Mario Kart Tour: Your First Tour Part 4: Optimal Coin Spending

Need ALL the money!
  • Part 4 of 4
  • New Player's Guide to Mario Kart Tour
  • Using your Resources Wisely

Ideal Coin Spending

Welcome to the last part of our 4 part series on your first Mario Kart Tour. If you've missed the earlier episodes, hit the links below.

When racing in MKT, any coins you pick up while racing get added to your spendable coin total, up to a limit of 300 coins per day. Coins (and item experience) have a ‘Soft Cap’. This means that if you have earned 299 coins today and enter one more race, you will earn EVERY coin you collect in your final race. So, if you have a phenomenal race and earn 35 coins, you will make out with 334 for the day. If you keep a close eye on your coin total for the day, you might be able to tailor your setup for a large final coin haul, speeding up your overall earnings. Pick a character who can frenzy on your track of choice. As of 1.0.2, the only characters and parts that increase your coin chance are High-End (Coin Box special skill is locked to Hakama Mario and Coin chance up is set to the Golden glider). So if you have them, be sure to use them.

There are a few other ways to earn coins.

First: getting Bingos (3-in-a-row) on Challenge cards. Tour and Gold challenges grant 50 to 150 points per bingo line, depending on the card. The weekly Tour-specific challenges are 50 coins apiece, but later long-term coins are more valuable.

Second: Tour Gifts frequently have an amount of coins within.

Third is Coin Rush (playable by clicking the + button to the right of your coin total at the top of the screen). This mode costs either Rubies or Coin Tickets. I generally recommend not spending Rubies on this. On average, for every 5 rubies you spend, you should get just under 800 coins (there are 400 coins on the track, and the cheapest option has a 2x multiplier). A Ticket gives you the same game as spending 5 rubies.

If each Item from spending rubies on a Pipe is worth the coin cost seen in Daily Selects, a Pipe pull is generally worth about double that of a coin rush. Basically, a 5 ruby Coin Rush is worth 1 Normal Driver, while a 5 Ruby Pipe Pull has a chance of a less valuable normal Part, but also more valuable Super/High End items.

So, that’s how to get coins, but what should you spend them on?

First, check on the Tour Challenges for the current tour.

With every tour, several of these will refer to specific characters that you will need to acquire in order to complete.

For example, if a challenge says “Earn a score of 6,000 points with a character with a Moustache”, you’ll need someone like Mario or Wario.

If it says “Use a Giant Banana a total of 3 times”, then Donkey Kong or Morton will be necessary.

Before you buy, look through the Tour Gifts and check on who you’ll be getting for free (or with your Gold Pass trial).

For example, that mustachioed challenge existed in the New York Tour, and the Gold Pass granted players a Metal Mario, allowing them to complete said challenge. However, it also included a challenge involving hitting enemies with Bowser’s Shell. This necessitated pulling or buying Dry or normal Bowser. Every Tour is different, so pay close attention.

In the first Tokyo Tour, three challenges available were “Score 6,000 points with a Koopaling”, “use a Giant Banana 3 times”,  and “Earn a score of 7,000 points using a driver with three hairs”.

While you could complete this using Wendy, Donkey Kong, and Lakitu, respectively, Morton matches all three conditions, so you can save many coins by only buying him.

Of course, the elephant in the room is the Daily Selects store.

You may need to wait several days to get the character you need. So, pay close attention to what is in stock, and aim to complete all of the challenges.

Your second priority when buying new items should be those necessary to score better on the most difficult cups. In the later cups, when 5 Grand Stars requires scores of over 8,000 coins, pay close attention to the grayed-out items. Purchase these when they show up in Daily Selects to give yourself an edge.

Third, on your second week playing, you should be in Tier 4 of the ranked cup (due to the artificially reduced scores inn Tier 1). Here is where Ranked truly becomes competitive.

During your second week, once you have earned all Grand Stars for all Gold rewards (or just have a few left such that you can rely on the last few Daily Challenges for the last box), consider going back into Ranked mode. First, focus on getting items that match the courses in the Ranked cup (if you don’t already have one, of course). If you’re still having difficulty, consider buying an additional copy of your item to begin raising its skill level. High skill levels mean more points, and these are absolutely necessary to continue scoring well week-to-week and earning you those huge piles of Rubies in Ranked.

With a solid inventory of items at the end of your first tour, you’ll be well-equipped to continue enjoying the game for as long as you find it enjoyable.

I hope you found this 4-part series useful and enjoyable. Tell us if you want more MKT-related content in the future!

Author(s)

Kyle has a PhD in Physics and over-analyzes games that should be considered simple time-wasters!

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