Friday, December 28, 2012

URGENT

PLEASE DO NOT UPGRADE YOUR GAME AT THIS STAGE.

People have been losing accounts.

Will post once I hear it's safe to upgrade.

ST

Monday, December 24, 2012

Friends!


When you start the game I believe you are allocated something like 20 friend slots.

Each friend gives 50% perk.

The max shown in shops is 600%. So I assume you can have 120 friends.

Let’s assume your TR is 100 Million, your average Perk is 900% without Friends.

Let’s assume base number of friends is 20 friends (CEO Level 0).  That’s an additional 10 million TR for total of 110 Million (see calculation below).

Let’s assume a reasonable number of 40 friends (CEO Level 10). That’s an additional 20 million TR for total of 120 Million.

Let's assume your average profit per Million Receivable is about 30%. That equates to an additional 6 million free cash to spend per day for 40 friends.

Now if your TR was say 1.5 Billion @ 30% profit, this would roughly equate to an additional 90 million a day to spend (for 40 friends).

So very much a worth while exercise.

Have fun,
ST

Calculations
------------
20 Friends,
                Perked TR = 100 Million
                Total Perk = 900% + 100% (Base) = 1000%
                Base TR = 100 Million / 1000% = 10 Million
                20 Friends Perk = 20 Friends x 5% each = 100%
                New Total Perk = 900% + 100% (Friends) + 100% (Base) = 1100%
                New TR = 10 Million * 1100% = 110 Million

40 Friends,
                Perked TR = 100 Million
                Total Perk = 900% + 100% (Base) = 1000%
                Base TR = 100 Million / 1000% = 10 Million
                40 Friends Perk = 40 Friends x 5% each = 200%
                New Total Perk = 900% + 200% (Friends) + 100% (Base) = 1100%
                New TR = 10 Million * 1200% = 120 Million

Per friend additional profit,
               TR / avgTPerk * 5% * profit margin,
               eg.
                    200 000 000 / 800% * 5% * 15% profit margin = 187.5k
                    10 000 000 / 400% * 5% * 18% profit margin = 22.5k
                    1 500 000 000 / 1100% * 5% * 25% profit margin = 1.7 Million

Friday, December 21, 2012

FAQ

The game's guide isn't very well written.

Therefore, I would like to compile a list of the most commonly asked questions and answer them to the best of my current ability.

Please leave a comment as to what questions would be relevant to you, or the most commonly questions you see in your guild chat/world chat.

As always, if you want to contribute something, I'm all ears, just email me in-game or leave a comment.

Have fun,
ST

Equality is Unequal

Here's a tricky point to remember:

Not all land are equal.

Those that allow you to build 4 land footprint landmarks are probably worth more in your final location.

To be fair, they are relatively common, but to find one that is far enough from the border is also a consideration to bear in mind.















As you can see, you cannot build a 4 footprint Landmark on the first picture shown, but you can on the second.

Have fun,
ST

Wednesday, December 19, 2012

Managerial Level Bonus

Another table to add to the collection!

Manager LevelPerk Bonus
12
28
318
432
550
672
798
8128
9162
10200

Can you work out the formula? :) It has a factor of 2.

Have fun,
ST

Executives

Sometimes, quests give you executives.

Rank 23, Company Upgrade
Goal: The company level reaches 24
Rewards:150 Tokens, 4 000 000 G, 1 x Executive

These executives come with three benefits.
1) They are level 10 - handy to raise shop perks
2) They have an assortment of skills, in particular this is suited to various landmarks
3) They are cheap for their skillsets

See below!














Have fun,
ST

Monday, December 17, 2012

Business Skill conversion

To convert a Vocation skill to Business skill costs tokens/gold.

See below.

Convert SkillToken CostCumulative Cost
One88
Two1624
Three3256
Four64120
Five128248

Have fun,
ST

Employees (Part Three)

Finally Skills.

This is the heart of the employee game.

Skills are divided into Vocational and Business Skills. These Skills can be levelled up to Level 10 each.

Each employee has a chance to learn a New Vocational Skill each time he/she levels up.

This means that maximally, an employee would learn 1 New Vocational Skill for each level to Level 10, resulting in 10 Vocational Skills - this is extremely rare.

The Vocational Skills are:
1)   Reception
2)   Supervision
3)   Negotiation
4)   Interpersonal
5)   Learning
6)   Bookkeeping
7)   Auditing
8)   Project
9)   Compliment
10) Sales

What are they for? Vocational Skills are used in
1)   Departments
2)   Landmarks
3)   Ship

Often, you will see that filling a certain Position in say a Landmark will require a certain number of Vocational Skills - In this example below, this Memorial Park requires 5 Vocational Skills, shown here circled in red. These icons stand for Supervision, Negotiation, Bookkeeping, Compliment, and Sales. This means the employee hired here will need these 5 skills, no other!




Molly is the first employee at the Memorial Park above and has fulfilled the requirements of all 5 skills and at Level 2 each, shown circled in red.

Often these requirements also have a Level requirement. For example, the second employee at the memorial park will require ALL the five skills to be at Level 3.


As you can see, the ticked employee only has 3 skills, and only 1 of which fits the 5 Skill profile required, and even then, is not high Level enough. Wanda has Level 1 of Bookkeeping, where Level 3 is required. She has none of the other skills required, but does have Reception and Interpersonal skills.

So on and so forth.

So we've spoken about Vocational Skills. What are Business Skills?

There are five Business skills:
1)   Geniality
2)   Compatibility
3)   Positivity
4)   Salesmanship
5)   Creativity

As far as I know, they do not differ from each other at all. But how do employees get them, you ask?

