So after seeing some videos on Youtube giving out advice on how to get a decent game of SDV started, as well as some tips videos, it came to mind that I've not written a guide for it (I like writing easy to follow guides, lol) so I figured I'd try one for SDV! Before we begin, let's establish what this guide is, and is not: It is: 1). For Beginners or "Newbies" to SDV (some game experience, perhaps a botched playthrough or two) 2). A well-rounded play experience that does not focus too heavily on anything nor leaves anything out. 3). A general idea of what you should be doing when. 4). For players who choose to do the Community Center. It is not: 1). Step-by-Step hand-holding walkthrough. 2). A "Get Rich Quickest" guide. 3). Min-maxed. 4). For elite/talented/experienced players. 5). For players who side with Joja. No offense to anybody meant by the above, I just wanted to get that bit out of the way. Your Goals by the end of the guide: 1). 200-300k total earnings by Winter 28. 2). Community Center (CC) mostly done, 'cept for a few straggling items. 3). Floor 120 reached in the Mines. 4). Tier 2 house. 5). At least 2 Iridium Sprinklers. 6). Fishing 10, all other skills 7-9. 7). 3 Stardrops (Mine, Fair, Krobus) 8). Mine Trolley/Bus Access. Now, before we begin actual gameplay, I will talk a little about mods and farm layouts: 1). This guide is going to assume you are either good at the fishing minigame, or you're using the Easier Fishing mod. If you are unable to catch the fish I talk about catching in this guide, I certainly recommend giving the mod a try. You can always restore it later without it screwing up your save files. It's a stand-alone mod that does not require any special API tools or anything to use. It's a simple file swap that can be swapped back at any time (obviously not while the game is running, but still). 2). I recommend using either the Hilltop, Forest or the Original Farm layouts to start your game with. This guide might not work with the River layout, though the Wilderness Layout should work as well. With that said, let's get started! This part I am going to go slow day-by-day until we get a few things established. The entire guide is not going to be like this, though. Keep in mind that the first thing you should be shooting for is the upgraded backpack from Pierre's store (it costs 2,000G). Buy it ASAP. Day 1: It doesn't matter if you watch the cutscene or not, you're going to start with 500G and 15 Parsnip Seeds. The first thing you're going to do, is hoe out 15 squares and plant the 15 seeds. Once you have this done, I suggest cutting down a few trees until you have 50 wood. Make a chest, and stick it just underneath your house or somewhere that's not on bare ground (you don't want to waste farmable area). You will be sticking everything you pick up in these chests that you're not going to sell, especially since your inventory is very small when you start the game. If you want to, you may want to buy 3 Parsnip Seeds from Pierre, because I had a playthrough where a crow ate one of my parsnips before I had the ability to make a Scarecrow. If this happens, you might as well start your entire game over because it will screw you hard because you will lose 5 days of progress. If you plant 3 extra Parsnip Seeds, you get a leeway of 3 crops (you need exactly 15 Parsnips to level up your Farming Skill so you can make a Scarecrow on Day 5). I would not buy anything other than Parsnips at this point. If you have extra energy left over after you've done your farm work and made your treasure chest, I suggest clearing a path to the Northern and Southern exits to your farm and if you chose the Hilltop Farm, clear a path to the mining area in the mid-left side of your farm. Keep in mind that you cannot use the vertical bridges yet on that map, but you can use the horizontal ones. If you still have energy and time left over, chop some more trees down, or, if you are on the hilltop map, mine the copper/geodes in the mining area. Day 2-3: You should get mail from Willy asking you to go visit him (if it doesn't happen on Day 2, it should on Day 3). Don't forget to water your parsnips before you go! As long as you visit the beach before 5PM, you should see a cutscene, and you will have a brand new fishing pole. This opens up a new activity: Fishing. I suggest spending the rest of this day fishing until you either run out of time (9PM+) or you are getting low on energy, or you run out of inventory room (You can sell fish to Willy's shop until he closes it). If you fish from the beach, be sure to stick 1 of the Sardines in your chest back at your house. Sell the rest of the fish to Willy or dump them in the Shipping Crate near your house. If Willy's mail didn't arrive at Day 2, then simply either chop wood, or explore the forest or the area near Robin's shop for forage items. Day 4: After you water your Parsnips, I suggest devoting another day to Fishing, especially if it rains. This time, go to the area just south of Jodi's house (the house on the