From Sandbox mode I was used to try out different height maps and regions and quit if I didn't like them. Now I wanted to start a new franchise zoo and abandoned four maps. I somehow thought I'd get my conservation points back if I deleted that zoo, but that wasn't true. Now I only have 7 conservation points and can't start a new franchise zoo. How can I get those points? Any ideas including cheats welcome, thank you!
How to get conservation points to start a new franchise zoo?
- Thread starter Lailantie
- Start date
Wait one day and you'll get 100 conversation points. Or, if this was your first franchise zoo, delete your franchise and start over.
Then start with 'cash only' animals. Preferably easy to keep ones. I personally wouldn't attempt to sell the offspring, but release them to the wild. Make sure you keep one good offspring to replace the parents though and acquire a mate for it. I tend to save up my CC until I can afford two mediocre (Frontier provided) cheetas. Let them breed. They have between 2 and 4 offspring and even the older ones you get from Frontier can breed two or three times before they die. Releasing the offspring to the wild gets you tons of CC, which fuels your expansion to other species. Just remember to keep one of the offspring and use some of that CC to get a good quality mate for it.
Then start with 'cash only' animals. Preferably easy to keep ones. I personally wouldn't attempt to sell the offspring, but release them to the wild. Make sure you keep one good offspring to replace the parents though and acquire a mate for it. I tend to save up my CC until I can afford two mediocre (Frontier provided) cheetas. Let them breed. They have between 2 and 4 offspring and even the older ones you get from Frontier can breed two or three times before they die. Releasing the offspring to the wild gets you tons of CC, which fuels your expansion to other species. Just remember to keep one of the offspring and use some of that CC to get a good quality mate for it.
To get quick cash, get some frogs. The golden poison frogs in particular breed like crazy
So I assume the points I made in the Goodwin Zoo didn't count, because it was a tutorial zoo and not a franchise zoo I played?
I have one played franchise zoo, the rest are sandboxes. If I understood correctly, I can log into my franchise zoo shortly and then again tomorrow, and I will have 100 points? That would do the trick. I could also release some animals in my franchise zoo.
Anyway, for someone who is fairly new and played sandbox most of the time to learn the basics, it is not intuitive that each new franchise zoo costs 100 points. So there is no chance to look at the different height maps and just quit if you don't like it, as you lose these points for good and nothing will bring them back. Is there a way to check height maps in franchise without losing points? They aren't always the same depending on some factors I haven't figured out yet, so I don't know if checking them in sandbox mode will give me the same ones in franchise.
I have one played franchise zoo, the rest are sandboxes. If I understood correctly, I can log into my franchise zoo shortly and then again tomorrow, and I will have 100 points? That would do the trick. I could also release some animals in my franchise zoo.
Anyway, for someone who is fairly new and played sandbox most of the time to learn the basics, it is not intuitive that each new franchise zoo costs 100 points. So there is no chance to look at the different height maps and just quit if you don't like it, as you lose these points for good and nothing will bring them back. Is there a way to check height maps in franchise without losing points? They aren't always the same depending on some factors I haven't figured out yet, so I don't know if checking them in sandbox mode will give me the same ones in franchise.
You could always start a new zoo and stay in with some peafowls or arctic foxes (or other fast breeding species) and release the offspring for some points. Those points stay with you, so when you released two pups for 500 points, you can open five zoos. You could repeat that in every zoo or just save up in some points until you have enough to go crazy with opening zoos 
Franchise zoos only share CC and research with other franchise zoos. Sandbox, Campaign and Challenge mode are completely separated from franchise
There is a daily log in bonus when you go to the menu where you can pick a franchise zoo. You don't have to load a zoo. You won't get the bonus when you load your franchise zoo from the main menu. You can sell or release animals from your franchise zoo to get CC as well.
You can test height maps in Sandbox. There are maps that can only be used in sandbox, but that won't affect height maps
No, Franchise Mode is for itself, as is sandbox. You will have to open a franchise zoo to gather points in franchise mode. (Same counts for animals)
Quick summary on conservation credits:
- Franchise, challenge and sandbox zoos are all separate, so making cc's in one zoo will not transfer over to another type.
- Every 24 hours you will get 100 free cc's for the franchise system - it's to help folks who's zoos failed/otherwise ran out of cc's, so they can begin again. Just log in and click on 'franchise' you don't need to open a zoo. I rarely play franchise but I visit (almost) every day to pick up the free cc's.
- Exhibit animals (the ones in the boxes) cannot be sold for cc's in franchise mode (despite what the challenge zoos make you believe)
- Conservation credits are a shared pool in the franchise, but cash starts anew for every zoo you open in your franchise system. You'll always get that 40 k for each new zoo.
- Animals you buy from the market for cash cannot be released to earn cc's - you need to breed them and release the offspring
- Different players have different ideas what's the 'best' animal for farming cc's - I prefer the lemurs or red pandas as they're relatively cheap to keep, breed rapidly and so on. Some recommend the peacocks, others foxes.
- Whenever you close a franchise zoo, the game will automatically sell for cc's all the adult animals so you'll get a pool of cc's when you do so (if you have cc eligible animals in the zoo).
- If you need to 'practice' something, do it in sandbox, not franchise, as it costs money/cc's. You can always blueprint a building, or even a patch of ground, and transfer it into your franchise zoo (it will cost you).
This entire thing is kind of what I have against using Sandbox as a 'teaching tool'. So many things you can do in Sandbox, simply doesn't work in Franchise. And then you get used to the 'cheats' and have trouble figuring out how to do things in Franchise. Don't get me wrong, I love sandbox and almost primarily play in sandbox. I view playing sandbox and playing franchise as almost two completely different games however. Therefore I don't think sandbox is useful for teaching how the game works at all. The career mode helps you figure out the basics and then just start playing.
Here is my advice for playing in Franchise.
Here is my advice for playing in Franchise.
- Don't use the height maps, or at least not without having tested them in sandbox first and figuring out which one you want to use. But don't use it at all for the first zoo in the franchise. This is usually hardly anything more than a CC/research farming expedition anyway
- For your first zoo in particular, though I use it for most of my zoos. Start with a very simple small zoo layout. PaulsLeys starter zoo is a good one, though I'm sure there are other ones.
- Get one single animal species (cash only! You don't have the CC yet). Research it completely and only then get your next species. Rinse and repeat.
- At later zoos when you've already researched the animals wait till they become pregnant and have babies before moving on to the next species, at least for the first few animals you add
- Don't decorate anything until you've got a good flow of money going
- Start your mechanical research asap. For themes, just research to level 1 to get the building material and move on to the next theme at first.
- Find a CC generating species (or several) that suits you. Several have been mentioned above, like lemurs, cheetahs, foxes, red pandas, etc. Just make sure they produce loads of offspring, are easy/cheap to keep, grow up relatively quickly and can be released to the wild for decent CC.
- In a very good running zoo you can do the Lion breeding trick, where you start with one male and few females. Once the females are pregnant, get rid of the male. Release all male offspring once they grow up, keep the females and introduce a new male. Rinse and repeat. You need to have a lot of cash coming in to support so many lions though.
- In your actual play zoo (so the one you want to look pretty and just build and manage) you can slow down aging so the babies don't grow up so fast and the adults don't keep dying on you every five seconds.
- Don't be afraid of using null barriers, just make sure you use something to block the path of the animals.
- Learn to love your heatmaps (H key on keyboard). Check regularly traversable area of staff and animals inside habitats (also after babies are born as they may be able to squeeze through openings that the adults cannot), guest happiness as well as food/drink/toilet requirements, negative influence of facilities, water cleaning/temperature, power, etc.