Pet harvester and best activation order for pets with EP buffs

Some pets give EP in addition to an EP buff. The order of activation for these pets can be optimized to maximize the amount of EP. I have made a list of the optimal order for my pets. If there are pets you want me to add to the list, just let me know and I'll figure out where they fit in.

I should say that I don't have the patience to wait for each bonus to "take" before I activate the next. Usually I harvest a couple at a time then wait for them to take, before I move on to the next (the zero EP pets can of course be activated in quick succession without pause). I do however follow this order:

Pet	EP	EP buff	EP/B
Owl, crow, dragon, etc.	0 EP	Varies	0
Lights out	850 EP	+30%	28
Brick house	4000 EP	+100%	40
Albino cave	1000 EP	+20%	50
Anti-Doomsday Machine II	1600 EP	+30%	53
Woodpecker	1000 EP	+15%	67
Rainbow magic	1800 EP	+25%	72
Viking Longhouse IV	4000 EP	+50%	80
Nostalgia film	2401 EP	+25%	96
Kitten caboodle	4200 EP	+40%	105
Volcano bungalow II	2500 EP	+15%	167
Ladybug lodge	17500 EP	+100%	175
Pug in the manger	7800 EP	+40%	195

Edit: The list is sorted by the EP/B number, from lowest to highest. B stands for the EP buff from the pet. The albino cave for instance has EP/B = 1000/20 = 50. I've added the EP/B number for each pet in the table above.

For those interested in my method of optimization: Lets take the ladybug lodge and pug in the manger as an example, which should we activate first?

• If we first activate the ladybug, then the pug, we get +100% on the pug pet, i.e., we get a bonus of 7800EP.
• If instead we would activate the pug first, then the ladybug, we get +40% on the ladybug pet, i.e., we get a bonus of 17500*0.4=7000EP.

The first bonus gives more EP, therefore it is better to activate the ladybug before the pug. Note that this is independent of whatever other bonuses that have or have not been activated, since the buffs always work on the basic amount of EP.

 

Yup. it's the way it goes here.

On the pet playground it's possible to harvest all at once but I only did so at the introduction and noticed the loss of EP buffs when doing so. Manually harvesting ever since.

Thanks for posting! Always nice to have a check.

 

I just calculated how much extra EP I get per day harvesting my pets the way I do, compared to first harvesting dragons, night-mare towers, crows and owls, wait for them to take, then all the rest in one go. It is on average 65,500EP per day! More than I thought.

Concerning the pet harvester. Does anyone know exactly how this works? I used it a couple of times to harvest pets with buffs, and I noticed that some of the buffs are applied, but not all. I am wondering if it might have to do with the order the pets are placed. Perhaps it harvests the pet that was placed first, applies that bonus to the rest, harvests the next pet and so on. This is just a guess of mine, I haven't tested it yet. The reason for the guess is that the seeder and watering machinery first seeds and waters the plots that where placed first. You can see this clearly if you have added some plots after the others (maybe replacing trees/stables with plots) and you don't have enough seed/water for all plots. The plots that were added last will be unseeded/unwatered. If anyone has any theories, or have/want to experiment with this, I would be very interested in hearing about it!

 

yea I noticed if I harvest everything together my tools don't show up in the list so I started doing them separate thanks fo starting this thread Mir85

 

If the list is too long, not all buffs are shown but they are applied.
I have noticed that the same occurs sometimes in events with more than one drops.
If the list of tools, artesian items and drops is too long, you may see one drop type but not the other(s).
But when you check in the bottom panel you see that you have received more items (item types) than shown in the list.

-Mir85- the pet harvester works in batch jobs, just like the normal harvester.
When you harvest all items are collected, the points are given and after that the buffs are applied.
When using the pet harvester you should only receive the EP calculated before buffs are applied.
I can make a check tomorrow morning when my pets will be ready and come back to you with the results.

I'm quite certain however that the only way to optimise the EP's is the manual collection you describe above.

 

Yes, I would suppose so I'm sure I saw some buffs being applied, but it might have been a display glitch. Look forward to the result of your check

 

I will be more than happy to be wrong
In any case, I will sum the EP on the pets and then harvest them with the pet harvester.
Then we shall see how many EPs will come out. Its worth the try.

 

Great it is probably worth noting down your total EP amount before and after, just in case there is a display glitch with the EP sum.

 

Ok...good point. I had not thought about that.
I have also restructured the pet distribution in the field to have the 0 EP pets first.
I will also avoid collecting the cloud rows until after the test in order not to allow for mistakes.
xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
I will continue here in order not to double post
I have some very interesting results
The pets ready for collection are shown in the table below.
The placement of the pets was more or less following the flow in the table.
Sequence starting from top-left and each line below flowing diagonally up-right.

