GFL Explained: Acquiring and Leveling HOC

1/8 update: Updated the Listening Post sample regen times as EN is off by one hour compared to CN/KR. Adjusted chart for Briefing Station. 

HOCs are acquired through Intelligence Analysis, a new mechanic that basically boils down to spending some items to roll a gacha. Fortunately, the currency that's consumed is entirely new and doesn't cost anything but time to generate. 

Intelligence Analysis is a process that converts 20 Original Samples or Pure Samples randomly into either part of a HOC (known as Central Data), or a Chip (equipment for HOCs). You should always spend all of your Original and Pure samples - there's no point in saving them unless there's both 1) a HOC Rate-Up announced and 2) you are interested in targeting the specific named HOC. 

Tip: Performing Intelligence Analysis once will clear an Achievement that grants 5x BGM-71 Central Data, unlocking the corresponding HOC unit immediately. 

This is carried out in a new Dorm Facility, the Intelligence Center.

The Intelligence Center is a new auxiliary dorm room that contains facilities mostly related to Sample Generation and Analysis Speed. Since this room's facilities are directly tied to the rate at which you'll acquire more HOC Central Data, they should be upgraded ASAP. 

As a refresher, here are the recommended upgrade levels for the Intelligence Center facilities:

As a refresher, here are the recommended upgrade levels for the Intelligence Center facilities:

The Listening Post is the player's main source of Original Samples and Pure Samples, generating them passively at the following rate: 

A total of 2955 are required to upgrade the Listening Post to the recommended level of 10.

Every 8 hours (at 00:00, 08:00, and 16:00 Server Time), the Listening Post outputs one-third of its daily Sample Generation into its internal buffer. 

Tap on the bubble to collect your generated samples. If you are near your storage limit, any excess samples are left in the buffer. 

While both types of samples are generated, the Listening Post will always generate Original Samples at a substantially higher rate than Pure Samples.

Players are recommended to upgrade the Analyzer as needed to ensure they can adequately process the Listening Post's sample output without reaching the internal buffer's cap (and thus losing samples). 

The Analyzer or Analysis Terminal is a facility where Intelligence Analysis is carried out, converting 20 Original Samples or Pure Samples to either HOC Central Data or Chips. 

Once analysis starts, it'll occupy an analysis slot for a predetermined amount of time (based on tier of the Analyzer). 

When the timer reaches zero, Analysis is complete and the results can be collected. Analysis output will primarily consist of Chips, with some Central Data present if the player is lucky. 

• Pure Samples yield higher rarity Chips as well as more Central Data. 

When the player collects enough Central Data to fully fill up the progress bar on a specific HOC, they can select the Unlock/Promote option on the interface to either unlock the HOC (if they don't have it yet) or raise its rarity by 1 additional star, up to 5 stars. 

The amount of Central Data needed varies as follows: 

Leveling up the Analyzer improves both the speed of intelligence analysis and the number of analysis slots available, substantially boosting its throughput. Upgrading the Analyzer will improve it as follows: 

The Analyzer should be leveled high enough to fully process the daily Sample income. The exact number will depend on how often the player logs in.

• Raise it to Level 3 (x155) immediately so the Analysis dailies are easier. 
• Level 6 (x755) is technically sufficient to fully process all Original Samples and Pure Samples from a maxed Listening Post and Briefing Station.
• The Quality of Life improvement from a Level 10 (x2955) Analysis Terminal should not be understated, however, especially when HOC Rate-Up events are active.

Commanders are therefore recommended to fully upgrade the Analyzer when all other priority upgrades are done. 

The Briefing Station is the player's secondary source of Original Samples and Pure Samples, providing daily quests that the player can complete for a small amount of additional Samples. Leveling the facility provides the following benefits: 

Players can view their Briefing Station quests by clicking on it, opening up the following interface:

Possible Briefing Station Quests include: 

• (T1) Clear 1 stage

• (T1) Kill 5 enemies

• (T1) Kill 3 unarmored humanoid SF enemies

• (T1) Kill 3 unarmored machine SF enemies

• (T1) Kill 3 armored humanoid SF enemies

• (T1) Kill 3 armored machine SF enemies

• (T2) Clear 4-6 two times

• (T2) Clear 5-6 two times

• (T2) Clear 1 normal story stage

• (T2) Clear 1 emergency story stage

• (T2) Clear 1 night story stage

• (T3) Clear 6-6 once

• (T3) Clear 7-6 once

• (T3) Kill 1 boss

Players receive one random quest of each Tier that they have unlocked per day. Tier 2 and Tier 3 quests will give slightly more Pure Samples but are usually more difficult to do.

