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Between my menu & booze, I make between 3000-3800 coppers per service (depending on supply shortages, as my menu has a lot of repeat materials, so when when they all hit, it's very bad, but sometimes I have no shortages). This nets me an average of 900-1100 gold per service. This is honestly so much more gold than I even need to cover expenses, even on Expert economy, that I've never even bothered to try pushing sale prices above reasonable (up into "orange", where you start taking satisfaction penalties.
TLDR: IMHO, it's easier to just leave prices at max "reasonable" (white), and keep satisfaction high. You will make more than enough gold this way. Plus, who wants to run a crummy tavern that your customers don't enjoy? XD
Satisfaction around 67 seems pretty good. Get 8-9k per shift in copper coins, can still maintain 100% sale odds, and 112 patrons.
I'd also be curious what your customer count is, menu, drinks, etc.
I just tried pushing all my prices up to maximum while still keeping 100% sale chance, and I only made 5,000k coppers w/ 96 customers. The tavern is capable of producing another 25 meals, but the only way I could I fit more customers in is by making my tavern look ugly and unrealistically packed with tables. I also would have to lower beverage quality to accommodate more customers without the kegs eventually running dry, which isn't worth the hassle IMO. To each their own, of course, but as someone who enjoys the RP aspect of games like this, I'd rather keep my tavern looking awesome with 100% satisfaction than squeeze out another 2k gold per service when there's nothing to spend it on anyway.
But, also, seriously, kudos for figuring out how to break the system XD I've spent a fair bit of time playing around with all the levers and dials in the Tavern, and it's impressive that you're able to make so much per service.
Seriously, this game desperately needs more Guides!
Don't you have purple stuff to upgrade?
I don't know what you're asking about. I'm happy to answer any questions, but please use more words to make it make sense XD
Generally speaking, I have unlocked everything there is to unlock/upgrade in the Tavern except the chicken, which of course is random chance.
Oh, you mean as something to spend money on . . . got it. Yeah, no, all the gear on all my mercs is upgraded to level 14, and I'm still sitting at 90K gold with nothing to spend it on.
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There are already many basic introductory guides to the Tavern DLC. This guide will summarize more advanced concepts and strategies.
End Goal: The Benefits of the Tavern
Obtain Krowns:
Once your basic Tavern is reliably making a couple hundred "copper coins" per shift, you can regularly extract krowns from it.
In the early-to-mid Tavern, you can use a simple technique that gives the optimal conversion ratio. The math is: the ratio starts at 100 krowns per 100 coins, every time you extract krowns this reduces by 5, and each shift the ratio is restored by 9. Math-wise, you should click convert coins any time the conversion ratio is 91 or above (91-100). You can extract between 96-195 krowns per shift, and 172.8 krowns per shift on average, or 864 krowns every 5 shifts. Because the conversion ratio is always optimal, this will leave a large amount of coins in reserve, and these coins are used to upgrade your tavern. The conversion rate drops by 5 each time you extract krowns, so clicking the button too often has diminishing returns. Extracting 200 coins gives 195 krowns, 600 coins gives 525 krowns, 900 coins gives 720 krowns. This means that: early on, it's not necessary to min-max the tavern economy. You can do a terrible job at managing your tavern, and still make enough coins to convert into krowns at the optimal conversion rate. Again: a novice tavern owner would get pretty similar benefits to a an experienced one, at least in the early part of the process. 172.8 krowns per rest is more than enough to fully pay the wages of a large army. Use your leftover coins to heavily invest in your Tavern to make it more profitable.
In the late game, you will make thousands of coins per shift, with nothing to spend it on. Since you have so many coins that are worthless, it's desirable then to convert them into krowns, even if the conversion rate is terrible. I personally have not done this yet, but other players have reported that the lowest conversion rate may depend on the game's Economic Difficulty. By this point, it's worthwhile to spend time and coins to min-max the Tavern. A Tavern that makes 8-9K coins per shift can generate a lot more krowns than a Tavern that makes 1.5-2.5K coins, even with the lowest conversion rate of coins to krowns.
