I told you that I had a lot planned for TBG's second year and here comes the first installment. Introducing 6 packs to go! Now you can drink virtual beer around the clock whether you are able to play online or not. To buy a six pack look for the new 'Buy 6-pack' link on the game tab near the beer pull down list. While its not ok to be drunk around the clock in real life there is absolutely no problem staying 'virtually drunk' virtually all the time! Let's do it!

Six-packs for drinkers

Six-packs are bought while you are online but consumed after you log off. After buying one or more six packs the server will feed your 'virtual self' six-packs at a rate of one per hour starting between 1 and 2 hours after you log off.

And why exactly would you want to do this? Well, several reasons actually. One reason is that it will make earning purple hearts easier, I talk more about that in a later paragraph. And just like drinking a limit of 6 individual beers, buying a six pack will grant you an instant raffle ticket (if you are active in the pub). Buying a six pack has no effect on your label limit, that's because you will be drinking them later. You can still drink six of every label in the pub and earn your regular raffle ticket, just like before. Six packs cost less then 6 separate beers at $20 beer money each and if you don't have enough beer money you can use brew money instead (still $20).

Lastly, buying six-packs is an opportunity to support your favorite brewers even if you don't really have the time to hang out in the pub. Most of you already know this... what comes around goes around in this game, its the players that you treat well that come back and consume the largest share of your fine crafted brewskis. So start buying sixers of your friend's beer and they will almost certainly reciprocate... everybody wins!

Six-packs for brewers

Six packs sell for $20 each and so you get less brew money per beer. For this reason and as has already been mentioned you have to 'opt in' for each label to make the beer available for sale in six packs. You do this by selecting the checkbox that now appears next to each label on the 'My Labels' page. If you are logged in to the game and in the pub then you will receive a notification whenever a player buys a six pack of your beer. The money for the sale is immediately deposited into your brewery and increased sales should let you brew more beer faster. Six packs can be sold at any brewery level.

Staying Drunk with 6-packs and Purple Hearts

Some of the ingredients that were recently added to the game are unlocked based on how many purple hearts you have received. Now with the new six packs it will be even easier to earn them! This bit is a little tricky so pay attention.

The server now keeps track of how drunk you are around the clock. This will be best explained with an example. Let's say that I have scrounged up enough beer money to buy 10 six packs and I log off the game at midnight. Between 1 and 2 hours after I log off the server will 'consume' one six pack on my behalf and another every hour after that. So by 9:00 the next morning I will have drunk about 8 six packs overnight... Do NOT try this at home kiddies or serious health consequences will result.

When I wake up and log in at 9 the next morning, the server will recognize that I have consumed 8x6=48 beers overnight and will 'credit' me that amount toward a purple heart in the pub. If something comes up and I don't log in that morning but wait until 9 that evening instead, the server will take that into account too... I lose 6 beers of purple heart 'credit' for every hour that passes without cosuming a six pack. So 9 PM is 20 hours after I started drinking 6 packs... for the first 10 hours I had 6 beers credited per hour and for the next 10 hours I had 6 beers subtracted from that credit each hour... so at 9PM I am completely sober and earning a purple heart will have to be done the old fashioned way, one beer at a time. Note that there is no long lasting credit for beers that you drink in the pub... when you log off then they no longer count toward your purple heart and you have to start over, this is unchanged.

The fine print...

You can only buy six packs of a player's beer if they elect to sell it in six packs. Similar to label limits, there is a limit on purchases of six packs over time. You can buy 1 six pack of each available label per 24 hour period. You cannot buy six packs of a player's beer during one of their keg parties. Wait for the party to finish first. Players are limited to a maximum of 20 total six packs at any time. Lastly, six packs will only be made available for sale if the brewer has at least 60 beers in cold storage and they can only be purchased with brew money if the buyer has at least 150 in brew money in the bank, there is no minimum for beer money except of course you have to have enough to buy one!

The strategy

Now I know that most of you are pretty smart and figure out the best strategy for these things fast, but I am going to give you a hint anyway. The best way to use six-packs to unlock ingredients and get purple hearts is to figure out when you are going to log in next. If it's 3 hours from now, then try to have about 3 six packs working when you log off. If you plan to log off for the night and may not play again for 12-15 hours then try have 15 six packs saved up. As a rule of thumb always try to log off with the same number of six packs as the number of hours you plan to be offline. By using this strategy you will log back in near the point that you are already at maximum drunkedness and it will make getting purple hearts in the pub a whole lot easier.

New brewery upgrades

Players at the full Brewery level and higher can now upgrade their breweries to include Offsite storage. There are two new upgrades, one for off-site cold storage and another for off-site dry storage. Each upgrade is relatively expensive and comes with a small surcharge in your per batch miscellaneous costs. These costs will cover your warehouse rental space and transportation costs. But the good news is that offsite storage is essentially unlimited and you will never have to worry about running out of storage space again.

Enjoy!

-Robc