The plan's figures assume Artisan workers at level 40. This page is the honest path from a 5-energy roll to that roster, researched rather than assumed, with the three facts that shape everything:
1. Promotion resets a worker to level 1 and wipes its skills. Every grade jump re-enters the climb. 2. Levelling an Artisan to 30 takes roughly a month of continuous work. To 10 is about 8 hours, to 20 about 3 days. Nothing accelerates worker EXP; short-cycle jobs and uptime are the only levers. 3. Skills cannot be targeted. A reroll needs level 30+, costs 20% of the EXP bar (about 1.9 days of banked work), and lands randomly in a pool of ~58. Landing one chosen skill is an expected 30 to 50 rerolls, so the solver's skill preferences are "keep good rolls" guidance, not a shopping list.
5 energy a roll. Measured odds across 9,176 rolls: Basic (green) 69.8%, Skilled (blue) 14.0%, Professional (yellow) 1.5%, Artisan (orange) 0.26%. So a Skilled costs about 36 energy and a direct Artisan about 1,850.
One attempt earned per 10 levels, up to four. The test takes 8 hours and the worker sits it out. A failure spends the attempt but keeps the worker. Success scales with level:
| jump | at 10 | at 20 | at 30 | at 40 |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Basic to Skilled | 50% | 70% | 90% | - |
| Skilled to Professional | 30% | 50% | 70% | 90% |
| Professional to Artisan | 10% | 30% | 50% | 70% |
The reset makes the timing a real decision: promoting at 30 buys odds with a month of levelling you are about to throw away.
The Worker Exchange is alive: Artisans buyable outright, price capped from about 5m at level 1 to about 100m at level 40, and a purchased worker keeps its level, skills and remaining promotion attempts. 95 capped level-40 Artisans would cost about 9.5b, two weeks of this plan's income. The constraint is not silver, it is that they are rarely listed and good ones sell instantly.
A hybrid, about 3 to 5 months to a full Artisan roster on 95 slots, with income ramping through the grade tiers the whole way: snipe every Exchange Artisan, roll while energy allows and keep the rare direct high grade, promote rolled Skilleds in the background (Skilled to Professional at 10 or 20, Professional to Artisan at 20 or 30, and re-roll rather than grind a failed worker to its next attempt), and fill gaps with named workers, which are Professional-grade with an extra skill but can never become Artisans.
Mechanics above are verified against the February 2023 patch notes and two maintained guides; the elapsed-time figures are community measurements and inference, and are the least certain numbers on this page. Sources with dates live in docs/worker_progression.json.