Ultimate Arty Challenge reLoaded

Fresh take on UAC, using everything available at your disposal to cut down the time needed for the payout.

Hell has a name...

....and it's Arty. Welcome to yet another horrible guide, trying to ease the pain of getting through the UAC.

Before you keep reading, this guide assumes you have the following available:

• 1. Lots of time, you will need it.
  
• 2. A knack for pain, blood and turtles.
  
• 3. Determination to actively play the UAC (until rebirth 4), thus ignoring a healthy lifestyle.
  
• 4. A functioning notebook/laptop/pc with a monitor (or 2). Sorry tablet/phone bois.

If these things do not appeal to your very core, I suggest you refrain from doing the UAC. It's payout/time spent got a horrible ratio to begin with. At the very least, you want to do 2 of them, at a steady pace. Did my first in around 24 days. In hindsight, I should have changed a few things, so I am going to give you the advice you need.

This guide does not assume that you have:

• 1. Any other challenges done, except for 1 UBC to unlock Crystals.
  
• 2. Any prior knowledge except for the initial slog through the game (= defeating Baal).
  
• 3. Any fancy purchase, like Improved Next At for Challenges.
  
• 4. A soul.

Information/What you can expect

The UAC is a challenge unlike any other in the game. You have 5 rebirths to beat Baal and loose nigh anything you gained before, except for the rewards of the 1KC/AAC. Those rewards are marginal though and around the time you will have finished those, the UAC will be nothing but a major sink of time.

The general suggestion is doing the UAC right away, after defeating Baal. The reason is stated in the previous paragraph, you don't really keep anything from your past endeavors. Still, I do highly suggest doing an Ultimate Baal Challenge (= UBC) to unlock the Crystal Factory before you head into the UAC. Those will play an important part in the last 2 Rebirths. Still, you can do without them.

I would argue there is also a good reason, very late in the game, when you have a few dozen pets, to do the UAC anyway, namely farming Item/Growth Campaigns, doing long D2-3 dungeon runs, etc, for the simple reason that gaining a ton of GP/day is basically only achievable by doing speedruns involving killing as many/all UBv2s as you can. Since you gonna sit around in the UAC, using it to grow some Pets, doing Dungeon stuff, fits the bill. Just remember you can't get GP from Dungeons, while you are doing an UAC.

Still, the big reward is a "free", future Defender, namely the Turtle. Getting it early means you can work on its growth much earlier too, plus you have another expendable member doing Dungeons with. Doing the 2nd challenge is necessary to evolve it and you also get 300k pet stones, which helps out a lot as well. Pet stones are hard to get by until you have the right pets for Item campaigns and Dungeons.

TL;DR: This challenge takes a lot of time. Said time can be spend wisely focusing on Dungeons if you have a few dozen pets already. But doing it right away is the norm. Don't send them into Dungeons trying to get extra GP (=Godpower). You won't get any, while doing UAC, in Dungeons.

What you need to do it in a reasonable amount of time, keeping at least some sanity

Now, I won't tell you to cheat directly, but I highly suggest the following: Use an Auto-Clicker.

I am using Auto Mouse Clicker by MurGee. It is free for 3 (my bad) 1 month, comes with no additional software/malware/etc. It's highly customisable. Big kudos to MurGee for developing it. Link:

https://www.murgee.com/auto-mouse-clicker/

Setting it up isn't hard, and if you decide to use it, a simple trial and error is sufficient to get the hang of it. Why are we using it? To make good, good use of the night, and to do most of the awkward 1-cap training without actual human input. If you decide this is not your thing, my guide will still let you win UAC without many issues, but you going to need a lot more time at hand, personally babysitting the 1-capping of many Skills.

Also, I am listing my 3 sources. Big thanks to all of those before me, including GoDLloyD, platinumwyrm11 and lodie, the creators of the 2 guides I used to get my time of around 24 days, and to those contributing to the 2 threads and the ItrtG wiki.

https://www.kongregate.com/forums/2874-idling-to-rule-the-gods/topics/650409-uac-guide

https://www.kongregate.com/forums/2874-idling-to-rule-the-gods/topics/661063-uac-lazy-mans-guide

https://itrtg.fandom.com/wiki/Idling_to_Rule_the_Gods_Wiki

Regardless of what you decide, onward to the guide-part.

