Money Optimization
All information from the current 0.40.5 patch and too much time to waste
Contents
Money Optimization or "Can I get the Delish Company Investment without using New Game+?"
With patch 0.39.10, the Delish Company Investment has been decreased from 7,000,000 sil to 1,400,000 sil. While money has always been a little tight at the beginning of the game, it had become merely and afterthought once you reach a certain point.
With this new investment, now there's a new endgame goal to work towards. This is how I attempt to do so without using New Game+ and while still completing all of the game (all quests, all Love Quests, all followers unlocked).
Premises
Money can be gained through quests as a singular payment, through investments as daily income and by selling items at the shop. All money in your bank account at the end of the day will also give you 1% interest.
That said, how much money do you even need to unlock each follower, purchase all player houses and finally do all investments, including Delish Company?
To unlock all followers, you require 237,750 sil:
| Follower | Cost | Follower | Cost |
|---|---|---|---|
| Apple Kid | 200 | Violet and Lilac | 750 |
| Penelope | 800 | Randi | 5,000 |
| Serade | 1,500 | Pandora | 2,000 |
| Miri | 3,000 | Natya | 2,500 |
| Diadira | 2,000 | Yamamaya | 10,000 |
| Chimei | 60,000 | Orange Kid | 150,000 |
For mandatory investments, you end up with costs of 1,542,972 sil. Mandatory for me are investments that contribute to your income (all 10% interest investments worth of 7,072 sil, all three inns worth 18,500 sil, Carriage Shop for 5,000 sil, Vineyard for 80,000 sil, Jeweler for 100,000 sil and Delish Company for 1,400,000 sil). In addition to that, there are three upgrades for Northmarket Manor (Stonemason, Floors and Plasterers) for a total of 9,000 sil.
During the game, there are certain quests that require you to have a certain amount of money available. To enter GearCon, you need 1,000 sil for tickets, visiting the Didi concert in Westcastle costs 2,000 sil. To attend to the party for the quest Honey Trapper, you have to invest 15,000 sil into fancy clothes and a signet ring.
There are also 23,100 sil of other investment left int the game that either aren't worth it or need to be set up properly:
| Investment | Cost | Reason |
|---|---|---|
| Tenement in Northmarket | 5,500 | no income, only for unlocking Elaiya's additional techniques |
| Brik-a-Brak-Shop | 5,000 | only 25 sil worth or interest |
| Sons of Ducane | 3,000 | Only offers income after Circle of Strife, so don't invest until the day before you start this quest. |
| Turnip Farm | 400 | +10 satisfaction sounds great, but preferably in later game after investments with income |
| Silver Mine | 6,000 | no interest |
| Plants/Furniture for Westcastle | 2,000 | Useful to give Nerys more happiness, helps us unlock her love quest more quickly |
| Clock for Southport Hovel | 500 | One of the only ways to push Pandora and Miri relationships. Might be worth for pushing other relationships? |
Other costs: Gifts vs Furniture - or both?
In order to get your relationship with your followers to rise, you will either have to invest into gifts or into furniture to decorate their homes. I've already mentioned the Northmarket Manor upgrades with work in the same was as furniture, but only for follower in Northmarket. With gifts, you can chose specifically which follower should receive a boost in relationship, but you need to pay for each gift you hand out. Furniture is more expensive, but it's only a one-time-investment that effects multiple followers at once.
To optimize your daily income, furniture in Northmarket Manor is a must, as it will help you push your relationship with Penelope and Florine to increase their profit, but more importantly to push Alina towards her love quest as fast as possible. Once you complete the quest, you'll get an additional daily income of 3,000 sil, which you want. I also use gifts on Alina and praise her during the Manor invasion to get her to "very happy" as fast as possible and keep her there.
The reason you want Alina's LQ as fast as possible is Nicholas. Once he reaches a relationship level of trust, he will increase all the income you currently have by 10%. You want to delay collecting his reward until after you finished Alina's LQ, optimally after you invested into the vineyard and jeweller as well, but you will want those 10% bonus as quickly as possible, so pushing Alina towards her love quest speeds your money stream up a lot. Florine, Penelope, Serade, Natya and Miri also increase their daily income with each new relationship level (and their love quest in case of Penelope). Since all their bonuses are a 10% increase each, you don't have to delay getting Nicholas' bonus for them to make it work.
