Alchemy Lab

The **Alchemy Lab** is an advanced crafting building that transmutes items into higher rarity ones, other items of the same rarity, or farmable ascension materials into non-farmable ones. The Lab can be converted at Stronghold level 23 (from any non-storage building of level at least 5).
It was released in June 2019 along with several other advanced buildings after first announcement in December 2018 and much anticipation (see the original Idea/Suggestion thread). Some original criticisms were improved in version 30 (June 2020).
However, the Alchemy Lab has several limitations unlike the other crafting buildings such as the Training Camp, Forge or even Hunter's Lodge:

* Level 10 requires Gems to use.
* Transmutation can't be sped up with Gems.
* The output is random. For conversions within the same rarity, it can be influenced in varying degree because it is guaranteed to be different from all of the ingredients.
* The number of queued transmutations of one kind is capped at 100, limiting its use for "banking" food.

The term "farmable" (3\*) Ascension Materials is used for those four that can be found as Battle reward on the Map: Battle Manual, Chainmail Shirt, Scabbard, and Tall Boots. The non-farmable (the game uses term "scarce") are the other seven available much less often only as loot from special events: Compass, Fine Gloves, Hidden Blade, Orb of Magic, Sturdy Shield, Trap Tools and Warm Cape.

## Upgrading

Each level unlocks two recipes; with the exception of Level 9 and 10, the first (i. e. higher in the menu and cheaper, at least to research) is for transmutation on the same level, marked here X, and the second upgrade to higher rarity, marked U (the game uses icons of intertwined horizontal arrows and a wide arrow pointing up).

At higher building levels, several concurrent transmutations are allowed, similar to Hero Academy: there can be two transmutations going on between levels 5–9 and three on level 10.

## Alkashards

The Alchemy Lab introduced a new inventory item called **Alkashards**. These are a by-product of every transmutation in varying amounts (see table below). When collecting the transmutation results, the produced Alkashards can be supplemented in exchange for gems (again, see below for ratios).

1000 Alkashards can be **combined** into some desirable and scarce items, chosen from a selection of 6. As soon as 1000 Alkashards are reached, the selection is made randomly and stays the same until the Alkashards are combined, even if one waits for the second or further thousands. This is indicated by an Alkashard icon above the Alchemy Lab building on Base screen, which takes precedence over a cauldron icon for transmutation results being ready. Rewards are:

* Slot 1: 90%: 3-star ascension material, 10%: 4-star ascension material
* Slot 2: 3-star ascension material
* Slot 3 & 4: 30 Class Emblems
* Slot 5 & 6: 5 five-star Battle Item

## Usage

The third column "Days to 1000 Alkashards" list "gross" values, i. e. the fifth "Number of transmutations" times transmutation duration – how much it takes from zero to achieve (and often surpass signficantly: like 5 three-day transmutations on Level 9 will bring 1125 Shards) the thousand. Where relevant, there are also lower "net" values, reciprocal to the second column "Alkashards per hour", which may be useful in long-term average running many consecutive transmutations. For Level 3, the difference is negligible 26 minutes.

## Forum Links

* "Alchemy Lab" Forum Tag
	+ "Alchemy Lab" FAQ Discussion