[X] Invite Gu Xiulan along to help you, if the last one was any indication, you would need to start a lot of fires.
[X][M] Ask Cai Renxiang to put it up for auction
[X] Invite them both, why not? They don't have any conflicts, right?
[X] Invite Gu Xiulan along to help you, if the last one was any indication, you would need to start a lot of fires.
[X] Invite Gu Xiulan along to help you, if the last one was any indication, you would need to start a lot of fires. [X][M] Ask Cai Renxiang to put it up for auction
Access to arts with higher starting cultivation levels for the most part. Floor one is green 1 with a scattering of green 2, floor 2 is the same with 2 and 3 etc.
Ling Qi had the same benefit back in the outer sect, it's not new. My guess it's a way to encourage newly minted greens to rely on the sect providing them with artificially depreciated GSS (since currently it's only one deal per month).
EDIT: My guess it's tied to RSS instead of sect point disciples could buy GSS without grinding sect missions since money is more easily gained than time (For instance, production disciples can sell their stuff and buy GSS instead of having to waste time working on grind mission that isn't helping them improve).
Access to arts with higher starting cultivation levels for the most part. Floor one is green 1 with a scattering of green 2, floor 2 is the same with 2 and 3 etc.
We're going to be under a lot of pressure to master our Arts, especially at Green Two, when we cap out our four key Arts and work to obtain their successors - and then cap those out. That's roughly twice as much pressure as would otherwise exist at Green Three, for example, and doesn't include any other Arts we're interested in learning.
However, the successor Arts probably won't require a thousand successes to master the first steps of; that goes against everything we've seen so far. PLR required fifty for the first part and one hundred fifty for the second, for a total of two hundred. Our successor Arts will probably follow a similar scale with the first level of the Art being relatively easy to learn and the second not all that much harder.
With a decent location multiplier (base 1.2, total 1.7 [Thank You Argent Soul!]) and mainlining GSS, we can easily hit 400+ successes in a single Art over a single turn.
So we can probably finish SCS in one full turn at Green Two, even if it does require 750 successes. Leave a turn to 'compress' the Art's Meridians down to the bare minimum of two (one in leg, one in spine, three reductions in total requires 25/45/65 sucessess; maximizing GSS use provides ~100) over three AP, and then one turn to master SCS+ to it's Green Two cap. That's three turns of going all-out with GSS... and we can afford at least four turns of that, even without EPC providing a virtual GSS/week and a better Argent Vent working the same way.
On the other hand, we've got Physical and Spiritual cultivation, which we also need to find a good location for...
Physical: (6 + 135 + 15 + 20) * 4 = 176 * 4 = 704 *.55 = 387.2 * 1.2 || * 1.9 = 464 (no location multiplier ) || 735 (with location multiplier).
Spiritual: (6 + 135 + 20 + 20) * 4 = 181 * 4 = 724 *.55 = 398.2 * 1.2 || *1.9 = 477 (no location multiplier) || 756.58 (with location multiplier).
If we don't find a good location, it should take about six turns at 4 AP/turn to progress through Green/Bronze two while maximizing GSS, presuming it requires 2400 successes; eight/nine turns at 3600 successes. As we can only be certain of four months at peak GSS/turn at this time, we need to obtain additional sources of GSS, either virtual or actual. EPC 7 may well have it; same with a higher tier of Argent Vent - the higher rank required for this may well involve a higher income - or 'rare' location. Hitting Green 2 should increase the allowance we are granted by CRX, but perhaps not by enough.
If we do find a good location, it should only take about four turns at 4 AP/turn to progress through Green/Bronze; three turns if we manage a higher multiplier, better resource dice, or run across some rare drugs; five turns if it requires 3600 successes. This should enable us to enter Green Three by around Turn Six or Turn Seven, which would allow us to use three GSS/week, or twelve/turn. This demands finding sources of Virtual GSS; we can't afford to spend 5200 RSS/month on cultivation supplies. If EPC 7 and/or a higher tier Argent Vent provide just one GSS/week each, then we can keep up the pace... barely.
The speed that finding a site with a good Multiplier provides does make it both easier and harder on us. Easier, in that we hit Green 3 faster; harder, in that we have to juggle our Cultivation just right to get enough successes everywhere else to be ready for Green 3 when we make it there.... easier, in that at Green Three those extra GSS make it even easier to rank up our Arts.
Hmm...
If EPC 7 is 750 successes as it looks to be, then we can almost certainly make it there with 4 AP at Green Two... if we get a Moon location multiplier. So.