What we are up against

A small list of things we are up against and how we are going to tackle those things (or ignore them because we can't do much about some of them).

• All skill caps are back to the original value (the BIGGEST problem actually).
  
• Pets don't give any multipliers (You can still level them/do campaigns though).
  
• Dungeons can not give any GP rewards (sucks).
  
• All GP purchases are reset (Yep, improved Next At too).
  
• TBS is locked (inconvenient, but we can get around it).
  
• Planet is locked, but the Crystal factory is unlocked (Unlock it in RB4, really helps!)
  
• Divinity Generator is reset to default values.
  
• Crystal power is lost as well (really bad for creation speed).
  
• Very limited supply of GP (5 rebirths only).
  
• Total Might is reset (horrible).

How do we get around these things then? Mostly by waiting. Well, one really, really important thing to keep in mind: Reducing 1 caps is easy if you DO NOT boost Physical at all. Don't. Leave it alone for a good time, until you have the last 4 skills, or, at the very least, the last 2 skills at a 1 cap (or very, very close to it). This requires you to be active - or use an Auto Clicker.

Afterwards, it is up to you if you want to 1-cap Gear Eyes, Transformation Aura, Mystic Mode, God Speed, etc., or not, actively. I suggest, in addition, to 1-capping the 1st eleven skills, you also gun for Aura Ball, Big Bang and 108 Fists of Destiny, which can be done after you started training Physical as well, during RB1. If you really hate your life, ignore training Physical until you cap even more of the last 8 skills, but be aware training Physical/Mystic is your only real way of defeating gods this rebirth. Multipliers aren't great from any skills but the last 8, which give immense rebirth multipliers. Your goal is, mainly, to prepare and get fit for the other 4 rebirths.

Go into the Doppelganger fight, and level up you skills. If you have no Physical training, he will 1-shot you. Always.

Kudos to GoDLloyD for that snarky trick.

Use this to your advantage, setting up your Auto Clicker, or doing it manually, as fast as you can. If you flee, all is null and void, but if he defeats you, you get the reduction for you skills. I see 2 reasonable choices, keeping that in mind either way:

A. Train only the last 2 skills, because you can use 2 skills before the Doppelganger attacks you.
B. Train the last 4 skills (probably the better choice, in the long term), starting with Reflection Barrier, to nullify 1 attack, letting you use the other 3 skills before you get knocked out.

Using an Auto Clicker, you can finish training A in around 1 day, and training B in a bit more than 2 days. If you keep 1-capping other skills, even better.
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Update#1: Currently, it won't always work perfectly if you use Time Manipulation after you used Reflection Barrier (resets internal block value but doesn't show, at least not to me), so stick to using Time Manipulation first always, regardless if you do it manually or use a bot to do it for you. After you 1-capped Time Manipulation, put Reflection Barrier 1st and use other skills.
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Personally, I spent around 13.5 days to get to Hathor and defeat him, after I messed up my training too early going for Physical. I reached 10m on all of my 1-capped skills, those were the last 2 Training skills, most of the first 16 skills, +108 Fists of Destiny, Aura Ball and Big Bang. The others I got to 100-500k, for additional achievements. In the following rebirths, I let the Auto Clicker go loose every now and then and further reduced my caps as I saw fit, and to gain Divinity. So no, you do not have to strictly 1-cap all of them.

Now you going to ask: What do you do with your clones? No monuments, no...nothing.

Well, the 2nd key to victory is getting your clone cap to 100k (or, more like 101k) as fast as possible, best starting at Rebirth 1 and reaching the cap at Rebirth 2. This means mass suicide, all the time, most of the rebirth. Only keep some clones on 1-capped Training and, if you want, on 1-capped monsters. Doesn't hurt.

Don't forget to put the mode under Special Fights on Auto whenever you are not doing something, like farming Divinity! Every bit helps.

And whatever you do, buy building speed in steps of 10, only. You don't have much GP to waste.

With that out of the way, it's about time to go into details of Rebirth 1-5.

Rebirth 1: Where Angels cry

So, it started. A small list of things to do, before we lose ourselves entirely.