By conversion using tokens. The employee must convert existing Vocational Skills into Business Skills. They can relearn these Vocational Skills by chance when they next level.


The rate of conversion is given below.

Business Change No.Token Cost
First skill converted8
Second skill converted16
Third skill converted32
Fourth skill converted64
Fifth skill converted128

So what do these Business Skills do? They serve only one purpose as far as I know - increasing shop perks as the manager. Each Level in a Business Skill provides 20 + 1% Perk if the employee is the manager.

For example, Pearl Fast, my manager for Fox Cosmetics, has 5 Geniality, 5 Compatibility and 10 Positivity. This equates to 20 Business Skill Levels - this provides 21% * 20 Perk = 400 + 20% Perk.



The extra 3% from the number highlighted in purple comes from 1 of Pearl's Vocational Skill and Two other employees with 1 skill each.

There are other things to know about Skills, for example, the cost of levelling each and Education, but I'll leave that for a later date.

I hope this introduction to Employees gives you a better basic understanding of what to look for in your new hirelings. As usual, I leave discovering the best strategy to hiring/firing/training to you - is it better to hire all Secondary Talents and try to get good employees there, knowing that your wages will be low or is it better to hire International Headhunts to likely shorten the time to get good employees?

Have fun,
ST

Friday, December 14, 2012

Employees (Part Two)

So we've covered Talent and Discernment.

Once hired, you can deploy your employee to different shops as you see fit. You can also invest money and tokens into employees to make them better, that is to help you turn a bigger profit.

The things to take into consideration into this is the concept of Level and Traits.

A new employee starts life at Level 0. Each employee also comes with three attributes, called Traits:
1) Experience
2) Adaptability
3) Loyalty

These start out with values of 12.

Let's discuss these: Levels and Traits.

Levels
------
An employee starts out at Level 0 and reaches maximum at Level 10.

To gain levels, the employee must undergo Cultivation, which is a (tedious) increase in Traits. Once all the three Traits reach a certain Level, the employee can be Upgraded to that Level. Eg. a Level 2 Employee with Level 4 Experience, Level 7 Adaptability, and Level 5 Loyalty can be upgraded to Level 3 and then Level 4.

Trait LevelPoints Required to Next Level
Level 121
Level 236
Level 363
Level 4110
Level 5192
Level 6336
Level 7588
Level 81029
Level 91800
Level 10-

The value of adding Levels is an increase in Perks for the shop the employee is hired at. This is measured as 'Professionalism' which has a separate score and then converted into a Perk score.

Employee LevelProfessionalism ScoreProfessionalism Perk
Level 181.67
Level 2173.33
Level 3255.00
Level 4336.66
Level 5428.33
Level 65010.00
Level 75811.66
Level 86713.33
Level 97514.99
Level 108316.66

Another benefit of Levelling an employee is to try for Skills. This will be discussed in the next section.

There are many ins and outs into determining whether this is a worthwhile endeavour, but there are several points to make here for the junior player:
1) Managers and simple employees have different ways of contribution to shop profit. Levelling a manager is more profitable.
2) Higher 'Talent' employees are more likely to have skills, but become too costly!
3) At an early stage, it is perhaps better to hire 'Primary Talent' or 'Secondary Talent' for the majority of your employees.

Have fun,
ST

Wednesday, December 12, 2012

Employees (Part One)

Employees form the backbone of your company. They are the ones who sell your goods while you sleep!

This is the first in a short series on employees.

You can hire/fire/tickle employees via the Staffing button in the bottom menu. (Not really, you can't tickle them.) All new employees start at Level 0 and max out at Level 10.

Before you hire them, they have three attributes that you need to consider, two hidden and one not.

These are:
1) Talent
2) Wage
3) Discernment

Talent is divided into 5 groups and will be the main way in which you decide how to hire your employees.

These groups are:
1) Primary Talent
2) Secondary Talent
3) Advanced Talent
4) Super Talent
5) International Headhunt

They are divided into these groups by wage grouping; Primary Talent has wages of 100 - 255; Secondary, 256 - 507; Advanced, 508 - 1142; Super, 1143 - 2570; International, 2571 - 3855.

These groupings are a basic indicator for two things - how likely you are to get different levels of Discernment (which I will explain shortly), and what the highest possible wage you are going to pay for this employee should you train them all the way to Level 10.

Discernment is one of the hidden qualities.

It is divided into 5 categories:
1) Data Collecting
2) Informed
3) Knowledgeable
4) Wise
5) Enlightened

An employee's Discernment, as far as I can tell, affects the chances of getting Skills, which help empower your business via various means. I will explain this in the next instalment. The higher the Discernment, the more likely the employee is going to learn a Skill each level. Enlightened is the highest Discernment, followed by Wise, etc. etc.

You can uncover an employee's discernment by using Aptitude Test or Tryout. This costs 10 Tokens and 30 Gold respectively. I will explain these in the next instalment.

Essentially, hiring an employee from a higher Talent group (i.e. International Headhunt) means you are more likely to get a more Discerning employee (i.e. Enlightened rather than Informed) - General Vezax from my guild calculates this at about 2% for Enlightened from International Headhunt.

Note however, this does not guarantee your employee will have more skills - just a higher chance of getting skills on levelling.

What it does mean though is that to increase your chance of getting multi-skilled employees, you are likely to higher more 'Talented' employees, which will increase your base wages. Whether this is worth doing is debatable at different Company levels.