Obtain meals:
Your cook can begin to cook a "Specialty" meal pretty early on, as one Specialty becomes available almost immediately. Specialties are on the bottom of the food list. Each of these weighs 1 lbs, and feeds 14 food. Being able to have 14 free food every shift (ever rest) is huge, it can greatly supplement the food requirements of a large group, or completely feed a small group. It also frees up a lot of weight of having to carry a large amount of food in your inventory (a meal that is both eaten and regenerated each rest weighs only 1 lbs each rest).
Gain XP:
Winning battles yield fairly low XP. You can get free XP each shift (rest) by assigning a Mercenary to Tavern Keeper or Bouncer. The XP seems to vary depending on the level of the Mercenary. In one test, Tavern Keeper gained 60 XP, and Bouncer gained 52 XP (but these numbers may be different, at different levels). I've levelled many Mercs to Level 13 using this method. You can Rest your troops once every few seconds, which is much faster than they can fight and win battles. Although this method of far inferior to using the Training Dummy (camp item), it's the best levelling method in the early game, before you obtain the Training Dummy.
Animals can be Bouncers. This can be a reliable way to level your Ponies, as Ponies cannot use the Training Dummy.
Gain Profession XP:
Professions gain different XP depending on level. The numbers vary slightly, but as an example, on testing, my Cook got 36-42 XP, my Brewer got 44-48 XP, my Thief got 21 XP, and I didn't test the Bard. It's pretty easy to get the Master level profession, for these four professions.
Temporarily (or Permanently) Store Your Mercenaries and Animals:
You can transfer anybody to the Tavern (but you must have at least 1 human left in your army). These stored humans and animals use up copper coins as income each rest, but do not eat food and do not take wages in krowns, so they have no real upkeep. This is useful to shrink your army whenever you need it, and then you can restore the Mercenaries (or Animals) to your army anywhere, anytime. You can access them in any town, on any road, inside of a tomb or arena, etc.
Get additional Recipes:
With high Prestige, your cooks and brewers can steal recipes from rival taverns.
As several other players had pointed out, there is no penalty for losing a theft attempt. So, the fastest strategy is to plant each cook and each brewer for the minimal duration (1 shift); the chance to steal is low (30%), but if they fail, you just plant them the next shift. Overall, the steal chance is better if the low chance (30%) is just repeated once every 1 shift, than a bigger chance (70%) but over 5 shifts.
Best choice of Food
Feasts sell for substantially more coins than regular Meals. The price of a Feast is so high that its price is not as affected by shortages of ingredients. The only downside of Feasts is that they require several prerequisite Meals and Drinks, which requires enough Cooks with enough free food slots, and enough barrels of alcohol. The maximum number of Feasts is 4, but my preferred number is 3. The reason: The best Feast is the last one, "The Feast of Five Kingdoms." that requires 3 prerequisite meals rather than 2; it can sell for way more krowns because it has universal appeal to all factions, meaning it's always in higher demand (maximum "Customer Preference" stat), meaning you can raise the price more than any other Feast while the sale odds remain high, to the maximum of 156 coins per sale.
The other two Feasts depend on a few factors. My preference is Upscale factions, so I choose "King's Feast" and "Broker's Table," both of which serve Upscale factions. An alternate strategy is "Hill Delight" and "Culture Shock," because both require the prerequisite meal Apple Pancake. This frees up 2 food slots as compared to any other combination of 2 Feasts, which you can use for something else.
Always have one Specialty meal, so that your army gets free food each rest. The first Specialty dish only takes 1 food slot, compared to 2 slots, meaning you can use that extra slot for another 1 slot food.
If you have food slots to spare, then select the dish "Two-Fish Tartare." It has universal appeal to all factions, so it has the maximum "Customer Preference" stat, so you can max its sale price.
I've noticed that patrons will sometimes not order certain meals. The meal that will not be bought changes from shift to shift. Since there is a limit to how much quantity of food you can sell per shift, it's better to maximize food price over food quantity. So, all of your Cooks should start with the "Mastery" skill, the one that gives a chance to increase food price by 20%.
