Alchemy (CoS)  

City of Steam Wikibase™ Guides

Alchemy is the use of chemistry to grow Technomagical energy crystals. Everyone in City of Steam can do Alchemy beginning at level 10. You will gain an extra crystal growing slot every ten levels until you unlock the fifth slot at level 50.

Just like nearly everything else, Crystals come in a range of color grades: Grey, Green, Blue, Purple and Gold. The first crystal that grows in a newly opened slot will always be Gold and fully formed, ready to harvest. After that crystal is claimed, newly cultured crystals will start as Grey and require 12 hours to grow to maturity.

When you have an empty slot (i.e. you have claimed a finished crystal), a Grey crystal will immediately start growing. While it is growing, you may spend Electrum to Refresh the slot (starts at 5  and increases by 5  each time you use it in the same day) which randomizes the crystal color, push the crystal reliably to the Full Level of Gold (95 ($0.92) ), or finish it's growth instantly (95 ($0.92) ).

Refreshing starts at 10  and increases by 5  each time you use Refresh in the same day. The chance for Refresh to improve or damage the quality of the crystal seems to be about even and moves only by one grade at a time. If you absolutely want Gold, use Full Level, but if you are more coin-cautious you could use Refresh once or twice for each crystal and then just live with what the gods of the RNG give you.

Claiming the grown crystal gets ONE random reward from the table, below, from the row of the crystal's color. Odds are better to the left of the table, worse to the right.

Regardless of whether you use Electrum to improve or accelerate the process, you cannot claim more than five crystals in a day.

Bound Electrum CAN be used for Alchemy. Be sure you have your settings set to use Bound first.

Gem Color	Random Rewards
	Shillings	Fish	Rocks	Bound Electrum	Subscription	Mods
Grey	Small Shilling Bag	Carp	Stahlium	50 Bound Electrum Bundle	Subscription (1 Hour)	Level 2 Mod Box
Green	25,000 Shilling Bag	Crab	Viridescium	100 Bound Electrum Bundle	Subscription (7 Day)	Level 3 Mod Box
Blue	50,000 Shilling Bag	Weever	Azurite	100 Bound Electrum Bundle x2	Subscription (15 Day)	Level 4 Mod Box
Purple	200k Shilling Bag	Ray	Violithium	500 Bound Electrum Bundle	Subscription (30 Day)	Level 5 Mod Box
Gold	500k Shilling Bag	Golden Tortoise	Ambergold	1000 Bound Electrum Bundle	Subscription (90 Day)	Level 6 Mod Box