far left bottom of town), walk straight down from her door, and all the way left until you hit a 'step' in the river's edge. Cast south. This is your primary "River Fishing Spot", and it is very convenient as it is close to your house and easy to get to. If it is not raining and you catch a Sunfish, keep 1 of them in your chest. If it is raining and you catch a Catfish and/or a Shad, keep one of each of those in your chest as well. Sell the rest of the fish. Day 5-6: Your Parsnips should be ready now! Hopefully you had at least 15 you could harvest. If not, seriously consider restarting your game. Harvest your crops, and buy another 10-20 parsnips, a green bean starter (just one will do), and a potato seed (ditto). You should get a mail from the Joja Corporation that the debris near the Mine has been removed. Time to go check it out! Unless, of course, it is raining. If it rains, go fish South of Jodi's house. If it doesn't rain, go to the Mine and meet Marlon by entering the Mine. He will give you a Rusted Sword and leave. If you had the 2,000 gold to buy the upgraded backpack by now, go ahead and give the mine a try! Try to get to Floor 5, so that you can take the elevator up and start on Floor 5 the next time. At this early in the game, I would not attempt more than 5 floors at a time unless you got lucky and found an awesome weapon in a chest while fishing. Make sure you craft all of your Bug Meat into Bait, even though you can't use it yet. Stash your bait in a chest for now. I recommend also stashing the slime that is dropped as well. If it did not rain on Day 5 and you were able to get to Floor 5 of the mines, I suggest shooting for Floor 10 on Day 6 unless it rains. If it rained on Day 5 and you fished, do the First 5 Floors on Day 6 instead (unless it also rains on Day 6, then fish at the river instead). If you started on the Hilltop Map: Try to also get enough stone for a well. Building one near your house will make watering your crops there so much easier. Let's set up a little routine based upon priorities, shall we? Priority #1: Tend to your crops: Water/harvest/re-plant your crops; keep about 20 Parsnips at any given time up until Spring 23 (if you plant Parsnips on Spring 24, they won't grow in time), along with the Green Bean plant, and make sure to keep 1 Potato and 1 Cauliflower (plant it early, perhaps after your first parsnip harvest as it takes 12 days to grow!) in a chest until you unlock the CC Bundle that wants it. Priority #2: If it rains: Go River Fishing south of Jodi's house. Sell all fish except for 1 Chad, 1 Sardine, 1 Catfish, and 1 Sunfish (you will need to go River Fishing at least once when it is not raining to catch the Sunfish. You can stop fishing as soon as you catch it). Priority #3: If it doesn't rain: Try to balance trips to the mine (this is why you don't want to keep more than 20 parsnips at a time) with spending some time foraging. You will want to get at least 1 of each: Dandelion, Daffodil, Leek, Wild Horseradish to fill the Spring Foraging Bundle at the CC (to unlock the crops scroll). On days you decide to forage, chop trees down to make use of your energy meter. Don't waste energy! You should never go to bed with a near full energy bar unless you completely ran out of time or it was a holiday. Priority #4: Fri and Sun: Check the Pig Merchant that you will find at the forest south of your farm. Simply exit the southern exit of your farm and go straight left, you will see a purple cart pulled by a pig of all things. Talk to this merchant; he/she will have random items for sale. Items you want to look out for: 1). Quality Sprinklers: Buy these if you see them. 2). Iridium Sprinklers: If you see one of these, you probably cannot afford it. If it is 9k or less, buy it. If not, skip it. 3). Large Cow Milk, Large Eggs, Large Goat Milk, Wool, Cheese: If you're doing well on money, you could pick up one of these, but my guide will assume you don't, so you can skip these. 4). Rabbit's Foot, Duck Feather, Truffle: Unless you're hurting for money, ALWAYS buy these if you see one. These will save you a lot of work later. Otherwise, just about everything else is "meh" and skippable. Obviously, you want to attend the two events (The Egg Hunt and the Flower Dance) and talk to everybody that you come across, though I wouldn't go out of my way to socialize. It doesn't hurt to be friendly if you got extra time, though. Should you get 25,000 in Total Earnings, Demetrius is going to stop by your farm and offer to make use of that empty cave you got near your greenhouse. He will give you the choice of Bats or Mushrooms. Choose the Mushrooms. Try to make sure you end Spring with 10k or more money. On Spring 28, after you see if any crops can be harvested, Pickaxe the rest of the crops (unless you have Coffee plants which is very unlikely). Your Goals for the End of Spring: 1). Mine Level 30. 2). Copper Pickaxe + Copper Axe. Do not worry about your Watering Can or your Hoe. Wait until Winter for those. 3). Fishing Level 3-4. 4). 