Correspondence strategy

Your Correspondence is a "slot" provided by Mr. Store items and one KoL Con item. You can have one correspondence active at any time.

My Own Pen Pal Kit

The original correspondent. Your Pen Pal sends you one fixed item per day based on your mainstat and level. (We won't consider the aftercore-only items here, since you obviously won't get them during an ascension.)

Turn Efficiency

• sticky gloves (Mox, L10+): Higher Pickpocket chance = more items = faster quests. This is a fairly marginal bonus.

Quality of Life

All items autosell for 200 or more Meat, which is a nice bonus at any point during a run.

• giant clay ashtray (Mus, L1-4): Zero-effort shield from turn 0. Especially useful for Hardcore TT. Conflicts with Kung Fu.
• orange leather lanyard (Mus, L5-9): Lots of extra weapon damage for physical combat strategies, which often means less MP per fight. Conflicts with Kung Fu.
• box of Pokëmann band-aids (Mus, fallback): Extra DR for the gremlins.
• Van der Graaf helmet (Myst, L1-4): Free MP! Conflicts with some challenge paths and (slightly) with the double-ice cap.
• electric crutch (Myst, L5-9): Enables very cheap combat, either by powering up normal spells or making Sauce Synergy possible without other sources of +spell damage. Conflicts with Kung Fu.

Notes

• This correspondent is vaguely themed towards quality-of-life. While rarely optimal, Pen Pal items will frequently make your run more pleasant.

GameInformPowerDailyPro subscription card

The GameInformPowerDailyPro company sends you one magazine every day, regardless of your level or class. This magazine, in a roundabout way, unlocks scaling monsters (which scale up to 10,000 mainstat), and provides one dungeoneering kit at no turn cost.

Turn Efficiency

• scaling monsters: If you can buff your mainstat to a high enough level, the video game dungeon can beat out Spookyraven zones for optimal Hardcore powerleveling. As a very, very rough rule of thumb, you want your buffed mainstat to be at least eight times your base mainstat, and ideally higher than that. This is often impossible for any class other than AT, who can create their +200% mainstat potion in Hardcore.
• soft green echo eyedrop antidote: Specifically, getting one on day 1. This can enable various Olfaction strategies that are otherwise implausible.

Quality of Life

• scroll of Protection from Bad Stuff: Helps in the A-boo Peak noncombats, among others. If your current path restricts your ability to get quest-necessary elemental resistance (i.e. Guano Junction), this can save turns.
• scroll of Puddingskin: A minor survivability buff, but one that lasts for eighty turns.
• (random dungeon drops): The food/booze drops and equipment, especially in later levels, can be very nice bonuses.
• Video Game Boss drops: Tons of quality-of-life enchantments, a handful of minor turn-efficiency enchantments, and autosells for 2,000 Meat! Requires going through the entire dungeon, though.

Notes

• The dungeon's ultimate reward of a fat loot token was a tempting prize when it was released, but with a Gelatinous Cubeling a single loot token takes only ~4 turns, making it less significant. It's still some free turns, however, if you use the entire dungeon for powerleveling.

Xi Receiver Unit

The Xiblaxians will send you a transmission from planet Xi each day.

• When used for the first time in an ascension, this gives a Xiblaxian holo-wrist-puter simcode, which becomes a Xiblaxian holo-wrist-puter. This is an accessory that provides +10% Item Drops, and allows you to find chunks of Xiblaxian alloy (underground), circuitry (indoors), and polymer (outdoors). You can also find a Xiblaxian crystal (1/day) while mining. These items can be used as ingredients for crafting with the 5D printer.
• When used for the second time, the transmission gives a Xiblaxian cache locator simcode, which becomes a Xiblaxian 5D printer.
• Subsequent transmissions give a random simcode, or a schematic that unlocks a 5D printer recipe. Each schematic needs to be unlocked only once, and will persist across ascensions.
• The holo-wrist-puter and 5D printer may be pulled in Softcore. They must be created in Hardcore, which means that items from the 5D printer are accessible on day 2+.

Turn Efficiency

• Xiblaxian ultraburrito and space-whiskey: EPIC size-4 food/booze which can help generate turns.
• Xiblaxian stealth cowl, vest, and trousers: Equipment that reduces Combat Frequency, which can speed up many quests. Unfortunately, these require too many ingredient items to make in a realistic run.

Quality of Life

• Xiblaxian holo-wrist-puter: The +10% Item Drops is marginal, and only slightly compensates for the need to equip it in an accessory slot for multiple combats.

Notes

• The ingredients for the 5D printer must be collected manually by adventuring with a holo-wrist-puter in various zones, which competes with other equipment in the accessory slot. Furthermore, each successive ingredient drop requires an increasing number of combat wins. This greatly reduces the usefulness of its products, and makes the Xi Receiver Unit a poor Eudora choice for serious speed ascensions.

New-You Club Membership Form

The New-You Club sends you one random Affirmation each day, which is a potion and combat item. The Affirmations are seeded by your Class, Path, and daycount while in an ascension, allowing you to predict which items you will get and plan accordingly.

Turn Efficiency

• Affirmations: When used as potions, these provide bonus stat gains, +% Meat and Item Drops, MP Regen and +% Spell Damage, togglable +/- Combat Frequency, bonus Monster Level, +50% to all attributes, or bonus Familiar Weight for a whopping 100 adventures (extensible with Incredible Self-Esteem). When used as combat items, these double the item drops from the current monster, banishes it for 80 adventures, acts as a minor version of Transcendent Olfaction, or grants a free insta-kill.

Notes

• The daily quests given out by the New-You Club require you to encounter the monster multiple times. While the Affirmation Cookie given as the reward is tempting, it is usually not worth it to go out of your way to farm them.

Our Daily Candles™ order form

Our Daily Candles™ sends you a candle-themed equipment, a "premium" candle potion, and two basic candle potions every day.

Turn Efficiency

• Equipment: All candle-themed weapons provide +25% Item Drops, which can speed up many quests. The hat gives large boosts to Weapon Damage, HP, and HP regen, which helps survival and the HP tests in the A-boo Peak. The off-hand item provides large boosts to Spell Damage, MP, and MP regen, which helps survival and buff management.
• Premium potions: Three of the potions each provide one of: bonus stat gains, +% Item Drops, and +% Meat Drops. The remaining two potions increase the encounter rate of Beasts and Dudes, respectively, which may speed up certain zones (The Black Forest, The Palindome, Whitey's Grove) during the level 11 quest.
• Basic potions: The rainbow glitter candle provides +2 prismatic elemental resistance, which can speed up the Spookyraven Manor and help in the A-boo Peak. The ear candle provides +100% Initiative, which can speed up The Defiled Alcove and other quests.

Quality of Life

• Basic potions: The banana candle (causes monsters to miss more often) and votive of confidence (+50% to all attributes) can greatly help survival. The natural magick candle can reduce the strain on MP.

See Also

• Correspondence

Ascension Strategy
Rankings:	HC Skills - HC Familiars - HC IotMs
General:	Class selection - Familiar usage - Lucky adventures
Paths:	BHY - Fist - AoB - BI - ZS - AoJ - BIG! - KOLHS - CA2 - AoSP - SS - HR - Picky - Ed - Random - AoWoL - Source - NA - GN - LtA - L.A.R. - PF - G-Lover - DD
Additional Paths:	DG - 2CRS - KoE - PotP - LKS - GG - Y,Robot - QT - WF
IotMs:	Tomes - Faxing - Copying - YR - Garden - Correspondent - Workshed - Tea party - Florist