Gold Chain - Cash Cow or Cash Crash?

[bladefury94]

I'm selling Gold deposits in the T.O for 2.5 to 3 times the gold ore (500 gold ore depo for 1300 gc, sold a 100 depo for 300 gc).

Unbuffed a 500 gold ore deposit produces 62.5 gold coins
Buffed x2 (every stage) produces 500 gold coins
Buffed x3 (every stage) produces 1688 gold coins

Doesn't seem logical to spend ~1300 gc to produce even 1688 gc considering the cost of x3 buffs. And the 2x buff loses gc.

Am I missing something here?

[Draconus2004]

Yes, you are missing the morons who operate 8 coinages/smelters and have 8 lvl 6 mines they run 1 day out of 10.

[theWhiteCane]

If you have enough explorers to drop rainbows on your operation, you can lay down some impressive coin and still make a good profit, though your operation would have to be fairly small. It's also possible that the gold chain is the only way to make money they have OR they don't care how much profit as long as it is profit. My advice: pocket the coin and buy yourself a senator.

[razor211]

Pretty much the same for the iron/steel chain. Buying iron ore depo's in the TO loses money. Better off to buy the swords directly.

[Draconus2004]

rainbow snow is only worthwhile when used on fast gold mines (which are second in profit to rebuilt mines with lvl 3 buffs).
its not worth being used on coinages or gold smelters

[Pinkleet]

I see people running gold chains at level 1-2 unbuffed all the time. The new players are actually losing money doing it. If it was up to me I would move the quest to get a gold chain up to about lev 40+. The rules to make a profit from it are simple:

1.Get your gold chain to lev4 to run it.
2.Always run your gold chain buffed 3X
3.NEVER let it run without buffs.

[Perwyn]

Everyone has an opinion, so here's mine. Everything depends on context, doesn't it?

I use a rainbow snow on a level 5 coinage, which nets me 4,640 coin for a 4 day a run. The rainbow snow is "free" because my explorers find them for me. Am also using a rainbow snow on a level 5 smelter, which produces 2 bars for each gold ore used. Because the smelter produces 9,280 bars per 4 day run & the coinage only uses 4,640 I only need to run the smelter 1/2 the time of running the coinage. The coinage and smelter only run buffed with rainbows. The net result is that I get 2 coins for each gold ore used.

I have 2 geos that find gold deposits of 372 ore, regular speed. I rebuild my mines as they go down and run them buffed most of the time. When I've accumulated a good number of gold depos from running adventures, I'll build one mine to level 5, load it up and run it buffed with gold fevers, which my lucky explorers bring home for free.

Am in the process of upgrading 2 more coinages and smelters to 5.

I used to run the whole (lvl 3) chain all the time & buffed all the time. Got really tired of jumping up in the middle of a movie yelling "crap!!! my gold chain!!!".

So for a small fry operation like mine, and for someone who doesn't want to be enslaved to monitoring gold production buffs every day, twice a day, it makes sense to run the gold chain with rainbow snows brought home by explorers.

Anybody running 12 coinages is of course, a completely different scenario & context, however, not everybody plays the game the same way. Which, BTW, is what makes this such a great game.

[Dirkjon]

I run 10 lvl 5 coinages and 6 lvl 5 smelters. I buy the majority of my ore. The profit/loss analysis of my chain over a 4 day cycle is as follows:

6840 ore - cost: 1900c
6 rainbow snow buffs for smelters - cost: 13,800c
27360 coal for smelters - cost: 275
80 exo baskets for coinages - cost: 8000

So, the 4 day cost of running my chain is 23,975c. The coinages produce 34,800c per 4 day cycle. So the base profit is 10,825 every 4 days with x3 buff applied by myself. As someone pointed out above, that profit increases if I use buffs found by my explorers or as loot in advents and don't have to buy them. Same holds true for depo refills that drop as loot in advents. If my explorers come back with just 1 x3 or x4 buff every 4 days, (which is **** near impossible not to do), then that profit increases yet again. Additionally, if you have friends drop your buffs then the cost for the x3 buffs decreases because you use fewer of them over the course of the 4 day cycle. Others run their chains a bit more efficiently than I do mine so they do a bit better.

Definitely not a "cash cow" but not a "cash crash" either.

[Moonlime]

nice, 10k profit in 4 days? not bad.

[psaltery]

i dont buy depo or buffs, just rebuild mines or use ones found in loot. im too lazy to constantly monitor trade to make a profit. so gold chain is the lazy way to get coin