Pet	No	Buff	EP	No*EP	No*Buff
crow tree	8	5%	0	0	40%
owl tree	8	10%	0	0	80%
Night-mare tower	2	20%	0	0	40%
Pet dragon	1	20%	0	0	20%
Nostalgia film	4	25%	2,401	9,604	100%
Woodpecker nest	2	15%	1,000	2,000	30%
propeller rabit house	1	0%	300	300	0%
viking longhouse IV	1	50%	4,000	4,000	50%
Anti doomsday machine II	1	30%	1,600	1,600	30%
Lights out	1	30%	850	850	30%
Albino vampire cave	1	20%	1,000	1,000	20%
Rainbow magic	1	25%	1,800	1,800	25%
**Harvest Helpers	-	-	-	-	100%
-	-	-	Sum	21,154	565%

So, the base EP count without buffs was 21,154
The buffs (additional %) correspond to 565% of the base EP.
Including the base EP we reach an ideal 665% or an ideal 140,674 EP (21,154*665%).
*Note. The ideal % is not achievable but provides a good indicator.

The pets were collected with the pet harvester.

EP after	3,025,215,856​
EP before	3,025,113,580​
difference	102,276​
EP displayed	102,276​

The collected EP corresponds to 483,5% of the base EP (or expressed differently an additional 383,5% on the base EP).

So:
- The first conclusion is that the pet harvester does accumulate the buffs while harvesting each pet in succession
- The second conclusion is that I am leaking EPs between 102,276 to 140,674EP.
Probably I should try to placing the pets in a different sequence and see if the results are better.

If anyone has any other thoughts or ideas on the data shown above, any input is appreciated.

 

Thank you very much for testing, this is good news indeed!

But now I have new questions. To me it looks like you got more EP than you would with manual harvesting

In the table below I have listed the best order I could find for manually activating the pets. In the fourth column the EP of all pets that are activated after this pet is summed up. This sum is then multiplied with the bonus from the pet, and the result is listed in the fifth column. The fifth column thus lists the bonus EP each pet contributes.

Pet name	EP	Buff	EP after	Bonus from this pet
0EP pets	0	1.8	21,154	38,077
Lights out	850	0.3	20,304	6,091
Albino vampire cave	1000	0.2	19,304	3,861
Anti-Doomsday Machine II	1,600	0.3	17,704	5,311
Woodpecker	1,000	0.15	16,704	2,506
Woodpecker	1,000	0.15	15,704	2,356
Rainbow magic	1,800	0.25	13 ,904	3,476
Viking Longhouse IV	4,000	0.5	9,904	4,952
Nostalgia film	2,401	0.25	7,503	1,876
Nostalgia film	2,401	0.25	5,102	1,8276
Nostalgia film	2,401	0.25	2,701	675
Nostalgia film	2,401	0.25	300	75
Propeller rabbit	300	0	-	-
Sum	21,154	-	-	70,531

So if we add the total bonus with the basic EP we get 91,685. I think that is the maximum amount you can get harvesting manually. If anyone finds any mistakes, please let me know, because this is confusing

 

I will check the numbers now.
A first missing bonus is the 100%EP I received while purchasing the harvest helpers.
Maybe I should have pointed it out more clearly.

 

Oh, right! I thought that was the basic EP, not a bonus. Then the order I listed would yield 112,839 EP total (bonus + basic EP). While the order you listed would give a total of 103,472 EP. That's really close to the amount you got

Edit: Apparently I didn't read properly, I see now that you wrote it.

 

Yes
The order I listed was a close approximation of the positioning of the pets, so any difference should be caused by this.
But I only reordered the pets for the test, otherwise I had everything in the complete opposite (wrong) order.

So, this is very very good news for two reasons:
1. Reordering the pets in optimum positions can increase your EP output and
2. Using the pet harvester will not reduce the EP output if the order is optimum.

I have to admit that I did not expect this.
I am so glad that I was wrong assuming that the harvester worked as a batch job .

PS:
I did a separate check on the 'optimum' sequence of the pets you have in your first post and came to the same order you show.
So, now I just have to place my pets in a slightly better position and gain maximum EP without any additional clicks.

 

Yes, it is amazing! Thanks again for testing

When you reordered your pets, did you just move them around? Or did you delete them and place them out in chronological order?

 

I moved them around.
Ok.. In the evening I will redo the test.
I have reordered the pets to provide an optimum spatial distribution.
I will remove the owl trees now and re-insert them, so they are the last chronologically placed pets.
If placement time has an effect, then this should create an 80% dent in the additional EP count.
If this loss of EP is not seen, then the spatial placement of the pets is the important factor.
Let's see.

 

Interesting! My initial guess was on the chronological order. Then I'll try to rearrange (just move around) my pets for the harvest this evening, and see how it goes

Great

 

There seems to be a sound basis on the chronological order also.
I emptied some space in the main farm and started playing around moving 1x1 fields.
I planted cress and then bought 1 water at a time and watered with the harvester.
Then I moved the fields in another position and repeated the procedure.
The fields that were created chronologically first were watered first, regardless if they were on one side of the farmland or the other.

 

Yes, that's what I have noticed too. But, the harvester might work differently from seeding/watering. We'll see

 

Where in the order of activating pets would you put the Brick House and Straw House?

 

The brick house goes almost at the beginning, before the albino cave. I've added it to the list in the first post The 5% buff for the straw house is for tool drops, not EP, so that goes at the end after all the EP buffs.