Have fun,
ST

Monday, December 10, 2012

Jobs Smhobs

A common question asked is, how can I increase the number of employees I have? I build all these shops, and I can't employ people!

As far as I know, you can only increase the number of employees in 2 ways:
1) Reaching certain levels.
2) Buying a Headquarters, found under the Corporate Facilities tab when building Landmarks

For number 1, I think you get a cap of 330 Jobs at level 20, 460 Jobs at level 22, and 700 Jobs at level 24.

Will update this as I find out more.

Have fun,
ST

Saturday, December 8, 2012

Sourcing Problems

At some point in the game you will find that your shops are selling your goods faster than you can buy them. This is exactly the point where you will have your sourcing problem.

To solve the problem you have two CEO Skills which will help you.
  1. Just in Time
    Can be used when all CEO attributes reach 1,200 points
    Effect: Make your shops able to store more goods (increase SFR) in steps of
  2. Multisourcing
    Can be used when all CEO attributes reach 2,500 points
    Effect: Shortens the time to cool down after buying goods in steps of 3%.

Example:

Procure 20,000 goods / shop = cool down 4h (240min)
Procure 500,000 goods / shop = cool down 15h (900min)

Now we increase the moutisourcing skill by one level (3% less cooling time)

Procure 20,000 goods per / shop = cool down 233min (you saved 7min)
Procure 500,000 goods per / shop = cool down 873min (you saved 27min)

Conclusion: With the same moultisourcing level you can save more cooling time when buying bigger quantity.

Important Note: If you buy 500,000 goods / shop you actually don't. You will just buy the maximum good which can be stored by your shop (maximum SFR). So you are not wasting any cash!

How to effectively solve the problem now?

Buy as much goods as possible in one go. But as your shops can only store a certain amount, you have to increase the shops storage capacity (SFR) by using your just in time CEO skill. Level up Just in Time and Moutisourcing and keep them in balance. DONT level up Multisourcing and leave Just in time at a low level!

Problems you will face when fighting against your sourcing issue

  • If you increase your Just In Time skill, you can buy more goods. This will use up more cash, so only upgrade once you have enough savings to procure more.
  • Pricing skill, increases the cost of your goods, so only upgrade once your sourcing is in balance.
  • Multisourcing is a very expensive skill, only upgrade once you can make the 500K procurement (which depends on your cash balance).


Friday, December 7, 2012

50:50

Another quick note,

There is a Daily Quest that tells you to engage in Futures 50 times.

Now, if you're anything like me, you'll not buy futures at a high price and you'll want to buy the most profitable commodity!

The trick is, buy 500 contracts of a cheap commodity, and sell them 1 contract at a time.

That way, you'll finish the quest as fast as possible, and be able to move on to the next Daily Quest, while not compromising your acquisition of cheap high yield contracts.

Have fun,
ST

Thursday, December 6, 2012

Back to BASICS

There are THREE important things to know in running your company.
     1) Demo
     2) Profit
     3) Perks

Demo
----
This is a difficult but important concept to grasp. Demo is the larger of GPC and CHC. These are ‘Geographical and Population Coverage’ (GPC) and ‘Customer Handling Capacity’ (CHC)respectively. The way to remember their relationship is this:
     If you don’t have GPC, all the CHC in the world is useless. 
     If you don’t have CHC, you're wasting GPC.

If you’re mathematically inclined, it looks like this:
     If GPC > CHC, Demo = CHC
     If CHC > GPC, Demo = GPC

Demo is very important because, all else being equal, it is the single most important determinant in your profit. The more Demo, the more profit.

GPC is governed by three things: 1) Land Population, 2) Landmark Bonus and 3) Shop Level. Land Population increases as you migrate from District A to District B and from District B to District C and so on. Landmark Bonus comes from landmarks that you build and staff. In summary, the higher the District, and the more the landmarks, the more money you make. Shop Level increases GPC by expanding the area of influence of the specific shop. A Three-Star Shop covers 9 squares. A Five-Star Shop covers 49 squares.

CHC is governed by three things: 1) Shop Floors, 2) Shop Size and 3) Interior Design.

In summary,
   
     More DEMO, more profit
     More GPC, more DEMO (if enough CHC to cope)
     More CHC, more DEMO (if enough GPC to fill)
       
          Higher DISTRICT, more GPC
          More LANDMARK, more GPC
          Higher SHOP LEVEL, more GPC
          More SHOP FLOORS, more CHC
          Bigger SHOP, more CHC
          More INTERIOR DESIGN, more CHC
     

Profit
------
Profit is governed by three things: 1) Shop Type, 2) Pricing Skill and 3) Chancellor Bonus.

Essentially, profit is what’s left over after buying and selling something.
Do not confuse profit with Receivable.

Receivable = what you get paid for selling something.
Profit = what you get paid MINUS what you paid for it first.

Therefore,
     ARPD = what you get paid
     CoGS% = percent of ARPD you pay in the first place.

For example:
     Shop Type: Cafe
     ARPD  = 44
     CoGS% = 61%
     Profit = 44 MINUS 61% x 44
            = 44 MINUS 26.84
            = 17.16

     This means that for each product sold, you Profit 17.16 Cash. You earn 44 Cash, but you paid 26.84 Cash earlier. 

Compare this to a different type of shop:
     Shop Type: Watch
     ARPD  = 58
     CoGS% = 82%
     Profit = 58 MINUS 82% x 58
            = 58 MINUS 47.56
            = 10.44

     This means that for each product sold, you Profit 10.44 Cash. You earn 58 Cash, but you paid 47.56 Cash earlier. 

