Once you have a dealer den ID you should find a cartel to be in. Why should you be in a cartel? A cartel gives you the chance to associate with other dealers and improve your dealing skills. They also give you a chance to make a big mark on the Dope Wars world. Ever hear of a little cartel called the High Rollers? I take it you have, for those 17 or so dealers have the biggest impression on Dope Wars. They associate with Beermat himself test the new versions and give Beermat suggestions as what to have and what not to have in the next version of the game. These are some of the many reasons you should be in a cartel.

Tips and Hints

            You ever wonder how you can improve your dealing? Well below I am listing a few tips from TheMrNice of Global cartel and Sir. They have covered mostly everything there is to cover. But remember the 5 most important things to do. 1: Always bank your extra cash and keep $400 so you can buy more trench coat pockets. 2: Always listen to the old lady, whatever she says there is going to be a bust of buy it. 3: Restart your game after day 8 if there has not been a MDA, heroin, or coke bust yet. Some say start after day 10, but it is more profitable if you get a raid on day 8 or below rather than day 10 or 9. 4: Always change what you are dealing in when the chance arrises, eg if you have Heroin and it goes to 10k and Coke is at 15k sell what you have and switch to Coke, the same if Coke goes above 26k and Heroin is below 6k. Dont just wait for busts and insist on keeping one drug, you must keep buying and selling. 5: Play the game all the time. The more often you play the better your scores will be. You can play more games faster by following the Game Speed section below. Below are some tips from TheMrNice and Sir that basically cover the basic tips. More detailed tips follow. Also we here at Reckless wanna give DaveBeer for, um, alot of the tips.

1. You can speed up your games by double clicking on the data bank to deposit and withdraw money, this only works for transfers between cash and bank, the loans still have to be paid via the finance window.

2. Always bank your cash. At the begining of the game for the first day and until you actually see either something to buy or a loan shark bank EVERYTHING. This will help you get bigger loans when you are starting off. During the game bank all your cash, except for 400 dollars that you should keep on you to enable the game to offer you more pockets and for you to buy them. Interest is still incredibly important to getting good scores.

3. Always buy the cheap drugs in the first day or so, if you see cheap speed, hashish, weed, acid, crack and even ecstasy, the more money you can make in the first few days will help you get bigger loans and thereby full pockets of coke or heroin.

4. Always fight the cops. There is no real merit in getting arrested by the cops so it is far more beneficial to get the extra cash by killing/scaring hardass and his posse. This is true on all the game lengths, with the possible exception of 15 day, You will have to buy a weapon, whilst the monkey can be sufficient the chicken launcher is far more accurate and will always prevent you from being killed, but its also much more expensive. NB: make sure you have a full quota of health for each day.

5. Visiting the doctor. Always sell your stash of drugs before you visit the doctor as he has a tendency to steal them if you're carrying. You can always buy them straight back once you've been fixed up.

6. What if the doc nicks your kidneys? You can get offered a kidney dialysis machine which will stop you from losing more health from lack of kidneys. This is offered in the same was as more pockets for your trench coat (see below) and therefore you need to have a certain amount of cash on you (not in the bank). This is $100,000!

7. Heroin, Coke and MDA. Unless you are at the very beginning of the game and a loan shark has not been released, only stick to these three main drugs. Personally I only go for coke and heroin. Always trust the old lady - sometimes she is wrong but when she is right it really pays off. Start with heroin (except when coke is cheap) then move on to coke as soon as you can.

8. Coke, Heroin, Coke. Following a coke bust, always buy heroin, no matter how much it is. It often busts within 2 days of the coke bust. If you have been able to take advantage of a heroin bust, always buy coke on the same day as the bust, regardless of price.

9. Start again time? If you don't have a major bust by 15-20 days, consider starting again. The restart time should be judged with common sense and many dealers do it differently. However, it is necessary to have about 20 million after 15 days (to make a billion on 120 days) so take into account the amount of drugs you have on you, the impact a bust would have if you got one in the next few days and judge for yourself.

10. Pay off your loans as early as possible except if you can't also fill your pockets with coke or heroin. It's far more beneficial to have a full quota of heroin or particularly coke at the beginning of the game than it is to have no debts. Also, on the 15 day game, if your loan won't become due before the last day, don't pay it off early. Wait for the game to automatically pay it off at the end as even if it hasn't become due, it won't incur any increments.

11. If you are near the begining of a game and have around 1 million in cash it can be helpful to split your pockets between coke and heroin. eg 40coke and 60 heroin (depending on price of course) this is often said to be wrong, but here is the proof -

Assuming you have 1,000,000 to spend this is equal to 66 coke at 15k which is equal to a bust value of 9,834,000 (at 149k coke bust)

With the same 1,000,000 to spend you can get 50coke@15k=750,000 & 50heroin@5k=250,000 and with optimal busts again we get 7,450,000+3,450,000 =10,900,000 (149k coke and 69k heroin)

A difference of OVER 1,000,000, sometimes it pays to split your pockets up.