36-Slot Backpack. 5). Mushroom Cave. 6). 10k+ current funds Hopefully you ended Spring with at least 10-20k of funds on you. If you have any Quality or by some miracle, an Iridium Sprinkler, set those up, have your Scarecrows ready and go visit Pierre's. Buy the following: 1). 9-10 Melon Seeds (unless you got some from a CC Bundle or Gunther). 2). 1 Tomato and 1 Hot Pepper seed. 3). 20-30 Blueberry Seeds (depending on your money situation). 4). 5-10 Corn. Go back to your farm, and you should, by now, be able to make Basic Fertilizer out of 2 Sap per. If you were chopping trees down like I suggested above, you should easily have enough Sap to make enough Fertilizer for all of your Melons and Corn. I wouldn't bother making Fertilizer for the Blueberries, Tomato, or Pepper plants though unless you really have lots of Sap to spare. Put the fertilizer in the ground before you plant the seeds; the fertilizer will last all season long as long as you don't allow a spot to be vacant and it turns back to un-tilled dirt. If you plant Corn in fertilized soil, it will stay fertilized until the end of Fall. Hopefully you get lucky enough to get 5 Gold-Star Melons for the Quality Crops Bundle. When you harvest the first batch of Melons, plant a second batch unless you got enough melons. The 5-star Corn should be easy-peasy. Don't forget the 1 normal melon for the Summer Crops bundle (along with a blueberry, pepper, and tomato). Keep 1 extra Pepper as George will ask for one for a quest. As for day-to-day routine priorities: Priority #1: Mine. Summer is a great time to go spelunking; you will want to get to at least Floor 60 by the end of Summer. Doing 5 floors at a time, it should not be that difficult. Once you get to Floor 30 (the Stone floors), you might want to farm up the 150 Insect Kills for the Insect Head weapon which will last you clear to Floor ~90 (Obsidian Edge) before going on further. If you get to the Floor 60s, keep Winter Roots in a fridge as they will be used for an easy food later. Same goes for any Cave Carrots you've been finding (except for turning 1 in for the Exotic Foraging Bundle). Priority #2: Foraging. If you're not going mining, you should be foraging. Get your Summer Forage bundle done. Priority #3: Fishing. Make sure you catch the following fish for CC Bundles: Sunfish (If you didn't get one in Spring, Daytime River), Sturgeon (Lake near the Mine). Otherwise, fish every so often to keep building your fishing levels up (and also decent money). It's a tossup where the best place to fish is, wherever you are comfortable. Priority #4: Silos. Try to build 2 Silos during the Summer. I recommend tucking them away on far corners of your farm, and I recommend once they are built, to periodically swipe your scythe at some of the grass to start filling them now. As you progress through the Summer, those Blueberry plants will start giving you a lot of money. If you planted about 20-30 of them, you should get 7-8k per harvest. Spend it wisely! It might seem like a lot of money, but it will disappear quick if you are unwise with your purchases. Here are some priorities: 1). 36-Slot Backpack (if you haven't gotten one already by now). 2). 2-3 Silos. 3). Iron Pickaxe/Axe (do not upgrade the Can or the Hoe yet) 4). A Coop (don't get any chickens until you can build Hardwood Fence). 5). Vault Bundles (don't take yourself too low on money; you will want to start 2nd Spring with at least 40k) At some point, you may or may not end up getting the 60 Museum Donations you need to get the Sewer Key. If you do get the Sewer Key during Summer, you can get an Iridium Sprinkler every Friday from Krobus who lives down there. These cost 10k, and are quite pricey (as his 20k Stardrop!). I recommend that at some point before Winter 28, that you buy between 2 and 4 of these. I wouldn't go overboard and spend a lot of money, though. 2-4 is fine. The Stardrop is a fine purchase, but only if you have the extra cash on you for it. Try to keep 20k+ in funds by the end of Summer if you can. On Summer 28, pickaxe all of your plants except for the Corn. Did you like your Blueberry Profits? Well you can do it all over again, now with Cranberries! Same routine that you did for summer, only this time you don't need to buy Corn (because the Corn plants are still producing). To start Fall off, buy: 1 Eggplant Seed ~30 Cranberry Seeds 1 Yam Seed ~10 Pumpkin Seeds 1 Amaranth Seed (for an upcoming quest) Same deal, Fertilize the Pumpkins (hoping to get 5 Gold-Star Pumpkins). If you do end up with 5 GS Pumpkins, don't turn them in yet! Something is coming up that you might need them for. So, let's look at day-to-day priorities: Priority #1: The Mine. Hopefully you've gotten to Floor 80 by now or are getting close. Once you get to Floor 80 as you might have guessed, you should be getting near Gold Ore, but the enemies down here are much more dangerous. You might want to start bringing food and making some bombs to make the journey a little easier. Floors 80 to 90 are going to be rough. If