Best Alcohol
Your end game meta is to have all Brewers start with the "Steady Hand" trait (the starting trait that produces 3 more alcohol per shift), 1 of each type of lesser alcohol needed to make all of your meals (for me, that's 1 Cider, 1 Wine, 1 Mead, 1 Gosenberg Wine), and fill the rest with the best alcohol (for me, that's 4 Sparkling Wine, which requires 1 Wine in another barrel), and to have every alcohol aged at 2 stars, and finally to have all Brewers able to produce enough aged alcohol per rest to make up for the amount that is sold (or strategically place nearby Brewers with the "Versatility" skill, that increases the production of each adjacent barrel). Below are specific details.
Your choice of alcohol will depend on which Feasts you choose (so it may be different from mine), plus at least 1 Wine because it is the prerequisite of Sparkling Wine. In order to age alcohol, early on you need to plan to have 1 barrel dedicated to age a specific alcohol (barrel 1), while another Brewer sells that same alcohol in another barrel (barrel 2). This is because alcohol that is aging cannot be sold right away, so you need the same alcohol in a regular barrel to be able to make your Feasts in the meantime. Barrel 1 needs to fill up to 50 alcohol first, then it ages 1 star, then it ages 2 stars. This process is quick, it takes about 4-6 shifts only. Once barrel 1 is fully aged (it has two stars), then change the barrel from aging to selling, and you can repurpose barrel 2 and repeat the process with the next alcohol that you need to age. For lower level Brewers, they cannot sell enough aged alcohol to make up for the amount being sold. Your barrel has 50 capacity, so you usually have plenty of time.
The goal is to have every Brewer have the starting trait "Steady Hand" (produces 3 more alcohol per shift), then improve the Brewer's skill slowly each shift to acquire the trait that gives bonus production to a specific category of alcohol (Fast, Average and Slow fermentation; there are three skills, one for each type, and you can train all three traits for every Brewer by swapping them from one barrel to another). The second trick is to acquire the "Versatility" skill, which usually shows up after your Brewer has obtained at least two fermentation skills (i.e. after gaining the traits for Slow and Average fermentatoin, Versatility can then unlock). Versatility improves output for the two barrels adjacent to where the Brewer is placed. With all of these bonuses, your aged barrel will produce more than it is selling, and your barrels with always be full.
Sparkling Wine is the best alcohol choice, because its base price is expensive, but also because it is universally loved by all factions. Like the Feast of Five Kingdoms, Sparking Wine can maintain huge sale odds, so you can increase the price a lot more. Aged Sparkling Wine sells for substantially more than aged Whiskey.
Upscale Patrons or Working Class Patrons.
The Tavern Mangement screen, second tab, will give details on all of the factions that you can attract. You will eventually want to unlock all factions, as each will offer you a special gift. So attracting both groups is something that every tavern owner will do, to at least a minimal degree. One faction gift is particularly good: it's a wall decoration ("List of Bounties") that increases your list of bounties by 2; this is amazing.
As other players have mentioned, it's easier and cheaper to attract Working Class patrons, but your food and drinks are sold at their minimum price. Attract Working Class in the early game. Attracting Upscale patrons will allow you to raise prices by up to 10%, but you can achieve this with only a moderate amount of Upscale, you don't actually need 100% Upscale to get the maximum price. In the end game, make a moderate effort to draw in Upscale, but no need to make more effort than is necessary to get a 10% increase in tolerability to high prices, which is the maximum bonus you can get.
Among the more obvious ways to attract Upscale, there are a few other ways. Certain music choices will do better (especially the Ballad, that pleases two Upscale factions), certain Feasts and Meals and Drinks will attract more Upscale patrons (you can match the faction symbols to the factions listed on the Tavern Management screen, second tab), different Bouncers or Tavern Keepers can attract one or the other, Wall and Floor renovations.