• 1-capping the last 2/4/8 skills, plus most of the 1st eleven skills, Aura Ball, 108 Fists of Destiny and Big Bang; get to 10m for all 1-capped skills, aim for 100-500k on the rest.
  
• (Try) to reach 101k clone cap. If you miss 10k, 20k, no big deal but it will prolong future runs.
  
• Once you start training Physical, get to Gaia, defeat her and buy 1k more clones using 3 GP.
  
• ~6 might on all Might skills. Gauge the unleash time to around 10-12 seconds max. If you need more Attack, aim for more lvls in Physical Attack (I had 11 I think) or 1, 2 more seconds with the unleash.
  
• Battle achievements don't hurt, but they are not really important. Still, get them.
  
• Creation achievements if you have time. Only the 1st for anything past Light/Stone. Can be ignored.

Once it starts, turn off the Sync button on the training menu. This will prevent you from accidentally pushing Physical without you noticing. Work on unlocking all Mystic skills, which will take a good while. Next At helps, but not as much as you think, only rely on it over night (unless you unlocked Improved Next At for challenges, then, do as you always do).

Onto the most tedious bit. The first Rebirth will be all about reducing 1-caps. Use the method described in the previous section. Only train Mystic, until you have all skills available. Set up an Auto Clicker or do it manually, maxing the last 2 or 4 skills, then gunning for the rest of the last 8 if you feel like it, at the very least do also 1-cap as many of the first 12 skills as you can, since it will be fast anyway. Every bit helps. Kill off Shadow Clones as you see fit.
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Update#2: If you train Mystic, you will hit a point where the last Monster you can reach won't be able to kill your Shadow Clones, but in return, you can't really kill it either. When that happens, gain more Battle and push over it that way, don't touch Physical for that, so you can continue your shadowy suicide spree while continuing to work on your 1-caps. Creating more Shadow Clones also adds a bit more to your Attack stat.
_____

After a few days, depending on your babysitting skills or thanks to the work of your auto-friend, you can start pushing Physical as well. Just be aware, once you do, pushing 1-caps further will be very dependent on your stats, since the stats of the gods don't change. If your current stats are a bit lower/roughly equal to the ones of a god, you will take a good amount of time just wearing him down, or for him to wear you down. So be sure that you only push Physical when you are satisfied with your current 1-caps.

Once you get to Gaia and defeat her, buy 1k more clones for 3 GP. You won't miss the 3 GP at all. Keep going until you unlock Might. Now, push all of those to around 5-6 (or more/less depending on how you doing so far). Kill gods as you can.

Keep in mind that the last 8 Skills also give a lot, lot more Physical/Mystic per clone, than the rest. This means gaining a lot more power in a shorter time. For the exact numbers, check my sources or the ItrtG wiki, but it seems to be around 2/3th of the highest stat gain/s with just the last 4 skills being BBed(Bluebar'd = running at full speed). So really work on those 1-caps before you start buffing up!

The target god is up for debate here. If you are really active, you might be able to kill Pontus in a reasonable amount of time. Personally, I know Hathor is enough. Just make sure your Rebirth multiplier gets pushed as high as you can. Since the only way of doing this is to get achievements by training and by...waiting, hourly, be patient.

To check how much stronger you already got, starting after Pontus (which, up to this point, is basically easy game):

Every 100^x you can divide your Physical/Mystic multiplier increase for the next Rebirth (the value in brackets) and get a number >1 is an additional god kill. An easy trick for all of us math-lazy people.

Helps for the future Rebirths. For this one, and the multipliers, it doesn't say much as we had to spend several days to get to the point of getting a reasonable amount of Physical/Mystic per second = 1-capping some of the last 8 skills and some others. Future Rebirths will follow the strict line of every god being 100x stronger than the previous (except for Baal, which is 500x), starting after defeating Pontus, so just keep that in mind.

Hold on though! While Nepthys is the most important god to beat quickly, so we can build monuments reliably in Rebirth 2, Artemis/Eros is our target god. There is a slight issue regarding Cybele though. Without defeating her, you can not create Mountains, which, in return, means:

YOU CAN NOT build Godly Statues or a Divinity generator (yet) before you defeat her.

