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A strategy for playing that works well but requires watching lots of ads
Nobody1
Posts: 24
Level 3
in Discussions
Hi. I have had a lot of success playing this game, and thought I would share my strategy. But I should first point out that this strategy does require watching lots of ads, which is somewhat controversial. It can waste a lot of time and makes king a lot of money, which you are never compensated for except by the enjoyment of playing and doing well. I figure King probably averages about 3 cents income per ad I watch, which likely means King has made about 1000 USD on my ad watches. But honestly I am usually multitasking, doing other things while watching the ads, so I don't mind it. I feel like filling chocolate boxes is actually more boring than watching the ads, so I personally don't mind it. If that's not for you, I understand. But if you are willing to watch ads, this strategy does seem to work pretty well, so I thought I'd share it.
Here is my current player card so you can see how I'm doing:
It says I've been playing since 2024, but actually I started on December 28, 2023. So I have been playing for just over one year and am already at level 16776. And I currently have over 30,700 gold bars, which I have earned in the game by using boosters (earned from watching ads) to complete episode races and fill gold chocolate boxes. I won my final in the Winter Cup with 1.5 million points, by spending more than usual gold bars; I had 32,000 gold bars before I started the final.
The strategy is really quite simple. As several of the regulars here have pointed out, the makers of the game have recently moved to an approach of no longer favoring the older puzzle-oriented aspect of the game, but instead wanting you to win by spending boosters to get through every level. It's kind of sad - I did enjoy the old game; I never had the game on my device, but my wife played it, and I would often go to her old levels with less than 3 stars and try to get them up to 3 stars, just for fun (didn't want to mess with her game by doing new levels for her). So since King wants us to play with boosters, and they let us earn boosters by watching ads, I decided to embrace the approach, and use lots of boosters to get through the new levels quickly, like King seems to want us to do.
My basic approach is this:
- Never start an episode race without having at least 10 free switches and 10 lollipop hammers saved and ready to use. Get them by using the Sweet Cinema to watch ads until you have them. Lately as it's getting a little harder on the higher levels I'm actually going for 15 of each, just to be safe.
- Make sure to take advantage of any side games possible when starting an episode race, so as to earn as much as possible with each one.
- Never start an episode race unless you're sure you have enough time to finish it within a few hours. While the episode races do give you some time to finish them and win the gold bars, that time is definitely less than 24 hours, and I hate losing an episode race. I had a streak of 500+ episode race wins about 6 months ago and lost one after just 8.5 hours, which was heartbreaking. So it's best to always win within 2 to 3 hours.
- For chocolate boxes, always go with colored candies or striped or wrapped candies or color bombs for the first 3 orders, and new levels for the last order. When I complete a chocolate box, I always pause my episode race to go back to old levels to complete the first 3 orders. Then I resume the race for the 4th order. That maximizes gold from the chocolate boxes.
- Lately the superchargers complicates filling the chocolate boxes. Since a supercharger is lost even if you lose an old level, you can't afford to play old levels you don't know well for fun. So that makes filling chocolate boxes a chore - you have to go back to old levels you know you can always complete successfully so you don't lose your supercharger.
- As much as possible, start with a color bomb active, add striped and wrapped if you can afford it, and add the third booster that is offered if the level is hard or above. I will always buy 20 of the third booster if I am out and on a hard level. But there are exceptions to this. If you see the level has sugar coat orders, you must fear the Oops. In that case, back off of the boosters. Also if the level has chocolate orders, again back off the boosters.
- When you enter the new level, check to make sure it's not a puzzle level that can get you in trouble by just bashing away. If not, which is usually the case, try to always start by matching 2 color bombs. Once you get a win streak going, you should always have at least 2 color bombs on the board, and you can often have 3 or more if you can watch an ad before starting. It's often worth it to use several boosters to accomplish this, since it is so valuable for completing a level in the given number of moves.
- When you are running out of moves, don't hesitate to use boosters if you need them. I actually prefer to never chance getting extra moves after not completing a level in the given number of moves, since I find that often leads to the game crashing, which breaks your win streak. But of course you must try to be as efficient as possible to minimize use of boosters to win in the requires number of moves. I rarely ever need party boosters, I use 1 or 2 UFOs per episode race, and maybe 2 or 3 striped brushes per episode race. So that's where I spend most of my gold bars.