What I like to do is push Alina to her love quest, which also makes Penelope and Florine level up faster to their highest reward. After that, I move the furniture to Eastfort, Southport and Westcastle to level up the other vendors (and potential love quests along the way). For gifts, I focus on girls with love quests and shop girls, since love quests will give me rewards and additional days and shop girls increase their profit. I give each girl their favourite gift three days in a row, and then a 'like' gift every other day after that (Shiny Bits and Monster Fangs and later Cake work great for that). At the current state of the game, you can neglect the other girls until your money income is steadied, as you still have enough days left to level up their relationship after the big Delish Investment.
Daily Random Quests - worth it?
From Day 2 on, you have the option to complete a daily quest at Northmarket Manor. You will always have to fight 4 packs of enemy and a boss pack, the type of enemy depends on the level of your hero. You will always be rewarded with (hero level)*50 sil of pay and in each dungeon you can find two chests. In these chests, you'll find either gift items, scrolls or potions. Some boss enemies also have special loot and enemies in general can drop trophies (Pocket Tome, Shiny Bits or Monster Fang).
While the actual reward is a nice boost at the beginning, it lacks behind very fast. The only thing of interest are the chests inside the dungeons. Gifts can save you up to 200 sil if you find a Clockwork Amusemente (best gift for Meline, Elaiya and Nicholas). Scrolls and potions you find can be sold for additional sil. You don't need them at any point of the game, except health potions, mana potions and maybe revive potions. Everything else can be sold for a prize of 37 sil to up to 120 sil.
I usually do the daily quest, as it has a high chance to give me trophies I can't really farm elsewhere, in general saves me some money and gives a nice experience boost which makes quests overall easier.
Specialized Vendors
During the game, you gather a lot of vendor trash with no other purpose than to sell. All of those items can be sold at any of your shops, but certain vendors specialize in specific trash items and will pay you double the prize. Those are:
- Slime trader in Southport: Talk to the guy in front of the cell with the slime, he will buy blue and green slime (from the slime fort) and crimson slime (from Elvo's Mansion).
- Fur Trader in Huntersvale: You can find him in the item shop, he will buy any skins or furs you get from killing animals like foxes and bears.
- Coin Collector in Eastfort: Right when you enter the bank, next to the guard you'll find a guy who has an interest in rare items. He buys an Antique Coin for 600 sil (you can dig up one in front of the Golden Tomb as soon as day 2).
Since you usually gain twice the money, it's worth going to those traders before you visit one of your shops, especially if you re-clear the slime fort and the mountains, but also after quests like "One is the Loneliest Number", "Ain't no Party like a Search Party", "Night of the Raping Death" and "It came from below the Equator".
Equipment
While you complete your quests and explore dungeons, you will be rewarded with a crazy amount of equipment. You'll never have to buy a single piece of equipment in the entire game and still have all of your 15 party members equipped in all four slots.
However, since you can only use four members at a time, you don't need to equip all of them all of the time. As such, you can sell the equipment you don't need for a rather good prize.
I would recommend deciding on a "standard party" you will use all the time, with maybe one backup character, and only save equipment for those five characters. Since equipment can easily be switched at any point of the game, you can change between should you need to for Love Quests that require a specific character in your party.
For me, my standard party consists of Yeon, Kyrie, Larelle, since you get a lot of light armour very early in the game and powerful accessories such as Rhinestone Gloves and Archmage Ring during your natural progression through the game. You will also find Gothloli Outfit, Steelcloth Dress, Deflector Ribbon, Thundermage Hat, Battlemage Outfit and Battlemage Hat, which is more than enough to get through everything the game throws at you. My backup characters are Meline (she can wear all the equipment from Larelle) and Bronwyn (who gets the Feather Mail and Feather Hat from the Wind Temple dungeon). Everything else can be turned in cash.
Optimized Start
There is not much you can do on Day 1 since you lose all your sil when you buy Northmarket Manor, so the first decisions you'll have to make start on Day 2. At this point of the game, you have 0 sil and no shop to sell anything yet. You're also limited to only a couple of quests. You can't do a Random Daily Quest on this day yet.