If we don't obtain a Physical/Spiritual location multiplier, then perhaps something roughly along the lines of the following:
Act 2 Month 3: EPC *4, Spiritual *4, Physical *4, SCS *4, 4 AP
Month 4: Phys/Spir*4 each, FVM *4, SCS Meridian reduction*3, FSS*4, Bronze 2, 1 AP
Month 5: Phys/Spir*4 each, FVM Meridian Reduction*3, FSS Meridian Reduction*3, SCS+, ~2AP
Month 6: Phys/Spir*4 each, FVM+, TRF, 4 AP
Month 7: Phys/Spir*4 each, TRF Meridian Reduction*2, FSS+, 6 AP
Month 8: Phys/Spir*4 each, TRF+, PLR, Green 3, 4 AP
Month 9: Phys/Spir*4 each, EPC*4, Bronze 3 8 AP.
That should get SCS+, FSS+, FVM+, TRF+, and PLR to the Green 2 Cap before we hit Green 3, with enough AP left over for a new Art or three. Argent Genesis specifically because we already have it and are training it this turn, that Perception Art we're all looking for, whatever we get from the Cai Archives, etc.
If we do obtain a physical/spiritual location multiplier, on the other hand? Then we can spread out a bit more - rushing as fast as possible has its benefits, but it also slows us down in other ways. See maximizing Phys/Spiritual below:
Act 2 Month 3: EPC*4, Spiritual*4, Physical*4, SCS*4, TRF*4, Bronze 2
Month 4: Spir/Phys*4, FVM*4, FVM*4, Meridian Reduction*2 (TRF), 2 AP
Month 5: Spir/Phys*4, Meridian Reduction*9 (FVM, SCS, FSS), 3 AP
Month 6: Spir/Phys*4, PLR, SCS+, 4 AP Green 3
Month 7: Spir/Phys*4, EPC*4, FVM+, 4 AP Bronze 3 <- start running max GSS (x12?)
Month 8: Spir/Phys*4, TRF+, FSS+, 4 AP
We get our Arts to Green 3 level in about the same amount of time, but they aren't nearly as strong as they would be due to being a Cultivation Level behind. On the other hand, there's also less blocked Overflow, meaning that our Arts should continue into Green 3 more smoothly instead of running into their caps at Green 2 and the overflow being shunted into Qi.
The other downside is that we have zero AP free to train additional Arts - and we know we're going to get more Arts that we will almost certainly want to master outside of the five we're currently most interested in.
As such, and to push our chances of reaching a higher rank - and therefore a better Argent Vent - prior to hitting Green 3 (And line up our successor Arts for said challenges):
Act 2 Month 3: EPC*4, Physical *4, SCS*4, FVM*4, Bronze 2, 4 AP
Month 4: SCS Meridians*3, FVM Meridians*3, TRF, FSS, 6 AP
Month 5: TRF Meridians*2, FS Meridians*3, SCS+, FVM+, 7 AP
Month 6: Spir/Phys*4, TRF+, FVM+, PLR, 4 AP
Month 7: Spir/Phys*4, 12 AP
Month 8: Spir/Phys*4, 12 AP
Month 9: Spir/Phys*4 Green 3, Bronze 3
The Free AP to be used for cultivating other Arts, obtaining Sect Points (That Second Floor month's requirement, 'designer' drugs, tutoring, and accessory talismans. We don't need an Armor Talisman at the moment, our weapon is doing fine (Flute), and our Domain Weapon is made of Cyan-tier materials), obtaining Contribution Points, opening new Meridians as needed, etc.
The downside is that it is slower to hit Green 3 - and therefore slower to hit Green 4, and that we'll need all the time we can get at Green 4 to prep for the Tournament... but the extra time should result in a better position to do said preparation within, so.
However, a little bit of work means that we can 'cap' our current set of Arts and start throwing challenges as a fairly strong Green Two by month Four; hopefully Zhengui will have awoken from his own breakthrough by then.
All of these are assuming that it'll take 700+ successes to get the last ranks in SCS, FVM, TRF, and FSS. This is supported for SCS and FVM, but not for TRF and FSS - it should take less AP to max those out.
Not that any of that is going to be of much use when we finally get there. Who knows what the situation will actually look like.
If you want the sect to give us cash, make it 300rss per month, then. It is silly for the sect to subsidise a purchase of currency with an interchangable currency.
Subsidizing the GSS purchase with sect points is also sensible, since those are not interchangable currencies.
That is assuming we use 8 GSS that month. Which is definintely going to happen, no question, but which is extremely unsustainable; we can only afford to do something like that a couple of times a year on our income; any more would come out of savings and the likalso, your math has +20 and +25 terms for the done whose origin I don't recognize.
We naturally have 1200 RSS/month in income right now, 500 from CRX, 400 from Rank, 300 from GSS arbitrage. So to spend 8 GSS we need to dig an additional 2800 RSS. If we sell the Mirror for 13k, that finances about 5 months of it counting some savings we have already. And in those 5 months our income could grow, we could get other loot, CRX could secure more resources, etc etc. I think once we hit Appraisal we should start doing max GSS and not stop until we are forced to.