- Be as efficient as possible to clear each board. LOL.
And that's pretty much it. I will add more details here as I think of them, but that's a general overview of my approach. I hope it will be helpful to someone, and open discussion of how to improve on this, and possibly encourage others to share their strategies.
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Comments
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Thanks for sharing those tips, they are really useful and interesting. It's striking how different players utilise different strategies to gain the same goal. I do have ads in my main game and I hate watching them, so I never touch my Sweet Cinema at all. But I can see how your strategy works a treat for anyone who chooses to watch ads.
I am surprised to learn that we lose the super colour bomb if we fail old levels. I did not know this. I don't really mind losing the super colour bomb if I fail any level. I think it is overrated and does not add as much to the game as you would think.
But as you mention watching ads I will add this here: I have found that I get the offer of a UFO plus extra moves for watching three ads at the end of even older levels if I fail them. The reason I noted this is because I often check out how older levels play for others in the community, when players ask for help here. So that is how I spotted this. I was surprised to find that these UFOs do count towards the chocolate box order. So since I realised this I choose the UFO order for the last chocolate in the gold box in preference over new levels. Also if you get your daily win you can use the timed UFO for that last chocolate, so it is worth filling up the first three chocolates if you know you are due the sixth daily win that day and then use the timed UFO for the 4th chocolate: I open the level, play the UFO and quit, two or four times in quick succession depending on what the order is. It does not matter to me if I lose a life as I have many friends and I don't lose the win streak on an old level, so that strategy works for me. I don't like to play more than one episode per day so I find this a better choice than the levels option for the last chocolate. I must add of course that we all get different offers and I am lucky that I get the option of a UFO for old levels. Not every player does and some no longer get gold in their chocolate boxes either.
I totally agree about the episode races. You must play them essentially in one session now. Those days when 24 hours used to be enough are gone. The game is evolving all the time, and the tips we gave one year ago are already largely out of date.
And of course if you write about ads never forget to warn anyone that spending any real money will automatically lose them their ads. So do NOT spend a penny of real money if you want to keep ads in your game.
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Thanks so much for your comments, @christinewupp! Thanks especially for the comment at the end about spending money losing ads. I was going to say something about that but forgot.
And thank you for the suggestion of using the UFOs for extra moves to fill a chocolate box order - that's a great idea! I have used timed UFOs for that before, but it never occurred to me to use the ones from watching ads at the end of levels for that.
As for the superchargers, I think you underestimate the value of them, at least with my strategy. I have found I use about half as many free switches and lollipop hammers when I have a supercharger going than I do without one, so superchargers allow me to build up resources quicker so I can move much faster through the levels without spending any gold bars.
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Oh, and in response to your comment on the other thread @christinewupp, I don't really know yet but I am hopeful that my approach (heavy on boosters) might make the final 1500-2000 levels a bit easier. Certainly I'm not noticing a significant increase in difficulty yet. And the superchargers they keep offering might really help on these levels. I noticed recent complaints about levels around 17,000, so I'm really curious how those are going to go - I should be there by this weekend. If I'm right, maybe I will still have 30,000+ gold bars when I get to the end of the map. I'm looking forward to finding out.
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Ugh. I tried editing my previous comment and it went away.
My previous comment was thanking you christinewupp for your comments, especially about the paying something stopping ads, and thanking you for your ideas about using UFOs for extra moves to fill a chocolate box, that was a great idea! And also that I think you may underestimate the value of the superchargers with my strategy, since I have noticed I use half as many resources on average to complete a level with superchargers active.
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You are probably right about the superchargers being of good use in the upper level ranges @Nobody1 . I find that in my test games in levels 1-3000 they don't add a lot to whether I win or lose a level and often just cause the level to finish within one or two moves and add boredom to what are already sadly boring levels. If your strategy is to use hand switches to move two colour bombs side by side then absolutely I agree those super colour bombs are invaluable in the upper level ranges full of blockers. A lot of those levels try to block players who use double colour bombs or party poppers by introducing sequences unfortunately. In the lowest levels King have introduced keys for this purpose and in the higher levels there are order locks and those horrible sour skulls. With 30,000 gold bars you are perfectly placed to make it to the end.