So the first thing you should do is get a dept from the bank in Northmarket. You'll get 10,000 sil, but every day you'll need to pay back 5% more of your current dept. You also only have 30 days to pay your dept, at which point you'd have to pay a total of 39,201 sil. Taking the dept is crucial to get your investments started, but paying back should be high on your priority list before the dept stacks up too high.
With your 10,000 sil, you can now purchase a Shovel for 50 sil. This is crucial as you will run into a ton of burried treasures throughout the game. You can even dig up a 'starting gear' for your party as soon as you get the shovel. You should also get the Seeker Stone from the Mysterious Package for 5 satisfaction so you don't miss any hidden treasure.
Next, invest into the Bitch's Sixth Tit in Northmarket Slums for 2,000 sil. Re-enter the bar which is now call the Pink Bandana and also got rid of the fighting ring and the gamblers. The gamblers moved to Shally's Bar and here you can now gamble for 30 sil. Each win gains you 270 sil and you can gamble until you've won a total of 7,500 sil. The chances of winning are 50%, so you best save after each win and reload the save file when you lose. Doing so leaves you with a total of 15,650 sil at your disposal.
With that done, there are some easy quests and fights that can be done on day 1 already. First, in the slums, enter the building below the Adventurer's Guild and fight three thieves. It should be easily done with just the Hero and Felix. When you talk to Kevin at the smith, you'll progress with A Forge too Far and can now talk to the loan guy at the bank again. He'll tell you to collect payments in Eastfort, Southport and Westcastle. In Westcastle, pay the 50 sil and get Brogen's payment and some satisfaction. In Eastfort, talk to the slaver and collect Doll for your party. Even if she doesn't belong to you yet, she will fight with you. With now three member's in your party, you're ready to tackle the Giant's Path (where the Search Party quest later happens as well). Kill off all the animals outside (racoons and bees) and inside the caves (bats and 4 bears) to gain some easy level ups. Also pick up the Smuggler's quest from the locked chest and collect all the keys on your way. Don't worry if you get poisoned, as Felix should reach level 4 inside the caves and learns Cleanse Body to dispell it. If you're really low on health and/or mana, you can always leave the place to heal up at the manor. After some level ups, you are ready to fight the ogre. He can hit hard, but if you keep Felix on healing duty, it shouldn't take too long to beat him. Collect all the treasures and the last key, then go open the chest and finish the Smuggler's quest. You'll now have a lot of valuable trash items and other items you can sell. Visit Huntervale to sell your racoon tails and bear skins to the fur trader for 1580 sil. Then head to Southport and clear Elvo's mansion. You should be close to level 6 by now, so even with three members it's easily doable. Now visit the slime trader in the beastiary, he will buy all the red slime you got in Elvo's mansion.
While you are travelling around to collect the payments and sell stuff, collect all the hidden treasures along the way. There is an Ancient Coin that you can sell to the collector in the bank of Eastfort for 600 sil. In front of the Forest Tower, you can find a bear rug which you can sell for 1,000 sil later. In Huntervale, dig up the ancient bones and in Lumberville, there is a ruby below the well, you can sell those once you own a shop. There are also Dark Seeds, CDs, Awiiabus and equipment items scattered around the towns which are very useful, especially in the beginning. Also, buy an apple at Penelope's farm for 15 sil, you'll be able to star the Spirit and Wine quest and hand in one of the Appletinis you got at the Pink Bandana for 90 sil.
After all that, you'll end up with 20,043 sil in your bags and a ton of stuff to sell once you get a job.
If you are really hardcore, you can also clear the zombies in Coastburg for another 645 sil. The fights are very hard on level 6 and with a party of only three, so if you're trying get ready for a lot of reloading. Also, check out the Challenges guide for this.
Early investments (Day 1)
With our 20,043 sil, you can now invest in different businesses in all towns. There are 11 'minor' investments which give you 10% of interest as income at the start of each following day, worth of 7,072 sil (including the Drug Dealer Quest in Eastport for an effective cost of 472 sil and the Cannery for which you will have to complete the quest as well. Chose "greed" for 10% interest. Yes, making kids cry is profitable in this game). These investments are a must, as the same amout of money would only offer you 1% of interest a day, so your investment is quickly paid off and your profit keeps growing. Same goes for investing into Apple Kid, you get her lead bars from the very first day and they represent about 18% of interest.