12. Always change what you are dealing in when the chance arrises, eg if you have Heroin and it goes to 10k and Coke is at 15k sell what you have and switch to Coke, the same if Coke goes above 26k and Heroin is below 6k. Dont just wait for busts and insist on keeping one drug, you'll end up with very average scores, you must keep buying and selling.

13. If you are ever given any drugs (particularly the more expensive ones) then you should buy into that particular product as it often busts the following day, I only tend to do this with coke, heroin or MDA, but I've seen this happen with others too.

14. Use the calculator. This can be very advantagous when you hear of a bust the following day and have enough to buy most but not all of the drug which has been mentioned. Heres what to do - buy as much of the drug as you can, make a note of how much empty space you have left, then sell the drugs again, now open up the calculator and multiply the amount of space you have by the cost of one unit of the required drug, the total is the exact amount you need to borrow. This saves you having too much and then paying more on interest, or too little and not taking full advantage of the bust.

15. If you are carrying drugs and press 'stay' when confronted by hardass , you sometimes hear a tip upon being released, these tips are usually good. To take advantage of this you might want to carry one unit of the cheapest available drug only (whilst there isnt anything else worth buying) and press stay when you get chased. The downside is that you will lose one day which you spend in jail.

Strategies for getting started

            Once you have know the most important hints and tips you should already have developed a strategy you like if not here are some of the most common ones below. These strategies are used to reach $1,000,000 in 2/3 days.
Strategy 1
            Some people like to use the strategy of simply using the loansharks (and not buying or selling anything) to get the $1,000,000 loan by day 2 or 3. Then just wait for the Old Lady to predict a Coke/Heroin bust by the sixth or seventh day, or else its restart time. The average number of games it takes to find this is about 30.
Strategy 2
            Another strategy is to buy the drugs that are cheap in the first days before any loan shark gets out of the jail. So hopefully theres cheap speed, hashish, weed, acid, crack and even ecstasy on offer. If youve made it to this site, you should know what cheap is(If not check out the price list below). And if its hash or weed be careful that your mother doesnt smoke it. This will hopefully get you off to a good start and will increase the amount of your first loan, which will lead to fuller pockets of coke or heroin. Remember the start is the only time to mess around with the smaller drugs. The rest of the game is strictly for Heroin and Coke.
            The initial goal with either strategy is to take out $1,000,000 in loans. As soon as the first loan shark is out of jail sell all the drugs you have in the stash and take the max amount of loan. Sometimes you will be able to get the full amount of loan from the first shark but mostly it takes 2/3 days.
            When a shark is free, you just borrow the maximum money from him. Repay Honest Harry the same day and bank the rest. Next day, borrow maximum amount of money from Honest Harry. If the combo is done with Bulbous Bertha or Midget Mickey, you'll already have near $1,000,000 (2 days process). If the combo is done with Sandy Schwing or Tank NoNeck, you'll have to repay that shark that day and borrow again from him the next day (3 days process).

Price List

            Wondering what are good prices to buy drugs and what are bad prices? Here is a list below that will optimize your Dope Wars abilities. Along with the tips above and the price list below you can turn into a world class dealer over night. Not to mention that this is probably the best place to get tips and help on your Dope Wars dealing.

Item

 Normal variations(first 2)

 Exceptionnal variation(last 2, some range from their highest low prices to their lowest low price the same is with busts or their high prices. This is because some items dont have bust or their prices dont bottom out)

Acid

 1 000

 4 500

 100

 450

Cocaine

 15 000

 30 000

 75 000

 150 000

Hashish

 450

 1 500

 45

 150

Heroin

 5 000

 14 000

 25 000

 70 000

Ecstasy

 10

 60

 1

 6

Smack

 1 500

 4 500

Opium

 500

 1 300

 2 500

 6 500

Crack

 1 000

 3 500

Peyote

 100

 700

Shrooms

 600

 1 400

Speed

 70

 250

 350

 1 250

Weed

 300

 900

 30

 90

The following prices are less accurate, since they occur much less often. These out their low prices(first) and their high prices(second).

Gun

 300

 550

Trenchcoat

 200

 350

Number of pockets

 10

 20

Money found on dead cop

 1 000

 3 500

Doctor fee

 1 000

 2 000

Loan Sharks

             During the course of the game you may need to take loans out in order to fill you pockets with drugs. But you must be careful from which loan shark you borrow from. Sandy Schwing will offer you 20x your cash. Tank Noneck 30x cash. Bulbous Bertha 50x cash. Midget Mickey 100x cash. Honest Harry 10x cash. They all offer loans with different interest rates for different amounts of time. Loans for a next day bust are best taken from people with low lengths like Bulbous Bertha and Midget Mickey. Loans in the hope of a bust should be taken from people like Sandy Schwing and Tony Noneck. If you don't have an option take what you can.  Pay back your loans only when you have enough to fill your pockets. Following this is a list of the loansharks and the amount you will have to repay, couresy of TheMrNice.