At the surface level, earning 58 Cash is better than earning 44 Cash. But if you count the actual Profit, earning that 44 Cash is better. Almost two times better.

Perks
-----
Perks are governed by a lot of things. The most important thing to know about perks is this: you sell things faster.

     More PERK, FASTER selling

If you can master these three concepts, you’re well on your way to becoming
a successful player in Biz Tycoon HD.

ST

Wednesday, December 5, 2012

I see the Light!

As you probably know, employees have different 'Discernment' that is their ability to learn new skills with each level gained.

This ranges from Data Collecting - Informed - Knowledgeable - Wise - Enlightened.

I know not the exact chances for each strata, but I got my first Enlightened employee!
















Whoo!
















The best part about her is only 88k wages!

Have fun,
ST

Tuesday, December 4, 2012

Biz Tycoon HD Database (Excel File)

Thought I'd share it for now.

There are things in there that are incorrect. Use at your own peril. :)

https://docs.google.com/open?id=0B1AL3P0AZvGjODdPWE1MNGRGZkk

Also more than happy to put up your files if you want to share, or incorporate any other information you have into this file. Email me in-game.

Have fun,
ST

Too Much Clicking for Joint Promos Irritates Me

Let's get them to change it.

Essentially a petition to:-
1) Offer all valid Joint Promotions
2) Accept all valid Joint Promotions

With One Click!

http://www.ipetitions.com/petition/jointpromobiztycoon/

Spread the word!

PS: Use your in-game name to sign please!

Have fun,
ST

Monday, December 3, 2012

Sailors

Sailors? In a business game?

Yes, you send handbags half way around the world and get paid for it.

You can also appoint 'sailors' or 'crew' if you like that increase the capacity of the boat.

Unfortunately, the requirements for the crew is inordinately high, so it may take a while to fill it in.

As it stands, I have only appointed 1 crew member - the added benefit was 100 extra goods. If it scales linearly, then a full crew will double the load. If it scales exponentially, who knows!

If you have more information, please let me know! I will update this as I appoint more crew members.

Have fun,
ST

NB: When I wrote this, I did not know if increasing the number of sailors improves cargo. In fact, it does! That is, the next employee increases the cargo capacity by a larger amount.

The second employee adds 200 cargo, the third 300 cargo. If one could extrapolate this, a full ship complement would result in 6500 cargo. That said, it is hard to fill the skillset required.

Friday, November 30, 2012

Token Exchange

For most of you this doesn't really matter, but for those of you seeking a new guild, there is another consideration to hold.

The lower level guilds have cheaper token exchanges, that is less cash buys more tokens.

At higher guild levels, if your personal TR isn't high enough to keep up, this can be prohibitive, particularly if you are trying to fulfill the Daily Task of Token Exchange x 8.

Therefore, I advocate that if you are lower level or have a smaller income, join a smaller guild for now and progress to a bigger one once you've increased your income! Or take the challenge and try to build up the smaller guild! Either way,

Have fun,
ST

Wednesday, November 28, 2012

Joint Promotions and Their Benefits

Joint Promotions allow two guild members to help advertise each others' products (or at least that's how I imagine it). This benefits both by an increase in perks, which if you remember, helps increase the speed of which you sell your goods.

Starting a JP begins by selecting a shop, hitting the Joint Promotion (JP) button and selecting the people you want to buddy up with. One of the nice things to note is that your shop can only JP with two other shops! As such, offering to JP with one guild member costs 10 000 cash, offering to JP with two guild members costs 20 000  cash, and each subsequent one is free! Therefore, it is useful to just offer JPs with all the available shops on the list.
















The average perk increase is 50%. Now if you pay with gold, this increases the perk to 80%. Is it worth it? Let's do some math.

Say your TR is 170 million. You roughly know your average perk works out to be around 800% (without JP). Normally you account for the different ARPD for different shops but because you'll be aiming to JP all your shops, you don't need to. Therefore, the estimate for how much JP affects your TR is given as (very roughly):

TR / TPerk * JPBonus/100 * No. of JP = 170 m / 900% multiplied by 50% x 2 = 9.5 x 2 = 18.9 million

If gold is used, this is (roughly) increased to:

TR / TPerk * JPBonus/100 = 170 m / 900% multiplied by 80% x 2 = 15.1 x 2 million = 30 million

For myself, at 50 shops, this 11 million increase in TR for 12 hours costs 300 gold. Not worth it in my opinion but that depends on how deep your pockets run and how close you are to the next level!

Have fun,
ST

Monday, November 26, 2012

Joint Promotions

Given that some of us are paying customers, I think we should be able to expect some response to our requests.

I want to initiate a petition for Hui Liu to put in place an 'accept all Joint Promotions' button.

Watch this space :)

ST

The Barrier

At a certain point in time, you will hit 'The Barrier'. This is when your shops sell so fast that you're re-stocking every 30 minutes or so! This happens early on when your shops have tiny capacities and you can only stock 10k goods.

The solution to this is the Just In Time skill, acquired when you reach the Roadshow phase. This lets you expand your Capacity or SFR as its known. My little piddly 10k shop now stocks 37k items. Whew!

Note, however, that it is okay to run empty! As long as you turn a profit each day.

Have fun,
ST

Formula and Datapoints

My apologies.

The formula I released last time is incorrect. As it stands now I cannot give a reasonably accurate formula. That initial formula worked for 15 footprint shops, that is 3 x 5 only. It doesn't work for 5 x 6, nor does it work for some other unknown variable.

