u/AbaloneOk1481

So I didn’t know that each parent has to take at least two months of elterngeld otherwise, they would not be eligible.

My issue is that I’ve only applied for a month of Elternzeit because I can’t afford a reduced salary for longer, and I thought I would apply for one month of Elterngeld too. However, this is not allowed.

What are my options?

1. Do not apply for elterngeld at all? Because in this case, I would save some instead of going for two months of elternzeit and its corresponding elterngeld. If I am on elternzeit and I don’t apply for elterngeld, do I also need to pay for health insurance myself for that month?

2. Apply for elterngeld for the first month, then down the line apply for elterngeld plus, but I have to ask the employer to reduce my working hours to a maximum of 32 so I get a reduced salary and some elterngeld too. This might be best option in terms of numbers, if I am correct in assuming how the whole system works. If not, please let me know where I might have been wrong.

Disclaimer: I know there already have been a lot of posts and I have been through them. But I had some questions that I would like to have answered in a single place.

First of all, I have been playing since 2014 mostly F2P and took multiple breaks in between for multiple years. Last hiatus started from 2023. Currently TH14/BH9and game has changed so much in last 3 years compared to the all the updates of last decade before that.

Some observations:

1. Farming is way easier now. I can easily max out loot storages under half hour.
2. Getting 3 stars is way easier now against same TH level or even higher. I have been just spamming dragons+loons and boom 3 stars. Unlike before, where even farming it would take shit ton of effort and planning to get 3 stars on a well planned base of same level(not rushed).
3. Hero revamp is PIA especially equipment stuff. Not to mention, pets were already an additional grind before too.

Some questions:

1. What hero equipment I should focus on? As I have few common ones at lvl1?
2. How to gather ore stuff more effectively as F2P?
3. Is maxing out still a thing or do people expect to rush for optimizing progression? I don’t know why I am asking this. As I always prioritized maxing out stuff before upgrading to next TH. EVEN THE GODDAMN WALLS when they were 4 million each with 2 upgrades at TH9. Good old days.

The game feels so different but at the same time, it is the same old at its core which is a good thing.

Please, feel free to drop any tips you can think of that might be helpful. Things are quite overwhelming at the moment and other than the usual stuff, I am not sure what to focus on.