you're still using the Insect Head, expect mild difficulties involving the Void Spirit Shamans that can cast a Defense-Down Curse on you (you will die very fast if you get hit while that curse is on you). If you absolutely cannot survive 80-90, you can buy a sword but you'll get a much better one if you make it to 90. If you "die" in the mine, exit the game and restart so you don't lose your hard-earned progress. At some point during Fall, you should upgrade to at least a Gold Pickaxe. Gold Axe is optional, but it would help. Priority #2: Fishing. If it rains during the Fall, go straight to the Mine Lake! This is your only chance to catch the Walleye, and if you miss it, you're going to have to wait until 2nd Fall to finish the Community Center. So prioritize this above everything else, including the mine until you get one! If you haven't gotten an Eel, that's the second thing you should go for (Eels only bite at Night, so chances are you should be able to get a Walleye and an Eel in the same day). I'd go for the Walleye first, because you can also catch Eels during Spring. Most of the CC Bundle Fish that you haven't gotten yet are available now, so fill in those as you can. Your Crab Pot Bundle should already be done, if you've been foraging the Beach periodically. Priority #3: Foraging. There's another Foraging Bundle to do as per usual and you don't want to let your foraging skill get too far behind, especially if you want to make Lightning Rods. Chances are, you've probably lost at least one crop to Lightning by now. I bet you're getting tired of Lightning? Well you need Foraging 6 to make Lightning Rods. Farming Hardwood from the Secret Forest Stumps are the best source of Foraging XP, and if you've already gotten to Floor 90+ in the Mine, consider spending some days in the Forest (and perhaps do some fishing afterward) to boost that Foraging XP a bit. A note about the Boiler Room Scroll: Once you get to Floor 90, make the Boiler Room Scroll your next major in-game goal. For it you need: 1 Copper/Iron/Gold Bar 1 Quartz/Fire Quartz/Earth Crystal/Frozen Tear 2 of: 99 Slime/10 Bat Wings/1 Solar or Void Essence By the time you get to Floor 90+, only the Fire Quartz should be in your way of finishing this. Once you do finish this, you can use the Mine Trolley as a warp between the Bus Stop, The Mine, and the Blacksmith Shop. This will make your life MUCH easier! With that said, here are some money priorities: 1). Barn (Don't get any animals until you can make hardwood fence). 2). Coop (if you haven't gotten one yet). 3). Upgraded Coop. 4). 2 Iridium Sprinklers (Krobus). 5). Stardrop (Krobus). 6). House Level 2 (this can be done anytime during Fall or Winter). A note about the Grange Display: Hopefully you've reached Floor 100 before the Fall Fair. If you did, go and fish up a Lava Eel (hopefully it's Gold-Star) before the Fair. Otherwise, here are some recommendations on what to put in your Grange Display (you need 9 items): 1). Diamond (or Ruby if you don't have a Diamond). 2). Lava Eel. 3). Gold-Star Pumpkin. 4). Flower Honey (grow a flower near a bee box). Regular Honey will also do. 5). Gold-Star Mayonnaise (if you had any chickens before the fair) 6). Gold-Star Pike. You can use multiples of the same item if you want, though I would stay away from doing so if possible. If you won First Place, the best thing to do next, is bet all 1000 tokens on the wheel. If you lose, exit the game and re-do it until you win. Spend 2000 tokens to buy the Stardrop. (You can always get the cosmetic items next year). We're almost there, eh? Winter's probably the simplest month ever. There are no crops to plant, except for the Winter Foraging Seeds (there's only 30) and if you got an IR Sprinker by now, that means 28 of those do not need watered, lol. So, with that said... day-to-day priorities will look like this: Priority #1: Mine. If you haven't gotten to Floor 120 yet, make this your priority. Get this done, seriously. What are you waiting for!? Once you get to 120, you can take a break from the Mine. Move the Mine down to last Priority unless you are farming for the Help Wanted achievements, and you happen to get "Kill Red Slime" quests. If you're tired of fishing, you can start farming Bats and Dust Sprites to get their rewards from Gil. I'd make Floor 60->70 runs every so often and hopefully you'll have the Vampire Ring by the end of Winter. Priority #2: Fishing, fishing, fishing. This is going to take most of your time during the winter. If you've gotten to Floor 120 in the Mine, this is your top priority. You can make 4-5k per day by fishing the River. Also, by now, all of the CC Bundles should be done except for the Sandfish (and maybe even that if you had enough money to finish the Vault Bundles). Make sure you do not miss the Orange Nautilus Shell that is found laying on the beach during Winter, or you will need to wait all the way until 2nd Winter to fully finish the CC. Priority #3: Occasionally take breaks from fishing to gather wood/hardwood and to get the Winter Foraging Bundle done. Keep a decent stock of random items that villagers tend to love for the Secret Santa event on Winter 25; you won't know until a week ahead of time who your recipient is, and you will want to choose a gift that is on their "Love" list preferably and set it aside until it's time to bring it. Otherwise, your goals for Winter 28 look something like this: 1). Barn/Coop/3 Silos 2). 