I am certain you could work out your own formula if you collected enough data.

As it stands right now, my own formula for 5 x 6 shops is estimated by:

119.88 x Inventory x Employees / (Total Perks x Demo)

I could not extend it to Kate Media's shops;

If you could send me your data points, I will be happy to try and work out a general formula,
I will upload my own data at some point;

The things that I think are particularly pertinent are:

(Assuming 100% GPCD and max employees) Shop footprint, Floors, Inventory, Perk, Demo and JIT level.

Whether CEO level, company level, or CHC affect SFR is unknown (to me at least). It would be useful if you included that in your data!

The reason for trying to work out a formula are two fold - it can help you plan your sourcing cycles by estimating the time to run down for any broad increases in floors/size of the shops (i.e. you expand all your shops by 1 floor); the second use would be to plan ahead to see how much of an increase in TR you could gain by selling smaller shops and opening larger ones.

Have fun,
ST

Friday, November 23, 2012

Why, hello there!

Firstly I would like to apologize for not having written anything in the last two weeks! It has been a busy time! This absenteeism stems from my improper time budgeting - that is playing Biz Tycoon before study! As I mentioned before, Prior Planning and Preparation Prevents P*ss Poor Performance. I should listen to my own advice...

At any rate, I am back! There are so many things to talk about, but they'll trickle through as usual.

Have fun,
ST

Monday, November 12, 2012

Quota!

A quick note,

Losing in PvE does not reduce your quota at time of writing.

Handy tip: When you get the Daily Quest of 3 x PvE, enter an arena you expect to lose. You'll get the Daily Quest and still be able to help out guild members later.

Have fun,
ST

Corrected Formula

As I reached the Roadshow phase, I got access to the skill Just-In-Time. This allows me to stockpile more goods. However, it invalidated the formula I just posted. I have a new approximation which includes JIT.

122.644 * Capacity * Inventory

---------------------------------

Employees * Demo * TPerk * 60 (seconds/min) * TJIT


where TPerk is Perk / 100 + 1, eg. 800 % Perk, TPerk = 9.00
where TJIT = 100 / (JIT bonus + 100), eg. 100/350

As a worked example, I'll take my Jewelry store.

122.644 * 36979 * 16569 * 100
----------------------------------
15 * 3602 * 9.8867 * 60 * 350

= 669.87 minutes
= 11.16 hours = 11 hours 10 mins which approximates 11:09:58 given by the game.

Have fun,
ST

Saturday, November 10, 2012

Lucky Star images!

Found in the game files under Lucky Star! Some might find this interesting.



Just some of the images, no sig different ones.
LuckyStar.strings show:
"Playing Lucky Star costs 100 000 Cash each time. If the points are greater than the last time, you can get the higher reward.";
"50% of the Cash players use to play Lucky Star will be put into the Jackpot, the upper limit of Jackpot is 2 billion."

There appears to be four levels of winning - Grand, First, Second, Consolation (80%, 15%, 5% and 50k Cash respectively). I couldn't locate where they would insert this however, but yes, very interesting.

Have fun,
ST

*all images copyright Hui Liu, Biz Tycoon HD

Friday, November 9, 2012

Be Smart

Remember that in Biz Tycoon HD and life, the glory goes to the winners. And winners get where they get by working day in day out, rain or shine, always hustling for that extra edge.

But anyone can work hard without achieving much. So to be the best you can be, you have to plan ahead.

That is,

Prior Planning and Preparation Prevent P*** Poor Performance.

Have fun, ST

ARPD, CoGS and NPAT

I want to point out something.

The table I posted earlier is convenient, but one can use it to calculate further. That is calculate the profits derived from each unit of goods sold.

All you have to do is subtract CoGs off the ARPD.

For example:

Shop CoGS ARPD 
Name CoGs% ARPD B Profit
Liquor 58 42 17.64
Ice Cream 61 44 17.16
Supermarket 64 46 16.56
Cinema 67 48 15.84
Bookstore 70 50 15
Bedding 73 52 14.04
Infant 76 54 12.96
AV 79 56 11.76
Perfumes 82 58 10.44
Health Care 58 42 17.64
Cafe 61 44 17.16
Department 64 46 16.56
Spa 67 48 15.84
Musical 70 50 15
Building 73 52 14.04
Shoe 76 54 12.96
Computers 79 56 11.76
Antique 82 58 10.44
Drug 58 42 17.64
Ethnic 61 44 17.16
Auto Service 64 46 16.56
Bar 67 48 15.84
Sporting 70 50 15
Furniture 73 52 14.04
Clothing 76 54 12.96
Wireless 79 56 11.76
Jewelry 82 58 10.44
Convenience 58 42 17.64
Italian 61 44 17.16
Cosmetics 64 46 16.56
Karaoke 67 48 15.84
Toys 70 50 15
Electric 73 52 14.04
Leather 76 54 12.96
Electronics 79 56 11.76
Watch 82 58 10.44
Sport Cars 65 58 20.3
Hotspring 65 58 20.3
Sculpture 65 58 20.3
Marine Science 65 58 20.3
Arts and Crafts 65 58 20.3
Window Dr 65 58 20.3

Useful isn't it. The gap also widens with each level of Pricing Skill.

If you take it one step further, you can subtract off the 10% sales tax, leaving you with Net Profit After Tax (also known as NPAT in business). I'll leave you to do that.

Have fun,
ST

Wednesday, November 7, 2012

Tricky Trade

The Daily Quest can often take the shape of "Complete 2x International Trade".

