oh so it's 16 superascensions

+1 SAsc for me
Artifacts: legendary AV (upgrading complete in 4d 20h), epic SAC, legendary TS

updated

Currently at Siege of Feldmere, about 6 days into my first SAsc. Just got my legendary AV artifact yesterday morning. In what order would y’all advise me to invest in my advancements in the beginning? There are a lot of stuff such as JS, IACP, mercs etc in phase 1 and I am close to maxing out JS

JS to 25% is of course a must.

I also recommend:

P1:
IACP to 100%, Add Mercs to 25-50%, Stats to 4.

P2:
AQ 5-10%, Inc AP +25%, Merc Disc 50%, Inc AV 100%

P3:
Start with Tech 10, Tech Discount 30%, Skip Levels 10 (helps get back to the new levels post Asc).

P4:
Better Hospitals 50%
AAQ 5%
Inc Army Caches 100%

That's what you "need" from each to get the best value at the lowest buy cost for each phase in order to set yourself up for another SAsc.

If you are instead looking to do lots of digs, finish the WZIC etc, results differ.

Update: now on CCC, maxed out JS, IACP 60%, Add mercs 22.5%, nothing else unlocked, 51 AP away from unlocking phase 2. I’ve been taking about 1.5 days per level for now, but I’m concerned if I’m too slow and I should superpower skip levels and hunt down any levels that are probably faster so as to unlock the good stuff in phase 2? Or am I at the right speed given my artifacts? I do not want to use powers unless absolutely necessary because these are not renewable

While technically true, most of the powers are effectively renewable if you are willing to wait a while and count on the daily rewards. Especially Skip Levels will fill up again if you don't tend to use them on a regular basis. I'm pretty confident that you will easily max out on Skip Levels with each ascension even if you completely use them up once per ascension. At least until you piled up a good chunk of super-ascension boosts that let you finish all levels with insane speed. And although I totally get why you would want to hoard the powers instead of spending them (I'm one of those folks as well), what are you saving Skip Levels for anyway? At some point in your super-ascension you can unlock the Skip Level advancement and then there will be absolutely no use for them again until you super-ascend yet again.

That said, I don't know whether playing the levels in a different order will really help you in any meaningful way. Playing more advanced levels with only few advancements will always be more tedious then playing them in order and having piled up a few more advancements by the time you reached the advanced levels. So, unless the higher level would give enough APs for specific upgrades when the lower levels wouldn't, and you really, really, really need this upgrade (or you want to skip certain unpleasant levels), I would probably not diverge from the level order. Because lower, and therefore shorter, levels give you more options to upgrade smaller things in the meantime that will still improve your level times, while with longer levels you have a long period without any improvements possible.

@Phoenix I am saving the skip levels till I need them for the new levels (I expect to buy 2 skip level advancements by the time I reach Triskelion, esp since all the hardened levels up to Scandinavia should be playable by then). That being said I have a strong feeling I might not need them anyway because the new levels look difficult enuff that it might only make sense to attempt them once I’m deep into phase 4 (though I’d want to farm the powers from the respective levels so I can get tech achievements there).
Looks like I’ll need to put up with the grind for another week, at least until I reach Far Land… (by that point I expect all the hardened levels up till there to be playable, except possibly for hardened CCC which I will hold off till additional mercs are high enuff…)

So there's really only been 15 people who have super ascended? Or is the reporting out of date? At first I was not going to consider the SA because I had been taking my time, being thorough with both the advancements and also the artifacts. I would basically finish everything that I wanted in phase 1 before moving onto phase 2, etc. Also, I have all 41 artifacts and were increasing all of them without getting rid of the base 41. So a super ascension would really screw all of that up. But now that I am on my fourth ascension, it looks like I can finish all 43 maps in about two months, it's probably time I made the jump. That being said, I have some questions to make sure I can actually do this:

I would have to pay the 150 coins to reset my spent AP since I have spent so much on phases 1-3 and not much at all on phase 4. When I do this, will it lock me out of the other phases and make me spend the allotted amount before moving on? And, I'm assuming it will reimburse me for all of the "extra" earned AP from levels (that I actually spent) and not just the base amounts for the levels I have beaten. Is this correct?