Doing that leaves you with 12,771 sil you can still invest. There are multiple otions for you to do that:
- You can immediately pay of your loan off 10,000 sil at the bank. This saves you the additional debt of 500 sil the next day. You'll have 2,771 sil left which offers 27 interest if you put them in the bank, so it's a win of 27 sil.
- You can invest into Westcastle Inn for 7,500 sil and the Carriage Shop for 5,000 sil. This gives you an additional income of 625 sil, plus 2 sil interest for putting 271 sil into the bank, so it's a win of 627 sil. Of course you still have to pay the dept of 500 sil, so you gain 127 sil for the next day.
- You can invest into Eastfort Inn and Southport Inn for 11,000 sil and an additional income of 550 sil the next day. Adding 17 sil of interest from 1,771 sil in the bank adds up to a win of 567 sil. Considering the debt of 500, you'll end up with 67 sil.
Option 2 turns out best, but only by a slim margin. If you want to buy gifts, you'll still have enough left to buy at least a Sweet Perfume for Alina.
What to do next?
Now that your money is sorted out, there are multiple ways to end your first day:
- Finish the A Forge to Far quest: gets you Doll and Kevin as well as a weapon upgrade, but no money whatsoever.
- Get Meline: gives you a forth party member and 25 sil additional income from the bakery.
- Get Penelope (only possible if you paid the loan instead of investing): gives 80 sil of income.
- Do the Na Na Why Don't You Get a Job quest: gives you 1,500 sill reward the next day and unlocks Florine's shop, but no additional income.
- Do the One Is The Loneliest Party quest: Gets you Elayia as a forth party member, 1,000 sil reward, 913 sil worth of slime you can sell to the vendor in soutport and 175 sil loot drop; also allows you to reclear the Slime Fort daily from now on to gain 816 sil each time.
Personally, access to the Slime Fort seems more profitable in the long run as 816 sil for barely any effort add up quickly, so I would suggest to start with that route.
Reclearable Dungeons
There are 4 dungeons available that drop either sil or vendor trash:
- Slime Fort for 816 sil, sell at the slime vendor in Southport
- Giant's Path for animal skins worth 1,580 sil at the fur trader in Huntervale and 315 sil from addition vendor trash. You don't have to kill the bats, unless you want the experience and chance for additional monster fangs.
- Coastburg for 645 sil. The zombies are very hard to kill, so on low level you should save after each fight. If possible, bring Meline or Therese for radiant damage. Can be done as soon as day one if you don't mind reloading a lot, is reliably doable at about level 8 with a party of four if you play defensively. Note: this area is only avaiable until you finish Can't Handle it Cove quest, after that the zombies disappear.
- Dark Mine north-est of Northmarket Manor for 960 sil. This dungeon can only be entered if you are level 10 or higher. Bring a spellcaster (like Felix with Magic Missiles) to deal with the Hostile Presences, let the rest of the party beat down the other guys.
For maximun money gain, you should clear these dungeons every day. As a trade off, you'll also gain a lot early experience which makes the rest of the game easier.
I'd also recommend doing the daily random quest at Northmarket Manor each day for more additional sil. You should do it as late into the day as possible, since level ups you get from reclearing the dungeons will give you a higher reward on the random quests.
Where to go next?
Once you're done with your little routine, you have quests to do, followers to collect and more investments to do. Florine should be done as soon as possible, so you can sell all the vendor trash you have gathered so far. Just remember to always check the fur trader and the slime vendor first, since they pay double the price that Florine will pay you. Paying up your loan should be next on the list; if you can't do it right away, at least pay back 500 sil of debt each day so it doesn't stack up further. Next are 11,000 sil left to be invested into the two leftover inns. Doing Night of the Raping Dead right after unlocking Florine will give you 5,500 sil of quest reward and more fur to sell in Huntervale; also you can sell all the potions and scrolls you don't need at Florine's shop, including the bearskin rug for 1,000 sil and the elixirs you gathered for 500 sil each.
