Two ways:

1. recruit them during an event or
2. recruit them from missions.

You'll want to work on unlocking the tier 2 talent "doing it again" ASAP as that is required to recruit t2 crusaders during events.

As a tip to help you along your way to faster progress, never be shy about resetting. Don't worry about pushing one or two extra areas per run. The common rule of thumb is that as SOON as you stop instantly killing enemies, that is when you reset. Your idols come from constant, repeated resets, so don't put too much stock in trying to make a single, huge reset because the time and effort needed to push only a few extra areas is time better spent starting a new run insta-killing enemies. 10 minutes pushing 5 areas, or 10 in a new run? Don't reset too early, of course. You want to get as far as possible. Just don't waste too much time pushing the last 5-10 areas where you're not insta-killing. Believe you me, resetting often for sliiiightly smaller amounts might feel counter-intuitive, but after your thousandth reset and you know better for yourself, you'll be glad you were told this nice and early.

Don't worry events repeated every year. But you always can get missed event crusaders in missions.

Very good info! I already applied some of them. I did mess up when I respeced idols once for the achievement and piled up what I could on the Speed Run talent so they could get shorter missions. So now I only have 2 respecs left. I already use Metal Soldierette in the front and have her epic gear (from purchase promos). I think her dps is ridiculously high enough to carry me to area 300, but she still needs more.

WOW! I had no idea that idols boost DPS and Gold find! I will stack them like you guys said ASAP! Where is that info written because I never saw it. :O

Yeah, idols help a lot toward buffing yourself early-game. They buff additively, so even if your first reset is only 30 idols, that is a 90% DPS buff and 30% gold buff from your base values, which then, in-turn, helps you get further in your next run. Again, it is additive, so if your second run merits you 50 idols, it is not 150% of the amount you had with the 30 idols, it is 240% of base (30 + 50 idols = 80, then 80% x 3 for DPS and +80% gold find), just to make sure that is clear. And like Snow said, no need to hoard idols. Spend them on talents. all that matters is how many idols you've ever earned, not how many you have unspent. As long as you earned them that is all that matters. You keep the DPS/gold buffs even if you spend them.

Metal Soldierette is definitely a good, well-rounded crusader. Again, this is all up to you since you know what crusaders and gear you have far better than I do, so I am only saying this for a "For your information" purely to let you know, in case the information helps your situation. I personally found it more useful to focus on earlier-slot (further-left) crusader for DPS until I began getting truly-great gear and crusader abilities, primarily because earlier crusaders costs less to level up, and that x4 multiplier per 25 levels is no joke. For example, let's assume that at whatever point you're at, the highest you can level up Soldierette is level 800. That means you'll probably be able to level up Emo Werewolf to about level 1050 with the same amount of gold. That is a difference of 250 levels, or 10 increments of the x4 multiplier stacking multiplicatively 10 extra times. Mathematically, that is X(4^10) where X = Emo's DPs at level 800. Even with Metal Soldierette's epic gear, that difference in multiplicative buffs probably makes Emo better. Of course, this should be tested by you on your own instead of just taking my word for it, but thankfully there is an easy way to test this...

On any run, avoid using Emo (or whatever other crusader you're considering) and Soldierette until you have enough gold to get whoever if farthest-right to level 200. Bring both to level 200, buy all their skills, and then level both up in increments of 25 (hold Ctrl + Shift when clicking) until neither of those two crusaders can be leveled up by 25 anymore, then compare their un-buffed DPS to eachother. That will show you which gives you more DPS for the amount of gold you can currently earn, and should be what you use. You want to avoid putting both crusaders in your formation for two reasons: 1) Other crusaders' formation abilities will affect the resulting DPS values, and 2) You don't have any levels on the talent that reduces time to get XP, so this certainly wouldn't take 8 hours to test, BUUT whenever you do start reducing XP gain time, you don't want XP to affect one crusader and not the other during the test.

Quick side-note: If you end up getting Veronica, the Android Archer, Pete the Carney, or Mr. Boggins, the Substitute Teacher, use crafting to make legendary gear out of their armgaurds (Veronica), chicken (Pete), and/or suspenders (Boggins), as each of these give utterly LUDICROUS DPS buffs. Boggins' works best when you've maxed out the "Passive Criticals" talent, but is still viciously overpowered regardless, while the other two work regardless of your talents. Getting these will ROCKET you forward, and they all get even more overpowered exponentially per level. Due to crafting costs and gear requirements, this will not be relevant to you for a fair while, but it is good to keep in mind.

You get 1 buff per purchase, $20 it is for the empowered crusading.

LOL. Yeah I think I should probably wait before I take advantage of another Empowered Crusading buff. Right now I reset whenever I get to around 20 idols as it is still slow going for me since I just started playing last week. After doing the math, with only a day and a half left to go on the Superhero Event, getting to 1500 idols and area 300 is still a titanic task for me at this point... but I'm still trucking. You guys have been a big help with this, but even if I apply all of the suggestions you guys gave me and pour a ton of time, it still feels like I'm not going to reach that goal.

Here is the Gear info:

Metal S.- R/GE/E

Bat Billionaire - R/R/R

Right. Like Snow said, as long as you start an event objective, that is all that matters. You won't get booted out of an objective when the event ends. You just won't be able to go back into another event objective after that, since the event would be over, but you'd still get the reward for completing that objective.

Just to back up what Snow said, I have about 1.5mil idols, and regularly get past area 1000, and yet even I still use some of the basic crusaders. Hell, Sal the Merman is my DPSer, and Gold Panda is a MUST on nearly any formation. Just something else to keep in mind. Even when you unlock event crusaders, that doesn't necessarily mean they are better than the basic crusaders in the same slot. Hence why I said to try out a bunch of formations to see what works for you with what you have.

As for your event crusaders, not really anything else I can suggest with that, other than what you're using already. I never use Bat Billionaire, but I also have a ton of crusaders, so you might find a use for him.

Sometimes the game does this. Everyone is unable to connect. Usually resolves itself within a few hours. At max, a day. I've learned to just accept it when it happens. Send a report to let the devs know, then just check in every few hours to see if it works again.

CotLI = Crusaders of the Lost Idols, the name of the game.