For exact details, check out the HOC Facilities Megasheet compiled by DMesse. 

The Briefing Station should be leveled to max eventually, costing x2955. The Listening Post takes priority, however.

• Level 3 (x155) and Level 7 (x1105) are important breakpoints where an additional quest is given per day, providing a large marginal benefit for generating Original Samples and Pure Samples.

Commanders are recommended to fully upgrade the Briefing Station when the Listening Post is done. 

The Storage Facility has no UI, and upgrading it simply controls how many samples you can hold in your inventory. 

The following table shows the amount of storage available at each tier. 

Since the storage is already pretty generous even at low levels, it is not recommended to upgrade it beyond Level 2 (x55) until all other facilities are done. 

Upgrading it does come in handy eventually for HOC Rate-Up events, however, as it'll let the player carry more Samples into Rate-Up. While next expected HOC Rate-Up is in May, it is not necessary to start saving for it until the Rate-Up is officially announced.

While the Intelligence Center handles HOC acquisition, the Garage has facilities that take care of what happens afterwards, namely HOC training and leveling. 

Thankfully, there aren't that many facilities to level here. The recommended upgrade levels for Garage (previously translated as "Hangar") facilities are as follows:

The Training Range has up to 4 training slots, allowing players to select a HOC then proceed with either EXP Training or Skill Training. 

While only 3 HOCs are available on release and the facility maxes out at 4 slots, the player cannot simultaneously Skill Train and EXP Train the same HOC; the extra slot will be useful when more HOCs are released in the future. 

• Unlike T-Dolls who can process Combat Reports instantly, time and Batteries are needed for Special Combat Reports to be consumed by HOC units.

An overview of of EXP and Skill Training are provided below in the official infographic:

Tip: While hourly EXP Training cost is fixed at x5, the number of Special Combat Reports processed per hour increases significantly when the Training Range is upgraded.

This means the battery efficiency of EXP Training increases massively at higher levels, making it desirable to level the Training Range to Level 10 (costing x2955) before the player does any EXP Training.

Detailed upgrade effects for the Training Range are listed below: 

HOC Skill Training will consume resources as follows: 

Maxing a HOC's primary skill (Skill 1) therefore costs a total of x1200, x1200, x1200, x690 and 182 hours of training time.

Maxing one of a HOC's additional skills (Skill 2 or 3) therefore costs a total of x600, x600, x600, x690 and 91 hours of training time.

"What do you mean it's not a washing machine?"

The Maintenance Machinery is used to repair your HOCs when they take damage. 

Since HOCs don't tend to take damage unless an enemy unit runs into it (in which case it takes critical damage requiring days of repair that you'll be skipping with 10x Quick Repair Contracts anyway), there's no point upgrading this room. Leave it at Level 0 or Level 1. 

While it's not recommended to upgrade this facility, its level-up effects are included below for completeness. 

The Storeroom, much like the Storage Facility in the Intelligence Center, has no UI and solely controls the size of your available Chip Storage. 

Since Chips can be fed into each other to make space if really needed, it's not really necessary to expand this too much early on; Level 4 (x305) or Level 6 (x755) is plenty. 

For a simple HOC EXP Calculator to estimate the resources needed for EXP Training, check out the EXP Calculator section. 

Note: This calculator assumes your Training Range is maxed (Level 10), because it's inefficient to EXP Train before then. 

Acquiring Special Combat Reports

• Asking Kalina to write them in the Data Room (same Surplus EXP and Battery cost as standard Combat Reports)
• A total of x600 can be purchased monthly from the Black Market for 900 Snowfield's Gifts. 

If you somehow skimmed through the rest of this article and didn't remember anything, this tl;dr should get you 80% of the way there: 

First: Everything except Maintenance Machinery to Level 1 -> Analyzer to Level 3 (for daily) -> Listening Post to Level 4 -> Briefing station to Level 3, then follow the below suggestions:

Here are some very useful resources that can supplement the content available on this page. 

DMesse's HOC Facilities Megasheet

DMesse compiled a HOC Facilities Megasheet that explains everything there is to know about the dorm facilities!

HOC Planning Sheet

eTern and corsage compiled this HOC Planning Sheet to help commanders track and manage their HOC progress; by creating a copy and entering your own HOC information, it'll instantly visualize the Training Data, Combat Report, and Battery requirements across all of your HOC units, simplifying the planning process by doing all the math for you.