            Below is a list of the 5 loan sharks, the amounts are what you will have to repay if you borrow 1 million dollars from them. It can be seen that if you are borrowing for 1 day that the cheapest lender to borrow from is Bulbous Bertha, followed by :- Midget Mikey, Tank Noneck, Honest Harry and then Sandy Schwing.

Day Honest Harry        Sandy Schwing       Tank Noneck     Bulbous Bertha          Midget Mickey       

1     2,018,667             2,023,175               1,914,954          1,300,000                 1,790,527              

2     2,139,417             2,100,175               2,082,954                                           2,009,277              

3     2,278,280             2,184,875               2,284,554                                           2,282,715              

4     2,437,971             2,278,045               2,526,474                                           2,624,512              

5     2,621,617             2,380,532               2,816,778                                           3,051,758              

6     2,832,810             2,493,267               3,165,143                                                                         

7     3,075,681             2,617,277               3,583,181                                                                         

8     3,354,983             2,753,687                                                                                                       

9     3,676,180             2,903,738                                                                                                       

10   4,045,557             3,068,795                                                                                                       

11                                3,250,357                                                                                                       

12                                3,450,075                                                                                                       

13                                3,669,765                                                                                                       

14                                3,911,424                                                                                                       

15                                4,177,249                                           

The Hospital

            Injured? Sick with an infection? See the Doc. He can fix you for amounts depending on how much your hurt. Remember never take any drugs with you to see him because he often rips you off, stealing your drugs and sometimes taking 1 of your kidneys.

Sell your drugs at any price and buy them back as soon as you are out. If you lose a kidney or two and have 100,000 cash you will be randomly offered a dialysis machine, this will stop your health flowing away. Below is some information on what the Doc charges, courtesy of TheMrNice of Global cartel, again.

            Beware of what the doctor charges, always look at how much he is going to charge you, especially at the begining of a game. His prices range from $50 to $450. If you arent carrying drugs and arent about to die then it can be worth waiting for the price to drop. The list below compares the different prices of the doctor depending on the amount of health you are buying.

Health points are listed in the left column.

1    $50        $100      $150         $200         $250         $300         $350         $400         $450        

10  $500      $1000   $1500       $2000      $2500      $3000       $3500      $4000      $4500      

20  $1000    $2000   $3000       $4000      $5000      $6000       $7000      $8000      $9000      

30  $1500    $3000   $4500       $6000      $7500      $9000       $10500    $12000    $13500   

40  $2000    $4000   $6000       $8000      $10000    $12000    $14000    $16000    $18000   

50  $2500    $5000   $7500       $10000    $12500    $15000    $17500    $20000    $22500   

60  $3000    $6000   $9000       $12000    $15000    $18000    $21000    $24000    $27000   

70  $3500    $7000   $10500    $14000    $17500    $21000    $24500    $28000    $31500   

80  $4000    $8000   $12000    $16000    $20000    $24000    $28000    $32000    $36000   

90  $4500    $9000   $13500    $18000    $22500    $27000    $31500    $36000    $40500   

Weapons

            Wondering about the weapons? Here our your answers: The handbag uses no ammo and is cheap but is useless. The Rubber Chicken Launcher is effective but very expensive. The rest are in between this. The monkey is probably the perfect balance, though the Chicken Launcher is more accurate. If you do want the Rubber Chicken Launcher it is worth buying a monkey to finish off Hardass to save on expensive ammo. Remember, you should always buy a weapon to fight off the cops in every day length with the exception of 15 days.

Tricks

            Now that you know about all of the factual tips here are some myths:

.  If you dump 10 units of coke, in the next few days a coke bust will happen. Run lots of background programs to slow your processor and watch for a flicker, which briefly tells you to do something, then the opposite happens.  Buy 500 bananas.  Air Raid guarantees that no bust will happen the next day.  On unfinished games if coke busts heroin will bust the next day, and vice versa.

 Game Speed

            The best dealers of the day not only play alot but the also play very fast. Therefor the faster they play equals more games played, which equals better scores. So here our some hints you can use speed up your game.

 To take out or deposit the money in the bank just double click at the green numbers at DW main screen.

Go to Tools, Optionsand change the cop chase delay to 500.

Go to Tools, Options and click at Add numeric accelerators to travel locations. Now you can move days by using the 1, 2 and TAB buttons. Some other hotkeys are: ALT+I to finance, ALT+T to store, N or F2 to restart, F to fight the cops. The use of the ENTER key is a must.

            There is no point in traveling around because you wont get a better deal in a different city, the game is random and you will only lose time moving around. So go to Tools, City Editor and delete all cities with the exception of your home town.

            After you read The DopeWars Guide there is nearly no way you can go except up on the world tables. If you have any questions concerning the game or tips, they can be answered the DopeWars Message Board. The DopeWars Guide shall be updated when the new season starts with new tips and suggestions. Remember to play as often as possible! Good luck, and happy dealing from Reckless Ambition.