So be sure you rebirth once you have gotten as much out of your achievements as you can, without wasting another 2, 3 days. If you wanna be sure you don't mess up, kill Pontus too. In my experience, that is not necessary, but it depends on your progress on Rebirth 1. Your Rebirth multiplier will be high enough to go for Nephtys, and using Divinity gained through Special Fighting gods, you can make enough Mighty Statues and a few Mystic Gardens to kill Cybele in a matter of 1.5-2 days. The more time you spend on the first Rebirth, the more time you waste, so after defeating Hathor you should aim for a couple more achievements and progress to Rebirth 2.

Personally, Rebirth 2 started with me having 70k clones at my disposal, the 10m achievements on my last 2 Skills, Artemis ganked and for most of the other skills' achievements I had up to 500k. Rebirth 2 took me around 4 days, without killing Pontus previously, so you should be fine going my route. At the very least, you will save some days on Rebirth 1. A decent increase of your Rebirth Multiplier is around 500k (the value in brackets). With that, you will breeze through most gods until you reach Nepthys.

Get some more Battle achievements, if you can, and rebirth once you feel comfortable.

Rebirth 2: Finally, something is moving...

Alright, so you killed Hathor/Pontus and got a multiplier high enough to get to Nepthys in a day. Time to work hard, yet again. Starting with RB2, Might gets important. If you need some more % to beat a god, I highly suggest putting lots/most of your clones in the first 2, 3 Usable Might skills and pushing your Total Might a bit more. This helped me quite a bit early on, the Total Might will also be one of the very few things you actually keep during the first 3 rebirths and a bit of a gamechanger during those, if you spend a bit more time on it.

In this rebirth, Divinity is starting to become important. So allocate around 5-15% of your clones to battle, BBing as many monsters as you can, but don't go for half speed. BB or nothing, using your resource at hand. Also, don't upgrade your Divinity generator. No reason to.

Another list of things to do:

• 10m achievements for all the 1-capped skills. No shortcuts, you have to beat Freya next rebirth. Since you now have more clones, you can now easily 500k-2m not-1-capped skills. Do that.
  
• If you didn't already, 101k cap your maximum clones. Work on all creation achievements, getting at least the 1st but preferably up to the 3rd. Don't waste too much time on them though, so get what you can. Starting with Rivers, you also get a higher Multiplier for the 2nd achievement, which is something to always consider before going into the next Rebirth.
  
• Our first target here is Nepthys. Beat her and finally buy creations. Defeat Cybele, make your Divinity generator and then go for Artemis. Eros is doable if you defeated Pontus earlier. If it gets close with Artemis already (like for me), don't even try and rebirth once you have most 10m achievements. You will need those for the next Rebirth.
  
• Aim for a high Unleash, you will need it (40 seconds were a close call for Artemis). Push any Might skill to 30 at the very least, a bit higher to gain more total Might sure does not hurt. 40-50 is often suggested on each, personally I had 30.
  
• Push Physical Attack to around 100 or more, which makes it all easier. A lot. Keep a good balance between building Mighty Statues and getting more Physical Attack. Remember that Total Might carries over, while, without Upgrades unlocked and built, monuments don't do anything for your Rebirth Multipliers.
  
• Buy building speed in steps of 10. Don't waste your GP on small purchases.

Not much to explain in this rebirth. Build a few Mighty Statues (2-3), prior to defeating Nepthys. 1 Mystic Garden too. Start doing Special Fights against gods now, and gain some Divinity you can use once you can buy creations.

The amount you get for Special Fighting Gods (or any other creature) depends on your highest god/monster you defeated and your current Divinity production = how much you get from defeating monsters or how powerful your Divinity Generator is. Use Unleash every time you think you can kill another monster or god, it helps. Do the Special Fights yourself, which is a lot faster, or use your software, to get high amounts of Divinity.

After you defeated Nepthys, you will need a lot more Mighty Statues to defeat Cybele. It might seem like a waste of Divinity but there is not really a way around it. How much of it you need depends on your rebirth multiplier so far. Having killed Pontus earlier will make this phase go by fast, if not you will have to build 50-120 and increase your Physical Attack (Might training) as much as you can. Find a good balance between those two.

