Thanks so much!

👧 ⛽
N

 

[Chloe11111]

I use sky captain, dice, golden dice, and spyglass all at the same time. And get roughly 50% drop rate for giants and below

 

[Nayeon]

Wow, that's a lot of bonuses to have to stack. I'll have to plan this out better...

 

[Chloe11111]

Wow, that's a lot of bonuses to have to stack. I'll have to plan this out better...

Most of them come from collections. And the more adventure buildings you have, the more collections you complete and the more bonuses you start accumulating.

 

[Barkmi4 (Mike)]

The (fairly extensive) data I have suggests the base rate is around 10% (slightly more but I prefer a little conservatism).
Bonuses like Sky Capt, Junior Pilot, Dice, Golden Dice, and Spy Glass stack.
I’m not sure about gold sub or bowl of riches.

Whilst the bonuses stack, they still play by the laws of average. And sometimes, getting that first item to drop can be a real pain and it feels like the game is broken, for lack of a better word. However, on the most part by the time you have done ~100 flights they do meet the average other than the odd anomaly (good or bad, maybe 1 destination in 25 fits this pattern).

For some reference, for adventure destinations, my data suggests;
+200% bonus =~ 30% rate
+300% bonus =~ 40% rate
+400% bonus =~ 50% rate
etc

 

[Madge59230]

Hey everyone,

I'm trying to figure out the best way to improve the drop rate for Excavation destinations, e.g. Ancient Rome, Stonehenge.

Even when I use bonuses like Sky Captain paired with Dice it doesn't seem to make any difference, which is highly disappointing as I'm trying to close out a few last stars.

Has anyone else noticed this? Is there a better path to help improve drop rates for these flights?

Thanks so much!

👧 ⛽
N

Agree with @Chloe11111 . Dice golden dice, sky Capt, spy glass minimum. Add business glass for coins. But I split the 6 hours between alliance purple maps and excavation maps to make the best use of the bonuses.

 

[Maverick68]

Wow, that's a lot of bonuses to have to stack. I'll have to plan this out better...

Another option 🤔, albeit perhaps not a favorite and likely only practical for small planes, is the brute force method using fewer bonuses and flying as many planes and speeding them up which for some, fuel is more plentiful\obtainable than stacked bonuses.

Perhaps someone has attempted and can provide comparative data?

 

[deepgreensea]

I would suggest that you don’t use any bonuses for Excavation flights as their drop rate is pretty good as is and they are easy to accumulate. Save your bonuses for the S3 map runs as you will want to throw everything at those. The space maps are in the middle, and I use the common bonuses for those, but not things like Spyglass and Golden dice which are rarer to gather.

 

[Chloe11111]

Another option 🤔, albeit perhaps not a favorite, is the brute force method using fewer bonuses and flying as many planes and speeding them up which for some, fuel is more plentiful\obtainable than stacked bonuses.

Perhaps someone has attempted and can provide comparative data?

That certainly is an approach. I guess it depends on your goals. BTW, @Barkmi4 (Mike) has very detailed data about this

My goal is not to fly to destinations after I have 3 starred them. I want to get the goods and move on to the next destination and 3 more stars. It's certainly more expensive from a bonus perspective - two giant runs at the same time though. 100 flights each - 50 drops from each destination in 100 flights, 6 stars, 100 bronze chests.

And I now get over 60 collection items every day so I'm accumulating more bonuses in collections without trying ... and without spending. I have over 30 sky captains waiting to be collected, along with dice, spy glass, vintage weathervane ...

 

[Madge59230]

I would suggest that you don’t use any bonuses for Excavation flights as their drop rate is pretty good as is and they are easy to accumulate. Save your bonuses for the S3 map runs as you will want to throw everything at those. The space maps are in the middle, and I use the common bonuses for those, but not things like Spyglass and Golden dice which are rarer to gather.

I’d say that’s ok for falcon, tbird and condor As you have 400, 500 and 600 flights to do for 3 star. But all the others are lower flight numbers. I don’t have a warehouse full extra of adventure buildings having 3 starred up to falcon. Reckon you need bonuses at all levels up to but not including falcon.

 

[Barkmi4 (Mike)]

Another option 🤔, albeit perhaps not a favorite and likely only practical for small planes, is the brute force method using fewer bonuses and flying as many planes and speeding them up which for some, fuel is more plentiful\obtainable than stacked bonuses.

