Early Dilation (Before first star)
Newcomers' Guide
Respec lab to Dilation build (see Lab Builds below). Start your first dilation, let it run for ~15 minutes, then exit for DP income. From the second run onwards, exit dilation every 8-9 levels of DU1. DU1/2 are your main tools to progress in dilation. DU1 allows you to push further in dilation and do EC10, DU2 boosts DP. DU3-9 help push score outside dilation for EP/SN, improving lab. More RPs will help you push both dilation and EP runs further. Once you can afford some DU3 levels, respec to EP build and do 10 mins EP runs every couple dilations. Push SN if close. Spend EP on lab upgrades (power > mult > base) then return to Dilation build.
DU priority:
Focus on DU1 while in dilation, DU2 while farming Σ (see Eternity Farming section below) or EP. Only buy other DUs if cost < 1/3 DU1 cost
Lab builds:
- Dilation build: All RPs in Lab 6
- EP build: Compare 15s runs of 50 pts Lab 5 increments. For example, with 1000 RPs, compare runs at 50 lab 5 + 950 lab 6, 100 lab 5 + 900 lab 6, etc. Use the build with highest score and do a 10 minutes run.
EC:
- EC10 should be attempted as soon as you reach the DU1 threshold in Appendix dilation.
- Try EC7/9 every time you exit dilation, if you can't clear it in a minute just don't bother and continue with normal gameplay loop.
Eternity (Σ) farming:
100k Σ provide a significant boost through dilation. 17ms farming method can be found in Appendix. Farming more than 100k is not recommended since dilation rebalance made it a lot shorter than before.
Mid Dilation (First star to EC10-5)
The goal of this stage is to finish all Eternity Challenges, which unlocks Dilation Tree.
Main gameplay loop:
- Using dilation lab build, push dilation for 30-40 minutes (aim for ~8-10% increase on score exponent)
- Respec lab to EP build and push EP for 15-20 minutes every 2 dilation runs. Aim for enough EP to afford power lab upgrade cost at least. If close to next SN, try to push there. If not, just eternate and get EP.
- Buy lab upgrades (power > mult > base)
- Respec lab back to dilation build and continue dilating.
DU priority:
Focus on DU1 while in dilation, DU2 while farming EP. Only buy other DUs (Except DU7) if cost < 1/3 DU1 cost. Max buy DU7 before starting EP push.
EC:
- EC10 should be attempted as soon as you reach the DU1 threshold in Appendix.
- Try EC7 and EC9 once every time you exit dilation, if you can't clear it in a minute just don't bother and continue with normal gameplay loop.
Lab builds
Once you have stars, lab 5 is better than pushing lab 6 past 7.00x.
- Dilation build: Put RP into Lab 6 until 979 total points (7.00x). Put the rest into Lab 5.
- EP build: Use Dilation build as a baseline. Let EP run for 10 seconds, record the score. Respec and move 50 points from lab 5 to lab 6, let EP run for 10 seconds again. Compare to last run, if score improves continue adding 50 points, if score gets worse stop and use the previous build.
Overnight grind
If you plan to run the game overnight, the best thing to do is push EP and set up autoclick on DU2. Dilation requires active play and bottlenecks hard if left running for more than an hour.
Late dilation (EC10-5 to DTP1)
The goal of this stage is to reach 1e27 DP, which allows you to buy the first DTP and proceed to the next part of the game, Dilation Tree.
Main gameplay loop
- Dilate in e10k increments (for example, if your current max score is e250k, you want to push dilation to e260k and so on). Each increment usually takes between 30 minutes to an hour.
- Stop dilation, respec to EP build
- Run EP for 15-20 minutes. If close enough to next SN, you can push towards it. If not, stop EP run after 15 minutes.
- Use EP to buy lab upgrades and get a bunch of RPs.
- Respec lab to Dilation build, work on the next e10k increment.
Continue this loop until you reach ~e300k-e310k score in dilation. From this point, only buy DU2s until you reach 1e27 DP, which takes around 2.7 hours. Stop buying DU2 once it costs more than 6.5e25 DP. You can also try to push dilation max score a bit further, but stop buying DUs other than DU2.
DU priority
Same as mid dilation, focus on DU1/2 and buy other DUs except DU7 if they are cheap. Max buy DU7 before doing EP run.
Lab guide
After EC10-5, you will have around 1900 RPs. At this point, the dilation build of putting RPs in lab6 until 7.00x mult and the rest in lab5 doesn't work anymore due to generator mult hitting softcap at e1000.
- Dilation build: Put points into lab 5/6, start dilation, then check generator mult. If gen mult exceeds e1000, move some points from lab 5 to lab 6. If generator mult can't reach e1000 after some time, put more points in lab 5. Once you see gen mult plateauing around e1000 after 10-15 seconds in dilation, you're good to go.
- Note: Lab 6 also affects gen mult (higher score -> IP -> new generators). Therefore all RPs must be used before checking gen mult.
- EP build: Similar to mid dilation, use 7.5x lab6 as a baseline then respec and add more points in lab 6 until it no longer improves score.
Appendix
EC10-1: 170 (Estimated run length: ~1 hour)
- PSA: EC10-1 goal is 1m (1000000) score, NOT e1000000. It is normal to see circles barely doing anything.
EC10-2: 230 (30 minutes) EC10-3: 338 (<10 minutes) EC10-4: 390 (<10 minutes) EC10-5: 435 (<10 minutes) For all EC10s, put all RPs in lab 6
EC10-5 guide:
Set up auto infinity 1 ip, farm IPs and buy all infinity upgrades up to column 16, skipping 16:1 and 15:2 Stop auto infinity and wait until challenge clear
EC 7-5, 9-4 and 9-5 data (credit to angelamoureux):
Approx SN/DU to beat non EC10 challenges
EC7-5: SN36 | DU4-12 (DU3/5 do not help in EC7) | ~10 minutes [pre 1.031 update] [Before EC10-1]
EC9-4: SN36 | DU3-41 | DU4-23 | DU5-09 | 1,042 RP <all lab 6> | Instant completion [between EC10-1 and EC10-2]
EC9-5: SN38 | DU3-79 | DU4-52 | DU5-34 | DU8-08 | 1,344 RP | less than 1 minute [before EC10-3]
If you manage a quick completion (under a minute) with fewer upgrades, let me know and I'll update (especially if you have data on EC7-5, not sure if that was some weird fluke or not)
SN36: 922 RP [353 : 569] | DU3-19 | DU4-07 | 560k Σ | ~9 mins
ET farming method:
So you want to farm Σ?
This yields over 210k Σ/hr with >300 lab rp
DO NOT USE TIME FLUX OR OFFLINE FLUX
- Set your Lab RP to all IP Gain.
- Set Automate Eternity: Min EP:1 Min time (s): 0
- Check your Statistics and verify you are getting 0.02s/ Σ