2 Cows, 1 Brown/1 White/Void Chicken (Krobus sells Void Eggs on Friday), 1 Duck. 3). Mine Trolley open (that should have been opened since Fall, lol). 4). 200-300k Total Profits; ~60k current funds. 5). Tier 2 house. 6). Level 10 Fishing. 7). Level 7+ everything else. So basically, if you followed this guide, you're well set for Year 2 to do everything else: You should prioritize trying to fill the last of the CC Bundles in (Gold-Star Parsnips/Melons if you weren't able to get them done, etc). You will probably have some Animal-related things (Rabbit's Foot, Duck Feather, etc) to do, and the Red Cabbage (Dye Bundle) ensures that you cannot get the CC done before 2nd Summer as it is impossible to get Red Cabbage until Year 2 (unless the Pig Merchant can sell it? I've never seen it there). Once you unlock the Greenhouse, you can start filling it with Ancient Fruits (or Strawberries, lol). The Greenhouse has 10x12 slots, and you will need 4 of those slots for Iridium Sprinklers (stick the other 2 on the border outside of the plantable area) for a total of 116 plants in your Greenhouse. The money flow really starts getting ridiculous once you fill your greenhouse up with these plants. Use a Seed Maker to get more Ancient Seeds out of Ancient Fruits. You can also put IR Sprinklers to good use outside of your greenhouse, too! You can also upgrade your animal buildings, get a Lv3 house, start making friends, get married, etc. Lots of stuff to do from this point! This guide was meant to build a solid starting point so that by the end of Year 1, you're well set to do anything you want in Year 2 without having to worry about money troubles whatsoever. Hope you enjoyed!
I have a few points to add and fix up minor errors. I'm on a slightly more experienced side, but feel anyone could use this information. Riverland farm actually has the strongest start of all the starting maps. The ease of access to rivers allows you to fish until near 1AM allowing you a large sum of starting gold. Stardew valley economy flow is like a snowball that builds up speed and mass over time. So the strong money start allows you to have a larger crop field. While the map lacks land mass to do large scale farming, it's enough to make more than enough money for anything you might need http://upload.farm/1BQXAa Take this late fall farm upload as an example. The upload of the map doesn't work because the site hasn't been updated yet, but money, animals, and skills are all set. The amount of parsnips to hit level 2 farming is actually 13, not 15. The spring onion spawn south of Marnie's ranch should be mentioned. It's a great source of cheap early game energy. It could help with the land clearing, mining, or keep the fishing going till 12:40. It replenishes so often that I actually exited spring with 70 extra even after hitting 120 in the mines. I suggest a rotation of potatoes after the 1st or 2nd harvest. If do 3 rotations of parsnips, your 3rd harvest will land on the egg festival, a day in which you can't directly sell your harvest and reinvest the money on seeds. Potatoes take 2 extra days, but you avoid the awkward situation and the double harvest chance boost your farming exp by quite a bit. The extra 2 days will also give you time to chop wood for sap/fertilizer for your 5 golden parsnips. You actually shouldn't rush your bag expansion. 2k early game is a lot of money, especially money that could be used to reinvest in crops. You can deal with the bag issue by dropping tools in a chest at your farm before heading out. For example if my goal is to fish for the day I might just take the rod, a hoe for any worms, and some spring onions for energy. For mining it'd be sword, pickaxe, spring onion. You should buy the bag when money is less of an issue, usually around your blueberry harvest. You should consider buying one rare seed before the start of fall. The gem berry can be given to the statue in the hidden forest for a stardrop, probably the easiest one to get as well. Not sure when this was changed, but during the fair I can't type in my token values anymore making the betting very long and tedious process. I suggest just doing the fishing tend repeatedly, which dumps an average of 200-250 tokens for 50 gold a try every 2 minutes. Gold should not be an issue at this point and only 3400 tokens is needed for everything. For winter, it should be pointed out you can actually grow winter forage seeds if you haven't maxed out foraging yet. It tends to be the 2nd hardest skill (combat being the hardest, opinion me?) to train up unfortunately and winter tends to be the best time to do it.