Second, for artifacts, I currently have 1 Leg, 10 Epic, 31 Rare, 2 Unc, 1 Com, 4 Poor. I'm sure this is mentioned in the above comments, but if I work to combine all of this to 1 insane (I'm 85.18% of the way there), is there one I want to avoid based on what I will find? For example, I know I was able to get a legendary triple strike without having to dig for it. If that is something that is still available (I can't remember if that was removed or not), I won't keep that one and I'll go another direction. (I think with my style of play, I am leaning toward the Alloy Values and Army Camp Boost, but am also thinking about Supercharge Army Camp).

Third (and final for now), I'm assuming the SACS permanent rewards are stackable. Meaning that if I super ascend a second time and choose the same reward, that it would allow me to choose the same one again. I think that's what I've read from the comments in the past, but just want to be sure.

Thanks for the help and guidance

I've never reset my APs so far, but my understanding is, you get exactly the amount of APs that you currently have spent in all of the advancements (no matter whether you had some AP-boosting effects active while earning them for example) and may use them to unlock stuff again. For that, all phases will again be locked but this time you can spent exactly 1k (or only little over) in phase 1 and therefore free up some points to unlock the super-ascension, hopefully.

There are some places where you can earn artifacts other than through digging, but I'm pretty sure that except for the Triple Strike, none are a fixed type. So, you can earn several artifacts from earning battle points for example but they will be random. The Triple Strike got nerved to Epic, though. So, unless you want to have Triple Strike from the get go after super-ascension (and want to sacrifice the Triple Strike reward as soon as you earn it in order to upgrade other artifacts), you shouldn't upgrade to an Insane Triple Strike.

Yes, they stack. You can stack up to keep several artifacts upon super-ascension. You can stack up several AP-boosts (although I don't know how they add up exactly, but probably just like any multiplicative boosts add up currently). Or, if you really want, you can stack up the 100 AP bonus upon super-ascension. And you can stack up the fourth reward, that I forgot what it was right now.

Edited 5/29/2022 19:55:26

guess I forgot about noting it here - but did my 1st super assend little over a week ago maybe two idk

Added Lefty's name.

@Gincompetent
I took an insane army camp boost and legendary alloy values my first super ascension. The time it took me to super ascend again was almost exactly the same as another player who took an insane alloy values and rare supercharge army camp.

It kind of makes sense. Assuming you both played the same amount (unknown), you both had AV, and for the other arti, both AcampB and SAC kind of serve the same purpose, increasing your opening SAC+FC bursts. Neither is truly good for anything else - marginal gains within a level, but ACB can be offset by adding IACP Adv, missing SAC can be offset by using powers ... so you were probably both playing the same style just with different offsets for what was missing from your repertoire.

I super ascended twice already so there is more than 15 people. I just forgot this thread existed. I did tech runs on all 17 stages for the achievements so "wasted" a bit of time but it took me 4 weeks (may 1st to may 28th).

Oh wow! Tech run on all new levels! That's impressive.

I did ~8 Tech Runs on the new levels, but they reeeeeeeeeally take a long time (like an extra 4-7 days per level, b/c of crazy crap like smelt 30k copper on a level with no markets, etc) so I got bored and just SAsc'd ... now I'm back to Hex, getting some Adv's ... might take another crack at the remaining levels.

Impressive that Xeno just ran through them all quickly.

Also took me about a month to complete the tech trees of the new levels, the last 2 levels before Hex Earth were the most annoying/long but the other ones were doable.

Yep, the XX years wars were awful but there were enough powers in the level to make it not that bad. I went backwards from Hex to Regio.

5/19/2022 2,000 Achievement: Acquire all techs in the Idle level Hex Earth
5/20/2022 2,000 Achievement: Acquire all techs in the Idle level Thirty Years War
5/20/2022 2,000 Achievement: Acquire all techs in the Idle level Seven Years War
...
5/26/2022 2,000 Achievement: Acquire all techs in the Idle level Regio Coquus.

I ended up investing in copper/tin/iron production since it was silly on the lower market less levels. I could have invested in zinc production but I think only 30y war required an obscene amount of it via chromium bars + microchips.

Xeno finally breaks down and invests in Copper & Tin Production! haha

I REFUSE !! (well . . .)

Edited 5/31/2022 18:08:12