I'm curious as to your reasoning for getting the Arc. And, what you'll get rid of to fit it in. (Being serious here, simply wondering what's your strategy as it relates to tiny town progression).
To me, it doesn't seem like you'd get much at all for practical return from that GB compared to other options (other GBs &/or event buildings) for a tiny town's needs. Arc will take up quite a bit of space, & other than the hourly fp freebies, you have tiny fp production with which to level it to 10. Seems like you'd have to stay in IA for many, many months just to get it there.
And then what? You're not going to get much fp packs profit from doing GB donations cuz too many folks are running up their Arcs without your space restrictions (so competition is much better situated than you). Whatever extra GBs donation winnings also seem to me somewhat unimportant in the scheme of things. You shouldn't need an ongoing collection of masses of bps (again, not that you'll get much given you're placing 4th or 5th spots) compared to what you can get without it. And your need for medals is rather limited given you'll never buy expansions. It's secondary benefit -- goods -- goes directly to treasury, not for you to use.
If you're looking to do something different (more challenging, perhaps) than standard tiny town GBs, did you consider HC instead of Arc? Mine's at level 10 ( a regular city, not tiny town) & I love it's daily bonuses (typically getting something each day, often multiple ones) + will provide you lots of supplies.
Are you (or other tiny towners) finding the settlements' buildings rather attractive?
I'm going for the Arc mainly so that I can snipe other players, which won't be fast, exactly, but will allow me to have a higher FP income. That will be incredibly useful in leveling my GB. It will take a while to build up a good stock, but, I think the benefits will be worth it. Already I have gotten some pretty good snipes, without the arc. (Part of the beauty of IA where everyone is self leveling) It's part experiment, part just for fun. Additionally, I'm testing to see whether this:
If I were to do this again, my speed-run strategy would be to build an Arc and Dynamic Tower as fast as possible.
Dynamic Tower high-age goods are worth a lot when traded down, so that's one problem solved. The lower your age is, the more powerful the DT is as a GB, so definitely worth the investment if you're just starting this out.
And then of course I'd use the Arc to get rich on FP, and use those FP to purchase more goods from other players, to progress through the ages without any head aches. But it requires a lot more effort than just logging in for daily harvest, of course.
is a viable strategy. I need to do a lot of RQs sometime in the near future, but haven't had the time recently. Additionally, once the Arc is leveled more it will be easier to level the other GB, like the DT (which I'm planning to get) and LoA. I figure that someone has to test it. Once I get the Arc I will probably get rid of most of my barracks and focus solely on FP production. Once I build up a good enough stock, I'll make my city more normal again. I'm staying in IA for as long as possible to get rewards faster, as IA is an easy age for events and questlines. With all the self levelers, I can make that even more profitable for myself.
Additionally, once I get the Arc that could open doors into some guilds that I otherwise could not get into (maybe. just speculation based on guild requirements I've seen. Remember, I'm on Zorskog, not Parkog, because I was stupid when starting out. Maybe I'll start a new one on Parkog soon? Idk). A guild would improve a couple of things - mainly FP production (Town Hall bonus), trading for goods, etc. Combine that with the DT and it could speed up the process immensely.
The settlement buildings are extremely efficient, and for the Tiny Town a fully leveled Shinto Temple would be incredibly useful, as well as using the timeless dojo (1 or 2 of them) for all one's troop needs. It would take time, but you wouldn't need any more military buildings as you'd get troops for free (like mini traz's, but not as powerful). The Emissaries' boosts would also be very welcome. However... I am running the settlements on my main, and thanks to my time I can spend on the game I don't have the ability to run a second set of settlements on my TinyTown at the same time. My hope is to finish the Feudal Japan settlement on my main and then work on it on my Tiny Town. I wish I had more time, but it just hasn't worked out that way.