Tips for High Scores

[shane]

I have some suggestiions that win me many tournaments on Home Before Dark.

1. Avoid getting more than one pet home at a time, at least in the early levels. You get a lot more points for tiles than a pet runs across then the points for the pet entering a regular house. If you have multiple pets running over the same path, that's wasted points. Once you get to level 6, you will need to score a couple of houses on about two turns to finish a level before you run out of time. I normally score 600-700 on round 1. If you're getting about 250 by trying to get all of the houses at once, you have next to no chance against me in the tournaments.
2. Once you get to level 8, pick up every house that you can. The time is pretty short, and the game tends to give you less oportunities for multiple houses.
3. Use the longest path possible. If you do connect to multiple house, try to split the paths as far away from each other as possible. That's the whole wasted points for multiple animals running over the same tiles thing again.
4. Always get the toy. The party house scores double the regular houses. A toy always scores more than simple double points. If you can make a path to the party house without a toy, or a regular house with a toy, you will score more with the toy.
5. Get the most toys that you can on any path. The score is substatially higher with each toy. However, if you can get to the party house with one toy, or a regular house with two toys, get the single toy to the party house. You need about three toys to a regular house to equal a single toy to the party house.
6. Build paths from the right AND from the left. Meet the paths in the middle. I find it much faster to design a path that has toys on the left side of the screen to start on the left. I want to get that toy in the party house, so I start on the right and work back towards the middle from the party house.
7. Add paths that go nowhere to pick up the extra point for each unused tile.
8. If you have a toy that is going to be very difficult to use in a path to a house, try to get the unused part of the path to go over the toy. If the toy drops off the screen, you will get a replacement toy, which may be easier to use.
9. Get rid of the dead properties that drop. One dead property isn't much of an issue. Level 9 and above really tend to block houses and will stop many paths. Leave either a used or unused path under the dead property to drop it all the way off the screen. It's worth an extra few seconds of planning.
10. The pet will always use the shortest available path. I've kicked myself many times working in a toy on a path, then find that there was a one tile shorter path on the left side of the screen that I didn't disable. The pet misses the toy all together. Grrr!
11. Once you get to level 8, take one last look at the board before you connect the last tile. Maybe you can make that path to drop a dead property. Do you have a house connected to a path that you didn't want connected. Can you connect one more house in an upper level by clicking on one or two tiles.

My highest level is 13. If somebody can beat that, I'd love to hear any of your extra tips.

See you in the tournaments!

[derring do]

This is just so excellent! Thanks very much for the tips, and rep to you.

[Princesspowder]

Aw man, my highest level is 9... I got a ways to go!

[yenaleddat]

I just got 20971 on home before dark, level 16, and a webkinz message said oops too many points and it will not be counted> What happened?

[needie]

Originally Posted by yenaleddat

I just got 20971 on home before dark, level 16, and a webkinz message said oops too many points and it will not be counted> What happened?

Webkinz seems to have some sort of built in safety glitch that thinks it's impossible to get that high of a score so they won't award your kinzcash. I've seen other people mention it on other games too. But congrats on the lvl 16! That is quite an accomplishment. I think I've only made it to lvl 14 once. Most of the time I lose around level 11 or 12.

[CanWeb]

Wow, congrats on reaching level 16!!!!!!!

---------- CanWeb added 0 Minutes and 20 Seconds later ----------

Oh - Great Tips - those are the ones I use when I play as well.