Having defeated Cybele, you can now build Godly Statues, Pyramids of Power and Temple of Gods. I can not 100% remember how I did it, but it isn't hard to figure out yourself at hand - Keep a balance between those 3 and go for Artemis. Improve Physical Attack further if your stat multiplier from monuments is already considerably high and not much is moving anymore. This will probably not happen if you followed this guide correctly, even if you only took 10 days for the first Rebirth.

A solid estimation from GoDLloyD can be found on the website I listed earlier. Between 5~20, depending on your multipliers, if you want to get to Artemis or Eros (only try Eros if you defeated Pontus) of every monument.

Rule of thumb: Defeat Artemis, at the very least. Eros might take a few days of extra grinding and that's not worth it. Rebirth and be sure you get all you can, as usual.

Rebirth 3: Not enough Divinity

So, you killed either Artemis or Eros and now, it's time to tackle RB3. I'll start off by saying, it took me 4.5d to beat Susann'o, because...I don't really know. So if it takes a bit longer for you, or not, that depends on your performance so far. It shouldn't take much longer than the last RB though.

A quick list, as always:

• You should be 1-capping almost all the skills now, for those you don't, keep them running until 2m at least. As usual, grab all achievements you can get. Creation achievements are mandatory now, you will be fighting Planet Eater starting with the next rebirth!
  
• Aim for an unleash of 25 seconds. Upgrade all of the Might skills to around 25, 30. Push Physical Attack higher, as always, a good value is 80. Tweak as you see fit.
  
• Build Mighty Statues, to gain extra Physical power. Use a ton of Upgrades, Physical is your lifeline, as always. Once you can, build and upgrade Godly Statues. Around upgrade 10, 11 should be enough. After you defeated Athena, try to do the same with Pyramids of Power
  
• To get the Physical to beat Susann'o, you will probably have to build a lot of upgrades on your Mighty Statues and also upgrade the main component.
  
• Don't bother with any other monuments unless you need more, additional Mystic, upgrading Mystic Gardens. Creation gets boosted enough by the Godly Statues/Pyramid of Power and Battle is useless.
  
• Do a LOT of Special Fighting against gods. Your Divinity generator should be 0/2/2. Upgrade your Div generator after you raised your Attack to a degree which allows you to defeat the last monster with 10% of your clones, tops, without much of an improvement in sight. Best set up the clones when you go to sleep. Buy stones and don't forget to put a few thousand Shadow Clones into the Divinity generator, so they keep refilling stones while you sleep. Naturally, buy a lot of Stones from Nephtys.
  
• Also: Buy stuff manually. It will save you some Divinity.

That's really about it. Get as many achievements as you can, as usual. If you defeat Susann'o, don't bother building Temple of Gods and its upgrades. The sole reason is because at this point, you probably spend most of your time improving the Statues and the Pyramid, only start building them when you defeat Susann'o relatively fast (1, 2 days) and try to take on Zeus as well (which is a bad idea, but if you did everything right until now it's doable in a few more days).

Rebirth, and head to RB4.

Rebirth 4: It's coming together...slowly

This rebirth is much of the same, slightly different. You have to prepare to beat Baal.

Most things from RB 3 are still true and proven. A 0/2/2 Div gen, getting the achievements, Special Fighting... all that stuff. Few changes though:

• Push only Temple of Gods and its Upgrades. Your multiplier should quickly let you pass Susann'o (using some Godly Statues and its Upgrades to defeat him), making it the only worthwhile monument, for both stats and rebirth multipliers, in overall.
  
• Build a Planet as soon as you can, then an Earthlike Planet, and unlock Planet Eater. Don't bother with Powersurge much unless you can fight something. Start defeating Planet Eater and produce, in the following order, Creation Crystals, then Physical Crystals, then Ultimate Crystals.
  
• Creation Crystals are very useful, regaining Shadow Clones you lose, much quicker after fighting Planet Eater. Very necessary due to your low creation speed/count. In conjunction with Ultimate Crystals, which boost everything, you can get a relatively high Creation Count as well, making you save tons of Divinity if you create Weather, and its components, yourself. Physical Crystals improve your building speed and your Physical by + level x 100%, Ultimate Crystals do the same but with every stat and boost building speed, Creation Count and Divinity gain. Very handy.
  
• Around this time, you should have 140% building speed. You can keep 3 Godpower to recover from the first UB you kill instantly, buying max Shadow Clones afterwards. Not a waste.
  