While that might be true, that's more an option for a Fishing-Heavy playthrough, rather than a more balanced one which is what this guide was meant to be. That might have been changed, then. I remember one playthrough, I had 15 Parsnips and a Crow ate one on Day 5 and I did not get the levelup. CA might have changed it in 1.1 or 1.07 or something to address this issue? But that's good to know either way. Thanks. I knew about the Spring Onions, but a lot of times I checked and they weren't there so I assumed they were a couple-times-a-season type thing. I never had much luck attempting 5 Gold Parsnips by end of First Spring... I figured since the Red Cabbage ensures CC must wait until 2nd Summer to be completely done, that I'd just focus on getting other stuff up instead. *shrugs* Either way I suppose. This I wholly disagree with. The first bag expansion needs to be ASAP because being limited to 12 slots very highly limits what you can do because of constantly filling up on items. Waiting until blueberries for 24-slot bag, I couldn't even imagine attempting to do this, especially not for a Newbie player who isn't quite sure how valuable what is, and what should be kept and what can be safely thrown away. Remember: This guide is for newbies, not experienced players. Lightning Rods are not guaranteed to protect against Lightning Strikes, and I would hate to lose a 4,000G Gem Berry Plant (since it takes 24? days to produce) to a lightning strike, especially since most of the time, you don't know it's been hit until the next morning, IE, too late to reset the day. I do not recommend planting a Gem Berry, Ancient Fruit, or Starfruit before getting the Greenhouse for that very reason. Also, the Pig Merchant can sell the Sweet Gem Berry itself for 9,000G. That might be twice the price of the seed, but you don't have to worry about potentially losing it to a lightning strike, or having to wait 24 days for it to grow. I was able to type the Token amount in just fine on Windows7 64-bit Steam Version two days ago, so I dunno what happened there. You could do this, yes, if you don't mind watering crops and doing all that stuff. I question how good XP it really is, because you get 150XP out of 6 Stumps in the Secret Forest, but yet you only get 3xp per harvested forage seed (assuming wiki is right, lol). You'd need to grow fifty seeds to equal one trip to the Forest. It only takes, what, 2 in-game hours to run to the forest and chop the 6 stumps apart (which is faster than chopping a whole tree down) and just a small amount of energy? If you did that once a day you'd have that foraging up in no time flat.
