12 spymasters vs 11 spymasters

I've built both versions of the fubgun temple this league, one with 11 and one with 12 spymastesr, run both at least a hundred times and i never once had a problem sustaining locks.
Proper lock medallion management is the secret, there's no magic number when is comes to spymasters. Also, you'll start getting lock medallions from other rooms, like the AlchChamber and the Smithies.

Doesn't really matter. Always save at least 1 lock minimum for when you get unlucky.

Let me ask you: how do you want to complete the 2. Chain ?

I have the version of the giga temple with 12 spymasters on my main character with the atziri kill tech and the middle corruption at the end of the first chain zig zag switched out with an alch (1299% rarity from monsters fully upgraded). Haven’t had an issue running out of locks and the average div/run solo is about 75 with 98% rarity on gear. Occasionally in the 80s and occasionally high 60s. I made a blood mage alt and considered doing the version with 11 spymasters but opted to keep 12 for lock safety. I’m near the end of the golem smithy chain and plan to keep the middle corruption at the end of the chain to see how that affects drops compared to extra rarity from the alch.

I think the version with 11 and one extra thaum/corruption is just giving you higher % chance for additional rare modifiers instead of the boost to rarity from monsters the extra spy gives you and the extra rare monsters from the elite legion. I watched fubgun after he finished his and I think his highest div/run was around 90 and averaged around 80, so not that much different in terms of div/run. I haven’t dropped a single lock or mirror and he had a few locks drop, but I think that’s really just RNG.

I had a single spymaster level 3 (got unlucky and the end of chain which was a spymaster 1 was deleted).

Those are the ONLY spymasters I EVER saw... I read somewhere that having a spymaster 3 and nothing else was preventing the spawn of others, so I removed it

I have spent around 90 crystals and have seen a total of 0 spymasters since (Yes, I reroll when I can)

The second chain (commanders-Garrisons) goes all the way up to atziri and despite being deleted often is much faster to rebuild

I'm starting to HATE those stupid spymasters, I can't even START the chain if I have litteraly 0 of them !

I've built the one with 12 spymasters, and haven't tried the other one, so I can't compare.

What I can say is that both spymasters and legion barracks have the highest monster density, and the highest amount of rare monsters which amounts in more drops when it comes to div's.

It is noticeable how the amount of dropped div's goes down once you've gone through the spymasters and entered the "rest" of the temple. Although I have to say that you'll barely notice the difference, if at all, when you're running with leechers.

That said, you need to keep in mind that with one less spymaster you'll have one more alchemy lab and corruption chamber, both of which will increase the item rarity overall, which can and likely will more than make up for the few more monsters that you get from the extra spymaster/legion barracks.

It comes down to whether you want to slightly increase your chances of getting a lock medallion dropped or not.

Legion barracks, smithies, alchemy labs and thaumaturges can also drop lock medallions ONCE THEY REACH TIER 3! But spymasters seem to have a higher chance of dropping lock medallions than any of the others.

In the end it's all RNG. And I did have 2 runs with 37 rooms capable of dropping lock medallions still not dropping a single one. (12 spies, 13 L.barrack, 8 smithies, 3 alchs and 1 Thau.) So nothing is really safe :)

If rng is going to be bad it won’t matter 11 or 12. And as far as I can see this looks fine. I’ve had runs where I had to leave locks on the floor and runs where 3-4 runs I didn’t see a single lock. Lost some progress in the process as well. You can have that situation

Have built 2 full temples and don't think it makes any difference. I ran 12 because I didn't want to get ruined by 1 in a million RNG. Never had an issue though. Currently have never not had a lock to keep both chains.

One other tip, focus on upgrading legion barracks, alch chamber, and smithy. It is tempting to upgrade the golem works or thaumaturge or corrruption chamber first for better drops, but you need to upgrade the other rooms to make sure you get more chances at locks. 

This looks like the temple I'm trying to build. Still trying to learn this stuff but a bit confused. Can you fight architect and Atziri with this design without breaking things? What are the pros / cons of this design over the single chain design posted a while back?