Level 181/Dreamworld

Level 181 (Dreamworld) is the eleventh level in Cotton Carnival and the 50th  ingredients level in the Dreamworld. To pass this level, you must bring down 2 cherries and score at least 30,000 points in 42 moves or fewer. When you complete the level, Sugar Crush is activated.

Difficulty

 * This main difficulty in this level is that like its Reality counterpart; the only way to remove the icing and let the ingredients drop is with horizontal-striped candies or any of the striped-candy combinations. Setting off either of these special candies (especially the latter) can easily unbalance the moon scale and must be done with caution. The multi-layer icing also requires a number of hits to get rid of.
 * However, due to moon struck, it is slightly easier than its reality counterpoint.

Moon Struck

 * 1st Start: moves left.
 * 1st End: moves left.
 * 2nd Start: moves left.
 * 2nd End:  moves left.

Part 1: Regular moves

 * You start with only one potential match on the board. The rest of the board is entirely blockaded by icings, preventing any other possible actions. Break through the icings as quickly as possible.
 * Once the icing is cleared, do the same strategy like the reality version of this level - keep on blasting horizontal stripes into the icing. Wrapped candies are useful, as they can be mixed with striped candies, including the vertical ones, which help significantly in this level. A colour bomb only helps indirectly in terms of reducing colours for a better chance to make special candies, or making a colour bomb + striped candy combination. However, that is not recommended as the striped candies created from the combination may be too low, too high, or have stripes in the wrong direction.
 * In short, assuming all horizontal striped candies are placed correctly and set off, there are a total of 14 hits needed to bring down the ingredients. If wrapped candy + striped candy combinations are used, placed correctly and set off, there are a total of 7 hits needed to bring down the ingredients (four to take out the four-layered icing and three striped candies or three wrapped candy + striped candycombinations to take out the three-layered icing).
 * You have 15 moves during each regular moves section to destroy as much as icing as possible before moon struck.
 * A way to sort of cheat the level is to get 28 lollipop hammers and destroy all the icing.

Part 2: The Moon Scale

 * Since this is a Dreamworld level, the moon scale is obviously present. While the moon scale is stable, occasionally pay attention to it and if it is tilting too dangerously, quickly make matches of candies whose colours match the other side of the moon scale. This is quite important since special candies are required to destroy the icing which in turn may tilt the moon scale.

Part 3: The Moon Struck

 * When there is a moon scale, there is a moon struck. As this board has five colours, moon struck will remove the colour on the left side of the moon scale when it occurs. Hence, it may interfere the creation of special candies a turn before the moon struck or may detonate special candies intended to be combined with other special candies.
 * With fewer colours on the board after the moon struck, it may cause special candies to be more easily created but may cause detonation of special candies more easily. In fact, colour bombs may be created which is not too useful.
 * Taking the above mentioned points into consideration, pay attention to making moves and plan ahead during the moon struck duration to maximize its benefits.

Earning More Stars

 *  difficulty: Very Easy
 *  difficulty: Very Easy

Reason

 * The presence of five colours makes it easy to create special candies and is essential as special candies must be used to drop the ingredients.
 * The ingredients are worth 20,000 points (2 ingredients x 10,000 points per ingredient = 20,000 points). Hence, an additional 35,000 points for two stars and an additional 45,000 points for three stars have to be earned through matching of candies.
 * The player is required to earn an additional 840 points per move (35,000 points / 42 moves = 833.33 points per move) for two stars and an additional 1,080 points per move (45,000 points / 42 moves = 1,071.43 points per move) for three stars. However, the icing at the start of the level means that players will only earn points in the low hundreds for at least the first five moves.
 * The icing at the start of the level mean that a good number of moves have to wasted to clear them and increase the size of the board. Despite this, special candies can be formed after the first two to three moves.
 * Since the cherries are on the isolated sides of the board, the most effective way to clear them is to use wrapped candy + striped candy combinations, reducing the number of moves left for sugar crush. Furthermore, that above mentioned combination has to be done multiple times, further reducing the number of remaining moves.
 * If done correctly, the player would only need at least 6 combinations to complete the level.
 * This above point is slightly negated by the fact that the above combination can give thousands of points. In fact, with well placed wrapped candy + striped candy combinations, it is possible to finish this level in as few moves as possible to give a huge amount of points due to sugar crush.
 * Moon struck removes candies matching the colour on the left side of the moon scale, lasts for five moves and occurs twice. This makes it much easier to create special candies. However, it can cause of creation of unwanted colour bombs because striped candies, wrapped candies or their combinations are the only useful special candies which must be used to drop the ingredients. Hence, moon struck may actually cause more moves to be wasted to drop the ingredients.
 * Even after each moon struck ends, it is not much harder to create special candies.