Some things: Check Cart Vendor for Red Cabbage, CC in year one is entirely possible if this happens! Take your 500 and buy up as many parsnips as possible. This will net you 40 parsnips. You might lose one or two, but in the end, the return on investment is significant. Enough so that you can pick up another 40 parsnips, probably a couple dozen potatoes, and the green bean starter (won't need to buy cauliflower because you get that from 5 artifacts/gems, with your time in the mines, this is easily accomplished early spring, by the end of the second week at the latest). Potatoes are your cash crop in Spring, the more you put down, the faster your cash grows, the faster your farm grows, the faster you are able to spend money to buy things like the backpack upgrade and whatever tickles your fancy with the cart vendor. 5 gold parsnips is pathetically easy to accomplish in year one. Once your first bundle comes up, delay your second batch one day until you get your scarecrow and the fertilizer recipe. Make 40 fertilizer with 80 sap (which you should have MORE than enough to do, considering how much wood you are needing at this stage). With luck, you can get all five by that harvest. If not, by the following harvest, which is still only halfway through the month. Then you can focus on cash cropping and bundle completion. Add Duck Egg to your list of things you can purchase. Getting a Duck Feather and Duck Egg from the vendor means skipping an entire tier of your Coop. I would remove the large cow milk and cow cheese and large chicken eggs from list of things to buy. You're going to want cheese anyway for mining food and chickens will easily keep you supplied in eggs. Large Goat Milk might save you from having to upgrade your barn early. Also, DO NOT PICKAXE CROPS ON THE 28th. If you let them sit, they keep the soil tilled on the first day of summer, and the dried husks can be cleared with a (free) swipe of your scythe, saving you endurance of not having to hoe them on one of the most punishingly stressful days of your career. I've gotten over a hundred spring onions in spring of year 1 before (in fact, I did so on my Let's Play on Youtube). Unless you plan on going to the mines, you should ALWAYS, every day, check them out. It costs no endurance to forage, and you can easily burn whatever energy you have left chopping. In addition to being a bit more effectively free cash, it also works up your Foraging skill so you can hit Foraging 6 before the last thunderstorm of Summer so you can get enough batteries for six iridium sprinklers before the end of the year to put in your greenhouse that you unlocked in the fall. I would agree with previous poster, bag can be delayed until Summer, spending 2k that early in the spring is going to significantly hinder your growth. I'd wait until after your first summer crop is planted, Summer 2, if you have the cash in hand for it, or wait for something to harvest otherwise. Inventory management is an easy skill to master.
For someone who would be completely new or someone who was playing blindly at first then needed a hand I think this is a good guide to follow, especially since you could pick and choose if you have different opinions. I like a slow relaxed play and I always get the upgrade on the bag as soon as possible, it not as fun just rushing to make money in fact I was poor often in my quick test of the recent beta still got married to Shane by Summer 24 I could have taken longer but I wanted to see how it would go. The right plan can bring in plenty of money all why enjoying a relaxed pace.
The problem with assuming Red Cabbage can be bought from the Pig Merchant: You could very well have a playthrough where you do not see a Red Cabbage on the Pig Merchant. My current playthrough is like this; I'm on Winter 15 and I have not seen a Red Cabbage and I check the merchant every Fri and Sun. I have not seen a Duck Feather, nor a Duck Egg either. I did see (and buy!) a Rabbit's Foot, though. You can't just assume you're going to see any X item on the Pig Merchant because it is entirely RNG and sadly the RNG is chosen before the game is saved so that you can't save-scum it. Because of that, when planning on how to approach the CC Bundles, it is always wise to assume you won't see any of that stuff on the Pig Merchant. That's why I advise getting Cows, a Pig, Chickens, a Duck, and a Rabbit just to make sure you got all your CC requirements covered without relying on the Pig Merchant. I wouldn't want to be that guy who waits and waits and waits on the Pig Merchant, and here, Year 4 you're still needing something stupid like a Duck Feather that just won't appear, ever, on the Merchant. If you had just gotten a duck, you woulda had the CC done by 2nd Summer. EDIT: And again I apparently need to re-iterate the fact that this guide is not meant to be an elite min-maxed guide on how to make the maximum amount of money possible. It is for newbies to have a direction to take while learning the ins and outs of the game without having to read up on every little thing ahead of time.
Since you need a duck egg anyway, you might as well buy the duck for the eventual feather. You only need to buy one duck too -- first egg to the Community Center, second egg into the incubator then you'll be able to double your chances at that feather down the road. And it's just as easy to grow a plot of red cabbage and have that by mid-summer year 2, and it's less time waiting around for Grandpa's verdict. Since you can't get the rabbits till the Tier 3 coop (20K and a lot of wood/stone), there's a decent chance you'll find a rabbit's foot before you're ready to upgrade, so knowing you've got that taken care of takes a lot of the stress off. I still like to get that max upgrade and get at least one rabbit anyway -- decent source of wool/cloth plus the rare rabbit's foot drop is great to save for gifts (everyone but Penny loves them). Ditto with the truffle for the bundle -- if you find that on the cart you don't have to rush to upgrade your barn to Tier 3.
I do like to get the first bag upgrade ASAP; it just makes it easier to not have to worry about dumping something in the mines. With the 12 slot bag, if you take food (onions or salmonberries) to replenish energy when needed, plus your sword, pickaxe and hoe (you can find cave carrots, ore and even geodes digging in the dirt, though I usually wait till my first hoe upgrade anyway before I do much digging) that only leaves 8 slots for stones and loot.
