I was spreading this 6-7 months ago. Very unmotivating, but like the rest of the game, patience pays.
Mughal Helpline
Like all settlements, patience pays. If you don’t care about the Minaret, take your time and it will happen. The Mughal Temple is well worth having, particularly if paired with the BG. I find the 2x2 secondary buildings a badge of honor, even if not super duper pieces. The timeframes aren’t 100% for a quick finish, but given some basics, you can get through a little quicker and a Minaret, too.
A Slow Start: And middle. And end. Be prepared for a very slow 4-5 days of near minimum production. The math plays out to relying on residential buildings for coin production, thusly limiting goods production. Very conservative spending and actions gets you to traditional coin and goods faster.
Day one, limit yourself to 1 Rice Patty (called Basmati in a quest, Basmati = rice) at any given time, including at start. Fill the rest with the basic residential buildings, using as little road as possible. If you line the backsides of the townhall with a single layer of residence, fed by a single piece of road, you can build less road and end up a couple spares when you rebuild. Your looking to have enough residence to make close to or more than a thousand coins every four hours.
Impeccable timing is needed for the 4 hour cycle to pay for the next goods production and saving up a little extra for the evening/bedtime 8 hour cycle (2000 coins). And your early goal is to get next residential building, that makes substantially more coins, but requires even better timing to maintain the 8 hour cycle for several days. If you mess up the cycle, it’ll have consequences at the end of the day. After the big residential, your next goal is the Chhatri, so you can produce coins in a more familiar method, yet still relatively slowly, rarely buildings more than 3 or 4 goods buildings at a time.
Goofy Diplomacy: Even if you take a month to finish, Diplomacy can make for difficulties up to the end. “Have 1500 Diplomacy” means after you’ve collected all those goods. Also, it’s gonna be a tight fit to get to 1500.
A couple tips for Diplomacy. First, arrange your Townhall so you can take advantage of the canal bonuses as much as possible. I place my Townhall in the far north corner, running the Canals Southeast and Southwest into the furthest reaching available slots, clearing those of obstructions first. The more that stack in one line, the more bonus. None off the backsides.
Another tip for Diplomacy, particularly the towards the end, the advanced residence and coin producers are needed for high levels of Diplomacy. The best buildings consume less space with more Diplomacy and without them, you’ll always end up needing just a little more space, tempting you for a few diamonds, just to finish. Pack and stack. Tetris every spare square. Like happiness buildings, coin producers only need roads to make coins, Diplomacy maintains when you put it to the back.
Get to the End, before you begin: Like the other settlements, planning the steps of quests (below) and rewards will accelerate your game. As example, when you have enough goods to build the Spice Merchant, continue collecting Rice and Sarrees to unlock all the way to the Lotus building. Then make most, if not all Spice needed. Unlock and build Lotus. Get bigger and go back to make Rice and Sarrees as per Quest 15, which is surprising late for such a request. Then plan for those last steps.
Quest 1: "Have 6 Bhavans" Reward: Small Supplies Package
Quest 2: “Have 3 Alleys" and "Have 102 diplomacy" Reward: Self-Aid Kit and 500 Rupees
Quest 3: “Have 1 Rice Paddy" and "Gather 10 Basmati" Reward: 1 Impediment Removal Item
Quest 4: “Have 3 Water Canals" and "Have 214 diplomacy" Reward: 5 Forge Points and 250 Rupees
Quest 5: “Have 1 Saree Weaver" Reward: Self-Aid Kit and 500 Rupees
Quest 6: “Gather 10 Saree" Reward: 2 Impediment Removal Items
Quest 7: “Gather 500 Rupees" Reward: Small Coins Package
Quest 8: “Have 2 Shanti Ghar" Reward: 5 Forge Points
Quest 9: “Have 2 Chhatri" Reward: Small Supplies Package
Quest 10: “Gather 1,500 Rupees" and "Have 540 diplomacy" Reward: 1 Impediment Removal Item
Quest 11: “Have 1 Spice Trader" Reward: Small Coins Package
Quest 12: “Gather 10 Spices" Reward: 5 Forge Points
Quest 13: “Have 2 Baldachin" Reward: 1 Impediment Removal Item and Small Supplies Package
Quest 14: “Gather 2000 Rupees" and "Have 870 diplomacy" Reward: Self-Aid Kit
Quest 15: “Gather 20 Basmati" and "Gather 20 Saree" Reward: 5 Forge Points
Quest 16: “Have 1 Lotus Flower Farm" Reward: Small Coins Package
Quest 17: “Gather 10 Lotus" Reward: 1 Impediment Removal Item
Quest 18: “Have 1 Charbagh" Reward: Self-Aid Kit
Quest 19: “Have 1 Haveli" and "Gather 4,000 Rupees" Reward: Small Supplies Package
Quest 20: “Have 1,500 diplomacy" and "Gather 50 Basmati" and "Gather 50 Saree" and "Gather 50 Spices" and "Gather 50 Lotus" Reward: 10 Forge Points