Optimal Furniture
Improved Games Table
The Improved Games Table (IGT) is the best seating. It takes up 3x4 space, so it can be rotated in order to fit optimally in any geometry (you can rows of 3x4, and rows of 4x3, depending on what's most space efficient for the room). It seats 2 people, but this is more efficient than a Banquet Table, which only holds 8 people but takes up 6x9 space. Plus, it increases "sales odds" of all nearby patrons (it seems to also include itself in the calculation, as far as I can tell?), so it kind of acts like its own Candlestick. So it is often better to just stack Improved Games Tables (in a specific amount of space) than it is to have an equivalent space of Improved Banquet Tables and Improved Candlesticks. They are so small that you can place them in every different area of the third Tavern in Gosenberg City, including in the narrow spaces in front of the kitchen and in front of the barrels.
In the smaller spaces that are left after you've spammed IGTs (2 spaces wide only), you can place Improved Candlesticks (2x2), or human Bouncers.
It's questionable whether Bards/Lutes are better than just more IGTs. Lutes take up 3x3 space. So, if you got rid of a row of 3 IGTs, you could fit 4 Bards/Lutes. Bards don't add seating, but their radius of increased sale odds can be huge, they are passively boosted by some unique furniture or by some Tavern Keeper bonuses, and they have other bonuses like 1 more food consumption in radius. I chose to have 4 Bards in a row in the centre of my IGT setup, but again, hard to say what the ideal ratio is. It's hard to tell if Bards are better to have the increased sale odds skill or the increased radius skill.
Generally, it seems optimal to mostly have IGTs, and the have a small number of Bards in the centre of the rooms or platforms.
Some players will remark that IGTs are not as asthetically appealling as an Improved Banquet Table. That's a valid opinion. However, I like to think of my Tavern as a sort of Medieval board game cafe. Board game cafes are awesome, and the IGT fits that asthetic perfectly! I'm just imagining my customers are Medieval geeks and they are playing Settlers of Catan or Pandemic. It's awesome.
Tavern Keeper
Best starting skills are "Loaded Trays" that increase Satisfaction by 5, and "Thoughtful Service" that attracts Upscale Patrons.
Meta: Maximize Sale Odds, Be Mindful of Low Satisfaction
Use all the strategies above to maximize sale odds as much as possible, including getting high Comfort. This will allow you to raise prices on all Food or Drinks by a lot. The higher the prices, the lower your Satisfaction, which lowers your overall sale odds by a small amount. You will eventually reach an equilibirum where it's impossible to raise prices any further because the hit to Satisfaction won't be worth it. I am not sure where this is. I'm comfortable sitting at 65 Satisfaction, but I can probably lower it a bit more and still maintain 100% sale odds.
This will allow you to obtain revenues of around 8-9K copper coins per shift.
Removing Furniture
In order to remove any furniture or wall decoration, you must first click on the Second Tab on the bottom, "Layout." You can't get the option to remove or move anything until you are in the Layout overlay, which also shows you the floor grid.
Don't use Thieves
Thieves are not useful in the end-game Tavern. They take up 1 customer seating each. This is not worth it; in the end-game, 1 customer can give you a lot more income than 1 Thief in that same seat.
Hard to believe that could slightly over double my tavern's income, but maybe I'm dramatically underestimating the effect of the game tables replacing those banquets, as that seems like it's where most of the difference is coming from.
Out of curiosity, would you mind posting a screenshot of your current tavern layout?
The only item above that I had not considered was maximizing Improved Gaming Tables over other tables + candlesticks. After testing out maximizing this element in my tavern, I am also able to get over 8K coppers per service, but my tavern is dark and ugly, so . . . not worth it for me XD Since I already have 100K gold and nothing to spend it on, I'll stick with my well-lit, aesthetically pleasing, realistically designed tavern that only makes 3-4K coppers.
I'm just too much or an RP'er to enjoy this "munchkin"-design in my tavern =D
Thanks for sharing your ideas, though!
https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=3367258425
I totally get your point. But like I said, I like to roleplay that I'm running a board game cafe. The Games Tables match that fantasy quite well! But totally get it that the Banquet Table matches a tavern fantasy better.