Unfortunately, this can be a roadblock in getting all five Daily Quests simply because the minimum time for an International Trade is 1 hour.

To shorten this, I often plan to have an international trade arrive just around the refresh mark. For me, this means my ship arrives at its destination around 1800h. Even if it arrived earlier and I pay a late sales tax, this strategy lets me finish this Daily Quest quicker than otherwise possible.

Have fun, ST

Go Hard or Go Home

Don't forget that friendship is a two-way street.

Trim your friendship list every so often.



















I usually get rid of people who haven't showed up for 5 to > 7 days.

"The truth is, everyone is going to hurt you. You just got to find the ones worth suffering for." Bob Marley

Have fun, ST

Monday, November 5, 2012

Token Spoken

There may be a time when you PvE with your guild members but have to do other things after your individual win.

When the guild wins the PvE, your Token count may often not be updated. To correct this, close your app and login again - this should show an updated Token count.

Have fun, ST

The Law of Diminishing Returns

I think Hui Liu mentions this in the FAQ.

The Law of Diminishing Returns, also known as the Law of Marginal Utility, means that the benefit (Y) of doing something (X) decreases with additions.

That is, for example,

X * function = Y
2X * function = 2Y
3X * function = 3Y
4X * function = 3.75Y
5X * function = 4.5Y
6X * function = 5Y

This can be graphed by














That is, the more you put out, the less you get back.

From my calculations, it may take over a million tokens to increase the Pricing skill by one level around the Pricing Level 45 mark.

Have fun, ST

*images from Wikipedia.

Friday, November 2, 2012

Be Specific





Great advice.

Don't ask, how can I make my TR go up. Ask with conditions, for example, given I have 7 x 5 star shops, 5x3x5floors, avg Perk ard 500% in Dis C, how can I improve my receivables?

It can seem pedantic but it helps! The person asking will have to think about where he/she can improve, while the person being asked can give adviced tailored to your situation.

This is true in Biz Tycoon and in life.

Have fun, ST

PvE

PvE is a technical term for Player versus Environment. It essentially means you (the player) against an AI (the environment).

In Biz Tycoon HD, PvE is available to members of guilds. It is run in terms of maps of 5 headquarters.


In each of these 'headquarters', there are 9 AI. You, as the player, can challenge one of them by clicking on their face.











Your ability to win against this AI is given by the metric 'Biz Sense'. This can be found circled in red in the first picture.

Biz sense is related to 'company level, CEO skills and cars.'

Before entering the competition, there are some important stats given in the right column, circled in green. Talent gives you a guideline for how much Biz Sense is required to win. This can vary up and down by a bit (not sure exactly how much). For example, in the picture, the minimum Biz Sense would be 210. Required gives you the number of Wins you need to claim the Prize (Token). Guild Fund tells you how much is paid to your guild on winning.


The higher up you go, the bigger the prizes.

Quota tells you how many times you can Win in the 24 hour window.

Finally, the Token prizes gets paid to each contestant (even if they lost) when the guild wins. The Guild Fund gets paid to the guild once. Therefore, it makes sense to coordinate with your guild members. For example, Darksoil Voicecom, requires 5 winners with a minimum of 425 Biz Sense. If you had,

Player A Biz Sense 455
Player B Biz Sense 480
Player C Biz Sense 490
Player D Biz Sense 600
Player E Biz Sense 800
Player F Biz Sense 190
Player G Biz Sense 255
Player H Biz Sense 300

Obviously, players A to E could easily win Darksoil Voicecom. However, it will be worth organizing it like this:

Player A - B - C - D then Player F - G - H, then lastly Player E to grab the win.

In this manner, Player F, G and H also get 45 tokens each, which they otherwise would not have been able to gain. The only detractor is that if they had won at a lower league, they would have contributed cash to the guild. In my mind however, this is insufficient to warrant them earning lower tokens.

Have fun, ST

Wednesday, October 31, 2012

Curious

The Senator seat, at least the Chancellor seat grants +9% to ARPD.

However, it is interesting to note that this bonus is applied after/before the Pricing perk for cost.

That is,

Cost of Goods = ARPD * Pricing bonus * Senator Perk * CoGS

eg. 58 ARPD * 1.24 * 1.09 * 0.82 = 64.28 per unit

instead of,

Cost of Goods = ARPD * (Pricing bonus + Senator Perk) * CoGS

eg. 58 ARPD * 1.33 * 0.82 = 63.25 per unit

This increases the effectiveness of the Pricing bonus in terms of cost of goods, I have not done specific observations for ARPD but I would assume it is the same.

Have fun, ST

The Formula

If you're like me, you found yourself just procuring all day. Your employees are working too hard and selling too fast. So I wanted to find out how Biz Tycoon HD determined the length of time to sell products.

As far as I can tell, this formula seems to be working for me, except for funnily enough, district A. I've tried to control for as many variables as possible. So without further ado:

Clearance time in minutes =

122.644 * Capacity * Inventory
-------------------------------------------
60 * Employee * Demo * TPerk

*Just a note: TPerk = (Perk + 100)/100

Example: Bejeweled, District C(94,101) =

122.644 * 10566 * 5940      =    330.57
--------------------------
60 * 15 * 3026 * 8.55

TPerk here is calculated as (755% + 100) / 100

The game gives me an estimated time of 5 hours 30 minutes and 36 seconds.

My formula is off by 2 seconds. Not bad.

Why figure this out? So I can determine what variables I need to control to procure at 24 hours.

That said, I only have a limited pool of sample, so if anyone has bigger shops or more variables, let me know in the chatbox or email me!