• To defeat Planet Eater reliably, you will need around 95k clones in Powersurge and around 30-35 in the Clones on Planet Might skill. This will leave you with around 30k, 40k clones usually. I am not sure if the damage reduction you can buy with Challenge Points works in UAC, I had it, and from previous estimations I am pretty sure it does.
  
• Your rebirth multiplier should be 1E36 according to the guide of GoDLloyD, that's 1 Undecillion. I had a multiplier of around 4E35, but that worked out fine too and let me beat baal in 1.5 days.
  
• Might is a fickle thing here. You will need less than before, but I still suggest a 20-25s Unleash and around 30 in each stat, for the sake of gaining more Total Might. Physical Attack should be 50-60.

That sums it up pretty well. Without the damage reduction from UBs, you might have a harder time with Planet Eater, but the Crystals are worth it. Close the game if you can't reliably kill it in succession, the UB can't snag your hard-earned Crystals if you are offline. Just stock up on Light/Air/Water, so the Crystal modules can keep running, beforehand.

The Divinity itself you get from the UB isn't that useful if you keep Special Fighting gods, but putting an Upgrade into the Physical Crystal module (Level 2) and letting that run over night will boost your power by a good margin, once you equip it. Build your base stats further/more Temple of Gods to push your Rebirth multiplier. Get it in between 5E35-1E36, if you mess this up there's no fixing it, next rebirth is the last.

Rebirth 5: Anor Londo

Finally, the famed city of Anor Londo was in sight. You didn't believe it at first. The jouney was too long, exhausting and devastating. Your mental health degraded, your skin is dry and peeling off of your fingers, as you keep bombarding your mouse and keyboard with input tasks. But, now that your goal is in sight, it's all ogre.

Keep doing what you did until now. You can reach/defeat Baal using Temple of God, or use Mighty Statues and Mystic Gardens and their Upgrades. I did it with the Temple of God in around 1.5d, but it should be faster with the former. Use the strategy of the last rebirth, and make good use of the Creation, Physical and Ultimate Crystal as a last, important source of stats. Those will lead you to victory.

Now that Anor Londo is yours, care for a New Game+? You even get a Squirtle as a Starter.

Congratulations, you made it.

The End

Hope you had a lot of fun and blisters using this guide. Maybe not the latter.

If you think you can take another one, go right back in, doing another Arty challenge. The 300k pet stones are worth it as a newcomer.



Here's just a little proof that I did it using my, more or less, refined strategy (and a third party program).

Now I am 100% sure there are things to improve, so just comment when there are a few things to add or adjust. Don't bother if you just wanna rage/insult me for using an Auto Clicker.

Thanks again to all those contributing to the Kongregate threads and the ItrtG's Wiki. Most stuff really helped me out there. As this is an attempt of compiling information and distributing it for the sole purpose of easing up this challenge for anyone attempting it, I am sorry if I used any information you view as your personal capital. Just point me at it and I can add you as the source/owner. If you care.

Either way, you do you. Hope this guide helps someone out.


Did some changes over time, regarding very specific information, hope I didn't confuse anyone : )

[Count Grustula]

Yeah, that is the original approach of platynumwyrm11. It will add around 2 additional weeks of playtime, which is, in general, ok. The thing is, the last 4 Skills give so much Physical/Mystical, once 1-capped, that one can argue they are all you need to win the UAC in 5 rebirths, if you also have the Crystal Factory unlocked.

You need like 2-3 days for the last 4 Skills to cap, if we assume you keep the auto-clicker on for around 10 hours per night at the least. It's not like you can get anything else out of it while you are at work or sleeping.

I finished my 2nd UAC in 19 days 20 hours, and I was a lot more offline during it, mainly just 1-capped the last 4 Skills with the auto-clicker and a bit of Divinity farming on Rebirth 3/4, much less than at my first attempt. But the time I saved by just focusing on 1-capping the last 4 Skills right from the start and ignoring most of the rest, was immense.

[Skiller50 [G.E.W.P]]

Although it will add a certain amount of days to the completion time, if you don't want to start a free trial for the autoclicker and really don't want to bother with manual Special fights, you could just leave it on auto till all skills are 1-capped, and only turn sync off so you can unlock all skills faster on RB1.