Your strategy to use boosters wisely rather than gold for extra moves is certainly the more enjoyable way to play, and it's how I prefer to play. Sadly King have made changes recently that make this strategy unprofitable and this really bugs me: It's actually cheaper to just use the 10 gold to play on, compared to using our gold to purchase boosters. Your strategy to use ads is a great alternative. But anyone without ads, and there are many players who never get them even though they never bought a thing, is stuck in a position where they have to choose to either play efficiently, which mean you buy yourself out of levels using the "pay gold for extra moves" option or enjoy the game and use boosters to pass levels, which is more costly in gold terms. This is where it gets philosophical: Why do we play this game and what do we aim to achieve in our games? The game has become too big for most players to be ever able to get to the end of the map, and I think the fun factor has largely been written out of the game in levels 1-3000. I am just not sure where the game is heading anymore at all.
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I'd like to elaborate a little on this point of mine above:
- When you enter the new level, check to make sure it's not a puzzle level that can get you in trouble by just bashing away. If not, which is usually the case, try to always start by matching 2 color bombs. Once you get a win streak going, you should always have at least 2 color bombs on the board, and you can often have 3 or more if you can watch an ad before starting. It's often worth it to use several boosters to accomplish this, since it is so valuable for completing a level in the given number of moves.Ideally you need to really use your judgement on this. I almost never will try to match 2 color bombs if it requires more than 4 boosters to do it. If that happens, I will try to match a color bomb with something else, usually a striped or wrapped candy. But even this requires judgement. If the level looks outrageously difficult (like is common above level 16,000 right now), it might very well be worth 5 or 6 boosters to do it. Better to use all those boosters (which are free if you earned them with ads) than to have to waste UFOs and/or party poppers at the end.
It also requires judgement if the level is particularly easy. If it is easy, it may not be worth expending the boosters to get the two color bombs together, especially if a color bomb can be matched with a striped or wrapped candy. If you know you can solve the level without matching 2 color bombs, might as well save the boosters.
Also always consider the other possibilities on the board. For a board that is particularly restricted, 2 color bombs may not do very much damage, and might even do less damage than a striped and wrapped or two wrapped candies. So always consider the alternatives.
So my point here is that it requires thinking about it; it's not as simple as always combining 2 color bombs. But I still believe I probably combine 2 color bombs as my first move on over half of the levels.
Also, I am now in the harder levels above 16,000 (I'm now on level 17,106, and the end is currently somewhere around 18,300 on mobile, which I am). At this level, I'm finding it hard to be highly successful with this approach unless you take heavy advantage of the supercharger (super color bomb). But with the super color bomb, I am able to chew through the levels here just as easily as I ever was on the easier levels. It makes a huge difference. Combining 2 super color bombs at the beginning of levels often almost finishes the level, even on these ones that are so packed that they are clearly utterly impossible to do without boosters or extra moves.
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Here is a recent example where I couldn't combine 2 color bombs to start.
Obviously it would be ridiculous to try to get these together when they are so far away. So I used a free switch:
And then combined the super color bomb with the red stripe to blow up lots of the board. A pretty good compromise.
This level still proved particularly difficult though, since there weren't enough crystal candies to fill the orders and it was being very stingy dropping lucky candies. To get through this I actually had to watch ads for 5 extra moves, and then use a UFO and paintbrush to get enough lucky candies to finish. It was a particularly tough level for me.
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I do think the game is designed around us using double colour bombs to clear a board now and you have spotted this to your advantage. It's an easy way for King to programme into the game to make it possible to pass levels. I have found for example that many frog levels are now possible to bypass the frog and the original intended mechanism by using a double colour bomb. This is what has dumbed down the game in the past few months. The puzzle effect of levels no longer matters if you can just bash your way through levels with a super double colour bomb. You will reach the end of the map with what you have saved up. Any plans of what you will do when you get there? I'm not sure what the point of playing Candy Crush is any more. Once you achieve whatever your goal is this game is just boring.
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I understand your point. When I started playing Candy Crush a year ago, I had already decided my goal then was to get to the very end. I don't think I realized then just how much effort would be required; I didn't realize it was already then over 16000 levels and that new levels were being added so quickly. Now that I've invested so much time, I definitely want to finish! And I still do find it somewhat entertaining to try to figure out the best way to get through each level on a first try with no extra moves and minimal booster use (other than starting boosters), so I still find it a challenging puzzle in many cases. So honestly, it's still fun for me, except for filling chocolate boxes, which is quite boring this way.
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