NB: The 122.644 is replaced with 132.588 in District A. I was guessing it had to do with population but the formula remains unchanged in VPT.

Have fun, ST

Monday, October 29, 2012

Overheads for Shops

Just a tip,

Overheads are calculated by floor area;

Each "square" costs 1000 coin per day, so a 3*5*5 floor shop will cost:

Daily cost = 3 x 5 x 5 x 1000 = 75 000 coin.

Interestingly, the floor area allows us to count that 1 "square is 3 metres x 3 metres.

Have fun, ST

More Landmarks!

LandmarkValues
Opera House
1 Land
360 x 49
17640 GPC
300 000 000 cash
30 000 000 cash
Supervision, Negotiation, Interpersonal, Learning,
Bookkeeping, Auditing, Project, Compliment
General Hospital
1 Land
460 x 49
22540 GPC
450 000 000 cash
45 000 000 cash
Reception, Supervision, Negotiation, Interpersonal,
Auditing, Project, Compliment, Sales
Skyscraper
1 Land
660 x 49
32340 GPC
540 000 000 cash
54 000 000 cash
Reception, Supervision, Negotiation, Interpersonal,
Learning, Auditing, Project, Compliment, Sales
Headquarters
1 Land
5* (+100 employees, +5 land)
+500 employees, +25 land
150 000 000 cash
5 000 000 cash
Reception, Supervision, Interpersonal, Learning,
Auditing, Project, Sales

Will add more when I have access to them! Send me info if you have it!

Have fun, ST
*all images copyright Hui Liu, Biz Tycoon HD

Friday, October 26, 2012

Don't Bite the Hand that Feeds You

As a new player, things may be confusing.

Especially so when you discover the land is a lot larger than you realized.

Word of advice, do not start your new shops near a guild member. You end up competing with them for the same resource. In the business world, this is known as cannibalisation (or near about).

Use the land heat map and avoid the cyan colors who are your guild members. Better yet, give yourself some clear room and dominate that area, avoiding competition while you can.
















As you can see, I'm already too close to one of my guild members.

Don't fight over the pie, fight to make the pie bigger.

Have fun, ST
*all images copyright Hui Liu, Biz Tycoon HD

Saving for A Rainy Day

There will be times that your company runs into liquidity issues.

That is to say, you can't pay the bills.

This is where I keep my Futures handy. Every day you're allocated 100 Buy transactions with a maximum 500 Contracts per transaction. This allows you to build up a position of 50000 Contracts each day.

You have, however, unlimited Sell transactions.

Therefore, each day, I make a profit trading Futures, but I also set aside 30-40 Buys into a long term Future.  This will reduce your immediate daily profit, but it is very handy when you need to raise 10-15 million in cash quickly. 

I have used my Rainy Day fund before by cashing out a third of my positions in Aluminium for a quick 6 mill so I could complete the Daily Quest Token Exchange for 50 free Tokens, 8 Luxuries, and 15 Diligence. It is a prudent business man who not only has a Primary plan, but an Alternative, Contingency and Emergency plan.

Remember, you don't need to sell all your positions when you need cash.

Also remember that the more expensive Futures rise and fall in trends, so they may not be high when you need them to be.

Have fun, ST

Wednesday, October 24, 2012

Business for The Brave

For the beginner,

Don't be afraid to sell your shops in Virtual Private Town once you've established a secure foothold in District A and/or B.

It's worth it.

Have fun, ST

Currencies of the Game: Gold Coins

I'm sure your PA has introduced you to the various currencies of the game, but here's another rundown for Gold Coins.

Gold Coins, also known as Gold, appears as Cash Balance on the Top Bar, sixth column.
These can be acquired via the following methods.
  1. Completing Quests
  2. In App Purchases
  3. Using Activation Codes (from gold purchases)
Gold Coins can be spent via:
  1. Bypassing Cooldowns (I believe it is 1 Gold per minute)
  2. Procuring stock for your Shops
  3. Relocating your Shops
  4. Buying Votes
  5. Buying Futures Seats
  6. Hunting Department Seats
  7. Upgrading employees Levels
  8. Discernment
  9. Buying Shop Patrol
  10. Buying Land
  11. Building Shops
  12. Building Infills
  13. Building Landmarks (need to check)
  14. Media campaigns
  15. Exchanging Gold for Tokens
  16. Improving employees Skills
  17. Teaching employees new Skills
Have fun, ST
*all images copyright Hui Liu, Biz Tycoon HD

Monday, October 22, 2012

Capture the Flag

There comes a time when you're thinking of expanding the company, and saved enough money to build yourself a nice shiny new landmark.

Your new landmark will spread its glorious light over your increasingly profitable shops!

However, a word of warning.

Your landmark influences 8 or 24 land around it. Please be sure to save up enough money to buy all 8 + 1 or 24 + 1 land you require in one go, or it could end very badly.


If you buy them one by one, some dastardly player will buy all the remaining pieces around your landmark.


A dastardly player like me. Hehe.

Have fun, ST
*all images copyright Hui Liu, Biz Tycoon HD

Currencies of the Game: Tokens

I'm sure your PA has introduced you to the various currencies of the game, but here's another rundown for Tokens.