Perhaps someone has attempted and can provide comparative data?

Depends what’s more important to you I would say. Fuel/bonuses/time.

I know many people that completed excavation/adventure without using bonuses or instant returns. It just takes longer, and you need more maps. But you don’t *need* to spend the bonuses or fuel. You can always get more maps.
Same goes for space maps really, if you play longer enough you’ll have 100 of each.

The one thing everyone agrees on, throw everything at S3 maps. The only time this is no longer relevant is if you have been playing in a top alliance for years.

Excavations and space maps are much easier to complete without speed ups once you have S3 planes. But equally adventure maps give buildings that drop items for collections. Once you have a lot of these, you’ll find bonuses become much more disposable, allowing you to spend more for less.

Personally I use all bonuses when doing excavations, but I value tokens more than most - therefore it is worth it for me.

 

[flyhores]

I look at you all like card players. .........

 

[Maverick68]

I look at you all like card players. .........

Uno, Gin Rummy, Go Fish, Hearts or Poker?

 

[flyhores]

Uno, Gin Rummy, Go Fish, Hearts or Poker?

Steam: KARDS - The WWII Card Game

 

[Chloe11111]

@Nayeon here is why you speed through the flights with bonuses. In the early days, it's expensive but it gets cheaper because your adventure buildings drop an item a day. I now have

1. 6 aztec pyramid
2. 6 colosseum
3. 6 stoneenge
4. 6 sphinx
5. 6 ancient greek temple
6. 6 louvre
7. 6 odessa opera house
8. 6 egeskov castle
9. 6 winter palace
10. 6 moai statues
11. 6 sagrada familia (building)
12. 6 notre-dame de paris (building)
13. field lab, quantum skyscraper

So 74 collectibles produced each day. And they help complete collections for dice, spy glass, sky captain, vintage weathervane and other bonuses. Not to mention they give items for Cards on the Table and More Precious than Gold collections which give you a mystery bonus.

I also have all 6 alien legacy, space travel monument and rocket garden giving me launch collection items daily.

I'm going after stone skyscrapers and tower of Babel next. Takes lots of space though

 

[Nayeon]

My pattern is more like @Chloe11111. Yes, we are star chasers.

My spreadsheet looks like this for what I'm chasing:

So basically I really need only one map for Hawk and one each for the 5 Eagle flights (as with a large fleet + 1 Weathervane it's easy to complete 20 flights with one map. I'll have to burn some fuel to complete Memphis & Thebes on one map though and will complete Athens later today with the last map I already have).

Right now I'm flying 14 Jumbos to get to 3 stars on those adventure maps, then I'm moving on to completing 3 stars for next 10 Jumbo destinations. I've accumulated 100 each of the necessary excavation maps.

Every time Duke Croocker's ship arrives I buy up all the Excavation maps I can, but you can only get 5 of each. You can see my problem right? Every time I have to swap out a few Jumbos to a Hawk or Eagle I only get 5 chances to get any map at all, let alone one for the 6 specific destinations I'm in the hunt for.

So if I only get 5 chances to get a map (which never seems to be Alesia or Constantinople) it's become an exercise in patience and to be honest I guess I could be more patient, but when you are *this* close...my anal retentiveness flares up. :-p

This is why I'm specifically looking to get better yields on the Excavation maps, as they the choke point from which all else opens up.

For collectable buildings I already have
2 Aztec Pyramids
2 Coliseums
1 Stonehenge
1 Sphinx
2 Ancient Greek Temples
1 Louvre

So by completing must one more Stonehenge and one more Sphinx I pick up a Louvre too, so that's another reason to close those out.

And yes, I already have 6 Alien Legacies, 6 Space Travel Monuments, and 6 Rocket Gardens and Ancient Sanctuary I picked up from I can't remember how.

From one perspective I can see how someone may prefer to getting 6 of each building first before going on to the next, but for now I'm enjoying exploring new buildings vs. getting six of each one.

Hopes this makes sense and thanks for all the advice. 🤗

👧⛽
N

 

[Maverick68]

@Nayeon,

"So if I only get 5 chances to get a map (which never seems to be Alesia or Constantinople) it's become an exercise in patience and to be honest I guess I could be more patient, but when you are *this* close...my anal retentiveness flares up. :-p"

If flare up gets too bad 🔥, don't forget, you could spend greens to buy these maps.