- All values are in Australian dollars (AUD).
- Please consider your own budget and playstyle when reading this!
- Where possible, I provide conditions that make each purchase most worthwhile.
¶ TLDR;
If you are considering to make a purchase / support the game, the best value you can get is by purchasing the level-up pack. Assuming the level-up pack only provided gems, it costs the equivalent of ~$11 per 1,000 gems.
Packs appear at levels: 7, 11, 15, 19, 23, 27, 31, 34, 37, 40, 43, 46, 49, 51, 53, 55. At a certain point in the higher levels, this frequency increases to once per level, though the exact level where this change occurs is uncertain.
Credit to Silvery for observing and recording this.
¶ Pixie Pass
This is a battlepass system. You still need to complete tasks in order to unlock the full benefits. This assumes you have completed the pass.
- This costs $8 and lasts 28 days.
- The pass doesn't provide much gems at all, it's <200.
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The main value is in the building skins / avatar outfits and the:
- Barn upgrade voucher: Free barn storage upgrade
- Welfare research voucher: Free welfare research
- Land expansion voucher: Free land expansion
- Factory skill voucher: Free factory queue change skill
(Unverified) It seems each pass gives a random selection of 4 of the above.
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Especially for mid-higher level players, each one of these free expansions / upgrades can be worth a lot. For example, say your welfare research needs 45 materials in total. This is equivalent to 540 gems (as each expansion material costs 12 gems). If you had similar requirements for your barn upgrade and land expansion, and suddenly the pass could be worth at least 540 x 3 = 1,620 gems in this particular situation.
- You need to claim the vouchers before the Pixie Pass ends.
- However, when you do claim it, the game will force you to use the voucher first before you can resume using expansion material to upgrade/expand.
¶ Diamonds
- The more expensive the pack, the cheaper it is per 1,000 gems.
- This is the only method to obtain roses.
- Note: These packs are quite expensive compared to the starter pack and occassional level up packs. I'm unsure when it spawns, but if you can wait I'd suggest purchasing the level up pack:
¶ Coins
- Earning coins is difficult in the early-mid game, but at some point you'll end up with more than you can possibly imaging or spend on.
- Purchasing this may not be valuable long-term.
¶ Hearts
- These can be earned in-game by helping other players through: watering their crops, fertilising their trees, and fulfilling their deer / lotus requests.
- Currently, the only use for hearts are to purchase the limited number of avatar cosmetics (clothing, hair, facial expressions).
- Purchasing this may not be valuable long-term.
¶ Lightning
- Each lightning provides a 5-minute speed up in (only) factory production.
- Purchasing this can be valuable long-term.
- If you are considering to use gems directly to finish production, it can be more cost-effective to use lightning instead. For example, to speed up a 5-minute production using gems directly will cost 1 gem. Versus if you purchased the 10 lightning for 5 gems, you'll use 1 lightning which effectively costs you 0.5 gems. You'll end up paying more upfront, but each "use" will be cheaper.
¶ Dye
- These are required to change the colour of their respective item.
¶ Lotus Dew
- These are used for converting one expansion material to another.
- Purchasing this can be valuable long-term.
- These are most useful when you have a significant imbalance in expansion materials, and more so when you're running out of barn storage.
- For example, say you bought the 20 lotus dew pack for 45 gems. This allows you to convert 5 specific expansion materials. If you were to otherwise use gems directly to make up a shortfall of 5 expansion materials, you would need 60 gems (as each expansion material costs 12 gems).
¶ Sun Potion
- These are used to speed-up watering your tree in Linden's Sapling Garden.
- Purchasing this may or may not be valuable long-term. It ultimately depends on how soon you want to receive the tree reward.
¶ Expansion / Barn / Silo Package
- Purchasing these packages can be valuable long-term but for the most cost-effective option, consider purchasing the level up pack then using conversion and/or purchasing the expansion materials to upgrade/expand directly.
- It can cheaper than buying gems from the gem shop and purchasing the expansion materials to expand directly.
- Each expansion material costs 12 gems. Using this conversion, say you purchase the pack that gives 10 of each expansion material, that is worth 360 gems for $14 which is equivalent to ~$39 per 1,000 gems. If you wanted to use gems instead and bought from the gem shop, you'd be forced to get the 600 gem pack for $31 which works out to ~$52 per 1,000 gems.
¶ Welfare Package
- This follows a similar rationale to the Expansion / Barn / Silo packages.
¶ Support Package
- This is the hardest to quantify since there are no easy comparisons.
- Generally, purchasing this may not be valuable long-term.
¶ Treasure Tree
- This equates to ~$34 per 1,000 gems which is a far better rate than what is provided in the gem shop.
- However, I'm unsure whether we can fill it up and purchase it more than once during the weeks it is active.