First of all I like this guide. For me it is a good guide as I return to that game with a fresh save on v1.1 (work and another game kept me away). So thanks! It will help me to structure it a bit even if I will not follow the timeline so I will spread it to two years But there needs to be one thing mentioned even if the guide is not min-maxed: Strawberry Seeds In Year one you should use your money first for the egg festival. In my opinion I would rather buy 20 Seeds of it for year two instead of the 12 Slot Bag. Totally I would say keep at least 10%-25% of your DAILY incoming until the festival only for the seeds! With fishing, foraging, farming you should be able to buy 20-40 Seeds even if you bought the bag. As you said: 10k+ should be possible. So it will be 6k+ if you add the Strawberry Seeds. 20 Seeds: 11664.8 G Incoming Spring 2nd Year 40 Seeds: 23326,6 G Incoming Spring 2nd Year For just 2-4k usage in the very first year indeed only the first 11 days (day 1 and day 13 doesn't count if I remember well). With the sprinklers you mentioned you do not have to do anything but plant and harvest. I am just mentioning this cause I was really frustrated on my first save game as everything was new and I did not look up the wiki and saw the seeds on the festival without money in the pocket.
@Sorainthy Is this before or after the 1.1 berry price nerf? I always figured that A ). Strawberry seeds are expensive. B ). You lose out on at least 1 harvest if you plant them after the Egg Festival (instead of waiting until 2nd+ Spring. So I never used them. Well I tried them in one playthrough and found that I didn't get as much money as I was hoping for. So, after berry nerf... it'd be even worse.
Or you could buy 10, plant them, harvest them twice, get an average of 40 seeds by using the seed maker you'll get later in the 1st year and save yourself the money for an additional 10-30 seeds - with 2000g for the first upgrade thats the money you are missing right there. which in the end means you only need to save 1000g until the 11th and can use the rest of your money for more potatoes >;3 And since there was no berry "nerf" but only a rebalance of certain crops, strawberries are still the same as in 1.07 - a nice addition for the 2nd spring but not necessary in the long run =.=
Strawberries were never hit by the berry nerf. If you plant on the very night that you get back from the egg festival, you get two harvests from the strawberries. The first harvest pays you back for the seeds and a bit more. The second is your profit margin. You have two options: 1) Sell them both, use Rhubarb for Spring of year 2 2) Sell your first batch of berries for more potatoes, save your second batch to seed up for the following year. The second option does hurt your growth significantly, but not nearly as much as it used to because your profit margin in summer and fall got hammered by said berry nerf. When you get your greenhouse, start filling it with strawberries and hops. This will tide you over to the spring. Then, since you are already rolling in strawberries, plant as many as you'd like outside on the first of spring.
Luck plays a role in crop quality come harvest time so you might want to hold of on harvesting those crops for the quality bundles until the fortune teller says you'll be lucky. Great guide!
Something important you might want to add is to plant at least one Cauliflower for the Spring CC bundle. I almost left it too late because I only saw that it was needed once the CC were available.
Well, the guide assumes that after the first few mentions, the reader would get into the habit of checking the bundles and keeping a tally of things needed. I could add it in, next time I revise it but it isn't meant to be a 100% step-by-step walkthrough, lol. My guides generally start off reading like a walkthrough, but as it progresses, I assume the reader is learning and getting the hang of how things ought to be, so only new things are mentioned, 'cept with little reminders where I feel they are needed. Hmm. After reading it again, I mentioned the potato and green bean but forgot the cauliflower. Okay I'll add it in. I wonder how I missed that, lol. For some reason, I was erroneously thinking that Cauliflower was a summer plant which is why I started typing what I said about walkthroughs and guides, lol. Sorry 'bout that. Thanks for pointing that out.
Nah, nothing to be sorry for. You're right that people should figure things out for themselves once they get going. It's only because the CC opens so late in Spring that I figured it might be good to know before hand.
You get nine by donating at least five items to the museum, which is generally how I end up with mine. Entirely doable before the middle of spring. Heck, it's actually possible to do it on your very first mine dive, depending on how many geodes you get and how lucky you get with Clint.
Totally true but the problem lies not in obtaining the seeds but knowing that you need to plant them in time for at least one harvest before the end of spring.
Generally, if I get seeds that I am able to plant, I plant them immediately. If anything, the concern would be 'if you get this after the 15th, do NOT plant them because they won't actually have enough time to mature and you lose them', which I believe the game does with a letter from someone or another on the 15th.