The 10,000 sil investment at the slaver in Northmarket should be the last of the middle investments, since it only pays off after three days and recruiting Yamamaya, so the other investments are more lucrative early on.
In general, as soon as you have enough sil to make an investment, you should do so. If you're far away from an investment, do a quest for rewards to quickly reach that goal. If you're less than 4,000 sil away from that goal, you can squeeze in another event like getting Penelope, the maids or Meline, since the amout of money you get from reclearing should be enough the next day, as a rule of thumb. As soon as you have Meline, you should also try to get Bronwyn as well and unlock the elven village. Take Meline to the baker to almost double her income and unlock Elf Improvement as well. It's 4,000 sil of investment and only pays out after 7 days, but it's still worth the investment if you have at least 27 days left in the game. So the sooner you get it, the more money you will get out of it.
Late-game investments
I'd consider the vinery, the jeweler and Orange Kid investment of late in the game, as you need to either save up for a while or do the later quests for higher rewards. The lowest investment stands at 80,000 sil, which also gives you a reasonable amount of interest if you just keep it in the bank. So should you invest or not?
For the vinery and jeweler, yes you should. It sounds like a deep cut to have your bank account in single digits again, but 5% of income are more than 1% of interest. If you calculate the interest from keeping the money and the income plus the interest you get from that, you'll need 24 days to make profit out of either investment. Since the game has about 65 days (plus vacation days), it's clearly worth doing these investments as early as possible.
Sadly, for Orange Kid the math doesn't add up. She only offers 4% of interest every 2 days. As it currently stands, you'd need about 69 days before investing into Orange Kid offers and profit against just keeping the money in the bank. Even if you consider the quest reward you get from her love quest, it still only cuts off three days. As it currently stands, investing into Orange Kid is not profitable. Same goes for Chimei, who doesn't offer any reward other than a day skip after raising her relationship level. You would need 6,000,000 sil in your bank to make a single day skip worth 60,000 sil. That being said, Orange Kid can be used to generate gold by using her alchemy to transmutate Kingsfoil (can be bought by the flower girl) and sell the potions, she also generates an additional day with her love quest. Chimei generates two days for you, with her 'Trust'-level scene that acts as a day end and her love quest.
Current state of the game
As it stands in patch 40.5 and higher, clearing the four repeatable dungeons from day 2 on as well as doing the daily random quest in Northmarket Manor whenever possible gains you enough money over the course of the game to reach the Delish Company investment of 1,4 million sil, with about 10 days to spare, depending on how much of your equipment you sell for a little extra sil. In quests, you should always focus on high rewards. Do other investments as soon as possible to maximize your income from early one and put everything in the bank for that 1% bonus at the end of each day. It's recommended to do at least one vacation, as soon as your daily income of four days is higher then the cost of the vacation (so if your vacation costs 60,000 sil, you should have more than 15,000 sil daily income).
For gifts, focus on the shopkeepers, Alina, Nicholas and Yamamaya and later the other members with love quests. Since you reclear the four dungeons every day, you'll have more than enough Shiny Bits and Monster Fangs (and by trading Pocket Tomes as well), so you can use those once you've boosted each girl to max happiness with three of their respective favourite gifts, so you'll barely have to spend any money to gain quick relationship points.
Note that 10 left is not enough to push Orange Kid to unlock her love quest, therefore you should buy her investment as soon as you got vinery and jeweler for income maximization. I'd recommend getting all the money investments and as soon as you get the 10% bonus from Nicholas' trust benefit, do your vacation (remember there's a bank on the island, so you can deposit your daily income each day). Only after you did that, invest into Orange Kid and later Chimei. To push Orange Kid faster, you can invest 2850 sil for four plants and the Keg of Ale for Westcastle Manor, also add the Landscape Picture and the Guild Banner and set everything up in the study (the room with the hidden staircase).
If you're on the edge of a new investment, I'd recommend to sell either equipment or combat items you don't need to get an extra edge, but at the current state of the game, you have enough days available so you don't need to do this. With further patches, there will be even more quests and days available and make this even easier.
With the playthrough I started in patch 40.4 and took over to 40.5, I had all investments done, all love quests finished and about 650,000 sil to spare in the bank when I ran out of days.