Tokens, also known as silver coins, appears as Token on the Top Bar, fifth column.
These can be acquired via the following methods.
  1. Completing Daily Tasks
  2. Completing PvE challenges
  3. Completing PVP
  4. Exchanging Vouchers for Tokens at Token Center
  5. Claiming Login Prize (for certain CEO levels only)
  6. Using Activation Codes (from gold purchases)
  7. Completing Quests
Tokens can be spent via:
  1. Discernment
  2. Upgrading Employees Levels
  3. Upgrading Employees Skills
  4. Building Infills
  5. Expanding Shops
  6. Building Landmarks
  7. Patrol Shops
  8. CEO Skills
  9. CEO Levels
  10. Buying Votes
Have fun, ST
*all images copyright Hui Liu, Biz Tycoon HD

Friday, October 19, 2012

Maxfills

Just a reminder of a handy trick, the Max Infill.

As you can see here, 1 of each infill, and 7 fountains, gives me 49% Perk.



















Adding 1 more fountain gives me 150% Perk because I fulfilled the rules as below. Voila!



















If you don't use the 4% infills though, your Perk may go below 150% like this below: 132% Perk.


















The rules:
1. At least one of each type
2. At least one type has 8 copies

In my opinion, it is best to use 4% infills as they give you the Max Infill bonus at the cheapest price.

Have fun, ST
*all images copyright Hui Liu, Biz Tycoon HD

Currencies of the Game: Cash

I'm sure your PA has introduced you to the various currencies of the game, but here's another rundown for Cash.

Cash, also known as G-COINS, appears as Cash Balance on the Top Bar, fourth column.

These can be acquired via the following methods.
  1. Receivables from Shops
  2. Completing Quests
  3. Selling Futures
  4. Completing International Trade
  5. Selling Luxuries
  6. Stealing from Shops
  7. Voting
  8. Using Activation Codes (from Gold purchases)
  9. Claiming Login prizes (I think this is only available to certain CEO levels)
These can be improved by the following.
  1. Upgrading Perks - including CEO level, Employees level, Infills, Landmarks etc.
  2. Upgrading ARPD
  3. Upgrading WTC and MC
  4. Upgrading Departments
  5. Joint Promotions
  6. Cooperation
  7. Selling Luxuries at max prices
  8. Hiring ship crew
A very nice summary of your daily earnings can be found under Co. -> Reports -> Finance Details

Cash can be spent via:
  1. [Compulsory] Sales taxes
  2. [Compulsory] Shop Overheads
  3. [Compulsory] Landmark Overheads
  4. [Compulsory] Employees wages
  5. Procuring stock for your shops
  6. Contributing to the Guild
  7. Buying Futures
  8. Starting International Trade
  9. Starting Joint Promotions
  10. Starting Cooperation
  11. Building new Shops
  12. Building Landmarks
  13. Buying Land
  14. WTC campaigns
  15. Media campaigns
  16. Improving employees Skills
  17. Upgrading employees Levels
  18. Buying Cars
  19. Buying Carparking Lots
  20. Investing in an Election Campaign Fund
  21. Investing in Supply Chains
  22. Removing friends
Have fun, ST
*all images copyright Hui Liu, Biz Tycoon HD

Wednesday, October 17, 2012

Pricing CEO Skill

This CEO Skill has a hidden attribute.

Description: Increases shop's Average Receivable per Demographics (ARPD).

What Hui Liu doesn't tell you is that Pricing also increases the average Unit Cost for Procurement.

Therefore, as an example, a Liquor Store with a CoGS% 58 and ARPD 42 will, after a Pricing Skill Level 3 (9%) have a CoGS% 58 and ARPD 45.78. However the unit cost goes from 24.36/unit pre-Pricing to 26.55/unit post-Pricing, increasing the profit per unit by 1.59/unit (19.23 - 17.64) pre Perks which is about 3.8% increase in profit. And remember, Perks don't increase profit per unit, they just increase units sold per unit time.

Have fun, ST

The Daily Run Up

The game is quite inadequately translated at times, so there are many things which took a while to learn.

There are many activities which get refreshed at midnight and if you're interested in Min/Maxing profit should be done each day.

This is the list of activities which I do in order of priority each day.
  1. Complete Daily Tasks
  2. Procurement for Shops
  3. Claim Stolen Cash (if you do)
  4. Claim Login Price (if you have access)
  5. International Trade
  6. Futures
  7. Operations (for Luxuries, then Traits)
  8. Joint Promotions
  9. Cooperation
  10. Contribute to Guild (I do a minimum of 1 million daily)
  11. Vote for Sectoral Interests Senate
  12. PvE (coordinate this with your guild, it gets much better)
  13. WTC Campaign
Then do whatever your remaining cash allows you to do.

Have fun, ST

Monday, October 15, 2012

Landmarks

LandmarkValues
Urban Park
1 Land
100 x 9
900 GPC
2 400 000 cash
240 000 cash
Unknown
Carpark
1 Land
130 x 9
1170 GPC
3 600 000 cash
360 000 cash
Reception, Project
Swimming Pool
1 Land
160 x 9
1440 GPC
4 500 000 cash
450 000 cash
Supervision, Interpersonal,
Learning
Memorial Park
1 Land
190 x 25
4750 GPC
24 000 000 cash
2 400 000 cash
Supervision, Communication, Sales,
Bookkeeping, Compliment
Subway Station
1 Land
240 x 25
6000 GPC
45 000 000 cash
4 500 000 cash
Reception, Interpersonal, Learning,
Auditing, Project
TV Tower
1 Land
290 x 9
7250 GPC
60 000 000 cash
6 000 000 cash
Supervision, Interpersonal, Learning,
Auditing, Compliment, Sales

Will add more when I have access to them! Send me info if you have it!

Have fun, ST
*all images copyright Hui Liu, Biz Tycoon HD